silent and frowning, looking down upon the two, and the factor saw with
a strange thrill that the hand, yet doubled, was flecked with blood.

"Ma'amselle," he said, "is of the new people who arrived last night from
Portage la Prairie?"

Then they were lifted for the first time to his face, those dark eyes
smouldering like banked fires, and he saw their marvellous beauty.

"Of a surety," she said slowly, and there was a subtle tone in her
deep-throated voice that made the blood stir vaguely within the factor's
veins, "does M'sieu have so many strangers passing through his gates
that he is at loss to place each one?"

And with that word she turned deliberately away, walked down toward the
gate, and entered the stockade.

McElroy watched her go, until the last glint of her sober dress, plain
and clinging easily to the magnificent shoulders that swung slightly
with her free walk, had passed from view. And not alone he, for the two
voyageurs alike gazed after her, this new-comer from the farther ways of
civilisation who dared the brute DesCaut and struck like a man.

Then the factor bent above the little Francette.

"Sh!" he said gently, "little one, let go. The dog is dead, poor beast.
Come away."

But the maid would not give up the battered body, and with the audacity
of her beauty and life-long spoiling, besought the young factor for
help.

"There is yet life, M'sieu. See! The breath lifts in his sides. Is there
naught to be done when one sleeps, so? He is so strong at the sledges
and he did not whimper,--no, not once,--when DesCaut was beating him to
death. Is there nothing, M'sieu?"

Very pretty she was in her pleading, the little Francette, with her
misty eyes and the frank tears on her cheeks; and McElroy went to the
river and filled his cap with water. This he poured into the open
jaws and sopped over the blood-clotted head, wetting the limp feet and
watching for the life she so bravely proclaimed.

And presently it was there, twitching a battered muscle; lifting the
side with its broken ribs, fluttering the lids over the fierce eyes; for
this was Loup, the fiercest husky this side of the Athabasca.

With pity McElroy gathered up the great dog, staggering under the load,
for it was that of a big-framed man, and entered the post, the little
maid at has side. Near the gate a running crowd met them, for the tale
had spread apace and wondering eyes looked on.

Down to the southern wall where lived the fami