sitting alone in the tilt at the
junction of his and Ed's trails, smoking his after supper pipe and
meditating on the happenings of the preceding weeks. There were some
things in connection with the tragedy that he had never been able to
quite clear up. Why, for instance, he asked himself, did Micmac John
steal the furs and then leave them in the tilt where they were found?
Had the half-breed been suddenly smitten by his conscience? That
seemed most unlikely, for Dick had never discovered any indication
that Micmac possessed a conscience. No possible solution of the
problem presented itself. A hundred times he had probed the question,
and always ended by saying, as he did now,

"'Tis strange--wonderful strange, an' I can't make un out."

He arose and knocked the ashes out of his pipe, filled the stove with
wood, and then looked out into the night before going to his bunk. It
was snowing thick and fast.

"'Tis well to-morrow's Sunday," he remarked. "The's nasty weather
comin'."

"That they is," said a voice so close to his elbow that he started
back in surprise,

"Why, hello, Ed. You were givin' me a rare start, sneakin' in as
quiet's a rabbit. How is un?"

"Fine," said Ed, who had just come around the corner of the tilt in
time to hear Dick's remark in reference to the weather. "Who un
talkin' to?"

"To a sensible man as agrees wi' me," answered Dick facetiously. "A
feller does get wonderful lonesome seem' no one an' has t' talk t'
hisself sometimes."

The two entered the tilt and Ed threw off his adikey while Dick put
the kettle over.

"Well," asked Dick, when Ed was finally seated, "how'd th' mother take
un?"

"Rare hard on th' start off," said Ed. "'Twere th' hardest thing I
ever done, tellin' she, an' 'twere all I could do t' keep from
breakin' down myself. I 'most cried, I were feelin so bad for un.

"Douglas were there an' Bessie were visitin' th' sick maid, which were
a blessin', fer Richard were away on his trail.

"I goes in an' finds un happy an' thinkin' maybe Bob'd be comin'. I
finds th' bones gettin' weak in my legs, soon's I sees un, an' th'
mother, soon's she sees me up an' says she's knowin' somethin'
happened t' Bob, an' I has t' tell she wi'out waitin' t' try t' make
un easy's I'd been plannin' t' do. She 'most faints, but after a while
she asks me t' tell she how Bob were killed, an' I tells.

"Then she's wantin' t' see a bit o' the clothes we found, an' when she
looks un over she