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Show 1,4 ffiii JTF i ill ra c cr tzf' iim mm. . nh coPY&tfr. 7szo little, jb&oaj; slvz cowaw. ini; words. Snowbird. You're a brave girl always have he-en since a little 1 1 1 i I ) U . as Cud is my Judge anil you know we mini fiic-e the truth. Better one of us 1 1 ; than Inch. And 1 promise prom-ise I'll never feel their fangs. And I won't take your pistol with me either." Her thought Hashed to the clasp hunting knife that he carried in his pocket. But her eyes- lighied, mill she bent and kissed him. And the wolves leaped forward even at this. "We'll slay it out," she told him. "We'll fight it to the last just as Dan would want us to do. Besides it would only mean the same fate for me, in a little while. I couldn't cling up there forever and Dan won't come hack." She was wholly unable to gain on the fire. Only by dint of the most heart-breaking toil was she able to secure se-cure any dry fuel for it at all. Every length of wood she cut had to be scraped of bark, and half the time tli fire was only a sickly column of white smoke. It became increasingly difficult diffi-cult to swing the ax. The trail was almost at Its end. The after-midnight hours drew one by one across the face of the wilderness, wilder-ness, and she thought that the deepening deep-ening cold presaged dawn. Her fingers fin-gers were numb. Once more she went to one of the saplings, but she stumbled and almost went to her face at the first blow. It was the instant that her gray watchers watch-ers had been waiting for. The wolf that stood nearest leaped a gray streak out of the shadow and every wolf in the pack shot forward with a yell. It was a short, expectant cry; but It chopped off short. For with a half-sob, and seemingly without mental men-tal process, she aimed her pistol and fired. A fast-leaping wolf is one of the most difficult pistol targets that can be imagined. It bordered on the miracu- CHAPTER III Continued. 22 "Good evening, Cranston," he said pleasantly. Cranston was also upon his feet the same Instant. His instincts were entirely en-tirely true. He knew If he leaped for his rille, Dan would be upon his back In an Instant, and he would have no chance to use It. The rille was now out of the running, as they were at about eipinl distances from It, and neither would have time to swing or aim It. Dan's sudden appearance had been so utterly unlooked for, that for a moment mo-ment Cranston could find no answer. His eyes moved to the rifle, then to his belt where hung his hunting knife, that still lay on the pallet. "Good evening, Failing," he replied, trying his hardest to fall Into that strange spirit of nonchalance with which brave men have so often met their adversaries, ad-versaries, And which Dan had now. "I'm surprised to see you here. What do you want ?" Dan's voice when lie replied was no more warm than the snow banks that reinforced the lean to. "I want your rifle also your snow shops and your supplies of food. And I think I'll take your blankets, too." "And I suppose you mean to fight for them?" Cranslon asked. His lips of defeat, of death, of heaven knows what remorselessness with which this grave giant would administer justice was upon him, and his heart seemed to freeze in his breast. Cravenly he leaped for his knife on the blankets below him. Dan was upon him before he ever reached It. He sprang as a cougar spings, incredibly fast and with shattering shat-tering power. Both went down, and for a long time they writhed and struggled strug-gled in each other's arms. The pine boughs rustled strangely. The dark, gaunt hand reached Jn vain for the knife. Some resistless power seemed to he holding his wrist and was bending its bone as an Indian bends a bow. Pain lashed through him. And then this dark-hearted man, who had never known the meaning of mercy, mer-cy, opened his lips to scream that this terrible enemy be merciful to him. But the words wouldn't come. A ghastly weight had come at his throat, and his tortured lungs sobbed for breath. Then, for a long time, there was a curious pounding, lashing sound in the evergreen boughs. It seemed merciless and endless. But Dan got up at last, in a strange, heavy silence, and swiftly went to work. He took the rifle and filled It with cartridges from Cranston's belt. Then he put the remaining two boxes j l ! drew up in a snuie, but tnere was no smile In the tone of his words. "You're right," Dan told him, and lie stepped nearer. "Not only for that, Cranston. We're face to face at last hands to hands. I've got a knife In my pocket, but I'm not even going to bring it out. It's hands to hands you and I until everything's square between us." "Perhaps you've forgotten that day on the ridge?" Cranston asked. "You haven't any woman to save you this time." "I remember the day, and that's part of the debt. The thing you did yesterday yester-day is part of It, too. It's all to be settled set-tled at last, Cranston, and I don't believe be-lieve I could spare you if you went to your knees before me. You've got a' clearing out by the fire big as a prize ring. We'll go out there side hy side. And hands to hands we'll settle all these debts we have between us with no rules of fighting and no mercy In the end I" I - Tn'ey measured each other with their eyes. Once more Cranston's gaze stole to his rille, but lunging out, Dan kicked it three feet farther into the shadows of the lean-to. Dan saw the dark face drawn with passion, the hands clenching, the shoulder muscles growing Into hard knots, And Cranston Cran-ston looked and kn5w that merciless vengeance that age old sin and Lsttess creed by which he lived had followed him dovfn and was clutching him at last. He saw it in the position of the stal-w-art form before him, the clear level eyes that the moon light made bright as steel, the hard lines, the slim, pow- oi snens into nis sniri pocnet. rue supplies of food the sack of nutritious nutri-tious jerked venison like dried bark, the little package of cheese, the boxes of hard tack and one of the small sacks of prepared flour he tied, with a single kettle, into his heavy blankets blan-kets and flung them with the rifle upon . his back. Finally he took the pair of snow shoes from the floor. He worked coldly, swiftly, all the time munching at a piece of jerked venison. When he had finished he walked to the door of the lean-to. It seemed to Dan that Cranston whispered whis-pered faintly, from his unconscious'-ness, unconscious'-ness, as he passed ; but the victor did not turn to look. The snow shoes crunched away into the darkness. On the hill behind a half dozen wolves-stragglers wolves-stragglers from the pack frisked and leaped about in a curious way. A strange smell had reached them on the wind, and when the loud, fearful steps were out of hearing, it might pay them to creep down, one by one, and investigate investi-gate its cause. The gray circle about the fire was growing impatient. Snowbird waited to the last instant before she admitted this fact. But it" is possible only so long to deny the truth of a thing that all the senses verify, and that moment for her waft past. She noticed that when she went to her hands and knees, laboriously to cut a piece of the drier wood from the rain-soaked, rotted shag that was her principal supply of fuel, every wolf wpuld leap forward, only to draw back when she stood straight again. She worked desperately to keep the fire burning bright. She dared not neglect Some Resistless Power Seemed to B Holding His Wrist. lous that she did not miss him altogether. alto-gether. Her. -nerves were torn, their control over her muscles largely gone. Yet the bullet coursed down through the lungs, inflicting a mortal wound. The wolf had leaped for her throat; but he fell short. She staggered from a blow, and she heard a curious sound in the region of her hip. But she didn't know- that the fangs had gone home in her soft flesh. The wolf rolled on the ground ; and if her pistol had possessed the shocking power of a rule, ne wouiu nave never got uy again. As it was, he shrieked once, then sped off in the darkness to die. Five or six of the nearest wolves, catching the smell of his blood, bayed and sped after him. But the remainder of the great pack fully 15 of the gray, gaunt creatures came stealing across the snow toward to-ward her. White fangs had gone home ; and a new madness was in the air. " Straining into the silence, a perfectly perfect-ly straight line between Cranston's camp and Snowbird's, Dan Failing came mushing across the snow. His sense of direction had never been obliged to stand such a test as this before. Snowbird's fire was a single dot on a vast plateau; yet he had gone straight toward It. (TO BE CONTINUED.) it tor a moment, l'.xcept tor tne single pistol ball that she could afford to expend ex-pend on the wolves of the three she had the fire was her last defense. But it was a losing fight. The rain-soaked rain-soaked wood smoked without flame, the comparatively dry core with which Dan had started the fire had burned down, and the green wood, hacked with such heart-breaking difficulty from the saplings that Dan had cut, needed the most tireless attention to burn at all. Her nervous vitality was flowing from her in a frightful stream. Too long she had toiled without food in the constant presence of danger, and she was' very near indeed to utter exhaustion. ex-haustion. But at the same time she knew she must not faint. That was one thing she could not do to fall unconscious un-conscious before the last of her three cartridges was expended in the right way. Again she went forth to the sapling, and this time it seemed to her that If she simply tossed the ax through the air, she could fell one of the gray crowd. But when she stooped to pick it up she didn't finish the thought. She turned t coax the fire. And then she leaned sobbing over the sled. "What's the use?" she cried. "He won't come back. What's the use of fighting any more?" "There's always use of fighting," her father tdld her. He seemed to speak "Good Evening, Cranston." erful hands. He could read it in the tones of the voice tones that he himself him-self could not imitate or pretend. The hour had come for the settling of old debts. lie tried to curse his adversary as a weakling and a degenerate, but the ob-ncene ob-ncene words be sought for would not come to his lips. Here was his fate, and because (he darkness always fades before the light, and the courage of wickedness always nreaks before the Coiira.L'e of righteousness, Cranslon was afraid 'u look it in the f.ice. The fear with difficulty, and his face looked strange and white. The cold and the exposure were having their effect on his weakened system, and unconsciousness unconscious-ness was a near shadow indeed. "But, dearest if I could only make you do what I want you to " "What?" "You're aide to climb a tree, and If you'd take these coats, you wouldn't freeze by morning. If you'd only have the strength " "And .see you torn to pieces!" "I'm old, dear and very tired and I'd crawl away into the shadows, where you couldn't see. There's no use minc- |