breath. Phantom-like, without apparently the slightest directing motion,
the bows of the canoes swung like wind-vanes to point toward a little
heap of driftlogs under the shadow of an elder bush. The bear was
wallowing in the cool, wet sand, and evidently enjoying it. A moment
later he stuck his head over the pile of driftwood, and indulged in a
leisurely survey of the river.

His eye was introspective, vacant, his mouth was half open, and his
tongue lolled out so comically that Dick almost laughed aloud. No one
moved by so much as a hand's breadth. The bear dropped back to his
cooling sand with a sigh of voluptuous pleasure. The canoes drew a
little nearer.

Now old Haukemah rose to his height in the bow of his canoe, and began
to speak rapidly in a low voice. Immediately the animal bobbed into
sight again, his wicked little eyes snapping with intelligence. It took
him some moments to determine what these motionless, bright-coloured
objects might be. Then he turned toward the land, but stopped short as
his awakened senses brought him the reek of the young men who had
hemmed in his shoreward escape. He was not yet thoroughly alarmed, so
stood there swaying uneasily back and forth, after the manner of bears,
while Haukemah spoke swiftly in the soft Cree tongue.

"Oh, makwá, our little brother," he said, "we come to you not in anger,
nor in disrespect. We come to do you a kindness. Here is hunger and cold
and enemies. In the Afterland is only happiness. So if we shoot you, oh
makwá, our little brother, be not angry with us."

He raised his trade-gun and pulled the trigger. A scattering volley
broke from the other canoes and from the young men concealed in the