art revolted at
the thought. Dave was never one to show the white feather and he pushed
resolutely on, though he quickened his steps.

For a time the woods were very still. With his cabin almost within
sight, the trapper had begun to breathe more freely when suddenly the
howl was repeated, this time so close that he stopped in dismay. A
moment later he saw them coming, flitting silently along his trail or
from tree to tree, like gray shadows of the coming night.

There would not be time to reach his cabin. Muttering angrily, Dave
kicked off his snowshoes and drew himself into the branches of the
nearest tree. He was just in time, for he had scarcely drawn up his feet
when the pack closed in. His snowshoes were quickly demolished while the
man could only look on, angry but helpless. Then the wolves sat down in
a circle in the snow and looked hungrily up at him.

"Yes, look at me!" Dave remarked, shaking his fist at the pack. "Think
you've got me, don't you? Well, you just wait."

He brought his ever-ready rifle into position and looked about for the
leader, thinking that if he could be killed, the pack would disband. For
a time he hesitated, unable to determine which wolf it might be; then he
stared, forgetting his discomfort in his astonishment. Among the pack
had suddenly appeared a snow-white wolf, the like of which the trapper,
in all his years in the wilderness, had never beheld, though it was said
that a tribe of them was to be found in the far north. Here was the
white wolf about whom so many stories had been told, stories to which he
had listened unbelieving.

For a moment he could only stare in admiration at the powerful animal;
then the hunter's instinct asserted itself and he fired. So quickly did
the wolf swerve that the eye of the hunter could not perceive the
movement. Dave only knew that he had missed, he, the best marksman in
all the Little Vermilion country! Again he fired, but the bullet
embedded itself harmlessly in a tree.

This was too much for the hunter. Here was no wolf. He felt sure that
the bullets had reached their mark, yet the beast was unharmed. Dave was
a mighty hunter but, like most ignorant people, he was superstitious. He
had often heard tales of the loup-garou, or witch wolf, whom no bullet
could kill. With a hand that trembled slightly he laid his gun across
his knees, deciding not to waste his bullets.

He had settled himself for a long cold wait in his tree when, without a
so