hill after Leloo, at a pace that Connie found hard to follow.

CHAPTER XVII

THE-LAKE-OF-THE-FOX-THAT-YELLS

Leaving 'Merican Joe to look after the line of marten and mink traps,
Connie Morgan struck out from the little cabin and headed for the Indian
village. Straight to the cabin of Pierre Bonnet Rouge he went and was
welcomed by the Indian with the respect that only the real sourdough
ever commands in the Indians of the North. For Pierre knew of his own
knowledge of the boy's outwitting the _hooch_-runners, and he had
listened in the evenings upon the trail to Fort Norman, while big Dan
McKeever recounted to McTavish, as he never tired of doing, the
adventures of Connie in the Mounted.

After supper, which the two ate in silence, while the squaw of Bonnet
Rouge served them, they drew up their chairs to the stove. The boy asked
questions as to the success of the trading, the news of the river
country, and prospects for a good spring catch. Then the talk drifted
to fox trapping, and Connie told the Indian that he and 'Merican Joe had
set some traps on the lake a day's journey to the south-eastward. Pierre
Bonnet listened attentively, but by not so much as the flicker of an
eyelash did he betray the fact that he had ever heard of the lake.
Finally, the boy asked him, point-blank, if he had ever been there.
Connie knew something of Indians, and, had been quick to note that
Pierre held him in regard. Had this not been so, he would never have
risked the direct question, for it is only by devious and round-about
methods that one obtains desired information from his red brother.

Pierre puffed his pipe in silence for an interminable time, then he
nodded slowly: "Yes," he answered, "I be'n dere."

"What is the name of that lake?"

"Long tam ago _nem_ 'Hill Lak'. Now, Injun call um
'Lak'-of-de-Fox-Dat-Yell'."

"You have seen him, too--the fox that yells?" asked the boy, eagerly.

"Yes. I kill um two tam--an' he com' back."

"Came back!" cried the boy. "What do you mean?"

"He com' back--an' yell w'en de sun com' up. An' w'en de sun go down he
yell on de side of de hill."

"But surely he couldn't yell after you'd killed him. You must have
killed the wrong fox."

"No. Wan tam I trap um, an' wan tam I shoot um--an' he com' back an'
yell."

"Where did you trap him? At the hole that goes under the rocks?"

"No. Wan tam I trap um on de shore of de lak'. An' wan tam I watch um
com' out de hole an' shoot um