on its border to listen. He was
not disappointed, for within one hundred or two hundred yards of him, he
heard for the third time the ominous yelp of the wolf. Then all the
hunter showed itself in Batoche. He became, at once, a new man. The bent
form straightened, the languid limbs became nerved, the sinister eyes
shot fire, as if lighting the way before them, and the blank melancholy
features were turned and hardened into one single expression--watching.
In a moment he had determined the exact direction of the sound.
Cautiously he advanced from tree to tree, with inaudible footfall and
bated breath, until he reached the outskirts of a thicket. There he
expected to bring the wolf to bay. He peered long and attentively
through the branches.

"It is a den of wolves," he whispered to himself. "Not one pair of eyes,
but four or five pairs are glancing through the dark. I must make quick
work of the vermin. They must not be allowed to take their residences
for the winter so near my cabin."

Saying which he raised his carbine to his shoulder and pointed. His
finger was upon the trigger and was about to let go, when he felt the
barrel of his gun bent from its position and quietly but firmly
deflected towards the ground.

"Don't be a fool, Batoche. Keep your ammunition for other wolves than
these. You will soon need it all," said a voice in a low tone.

The hunter immediately recognized Barbin, a farmer of Beauport.

"What are you doing here?"

"No time for questions to-night. You will know later."

"And who are those in the thicket yonder?"

"My friends and yours."

Batoche shook his head dubiously, and muttered something about going
forward to satisfy himself by personal inspection. He was an enemy of
prowlers of all sorts, and must know with whom he had to deal before
abandoning the search.

A low whistle was heard and the thicket was instantaneously cleared.

Barbin tried to retain him, but the old man's temper rose, and he
snatched himself away.

"Don't be a fool, I say to you again, Batoche. You know who I am and you
must understand that I would not be out in such a place and on such a
night without necessary cause. These are my friends. For sufficient
reasons, they must not be known at present. Believe me, and don't
advance further. Besides they are now invisible."

"But why these strange cries?"

"The bark of the wolf is our rallying cry."

"The wolf!"

"Do you understand now?"

The old man passed