ings!" The pain in his empty
stomach was now becoming excruciating. To steady himself he shut his
eyes, shook his head as though to clear it, then looked again at that
strip of metal in his hand. Attached to it were two slender strips of
leather like straps, ending in small, bronze buckles.

"Why, it's not from the plane," he stammered aloud. "Damned if it
doesn't look like a greave the old Greek warriors used to wear to
protect their shins."

Suddenly alarmed and mystified beyond words, he shuffled forward over
the snow, the greave yet clutched in a fur gloved hand. Presently two
more objects, already half buried by the stinging, swirling drifts,
caught his attention. One was the stock of Alden's rifle, protruding
starkly brown from the unrelieved whiteness, and the other was a
broken wooden shaft that ended a graceful but wickedly sharp bronze
spear head.

"I've either gone crazy," he said, "or I'm delirious. Yes, I must be
clean nutty! There _couldn't_ be a human settlement within a thousand
miles. Let's see what's happened."

* * * * *

On the snow of a little wind-sheltered space behind the igloo he
discovered the unmistakable and ominous signs of a struggle. An
indefinite number of footprints, blurred but enormous in size, were
marked in the snow. Here and there deep furrows mutely testified how
Alden and the enemies against whom he struggled had reeled back and
forth in vicious combat over a considerable area. Then, shaken by a
new fear, he discovered Alden's left glove and a rag of some peculiar
thick material that seemed to have a metallic finish. But what aroused
his gravest fears were the numerous splashes of blood that here and
there streaked the snow in gruesome relief.

Only a moment Nelson stood, shaken by the merciless wind, scanning the
piece of bronzed armor between his gloved hands with a fresh interest.
It was beautifully fashioned, and decorated at the knee point with the
wonderfully wrought figure of a dolphin.

If he could only think clearly! But his brain seemed to lie in a
red-hot skull. "Whatever's happened," he muttered, "I'd better not
waste time; they couldn't have been here so long ago. Poor Alden! I
wonder what kind of devils caught him?"

* * * * *

Even before he had finished the sentence the aviator had taken up the
partially obliterated trail of spattered blood drops. That what he
sought appeared to be a marauder