"Thar, Mr. Thayor!" shouted the trapper in a voice that could be heard above the roar of water. "Guess you'll be better off here whar ye kin see up and down--if the deer comes through here he's liable to cross jest above whar ye see them cedars noddin' to us, or like's not he'll take a notion to strike in a leetle mite higher up, and slosh down till he kin git acrost by them big rocks. Take your time, friend, and if ye see him comin' your way, let him come on and don't shoot till he turns and ye kin see the hull bigness of him." "I'll do my best," returned Thayor above the roar, as he settled himself behind the pile of driftwood the trapper had indicated. "But where are you going, Mr. Holt?" "Me? Oh, further up. 'T ain't likely he'll come my way, but if ye was to miss him I'll be whar he can't git by without my gittin' the gun on him if he undertakes to back track up the brook. Let's see!" he exclaimed, after a moment's hesitation, again casting his keen eyes over Thayor's vantage point. "Guess ye'd be more comfortable, wouldn't ye, if ye was to set over thar whar ye won't git sloppin' wet. Gosh! how she's riz!" he remarked, as Thayor re-settled himself. "If you was to hear me shoot," said the old man, as he took his leave, "come back up to whar I be. 'T ain't more 'n half a mile." Thayor watched the gaunt figure of the trapper as he went off to his runway, leaping with his long legs from one slippery boulder to the next, as sure-footed as a goat--watched until he disappeared beyond the clump of torrent-scarred trees. The man from the city was alone. He sat there listening and watching as eager as a boy. An hour passed. Time and again since he had taken up his vigil he had started up excitedly, glancing here and there, confident he heard the baying notes of a hound above the roar of Big Shanty. Voices, too, rang in his ears from out of that deceptive torrent as it boiled and eddied past him in the sunlight. Again, it seemed as if quarrelling had broken out among the boulders--quarrels that changed to girlish laughter and distant choruses. Once his mind reverted to the note he had sent by Blakeman; he wondered what effect the news had had upon Alice. When he faced her again would he have to go through what he had gone through before? or would she come to her senses, and be once more the loyal, loving wife she had always been until--No; he would not go into that. Then Margaret's eyes looked into his. Again he felt her arms about his neck; the coo and gurgle of her voice, and laughter in his ears. Here she, at least, would be happy, and here, too, they could have those long days together which he had always promised himself, and which his life in the Street made impossible.