Page:Hendryx--Connie Morgan with the Mounted.djvu/70



On the evening of the third day after his parting with Ick Far and McKeever on the bank of the McQuesten, Connie Morgan inched his way through a thick growth of aspens that fringed a narrow beaver meadow from whence floated the sounds of an Indian village. For an hour he had proceeded cautiously, guided by the sounds, and now, crawling stealthily through the bush, he could see the twinkling lights of many camp-fires. Husky dogs howled in concert, babies cried, and from one of the dark, conical tepees came the monotonous sound of a drum. The boy edged nearer. Forsaking the friendly shelter of the aspen copse for the high lush grass of the open ground, he wriggled snakewise toward the dark shadow of a tepee fifty yards distant.

Behind him the thicket loomed black with its promise of concealment, and in front, fires flared,