d."

"I called it an excuse."

"In this case the words mean the same."

"Well, then, I had a reason: if the person whom Spurling murdered is
the person whom I . . ."

"Indeed! So you knew that much, did you?" At mention of the word
"murdered," Strangeways had swung fiercely round and confronted
Granger.

"Yes, I know that much. And if the man whom Spurling murdered is the
man whom I suspect him to be, I had intended to dispense with law and
to exact the penalty slowly, up here whence there is no escape,
myself."

"Then you'll be sorry to hear that you've lied to no purpose. The
person whom Spurling murdered was not a man, you damned scoundrel."

Strangeways turned sharply away from him, and, moving as briskly on
his snowshoes as the unpacked state of the snow would allow, commenced
methodically to go about the store in ever widening circles. He
evidently suspected that the fugitive was still in hiding there, or
had been at the time of his arrival, and had since escaped, in which
case the snow would bear traces of his flight. When he had searched
the mound in vain, he turned his attention to the river-bed where his
team of dogs was stationed. Granger, watching him from above, saw that
he had halted suddenly and was bending down. Then he heard him
calling his dogs together and saw him harnessing them quickly into his
sledge. Panic seized him lest Strangeways should drive away without
telling him the name of _this thing, which was not a man_, which
Spurling had murdered, and _whether the deed had been done in the
Klondike_. Also he was curious to see for himself what it was that he
had found in the snow down there, which made him so eager to set out.
He ploughed his way down the hillside, breaking through the surface
and slipping as he ran, till he arrived out of breath at the
river-bank. Then he saw the meaning of this haste; approaching the
Point from the northward was a muffled track, partially obliterated by
the snow which had since fallen, which, on reaching Murder Point,
doubled back, returning northward whence the traveller had come. It
meant to Granger that, while he and Strangeways had been seated
together recalling old times in the store, Spurling had come back. For
what reason? No man would fight his way through a blizzard without
good purpose; he would lie down where he was till the storm had spent
itself, lest he should wander from his trail. This man had everything
to lose by turning back. Then he d