ps, apparently with extreme
caution, caused Philip to move quickly behind the embankment of the
road-bed. Two or three minutes later a man crossed into view. Philip
could not see his face distinctly, but by the tired droop of the
stranger's shoulders and his shuffling walk he guessed that what he had
first taken for caution was in reality the tedious progress of a man
nearing exhaustion. He wondered how he had missed him in his own
journey over the trail from the ridge mountains, for he had made twice
the progress of the stranger, and must surely have passed him somewhere
within the last mile or so. The fact that the man had come from the
direction of Fort o' God, that he was exhausted, and that he had
evidently concealed himself a little way back to avoid discovery, led
Philip to cut out diagonally across the plain so that he could follow
him and keep him in sight without being observed. Twice in the next
mile the nocturnal traveler stopped to rest, but no sooner had he
reached the first scattered shacks of the camp than he quickened his
steps, darting quickly among the shadows, and then stopped at last
before the door of a small log cabin within a pistol-shot of Philip's
own headquarters. The cabin was newly built, and Philip gave a low
whistle of surprise as he noted its location. He had, to a certain
degree, isolated his own camp home, building it a couple of hundred
yards back from the shore of the lake, where most of the other cabins
were erected. This new cabin was still a hundred yards farther back,
half hidden in a growth of spruce. He heard the click of a key in a
lock and the opening and closing of a door. A moment later a light
flared dimly against a curtained window.

Philip hurried across the open to the cabin occupied by himself and
MacDougall, the engineer. He tried the door, but it was barred. Then he
knocked loudly, and continued knocking until a light appeared within.
He heard the Scotchman's voice, close to the door.

"Who's there?" it demanded.

"None of your business!" retorted Philip, falling into the error of a
joke at the welcome sound of MacDougall's voice. "Open up!"

A bar slipped within. The door opened slowly. Philip thrust himself
against it and entered. In the pale light of the lamp he was confronted
by the red face of MacDougall, and a pair of little eyes that gleamed
menacingly. And on a line with MacDougall's face was an ugly-looking
revolver.

Philip stopped with a sudden uncomf