That was all.
* * * * *
At the fall of day, cold, exhausted, famished, the party came to the
end of the long portage and dragged themselves into a camp that at
first glimpse seemed empty. Fire there was none, and no Punk came
forward to welcome them. The emotional capacity of all three was too
over-spent to recognize either surprise or annoyance; but the cry of
spontaneous affection that burst from the lips of Hank, as he rushed
ahead of them towards the fire-place, came probably as a warning that
the end of the amazing affair was not quite yet. And both Cathcart and
his nephew confessed afterwards that when they saw him kneel down in
his excitement and embrace something that reclined, gently moving,
beside the extinguished ashes, they felt in their very bones that this
"something" would prove to be Defago--the true Defago, returned.
And so, indeed, it was.
It is soon told. Exhausted to the point of emaciation, the French
Canadian--what was left of him, that is--fumbled among the ashes, trying
to make a fire. His body crouched there, the weak fingers obeying feebly
the instinctive habit of a lifetime with twigs and matches. But there
was no longer any mind to direct the simple operation. The mind had
fled beyond recall. And with it, too, had fled memory. Not only recent
events, but all previous life was a blank.
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