"Gee, Eth, think of that!" exclaimed the boy, turning toward his sister, who from her place by the side of her Aunt Margaret had been an interested listener. "He must be some man! Where does he live? Will we see him?"

Before the half-breed could reply Appleton broke in.

"He sure is some man!" he exclaimed enthusiastically. "And you will see him about day after to-morrow night, if we have good luck. I don't know about all the adventures Blood River Jack mentioned, but I have heard of some of them, and I can add the story of the outwitting of a couple of card-sharps and a fight in the dark, in the cramped quarters of an overturned railway coach, in which he all but choked the life out of a human fiend who was robbing the dead and injured.

"And I might tell of another fight—the gamest fight of all—but, wait till you know him. He is foreman of the camp which will be our headquarters for the next two or three weeks."

"To hear them talk," said Mrs. Appleton to her niece, "one would imagine this man a huge, bloodthirsty ruffian; but he isn't. Hubert says that he is in every respect a gentleman."

"Yes," agreed her husband, "but one who is not afraid to get out and work with his two hands—and work hard—and who has never learned the meaning of fear. I took a chance on him, and he has made good."

The phrase fell upon the ears of the girl with a shock. They were the words he had used, she remembered. Was he making good—somewhere? She felt her heart go out with a rush to this big man she had never seen, and she found herself eagerly looking forward to their meeting.

"Oh, he must be splendid!" she exclaimed impulsively, and her face glowed in the play of the firelight—a glow that faded almost to pallor at the words of the half-breed.

"He has come again into the woods?" he asked quickly. "It is well. For now Jeanne need have no fear. He promised her that he would return again into the North—and to her."

"What?" cried Appleton in surprise. "Who is this Jeanne? And why should he return to her?"

"She is my sister," Jacques replied simply. "Her skin is white like the skin of my father. She is beautiful, and she loves him. She helped Wa-ha-ta-na-ta to draw him from the river, and through all the long days and nights of his sickness she took care of him. When he went out of the woods she accompanied him for three days and three nights upon the trail to the land of the white man, and he promised her that he would come again into the woods and protect her from harm."

At a hurried glance from his wife Appleton changed the subject abruptly. "I wish to thunder it would snow!" he exclaimed. "Hunting deer without snow is like fishing without bait. You might accidentally hook one, but it's a long chance."

Blood River Jack sniffed the air and shrugged, glancing upward.

"Plenty of snow in a few days," he said. "Maybe too much."



CHAPTER XXXVII

IN THE OFFICE

The setting sun shone weak and coppery above the pines as the big four-horse tote-team dashed with a flourish into the wide clearing of the new camp on upper Blood River. The men had not yet "knocked off," and from the impenetrable depths of the forest came the ring of axes and the roar of crashing trees.

In the little blacksmith-shop a grimy-faced, leather-aproned man bent over a piece of glowing iron which he held in long tongs, and the red sparks radiated in showers as the hammer thumped dully on the soft metal—thumps sharply punctuated by the clean ring of steel as the polished face of the tool bounced merrily upon the chilled surface of the anvil.

The feel of snow was in the air and over by the cook-shack men were hauling fire-wood on a pole-drag. The team brought up sharply before the door of the office which was located at one end of a long, low building of logs, the two other rooms of which contained stoves, chairs, and a few rough deal-tables.

Appleton leaped from the wagon and swung the ladies lightly to the ground, while the teamster and Blood River Jack, assisted by Charlie, proceeded to unload the outfit. The lumberman pushed open the door of the office and glanced within. It was empty. He called one of the men from the cook-shack and bade him build a fire in the little air-tight.

"Well, H. D., your man ain't an office foreman, anyhow," grinned Sheridan, with a nod of approval toward the cold stove.

Sheridan was a bluff man with a bristling red mustache—the kind that invariably chew upon their cigars as they talk.

Appleton turned to the ladies.

"Make yourselves at home," he said as the fire roared up the stove-pipe. "Ross and I will look over the works a bit. Where is the boss?" he asked of the man who was returning to the wood-pile.

"Out in the cuttin' somewheres; er me'be over to the rollways," replied the man, laughing. "Big Bill he's out among 'em all the time."

"By Glory! H. D., we've all got to hand it to you when it comes to picking out men. I'd like to catch one of my foremen out on the works some time—I wouldn't know whether to fire him or double his wages!"

Sheridan mouthed his cigar, and the two turned into a skidway.

Appleton smiled. He raised a finger and touched his eyelid.

"It's the eye," he said. "Look in a man's eye, Ross. I don't give a damn what a man's record is—what he's done or what he hasn't done. Let me get a good look into his eye when he talks and in half a minute I'll know whether to hire him or pass him on to you fellows. Here he comes now."

Bill took keen delight in showing the two lumbermen about the camp.

"What's the idea of the ell on the bunk-house?" asked Appleton.

"Teamster's bunk-house," replied the foreman. "You see, I know how it feels to be waked up at four in the morning by the teamsters piling out of their bunks; so I built a separate bunk-house for them. The men work too hard to have their sleep broken into that way. And another thing—I built a couple of big rooms onto the office where the men can play cards and smoke in the evening. I ordered a phonograph, too. I expect it in on the tote-wagon."

Sheridan grinned skeptically and spat out part of his cigar. Appleton made no comment.

"Come over to the office, Bill," he said. "I want you to meet the ladies—my wife and niece and Mrs. Sheridan."

"I am afraid I am not very presentable," replied Bill dubiously as they crossed the clearing in the lengthening shadows; but he went with them without hesitation.

They were met at the door by a plump-faced lady of ample proportions who was evidently fighting a losing battle with a tendency toward embonpoint; and a slight, gray-haired one who stood poised upon the split puncheon that served as a door-step.

"Ladies, this is Bill, the foreman of this camp. Mrs. Sheridan, Bill, and my wife."

The ladies bowed formally, and secretly approved of the grace with which the foreman removed his cap and returned their salute. Nevertheless, there was an icy note in Mrs. Appleton's voice as she said:

"My niece begs to be excused. She is very tired after her rather hard trip." If Bill noticed the frigidity in the tone he gave no sign.

"I imagine it has been a very trying trip for you all. However, I will offer you the best accommodations the camp affords. If you will kindly choose which of those two rooms you prefer I will have your belongings moved in at once."

"I suppose you brought cots," he added, turning to Appleton.

"Yes, everything necessary for a tenderfoot outfit."

"When the ladies have selected their room I will have your gear moved into the other," said Bill; and, with a bow to the ladies, moved off in the direction of the cook-shack.

Alone in the office, Ethel Manton gazed about upon the meager furnishings; a desk, the little air-tight stove with its huge wood-box; three wooden chairs, a trunk secured by a padlock, and a bunk neatly laid with heavy blankets.

Several pairs of boots, moccasins, and heavy mittens were ranged along the floor next to the wall, while from pegs above them hung a faded mackinaw, a slicker, and several pairs of corduroy trousers.

Tacked to the wall above the desk was a large, highly colored calendar, while upon the opposite wall hung a rifle and a belt of yellow cartridges. Her woman's eye took in the scrupulous neatness of the room and the orderly disposition of the various articles.

For the first time in her life she was in a man's room, and she felt a keen thrill of interest in her surroundings. Upon the top of the desk beside the little bracket-lamp was a short row of books.

"It is too bad," she muttered, "that he couldn't have been nice. How I would have enjoyed talking with him and telling him how splendid it is that he is making good!

"Maybe somewhere a girl is wondering where he is—and waiting day after day for word from him—and worrying her very heart out. Oh, I hope she will never know about this Jeanne—ugh! An Indian—and Uncle Appleton said he is a gentleman!"

She paused before the desk and idly read the titles of the books; there were a logger's manual, a few text-books on surveying and timber estimating, several of the latest novels, apparently unread and a well-thumbed copy of Browning.

"Browning! Of all things—in a log camp! Now I know there is a girl—poor thing!" Open, face downward upon the surface of the desk where it had been pushed aside to make room for a rough sketch of the camp with its outreaching skidways and cross-hauls, lay a small volume.

"And Southey!" she exclaimed under her breath, and picked up the book. It was "Madoc," and three lines, heavily underscored, stood boldly out upon the page:

"Three things a wise man will not trust, The wind, the sunshine of an April day, And woman's plighted faith."

Over and over she read the lines, and, returning the book to its place, pondered, as she allowed her glance to rove again over the little room whose every detail bespoke intense masculinity.

"I might at least be nice to him," she murmured. "Maybe the girl was horrid. And he is 'way up here, trying to forget!" Unconsciously she repeated the words of her Uncle Appleton: "He has made good."

And then there flashed through her mind the words of the guide: "She is beautiful, and she loves him. She accompanied him for three days and three nights on the trail to the land of the white man, and he promised that he would come again into the woods and protect her from harm."

"This Indian girl," she whispered—"she loves him, and he persuaded her to accompany him, and when they drew near to civilization he sent her back—with a promise!"

Her lips thinned and the hot blood mounted to her cheeks. No matter what conditions sent this man into the woods, there could be no justification for that. She shuddered as she drew her skirts away where they brushed lightly against the blankets of his bunk, and turned toward the door.

And just at that moment the door opened, and in the gathering darkness a man stood framed in the doorway. She drew back, startled, and with the swiftness of light her glance swept him from the top of his cap to the soles of his heavy boots.

He was a large man whose features were concealed by a thick beard. His fringed and beautifully embroidered shirt of buckskin was open at the throat, as if to allow free play to the mighty muscles of his well-formed neck.

Only a few seconds he stood thus, and with a swift movement removed the cap from his head.

"You will pardon me," he said, and his eyes sought hers; "I did not know any one was here."

At the first sound of his voice the girl started. One quick step, and she stood before him, staring into his eyes. She felt her flesh grow cold, and her heart seemed gripped between the jaws of a mighty vise.

"You!" she gasped, and swayed unsteadily as her hand sought her throat. Her voice came dry and hard and choking as she repeated the word: "You!" And in that moment the man saw her face in the deepening gloom of the room.

"Ethel!" he cried, springing toward her with outstretched arms. Then, when she was almost within their grasp, the arms dropped, for the girl shrank from his touch and her eyes blazed.

Thus for a moment they stood facing each other, the girl—white, tense—with blazing eyes, and the big man, who fought for control of himself. Finally he spoke, and his voice was steady and very low.

"Forgive me, Ethel," he said. "For the moment I forgot that I have not the right—that there is another——"

With a low, moaning cry the girl covered her face with her hands. Even since she faced him there the thought had flashed through her brain that there might be some mistake—that the man might even yet be as he appeared to be—big and brave and clean.

But now—from his own lips she had heard it—"there is another"—and that other—an Indian!

A convulsive shudder shook her whole body, the room seemed to reel; she pressed her hands more tightly to her eyes, as if to shut out the sight of him, and the next instant all was dark, and she pitched heavily forward into the arms of the man.

For one brief moment he held her, straining her limp body to his. The hands relaxed and fell away from her pallid face, and the bearded lips bent close above the soft lips of the unconscious girl—but only for a moment.

Without touching the lips, the man straightened up and, crossing to the bunk, laid the still form upon the blankets. With never a backward glance, he passed out through the door.

It was dark in the clearing, and a couple of steps brought him face to face with Appleton, who was coming to tell his niece that the ladies' quarters were ready.

The foreman paused and looked squarely into the face of his employer. He slowly raised an arm and pointed to the open door of the office.

"Miss Manton," he said, "has fainted." And without waiting for a reply, passed on into the night.



CHAPTER XXXVIII

CHARLIE FINDS A FRIEND

The following morning the camp looked out upon a white world. The threatened snow which began during the night was still falling, and from the windows the dark walls of the clearing could be seen but dimly through the riot of dancing flakes.

It was a constrained and rather glum party that sat down to breakfast shortly after daylight in the room adjoining the office, where two deal tables had been drawn together and spread with a new, white oilcloth.

Ethel Manton had entirely recovered from her syncope of the previous evening, and had offered no elucidation other than that of fatigue. Nevertheless, not a person in the room but felt that there had been another and more immediate cause for the girl's collapse.

Charlie had begged to be allowed to "eat with the men," and the foreman had courteously declined Appleton's invitation to join the party during their stay in camp.

The dismal and sporadic attempts at conversation had slumped into an awkward silence, in the midst of which the door burst open and young Charlie catapulted into the room.

"Oh, Eth! Guess who he is!" he cried. "Guess who's the boss—the man the Indians call The-Man-Who-Cannot-Die'! It's Bill Carmody! And I knew him the minute I saw him, if he has got whiskers all over his face and a buckskin shirt.

"And he knew me! And he shook hands with me right before all the men—and you ought to seen 'em look! And he's going to teach me how to walk on snowshoes! Oh, ain't you glad! 'Cause now you and Bill can——"

"Charlie!" The girl's face flamed, and the word seemed wrung from her very heart. The boy paused for a moment in the midst of his breathless harangue and eyed his sister with disgust.

"You know you do love him," he continued, his eyes flashing defiantly, "even if you did have a scrap—and he loves you, too! And that dang St. Ledger's just nothing but a—a—a squirt—that's what he is—and if I was Bill Carmody I'd punch his head for him if he even spoke to you again—if you was my girl!

"And I'm going to tell him we know he never swiped those bonds, and you stuck up for him when old man Carmody told you he did."

The last words of the boy's remarks were addressed to an empty chair, for the girl, white and trembling, had fled into the other room and banged the door after her.

Mrs. Appleton, with an unintelligibly muttered excuse, hurriedly followed, leaving her husband gazing from her retreating back to the excited face of the youngster, and muttering: "Bless my soul! Bless my soul!" between the gulps of his coffee, which for once in his life he swallowed with never a growl at the canned milk. A moment later he abruptly left the table and, motioning the boy to follow, led the way to the office.

A half-hour passed, and Charlie left the building under the strictest kind of orders not to mention to Bill Carmody either Ethel or the bonds.

Puzzling his small head over the inexplicable doings of grown-up people, he wandered toward the cook-shack to hunt up Daddy Dunnigan, with whom he had already struck up a great friendship.

"She loves him and he loves her," he muttered to himself as he scuffed his brand-new moccasins through the soft snow, "and each one tries to let on they don't. And Uncle Appleton won't let me tell Bill she does so he'd go and tell her he does; and then old man Carmody and his bonds could go to the devil!

"You bet, I hope I never get in love and act like a couple of fools. Now, I bet she'll marry that sniffit, and he'll marry Blood River Jack's sister." The boy paused and glanced speculatively at the falling snow. "I wonder if he wants to? Anyhow, I can ask him that much."

Later, in the office, Mrs. Appleton broke in upon her husband's third black cigar. There was no doorway connecting the office with the other two rooms, and the lumberman watched the snowflakes melt on his wife's hair as she seated herself directly in front of him.

"Well, Hubert Appleton, this is a nice mess you have got us into, I must say!"

"Me!" grinned the man. "Why, little girl, this is your party."

"I wish you would tell me who it was that suggested leaving out young Mr. Holbrooke, and coming here so that Ethel could meet this man?"

"She—er—met him—didn't she?"

"You needn't try to be facetious! What are you going to do about it?"

"Who—me? Oh, just stick around and watch the fun."

"Fun! Fun! Hubert Appleton, aren't you ashamed of yourself? And that poor girl in there crying her eyes out! Fun, indeed—it's tragedy!"

"There, there, little woman; don't let's get excited. It's up to us to kind of figure things out a bit; but the young folks themselves will be the real actors.

"Now, just how much—or, how little did she tell you?"

"She told me everything. Poor dear, it did her good. She has had nobody to tell—nobody to cry with her and sympathize with her."

When his wife concluded, H. D. Appleton had received a very accurate chronicle of the doings of Bill Carmody from the time of his boyhood until chance threw them together in the smoking-compartment of the west-bound sleeper.

The lumberman listened attentively, without interrupting, until his wife finished.

"Does she think Bill took those bonds?" he asked.

"No. She does not. Even with everything else against him, she cannot bring herself to believe that he is a thief."

"Do you think he took them?"

"Why—I—I don't know," she hesitated.

"Do you think he took them?"

The little woman looked into her husband's eyes as she purposely delayed her reply.

"No," she said at length. "I do not. But his own father accused him."

Appleton leaned forward in his chair and brought his fist down upon the desk-top.

"I don't give a damn who accused him!" he cried. "That boy never stole a bond, or any other thing, and I'll stake my last cent on it!"

"Oh, it isn't the bonds. Ethel does not believe he stole them. But—the other—you heard what the guide said—and Ethel heard it. She never can get over that! He may be honest—but he is a perfect villain!"

"Hold on, now. Let's go easy. Maybe it isn't so bad as it sounds."

"Not so bad! Hubert Appleton, do you mean to tell me that you would, for a minute, think of allowing your niece to marry such a man?"

Appleton smiled into the outraged eyes of his wife.

"Yup. I think I would," he replied, and then hastened to add:

"Wait here and I will fetch Blood River Jack. He may have told more than he knows, or he may not have told all he knows. When you come to think of it, from what he did tell, we only jumped at conclusions."

He hurried from the office, returning a few minutes later with the half-breed, who seated himself and lighted the proffered cigar with evident enjoyment.

"Now, Jack," Appleton began, speaking with his accustomed brevity, "tell us about Monsieur Bill and this sister of yours. Did you say he was going to marry her?"

The guide looked from one to the other as if silently taking their measure. Finally he seemed satisfied.

"No," he said gravely, "he will not marry Jeanne."

The lumberman cleared his throat and waited while the man looked out upon the whirling snow, for well he knew that the half-breed must be allowed to take his own time—he could not be "pumped." And Mrs. Appleton, taking her cue from her husband, curbed her impatience, and waited with apparent unconcern.

"It is," the guide began, as if carefully weighing his words, "that you are the good friends of M's'u' Bill. Also I have seen that you know the men of the logs.

"Wa-ha-ta-na-ta, my mother, who is old and very wise, knows the men of the logs, and, knowing them, hated M's'u' Bill, and would have returned him to the river, but Jeanne prevented. For Wa-ha-ta-na-ta, knowing of the fatherless breeds of the rivers, hated all white men, and a great fear was in her heart for the girl, who is her daughter, and the daughter of Lacombie whom, she says, was the one good white man; but Lacombie is dead.

"So always in the days of the summer, when these two would leave the lodge to visit the deserted camp of Moncrossen, Wa-ha-ta-na-ta followed them. Stealthily and unknown she crept upon their trail, and always her sharp eyes were upon them, and in the fold of her blanket was concealed a long, keen blade, and behind the unfailing gaze of the black eyes was the mind to kill.

"Thus passed the days of the summer, and the hand of Wa-ha-ta-na-ta was stayed, but her vigilance remained unrelenting. For deep in her heart is seared the memory of two winters ago, when Moncrossen gazed upon the beauty of Jeanne, and came to the tepee in the night, knowing I was away, and Wa-ha-ta-na-ta fought him in the darkness until he fled, cursing and swearing vengeance.

"Never since that night has the girl been safe, for Moncrossen, with the cunning of the wolf, is waiting his time—and some day he will strike!

"But I shared not the fear of my mother that harm would come to Jeanne at the hand of the great chechako, for I have looked into his eyes, and I know that his heart is good.

"Upon the day before his departure for the land of the white man he gave to the girl the skin of Diablesse, and then she told him she loved him, and begged him to remain with her in the country of the Indians.

"But he would not, for he does not love Jeanne, but another—a woman of his own people, who lives in the great city of the white man. And even though this woman sent him from her, he loves her, and will marry no other.

"Listening, Wa-ha-ta-na-ta heard him tell this to Jeanne; but of this woman the girl knew, for he talked incessantly of her, and cried out that she would marry another—in the voice of the fever-spirit, in the time of his great sickness.

"The following day he departed in a canoe, and as he pushed from the shore, Jeanne handed him his mackinaw, and words passed between them that Wa-ha-ta-na-ta could not hear from her position behind a log.

"But, as the canoe passed from sight around a bend in the river, the girl plunged into the woods, and Wa-ha-ta-na-ta returned to the tepee and made up a light pack and slipped silently upon her trail. The girl cut through the forest and came again to the river, and for a night and a day awaited the coming of the canoe.

"The third evening it came and the man camped, and Jeanne crept close and watched him across the blaze of his little fire as he smoked and stared into the embers. While Wa-ha-ta-na-ta also crept stealthily to the fire, making no sound, and she came to within an arm's reach of the man's back, and in her hand was clutched tightly the sheath-knife with its long, keen blade.

"At the midnight the man unrolled his blankets and laid down to sleep, and then it was that Jeanne stepped into the firelight. And in the deep shadow, Wa-ha-ta-na-ta gripped more tightly the knife and made ready to strike."

The half-breed paused while the others waited breathlessly for him to resume.

"Think not that Jeanne is bad. She is good, and her heart is the pure heart of a maiden. But, such is the love of woman—to face gladly the sneers of the world, and the wrath of her people—for she did not ask him to marry her—only to take her.

"But the man would not, and commanded her to return to the lodge. She told him that she could not return—that three days and three nights had passed since they had departed together, and that, if he would not take her, she would go alone to the land of the white man.

"Then M's'u' Bill arose and folded his blankets and made up his pack, and when he spoke to her again it was in the voice of the terrible softness—the softness that causes men first to wonder, and then to obey, though they know not why. He said that he himself would take her back, and that Wa-ha-ta-na-ta, who is old and very wise, would know that his words were true.

"Wa-ha-ta-na-ta, lurking there in the deep shadow, in that moment knew that the man's heart was good. And she stepped into the firelight, and looked long into his eyes—and she broke the knife—and between them there passed the promise."

Jacques puffed slowly upon his cigar, arose to his feet, and stood looking down upon the two who had listened to his words.

"It is well," he said, and his dark eyes flashed, "for the heart of Moncrossen is bad, and the beauty of Jeanne has inflamed the evil passions of him, and he will stop at nothing in the fulfillment of his desire.

"But, into the North has come a greater than Moncrossen. And terrible will be the vengeance of this man if harm falls upon Jeanne. For he is her friend, his word has passed, his heart is strong and good, and he knows not fear.

"Upon Moncrossen will fall the day of the Great Reckoning. And, in that day, justice will be done, for he will stand face to face with M's'u' Bill—The-Man-Who-Cannot-Die—the man whom Wa-ha-ta-na-ta has named 'The One Good White Man'!"



CHAPTER XXXIX

BILL'S WAY

"And, to think," whispered Mrs. Appleton as she wiped a tear from her eye, after the half-breed's departure, "that in New York this same man had earned the name of 'Broadway Bill, the sport'!"

"Yes," answered her husband; "but Broadway Bill has passed, and in his place, out here in the big country, is Broadgauge Bill, the man! I knew I was right, Margaret, by gad, I knew it! Look in his eye!"

Followed, then, in the little office, an hour of intimate conversation, at the conclusion of which the two arose.

"Not a word to Ethel, remember," admonished the woman, and laughed knowingly as her husband stooped and kissed her.

During the days that followed, Appleton and Sheridan, accompanied by Blood River Jack, hunted from early morning until late evening, when they would return, trail-weary and happy, to spend hours over the cleaning and oiling of guns and the overhauling of gear.

Young Charlie was allowed to go on some of the shorter expeditions, but for the most part he was to be found dogging the heels of Bill Carmody; or perched upon a flour-barrel in the cook-shack, listening to the tales of Daddy Dunnigan.

The ladies busied themselves with the care of the two rooms, with useless needlework, and with dummy auction, varying the monotony with daily excursions into the near-by forest in quest of spruce-gum and pine-cones.

Since the morning Charlie had broken in so incontinently upon their breakfast no reference had been made to Bill Carmody by any member of the party; while the foreman pursued the even tenor of his way, apparently as unconcerned by their existence as they were by his.

One afternoon as the ladies were starting upon one of their tramps they came face to face with the foreman, who tipped his cap, bowed coldly, and passed into the office, closing the door behind him.

Mrs. Appleton halted suddenly, glanced toward the building, and retraced her steps. It was but a short distance, and Ethel walked back, waiting at the door while her aunt entered their own apartment.

The girl watched abstractedly, thinking the older woman had returned for something she had forgotten.

Suddenly she became all attention, and a hot flush of anger mounted to her face as she saw her aunt walk to the table, pick up her purse and several rings which she had left, and with a glance at the thick, log wall which separated the room from the office, deliberately walk to her trunk and place the articles under lock and key.

Apparently Mrs. Appleton had not noticed the girl's presence, but more than once during the afternoon the corners of her mouth twitched when, in response to some question or remark of hers, the shortness of the girl's replies bordered upon absolute rudeness.

And late that night she smiled broadly in the darkness when the low sound of stifled sobs came from the direction of the girl's cot.

Immediately after breakfast the following morning, Ethel put on her wraps and started out alone. Arriving, after a long, aimless ramble, at the outermost end of a skidway, she sat upon a log to rest and watch a huge swamper who, unaware of her presence, was engaged in slashing the underbrush from in front of a group of large logs.

Finally, tiring of the sight, she arose and started for the clearing, and then suddenly drew back and stepped behind the bole of a great pine, for, striding rapidly toward her on the skidway was Bill Carmody, and she pressed still closer to the tree-trunk that he might pass without observing her.

He was very close now, and the girl noticed the peculiar expression of his face—an expression she had seen there once before—his lips were smiling, and his gray eyes were narrowed almost to slits.

The man halted scarcely fifty feet from her, at the place where the swamper, with wide blows of his axe, was laying the small saplings and brushwood low. She started at the cold softness of the tones of his voice.

"Leduc," he said, "just a minute—it will hardly take longer."

The man turned quickly at the sound of the voice at his side, and for the space of seconds the two big men faced each other on the packed snow of the skidway.

Then, with a motion of incredible swiftness, and without apparent effort, the foreman's right arm shot out and his fist landed squarely upon the nose of the huge swamper.

The girl heard the wicked spat, and the peculiar, frightened grunt as the man reeled backward, and saw the quick gush of red blood that splashed down his front and squirted out over the snow.

Before the man had time to recover, the foreman advanced a step and struck again. This time it was his left hand that clove the air in a long, clean swing, and the man went down into the snow without a sound as the fist thudded against his neck just below the ear.

Without so much as a glance at the man in the snow, Bill Carmody turned on his heel and started back down the skidway.

Few seconds had elapsed, and a strange, barbaric thrill ran through the girl's body as she looked out upon the scene, quickly followed by a wave of sickening pity for the poor wretch who lay sprawled in the snow.

And, then, a great anger surged into her heart against the man who had felled him. She dashed from her hiding-place, and in a moment stood facing him, her blue eyes flashing.

"You brute!" she cried, "what right had you? Why did you strike him?" The man regarded her gravely, lifting his cap politely as if answering a most commonplace question.

"Because," he replied, "I wanted to," and, with a curt bow, stepped into the timber and disappeared, leaving her alone in the skidway with the bloody, unconscious form in the snow.

Never in her life had Ethel Manton been so furiously angry—not because a man had been felled by a blow—she had forgotten that—but because, in demanding an explanation, in attempting to call Bill Carmody to account, she had laid herself open to his stinging rebuff.

Without pretense of defense or justification, the man had quietly told her that he knocked the swamper down "because he wanted to"; and without waiting for comment—as if the fact that "he wanted to" was sufficient in itself—had gone about his business without giving the matter a second thought.

The flash of anger, which in the first place had prompted her to speak to the man, was but an impulsive protest against what she considered an act of brutality; but that quickly passed.

The anger that surged through her heart as she gazed, white-faced, at the spot where the big man disappeared, was the bitter anger of outraged dignity and injured pride.

He had not taken the trouble to find out what she thought, for the very obvious reason that he had not cared what she thought—and so he left her. And when he had gone the girl plodded wrathfully back to camp and spoke to no one of what she had seen. But, deep down in her heart, she knew there had been a reason for Bill's act—and she knew that the reason was good.

That same evening Appleton pushed his chair back from the table and glanced toward Ethel, who had got out a bit of crochet-work. Then, with a sidewise glance at his wife, he remarked thoughtfully:

"I'm afraid I'll have to get rid of Bill. A Canuck swamper named Leduc complained to me that the boss slipped up on him and knocked him insensible with a club. I can't stand for that—not even from Bill."

At the mention of the foreman's name the girl looked up quickly.

"He didn't hit him with a club! He hit him with his fist! And there was a reason——" The girl stopped abruptly, and a wave of crimson suffused her face. She could have bitten her tongue off for speaking—for defending this man.

"How do you know?" asked her uncle in surprise.

"I saw him do it," she replied; realizing that, having gone so far, she must answer.

"Why did he strike him?" persisted Appleton.

"You might ask him that," she said and, with a defiant toss of her head, quitted the room and closed the door behind her.

The Sheridans had been taken into confidence, and when the four found themselves alone they smiled knowingly.

As the days slipped into the second week of their stay, the carcasses of many deer hung from poles in the clearing, and the outside walls of the log building were adorned with the skins of numerous wolves and bobcats.

Hardly a day passed but some one, by word or look, or covert sneer, expressed disapproval of the boss; and Ethel, entirely ignorant of the fact that these expressions of disapproval were made only in her presence, and for her special benefit, was conscious of a feeling of great pity for the lonely man.

The indescribable restlessness of a great longing took possession of her; she found herself, time and again, watching from the window, and from places of concealment behind the trunks of trees, while the big foreman went stolidly about his work.

The fact that she should hate Bill Carmody was logical and proper; but she bitterly resented the distrust and criticism of the others. She wished now with all her heart that she had not confided in her aunt, and a dozen times she caught herself on the point of rushing to his defense.

Not since that morning on the skidway had the two met. Bill deviated not one whit from the regular routine of his duties, and the girl purposely avoided him.

She hated him. Over and over again she told herself that she hated and despised him, and yet, on two or three occasions when she knew he had gone to the farthest reaches of the cutting, she had slipped unobserved into the office and read from his books—not the uncut novels—but the well-thumbed copies of Browning and Southey; and as she read she pondered.

She came upon many marked passages; and in her heart the unrest continued, and she allowed her hands to stray over the coarse cloth of his mackinaw, and once she threw herself upon his bunk and buried her face in his blankets, and sobbed the dry, racking sobs of her deep soul-hurt.

Then she had leaped to her feet and smoothed out the wrinkles in the blankets, and stooped and straightened the row of boots and moccasins along the base-log—and quickly disarranged them again for fear he might remember how he left them—and rushed from the office.

Of these secret visits the members of the party knew nothing, but Daddy Dunnigan, from the window of the cook-shack, took note of the girl's comings and goings, and nodded sagely and chuckled to himself. For Daddy Dunnigan, wise in the ways of women, had gathered much from the talk of the impetuous youngster.



CHAPTER XL

CHARLIE GOES HUNTING

Blood River Jack halted suddenly in his journey from the bunk-house to the grub-shack and sniffed the air.

He dropped the butt of his rifle to the hard-packed snow of the clearing and glanced upward, where a thin sprinkling of stars winked feebly in the first blush of morning.

The dark sky was cloudless, and the trees stood motionless in the gloom, which slowly dissipated where the first faint light of approaching day grayed the east. The air was dry and cold, but with no sting of crispness. The chill of it was the uncomfortable, penetrating chill that renders clothing inadequate, yet brings no tingle to the exposed portions of the body.

Again the man sniffed the dead air and, swinging the rifle into the crook of his elbow, continued toward the grub-shack.

Appleton and Sheridan accepted without remonstrance the guide's prediction of a storm and retired to the "house," as the rooms in which the party was quartered had come to be known—not entirely unthankful for a day of rest.

The crew went into the timber, as usual; the guide retired to his bunk for a good snooze; and young Charlie Manton, tiring of listening to Daddy Dunnigan's yarns, prowled about the camp in search of amusement.

Entering the bunk-house, his attention was attracted by the loud snoring of Blood River Jack, and his eye fell upon the half-breed's rifle and cartridge-belt, which reposed upon the floor just beneath the edge of his bunk.

The boy crept close, his soft moccasins making no sound, until he was within reach of the gun, when he dropped to the floor and lifted it in his hands. For many minutes he sat upon the floor examining the rifle, turning it over and over.

At length he reached for the cartridge-belt, and buckling it about his waist, left the room as noiselessly as he had entered and, keeping the bunk-house in line with the window of the cook-shack, slipped unobserved into the timber.

Upon his hunting expeditions with the others, Charlie had not been allowed to carry a high-power rifle. It was a sore blow to his pride that his armament had consisted of a light, twenty-gauge shotgun, whose possibilities for slaughter were limited to rabbits, spruce-hens, and ptarmigan.

Farther and farther into the timber he went, avoiding the outreaching skidways and the sound of axes. Broad-webbed snow-shoe rabbits leaped from under foot and scurried away in the timber, and the whir of an occasional ptarmigan or spruce-hen passed unheeded.

He was after big game. He would show Uncle Appleton that he could handle a rifle; and maybe, if he killed a buck or a wolf or a bobcat, the next time he went with them he would be allowed to carry a man's-size weapon.

An hour's tramp carried him to the bank of the river at a point several miles below the camp, where he seated himself upon a rotten log.

"Blood River Jack just wanted to sleep to-day, so he told 'em it was going to storm," he soliloquized as he surveyed the narrow stretch of sky which appeared above the snow-covered ice of the river.

But somehow the sky did not look as blue as it had; it was a sickly yellow color now, like the after-glow of a sunset, and in the center of it hung the sun—a dull, copper sun, with uneven, red edges which lost themselves in a hazy aureola of yellowish light.

The boy glanced uneasily about him. The woods seemed uncannily silent, and the air thick and heavy, so that the white aisle of the river blurred into dusk at its farther reaches.

It grew darker, a peculiar fuliginous darkness, which was not of the gloom of the forest. Yet no smell of smoke was in the air, and in the sky were no clouds.

"Looks kind of funny," thought the boy, and glanced toward the river. Suddenly all thought of the unfamiliar-looking world fled from his brain, for there on the snow, not twenty yards distant, half crouched a long, gray body with the claws of an uplifted forefoot extended, and cruel, catlike lips drawn into a hideous snarl.

The other forefoot rested upon the limp, furry body of a rabbit, and the great, yellow-green eyes glowed and waned in the dimming light, while the sharply tufted ears worked forward and back in quick, nervous twitches.

"A loup-cervier," whispered the boy, and slowly raised Blood River Jack's rifle until the sights lined exactly between the glowing eyes. He pulled the trigger and, at the sharp metallic click with which the hammer descended upon the firing-pin, the brute seized the rabbit between its wide, blunt jaws and bounded away in long leaps.

Hot tears of disappointment blurred the youngster's eyes and trickled down his cheeks—he had forgotten to load the rifle, and his hands trembled as he hurriedly jammed the long, flask-shaped cartridges into the magazine and followed down to the river on the trail of the big cat.

He remembered as he mushed along on his small rackets that Bill had told him of a rocky ledge some five or six miles below camp, and had promised to take him to this place where the loup-cerviers had their dens among the rocks.

The trail held to the river, whose banks rose more abruptly as he proceeded, and at length, as he rounded a sharp bend, he could make out dimly through the thickening air the outline of a high rocky bluff; but even as he looked, the ledge was blotted out by a quick flurry of snow, and from high among the tree-tops came a long, wailing moan of wind.

The trees pitched wildly in the icy blast; the moan increased to a mighty roar, and the air was thick with flying snow. Not the soft, flaky snow of the previous storm, but particles fine as frozen fog, that bit and stung as they whirled against his face in the eddying gusts that came from no direction at all and every direction at once.

The boy bowed his head to the storm and pushed steadily forward—he must kill the loup-cervier, whose trail was growing momentarily more indistinct.

His eyes could penetrate but a few yards into the white smother, and suddenly the dark wall of the rock ledge loomed in front of him, and the trail, almost obliterated now, turned sharply and disappeared between two huge, upstanding bowlders.



CHAPTER XLI

THE BLIZZARD

At eleven o'clock in the morning Bill Carmody ordered his teams to the stables.

At twelve o'clock, when the men crowded into the grub-shack, the air was filled with fine particles of flinty snow, and the roar of the wind through the pine-tops was the mighty roar of the surf of a pounding sea.

At one o'clock the boss called "gillon," and with loud shouts and rough horse-play, the men made a rush for the bunk-house.

At two o'clock Daddy Dunnigan thrust his head through the doorway of the shop where Bill, under the blacksmith's approving eye, was completing a lesson in the proper welding of the broken link of a log chain.

With a mysterious quirk of the head he motioned the foreman to follow, and led the way to the cook-shack, where Blood River Jack waited with lowering brow.

"D'yez happin to know is th' b'y up yonder?" asked the old Irishman, with a jerk of his thumb in the direction of the house. Bill beat the dry snow from his clothing as he stared from one to the other.

"The boy!" he cried. "What do you mean? Come—out with it—quick!"

"It is that my rifle and belt have gone from under the bunk," Blood River Jack answered. "They were taken while I slept. The boy did not come to dinner in the grub-shack. Is it that he eats to-day with his people?"

"Good Lord! I don't know! Haven't you seen him, Daddy?"

"Not since mebbe it's noine o'clock in th' marnin', an' he wint to th' bunk-house. I thoucht he wuz wid Jack." Bill thought rapidly and turned to the old man.

"Here, you, Daddy—get a move on now!" he ordered. "That ginger cake of yours that the kid likes, hustle some of it into a pail or a basket or something, and carry it up to the house. Tell them it's for Charlie, and you'll find out if he's there. If not, get out by saying that he's probably in the bunk-house, and get back here as quick as you can make it. There is no use in alarming the people up there—yet."

"Here you, Jack, go help the old man along. It's a tough job bucking that storm even for a short distance. Come now, beat it!"

After ten minutes the two returned, breathless from their short battle with the storm.

"He ain't there," gasped the old man and sank down upon the wood-box with his head in his hands. "God help um, he's out in ut!"

"I'm going to the office," said the foreman and stepped out into the whirling snow.

"Man! Man!" called Daddy, springing to his feet; "ye ain't a goin' to thry——" The door banged upon his words and he sagged slowly onto his rough seat.

A few minutes later Appleton stamped into the cook-shack. "Did you find him, Daddy?" he asked.

The old man shook his head. "He ain't in th' camp," he muttered. "He tuk Jack's gun whilst he slep' an' ut's huntin' he's gone—Lard hilp um!"

"Where is Bill?" the lumberman inquired.

"Av ye're quick, ye may catch um in th' office—av ye ain't Oi'm thinkin' ye niver will foind um. Be th' luk in his eye, he's gone afther th' b'y."

The lumberman plunged again into the storm and made his way to the office. It was empty. As he turned heavily away the door opened and Ethel Manton flung herself into the room, gasping with exertion. Giving no heed to her uncle's presence, the girl's glance hurriedly swept the interior.

Her hand clutched at the bosom of her snow-powdered coat as she noted that the faded mackinaw was gone from its accustomed peg and the snowshoes from their corner behind the door.

Instantly the truth flashed through her brain—Charlie was lost in the seething blizzard and somewhere out in the timber Bill Carmody was searching for him.

With a smothered moan she flung herself onto the bunk and buried her face in the blankets.

* * * * *

The situation the foreman faced when he plunged into the whirling blizzard in search of the boy, while calling for the utmost in man's woodsmanship and endurance, was not so entirely hopeless as would appear. He remembered the intense interest evinced by the boy a few days before, when he had listened to the description of the rocky ledge which was the home of the loup-cerviers, and the eagerness with which he begged to visit the place.

What was more natural, he argued, than that the youngster, finding himself in unexpected possession of a rifle and ammunition, had decided to explore the spot and do a little hunting on his own account?

The full fury of the storm had not broken until noon, and he figured that the boy would have had ample time to reach the bluff where he could find temporary shelter among the numerous caves of its rocky formation.

Upon leaving the office, the boss headed straight for the rollway, and the mere holding his direction taxed his brain to the exclusion of all other thoughts.

The air was literally filled with flying snow fine as dust, which formed an opaque screen through which his gaze penetrated scarcely an arm's reach.

Time and again he strayed from the skidway and brought up sharply against a tree, but each time he altered his course and floundered ahead until he found himself suddenly upon the steep slope where the bank inclined to the river.

When Bill Carmody turned down-stream the gravity of his undertaking forced itself upon him. The fury of the storm was like nothing he had ever experienced.

The wind-whipped particles cut and seared his face like a shower of red-hot needles, and the air about him was filled with a dull roar, mighty in volume but strangely muffled by the very denseness of the snow.

It took all his strength to push himself forward against the terrific force of the wind which seemed to sweep from every quarter at once into a whirling vortex of which he himself was the center.

One moment the air was sucked from his lungs by a mighty vacuum, and the next the terrible compression upon his chest caused him to gasp for breath.

The fine snow that he inhaled with each breath stung his lungs and he tied his heavy woolen muffler across his mouth. He stumbled frequently and floundered about to regain his balance. He lost all sense of direction and fought blindly on, each bend of the river bringing him blunderingly against one or the other of its brush-grown banks.

The only thought of his benumbed brain was to make the rock ledge somewhere ahead. It grew dark, and the blackness, laden with the blinding, stinging particles, added horror to his bewilderment.

Suddenly his snowshoe struck against a hard object, and he pitched heavily forward upon his face and lay still. He realized then that he was tired.

Never in his life had he been so utterly body-weary, and the snow was soft—soft and warm—and the pelting ceased.

He thrust his arm forward into a more comfortable position and encountered a rock, and sluggishly through his benumbed faculties passed a train of associated ideas—rock, rock ledge, loup-cerviers, the boy! With a mighty effort he roused himself from the growing lethargy and staggered blindly to his feet.

He filled his lungs, tore the ice-incrusted muffler from his lips and, summoning all his strength, gave voice to the long call of the woods:

"Who-o-o-p-e-e-e!"

But the cry was cut off at his lips. The terrific force of the shifting gusts hurled the sound back into his throat so that it came to his own ears faint and far. Again and again he called, and each time the feeble effort was drowned in the dull roar of the storm.

An unreasoning rage at the futility of it overcame him and he plunged blindly ahead, unheeding, stumbling, falling, rising to his feet and staggering among the tumbled rocks at the foot of the bluff—and then almost in his ear came the sharp, quick sound of a rifle-shot and another and another, at a second apart—the distress signal of the Northland.



CHAPTER XLII

BUCKING THE STORM

Bill Carmody wheeled against the solid rock wall and frantically felt his way along its broken surface. His groping hands encountered a cleft barely wide enough to admit the passage of a man's body.

With a final effort he called again; instantly the high, clear tones of the boy's voice rang in his ears from the depths of the rock cavern, and the next moment small hands were tugging at his armpits.

"Oh! Bill, I knew you would come!" a small voice cried close to his ear. "It was my last three shots. I've been shooting every little while for hours and hours. Hold on! We've got to take off your snowshoes; they won't come through the door."

A few minutes later the man sat upon the hard floor of the cave which reeked of the rank animal odor of a long-used den. The place was bare of snow and he leaned back against a soft, furry body while the boy rattled on:

"I killed the loup-cervier! I chased him in here and shot him right square through the head. And he never kicked—just slunked down in a heap and dropped his rabbit. And now, if we had some matches, we could build a fire—if we had some wood—and cook him. I'm hungry—aren't you?"

The boy's utter disregard of the real seriousness of their plight, and the naive way in which he accepted the coming of his friend as a matter of course, irritated the man, who listened in scowling silence.

"Blood River Jack was right," Charlie went on. "I thought he just wanted a chance to sleep for a day. Pretty good storm, isn't it? Say, Bill, how did he know it was going to snow?"

"Look here, young man," Bill replied wrathfully, "do you realize that we are in a mighty bad fix, right this minute? And that it is your fault? And that there was only about one chance in a thousand that I would find you? And that if we ever get out of this, and your Uncle Appleton don't give you a darn good whaling, I will?" The man felt a small body press close against him in the darkness.

"Honest, Bill, I'm sorry," a subdued voice answered. "I thought Jack was fooling, and I did want to show 'em I could kill something bigger than a rabbit. You aren't mad, are you, Bill? I hope Eth won't worry; we'll prob'ly have to stay here all night, won't we?"

"All night! Won't worry! Don't you know that this is a regular blizzard—the kind that kills men at their own doors—and that it may last for a week? And here we are with no fire-wood, and nothing to eat! The chances are mighty good that we'll never see camp again—and you pipe up and hope your sister won't worry!"

Charlie leaned over closer against Carmody's body.

"Why, we've got to get back, Bill!" he said, and his voice was very earnest now. "We're all Eth's got—you and me—and she needs us."

The boy felt a sudden tightening of the muscles beneath the heavy mackinaw, and the quick gasp of an indrawn breath. A big arm stole about his shoulders. The harshness was gone from Bill's voice, and when he spoke the sound fell softly upon the culprit's ears.

"Sure, kid, we'll get back. Buck up! We've got a fighting chance, and that's all we need—men like you and me. Life up here is a hard game, kid, but we're no quitters! This is just one of the rough places in the long, long trail.

"And, say, kid—just man to man—I want you always to remember that—she needs you—and some day she may need you bad. This St. Ledger may be all right, but——"

"St. Ledger!" The voice of the boy cut sharply upon the darkness. "Say, Bill, you aren't going to marry Blood River Jack's sister, are you?"

"What!"

"Why, Blood River Jack's sister, you know, that helped fish you out of the river."

"Lord! No! What ever put that into your head?"

"Blood River Jack told us when we were coming out about you—only we didn't know it was you, then. And he said that his sister was pretty, and she loved you, and she went down the river with you for three or four days, or something. And Eth thinks you love this half-breed girl. And, maybe, if you did marry her, Eth would marry St. Ledger; but she don't love him."

Bill sat suddenly erect, and the arm about the boy's shoulder tightened and shook him roughly.

"Look here! How do you know? I read an account of their engagement 'way along last winter."

"That was a dang lie! 'Cause I was in the den when she called St. Ledger up about it. She gave him the darndest talking to he ever got, and she told him she never would marry him as long as she lived. And Eth does love you! And you ought to heard her stick up for you when old——"

The boy stopped abruptly, suddenly remembering his uncle's injunction of silence. "There's an old dead tree right close to the door of the cave," he added hastily. "We might get some wood off that."

"What were you saying?" inquired Bill. "Never mind the wood."

"Nothing—I forget, I mean. Come on, let's get some wood—I'm hungry."

And in spite of his most persistent efforts, not another word could Bill Carmody get out of the youngster, except the mournful soliloquy that:

"I bet Uncle Appleton will whale me—anyway, he couldn't whale as hard as you."

In the thick blackness of the storm the man groped blindly near the snow-choked entrance to the den, guided in his search for the dead tree by the voice of the boy from the interior.

It was no easy task to twist off the dead limbs and carry them one by one to the cavern where the boy piled them against the wall. At length, however, it was accomplished, and Bill crept in and whittled a pile of fine shavings.

A few minutes later the flicker of a tiny flame flashed up, the shavings ignited, and the narrow cavity lighted to the crackle of the fire. Together they skinned the rabbit which the dead lynx had dropped, and soon they were busily engaged in roasting it over the flames.

The two were far from comfortable. Despite the fact that the fire had been built as near as possible to the entrance, the smoke whipped back into their faces. The air became blue and heavy, they coughed, and tears streamed from their eyes at the sting of it.

"I'm thirsty," said the boy, as he finished his portion of the rabbit. "I guess we'll have to eat snow; there's nothing to melt it in."

"Never eat snow," the man cautioned as his eyes swept the barren interior.

"Why not?"

"It will burn you out. I don't know why, but when a man starts eating snow, it's all off."

Directly in front of him, in the rock floor, was a slight depression, and with a stick Bill scraped the fire close to this natural basin and filled it with dry snow. At the end of ten minutes the snow had melted, leaving a pool of filthy, black water.

"It's the best we can do," laughed the man as the boy made a wry face as he gulped down a swallow of the bitter floor-washing.

They set about skinning the loup-cervier, and spread the pelt upon the floor for a robe.

"We'll have to tackle the cat for breakfast," grinned Bill.

"Oh, this is fun!" cried the boy. "It's like getting cast away and living in a cave, like you read about." But the humor of the situation failed to enthuse Bill, who lighted his pipe and stared moodily into the tiny fire.

The two spent a most uncomfortable night, their brief snatches of sleep being interrupted by long hours of wakefulness when they huddled close to the small blaze.

The scarcity of wood and the danger of suffocation precluded the building of an adequate fire, and the miserable night wore interminably upon the nerves of the imprisoned pair.

At last the dull gray light of morning dispersed the gloom, and the two crept to the snow-choked door.

The storm raged unabated, and their eyes could not penetrate the opaque whiteness of the powdery snow. Bill gathered more firewood, cut up the lynx, and roasted the hams, shoulders, and back.

The meat was dry and stringy, with a disagreeable, strong flavor that savored intimately of the rancid odor of the den. Nevertheless, they devoured a great quantity of the tough, unpalatable food, washing it down with bitter drafts from the pool of dirty snow-water, thick with ashes and the pungent animal reek.

Again the man filled his pipe and sat gazing out upon the whirling void.

"Bill, let's try it," said a voice at his elbow. "She's waiting for us—and worrying."

Carmody glanced quickly into the determined little face. The boy had voiced his own thoughts to the letter, and he remained long without speaking, carefully weighing the chances.

"It's better than staying here," pursued the youngster; "'Cause, if we don't snufficate, we'll starve to death, or freeze. We can tie us to each other so we won't get lost, and all we got to do is stick to the river. I can make it if you can," he added naively.

Bill grinned, and then his eyes became serious and he began methodically to stow the remains of the roast cat into his pockets.

"It's going to be an awful pull, kid. You are a man, now, and I'll give it to you straight—maybe we'll make it, and maybe we won't. But I'd hate to 'snufficate'—and she is worrying. We'll try it—and God help us, if we don't keep the river."

The skin of the lynx was cut into strips and fashioned into a rawhide line which Bill made fast to their belts, leaving plenty of slack to allow free use of the rackets. The rifle was left in the cave, and, muffled to the ears, the two stepped out into the storm.

Bill judged it to be well after noon when a sudden tightening of the line brought him to an abrupt halt.

Many times during the long hours in which they forged slowly ahead had the line gone taut as the boy fell in the snow, but each time it was followed by a wriggling and tugging, and the youngster scrambled gamely to his feet and floundered on in the wake of his big friend.

But this time Carmody waited in vain for the movement of the line that would tell him that the boy was regaining his feet—the line remained taut, and Bill turned and groped in the snow. He lifted the boy to his feet, but the small body sagged limply against his own, and the head rolled weakly.

He shook him roughly and, with his lips close to the boy's ear, shouted words of encouragement. But his only answer was a dull look from the half-closed eyes, and a sleepily muttered jumble of words, in which he made out: "Can't make it—all in—go on—she does love you."

Again and again he tried to rouse him, but all to no purpose; the boy had battled bravely to the end of his endurance, and now only wanted to be let alone. Bill sat beside him in the snow and, sheltering him as best he could from the sting of the wind-driven particles, produced a piece of the meat from his pocket.

The boy gnawed it feebly, and the food revived him somewhat, so that for a few rods he staggered on, but the line again tightened, and this time the man knew that it was useless to attempt to arouse his little companion.

Hurriedly removing his mackinaw, he wrapped it around the body of the boy and, by means of a "squaw hitch" sling, swung him to his back. The boy's dangling rackets hindered his movement, and he slashed the thongs and left them in the snow.

Then, straining the last atom of his vitality, he plunged ahead.

The early darkness of the North country settled about the staggering man. His progress was painfully slow and, without sense of direction, he wallowed forward, stumbling, falling, struggling to his feet only to fall again a few rods farther on.

The weight of the boy seemed to crush him into the snow, and each time it became harder and harder to regain his feet against the merciless rush of the blizzard.

He lost all hope of making camp. He did not know whether it was near or far, he only knew that he was upon the river, and that he must push on and on.

He realized dully that he might easily have passed the rollways hours ago. He even considered doubling back; but what was the use? If he passed them once, he would pass them again.

Every drop of his fighting blood was up. He would push on to the end. He would die, of course; but he wouldn't die yet! And when he did die, he would fall to die—he would never lie down to die!

It was not far off, he knew—that fall, when he would never get up. He wondered who would find them; Blood River Jack, probably. As he leaned into the whirling, cutting wind, he thought of Jeanne and of his promise to Wa-ha-ta-na-ta.

His fists clenched, and a few more rods were gained. He thought of Ethel, and of what Charlie had told him in the cave:

"She needs us; we're all she's got—you and me."

Again the fists in the heavy mittens clenched, and more rods were covered. It was growing black; the white smother of snow ceased to dance before his eyes. His advance now was hesitating, dogged; each step became a measure of time.

He reeled suddenly against an unyielding object. A tree, he thought, and grasped it for support as he struggled to get his bearings. He was off the river; yet, when had he ascended the bank?

The tree felt smooth to the touch, and he moved his mittens up and down the trunk. Suddenly he realized that it was no tree, but a skinned pole. His numbed brain groped dully as his hands traveled up and down its smooth length.

At the height of his waist he encountered a rope, and at the feel of the heavy line the blood surged to his head, clearing his brain.

"The water-hole!" he cried thickly. "They've roped off the water-hole!" Frantically he pulled himself along, hand over hand. The rope seemed endless, stretching from stake to stake.

He was ascending the bank now at the foot of the rollways—and, at the top was the camp!

He exerted his strength to the uttermost ounce, heaving and lifting with the huge muscles of his legs, and pulling with his arms until it seemed they must be torn from his shoulders, inching himself along, gasping, sweating, straining.

The incline grew steeper, his frozen mittens slipped, the guide-rope tore from his grasp, and he pitched heavily backward into the soft smother.

He struggled helplessly. Something seemed pressing him down, down—at last he was home. He had won out against the terrible odds, and the boy was safe.

He had brought him back to her, and now he must sleep. How warm and comfortable it was in the bunk. He did not know a man could be so sleepy.

What was it the girl was singing as he passed her window only a few nights ago—when he paused in the darkness of the clearing to listen?

Dreamily the words floated through his brain:

"And the women are weeping and wringing their hands For those who will never come back to the town."

But he had come back. He smiled vaguely; they needn't wring their hands and weep—and the rest of it:

"For men must work, and women must weep, And the sooner it's over the sooner to sleep, And good-by to the bar and its moaning."

Sleep! That's what he needed—sleep. He could sleep forever and ever, here in his warm, warm bunk. And the moaning of the bar—he liked that; he could hear it moaning now—roaring and moaning.

Bill Carmody closed his eyes. The fine, sifting snow came and covered his body and the smaller body of the boy who was lashed firmly to his broad back—and all about him the blizzard howled and roared and moaned.

And it was night!



CHAPTER XLIII

IN CAMP AGAIN

The violence of the storm precluded the use of horses about the camp, and the trail that slanted from the clearing to the water-hole was soon drifted high with snow, rendering useless the heavy tank-sled. Fallon, who had been placed in temporary charge of the camp, told the men into water-shifts; barrels were lashed to strong sleds and man-hauled to the top of the bank, where the guide-rope had been run to the water-hole.

The men of the shift formed a long line reaching from the sled to the river, and the water dipped from the hole cut in the ice was passed from man to man in buckets to be dumped into the barrels and distributed between the stables, cook-shack, bunk-house, and "house."

Darkness had fallen when the men of the afternoon shift wallowed toward the river upon the last trip of the second day of the great blizzard. The roar of the wind as it hurled the frozen particles against their cold-benumbed faces drowned their muttered curses as, thirty strong, they pushed and hauled the cumbersome sled to the top of the bank. Seizing the buckets, they strung out, making their way down the steep slope with one hand on the guide-rope.

Suddenly the foremost man stumbled and fell. He scrambled profanely to his knees and began feeling about in the thick darkness for his bucket. His mittened hand came into contact with the object which, protruding from the snow, had tripped him, and with a vicious wrench he endeavored to remove it from the trail. It yielded a little, but remained firmly imbedded.

With a wild yell he forgot his bucket and began digging and clawing in the snow, for the object he grasped was the bent ash edge of a snowshoe, and firmly lashed in the center of the webbing was the moccasined foot of a man.

Other men came, floundering and sprawling over each other in the darkness, and the word was bellowed from lips to listening ear that a man lay buried beneath the drift.

"Dig! Ye tarriers!" roared Fallon as his heavy mittens gouged into the snow. "Dig! Ut's th' boss!" he yelled into the ear of the nearest man. "Oi know thim rackets!"

And from lip to bearded lip the word passed, and the big men of the logs redoubled their efforts; but the fine snow had packed hard around the prostrate form, and it was many minutes before they had uncovered him sufficiently to note the smaller body lashed tightly upon his back. The frozen lash was soon severed and the two exanimate bodies lifted in eager hands.

Buckets were left to snow under as the men crowded up the bank, howling into each other's ears. Big Stromberg, who bore the boss in his arms, was propelled up the steep slope by the men who crowded about him, pushing, pulling, hauling—the ground-gaining, revolving wedge of the old days of mass formation in football.

"To th' office wid um!" roared Fallon in Stromberg's ear as they milled across the clearing. "Th' b'ys'll crowd th' bunk-house till they hindher more thin hilp!"

The boy responded quickly to vigorous treatment and stimulants and was removed to his own bunk and placed under the able care of his Aunt Margaret and Mrs. Sheridan.

In the office Ethel Manton, white-faced and silent, watched breathlessly the efforts of Appleton and Blood River Jack to revive the exhausted and half-frozen foreman. The lumber magnate unscrewed the silver cap from a morocco-covered flask and poured out a generous dose of liquor; but before it reached the unconscious man's lips the half-breed stayed his hand.

"M's'u' Bill drinks no whisky," he said. "Even in the time of his great sickness would he drink no whisky; and if you give him whisky he will be very angry."

Appleton paused and glanced curiously from the face of the half-breed to the still form upon the bunk, and the other continued:

"It is strange—I do not know—but he told it to Jeanne one day—that, in the great city of the white man is a girl he loves. He used to drink much whisky, and for that reason she sent him from her—and now he drinks no whisky—even though this girl has married another."

Ethel stared at the speaker, wide-eyed, and the pallor of her face increased.

"Married another!" she gasped.

Jacques regarded her gravely. "I know nothing except it was told me by Jeanne," he returned—"how he talked in the voice of the fever-spirit, that this girl would marry another. In the paper he read it—but even so, will he drink no whisky. One week ago did he not hear how one night in the bunk-house Leduc tried to make the little boy drink whisky? And did he not hunt up Leduc the next morning, and, upon the skidway, smash the nose of him and knock four teeth from his jaw?"

The guide paused, and Appleton slowly screwed the silver top to his flask and returned it to his pocket.

"Upon the stove is a pot of very strong coffee which Daddy Dunnigan told me to bring," Jacques went on; "and he is even now making broth in the cook-shack. M's'u' Bill cannot die. The strong coffee and the good broth will bring him back to life; for he is called in the woods The-Man-Who-Cannot-Die.

"If he could die he would die in the blizzard. For, since blizzards were known, has no man done a thing like this—to search for two days and a night for one boy lost in the snow, and carry him home in safety."

The half-breed finished, and the girl, with a low cry, sank into a chair and, leaning forward upon the desk, buried her face in her arms while her shoulders shook with the violence of her sobbing.

Appleton crossed to her side and laid a hand gently upon her shoulder.

"Come, Ethel," he said; "this has been too much for you. Let me take you to the house."

But the girl shook her head. She raised her eyes, wet with tears, and with an effort controlled her voice.

"My place is here—with him," she said softly as she arose, and, walking to the side of the cot, looked down at the set face of the unconscious man. "Leave me alone now. There is nothing you can do. I will stay with him while you sleep. Draw your cot close to the wall, and if I need you I will knock. Jacques will go to the cook-shack," she added, turning to the half-breed, "and when the broth is ready bring it to me."

The men obeyed without question, and as the office door closed behind them the girl dropped to her knees beside the bunk and, throwing her arms about the man's neck, pressed her soft cheek close against his bearded face.

The little tin lamp in its bracket beside the row of books on the top of the desk was turned low and its yellow light illuminated dimly the interior of the rough room. She slipped into an easier position and, seated upon the floor at the edge of the low bunk, drew his head close against her breast. At the touch—the feel of this strong man lying helpless in her arms—the long-pent yearning of her soul burst the studied bonds of its restraint and through her whole body swept the torrent of a mighty love.

Resistlessly it engulfed every nerve and fiber of her—wave upon wave of wild, primitive passion surged through her veins until her heart seemed bursting with the sweet, intense pain of it. Fiercely, in the hot, quick flame of passion, she strained him to her breast and her lips sought his in an abandon of feverish kisses.

And in that moment she knew that, in all the world of men, this man was her man. Always he had dominated her life—always she had known this great love, had fought against it, and feared it—and always she had held it in check.

But now, alone in the night, with the man lying helpless in her arms, this mighty passion welled to the bursting of restraint.

Her heart, subservient no longer to the will of her brain nor to creeds nor the tenets of convention, had this night come into its own, and she loved with the hot, savage mate-love of her pristine forebears.

The man's lips moved feebly upon hers and the closed eyelids fluttered. The girl sprang to the stove and returned a second later bearing a thick porcelain cup steaming with strong, black coffee.

She raised his head upon her arm and, holding the cup, let part of its contents trickle between his lips. He strangled weakly and swallowed.

Again she tilted the cup and again he swallowed. "My darling! My darling!" she sobbed as the fluttering eyelids half opened and the lips moved, and then leaned close to catch their faintest murmur.

"Jeanne," he whispered, "Jeanne, little girl——" and then the lips ceased to move, he shuddered slightly through the length of him, his eyes closed, and he slept.

The thick cup thudded heavily upon the floor and its contents splashed unheeded over her gown, as the girl sat motionless, staring past the bunk at the blank wall of logs.

The little nickel-plated alarm-clock ticked loudly in sharp, insistent threes, as she sat, white of face, with set lips and unwinking eyes staring stonily at the parallel logs of the wall.

Centuries of supercultivation and the refinement of breeding were concentrated in that white-lipped, cold-eyed stare, which is the heart-mask of the recherche woman of empire. And then—the mask dropped.

The inevitable artificiality of years of unconscious eugenic selection melted in a breath before the fierce onrush of savage emotion. The girl sprang to her feet as the hot blood surged to her face and paced frantically back and forth in a fume of primordial hate. Her small fists clenched till pink nails bit deep into soft, pink palms. Her nostrils dilated, quivering; her eyes flashed, and the breath hissed through her lips in deep sobs of impotent rage against the woman who had robbed her of this man's love and whose name was upon his lips in the first moment of his awakening.

She paused and gazed into the face of the man who was the hero of her fondest dreams—the man who had overcome obstacles, who defied danger and death, and had won, with his two hands and the great force of his personality, the respect and devotion of the big men of the rough country.

And he was hers—never had he been aught else but hers—and she had lost him! Wildly she resumed her restless pacing, while the words of the half-breed rang in her ears: "She is beautiful, and she loves him."

She halted abruptly, and in her eye flashed a momentary ray of hope; the man had said, not "He loves her," but, "She loves him." Could it be—but, no, there were his own words, spoken at the time of their first meeting in the gloom of this very room: "I forgot that I have not the right—that there is another."

And was it not her name that sprang to his lips in the half-consciousness of a few moments ago? In her mind she pictured the wild, dark beauty of the other girl, and in the jealous fury of her heart could have torn her in pieces with her two hands.

"M's'u' Bill drinks no whisky"—the dream of her life had been realized, but in the realization she had been beaten—all her hopes and prayers, the long, bitter hours of her soul-anguish, which burned and gnawed beneath the stoicism and apathy her environment demanded, had gone for naught, and she, who had borne the brunt of the long battle, was brushed aside and forgotten.

The spoils belonged to another—and that other, an Indian!



CHAPTER XLIV

THE MISSING BONDS

The walls of the room seemed the restraining bars of a prison, shutting her apart from life and the right to love. She lifted the latch and flung open the door, standing upon the threshold amid the seething inrush of the storm.

The fine snow felt good against her throbbing temples, and she stared into the blackness whose whirling chaos voiced the violence of the heart-storm that raged within her breast. He had conquered the storm!

She shivered as an icy blast sent the snow-powder flying half across the room, closed the door, and resumed her tireless journey to and fro, to and fro, and at each turn she glanced at the sleeping man.

She dropped to her knees beside the bunk and looked long into his rugged face. He, too, had suffered. She remembered the deep hurt in his eyes at their parting. Yet he was not beaten.

She had sent him from her, heartsick and alone into the great world, and he had fought and conquered and earned a place among men.

And as the girl looked, her eyes grew tender and the pain in her heart seemed more than she could bear. When she rose to her feet the savage hatred was gone from her heart, and in its place was determination—the determination to win back the love of this man.

She, too, would fight, even as he had fought—and win. He had not been discouraged and beaten. She remembered the look upon his face as he strode toward her that morning on the skidway in search of Leduc.

Unconsciously her tiny fists doubled, her delicate white jaw squared, and her eyes narrowed to slits, even as his had narrowed—but her lips did not smile.

He was her man! She could give him more than this half-breed girl could give him, and she would fight to win back her own—that which had been her own from the first.

Almost at her feet upon the floor, just under the edge of the bunk where it had been carelessly tossed, lay his mackinaw of coarse, striped cloth. The girl stooped, drew it forth, and smoothed it out.

"His coat," she breathed almost reverently as she patted its rough folds. "He took it off and wrapped it around Charlie. Oh, it must have been terrible—terrible!"

She was about to hang it upon its peg when something fell to the floor with a sharp slap—a long, heavy envelope that had dropped from a ragged tear in the lining where the men had ripped it from the body of the boy.

She hung the garment upon its peg and stooped to recover the packet. The envelope was old, and had evidently been exposed to the action of water, for the flap gaped open and the edges were worn through at the ends. Upon one side was tightly bound a photograph, dim and indistinct from the rub of the coarse cloth.

Her lips tightened at the corners as she stepped to the desk and turned up the lamp. She would see what manner of girl it was who had scored so heavily against her in this battle of hearts. She held the picture close to the yellow flame and stared unbelievingly at the nearly effaced features.

With a swift movement she tore the encircling cord from the packet and examined it more closely. Her heart beat wildly, and the blood surged through her veins in great, joyous waves. For the photograph showed, not the dark features of the Indian girl, but—her own!

Worn almost beyond recognition it was, with corners peeled and rolled back from the warped and water-thickened mounting—but unmistakably her picture.

"He cares! He does care!" she repeated over and over. "Oh, my boy! My boy!" And then her eyes fell upon the thick envelope with its worn edges and open flap which lay unheeded upon the desk-top.

Mechanically she reached for it, and her hand came in contact with its thick, heavily engraved contents. She raised the papers to the light and stared; there were five in all, neatly folded, lying one upon another.

The green background of the topmost one was faded and streaked, and a thin, green wash had trickled over the edges of the others, staining them.

A yellow slip of paper fluttered to the desk. She picked it up and read the almost illegible, typewritten lines. It was a memorandum addressed to Strang, Liebhardt & Co., and bearing the faded signature of Hiram Carmody.

A sudden numbness overcame the girl. She sank slowly into the chair in front of the desk and stared dully from the yellowed slip of paper to the faded green bonds.

The room seemed suddenly cold, and she stared, unseeing, at her bloodless finger-tips. She tried to think—to concentrate her mind upon the present—but her brain refused to act, and she muttered helplessly:

"The bonds—the bonds—he took the bonds!"

Like one in a dream, she arose and replenished the fire in the little air-tight. It had burned almost to ashes.

She watched the yellow flames lick hungrily at the bubbling pitch of the knot she had thrown upon the coals, and glanced from the flaring flames to the little pile of green papers—and back again at the little flames that climbed higher about the resinous chunk.

"Why not?" she muttered. "They can never prove he took them, and he would think that they were lost." For a long time she sat, thinking, and then she closed the stove and returned to the desk.

"I stood by him when his father accused him," she murmured, "when I thought he was innocent. And now—oh, I can't! I can't give him up!" Her voice quavered pitifully, and she clutched at the hurt in her throat.

"I can't!" she gasped again. "He needs me now. He is mine! Mine!" she cried fiercely. "We will work it out together. He was weak then—but now he is strong. I will tell him that I know, and persuade him to return them. And then he will be clean—brave and strong and clean!"

She started nervously at the sound of a fumbling at the latch. Hastily catching up the bonds, she thrust them into the bosom of her gown and turned to face Blood River Jack, who entered, bearing a steaming pail of broth and a larger pail covered with a clean white cloth.

Behind him Daddy Dunnigan noisily stamped the snow from his feet. The old man hobbled to the side of the bunk and looked intently into the face of the sleeper, and, stooping, held his ear close to the man's heart.

With a satisfied nod he turned to the girl, who stood close by his side.

"He's shlaypin' foine," he said, and the little red-rimmed eyes looked straight into the eyes of blue. "But, miss, hear-rt-hunger has kilt more good min thin belly-hunger—ye'll foind th' broth in yon buckut."

He joined the half-breed, who waited in silence. At the door he turned and again addressed the girl.

"In th' big buckut's ye're oun snack. Ate ut befoor ut gits cowld. Phwin ye're done, wake um up an' make um dhrink some coffee an' all he c'n howld av th' broth. He's th' bist man in th' woods, an' ut's up to you to pull um t'rough."

Before the girl could reply the door closed and the two men were swallowed up in the storm.

Ethel was surprised to find that she was hungry, and the appetizing luncheon which old Daddy Dunnigan had carefully prepared and packed for her was soon disposed of.

The hands of the little alarm-clock pointed to two as she crossed and knelt at the side of the sleeping man. She leaned over and kissed his forehead—his lips—and whispered softly into his ear.

"Bill—Bill, dear."

She blushed at the sound of the word, and glanced hurriedly about the room, but there was no one to hear, and the man slept on undisturbed by the tiny whisper. She laid a hand upon his shoulder and shook him gently.

"Bill—wake up!" He stirred slightly, and a sigh escaped him.

"Come, wake up, dear, you must eat."

This time she did not blush at the word, and the shaking became more vigorous. Carmody moved uneasily, grunted, and opened his eyes. Ethel started at the steady gaze of the grey eyes so close to her own. The grey eyes closed and he passed a hand slowly across them.

"A dream," he muttered, and the girl leaned closer.

"No, Bill," she whispered, "it is not a dream. I am here—Ethel—don't you know me?"

"Ethel," he repeated, and the name seemed to linger on his lips. "We must get back to her, kid, she is worrying—come—mush, kid—mush!" The girl laid a soft hand on his forehead and smoothed back the tangled hair.

"Bill, dear," she whispered, with her lips close to his, "Charlie is safe. And you are safe, here in the office—with me."

Bill seemed suddenly to grasp the situation.

"Ethel!" he exclaimed. And then, in a dull, tired voice, "I—I brought him back to you." His eyes closed, and he turned his face toward the wall.

Ethel poured a cup of coffee from the pot on the stove, and returning, seated herself upon the edge of the bunk. Deftly her arm slipped under his head, and she held the cup to his lips. Bill drank greedily to the last drop, and the girl filled another cup with broth.