into the bleached ones of his vis-a-vis.

"I figure that there Chinook an' me an' th' bear must have been all
travellin' 'bout th' same line of speed--kind of swift. After a mile or
two of it, th' bear--he got fed up an' quit cold," he ended gravely.
"Why--what's your hurry, Fred?"

But that individual, feebly raising both arms with a sort of hopeless
gesture, suddenly grabbed up his mail and beat a hasty retreat to his
horse.

The hoof-beats died away and MacDavid turned to the grinning policemen.
"Fred Storey," he said, in answer to their looks of silent enquiry.
"Runs th' R.U. Ranch, out south here. Not a bad head, but"--he sighed
deeply--"he's such an ungodly liar. I can't resist gettin' back at him
now an' again--just for luck. He's up here on a visit--stayin' with th'
Sawyers."

"H-mm!" ejaculated Yorke, "seems to me I've got a hazy recollection of
meeting up with that fellow before--somewhere. In a hotel in High River,
I think it was. Beggar was yarning about Cuba, I remember."

"Bet it was hazy all right," was Redmond's sarcastic rejoiner, "like most
of your bar-room recollections, Yorkey." He gave vent to a snorting
chuckle. "That 'D'you know? Ya! ya!' accent of his reminds me of that
curate in 'The Private Secretary.' I saw it played to Toronto, once."

At this juncture the door opened, and a trio of Indians padded softly
into the store with gaily-beaded, moccasined feet. Two elderly bucks and
a young squaw. The latter flashed a shy, roguish grin at the white men,
and then with the customary effacement of Indian women withdrew to the
rear of the store. Squatting down, all huddled-up in her blanket, she
peered at them with the incurious, but all-seeing stare of her tribe.
George got an impression of beady black eyes and a brown, rounded,
child-like face framed in a dazzling yellow kerchief.

The two bucks, with a momentary gleam of welcome wrinkling their
ruthless, impassive features, exchanged a salutation with MacDavid in
guttural Cree, which language the latter spoke fluently. They were
clothed in the customary fashion of their tribe--with a sort of
blanket-capote garment reaching below the knee, their lower limbs swathed
in strips of blanket, wound puttee-wise. Battered old felt hats
comprised their head-gear, below which escaped two plaited pig-tails of
coarse, mane-like, black hair, the latter parted at the nape of the neck
and dangling forward down their broad chests.

Slavin and