bohunks. He hated the shadows of the
forest, where life was scarcer than in the Hills, where even keen wits
were wasted.

Here the guns of his former enemies were supplanted by knives and
knuckle-dusters and clubs; and the men who wielded them were cowardly,
slinking foreigners whose very appearance was repugnant. Sneaky,
underground, despicable crime it was, running the gamut from petty
annoyance to senseless murder. None of the open-handed, bold and
reasoned intelligence of the prairie criminal. It revolted him.
Senseless, insensate, formless, erratic, it only disgusted him with its
sheer and unprofitable lawlessness. On the prairie crime meant double
duty for him--to discover, then to catch the criminal; here there was
no escape--once the criminal was discovered.

This offscouring of Europe was little more individual to him than a
Chinaman; Mahon was doubtful that he could pick out a second time more
than a few of the bohunks. With faces dull and brainless, voices drab
and lifeless, they merged into a mass of slime.

For the first time since he had donned the uniform Mahon began to
question his capacity for it. Knowing the history of the wide effort
demanded of the Mounted Police, he began to wonder if he could throw
himself into it with credit to the Force.

The only attractive feature of his new life was the friendship of the
bluff, cantankerous, but kind-hearted contractor, his sunny daughter,
the manly foreman, and the talkative Murphy. Of Tressa he had so many
glowing things to write in his letters to his wife that Helen
threatened to rush north in self-defence. Thereupon he crammed one
letter from start to finish with Tressa Torrance's praises, and defied
Helen to fulfil her threat.

In the course of his work the solitary part that intrigued him was the
mystery of the Indian. He felt that there was more there than he knew
of; he had more than a suspicion that Torrance was concealing from him
essential facts. But there seemed no call for official action. Thus
far the Indian was friendly; it was his nature to be silent and
mysterious.

Failing use for his horse, Mahon spent much time in the forest. And
after a time, the very shadows, and the secrecy breathed by the trees
seemed to hint at revelations just round the corner. Down in the camp
half a thousand bohunks, with brutal murder in their hearts, would,
under Police eye, climb to their bunks as innocent in appearance as
kittens. There in