pen water,
of air holes, or cracks which might gape beneath their feet like jaws.
Immersion in this temperature, no matter how brief, meant death.

The monotony of progress through this unreal, leaden world became almost
unbearable. The repeated strainings and twistings they suffered in
walking the slippery ridge reduced the men to weariness; their legs grew
clumsy and their feet uncertain. Had they found a camping place they
would have stopped, but they dared not forsake the thin thread that
linked them with safety to go and look for one, not knowing where the
shore lay. In storms of this kind men have lain in their sleeping bags
for days within a stone's throw of a road-house or village. Bodies have
been found within a hundred yards of shelter after blizzards have
abated.

Cantwell and Grant had no choice, therefore, except to bore into the
welter of drifting flakes.

It was late in the afternoon when the latter met with an accident.
Johnny, who had taken a spell at the rear, heard him cry out, saw him
stagger, struggle to hold his footing, then sink into the snow. The
dogs paused instantly, lay down, and began to strip the ice pellets
from between their toes.

Cantwell spoke harshly, leaning upon the handle-bars: "Well! What's the
idea?"

It was the longest sentence of the day.

"I've--hurt myself." Mort's voice was thin and strange; he raised
himself to a sitting posture, and reached beneath his parka, then lay
back weakly. He writhed, his face was twisted with pain. He continued to
lie there, doubled into a knot of suffering. A groan was wrenched from
between his teeth.

"Hurt? How?" Johnny inquired, dully.

It seemed very ridiculous to see that strong man kicking around in the
snow.

"I've ripped something loose--here." Mort's palms were pressed in upon
his groin, his fingers were clutching something. "Ruptured--I guess." He
tried again to rise, but sank back. His cap had fallen off and his
forehead glistened with sweat.

Cantwell went forward and lifted him. It was the first time in many days
that their hands had touched, and the sensation affected him strangely.
He struggled to repress a devilish mirth at the thought that Grant had
played out--it amounted to that and nothing less; the trail had
delivered him into his enemy's hands, his hour had struck. Johnny
determined to square the debt now, once for all, and wipe his own mind
clean of that poison which corroded it. His muscles were strong, his