skull--and with visions of a face, a woman's face--

Thus far had Steele written, when with a nervous laugh he sprang from
his chair, and with something that sounded very near to an oath, in the
wild tumult of the storm, crumpled the paper in his hand and flung it
among the blazing logs he had described but a few moments before.

"Confound it, this will never do!" he exclaimed, falling into his own
peculiar habit of communing with himself. "I say it won't do, Phil
Steele; deuce take it if it will! You're getting nervous, sentimental,
almost homesick. Ugh, what a beast of a night!"

He turned to the rude stone fireplace again as another blast of snow
plunged down the chimney.

"Wish I'd built a fire in the stove instead of there," he went on,
filling his pipe. "Thought it would be a little more cheerful, you know.
Lord preserve us, listen to that!"

He began walking up and down the hewn log floor of the cabin, his hands
deep in his pockets, puffing out voluminous clouds of smoke. It was not
often that Philip Steele's face was unpleasant to look upon, but
to-night it wore anything but its natural good humor. It was a strong,
thin face, set off by a square jaw, and with clear, steel-gray eyes in
which just now there shone a strange glitter, as they rested for a
moment upon the white skull over the fire. From his scrutiny of the
skull Steele turned to a rough board table, lighted by a twisted bit of
cotton cloth, three-quarters submerged in a shallow tin of caribou
grease. In the dim light of this improvised lamp there were two letters,
opened and soiled, which an Indian had brought up to him from Nelson