Page:The trail of the golden horn.djvu/106

102 Far away beyond the valley he had another cabin, and there he decided to go for food and rest.

Shaping his course by a distant mountain peak, he strode rapidly onward. Anger and disappointment raged in his bosom, as with great swinging strides he plowed through the snow down toward the valley below. He did not mind the cold, neither did the sombre forest have any terror for him. In fact, he would have welcomed another encounter with a pack of wolves. He was in a fighting mood and would have proven a stern antagonist to any living creature attempting to oppose him.

Passing through a heavy tract of timber he came out into a region where the trees were small and scattered. Here the snow was deep and in places it had been whipped by the wind in long drifts. Part way across this desolate stretch he came suddenly upon a straggling trail which caused him to stop and examine it with the greatest attention. He could easily tell that it was made by a human being floundering wildly along. He looked first to the right and then to the left, wondering which way the traveller had gone.

“What in time could anyone be doing here without snow-shoes?” he asked himself. “Why, the fellow must be crazy!”

Then an illuminating idea flashed through his mind. It must be the half-breed girl! She had no doubt escaped from her captor, and in trying to get back to her camping-place had lost her way. But where was Bill? Why had he not followed her? Then he thought of the blood he had seen upon the snow by the cold ashes. Had the girl in some way wounded him? Perhaps she was armed, and had disabled the villain.

Thinking thus, he decided that the girl had gone up