something made me look behind me. Against the small hole in the logs
that served as a window was a man's head and shoulders--a white man--and
he wore a grey mackinaw. Foxy and I were on our feet at once, but the
man crashed through the woods and was gone. But he had heard my story,
had seen I had a map, and--well, he wants my gold! That is all."


III

"And the grey hair above your eyes, Larry?" asked Jack, in an awed
voice.

"_That_ came the time I mentioned when I gave you your revolver, and you
remarked you would hate to be in a position where you might _wish_ you
had one. I told you I had been there myself. It was last August, on a
lonely trail far east of here. I had lain down during the intense heat
of the day to sleep, only to wake to see his peering eyes, to feel that
my feet were tied together, my hands caught in his vise-like clutch,
bound together. Then I was dragged to a tree and lashed to it by yards
of leather strapping, and all the time looking into the barrel of his
revolver. He searched every stitch of clothing I had on, but he did
not find the map. I was not armed, was perfectly helpless, and he left
me lashed to that tree, naked all but my trousers and socks. I was
there forty hours. The black flies came in swarms, the mosquitoes in
thousands, and the second night timber wolves barked in the distance.
Towards morning they came nearer, nearer. The agony from the insects
made me desperate, but it was the yapping of those wolves that drove me
crazy. I chewed through the leather straps binding my shoulder, chewed
the shoulder with it, boy, and broke loose, with the blood running from
every fly-bite, my eyes blinded with their poison, my throat cracked