suspicious, but it did not seem to either Dick or
Albert that his movements betokened fear. There was strength in
his long, lean body, and ferocity in his little red eyes.

"What a hideous brute!" whispered Albert, shuddering.

"And as wicked as he is ugly," replied Dick. "I hate the sight
of these timber wolves. I don't wonder that the wild cat made
himself scarce so quickly."

"And he's surely hungry!" said Albert. "See how he stretches out
his head toward our Annex, as if he would devour everything
inside it!"

Albert was right. The big wolf was hungry, hungry through and
through, and the odor that came from the tree was exquisite and
permeating; it was a mingled odor of many things and everything
was good. He had never before known a tree to give forth such a
delightful aroma and he thrilled in every wolfish fiber as it
tickled his nostrils.

He approached the tree with all the caution of his cautious and
crafty race, and, as he laid his nose upon the bark, that mingled
aroma of many things good grew so keen and powerful that he
came as near as a big wolf can to fainting with delight. He
pushed at the places where the door fitted into the tree, but
nothing yielded. Those keen and powerful odors that penetrated
delightfully to every marrow of him were still there, but he
could not reach their source. A certain disappointment, a vague
fear of failure mingled with his anticipation, and as the
wolverine and the wild cat had done, he moved uneasily around the
tree, scratching at the bark, and now and then biting it with
teeth that were very long and cruel.

His troubled circuit brought him back to the door, where the
aroma was finest and strongest. There he tore at the lowest bar
with tooth and claw, but it did not move. He had the aroma and
nothing more, and no big, strong wolf can live on odors only.
The vague disappointment grew into a positive rage. He felt
instinctively that he could not reach the good things that the
wonderful tree held within itself, but he persisted. He bent his
back, uttered a growl of wrath just as a man swears, and fell to
again with tooth and claw.

"If I didn't know that door was so very strong, I'd be afraid
he'd get it," whispered Albert.

"Never fear," Dick whispered back with confidence.

The big wolf suddenly paused in his effort. Tooth and claw were
still, and he crouched hard against the tree, as if he would have
his body to blend with its shadow. A new od