With a quick, resolute movement, he threw the bag into the fire, and
when the resin flared up with a thick brown smoke the others regarded
him with silent sympathy. This was the end of the project from which
he had expected so much; but it was obvious that he could meet failure
with fortitude. Nothing that would serve any purpose could be said,
and they quietly strapped on their blankets.

There was not much snow when they set off, and fortunately the wind
blew behind them, but the white haze narrowed in the prospect and
Blake, breaking the trail, kept his eyes on the compass. He was not at
all sure of the right line, but he had the satisfaction of knowing that
he was, at least, going straight.

After a few minutes, Harding glanced behind. Their camping place had
vanished, they were out in an open waste, and he knew that he had
started on the last march he was capable of making. Where it would
lead him he could not tell, though the answer to the question was of
vital importance. For a time he thought of his wife, and wondered with
keen anxiety what would become of her if his strength gave way before
they reached the post; but he drove these cares out of his mind. It
was dangerous to harbor them, and it served no purpose; his part was to
struggle on, swinging the net snowshoes while he grappled with the pain
each step caused him. He shrank from contemplating the distance yet to
be covered; it seemed vast to him in his weakness, and he felt himself
a feeble, crippled thing. Soft snow and arctic cold opposed his
advance with malignant force; but his worn-out body still obeyed the
spur of his will, and he roused himself to fight for the life that had
some value to another. He must march, dividing up the distance into
short stages that had less effect upon the imagination; limping forward
from the ice-glazed rock abreast of him to the white hillock which
loomed up dimly where the snow blurred the horizon; then again he would
look ahead from some patch of scrub to the most prominent elevation
that he could see.

The marks he chose and passed seemed innumerable; but the wilderness
still ran on, pitilessly empty. His leg was intensely painful; he knew
that he must break down soon; and they had seen nothing of a stony rise
for which they watched eagerly. To find it would simplify matters, for
the Indian had made them understand that the bluffs about the post lay
nearly east of it.

Noon passed, and they still p