he saw, or all that she realized by her subconscious self. Everything
in the world seemed small. How calm it was even with the fury within!

"Tell me," she said, quietly--"tell me how you are able to save Haman?"

"He not kill Wakely. It is my brudder Fadette dat kill and get away. Haman
he is drunk, and everyt'ing seem to say Haman he did it, an' every one
know Haman is not friend to Wakely. So the juree say he must be hanging.
But my brudder he go to die with hawful bad cold queeck, an' he send for
the priest an' for me, an' tell all. I go to Governor with the priest, an'
Governor gif me dat writing here." He tapped his breast, then took out a
wallet and showed the paper to her. "It is life of dat Haman, _voici_! And
so I safe him for my brudder. Dat was a bad boy, Fadette. He was bad all
time since he was a baby, an' I t'ink him pretty lucky to die on his bed,
an' get absolve, and go to purgatore. If he not have luck like dat he go
to hell, an' stay there."

He sighed, and put the wallet back in his breast carefully, his eyes half
shut with weariness, his handsome face drawn and thin, his limbs lax with
fatigue.

"If I get Askatoon before de time for _dat_, I be happy in my heart, for
dat brudder off mine he get out of purgatore bime-bye, I t'ink."

His eyes were almost shut, but he drew himself together with a great
effort, and added desperately: "No sleep. If I sleep it is all smash. Man
say me I can get Askatoon by dat time from here, if I go queeck way across
lak'--it is all froze now, dat lak'--an' down dat Foxtail Hills. Is it so,
ma'm'selle?"

"By the 'quick' way if you can make it in time," she said; "but it is no
way for the stranger to go. There are always bad spots on the ice--it is
not safe. You could not find your way."

"I mus' get dere in time," he said, desperately.

"You can't do it--alone," she said. "Do you want to risk all and lose?"

He frowned in self-suppression. "Long way, I no can get dere in time?" he
asked.

She thought a moment. "No; it can't be done by the long way. But there is
another way--a third trail, the trail the Gover'ment men made a year ago
when they came to survey. It is a good trail. It is blazed in the woods
and staked on the plains. You cannot miss. But--but there is so little
time." She looked at the clock on the wall. "You cannot leave here much
before sunrise, and--"

"I will leef when de moon rise, at eleven," he interjected.

"You have had no sleep for two