For God's sake, don't be a fool! The offer I made you
today is still good. If you don't accept it--the law must take
its course."
"_The law!_" Alan's voice was a savage cry.
"Yes, the law. The law is with us. We have the proper authority to
recover a stolen wife, a captive, a prisoner held in restraint with
felonious intent. But we don't want to press the law unless we are
forced to do so. You and the old Eskimo have killed three of our men and
wounded two others. That means the hangman, if we take you alive. But we
are willing to forget that if you will accept the offer I made you
today. What do you say?"
Alan was stunned. Speech failed him as he realized the monstrous
assurance with which Graham and Rossland were playing their game. And
when he made no answer Rossland continued to drive home his arguments,
believing that at last Alan was at the point of surrender.
Up in the dark attic the voices had come like ghost-land whispers to old
Sokwenna. He lay huddled at the window, and the chill of death was
creeping over him. But the voices roused him. They were not strange
voices, but voices which came up out of a past of many years ago,
calling upon him, urging him, persisting in his ears with cries of
vengeance and of triumph, the call of familiar names, a moaning of
women, a sobbing of children.
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