l?"

"I can scent him. It's strong enough in the wind," she added, wrinkling
her delicate nose with a smile.

Grandcourt sniffed and sniffed, and finally detected a slight acrid
odour in the light, clear breeze. He looked wisely around him; Geraldine
was skirting a fallen tree on her skis; he started on and was just
rounding a clump of brush when there came a light, crashing noise
directly ahead of him; a big, dark, shaggy creature went bounding and
bucking across his line of vision--a most extraordinary animal, all head
and shoulders and big, furry ears.

The snapping crack of a rifle echoed by the sharp racket of another shot
aroused him to action too late, for Miller, knife drawn, was hastening
across the snow to a distant dark, motionless heap; and Geraldine stood
jerking back the ejector of her weapon and throwing a fresh cartridge
into the breach.

"My goodness!" he faltered, "somebody got him! Who fired, Geraldine?"

She said: "I waited as long as I dared, Delancy. They go like lightning,
you know. I'm terribly sorry you didn't fire."

"Good girl!" said Duane in a low voice as she sped by him on her skis,
rifle ready for emergencies as old Miller cautiously approached the
shaggy brown heap, knife glittering.

But there was no emergency; Miller's knife sank to the hilt; Geraldine
uncocked her rifle and bent curiously over the dead boar.

"Nice tusks. Miss Seagrave," commented the old man. "He's fat as butter,
too. I cal'late he'll tip the beam at a hundred and forty paound!"

The hunters clustered around with exclamations of admiration; Rosalie,
distractingly pretty in her white wool kilts and cap, knelt down and
touched the fierce, long-nosed head and stroked the furry jowl.

"Oh, Delancy!" she wailed, "why _didn't_ you 'plug' him as you promised?
_I_ simply _couldn't_ shoot; Duane tried to make me, but I was so
excited and so surprised to see the creature run so fast that all my
ideas went out of my head and I never thought of pulling that wretched
trigger!"

"That," said Delancy, very red, "is precisely what happened to me." And,
turning to Geraldine, who looked dreadfully repentant: "I heard you tell
me to shoot, and I merely gawked at the beast like a rubbering jay at a
ten-cent show."

"Everybody does that at first," said Duane cheerfully; "I'll bet
anything that you and Rosalie empty your magazines at the next one."

"We really must, Delancy," insisted Rosalie as she and Geraldine turned
awa