of the beach Kobuk settled on his haunches, watching her
with questioning, side-turned head. He whined uneasily.

The scarlet shawl slipped from her shoulders and floated off behind
her. . . . The water crept above her waist . . . her shoulders. Her
wide-eyed, frightened face caught the light. . . . Then the ripples
closed above her head. A moment later her long hair, loosed from its
braids, swayed on the amber-lighted surface like seaweed, then the
moonpath lay quiet as before.

On the shore Kobuk waited, his slant eyes blinking at the moon.
Occasionally he raised his pointed nose and uttered a muffled whine
that ended in a short, querulous yelp. . . . Hours passed. . . . The
tide began to ebb, leaving a dark line of sand at the edge of the
water. . . . After a long while Kobuk went in search of his mistress,
and having found her, watched beside her until Harlan came and bore her
away.

As the young man ascended the steps to the store platform he was dimly
aware of encountering a tall, dark stranger, who afterward proved to be
the owner of the schooner that had come in the evening before. Shane
Boreland, whose figure was blocking the doorway, stepped aside to let
Gregg pass into the building with his burden.

From about the stove, where several men were already gathered, came low
exclamations, and the White Chief, who had been following Boreland to
the door, stopped suddenly at the sight of Harlan. His face went as
cold and emotionless as that of the dead girl.

"Take her in to Decitan," he said shortly, with a gesture toward his
quarters back of the store. Turning on his heel, he walked out to the
platform where Boreland stood waiting.

"A damned sad ending to their little domestic difficulty," he murmured
softly, as befitted one with a large heart and a kindly understanding
of the follies of youth. "But young Harlan, my bookkeeper, hasn't been
long enough in the North to appreciate the intensity of these little
hot-blooded savages. I told him, when he took Naleenah, . . ." The
Chief, as if he had said too much, let his sentence trail off into
silence. He shook his head in apparent sorrow, but his eyes were fixed
on the schooner that rode at anchor in the bay.

"But don't let this incident mar your arrival, Boreland," Paul Kilbuck
went on, and then, with the frontier heartiness he knew so well how to
assume, he set about tendering Boreland the hospitality of the post,
urging the prospector to b