parties to the wilds."

"I think I shall be able to give you one, quite conscientiously," Stane
retorted laughingly. "You certainly are a very apt pupil."

"Ah! you haven't seen that hideous mess on the other side of the bluff.
The fact is I shudder at the thought of viewing it again. But we must
have the meat, I suppose."

Having rested a little, she turned and left the camp again and the man
followed her with eyes that glowed with admiration. As he lay there he
thought to himself that however she might shudder at the thought of a
vilely unpleasant task, she would not shirk it, and as he reflected on
the events of the past few days, there was in his heart a surge of
feeling that he could not repress. He loved this delicately-nurtured
girl who adapted herself to the harsh ways of the wilderness with so
gay a spirit; and though a look of bitterness came on his face as he
reflected that circumstances must seal his lips, in his heart he was
glad that they should have met, and that she should be his pupil in the
ways of the wild.

CHAPTER XIII

A LODGE IN THE WILDERNESS

It was six weeks later. The dawn came less early, and nightfall
perceptibly sooner.

There was a new crispness in the air, and the leaves on the trees were
losing their greenness and taking on every possible shade, from pale
yellow to old gold, and from that to dusky red. Both Stane and Helen
Yardely noticed the signs. Autumn was upon them and they were still in
their camp by the lake, though now Stane was able to hobble about with
a pair of crutches made from a couple of forked sticks, padded with
moss at the forks for his arms, and covered with caribou skin. Helen
herself was busy from dawn to sunset. From words that he had dropped
she knew that they had lost in the race with the seasons, and that
winter would be on them before he would be able to take the trail. She
faced the dreary prospect light-heartedly, but under his instruction
omitted no precautions that would make a winter sojourn in the wild
land tolerable. Fish were caught and dried, rabbits and hares snared,
not merely for meat, but for their skins, which when a sufficient
number had been accumulated were fashioned into parkas and blankets
against the Arctic cold which was surely marching on them.

The leaves began to fall, light frosts were succeeded by heavier ones,
and one morning they awoke to find a thin film of ice on the surface of
the still water of the little bay wh