nts of the
newly blind, he got slowly to his feet, and went shambling onward.

And, now, the mood of abject depression in the face of catastrophe
was thrust out, never to return, whatever the issue. Fear was
swallowed up by fierce effort and fiercer resolve. All the strength
of will in the man was concentrated in an iron determination that
was steadfast, unflinching, as hour followed hour in the sickening
toil of a vague progress. The blood of his ancestors was at work
in Donald, driving him on remorselessly. Even more than that, the
strong man's instinctive love of life, the gut-string tenacity that
makes him fight off death until the last horrible second, welled
high in his heart, surged wildly in his blood, compelling him on
and on--ever on!

The afflicted man needed such scourging of impulse. And the
scourging might well have failed, had he known all the ghastly
truth as to how sorely he was beset. Had sight been granted to him
again for a minute, he might have turned readily to the expedient
suggested by the half-breed, which he had rejected so firmly--might
have drawn the keen blade of the knife across his own throat...
For, stealthily picking their way along the back trail toward Lake
Sturgeon, two Indians went swiftly, and they bore with them, divided
equally between them, the contents of the lost man's pack. From
the moment of Donald's setting forth, these two had followed him,
in order to make certain of his death. Last night, they had ventured
to camp close to him, since to their eyes of experience it was made
plain: by his actions that he was blind. In the morning, when he
lost his way, they had stolen his belongings, thereby to insure
the end. Then, wearied of their long vigil, they took the homeward
trail with glad hearts. They knew beyond any shadow of questioning
that death to the wanderer could be only a matter of a few hours
now. They could safely report to the council of the brotherhood
that the condemned had followed Death Trail to its end.

Mercifully, Donald guessed nothing of all this. So, he held to
his slow course eastward with a stolidly patient courage against
every obstacle. Very often, he verified his direction by feeling
the shoots of the shrubbery, or by the more laborious digging to
the moss that grew at the foot of the tree-trunks. Always, the cold
assaulted him, and as time passed and hunger waxed, its attacks
were more difficult to resist. The draining of his energies left
him unp