"But what shall we do? What _can_ we do?"

"You know something of this part of the country; let's take off our
skates and cut across the creek; she may have taken refuge in the limb
of a tree and is awaiting us."

"Isn't some one coming up stream?" asked Fred, peering forward, where
the straight stretch was so extensive that the vision permitted them
to see unusually far.

"It may be another wolf."

"No; it is a person. Perhaps Quance has been drawn from his home by
the racket. He is a great hunter. I hope it is he, for he can give us
help in hunting for Jennie--"

Monteith suddenly gripped the arm of his friend.

"It is not a man! It is a woman!"

"Who can it be? Not Jennie, surely--"

"Hurry along! You are no skaters at all!"

It was she! That was her voice, and it was her slight, girlish figure
skimming like a swallow toward them.

Within the following minute Fred Whitney clasped his beloved sister in
his arms, both shedding tears of joy and gratitude.

Jennie had had a marvellous experience, indeed. Controlled by an
intuition or instinct which often surpasses reason, she was led to
dart aside into the smaller stream at the critical moment when the
fierce wolves were so near that escape seemed impossible. She had
fallen slightly to the rear, and a single terrified glance showed her
a beast in the act of leaping at her. Her dart to the left was only
the effort to elude him for that instant, and she was not aware of the
mouth of the creek until she had entered it. Then, seeing that it was
altogether too late to rejoin her brother, she had no course left but
to continue the flight which, until then, she had not intended.

The words which she called to Fred, that were not understood by him,
were to the effect that she would try to rejoin him farther down the
stream, with whose many turnings she was more familiar than he.

She ascended the tributary with all the wonderful skill at her
command. Not only the brute that was on the point of leaping at her,
but three others, turned as soon as they could poise themselves and
went after her at their utmost bent.

But her change of direction was a most fortunate action. As in the
case of the abrupt darting aside, when on the surface of the larger
stream, it placed her considerably in advance of the nearest pursuers.
Add to this her power of outspeeding them when the chance was equal,
and it will be seen that her only danger was from the front.

The creek was so