l signal. The signal
floated back to them softly. Five minutes later MacDonald rode up and
dismounted. Until he had taken the saddle off, and had hobbled his horse,
he did not speak. Neither Joanne nor Aldous asked the question that was in
their hearts. But even in the darkness they felt something. It was as if
not only the torrent rushing through the chasm, but MacDonald's heart as
well, was charging the air with a strange and subdued excitement. And when
MacDonald spoke, that which they had felt was in his voice.

"You ain't seen or heard anything, Johnny?"

"Nothing. And you--Donald?"

In the darkness, Joanne went to the old man, and her hand found one of his,
and clasped it tightly; and she found that Donald MacDonald's big hand was
trembling in a strange and curious way, and she could feel him quivering.

"You found Jane?" she whispered.

"Yes, I found her, little Joanne."

She did not let go of his hand until they entered the open space which
Aldous had made in the spruce. Then she remembered what Aldous had said to
her earlier in the day, and cheerfully she lighted the two candles they
had set out, and forced Aldous down first upon the ground, and then
MacDonald, and began to help them to beans and meat and bannock, while all
the time her heart was crying out to know about the cavern--and Jane. The
candleglow told her a great deal, for in it Donald MacDonald's face was
very calm, and filled with a great peace, despite the trembling she had
felt. Her woman's sympathy told her that his heart was too full on this
night for speech, and when he ate but little she did not urge him to eat
more; and when he rose and went silently and alone out into the darkness
she held Aldous back; and when, still a little later, she went into her
nest for the night, she whispered softly to him:

"I know that he found Jane as he wanted to find her, and he is happy. I
think he has gone out there alone--to cry." And for a time after that, as
he sat in the gloom, John Aldous knew that Joanne was sobbing like a little
child in the spruce and cedar shelter he had built for her.

CHAPTER XXVIII

If MacDonald slept at all that night Aldous did not know it. The old
mountaineer watched until a little after twelve in the deep shadow of a
rock between the two camps.

"I can't sleep," he protested, when Aldous urged him to take his rest. "I
might take a little stroll up the plain, Johnny--but I can't sleep."

The plain lay in a