rcel will
follow her--out to the sunset."

Then he turned, cracked his whip, hoarsely shouted: "Marche, Fleur!" and
disappeared with his dogs into the night.

CHAPTER XXXVIII

THE WHITE TRAIL TO FORT GEORGE

One hundred and fifty miles down the wind-harassed East Coast, was a man
who could save Julie Breton. The mind of Marcel held one thought only as
his hurrying dogs loped down the river trail to the Bay. Dark though it
was, for the stars were veiled, Fleur never faltered, keeping the trail
by instinct and the feel of her feet.

Reaching the Bay the trail swung south skirting the beach, often cutting
inland to avoid circling long points and shoulders of shore; at the Cape
of the Winds--the midwinter vortex of unleashed Arctic blasts--making a
deep cut to the sheltered valley of the Little Salmon. Marcel was too
dog-wise to push his huskies as they swung south on the sea-ice, for no
sled-dogs work well after eating.

As the late moon slowly lifted, he shook his head, for it was a moon of
snow. If only the weather held until he could bring his man from Fort
George, but fate was against him. That he could average fifty miles a
day going and coming, with the light sled, he was confident. He knew
what hearts beat in those shaggy breasts in front--what stamina he had
never put to the supreme test, lay in their massive frames. He knew that
Fleur would set her sons a pace, at the call of Jean Marcel, that would
eat the frozen miles to Fort George, as they had never before slid past
a dog-runner. But once a December norther struck down upon them on their
return, burying the trail in drift, with its shot-like drive in the
teeth of man and dogs, it would kill their speed, as a cliff stops wind.

He had intended to camp for a few hours, later in the night, to rest his
dogs, but the warning of the ringed moon flicked him with fear, as a
whiplash stings a lagging husky. It meant in December, snow and wind. He
must race that wind to the lee of Big Island, so he pushed on through
the night over the frozen shell of the Bay, stopping only once to boil
tea and rest his over-willing dogs.

As day broke blue and bitter in the ashen east, a team of spent huskies
with ice-hung lips and flews swung in from the trail skirting the lee
shore of Big Island and the driver in belted caribou capote, a rim of
ice from his frozen breath circling his lean face, made a fire from
cedar kindlings brought on the sled, boiled tea and pemmi