hing was there.

They began to stumble over nothing; occasionally to fall. In this was
added effort, but more particularly added annoyance. They had
continually to watch their footsteps. The walking was no longer
involuntary, but they had definitely to think of each movement necessary
to the step, and this gave them a further reason for preoccupation, for
concentration. Dick's sullenness returned, more terrible than in the
summer. He went forward with his head down, refusing to take notice of
anything. He walked: that was to him the whole of existence.

Once reverting analogously to his grievance of that time, he mentioned
the girl, saying briefly that soon they must all die, and it was better
that she die now. Perhaps her share of the pemmican would bring them to
their quarry. The idea of return--not abandoned, but persistently
ignored--thrust into prominence this other,--to come to close quarters
with the man they pursued, to die grappled with him, dragging him down
to the same death by which these three perished. But Sam would have none
of it, and Dick easily dropped the subject, relapsing into his grim
monomania of pursuit.

In Dick's case even the hope of coming to grapples was fading. He
somehow had little faith in his enemy. The man was too intangible, too
difficult to gauge. Dick had not caught a glimpse of the Indian since
the pursuit began. The young man realised perfectly his own exhaustion;
but he had no means of knowing whether or not the Indian was tiring. His
faith waned, though his determination did not. Unconsciously he
substituted this monomania of pursuit. It took the place of the faith he
felt slipping from him--the faith that ever he would see the _fata
morgana_ luring him out into the Silent Places.

Soon it became necessary to kill another dog. Dick, with a remnant of
his old feeling, pleaded for the life of Billy, his pet. Sam would not
entertain for a moment the destruction of the hound. There remained
only Claire, the sledge-dog, with her pathetic brown eyes, and her
affectionate ways of the female dog. They went to kill her, and
discovered her in the act of defending the young to which she had just
given birth. Near at hand crouched Mack and Billy, their eyes red with
famine, their jaws a-slaver, eager to devour the newborn puppies. And in
the grim and dreadful sight Sam Bolton seemed at last to glimpse the
face of his terrible antagonist.

They beat back the dogs, and took the puppies. T