re for a moment she bowed her head until Jolly Roger could see only
her dew-wet hair and she said,

"In the Country Beyond, Neekewa."

Her eyes were looking at him again, big, dark and filled with mystery.

"And where is this country, Yellow Bird?" he asked, a strange chill
driving the warmth out of his heart. "You mean--up there?" And he
pointed to the gray sky above them.

"No, it is happiness to come in life, not in death," said Yellow Bird
slowly. "It is not beyond the stars. It is--"

He waited, leaning toward her.

"In the Country Beyond," she repeated with a tired little droop of her
head. "And where that is I do not know, Neekewa. I could not pass beyond
the great white cloud that shut me out. But it is--somewhere, I will
find it. And then I will tell you--and The Pigeon."

She stood up, and swayed in the gray light, like one worn out by hard
travel. Then she passed into the tepee, and Jolly Roger heard her fall
on her blanket-bed.

And still stranger whisperings filled his heart as he faced the east,
where the first red blush of day drove back the star-mists of dawn. He
heard a step in the soft sand, and Slim Buck stood beside him. And he
asked.

"Did you ever hear of the Country Beyond?" Slim Buck shook his head, and
both looked in silence toward the rising sun.

Peter was glad when the camp roused itself out of sleep with waking
voices, and laughter, and the building of fires. He waited eagerly for
Sun Cloud. At last she came out of Yellow Bird's tepee, rubbing her eyes
in the face of the glow in the east, and then her white teeth flashed a
smile of welcome at him. Together they ran down to the edge of the
lake, and Peter wagged his tail while Sun Cloud went out knee-deep and
scrubbed her pretty face with handfuls of the cool water. It was a happy
day for him. He was different from the Indian dogs, and Sun Cloud and
her playmates made much of him. But never, even in their most exciting
play, did he entirely lose track of his master.

Jolly Roger, to an extent, forgot Peter. He tried to deaden within him
the impulses which Yellow Bird's conjuring had roused. He tried to see
in them a menace and a danger, and he repeated to himself the folly
of placing credence in Yellow Bird's "medicine." But his efforts were
futile, and he was honest enough to admit it. The uneasiness was in
his breast. A new hope was rising up. And with that hope were fear and
suspense, for deep in him was growing stronger the c