ed-hot
stream of fire pass with the swiftness of a lightning-flash through his
brain. He stumbled back, his legs gave way under him, and he crumpled
down in a limp heap. Gray Wolf darted like a streak off into the bush.
Blind, she had not seen Kazan wilt down upon the white sand. Not until
she was a quarter of a mile away from the terrifying thunder of the
white man's rifle did she stop and wait for him.

Sandy McTrigger grounded his canoe on the sand-bar with an exultant
yell.

"Got you, you old devil, didn't I?" he cried. "I'd 'a' got the other,
too, if I'd 'a' had something besides this damned old relic!"

He turned Kazan's head over with the butt of his gun, and the leer of
satisfaction in his face gave place to a sudden look of amazement. For
the first time he saw the collar about Kazan's neck.

"My Gawd, it ain't a wolf," he gasped. "It's a dog, Sandy McTrigger--_a
dog!"_

CHAPTER XXII

SANDY'S METHOD

McTrigger dropped on his knees in the sand. The look of exultation was
gone from his face. He twisted the collar about the dog's limp neck
until he came to the worn plate, on which he could make out the faintly
engraved letters _K-a-z-a-n_. He spelled the letters out one by one, and
the look in his face was of one who still disbelieved what he had seen
and heard.

"A dog!" he exclaimed again. "A dog, Sandy McTrigger an' a--a beauty!"

He rose to his feet and looked down on his victim. A pool of blood lay
in the white sand at the end of Kazan's nose. After a moment Sandy bent
over to see where his bullet had struck. His inspection filled him with
a new and greater interest. The heavy ball from the muzzle-loader had
struck Kazan fairly on top of the head. It was a glancing blow that had
not even broken the skull, and like a flash Sandy understood the
quivering and twitching of Kazan's shoulders and legs. He had thought
that they were the last muscular throes of death. But Kazan was not
dying. He was only stunned, and would be on his feet again in a few
minutes. Sandy was a connoisseur of dogs--of dogs that had worn sledge
traces. He had lived among them two-thirds of his life. He could tell
their age, their value, and a part of their history at a glance. In the
snow he could tell the trail of a Mackenzie hound from that of a
Malemute, and the track of an Eskimo dog from that of a Yukon husky. He
looked at Kazan's feet. They were wolf feet, and he chuckled. Kazan was
part wild. He was big and powerf