Page:The Cross Pull.pdf/99

 behind until he crossed a track that angled back down into the timber.

The track was many hours old, and the scent was faint but the little that was left thrilled him with a strange excitement. He knew it for the woman scent.

He had now no clear cut recollection of the girl he had seen but once. His dreams of her were misty visions of some lovely being—like a child’s dream of a fairy princess. Flash turned and followed along on her trail. Dusk was settling over the hills when he started and night shut down around him as he sped through the trees.

The trail led almost straight down, and he soon dropped to the lower edge of the snow line. The trail grew steadily warmer and at last he could smell smoke and see the glimmer of a camp fire through the trees. The girl was wrapped in a single blanket and sat leaning back against a tree. Flash circled twice around the fire, his pads making no sound on the pine-straw carpet under the trees. As silently as a shadow he drew near until he stood watching her from a distance of ten feet, breathing deeply each time the shifting breeze carried her scent to him.