"I see heem move," the big voice was saying, "jus' as I go to look at my trap. Then Golemar come beside me and raise his hair along his neck and growl--r-r-r-r-r-u-u-f-f-f--like that. I look again--it is jus' at the dawn. I cannot see clearly. I raise my gun to shoot, and Golemar, he growl again. Then I think eet strange that the bear or whatever he is do not move. I say to Golemar, 'We will closer go, _ne c'est pas_?' A step or two--then three--but he do not move--then pretty soon I look again, close. Eet is a man, I pick heem up, like this--and I bring heem home. _Ne c'est pas_, Medaine?" Her name was Medaine then. Not bad, Barry thought. It rather matched her hair and the tilt of her nose and the tone of her laugh as she answered: "I would say you carried him more like a sack of meal, Ba'tiste. I'm glad I happened along when I did; you might have thrown him over your shoulder!" A booming laugh answered her and the sound of a light scuffle, as though the man were striving to catch the girl in his big embrace. But the cold voice of Thayer cut in: "And he hasn't regained consciousness?" "Not yet. That is, I think he's recovered his senses, all right, and fallen immediately into a heavy sleep." "Guess I'll go in and stay with him until he wakes up. He's my boss, you know--since the old man died. We've got a lot of important things to discuss. So if you don't mind--" "Certainly not." It was the girl again. "We'll go in with you." "No, thanks. I want to see him alone." Within the bedroom, Barry Houston gritted his teeth. Then, with a sudden resolve, he rested his head again on the pillow and closed his eyes as the sound of steps approached. Closer they came to the bed, and closer. Barry could feel that the man was bending over him, studying him. There came a murmur, almost whispered: "Wonder what the damn fool came out here about? Wonder if he's wise?" CHAPTER III It was with an effort that Houston gave no indication that he had heard. Before, there had been only suspicions, one flimsy clue leading to another, a building-block process, which, in its culmination, had determined Barry to take a trip into the West to see for himself. He had believed that it would be a long process, the finding of a certain telegram and the possibilities which might ensue if this bit of evidence should turn out to be the thing he had suspected. He had not, however, hoped to have from the lips of the man himself a confession that conditions were not right at the lumber mill of which Barry Houston now formed the executive head; to receive the certain statement that somewhere, somehow, something was wrong, something which was working against the best interests of himself and the stern necessities of the future. But now--