"That's what he said anyway. He was took with just such a lonesome spell once when he was trapping in the Mandans country. He was a pious critter, great on prayer and communing with the Lord. And he felt--I've heard him tell about it--just as if he'd go wild if he didn't get something for company. What he wanted was a dog and you might just as well want an angel out there with nothin' but the Indian villages breakin' the dazzle of the snow and you as far away from them as you could get. But that didn't stop Jim. He just got down and prayed, and then he waited and prayed some more and 'ud look around for the dog, as certain he'd come as that the sun 'ud set. Bimeby he fell asleep and when he woke there was the dog, a little brown varmint, curled up beside him on the blanket. Jim used to say an angel brought it. I'm not contradictin', but----" "Wal," said old Joe, "he most certainly come back into the fort with a dog. I was there and seen him." Leff snickered, even the doctor's voice showed the incredulous note when he asked: "Where could it have come from?" The tall man shrugged. "Don't ask me. All I know is that Jim Cockrell swore to it and I've heard him tell it drunk and sober and always the same way. He held out for the angel. I'm not saying anything against that, but whatever it was it must have had a pretty powerful pull to get a dog out to a trapper in the dead o' winter." They wondered over the story, offering explanations, and as they talked the fire died low and the moon, a hemisphere clean-halved as though sliced by a sword, rose serene from a cloud bank. Its coming silenced them and for a space they watched the headlands of the solemn landscape blackening against the sky, and the river breaking into silvery disquiet. Separating the current, which girdled it with a sparkling belt, was the dark blue of an island, thick plumed with trees, a black and mysterious oblong. Old Joe pointed to it with his pipe. "Brady's Island," he said. "Ask Hy to tell you about that. He knew Brady." The tall man looked thoughtfully at the crested shape. "That's it," he said. "That's where Brady was murdered." And then he told the story: "It was quite a while back in the 30's, and the free trappers and mountain men brought their pelts down in bull boats and mackinaws to St. Louis. There were a bunch of men workin' down the river and when they got to Brady's Island, that's out there in the stream, the water was so shallow the boats wouldn't float, so they camped on the island. Brady was one of 'em, a cross-tempered man, and he and another feller'd been pick-in' at each other day by day since leavin' the mountains. They'd got so they couldn't get on at all. Men do that sometimes on the trail, get to hate the sight and sound of each other. You can't tell why.