e dead.

And Jolly Roger even laughed, softly, under his breath.

"This is February," he said. "We ought to make it late in March. I mean
Cragg's Ridge, _Pied-Bot_."

After that they went on, traveling hard to reach their cabin before the
darkness of night, which would drop upon them like a thick blanket at
four o'clock. In these last hours there pressed even more heavily upon
Jolly Roger that growing realization of the vastness and emptiness of
the world. It was as if blindness had dropped from his eyes and he saw
the naked truth at last. Out of this world everything had emptied
itself until it held only Nada. Only she counted. Only she held out her
arms to him, entreating him to keep for her that life in his body which
meant so little in all other ways. He thought of one of the little worn
books which he carried in his shoulder-pack--Jeanne D'Arc. As she had
fought, with the guidance of God, so he believed the blue-eyed girl
down at Cragg's Ridge was fighting for him, and had sent her spirit out
in quest of him. And he was going back to her. _Going_!

The last word, as it came from his lips, meant that nothing would stop
them. He almost shouted it. And Peter answered.

In spite of their effort, darkness closed in on them. With the first
dusk of this night there came sudden lulls in which the blizzard seemed
to have exhausted itself. Jolly Roger read the signs. By tomorrow there
would be no storm and Breault the Ferret would be on the trail again,
along with Porter and Tavish.

It was his old craft, his old cunning, that urged him to go on.
Strangely, he prayed for the blizzard not to give up the ghost.
Something must be accomplished before its fury was spent; and he was
glad when after each lull he heard again the moaning and screeching of
it over the open spaces, and the slashing together of spruce tops where
there was cover. In a chaos of gloom they came to the low ridge which
reached across an open sweep of tundra to the finger of shelter where
the cabin was built. An hour later they were at its door. Jolly Roger
opened it and staggered in. For a space he stood leaning against the
wall while his lungs drank in the warmer air. The intake of his breath
made a whistling sound and he was surprised to find himself so near
exhaustion. He heard the thud of Peter's body as it collapsed to the
floor.

"Tired, _Pied-Bot_?"

It was difficult for his storm-beaten lips to speak the words.

Peter thumped his tail. The