r McKay. Nature was his god; its manifestations, its life, and
the air it gave him to breathe were the pages which made up the Book
that guided him. And within the last hour, since the sun had begun to
drop behind the tips of the tallest trees, these things had told him
that he was a fool for turning away from the one great thing in all
life--simply because his own humors of existence had made him an
outcast and hunted by the laws of men. So the change had come, and for
a space his soul was filled with the thrill of song and laughter.

Half an hour ago he believed that he had definitely made up his mind.
He had forced himself into forgetfulness of laws he had broken, and the
scarlet-coated men who were ever on the watch for his trail. They would
never seek him here, in the wilderness country close to the edge of
civilization, and time, he had told himself in that moment of optimism,
would blot out both his identity and his danger. Tomorrow he would go
over to Cragg's Ridge again, and then--

His mind was crowded with a vision of blue eyes, of brown curls glowing
in the pale sun, of a wistful, wide-eyed little face turned up to him,
and red lips that said falteringly, "I don't think it's wrong for you
to kiss me--if you want to, Mister Jolly Roger!"

Boldly he had talked about it to the bright-eyed little mother-mouse
who peered at him now and then over the edge of her box.

"You're a little devil of iniquity yourself," he told her. "You're a
regular Mrs. Captain Kidd, and you've eaten my cheese, and chawed my
snowshoe laces, and robbed me of a sock to make your nest. I ought to
catch you in a trap, or blow your head off. But I don't. I let you
live--and have a fam'ly. And it's you who have given me the Big Idea,
Mrs. Captain Kidd. You sure have! You've told me I've got a right to
have a nest of my own, and I'm going to have it--an' in that nest is
going to be the sweetest, prettiest little angel that God Almighty ever
forgot to make into a flower! Yessir. And if the law comes--"

And then, suddenly, the vision clouded, and there came into Jolly
Roger's face the look of a man who knew--when he stood the truth out
naked--that he was facing a world with his back to the wall.

And now, as the sun went down, and his supper waited--that cloud which
came to blot out his picture grew deeper and more sinister, and the
chill of it entered his heart. He turned from his table to the open
door, and his fingers drew themselves s