shed a moment's hope through her
tears--"me learn sew up at Holy Cross. Sew up your socks for you when
they open their mouths." But she could see that not even this grand new
accomplishment availed.

"Can help pull sled," she suggested, looking round a little wildly as
if instantly to illustrate. "Never tired," she added, sobbing, and
putting her hands up to her face.

"Sh! sh! Don't wake the Colonel." He got up hastily and stood beside
her at the smouldering fire. He patted her on the shoulder. "Of course
you're a nice girl. The nicest girl in the Yukon"--he caught himself up
as she dropped her hands from her face--"that is, you will be, if you
go home quietly."

Again she hid her eyes.

Go home? How could he send her home all that way at this time of night?
It was a bothering business!

Again her hands fell from the wet unhappy face. She shivered a little
when she met his frowning looks, and turned away. He stooped and picked
up her mitten. Why, you couldn't turn a dog away on a night like this--

Plague take the Pymeuts, root and branch! She had shuffled her feet
into her snow-shoe straps, and moved off in the dimness. But for the
sound of sobbing, he could not have told just where, in the
softly-falling snow, Muckluck's figure was fading into the dusk. He
hurried after her, conscience-stricken, but most unwilling.

"Look here," he said, when he had caught up with her, "I'm sorry you
came all this way in the cold--very sorry." Her sobs burst out afresh,
and louder now, away from the Colonel's restraining presence. "But, see
here: I can't send you off like this. You might die on the trail."

"Yes, I think me die," she agreed.

"No, don't do that. Come back, and we'll tell the Colonel you're going
to stay by the fire till morning, and then go home."

She walked steadily on. "No, I go now."

"But you can't, Muckluck. You can't find the trail."

"I tell you before, I not like your girls. I can go in winter as good
as summer. I _can_ hunt!" She turned on him fiercely. "Once I hunt a
owel. Ketch him, too!" She sniffed back her tears. "I can do all
kinds."

"No, you can't hunt Orange Groves," he said, with a severity that might
seem excessive. "But I can't let you go off in this snowstorm--"

"He soon stop. Goo'-bye."

Never word of sweeter import in his ears than that. But he was far from
satisfied with his conduct all the same. It was quite possible that the
Pymeuts, discovering her absence, would think