s bundle that at first she
could not recognize. Then she saw that they were gray grouse, almost
the color of a Plymouth Rock hen, and there was not one, but four! He
started to stuff them into his saddlebag. "Pretty lucky that time," he
explained. "Got 'em through the neck. That leaves the meat clean----"

He seemed wholly matter-of-fact about the incident, but Virginia
continued to stare at him in open-mouthed astonishment. "Four of them?"
she cried.

"One apiece. There was five in the flock, but the other looked like a
tough old hen. But don't look so amazed, Miss Tremont. They are fool
hens--Franklin's grouse--and that means that they'll set all day and
let you pepper at 'em. And with a little practice it's easy to get them
in the neck pretty near every time."

He swung into the saddle, and they started forth upon the last hour of
their day's journey. And Vosper made the only remark worth recording.

"When I was in Saskatchewan last year," he began in a thin, far-carrying
voice, "I must 'a shot a thousand grouse and didn't miss one."

Virginia felt that she'd like to go back and shake him.

V

Now that they were upon the last hour of the day's ride Virginia began
to be aware of the full measure of her fatigue. She was strained and
tired from the saddle, her knees ached, her face burned from the scratch
of the spruce needles. Ever she found it more difficult to dodge the
stinging blows of the boughs, she was less careful in the control of her
horse. From sheer exhaustion Lounsbury had stopped his complaints.

The first grayness of twilight had come, like mist, over the distant
hills; but the peaks were still bathed in the sunset's glow. She began
to have a real and overwhelming longing for camp and rest. And in the
midst of her dejection the dark man in front threw her a smile.

"It goes hard at first," he told her gently. "But we'll soon be in
camp--with a good fire. You'll feel better right away."

It had not been Virginia's way--or the way of Virginia's class--to
depend upon their menials for encouragement; but, strangely, the girl
felt only grateful.

She was hungry, chilled through by the icy breath of the falling night,
half-sick with fatigue. The last mile seemed endless. And she was
almost too tired to drag herself off the horse when they came to camp.

Back among the dark spruce, by the edge of a fast-flowing trout stream,
Bill had built a cabin,--one of the camps of his t