In that moment he saw Oachi again at his feet; he heard the low,
sweet note of love in her throat, so much like that of the bird over his
head; he saw the soft lustre of her hair, the glory of her eyes, looking up
at him from the half gloom of the tepee, telling him that they had found
their god. It was all so near, so real for a moment, that he sprang erect,
his fingers clutching handfuls of moss. He looked toward the camp, and he
saw something move between the rock and the fire.
It was a wolf, he thought, or perhaps a lynx, and drawing his revolver he
moved quickly and silently in its direction. The object had disappeared
behind a little clump of balsam shrub within fifty paces of the camp, and
as he drew nearer, until he was no more than ten paces away, he wondered
why it did not break cover.
There were no trees, and it was quite light where the balsam grew. He
approached, step by step. And then, suddenly, from almost under his hands,
something darted away with a strange, human cry, turning upon him for a
single instant a face that was as white as the white stars of early
night--a face with great, glowing, half-mad eyes. It was Oachi. His pistol
dropped to the ground. His heart stopped beating. No cry, no breath of
sound, came from his paralyzed lips. And like a wild thing Oachi was
fleeing from him into the darkening depths of the forest.
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