The Lady of North Star

and sniffed it gratefully. His team of dogs had been conscious of it for some time, and now, quickening the pace, they broke into

not wise enough to know the trail's end

n cut through the trees, and here and there a stump bearing the mark of the ax protruded above the snow. For perhaps three hundred yards it ran in a bee-line between the tall trunks, and then turned abruptly

2

pment somewhere about," h

the main track, and he stooped to examine it carefully. When he straightened himself there was an

thoughts ran, "but if there's mor

d then shook his head. "Too much style for Koona Dick. There must be a homestead s

ipped the handle of the weapon in preparation for action. The man whose trail he believed that he was following was not given to being over-scrupulous. He had pursued him for nearly four hundred miles, and now that the end of the c

was coming on apace, and the gloom under the tr

ck into the heart of the wood

second, and that by the sharp cry of a woman assailed by mortal terror, and then there c

knew, but never in his life had he run so fast before. F

the road and into the dark woods on either hand. There was nothing to be seen, and the coming of night had already shortened the range of vision. He stood listening

e woman, at that. There's some infernal

Somewhere at the end of the road there was a human habitation. Of[4] that he was convinced. He would find it, and perhaps

wards him. Against the fading light and the white background of snow he made out the form of a woman, and instantly halted his dogs with the intention of speaking to her. She was perhaps five and twenty yards away when he first saw her, and the distance between them she covered at a r

fore, once when a drunken half-breed had lifted a knife to slay, and once on the face of an Indian girl, swept towards the White Horse Rapids on the Yukon in a frail canoe, and he had no doubt[5] whatever as to the emotion which found expression in that stonily beautiful face. The g

they mean? They had sounded quite close, and now there came this girl, clearly badly frightened, carrying a rifle and hurrying from the wood. He looked up the narrow path between the gl

ly, with the service pistol in his hand. He did not know what to expect, and he was not inclined to be caught unprepared. Once, as he walked in the darkness of the trees, he paused, and throwing back the ear-flaps of his fur-cap, stood listening. No sound reached him, though a moment bef

he man did not move, when the moment had passed he stepped swiftly forward, and bent over the inanimate form. The man was lying on his side, and a dark stain in the snow the corporal divined was blood. Apparently the man was dead, and as it was now too dark to see his face, the corporal felt in his pouch and

ered, and then whistl

four hundred[7] miles through the waste, the man whom he had hoped to make his prisoner, but who now, if appearances were to be trusted, had finally escaped him. Dropping the match as it burned towards the end, he thrust hi

the direction she had followed, and he guessed that whatever homestead lay at the end of that road cut through the forest would be her dwelling place. As this conviction surged into his mind the whining of his dogs came to his ears. They were evidently growing restless, and since he cou

and from its outline in the darkness was of considerable proportions for a Northland lodge.[8] Lights shone in three of the windows, and just as he re

red into the darkness, then he rested something against the wooden

he asked, as

n Dominion service,"

al Brac

orporal caught a puzzled note in

the Mount

r in the Nor'-West-" Bracknell had already divined that such must be the

should be grateful for supper

iss Gargrave will be very glad to oblige you. Sh

nglishman, who had been reported enormously wealthy and who had perished rather tragically on the Klondyke, three y

th Star Lodge, t

you go in now and attend t

ughed Bracknell, "t

red the other. "I

an in the man engaged upon it, for never for a moment did his eyes leave the officer, and there was a ruminative look in them, as if he were speculating what manner of man the policeman was. The corporal was quite consc

read

the man; "it is c

Corporal Bracknell followed him, and as the door opened his guide st

oped and pi

1

rgotten it was there. I rested it a

e was wondering what the meeting with Joy Gargrave would be like, guessing as he did that she must be the girl who had passed him out i

politely. "I will go and inform Miss Gargrave, and return fo

om, he was sure. Even the commandant's rooms down at the Post were poor beside it. The furniture was of excellent quality. The wall was match-boarded, hiding the outer logs, an

ts precincts. He wondered what the picture was doing here in this lodge in the northern wilderness, and he was still wondering when a gong sound

, Corp

and half a minute late

Except for the roaring Yukon stove, and the fur rugs on the polished floor, it was a replica of the typical dining-room of an English country house. The furniture was Jacobean, the table was laid with the whitest napery, and

ll! Miss Gargrave

her veins; but the first was a golden-haired English girl, tall, blue-eyed, with face a little bronzed by the open-air, and-the girl who had passed

. No doubt, if you have been long on the trail