"

"'Which art in--'"

His head fell forward. "Bless you, my boy. Father, forgive, forgive--"

He sank back very quietly.

He was dead.

* * * * *

Next morning the Halfbreed caught a minnow. We divided it into three and
ate it raw. Later on he found some water-lice under a stone. We tried to
cook them, but they did not help us much. Then, as night fell once more,
a thought came into our minds and stuck there. It was a hidden thought,
and yet it grew and grew. As we sat round in a circle we looked into
each other's faces, and there we read the same revolting thought. Yet
did it not seem so revolting after all. It was as if the spirit of the
dead man was urging us to this thing, so insistent did the thought
become. It was our only hope of life. It meant strength again, strength
and energy to make a raft and float us down the river. Oh, if only--but,
no! We could not do it. Better, a hundred times better, die.

Yet life was sweet, and for twenty-three days we had starved. Here was a
chance to live, with the dead man whispering in our ears to do it. You
who have never starved a day in your lives, would you blame us? Life is
sweet to you, too. What would you have done? The dead man was urging
us, and life was sweet.

But we struggled, God knows we struggled. We did not give in without
agony. In our hopeless, staring eyes there was the anguish of the great
temptation. We looked in each other's death's-head faces. We clasped
skeleton hands round our rickety knees, and swayed as we tried to sit
upright. Vermin crawled over us in our weakness. We were half-crazy, and
muttered in our beards.

It was the Halfbreed who spoke, and his voice was just a whisper:

"It's our only chance, boys, and we've promised him. God forgive me, but
I've a wife and children, and I'm a-goin' to do it."

He was too weak to rise, and with his knife in his mouth he crawled to
the body.

* * * * *

It was ready, but we had not eaten. We waited and waited, hoping against
hope. Then, as we waited, God was merciful to us. He saved us from this
thing.

"Say, I guess I've got a pipe-dream, but I think I see two men coming
downstream on a raft."

"No, it's no dream," I said; "two men."

"Shout to them; I can't," said the Prodigal.

I tried to shout, but my voice came as a whisper. The Halfbreed, too,
tried to shout. There was scarcely any sound to it. The men did not see
us a