; he was quicker than any of them to notice
the least sound in the night about them--a fish jumping in the lake, a
twig snapping in the bush, the dropping of occasional fragments of
frozen snow from the branches overhead where the heat loosened them. His
voice, too, changed a little in quality, becoming a shade less
confident, lower also in tone. Fear, to put it plainly, hovered close
about that little camp, and though all three would have been glad to
speak of other matters, the only thing they seemed able to discuss was
this--the source of their fear. They tried other subjects in vain; there
was nothing to say about them. Hank was the most honest of the group; he
said next to nothing. He never once, however, turned his back to the
darkness. His face was always to the forest, and when wood was needed he
didn't go farther than was necessary to get it.

VII

A wall of silence wrapped them in, for the snow, though not thick, was
sufficient to deaden any noise, and the frost held things pretty tight
besides. No sound but their voices and the soft roar of the flames made
itself heard. Only, from time to time, something soft as the flutter of
a pine moth's wings went past them through the air. No one seemed
anxious to go to bed. The hours slipped towards midnight.

"The legend is picturesque enough," observed the doctor after one of the
longer pauses, speaking to break it rather than because he had anything
to say, "for the Wendigo is simply the Call of the Wild personified,
which some natures hear to their own destruction."

"That's about it," Hank said presently. "An' there's no misunderstandin'
when you hear it. It calls you by name right 'nough."

Another pause followed. Then Dr. Cathcart came back to the forbidden
subject with a rush that made the others jump.

"The allegory _is_ significant," he remarked, looking about him into the
darkness, "for the Voice, they say, resembles all the minor sounds of
the Bush--wind, falling water, cries of the animals, and so forth. And,
once the victim hears _that_--he's off for good, of course! His most
vulnerable points, moreover, are said to be the feet and the eyes; the
feet, you see, for the lust of wandering, and the eyes for the lust of
beauty. The poor beggar goes at such a dreadful speed that he bleeds
beneath the eyes, and his feet burn."

Dr. Cathcart, as he spoke, continued to peer uneasily into the
surrounding gloom. His voice sank to a hushed tone.

"The