artened by the feel of the
snow. The tingling air was filled with familiar man-sounds--the
resonant stroke of axes, and the long crash of falling trees, the
metallic rattle of chains, the harsh rasp of saws, and the good-natured
calls of men in rude banter; sounds that rang little and thin through
the mighty silence of the forest.

Gradually the flakes hardened and the zigzag patterns resolved
themselves into long, threadlike lines which slanted earthward with a
soft, hissing sound.

Fast it fell, and faster, until the background disappeared, and all the
world was a swift-moving riot of white.

It was a real snow now--a snow of value which buried the soft blanket
of the feathery flakes under a stable covering which would pack hard
under the heavy runners of the wide log sleds.

It lodged in thick masses in the trees whose limbs bent under the
weight, and the woods rang to the cries of the sawyers when the
tottering of a mighty pine sent a small avalanche hurtling through the
lower branches, half-burying them in its white smother.

As the early darkness of the North country settled about them the men
plowed heavily to the bunk-house through a foot and a half of
fresh-fallen snow--and still it snowed.

CHAPTER XI

BILL HITS THE TRAIL

In a long-abandoned shack midway between Moncrossen's Blood River camp
and Hilarity, Bill Carmody hugged close the rusty, broken stove.

All day he had tramped northward, guided through the maze of abandoned
roads by the frozen ruts of Moncrossen's tote wagons, and it was long
after dark when he camped in the northernmost of the old shacks with
civilization, as represented by Hilarity's deserted buildings and the
jug-tilting, barrel-head conclave of Hod Burrage's store, forty miles
to the southward.

It had been a hard day--this first day of his new life in the
Northland. And now, foot-sore, dog-tired, and dispirited, he sat close
and fed sticks to his guttering fire which burned sullenly and flared
red for want of draft.

The chinking had long since fallen from between the logs and the night
wind whipped the smoke in stinging volleys from gaping holes in the
rust-eaten jacket of the dilapidated air-tight.

Tears streamed from the man's smoke-tortured eyes, every muscle of his
body ached horribly from the unaccustomed trail-strain, and his feet,
unused to the coarse woolen socks beneath heavy boots, were galled and
blistered until the skin hung in rolls from the edges