Page:Toilers of the Trails.djvu/201

 For a week Hertel patrolled the sleeping forests of the white valley, but neither heard his enemy nor found fresh signs. Twice he climbed the big ridge and traversed the swamp beyond, where he had lost the trail the night the moon failed him, but evidently the beast had abandoned his former haunts, for the new snow lay unmarked. Over the river the logs in the deadfalls still menaced the doomed creature that should trip them, but the yawning jaws of one of the bear-traps had closed on a young wolverine rashly entering the house of sticks which his cunning elders first would have torn to pieces gingerly from the rear, then ferreted out the bait, or eaten the animal in the sprung trap inside.

Another week of waiting passed and Hertel began to wonder if the beast had quit the country. Then, one bitter night on his return under the stars from the lakes, the familiar challenge floated faintly up the valley,

"Ah-hah! Eet ees you, mon ami?" he muttered, and quickened his stride. He had travelled for some time when the cry was repeated. The thought of Marie alone in the shack with the cowed huskies, while the skulking thing was loose in the neighboring forest, spurred him into a run. He was nearly home when again the windless night was filled with the horror of the lingering wail echoing from the hills. Now the runner on the river-trail was close enough to locate his enemy. The beast was on the ridge the trapper had prepared for him.

"By Gar!" Hertel exclaimed, in his joy at the