Malemute Kid also had business in the Lower Country, so they
journeyed together.
But one, in all the Northland, knew the man Paul Roubeau, and
that man was Malemute Kid. Before him alone did the priest cast
off the sacerdotal garb and stand naked. And why not? These two
men knew each other. Had they not shared the last morsel of fish,
the last pinch of tobacco, the last and inmost thought, on the
barren stretches of Bering Sea, in the heartbreaking mazes of the
Great Delta, on the terrible winter journey from Point Barrow to
the Porcupine? Father Roubeau puffed heavily at his trail-worn
pipe, and gazed on the reddisked sun, poised somberly on the edge
of the northern horizon.
Malemute Kid wound up his watch. It was midnight.
'Cheer up, old man!' The Kid was evidently gathering up a broken
thread.
'God surely will forgive such a lie. Let me give you the word of
a man who strikes a true note: If She have spoken a word,
remember thy lips are sealed, And the brand of the Dog is upon
him by whom is the secret revealed.
If there be trouble to Herward, and a lie of the blackest can
clear, Lie, while thy lips can move or a man is alive to hear.
Pages:
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134