hang heavy with death. In the dark Scraggy broke out into
sobs, and was seized with spasms of shivering; she had no strength to
move forward or backward.

But again love drove her on, and some seconds passed before she found
matches to light the candle. When the dim flame lighted up the room, she
turned slowly to the middle of the floor. Tremblingly she drew down the
covering and looked upon her dead. They were hers--these men were hers
even in death! Chokingly she stifled her sobs, and then the decision
came to her that she would keep a night vigil until break of day. Of the
two, Screech Owl knew not which she loved better.

"Ye both be dead," she moaned, looking first at Lem then at Everett;
"dead so ye'll never breathe no more! But Scraggy loves ye.... God! ye
nuther one of ye knows how she loves ye! There weren't no men in the
hull world as good as ye both was.... Lemmy didn't know ye was his,
little 'un, and ye didn't know Lemmy were yer daddy. I'll stay with ye
both till the day."

Saying this, she crouched low between Crabbe and Brimbecomb, and,
encircling each neck with an arm, thrust her face down close between
them.

Lon Cronk's old clock on the shelf ticked out the minutes into the
somberness of the hut. The waves of the lake, breaking ceaselessly upon
the shore, softened the harsh, uneven croaks of the marsh-frogs with
their harmony. Through the broken window drifted the night noises, and
the wind fluttered the candle-flame weakly. Suddenly Screech Owl thought
she heard a voice--a voice filled with tender sympathy and pathos.
Without disengaging her arms, she lifted herself and searched with dim
eyes even the corners of the hut. Misty forms shaded to ghost-gray
seemed to steal out and group themselves about her dead. She took her
arm from Everett and brushed back the straggling locks that blurred her
sight.

The voice spoke again, pronouncing her name in low, even tones. Once
more she wound her arm about Everett, and pressed herself down between
her beloveds. Her eyes, protruding and fearful, saw the candlelight grow
dimmer.

"Lemmy, Lemmy," she gasped between hard-coming breaths, "I'm comin'
after ye and our pretty boy! Wherever ye both be--I come--"

A film gathered over Scraggy's eyes, and her words were cut short by the
pain of the intermittent flutterings of her heart. She fell lower, and
with a last weak effort drew the heads closer together. Then Scraggy's
spirit, which had ever sought her l