see, old-timer?" Ben asked. "I wish I could see too."

He brought his senses to the finest focus, trying hard to understand. He
was aware only of the strained silence at first. Then here and there,
about the dimmining circle of firelight, he heard the soft rustle of
little feet, the subdued crack of a twig or the scratch of a dead leaf.
The forest smells--of which there is no category in heaven or
earth--reached him with incredible clarity. These were faint, vaguely
exciting smells, some of them the exquisite fragrances of summer
flowers, others beyond his ken. And presently two small, bright circles
appeared in a distant covert, glowed once, and then went out.

By peering closely, with unwinking eyes, he began to see other
twin-circles of green and yellow light. Yet they were furtive little
radiances--vanishing swiftly--and they were nothing of which to be
afraid.

"They _are_ out to-night," he murmured. "No wonder you're excited,
Fenris. What is it--some celebration in the forest?"

There was no possible explanation. Foresters know that on certain nights
the wilderness seems simply to teem with life--scratchings and rustlings
in every covert--and on other nights it is still and lifeless as a
desert. The wild folk were abroad to-night and were simply paying
casual, curious visits to Ben's fire.

Once more Ben glanced at the wolf. The animal no longer crouched. Rather
he was standing rigid, his head half-turned and lifted, gazing away
toward a distant ridge behind the lake. A wilderness message had reached
him, clear as a voice.

But presently Ben understood. Throbbing through the night he heard a
weird, far-carrying call--a long-drawn note, broken by half-sobs--the
mysterious, plaintive utterance of the wild itself. Yet it was not an
inanimate voice. He recognized it at once as the howl of a wolf, one of
Fenris' wild brethren.

The creature at his feet started as if from a blow. Then he stood
motionless, listening, and the cry came the second time. He took two
leaps into the darkness.

Deeply moved, Ben watched him. The wolf halted, then stole back to his
master's side. He licked the man's hand with his warm tongue, whining
softly.

"What is it, boy?" Ben asked. "What do you want me to do?"

The wolf whined louder, his eyes luminous with ineffable appeal. Once
more he leaped into the shadows, pausing as if to see if Ben would
follow him.

The man shook his head, rather soberly. A curious, excited light w