o recover footing, tripped
again, and fell backward to the ground. His head struck a jutting
root, and he was half-stunned and could struggle but feebly. In the
fall she had heard the feathered swish of an arrow darting past, and
she covered his body with hers, as with a shield, her arms holding him
tightly, her face and lips pressed upon his neck.

Then it was that Keen rose up from a tangled thicket a score of feet
away. He looked about him with care. The fight had swept on and the
cry of the last man was dying away. There was no one to see. He fitted
an arrow to the string and glanced at the man and woman. Between her
breast and arm the flesh of the man's side showed white. Keen bent the
bow and drew back the arrow to its head. Twice he did so, calmly and
for certainty, and then drove the bone-barbed missile straight home
to the white flesh, gleaming yet more white in the dark-armed,
dark-breasted embrace.

THE LAW OF LIFE

Old Koskoosh listened greedily. Though his sight had long since faded,
his hearing was still acute, and the slightest sound penetrated to the
glimmering intelligence which yet abode behind the withered forehead,
but which no longer gazed forth upon the things of the world. Ah! that
was Sit-cum-to-ha, shrilly anathematizing the dogs as she cuffed
and beat them into the harnesses. Sit-cum-to-ha was his daughter's
daughter, but she was too busy to waste a thought upon her broken
grandfather, sitting alone there in the snow, forlorn and helpless.
Camp must be broken. The long trail waited while the short day refused
to linger. Life called her, and the duties of life, not death. And he
was very close to death now.

The thought made the old man panicky for the moment, and he stretched
forth a palsied hand which wandered tremblingly over the small heap
of dry wood beside him. Reassured that it was indeed there, his hand
returned to the shelter of his mangy furs, and he again fell to
listening. The sulky crackling of half-frozen hides told him that the
chief's moose-skin lodge had been struck, and even then was being
rammed and jammed into portable compass. The chief was his son,
stalwart and strong, head man of the tribesmen, and a mighty hunter.
As the women toiled with the camp luggage, his voice rose, chiding
them for their slowness. Old Koskoosh strained his ears. It was the
last time he would hear that voice. There went Geehow's lodge! And
Tusken's! Seven, eight, nine; only the shaman's