the sunlight.

"There is nothing to do but fight," he repeated, even more calmly than
before. "If we were a mile or two back there it could all happen as I
planned it. But here--"

"They will hear the shots," cried Jean. "The post is no more than a
gunshot beyond the forest, and there are plenty there who would come out
to see what it means. Quick, M'seur--follow me. Possibly they are
hunters going out to the trap-lines. If it comes to the worst--"

"What then?" demanded Howland.

"You can shoot me a little later," temporized the Frenchman with a show
of his old coolness. "_Mon Dieu_, I am afraid of that gun, M'seur. I
will get you out of this if I can. Will you give me the chance--or will
you shoot?"

"I will shoot--if you fail," replied the engineer.

Barely were the words out of his mouth when Croisset sprang to the head
of the dogs, seized the leader by his neck-trace and half dragged the
team and sledge through the thick bush that edged the trail. A dozen
paces farther on the dense scrub opened into the clearer run of the
low-hanging banskian through which Jean started at a slow trot, with
Howland a yard behind him, and the huskies following with human-like
cleverness in the sinuous twistings of the trail which the Frenchman
marked out for them. They had progressed not more than three hundred
yards when there came to them for a third time the hallooing of a voice.
With a sharp "hup, hup," and a low crack of his whip Jean stopped
the dogs.

"The Virgin be praised, but that is luck!" he exclaimed. "They have
turned off into another trail to the east, M'seur. If they had come on
to that break in the bush where we dragged the sledge through--" He
shrugged his shoulders with a gasp of relief. "_Sacre_, they would not
be fools enough to pass it without wondering!"

Howland had broken the breech of his revolver and was replacing the
three empty cartridges with fresh ones.

"There will be no mistake next time," he said, holding out the weapon.
"You were as near your death a few moments ago as ever before in your
life, Croisset--and now for a little plain understanding between us.
Until we stopped out there I had some faith in you. Now I have none. I
regard you as my worst enemy, and though you are deuced near to your
friends I tell you that you were never in a tighter box in your life. If
I fail in my mission here, you shall die. If others come along that
trail before dark, and run us down, I will kill you. Unle