zing, not to be easily believed. A third time the
order of the mysterious footprints in the sand was changed--and the
grizzly was now following the boy, obliterating almost entirely the
indentures in the sand of his small, moccasined feet. He wondered
whether it was possible that his eyes had gone bad on him, or that his
mind had slipped out of its normal groove and was tricking him with
weirdly absurd hallucinations. So what happened in almost that same
breath did not startle him as it might otherwise have done. It was for a
brief moment simply another assurance of his insanity; and if the
mountains had suddenly turned over and balanced themselves on their
peaks their gymnastics would not have frozen him into a more speechless
stupidity than did the Girl who rose before him just then, not twenty
paces away. She had emerged like an apparition from behind a great
boulder--a little older, a little taller, a bit wilder than she had
seemed to him in the picture, but with that same glorious hair sweeping
about her, and that same questioning look in her eyes as she stared at
him. Her hands were in that same way at her side, too, as if she were on
the point of running away from him. He tried to speak. He believed,
afterward, that he even made an effort to hold out his arms. But he was
powerless. And so they stood there, twenty paces apart, staring as if
they had met from the ends of the earth.

Something happened then to whip David's reason back into its place. He
heard a crunching--heavy, slow. From around the other end of the boulder
came a huge bear. A monster. Ten feet from the girl. The first cry
rushed out of his throat. It was a warning, and in the same instant he
raised his rifle to his shoulder. The girl was quicker than he--like an
arrow, a flash, a whirlwind of burnished tresses, as she flew to the
side of the great beast. She stood with her back against it, her two
hands clutching its tawny hair, her slim body quivering, her eyes
flashing at David. He felt weak. He lowered his rifle and advanced a few
steps.

"Who ... what ..." he managed to say; and stopped. He was powerless to
go on. But she seemed to understand. Her body stiffened.

"I am Marge O'Doone," she said defiantly, "and this is my bear!"

CHAPTER XVII

She was splendid as she stood there, an exquisite human touch in the
savageness of the world about her--and yet strangely wild as she faced
David, protecting with her own quivering body the g