y to follow Lapierre to his stronghold.
Awaiting the return of the supply train, MacNair employed his remaining
Indians in getting out logs for the rebuilding of his fort, and he smiled
grimly as his eyes roved over the dumps--the rich dumps which represented
two months' well-directed labour of a gang of a hundred men.

As Chloe Elliston sat in the little living-room and listened to the
impassioned words of Lapierre, the man's chance of winning her was far
better than at any time in the whole course of their acquaintance.
Without in the least realizing it, the girl had all along held a certain
regard for MacNair--a regard that was hard to explain, and that the girl
herself would have been the first to disavow. She hated him! And
yet--she was forced to admit even to herself, the man fascinated her.
But never until the moment of the realization of his true character, as
forced upon her by the action and words of the Louchoux girl, had she
entertained the slightest suspicion that she loved him. And with the
discovery had come a sense of shame and humiliation that had all but
broken her spirit.

Her hatred for MacNair was real enough now. That hatred, the shame and
humility, and the fact that Lapierre was pleading with her as he had
never pled before, were going far to convince the girl that her previous
estimate of the quarter-breed had been a mistaken estimate, and that he
was in truth the fine, clean, educated man of the North which on the
surface he appeared to be. A man whose aim it was to deal fairly and
honourably with the Indians, and who in reality had the best interests of
his people at heart.

No one but Chloe herself will ever know how near she came upon that
afternoon to yielding to his pleading, and laying her soul bare to him.
But something interposed--fate? Destiny? The materialist smiles
"supper." Be that as it may, had she yielded to Lapierre's plans, they
would have stolen from the school that very night and proceeded to Fort
Rae, to be married by the priest at the Mission. For Lapierre, fully
alive to the danger of delay, had eloquently pleaded his cause.

Not only was MacNair upon his trail--MacNair the relentless, the
indomitable--but also the word had passed in the North, and the men of
the Mounted--those inscrutable sentinels of the silence whose watchword
is "get the man"--were aroused to avenge a comrade. And Lapierre
realized with a chill in his heart that he was "the man"! His one