s pads of bear, or lynx, or panther, the hard hoofs of
moose or deer, or the airy, swift feet of hare and mink and marten? As
he wondered, moving more and more furtively as the spirit of the
unseen wild pervaded and possessed him, his nostrils discerned across
the savours of the trees and the mould a sudden musky scent; and he
knew that one of the frequenters of the trail was a red fox, who had
just gone by.

Impressed by a sense that he was not so utterly alone as he had
imagined himself to be, the man now obeyed one of the wary impulses of
the wood-folk. He stepped aside from the trail, feeling his way, and
leaned his back against a huge birch-tree. The ragged, ancient,
sweet-smelling bark felt familiar and friendly to his touch. Here he
stood, sniffing the still air with discrimination, testing with
initiated ears every faint forest breathing. The infinitesimal and
incessant stir of growth and change and readjustment was vaguely
audible to his fine sense, making a rhythmic background against which
the slightest unusual sound, even to the squeak of a wood-mouse, or
the falling of a worm-bitten leaf, would have fairly startled the
dark. Once he heard a twig snap, far in the depths on the other side
of the trail, and he knew that some one of the wild kindred had moved
carelessly. But on the trail nothing went by.

Had there been ever so small a glimmer of light, to enable his eyes to
play their part in this forest game, the man could have watched for an
hour as moveless as the tree on which he leaned. But in that strange,
absolute dark the strain soon grew almost intolerable. The game
certainly ceased to be amusing after an uneventful fifteen minutes had
passed. He was just about to give up, to step forth into the trail and
resume his journey to the cabin, when he caught a strange sound, which
made him stiffen back at once into watchful rigidity.

The sound was a great breath. In its suddenness and its vagueness the
listener was unable to distinguish whether it came from a dozen yards
down the trail, or a couple of dozen inches from his elbow. His nose,
however, assured him that he had not the latter alternative to face;
so he waited, his right hand upon the knife in his belt. He could hear
his heart beating.

For several minutes nothing more was heard. Then through the high
leafage overhead splashed a few big drops of rain, with the hushing
sound of a shower not heavy enough to break through. The next moment a
fla