Page:Toilers of the Trails.djvu/189

 The warning of the old Cree at Ptarmigan Lake flashed across his memory.

"De Windigo, he leeve een dees valley. He rob trap; kill you; eat you' squaw."

"Bon soir! M'sieu' Weendigo!" called the imperturbable Frenchman as he reached for his Winchester in its skin case, and, drawing out the rifle, threw a shell into the barrel. Hertel had little fear of the thing that waked the white valley with its unearthly cries. For if it had lungs to howl, it had lungs and heart and stomach to stop his rifle-bullet, or bleed at the thrust of his knife, and from the Roberval to the white Gatineau, men knew how sure was the eye and what power lay in the right arm, of François Hertel. But, as he sat listening with straining ears, he cudgelled his brain to identify this prowler of the night. Lynx he had heard screaming like a child or a woman in agony; the wolverine, or Injun-devil, he had known to terrify superstitious French and Indian trappers by his maniacal caterwauling, and the howl of timber-wolves on a fresh trail was familiar to his ears; but this was neither lynx, wolf, nor wolverine. What could it be? Then the Cree's flouted tale of the demons of the valley returned to mock him.

For one thing he was deeply thankful—Marie, in the shack with the dog, far up the river, had not been wakened. Now, moreover, she must never know the Cree tradition of the valley or he could not leave her again alone, with this yowling thing, beast or devil, to terrify her.

Hugging his replenished fire, Hertel smoked a pipe,