anticipations. In some mysterious way Meleese was closely associated
with those who sought his life, and if they disappeared she would
disappear with them. He was convinced of that. And then--could he find
her again? Would she go into the South--to civilization--or deeper into
the untraveled wildernesses of the North? In answer to his question
there flashed through his mind the words of Jean Croisset: "M'seur, I
know of a hundred men between Athabasca and the bay who would kill you
for what you have said." Yes, she would go into the North. Somewhere in
that vast desolation of which Jean had spoken he would find her, even
though he spent half of his life in the search!

It was past midnight when he spread out the furs and undressed for bed.
He opened the stove door and from the bunk watched the faint flickerings
of the dying firelight on the log walls. As slumber closed his eyes he
was conscious of a sound--the faint, hungerful, wailing cry to which he
had listened that first night near Prince Albert. It was a wolf, and
drowsily he wondered how he could hear the cry through the thick log
walls of his prison. The answer came to him the moment he opened his
eyes, hours later. A bit of pale sunlight was falling into the room and
he saw that it entered through a narrow aperture close up to the
ceiling. After he had prepared his breakfast he dragged the table under
this aperture and by standing on it was enabled to peer through. A
hundred yards away was the black edge of the spruce and balsam forest.
Between him and the forest, half smothered in the deep snow, was a
cabin, and he shuddered as he saw floating over it the little red signal
of death of which Croisset had told him the night before.

With the breaking of this day the hours seemed of interminable length.
For a time he amused himself by searching every corner and crevice of
his prison room, but he found nothing of interest beyond what he had