hat she had
severed from her head. He was puzzled. And Nada dropped the knife, and
his curiosity increased when she tore a great piece out of her tattered
dress, and carefully wrapped the tress of hair in it. Then she drew
him to her again, and tied the knotted fold of dress securely about his
neck; after that she tore other strips from her dress, and wound them
about his neck until he felt muffled and half smothered.

And all the time she was talking to him in a half sobbing, excited
little voice, and the blood in Peter's body ran swifter, and the strange
thrill in him was greater. When she had finished she rose to her feet,
and stood there swaying back and forth, like one of the spruce-top
shadows, while she pointed up the moonlit trail.

"Go, Peter!" she cried softly. "Quick! Follow him, Peter--catch
him--bring him back! Mister Roger--Jolly Roger--go, Peter! Go--go--go--"

It was strange to Peter. But he was beginning to understand. He sniffed
in Jolly Roger's footprints, and then he looked up quickly, and saw
that it had pleased the girl. She was urging him on. He sniffed from one
footprint to another, and Nada clapped her hands and cried out that he
was right--for him to hurry--hurry--

Impulse, thought, swiftly growing knowledge of something to be done
thrilled in his brain. Nada wanted him to go. She wanted him to go to
Jolly Roger. And she had put something around his neck which she wanted
him to take with him. He whined eagerly, a bit excitedly. Then he began
to trot. Instinctively it was his test. She did not call him back. He
flattened his ears, listening for her command to return, but it did not
come. And then the thrill in him leapt over all other things. He was
right. He was not abandoning Nada. He was not running away. She WANTED
him to go!

The night swallowed him. He became a part of the yellow floods of its
moonlight, a part of its shifting shadows, a part of its stillness, its
mystery, its promise of impending things. He knew that grim and terrible
happenings had come with the storm, and he still sensed the nearness of
tragedy in this night-world through which he was passing. He did not go
swiftly, yet he went three times as fast as the girl and he had traveled
together. He was cautious and watchful, and at intervals he stopped and
listened, and swallowed hard to keep the whine of eagerness out of his
throat. Now that he was alone every instinct in him was keyed to the
pulse and beat of life abou