shaped shelter of spruce boughs and sticks, and strong in his
nostrils was the SMELL OF MEAT. He found the meat not more than a foot
from the end of his nose. It was a chunk of frozen caribou flesh
transfixed on a stick, and without questioning the manner of its
presence he gnawed at it ravenously. Only Jacques Le Beau, who lived
eight or ten miles to the east, could have explained the situation.
Miki had rolled into one of his trap-houses, and it was the bait he was
eating.

There was not much of it, but it fired Miki's blood with new life.
There was smell in his nostrils now, and he began clawing in the snow.
After a little his teeth struck something hard and cold. It was
steel--a fisher trap. He dragged it up from under a foot of snow, and
with it came a huge rabbit. The snow had so protected the rabbit that,
although several days dead, it was not frozen stiff. Not until the last
bone of it was gone did Miki's feast end. He even devoured the head.
Then he went on to the windfall, and in his warm nest slept until
another day.

That day Jacques Le Beau--whom the Indians called "Muchet-ta-aao" (the
One with an Evil Heart)--went over his trapline and rebuilt his
snow-smothered "houses" and re-set his traps.

It was in the afternoon that Miki, who was hunting, struck his trail in
a swamp several miles from the windfall. No longer was his soul stirred
by the wild yearning for a master. He sniffed, suspiciously, of Le
Beau's snowshoe tracks and the crest along his spine trembled as he
caught the wind, and listened. He followed cautiously, and a hundred
yards farther on came to one of Le Beau's KEKEKS or trap-shelters. Here
too, there was meat--fixed on a peg. Miki reached in. From under his
fore-paw came a vicious snap and the steel jaws of a trap flung sticks
and snow into his face. He snarled, and for a few moments he waited,
with his eyes on the trap. Then he stretched himself until he reached
the meat, without advancing his feet. Thus he had discovered the hidden
menace of the steel jaws, and instinct told him how to evade them.

For another third of a mile he followed Le Beau's tracks. He sensed the
presence of a new and thrilling danger, and yet he did not turn off the
trail. An impulse which he was powerless to resist drew him on. He came
to a second trap, and this time he robbed the bait-peg without
springing the thing which he knew was concealed close under it. His
long fangs clicked as he went on. He was eager