lf.

But by the thin, cold starlight and the pale luminosity of the fading
aurora, he recognized each surrounding detail, and wondered at the
accuracy with which the trivialities of the setting had been
subconsciously impressed upon his memory.

It was here he had first met Fallon, and he remembered the undisguised
approval in the Irishman's voice and the firm grip of the hand that
welcomed him into the comradery of the North-men as he stood, faint
from hunger and weary from exertion, staring dully down at the
misshapen carcass of Diablesse.

"Good old Irish," he muttered, and smiled as he thought of himself,
Bill Carmody, proud of the friendship of a lumberjack.

He had come to know that in the ceaseless whirl of society the heavier
timbers--the real men are thrown outward--forced to the very edges of
the bowl, where they toil among big things upon the outskirts of
civilization.

He pulled off his heavy mitten and fumbled for his pipe. In the
side-pocket of his mackinaw his hand encountered an object--hard and
cold and unfamiliar to his touch.

He withdrew it and looked at the wicked, blue-black outlines of an
automatic pistol. Idly he examined the clip, crowded with shiny, yellow
cartridges. He recognized the gun as Fallon's, and smiled as he
returned it to his pocket.

"Only in case of a pinch," he grinned, and glanced approvingly at the
fist that doubled hard to the strong clinch of his fingers.

Hour after hour he slipped smoothly southward, relieving the monotony
of the journey by formulating his plan of action in case the
forebodings of Fallon should be realized.

Personally he apprehended no trouble, but he made up his mind that
trouble coming should not find him unprepared.

When at last the team swung into the clearing of Melton's old No. 8,
the stars winked in cold brilliance above the surrounding pines, and
the deserted buildings stood lifeless and dim in the deepening gloom.

Bill headed the horses for the stable which he found, as Irish had told
him, located at some distance from the other buildings and cut off from
sight by a knoll and a heavy tangle of scrub that had sprung up in the
clearing.

He climbed stiffly and painfully from the sled-box, and with the aid of
his crutch, hobbled about the task of unhitching the horses. He watered
them where a plume of thin vapor disclosed the whereabouts of a
never-freezing spring which burbled softly between its low,
ice-encrusted banks.

It prov