When Nan looked at Claire she cried out despite herself. Claire had snatched the axe of some unknown white man from about the fire and thrown herself at the Indian. There was something in her face the child had never seen before. Osgaak went for his hatchet but before he could reach it, Claire’s axe was on him. Then Nan covered her face with her hands and screamed.

She was still screaming pitifully when she opened them again. By this time Claire had picked up Otter Boy and was slowly rocking him in her arms, moaning, saying unknown words over and over in the Indian tongue, but there was no answer from the boy. Never had Claire seemed more Indian than now. Staring at her and the bloody scene, Nan felt the great gulf between them. Hardly did Claire seem to know the girl was there.

In the end when Claire turned, the leaden face was as that of a stranger.

“They will kill when they find,” she said, and held out a hand to go.

“No!” Nan called out, holding back.

“You will burn for Osgaak,” she told her.

“He has my chain that was Mamma’s,” the girl cried, pointing to the bloody figure.

Claire unfastened the chain and cross from the heavy wrist. The chain was finely woven. It seemed like a thick gold cord in her hands. She hung it slowly around Nan’s neck. Then, with a deerskin pouch of meal on her back, she was ready to go but the child held back at the sight of Otter Boy in Claire’s arms. Surely she didn’t expect to take that frightening object with them.

“I don’t want to!” she cried. Claire had to seize a hand and drag her into the forest.

It seemed to the child that day that Claire must be mad. She spoke little or nothing. She forced her small companion into the rough woods instead of easy paths, and refused to part with her dreadful burden. At first the short bare legs of the corpse swung limp as she tramped, but at the end they stood out stiffly like the legs of a dead wolverine Nan had once seen lying on its back near the inn.

They had not been gone long from camp when they heard a hallooing behind them. Two shots followed, answered almost at once by others far distant.

“Somebody come back and find,” Claire said. “Now he call the rest.”

All day till darkness closed in on them, Claire insisted that they keep on. She stayed away from easy paths, holding to the difficult side hills instead of the valleys. Next day it was the same, treading on rocks when possible, never on sticks, stepping over water, never muddying a run, or leaving footprints in wet places. Twice that day they heard musket shots behind them. Morning and evening Claire opened the pouch, quaffing the meal in her mouth with her hand, washing it down with water, doing the same to Nan, forcing down both meal and water only to have the child vomit, after which Claire chewed it herself first, mixed it a long time with her own spit, forced the repulsive stuff into the child’s mouth and held the jaws shut till it was swallowed.