ough the muck which
lay knee deep in the right-of-way ditch. It was what was left of the
cutter's cabin, a clutter of burned logs, a wind scattered heap of
ash. Even there, within arm's reach of the railroad, there had been no
salvation from the fire.

He waded again through the muck of the ditch, and went on. Mentally
and physically he was fighting the ogre that was striving to achieve
possession of his brain. Over and over he repeated his faith that Nada
and the Missioner had escaped and he would find them in the settlements.
Less than ever he thought of the law in these hours. What happened to
himself was of small importance now, if he could find Nada alive before
the menace caught up with him from behind, or ambushed him ahead.
Yet the necessity of caution impinged itself upon him even in the
recklessness of his determination to find her if he had to walk into the
arms of the law that was hunting him.

For an hour they went on, and as the moon sank westward it seemed to
turn its face to look at them; and behind them, when they looked back,
the world was transformed into a black pit, while ahead--with the glow
of it streaming over their shoulders--ghostly shapes took form, and
vision reached farther. Twice they caught the silvery gleam of lakes
through the tree-stubs, and again they walked with the rippling murmur
of a stream that kept for a mile within the sound of their ears. But
even here, with water crying out its invitation to life, there was no
life.

Another hour after that Jolly Roger's pulse beat a little faster as he
strained his eyes to see ahead. Somewhere near, within a mile or two,
was the first settlement with its sawmill and its bunkhouses, its one
store and its few cabins, with flat mountains of sawdust on one side
of it, and the evergreen forest creeping up to its doors on the other.
Surely they would find life here, where there had been man power to hold
fire back from the clearing. And it was here he might find Nada and
the Missioner, for more than once Father John had preached to the
red-cheeked women and children and the clear-eyed men of the Finnish
community that thrived there.

But as they drew nearer he listened in vain for the bark of a dog, and
his eyes quested as futilely for a point of light in the wide canopy of
gloom. At last, close together, they rounded a curve in the road, and
crossed a small bridge with a creek running below, and McKay knew his
arm should be able to send a sto