The woodsmen, with a simultaneous movement,
raised their rifles. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . _Frontispiece_

Facing page
The child uttered a sharp cry of fright. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
"Pretty enough to kiss!" cried Dick. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
"Listen, Little Sister," said he. "Now I go on a long journey" . . . 148
Dick jumped forward and snatched aside the opening into the wigwam . 228
The hound sniffed deep, filling his nostrils with the feather snow . 258
"Stop!" he commanded, his voice croaking harsh across the stillness. 294




THE SILENT PLACES




CHAPTER ONE


At about eight o'clock one evening of the early summer a group of men
were seated on a grass-plot overlooking a broad river. The sun was just
setting through the forest fringe directly behind them.

Of this group some reclined in the short grass, others lay flat on the
bank's slope, while still others leaned against the carriages of two
highly ornamented field-guns, whose embossed muzzles gaped silently at
an eastern shore nearly two miles distant.