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Even as he felt himself trembling strangely at Jean Croisset's words, Philip replied: "Always, Jean, I swear that." In the open door Josephine had paused for a moment, and was looking back. Then she disappeared. "Come," said Jean. "And may God have pity on you if you fail to keep your word in all you have promised, M'sieur Philip Darcambal.

"After I have looked into your pockets I will free your hands so that you can smoke. Are you comfortable?" "Comfortable be damned!" were the first words that fell from Howland's lips, and his blood boiled at the sociable way in which Croisset grinned down into his face. "So you're in it, too, eh? and that lying girl " The smile left Croisset's face. "Do you mean Meleese, M'seur Howland?" "Yes."

Before they had come to the edge of the black banskian forest which Jean had pointed out from the farther side of the plain, Howland saw that the pace was telling on the team. The leader was trailing lame, and now and then the whole pack would settle back in their traces, to be urged on again by the fierce cracking of Croisset's long whip.

Croisset's voice sounded in a shrill shout behind him, and at that warning cry in French the second figure sprang back into the gloom. But Howland had recognized it, and the chilled blood in his veins leaped into warm life again at the knowledge that it was Meleese who was trailing behind them on the second sledge!

See this white glistening surface over the first trail, M'seur, like a billion needle-points growing out of it? That is the work of three or four days' cold. The first sledge passed that long ago." Howland turned and picked up Croisset's rifle. The Frenchman watched him as he slipped a clip full of cartridges into the breech.

Up there " and he pointed still farther into the north "I know of a hundred men between the Athabasca and the bay who would kill you for what you have said. And it is not for Jean Croisset to listen to it here. I will kill you unless you take it back!" "God!" breathed Howland. He looked straight into Croisset's face. "I'm glad it's so Jean," he added slowly. "Don't you understand, man? I love her.

There was no visible sign of life, no breathing, no movement but their own, and yet Howland could feel the half-breed's hand clutch him nervously by the arm as they went step by step into the black and silent mystery of the place. Soon there came a fumbling of Croisset's hand at a latch and they passed through a second door. Then Jean struck a match.

For as the blow had fallen on his head he was sure that he had heard a woman's scream; and as he lay in the snow, dazed and choking, spending his last effort in his struggle for life, there had come to him, as if from an infinite distance, a woman's voice, and the words that it had uttered pounded in his tortured brain now as his head dropped weakly against Croisset's shoulder.

They had covered less than half of the distance to the caribou trail when in a small open space free of bush Croisset's voice rose sharply and the team stopped. "What do you think of it, M'seur?" he cried, pointing to the snow. "What do you think of that?" Barely cutting into the edge of the open was the broken crust of two sledge trails.

He was astonished at Croisset's words and more confused than ever at the half-breed's assurance that his life was no longer in immediate peril. To him this meant that Meleese had not only warned him but was now playing an active part in preserving his life, and this conclusion added to his perplexity.