hunted the private car onto a
spur.

Appleton promptly impressed one of his own tote-wagons which had been
sent to town for supplies; and before noon the four-horse team was
swung into the tote-road carrying the hunting party into the woods.

Tents, blankets, and robes had been ranged into more or less
comfortable seats for the accommodation of the party, while young
Charlie Manton insisted upon climbing onto the high driver's seat,
where he wedged himself uncomfortably between the teamster and Blood
River Jack, the guide.

From the time the latter had joined the party at Hilarity the boy had
stuck close to his side, asking innumerable questions and listening
with bated breath to the half-breed's highly colored narratives in
which wolves, bears, and Indians played the important parts.

In the evening, when they camped beside the tote-road, and he was
permitted to help with the tents and the fire-wood, the youngster
fairly bristled with importance, and after supper when the whole party
drew about the great camp-fire the boy seated himself close by the side
of the guide.

"You never told me your name," he ventured.

"Blood River Jack," the man replied.

"That's a funny kind of a name," puzzled the boy. "Why did they name
you that?"

"Jacques--that is my name. Blood River--that is where I live. It is
that my lodge is near the bank of the river and in the Blood River
country I hunt and lay my trap lines, and in the waters of the river I
fish. What is your name?"

"New York Charlie," unhesitatingly replied the boy and flushed deeply
at the roar of laughter with which the others of the party greeted his
answer. But the long-haired, dark-skinned guide, noting the angry flash
of the wide, blue eyes, refrained from laughter.

"That is a good name," he said gravely. "In the land of the white man
men are called by the name of their fathers. In the woods it is not
often so, except when it be written upon papers. The best man in the
North is one of whom men know only his first name. He is M's'u'
Bill--The-Man-Who-Cannot-Die."

"Why can't he die?" asked the youngster eagerly.

Jacques shook his head.

"Wa-ha-ta-na-ta says 'all men die,'" he replied; "but--did not the
_chechako_ come into the North in the time of a great snow, and without
rackets mush forty miles in two days? Did he not kill with a knife
Diablesse, the werwolf, whom all men feared, and with an axe chop in
pieces the wolves of her pack?

"Did he not