ange
adversary approaching, the hair stood straight up along their backs,
their little tails puffed to bottle brushes, their ears lay flat back
on their heads, and they screeched defiance in harsh unison. Then, as
if by one impulse, they turned from their prey and crept stealthily
towards her.

They did not like that steady light in her blue eyes, but they felt by
some instinct that she was young and unstable of nerve. At this
unexpected move on their part the girl stopped short, suddenly
undecided whether to fight or flee.

At once the lynxes stopped also, and crouched flat, tensely watching,
their claws dug deep into the hard-trodden snow so as to give them
purchase for an instant, powerful spring in any direction.

In the meantime, however, the crippled old woman within doors had
not been idle. Great of spirit, and still mighty of sinew for all her
ailment, she had managed to work the weight of the heavy chair and her
own solid bulk all the way across the cabin floor. Being straight
in front of the door, she had seen almost all that happened; and her
brave old berserk heart was bursting with pride in the courage of
this frail child, whom she had hitherto regarded with a kind of
affectionate scorn.

The Griffises of Nackawick and Little River had always been sizable
men, men of sinew and bulk, and women tall and ruddy; and this small,
blue-eyed girl had seemed to her, in a way, to wrong the stock. But
she was quick to understand that the stature of the spirit is what
counts most of all.

Now, in this moment of breathless suspense, when she saw Melindy and
the two great beasts thus holding each other eye to eye in a life and
death struggle of wills, her heart was convulsed with a wild fear. In
the spasm of it she succeeded in lifting herself almost erect, and so
gained possession of the big duck-gun, which her son Jake, now away in
the lumber woods, always kept loaded and ready for use. As she cocked
it and settled back into her chair, she called in a piercing voice--

"Don't stir one step, Melindy! I'm going to shoot!"

The girl never stirred a muscle, although she turned pale with terror
of the loud noise which was about to shock her ears. The two lynxes,
however, turned their heads, and fixed the pale glare of their eyes
upon the figure seated in the doorway.

The next moment came a spurt of red flame, a belch of smoke, a
tremendous report that seemed as if it must have shattered every pane
of glass in th