“Very true,” Barreau admitted, “but there is a heavy debit against me for this last four years of baiting the Hudson’s Bay, and this would be of a piece with the Black Factor’s methods. Their way—his way is the policy of the Company—to an end is often oblique. Only by driving a bargain could they have taken the post—Montell could have fought them all winter. Even though they bought it cheaply, I do not think they had any intention of letting him get away with money. Le Noir paid—and put me on the trail; at the same time this bushwhacker held Montell back so that we overtook him—otherwise, with two days’ start, he might have beaten us to the Police country, where we would not dare follow. Can you appreciate the sardonic humor that would draw out our misery to the last possible pang, instead of making one clean sweep? Le Noir knows how the North will deal with us, once we are reduced to carrying our food and bedding on our backs. He has based his calculations on that fact. These breeds of his can hover about us and live where we shall likely perish. Then there will be no prima facie evidence of actual murder, and the Company will have attained its end. They have done this to others; we can hardly be exempt. If we seem likely to reach the outer world, it will be time enough then for killing. Either way, the Company wins. I wish to God it would snow. We might shake them off then.” We harnessed the two remaining dogs and pushed on. There was nothing else to do. Either in camp or on trail the huskies, to say nothing of ourselves, were at the mercy of that hidden marksman. So we kept our way, praying only for a sight of him, or for a thick swirl of snow to hide the betraying tracks we made. We moved slowly, the lugging of the dogs eked out by myself with a rope. Barreau broke trail. Jessie brought up the rear. At sundown, midway of a tiny open space in the woods, our two dogs were shot down. Barreau whirled in his tracks, stood a moment glaring furiously. Then, with a fatalistic shrug of his shoulders, he stooped, cut loose the dead brutes, harness and all, and laid hold of the rope with me. That night we were not disturbed. Jessie slept in the little round tent. Barreau and I burrowed with our bedding under the snow beside the fire. The time of arising found me with eyes that had not closed; and the night of wakefulness, the nearness of a danger that hovered unseen, stirred me to black, unreasoning anger. I wanted to shout curses at the North, at the Hudson’s Bay Company, at Barreau—at everything. And by the snap of his eye, the quick scowl at trivial things, I think Barreau was in as black a mood as I. The girl sensed it, too. She shrank from both of us. So to the trail again, and the weary drag of the shoulder-rope. At noon we ate the last of our moose-meat, and when next we crossed moose-tracks in the snow, Barreau ordered me in a surly tone to keep straight south, and set out with his rifle.