mping
on this side of Grizzly River, and he stayed to eat with me. He said
his name was Lounsbury. I've never heard of him since."

The surface lights died in her eyes. "Then that doesn't help us much,
except to know that he got that far, at least," she went on. "I'll tell
you the whole thing, simply; maybe it will help you in deciding where to
look for him. He was twenty-seven then--and he'd spent the fortune
his father left him. He had to have more, and he came up here--to
look for gold.

"Like many other men--before him," Bill interrupted gravely.

"He had some sort of definite plan--a vacation place to go--but he
never told me what it was. He told me he was going into Clearwater. He
had to have money--he was in debt and besides, he was engaged to marry
me. The last word I ever heard of him was a note he wrote from
Bradleyburg. I was just a girl then--and I've waited ever since.
His friends, his aunt, sometimes even his uncle thought that he was
dead. I've always felt, just as sure as I am here, that he was still
alive--and in some trouble--and he couldn't come back. Mr. Lounsbury
has hired detectives, but none of them have ever made a real search.
He's financing this trip now--I've been able to persuade him at last to
make one great try to find him. What's what we've hired you to do."

"It's a big order," Bill spoke softly. "There's just one thing we can
do--to look into the country where he's gone and try to trace him.
Every man who goes through Clearwater leaves his mark--there's not so
many of them that their trails get crossed. My plan would be to watch
for the camps he made--there'd be some sign of 'em yet--the trees he
cut and the trails he blazed--and trace him clear to the Valley of the
Yuga."

"And what is there?"

Bill's ears, trained to the silences of the woodland, caught the almost
imperceptible tremor in her voice. "There are a few Indians who have
their tents there--trappers and fishers--and I know how to get
things out of 'em. If he's passed that way, they'd know about it. If
he hasn't--something has happened to him--somewhere between here and
there. He couldn't have remained out of sight so long."

"I want you to make every try. I can't bear--to give up."

Even this woodsman, knowing men to the heart but stranger to the world
of women, knew that she meant what she said. She wasn't of the mold
that gives up quickly. For all her cool exterior, her impersonal voice,
the