s solid, and over this
bridge ready built for them they crossed to the higher ground on the
opposite side. A few hundred yards farther on Thor struck a fairly
well-beaten caribou trail which in the course of half an hour led them
around the end of the lake to the outlet stream flowing north.

Every minute Muskwa was hoping that Thor would stop. His afternoon's nap
had not taken the lameness out of his legs nor the soreness from the tender
pads of his feet. He had had enough, and more than enough, of travel, and
could he have regulated the world according to his own wishes he would not
have walked another mile for a whole month. Mere walking would not have
been so bad, but to keep up with Thor's ambling gait he was compelled to
trot, like a stubby four-year-old child hanging desperately to the thumb of
a big and fast-walking man. Muskwa had not even a thumb to hang to. The
bottoms of his feet were like boils; his tender nose was raw from contact
with brush and the knife-edged marsh grass, and his little back felt all
caved in. Still he hung on desperately, until the creek-bottom was again
sand and gravel, and travelling was easier.

The stars were up now, millions of them, clear and brilliant; and it was
quite evident that Thor had set his mind on an "all-night hike," a
_kuppatipsk pimootao_ as a Cree tracker would have called it. Just how it
would have ended for Muskwa is a matter of conjecture had not the spirits
of thunder and rain and lightning put their heads together to give him a
rest.

For perhaps an hour the stars were undimmed, and Thor kept on like a
heathen without a soul, while Muskwa limped on all four feet. Then a low
rumbling gathered in the west. It grew louder and louder, and approached
swiftly--straight from the warm Pacific. Thor grew uneasy, and sniffed in
the face of it. Livid streaks began to criss-cross a huge pall of black
that was closing in on them like a vast curtain. The stars began to go out.
A moaning wind came. And then the rain.

Thor had found a huge rock that shelved inward, like a lean-to, and he
crept back under this with Muskwa before the deluge descended. For many
minutes it was more like a flood than a rain. It seemed as though a part of
the Pacific Ocean had been scooped up and dropped on them, and in half an
hour the creek was a swollen torrent.

The lightning and the crash of thunder terrified Muskwa. Now he could see
Thor in great blinding flashes of fire, and the next inst