ood;
and now she waited, rocking gently and sometimes crooning a plaintive
song of the coast to the restless child.

Tom West came in.

"Hush!"

"Is she sleepin' still?"

"Off an' on. She's in a deal o' pain. She cries out, poor lamb!" Dolly
stirred and whimpered. "Any sign of un, Tom?"

[Illustration: "If he comes by the bight he'll never get here
at all."]

"Tis not time."

"He might----"

"'Twill be hours afore he comes. I'm jus' wonderin'----"

"Hush!" Dolly moaned. "Ay, Tom?"

"Terry's but a wee feller. I'm wonderin' if he----"

The woman was confident. "He'll make it," she whispered.

"Ay; but if he's delayed----"

"He was there afore dusk. An' the doctor got underway across the
Bight----"

"He'll not come by the Bight!"

"He'll come by the Bight. I knows that man. He'll come by the
Bight--an' he'll----"

"If he comes by the Bight he'll never get here at all. The Bight's
breakin' up. There's rotten ice beyond the Spotted Horses. An'
Tickle-my-Ribs is----"

"He'll come. He'll be here afore----"

"There's a gale o' snow comin' down. 'Twill cloud the moon. A man
would lose hisself----"

"He'll come."

Bad-Weather Tom West went out again--to plod once more down the
narrows to the base of Blow-me-Down Dick and search the vague light of
the coast for the first sight of Doctor Rolfe. It was not time; he
knew that. There would be hours of waiting. It would be dawn before a
man could come by Thank-the-Lord and Mad Harry, if he left Afternoon
Arm even so early as dusk. And as for crossing the Bight--no man could
cross the Bight. It was blowing up too--clouds rising and a threat of
snow abroad. Bad-weather Tom glanced apprehensively toward the
northeast. It would snow before dawn. The moon was doomed. A dark
night would fall. And the Bight--Doctor Rolfe would never attempt to
cross the Bight----

* * * * *

Hanging between the hummock and the pan, the gaff shivering under his
weight, Doctor Rolfe slowly subsided toward the hummock. A toe
slipped. He paused. It was a grim business. The other foot held. The
leg, too, was equal to the strain. He wriggled his toe back to its
grip on the edge of the ice. It was an improved foothold. He turned
then and began to lift and thrust himself backward. A last thrust on
the gaff set him on his haunches on the Arctic hummock, and he thanked
Providence and went on. And on--and on! There was a deal of slippery
crawling to