lly
keen. She could wind a caribou two miles distant, and the presence of
man she could pick up at an even greater distance. On a still night she
had heard the splash of a trout half a mile away. And as these two
things--scent and hearing--became more and more developed in her, those
same senses became less active in Kazan.

He began to depend upon Gray Wolf. She would point out the hiding-place
of a partridge fifty yards from their trail. In their hunts she became
the leader--until game was found. And as Kazan learned to trust to her
in the hunt, so he began just as instinctively to heed her warnings. If
Gray Wolf reasoned, it was to the effect that without Kazan she would
die. She had tried hard now and then to catch a partridge, or a rabbit,
but she had always failed. Kazan meant life to her. And--if she
reasoned--it was to make herself indispensable to her mate. Blindness
had made her different than she would otherwise have been. Again nature
promised motherhood to her. But she did not--as she would have done in
the open, and with sight--hold more and more aloof from Kazan as the
days passed. It was her habit, spring, summer and winter, to snuggle
close to Kazan and lie with her beautiful head resting on his neck or
back. If Kazan snarled at her she did not snap back, but slunk down as
though struck a blow. With her warm tongue she would lick away the ice
that froze to the long hair between Kazan's toes. For days after he had
run a sliver in his paw she nursed his foot. Blindness had made Kazan
absolutely necessary to her existence--and now, in a different way, she
became more and more necessary to Kazan. They were happy in their swamp
home. There was plenty of small game about them, and it was warm under
the windfall. Rarely did they go beyond the limits of the swamp to hunt.
Out on the more distant plains and the barren ridges they occasionally
heard the cry of the wolf-pack on the trail of meat, but it no longer
thrilled them with a desire to join in the chase.

One day they struck farther than usual to the west. They left the swamp,
crossed a plain over which a fire had swept the preceding year, climbed
a ridge, and descended into a second plain. At the bottom Gray Wolf
stopped and sniffed the air. At these times Kazan always watched her,
waiting eagerly and nervously if the scent was too faint for him to
catch. But to-day he caught the edge of it, and he knew why Gray Wolf's
ears flattened, and her hindquarter