ieu, shall say zee prayer, for I haf not zee religion, but----"

"Call me when you are ready!" interrupted Stane, and turned away,
finding the situation intolerably poignant.

He went to the hut, and busied himself with the meal which the trapper
had been preparing, and presently Jean Benard called him.

The man had swathed the dead girl in a blanket and had bent the tops of
a couple of small spruce, growing close together, almost to the ground,
holding them in position with a sled thong. To the trees he had lashed
the corpse, and he was standing by with a knife in his hand.

"Zee ground," he said in a steady voice, "ees too frozen to dig. We
bury Miskodeed in zee air; an' when zee spring winds blow an' the
ground grow soft again, I dig a grave. Now eef m'sieu ees ready we will
haf zee words of religion."

Stane, almost choked at the poignant irony of the thing, then shaped
his lips to the great words that would have been strange if not
unmeaning to the dead girl.

_"I am the resurrection and the life. He that believeth in Me, though
he were dead yet shall he live...._"

For the comfort of the man, who stood by knife in hand, he recited
every word that he could remember, and when he reached the words, "We
therefore commit her body to the grave," the keen knife severed the
moose-hide thong, and the trees, released, bent back, carrying the
girl's body to its windy sepulchre, amid a shower of snow that
scattered from the neighbouring trees. Stane pronounced the
benediction, waited a few moments, then again he put a hand on the
other's shoulder.

"Benard, we have done what we can for the dead; now we must think of
the living."

"Oui, m'sieu!"

"You must eat! I have prepared a meal. And when you have eaten and the
dogs are ready we must start on the trail of Miss Yardely."

"Oui, m'sieu."

They returned to the hut together, and noting that some of the outer
logs were still smouldering, the trapper shovelled snow against them
with his snow-shoes, then they entered. The cabin was not so badly
burned as Stane had expected to find it. The bunk had burned out, but
the inner wall of the cabin had scarcely caught and the place was still
tenable. Benard blocked the window, and they sat down to eat. For a
time the meal progressed in silence, Stane deliberately refraining from
speech out of consideration for the feelings of his companion, though
from time to time glancing at him he caught an expression of perplexity
on