ain the trail of
the new presence upon Carboona, the dread of which had caused her to
seek another den. The trail went straight into the forest, in a
south-easterly direction. With the utmost caution the mother-wolf took
it up, in a swift, noiseless lope, passing deeper and deeper into the
vast wilderness of spruce and pine that went descending, always
descending, towards the basin of the world. But long before it reached
the lowest levels, the trail turned due east through the mighty gorge
that sucks the prairie wind into Carboona's bosom like an enormous
throat. Through the gorge went the old wolf, sniffing, peering,
listening--every sense strained to the utmost, for now the buckskin
scent was strong upon the ground, and the trail was very new.

Just where the gorge began to deepen at its western extremity, the wolf
caught sight of a creature moving, the like of which she had never seen
before. It was like a wolf that went upon its hind legs, and yet it was
certainly not a wolf. Its gait was slow, yet certain, with a free,
elastic movement that seemed to drink the wind.

The wolf slackened her pace, crouching so low as she went that the
longer hairs on her belly swept the ground. Nearer and nearer she drew
in her soundless progress, and as the distance lessened between her and
her mysterious foe, the green fire in her eyes glittered more
dangerously, for now her senses told her what her heart and brain had
already guessed. _She saw the little shape that lay in the Indian's
arm!_

And in spite of the unseen danger slowly but surely drawing upon him
down the dark throat of the gorge, the Indian's elastic stride never
faltered, as he proceeded towards the spot where he had hobbled his pony
beside the camp of the evening before. And yet, before it was too late,
the warning came.

He heard nothing; he saw nothing. That strange sense which seems to
belong to the wild creatures, and the wild people, only, woke in the
dark places of his brain. He turned his head quickly over his shoulder,
sweeping the gorge with a piercing glance. He saw the fir-trees bracing
themselves in the clefts of the precipice; he saw the tangled curtains
of clematis and vine; he saw the ancient tree-trunks that went on
dropping to decay through a thousand moons. One thing only he
missed--the gaunt grey shadow where two points of light smouldered dully
in the shelter of a rock.

Having satisfied himself that nothing living was in sight, he contin