ls, and it was therefore with a sense of deep satisfaction to all
that the camp on the shore of the Great Lake was broken.

Travelling slowly, with Shad following in the well-packed trail which
the others made, they arrived at their destination on an afternoon
five days later, and were welcomed by Bill Campbell and Mookoomahn.

How deeply or how lightly Mookoomahn felt when he learned of
Manikawan's death, none knew. He listened in stoical silence while Bob
related to him in detail the circumstances of her going and the
subsequent happenings in the lodge and in the camp at the Great Lake;
but throughout the recital Mookoomahn made no comments, and his
countenance betrayed nothing of his sensations.

Mookoomahn was recovering rapidly. He was passing, indeed, quite
beyond Bill Campbell's control; and not satisfied now with the limited
portions of food which Bill, religiously adhering to the advice he had
received from Dick Blake and Ed Matheson, doled out to him, he had the
day before the return of the travellers stolen away to the willows
along the river bank below the tilt, killed some ptarmigans on his own
account, and gorged himself upon the flesh to his temporary
satisfaction; but nature balanced her account with him in the hours of
subsequent agony which he suffered for his indiscretion.

Fully a month elapsed after their return before Shad could eat a meal
with any assurance that it would not be followed by distress. His
normal appetite, however, had begun to return before they broke camp
on the Great Lake, and had quickly developed into a highly abnormal
appetite.

No sooner was one meal finished than his mind was centred upon the
next. At night his last thought was his next morning's breakfast, and
when he awoke breakfast was still on his mind. Eating during this
period of recuperation was to him the all-important object in life.

It was nearly a month after his return to the river tilt that Shad
first learned of Bob's loss of fortune. It was upon the occasion of
the fortnightly rendezvous, when Ed Matheson remarked:

"Th' next round's about th' last we can make. Th' fur's 'most too poor
t' take, now, an' when I comes back I'll strike up my traps. An' it's
been a wonderful poor hunt."

"Aye, wonderful poor, an' wonderful disappointin'," sighed Bob.

"Th' worst I ever see," continued Ed. "If 'tweren't for you, Bob,
clearin' Dick's an' my old debts, we'd be in a bad way gettin' next
fall's debt from th' C