"Harold knows the way as well as I do. I can mush all right, by hanging on the gee-pole. It will be comparatively easy going; the brush is covered with snow. The only thing that remains is to have Harold go over and get a supply of the grizzly meat. Or, better still, since he'll have to take the sled, we can pick it up on the way out. It's frozen hard and won't take harm, and it's only a half mile out of our way." As if the invocation of his name were a magic summons, Harold opened the door and entered. He carried Bill's loud-mouthed rifle in the hollow of his arm. "You've been hunting?" Virginia cried. She was pleased that this sweetheart of hers should have risen so early in an attempt to secure fresh meat for their depleted larder. It was wholly the manly thing to do. "Of course. I figured we needed meat. I carried Bill's rifle because I don't trust the sights of mine. They were a yard off that day I shot at the caribou." "Did you see any game?" Harold's eyes met hers an narrowed, ever so slightly. But his answer was apt. "I saw a caribou--about two miles away. There didn't seem a chance in the world to hit it, but considering our scarcity of meat, I took that chance. Of course, I didn't hit within ten feet of him; Bill's gun isn't built for such long ranges. I shot--four times." Bill did not reply. He was thinking about those same four shots. It was incomprehensible that they should have made such an impression upon him. "And for all that Bill hasn't got his sight back yet, we're going to start down to-morrow," Virginia went on in a gay voice. She glanced once at Bill, but she did not see the world of despair that came into his face at the delight with which she spoke. "You and I will take turns pulling the sled; Bill will hang on to the gee-pole. And Bill says you know the way. We're going to dash right through--camp out only two nights." "I know the way all right," Harold answered. "What about food?" "It's only a half-mile out of the way to Bill's mine. There we're going to load the sled with grizzly meat." It was in Harold's mind that their journey would be far different--down to the Twenty-three Mile cabin and to the Yuga rather than over Grizzly River. But for certain very good reasons he kept this knowledge to himself. His lips opened to tell them that the wolves and coyotes had already devoured the carcass of the bear; but he caught himself in time. It would be somewhat hard to explain how he had learned that fact, in the first place; and in the second, there was a real danger to his plot if this revelation were made. Likely they would suggest that, to conserve what little food they had, they start at once. The time had not yet come to unfold this knowledge.