then the song drifted away until she could no longer hear it, and she
sank back into an oblivion of darkness in which she seemed lost for a
long time, and out of which some invisible force was struggling to drag
her.

There came at last a sudden irresistible pull at her senses, and she
opened her eyes, awake. Her head was no longer in the crook of Jolly
Roger's arm. She could see him sitting up straight, and he was not
looking at her. It must be late, she thought, for the light was strong
in his face, warm with the first golden flow of the sun. She smiled,
and sat up, and shook her soft curls with a happy little laugh.

"Roger--"

And then she, too, was staring, wide-eyed and speechless. For she saw
Peter under Jolly Roger's hand. But it was not Peter who drew her
breath short and sent fear cutting like a sharp knife through her heart.

Facing them, seated coldly on a log which McKay had dragged in from the
timber, was a thin-faced sharp-eyed man who was studying them with an
odd smile on his lips, and instantly Nada knew this man was Breault.

There was something peculiarly appalling about him as he sat there, in
spite of the fact that for a few moments he neither spoke nor moved.
His eyes, Nada thought, were not like human eyes, and his lips were
like the blades of two knives set together. Yet he was smiling, or half
smiling, not in a comforting or humorous way, but with exultation and
triumph. From looking at him one would never have guessed that Breault
loved his joke.

He nodded.

"Good morning, Jolly Roger McKay! And--good morning, Mrs. Jolly Roger
McKay! Pardon me for watching you like this, but duty is duty. I am
Breault, of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police."

McKay wet his lips. Breault saw him, and the grin on his thin face
widened.

"I know, it's hard," he said. "But you've got Peter to thank for it.
Peter led me to you."

He stood up, and in a most casual fashion covered Jolly Roger with his
automatic.

"Would you mind stepping out, McKay?" he asked.

In his other hand he dangled a pair of handcuffs. McKay stood up, and
Nada rose beside him, gripping his arms with both hands.

"No need of those things, Breault," he said. "I'll go peaceably."

"Still--it's safer," argued Breault, a wicked glitter in his eyes.
"Hold out one hand, please--"

The manacle snapped over Jolly Roger's wrist.

"I'm Breault--not Terence Cassidy," he chuckled. "Never take a chance,
you know. Never!"

Swift as a