hearth and lay down with his head
on his paws and the little girl sat beside him watching the fire, her
head leaning wearily on his shoulder. Kate went to the door.

"It's almost night," she said. "Why isn't he here?"

"Buck, they couldn't have overtaken--"

She started. "Dan?"

Buck Daniels grinned reassuringly.

"Not unless his hoss is a pile of bones; if it has any heart in it,
Dan'll run away from anything on four legs. No call for worryin', Kate.
He's simply led 'em a long ways off and waited for evenin' before he
doubled back. He'll come back right enough. If they didn't catch him
that first run they'll never get the wind of him."

It quieted her for a time, but as the minutes slipped away, as the
darkness grew more and more heavy until a curtain of black fell across
the open door, they could see that she was struggling to control her
trouble, they could see her straining to catch some distant sound. Lee
Haines began to talk valiantly, to beguile the waiting time, and Buck
Daniels did his share with stories of their prospecting, but eventually
more and more often silences came on the group. They began to watch the
fire and they winced when a log crackled, or when the sap in a green
place hissed. By degrees they pushed farther and farther back so that
the light would not strike so fully upon them, for in some way it became
difficult to meet each other's eyes.

Only Joan was perfectly at ease. She played for a time with the ears of
Black Bart, or pried open his mouth and made him show the great white
fangs, or scratched odd designs on the hearth with pieces of charcoal;
but finally she lost interest in all these things and let her head lie
on the rough pelt of the wolf-dog, sound asleep. The firelight made her
hair a patch of gold.

Black Bart slept soundly, too, that is, as soundly as one of his nature
could sleep, for every now and then one of his ears twitched, or he
stirred a paw, or an eyelid quivered up. Yet they all started when he
jumped from his sleep into full wakefulness; the motion made Joan sit
up, rubbing her eyes, and Black Bart reached the center of the room
noiselessly. He stood facing the door, motionless.

"It's Dan," cried Kate. "Bart hears him! Good old Bart!"

The dog pointed up his nose, the hair about his neck bristled into a
ruff, and out of his quaking body came a sound that seemed to moan and
whimper from the distance at first, but drew nearer, louder, packed the
room with terr