the shadow were running fast, with low,
slim bodies, and outstretched nostrils that had in them a grateful odor
of food, soon to come.

Nature had given to Henry Ware a physical mechanism of great strength,
but as delicate as that of a watch. Any jar to the wheels and springs
was registered at once by the minute hand of his brain. He stirred in
his sleep and moved one hand in a troubled way. He was not yet awake,
but the minute hand was quivering, and through all his wonderfully
sensitive organism ran the note of alarm. He stirred again and then
abruptly sat up, his eyes wide open, and his whole frame tense with a
new and terrible sensation. He saw the dead coals, where the fire had
been; the long, quavering and ferocious whine came to his ears, and, in
an instant, he understood. It was well for the two that Henry was by
nature a creature of the forest! He sprang to his feet and with one
sweeping motion pulled Paul to his also.

"Up! Up, Paul!" he cried. "The fire is out, and the wolves are coming!"

Paul's physical senses were less acute and delicate than Henry's, and he
did not understand at once. He was still dazed, and groping with his
hands in the dusk, but Henry gave him no time.

"It's our lives, Paul!" he cried. "Another enemy as bad as the fire is
after us!"

Not twenty feet away grew a giant beech, spreading out low and mighty
boughs, and Henry leaped for it, dragging Paul after him.

"Up you go!" he cried, and Paul, not yet fully awake, instinctively
obeyed the fierce command. Then Henry leaped lightly after him and as
they climbed higher among the boughs the ferocious whine burst into a
long terrible howl, and the dusky forms, running low, gaunt and ghostly
in the shadow, shot from the forest, and hurled themselves at the beech
tree.

Henry, despite all his courage, shuddered, and while he clutched a bough
tightly with one hand put the other upon his comrade to see that he did
not fall. He could feel Paul trembling in his grasp.

The two looked down upon the inflamed red eyes, the cruelly sharp, white
teeth and slavering mouths, and, still panting from their climb, each
breathed a silent prayer of thankfulness. They had been just in time to
escape a pack of wolves that howled horribly for a while, and then sat
upon their haunches, staring silently up at the sweet new food, which
they believed would fall at last into their mouths.

Paul at length said weakly:

"Henry, I'm mighty glad you're a ligh