Presently he raised
his pointed nose, howling mournfully across the waste.

The fire died down to coals. Sam piled on fresh wood. It hissed
spitefully, smoked voluminously, then leaped into flame. The old
woodsman sat as though carved from patience, waiting calmly the issue.

Then through the shadows, dancing ever more gigantic as they became more
distant, Sam Bolton caught the solidity of something moving. The object
was as yet indefinite, mysterious, flashing momentarily into view and
into eclipse as the tree-trunks intervened or the shadows flickered. The
woodsman did not stir; only his eyes narrowed with attention. Then a
branch snapped, noisy, carelessly broken. Sam's expectancy flagged.
Whoever it was did not care to hide his approach.

But in a moment the watcher could make out that the figures were two;
one erect and dominant, the other stooping in surrender. Sam could not
understand. A prisoner would be awkward. But he waited without a motion,
without apparent interest, in the indifferent attitude of the
woods-runner.

Now the two neared the outer circle of light; they stepped within it;
they stopped at the fire's edge. Sam Bolton looked up straight into the
face of Dick's prisoner.

It was May-may-gwan, the Ojibway girl.

CHAPTER TEN

Dick pulled the girl roughly to the fireside, where he dropped her arm,
leaving her downcast and submissive. He was angry all through with the
powerless rage of the man whose attentions a woman has taken more
seriously than he had intended. Suddenly he was involved more deeply
than he had meant.

"Well, what do you think of that?" he cried.

"What you doing here?" asked Sam in Ojibway, although he knew what the
answer would be.

She did not reply, however.

"Hell!" burst out Dick.

"Well, keep your hair on," advised Sam Bolton, with a grin. "You
shouldn't be so attractive, Dicky."

The latter growled.

"Now you've got her, what you going to do with her?" pursued the older
man.

"Do with her?" exploded Dick; "what in hell do you mean? I don't want
her; she's none of my funeral. She's got to go back, of course."

"Oh, sure!" agreed Sam. "She's got to go back. Sure thing! It's only two
days down stream, and then the Crees would have only four days' start
and getting farther every minute. A mere ten days in the woods without
an outfit. Too easy; especially for a woman. But of course you'll give
her your outfit, Dick."

He mused, gazing into the flames