“I have heard of dogs doing that,” said David.

“Of course they will do it,” shot back Father Roland unhesitatingly.  “Northern dogs always do it, and especially mine.  They are accustomed to death.  Twenty times in a winter, and sometimes more, I care for the dead.  They always go with me, and they can smell death in the wind.  But here—­why, it is absurd!  There is nothing dead here—­unless it is that mouse, and Tavish’s meat!” He shook himself, grumbling under his breath at Mukoki’s folly.  And then:  “The dogs have always acted queerly when Tavish was near,” he added in a lower voice.  “I can’t explain why; they simply do.  Instinct, possibly.  His presence makes them uneasy.  An unusual man, this Tavish.  I wish he would come.  I am anxious for you to meet him.”

That his mind was quite easy on the score of Tavish’s physical well-being he emphasized by falling asleep very shortly after rolling himself up in his blankets on the floor.  During their three nights in camp David had marvelled at and envied the ease with which Father Roland could drop off into profound and satisfactory slumber, this being, as his new friend had explained to him, the great and underlying virtue of a good stomach.  To-night, however, the Missioner’s deep and regular breathing as he lay on the floor was a matter of vexation to him.  He wanted him awake.  He wanted him up and alive, thoroughly alive, when Tavish came.  “Pounding his ear like a tenderfoot,” he thought, “while I, a puppy in harness, couldn’t sleep if I wanted to.”  He was nervously alert.  He filled his pipe for the third or fourth time and sat down on the edge of the bunk, listening for Tavish.  He was certain, from all that had been said, that Tavish would come.  All he had to do was wait.  There had been growing in him, a bit unconsciously at first, a feeling of animosity toward Tavish, an emotion that burned in him with a gathering fierceness as he sat alone in the dim light of the cabin, grinding out in his mental restlessness visions of what Tavish might have done.  Conviction had never been stronger in him.  Tavish, if he had guessed correctly, was a fiend.  He would soon know.  And if he was right, if Tavish had done that, if up in those mountains....

His eyes blazed and his hands were clenched as he looked down at Father Roland.  After a moment, without taking his eyes from the Missioner’s recumbent form, he reached to the pocket of his coat which he had flung on the bunk and drew out the picture of the Girl.  He looked at it a long time, his heart growing warm, and the tense lines softening in his face.

“It can’t be,” he whispered.  “She is alive!”

As if the wind had heard him, and was answering, there came more distinctly the sound close behind him.

Thud!  Thud!  Thud!

There was a silence, in which David closed his fingers tightly about the picture.  And then, more insistently: 

Thud!  Thud!  Thud!