wbridge," continued Dick. "He makes un a lot worse'n Bob tells
un. Fog's clearin', Ed, an' we better be goin' after we eats dinner."

"That we had, an' the fog's clearin'," agreed Ed.

"But how about Ungava Bob? I'd like to meet him. Do you really think I
may be able to engage him to guide me on a two or three weeks' trip?"
asked Shad.

"Aye," said Ed. "I'm thinkin', now, you might. Bob's not startin' for
th' trails for three weeks, whatever, an' he's bidin' home till he
goes, an' not wonderful busy. I'm thinkin' Bob could go."

"That settles it," Shad decided. "I'll look him up."

"You'll be welcome t' a place in our boat," suggested Dick. "'Tis a
two-days' sail, wi' fair wind. They's plenty o' room, an' we can tow
th' canoe. Me an' Ed lives at Porcupine Cove, an' you can paddle th'
canoe over from there t' Wolf Bight in half a day, whatever."

"Done!" exclaimed Shad.

With the assurance of Mr. James Forbes, the factor, that the rivers
flowing into the head of the Bay, a hundred miles inland from Fort
Pelican, offered good canoe routes, Shad felt that a kind fate had
indeed directed him to Fort Pelican, and that he had been particularly
fortunate in meeting the two trappers.

"Bob Gray will be a good man for you if you can engage him, and I
think you can," said Mr. Forbes. "Bob has had some truly remarkable
adventures, and he's an interesting chap. Ed Matheson will probably
relate these adventures to you, properly embellished, if you go up the
Bay with him and Dick Blake. Take Ed's stories, though, with a grain
of salt. He is a good trapper, but he has a vivid imagination."

Shad accepted Mr. Forbes's invitation to dine in the "big house," as
the factor's residence was called, and when, after dinner, Mr. Forbes
accompanied him to the wharf, the trappers had already stowed his
outfit into their boat, and the two mean were awaiting his arrival. No
time was lost in getting away. Sail was hoisted at once, and with
Shad's canoe in tow the boat turned westward into the narrows that
connect Eskimo Bay with the ocean.

"Th' wind's shifted t' nu'th'ard, and when we gets through th' narrows
there'll be no fog," Dick prophesied, and his prophecy proved true.
Presently the sky cleared, the sun broke through the mist, the
freshening north wind swept away the last lingering fog bank, and as a
curtain rises upon a scene, so the lifting fog revealed to Shad
Trowbridge the weird, primitive beauty of the rugged northland that