Page:Hendryx--Connie Morgan with the Mounted.djvu/21

Rh “He beat oat th’ Ten Bow stampede—I was there, an’ I know.”

“Black Jack Demaree tol’ me about him,” interrupted a huge man who carried his arm in a sling.

“I know’d Sam Morgan!” exclaimed another, whose beard was shot with grey. “They don’t make ’em no better’n Sam. His grave’s down by Ragged Falls trail.” Other men crowded about, offering their hands, and just when Connie was beginning to fear that his arm would be jerked out by the roots, a loud cry sounded from the direction of the river, and all turned to see a man excitedly gesticulating and pointing upstream where, far out upon the river, a black speck was discernible upon the surface of a drifting ice floe. As a unit the men rushed to the bank which rose sharply from the water’s edge. And as they gazed out over the field of grinding ice-cakes, a cry of horror arose from fifty throats:

“It’s a man!” “Ther’s a man out there!” Men rushed up and down the bank in their excitement, shouting useless advice, while others, seizing poles and ropes, dashed out upon an anchored floe whose outer edge extended to the middle of the river.