n sought to regain his lost sense of
direction. Once faintly, in the far-away, as the storm lifted for a
moment, he thought that he glimpsed a pole and hurried toward it with
new hope, only to find it a stalwart trunk of a dead tree, rearing
itself above the mound-like drifts. Discouraged, half-beaten, he tried
again, only to wander farther than ever from the trail. Dawn found him
at last, floundering hopelessly in snow-screened woods, going on toward
he knew not where.

A half-hour, then he stopped. Fifty feet away, almost covered by the
changing snows, a small cabin showed faintly, as though struggling to
free itself from the bonds of white, and Houston turned toward it
eagerly. His numbed hands banged at the door, but there came no
answer. He shouted; still no sound came from within, and he turned the
creaking, protesting knob.

The door yielded, and climbing over the pile of snow at the step,
Houston guided his snowshoes through the narrow door, blinking in the
half-light in an effort to see about him. There was a stove, but the
fire was dead. At the one little window, the curtain was drawn tight
and pinned at the sides to the sash. There was a bed--and the form of
some one beneath the covers. Houston called again, but still there
came no answer. He turned to the window, and ripping the shade from
its fastenings, once more sought the bed, to bend over and to stare in
dazed, bewildered fashion, as though in a dream. He was looking into
the drawn, haggard features of an unconscious woman, the eyes
half-open, yet unseeing, one emaciated hand grasped about something
that was shielded by the covers. Houston forced himself even closer.
He touched the hand. He called:

"Agnes!"

The eyelids moved slightly; it was the only evidence of life, save the
labored, irregular breathing. Then the hand moved, clutchingly.
Slowly, tremblingly, Houston turned back an edge of the blankets,--and
stood aghast.

On her breast was a baby--dead!

CHAPTER XX

There was no time for conjectures. The woman meant a human life,--in
deadly need of resuscitation, and Barry leaped to his task.

Warmth was the first consideration, and he hurried to the sheet-iron
stove, with its pile of wood stacked behind, noticing, as he built the
fire, cans and packages of provisions upon the shelf over the small
wooden table, evidence that some one other than the woman herself had
looked after the details of stocking the cabin with