The Reckoning - Page 141/223

I was astounded. Where passion led this libertine, nothing barred his way--neither fear nor pity. And he had even dared to reckon with this frightful hag, Catrine Montour--this devil's spawn of Frontenac--and her tawny offspring.

I had seen the girl, Carolyn, at Guy Park--a splendid young animal, of sixteen then, darkly beautiful, wild as a forest-cat. No wonder the beast in him had bristled at view of her; no wonder the fierce passion in her had leaped responsive to his forest courtship. By heaven, a proper mating in the shaggy hills of Danascara! Yes, but when the male beast emerges, yellow eyes fixed on the dead line that should bar him from the haunts of men, then, then it is time that a man shall arise and stand against him--stand for honor and right and light, and drive him back to the darkness of his lair again, or slay him at the sunlit gates of that civilization he dared to challenge.