was startled by a low whine from White Fang. He had got
upon his feet, his ears cocked towards the door, and he was listening
intently. A moment later, Matt heard a footstep. The door opened, and
Weedon Scott stepped in. The two men shook hands. Then Scott looked
around the room.

"Where's the wolf?" he asked.

Then he discovered him, standing where he had been lying, near to the
stove. He had not rushed forward after the manner of other dogs. He
stood, watching and waiting.

"Holy smoke!" Matt exclaimed. "Look at 'm wag his tail!"

Weedon Scott strode half across the room toward him, at the same time
calling him. White Fang came to him, not with a great bound, yet
quickly. He was awakened from self-consciousness, but as he drew near,
his eyes took on a strange expression. Something, an incommunicable
vastness of feeling, rose up into his eyes as a light and shone forth.

"He never looked at me that way all the time you was gone!" Matt
commented.

Weedon Scott did not hear. He was squatting down on his heels, face to
face with White Fang and petting him--rubbing at the roots of the ears,
making long caressing strokes down the neck to the shoulders, tapping the
spine gently with the balls of his fingers. And White Fang was growling
responsively, the crooning note of the growl more pronounced than ever.

But that was not all. What of his joy, the great love in him, ever
surging and struggling to express itself, succeeding in finding a new
mode of expression. He suddenly thrust his head forward and nudged his
way in between the master's arm and body. And here, confined, hidden
from view all except his ears, no longer growling, he continued to nudge
and snuggle.

The two men looked at each other. Scott's eyes were shining.

"Gosh!" said Matt in an awe-stricken voice.

A moment later, when he had recovered himself, he said, "I always
insisted that wolf was a dog. Look at 'm!"

With the return of the love-master, White Fang's recovery was rapid. Two
nights and a day he spent in the cabin. Then he sallied forth. The sled-
dogs had forgotten his prowess. They remembered only the latest, which
was his weakness and sickness. At the sight of him as he came out of the
cabin, they sprang upon him.

"Talk about your rough-houses," Matt murmured gleefully, standing in the
doorway and looking on.

"Give 'm hell, you wolf! Give 'm hell!--an' then some!"

White Fang did not need the encouragement.