r own way had nothing to fear from them. There was now no
bar to their departure, save the unhappy chance of being seen by the
sentinel.

A rod from the camp and Boyd lay flat upon the ground, Will, without the
need of instruction, imitating him at once. The sentinel was coming
back, but like his commander he was a soldier of the civil war, used to
open battlefields, and he did not see the two shadows in the dusk. He
reached the end of his beat and turning went back again, disappearing
once more beyond the stunted pines.

"Now's our time," whispered Boyd, and rising he walked away swiftly but
silently, Will close behind him. Three hundred yards, and they stopped
by the trunk of a mountain oak.

"We're clear of the soldiers now," said the hunter, "but we must have
our horses. Without 'em and the supplies they carry we'd be lost. I
don't mean anything against you, Will. You're a likely lad and you learn
as fast as the best of 'em, but it's for me to cut out the horses and
bring 'em here. Do you think you can wait patiently at this place till I
come with 'em?"

"No, Jim, I can't wait patiently, but I can wait impatiently. I'll make
myself keep still."

"That's good enough. On occasion I can be as good a horse thief as the
best Sioux or Crow or Cheyenne that ever lived, only it's our own horses
that I'm going to steal. They've a guard, of course, but I'll slip past
him. Now use all your patience, Will."

"I will," said the lad, as he leaned against the trunk of the oak. Then
he became suddenly aware that he no longer either saw or heard Boyd. The
hunter had vanished as completely and as silently as if he had melted
into the air, but Will knew that he was going toward the thin forest,
where the horses grazed or rested at the end of their lariats.

All at once he felt terribly alone. He heard nothing now but the moaning
of the wind that came down from the far mountains. The camp was gone,
Boyd was gone, the horses were invisible, and he was the only human
being in the gigantic and unknown Northwest. The air felt distinctly
colder and he shivered a little. It was not fear, it was merely the
feeling that he was cut off from the race like a shipwrecked sailor on a
desert island. He took himself metaphorically by the shoulders and gave
his body a good shake. Boyd would be coming back soon with the horses,
and then he would have the best of comradeship.

But the hunter was a long time in returning, a half hour that seemed