Classic Audiobook Collection - The Danger Trail by James Oliver Curwood ~ Full Audiobook [adventure]

Episode Date: January 31, 2023

The Danger Trail by James Oliver Curwood audiobook. Genre: adventure Chicago engineer Jack Howland is sent to the edge of the Canadian barren lands north of Prince Albert to establish a train route through some of the most treacherous terrain in North America. He would soon learn that it was not only the terrain that was forbidding, as he begins to understand why the previous engineers sent on the same mission had been forced to give up the task and flee back to the south. Mysterious visitors, suspicious characters, strange apparent coincidences, and one particularly mysterious girl meet Howland at every turn in this suspenseful tale of adventure, excitement, danger, and romance set in the northern Canadian wilderness. For ad-free listening try our premium subscription Chapters (Approximate) (00:00:00) Chapter 01 (00:15:39) Chapter 02 (00:32:34) Chapter 03 (00:45:30) Chapter 04 (01:08:42) Chapter 05 (01:43:19) Chapter 06 (02:04:23) Chapter 07 (02:27:53) Chapter 08 (02:45:42) Chapter 09 (02:58:11) Chapter 10 (03:20:34) Chapter 11 (03:47:12) Chapter 12 (04:05:25) Chapter 13 (04:23:15) Chapter 14 (04:50:41) Chapter 15 (05:14:27) Chapter 16 (05:44:13) Chapter 17 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

the danger trail by james oliver curwood chapter i the girl of the snows for perhaps the first time in his life howland felt the spirit of romance of adventure of sympathy for the picturesque and the unknown surging through his veins a billion stars glowed like yellow passionless eyes in the polar cold of the skies behind them white in its sinuous twisting behind them white in its sinuous twisting through the snow-smothered wilderness lay the icy saskatchewan with a few scattered lights visible where prince albert the last outpost of civilization came down to the river half a mile away but it was into the north that howland looked from the top of the great ridge which he had climbed he gazed steadily into the white gloom which reached for a thousand miles from where he stood to the arctic sea faintly in the grim silence of the winter night there came to his ears the soft hissing sound of the aurora borealis as it played in its age-old song over the dome of the earth and as he watched the cold flashes shooting like pale arrows through the distant sky and listened to its whispering music of unending loneliness and mystery there came on him a strange feeling that it was beckoning to him and calling to him telling him that up there very near to the end of the earth lay all that he had dreamed of and hoped for since he had grown old enough to begin the shaping of a destiny of his own he shivered as the cold nipped at his blood and lighted a fresh cigar half turning to shield himself from a wind that was growing out of the east

as the match flared in the cup of his hands for an instant there came from the black gloom of the balsam and spruce at his feet a wailing hungerful cry that brought a startled breath from his lips it was a cry such as indian dogs make about the tepees of masters who are newly dead he had never heard such a cry before and yet he knew that it was a wolf's it impressed him with an awe which was new to him and he stood as motionless as the trees about him until from out of the gray night gloom to the west there came an answering cry and then from far to the north still another sounds as though i'd better go back to town he said to himself speaking aloud by george but it's lonely he descended the ridge walked rapidly over the hard crust of the snow across the saskatchewan and assured himself that he felt considerably easier when the lights of prince albert gleamed a few hundred yards ahead of him jack howland was a chicago man which means that he was a hustler and not overburdened with sentiment for fifteen of his thirty-one years he had been hustling since he could easily remember he had possessed to a large measure but one ambition and one hope with a persistence which had left him peculiarly a stranger to the more frivolous and human sides of life he had worked toward the achievement of this ambition and to-night because that achievement was very near at hand he was happy he had never been happier there flashed across his mental vision a swiftly moving picture of the fight he had made for success it had been a magnificent fight without vanity he was proud of it for fate for fate had handicapped him at the beginning

and still he had won out he saw himself again the homeless little farmer boy setting out from his illinois village to take up life in a great city as though it had all happened but yesterday he remembered how for days and weeks he had nearly starved how he had sold papers at first and then by lucky chance became errand-boy in a big drafting establishment it was there that the ambition was born in him he saw great engineers come and go men who were greater than presidents to him and who sought out the ends of the earth and the following of their vocation he made a slave of himself in the nurturing and strengthening of his ambition to become one of them to be a builder of railroads and bridges a tunneller of mountains a creator of new things in new lands his slavery had not lessened as his years increased voluntarily he had kept himself in bondage fighting ceaselessly the obstacles in his way triumphing over his handicaps as few other men had triumphed rising slowly steadily resistlessly until now he flung back his head and the pulse of his heart quickened as he heard again the words of van horn present of the greatest engineering company on the continent. Howland, we've decided to put you in charge of the building of the Hudson Bay Railroad.

It's one of the wildest jobs we've ever had, and Gregson and Thorne don't seem to catch on. They're bridge builders, and not wilderness men. We've got to lay a single line of steel through 300 miles of the wildest country in North America, and from this hour your motto is do it or bust you can report at lepah as soon as you get your traps together those words had broken the slavdom for howland he had been fighting for an opportunity and now that the opportunity had come he was sure that he would succeed swiftly with his hands thrust deep in his pockets he walked down the one main street of prince albert puffing out of the one main street of prince albert puffing out of the room odorous clouds of smoke from his cigar, every fiber in him tingling with the new joy that had come into his life. Another night would see him in Le Pa, the little outpost, sixty miles farther east

on the Saskatchewan. Then a hundred miles by dog sledge, and he would be in the big wilderness camp where three hundred men were already at work, clearing away to the Great Bay to the north. What a glorious achievement that road would be. It would remain for all time as a cenotaph to his ability, his courage and indomitable persistence. It was past nine o'clock when Howland entered the little old Windsor Hotel. The big room, through the windows of which he could look out on the street and across the frozen Saskatchewan, was almost empty.

The clerk had locked him. his cigar case and had gone to bed. In one corner, partly shrouded in gloom, sat a half-breed trapper who had come in that day from the Laclarange country, and at his feet crouched one of his wolfish sledge dogs. Both were wide awake and stared curiously at Howland as he came in. In front of the two large windows sat half a dozen men, as silent as the half-breed, clad in in moccasins and thick caribou-skin coats. One of them was the factor from a Hudson Bay post at Lacbonne, who had not been down to the edge of civilization for three years. The others, including two Crees and a Chippewyuan, were hunters and postmen who had driven in their

furs from a hundred miles to the north. For a moment, Howland paused in the middle of the room and looked about him. ordinarily he would have liked this quiet and would have gone to one of those two rude tables to write a letter or work out a problem of some sort for he always carried a pocketful of problems about with him his fifteen years of study and unceasing slavery to his ambition had made him naturally as taciturn as these grim men of the north who were born to silence but to-night there had come a change over him he wanted to talk he wanted to ask questions he longed for human companionship for some kind of mental exhilaration beyond that furnished by his own thoughts feeling in his pocket for a cigar he seated himself before one of the windows and proffered it to the factor from la you smoke he asked companionably i was born in a wigwam said the factor slowly taking a cigar thank you dused polite for a man who hasn't seen civilization for three years thought howland seating himself comfortably with his feet on the window-sill aloud he said the clerk tells me you are from lacbonne that's a good distance

north, isn't it? Four hundred miles, replied the factor with quiet terseness. We're on the edge of the barren lands. Whew, howland shrugged his shoulders. Then he volunteered, I'm going north myself tomorrow. Postman? No, engineer.

I'm putting through the Hudson Bay Railroad. He spoke the words quite clearly. and as they fell from his lips the half-breed partly concealed in the gloom behind him straightened with the alert quickness of a cat he leaned forward eagerly his black eyes gleaming and then rose softly from his seat his moccasined feet made no sound as he came up behind howland it was the big husky who first gave a sign of his presence for a moment the upturned eyes of the young engineer met those of the half-breed. That look gave Howland a glimpse of a face which he could never forget, a thin, dark, sensitive face framed in shining, jet-black hair, and a pair of eyes that were the most beautiful he had ever seen in a man. Sometimes a look decides great friendship or bitter hatred between men, and something, nameless, unaccountable, passed between,

these two not until the half-breed had turned and was walking swiftly away did howland realize that he wanted to speak to him to grip him by the hand to know him by name he watched the slender form of the northerner as live and as graceful in its movement as a wild thing of the forests until it passed from the door out into the night who was that he asked turning to the factor his name is cuisse he comes from the holdaille country beyond la calrange french half french half cree the factor resumed his steady gaze out into the white distance of the night and howland gave up his effort at conversation after a little his companion shoved back his chair and bade him good-night the crees and chippewyian followed him and a few minutes later the two white hunters left the engineer alone before the windows mighty funny people he said half aloud wonder if they ever talk he leaned forward elbows on knees his face resting in his hands and stared to catch a sign of moving life outside in him there was no desire for sleep often he had called himself a night-bird but seldom had he been more wakeful than on this night the elation of his triumph of his success had not yet worn itself down to a normal and reasoning satisfaction and his chief longing was for the day and the day after that and the next day when he would take the place of gregson and thorn every muscle in his body was vibrant in its desire for action

he looked at his watch it was only ten o'clock since supper he had smoked almost ceaselessly now he lighted another cigar and stood up close to one of the windows faintly he caught the sound of a step on the boardwalk outside it was a light quick step and for an instant it hesitated just out of his vision then it approached and suddenly the figure of a woman stopped in front of the window how she was dressed howland could not have told a moment later all that he saw was the face white in the white night a face on which the shimmering starlight fell as it was lifted to his gaze beautiful as clear-cut as a cameo with eyes that looked up at him half pleadingly half luringly and lips parted as if about to speak to him he stared moveless in his astonishment and in another breath the face was gone with a hurried exclamation he ran across the empty room to his room to him with a hurried exclamation he ran across the empty room to the door and looked down the starlit street to go from the window to the door took him but a few seconds yet he found the street deserted deserted except for a solitary figure three blocks away and a dog that growled at him as he thrust out his head and shoulders he heard no sound of footsteps no opening or closing of a door only there came to him that faint hissing music of the northern skies and once more from the black forest beyond the saskatchewan the infinite sadness of the wolf howl

end of chapter one recording by roger maline chapter two of the danger trail this libravox recording is in the public domain recording by roger maline the danger trail by james oliver curwood chapter two lips that speak not howland was not a man easily susceptible to a pair of eyes and a pretty face the practical side of his nature was too much absorbed in its devices and schemes for the building of material things to allow the breaking in of romance at least howland had always complimented himself on this fact and he laughed a little nervously as he went back to his seat near the window he was conscious that a flush of unusual excitement had leaped into his cheeks and already the practical side of him was ashamed of that to which the romantic side had surrendered the deuce but she was pretty he excused himself and those eyes suddenly he checked himself there had been more than the eyes more than the pretty face why had the girl paused in front of the window why had she looked at him so intently as though on the point of speech the smile and the flush left his face as these questions came to him and he wondered if he had failed to comprehend something which she had meant him to understand after all might it not have been a case of mistaken identity for a moment she had believed that she recognized him then seeing her mistake had passed swiftly down the street under ordinary circumstances howland would have accepted this solution of the incident but to-night he was in an unusual mood and it quickly occurred to him that even if his supposition were true it did not explain the pallor in the girl's face and the strange entreaty which had glowed for an instant in her eyes

anyway it was none of his business and he walked casually to the door at the end of the street a quarter of a mile distant a red light burned feebly over the front of a chinese restaurant and in a mechanical fashion his footsteps led him in that direction i'll drop in and have a cup of tea he assured himself throwing away the stub of his cigar and filling his lungs with great breaths of the cold dry air lord but it's a glorious night i wish van horn could see it he stopped and turned his eyes again into the north its myriad stars white and unshivering the elusive play of the mysterious lights hovering over the pole and the black edge of the wilderness beyond the river were holding a greater and greater fascination for him since morning when he had looked on that wilderness for the first time in his life new blood had entered into him and he rejoiced that it was this wonderful world which was to hold for him success and fortune never had he dreamed that the mere joy of living would appeal to him as it did now that the act of breathing of seeing of looking on wonders in which his hands had taken no part in the making would fill him with the indefinable pleasure which had suddenly become his experience He wondered, as he still stood gazing into the infinity of that other world beyond the Saskatchewan, if romance was really quite dead in him. Always he had laughed at romance.

Work, the grim reality of action, of brain-fighting brain, of cleverness pitted against other men's cleverness, had almost brought him to the point of regarding romance in life as a peculiar illusion of fools and women. but he was fair in his concessions, and to-night he acknowledged that he had enjoyed the romance of what he had seen and heard, and most of all, his blood had been stirred by the beautiful face that had looked at him from out of the night. The tuneless thrumming of a piano sounded behind him. As he passed through the low door of the restaurant, a man and woman lurched past him, and in their irresolute faces and leering stare, he read the verification of his suspicions of the place. Through a second door he entered a large room filled with tables and chairs, and pregnant with strange odors. At one of the farther tables sat a long-kewed Chinaman,

with his head bowed in his arms. Behind a counter stood a second, as motionless as an obelisk in the half-gloom of the dimly illuminated room, his evil face challenging Howland as he entered, the sound of a piano came from above and with a bold and friendly nod the young engineer mounted a pair of stairs tough joint he muttered falling into his old habit of communing with himself hope they make good tea at the sound of his footsteps on the stair the playing of the piano ceased he was surprised at what greeted him above in startling contrast to the loathsome environment below he entered a luxuriously appointed room heavily hung with oriental tapestries and with half a dozen onyx tables partially concealed behind screens and gorgeously embroidered silk curtains at one of these he seated himself and signal for service with the tiny bell near his hand in response there appeared a young chinaman with close-cropped hair and attired in evening dress a pot of tea ordered howland and under his breath he added

pretty deuced good for a wilderness town i wonder he looked about him curiously although it was only eleven o'clock the place appeared to be empty yet howland was reasonably assured that it was not empty he was conscious of sensing in a vague sort of way the presence of others somewhere near him he was sure that there was a faint acrid odor lurking above that of burned incense and he shrugged his shoulders with conviction when he paid a dollar for his pot of tea opium as sure as your name is jack howland he said when the waiter was gone i wonder again how many pots of tea do they sell in a night he sipped his own leisurely listening with all the eagerness of the new sense of freedom which had taken possession of him the chinaman had scarcely disappeared when he heard footsteps on the stair in another instant a low word of surprise almost leaped from his lips hesitating for a moment in the doorway her face staring straight into his own was the girl whom he had seen through the hotel window for perhaps no more than five seconds their eyes met yet in that time there was painted on his memory a picture that howland knew he would never forget his was a nature because of the ambition imposed on it that had never taken more than a casual interest in the form and feature of women he had looked on beautiful faces and had admired them in a cool dispassionate way judging them when he judged it all as he might have judged the more material workmanship of his own hand but this face that was framed for a few brief moments in the door reached out to him and stirred an interest of his own hand but this face that was framed for a few brief moments in the door reached out to him and stirred an interest

within him, which was as new as it was pleasurable. It was a beautiful face. He knew that in a fraction of the first second. It was not white, as he had first seen it through the window. The girl's cheeks were flushed. Her lips were parted, and she was breathing quickly, as though from the effect of climbing the stair. But it was her eyes that sent Howland's blood a little faster through his veins. They were glorious eyes. The girl turned from his gaze and seated herself at a table so that he caught only her profile. The change delighted him. It afforded him another view of the picture that it appeared to him in the doorway, and he could study it without being observed in the act, though he was confident that the girl knew his eyes were on her. He refilled his tiny cup with

tea and smiled when he noticed that she could easily have seated herself behind one of the screens. From the flush in her cheeks, his eyes traveled critically to the rich glow of the light in her shining brown hair, which swept half over her ears in thick, soft waves, caught in a heavy coil low on her neck. Then, for the first time, he noticed her dress. It puzzled him. Her turban and muff were of deep gray lynx fur. Around her shoulders was a colerette of the same material. Her hands were immaculately gloved. In every feature of her lovely face, in every point of her dress, she bore the indisputable mark of refinement. The quizzical smile left his lips. The thoughts which at first had filled his mind as quickly disappeared. Who was she?

Why was she here? With cat-like quietness, the young Chinaman entered between the screens and stood beside her. On a small tablet which Howland had not before observed, she wrote her order. It was for tea. He noticed that she gave the waiter a dollar bill in payment and that the Chinaman returned seventy-five cents to her in change. Discrimination, he chuckled to himself. Proof that she's not a stranger here and knows the price of things. He poured his last cup of tea, and when he lifted his eyes,

he was surprised to find that the girl was looking at him. For a brief interval, her gaze was steady and clear. Then the flush deepened in her cheeks. Her long lashes drooped as the cold gray of Howland's eyes met hers in unflinching challenge, and she turned to her tea. Howland noted that the hand which lifted the little Japanese pot was trembling slightly. He leaned forward, and as if impelled by the movement, the girl turned her face to him again, the tea urn poised above her cup.

In her dark eyes was an expression which half brought him to his feet, a wistful glow, a pathetic and yet half-frightened appeal to him. He rose, his eyes questioning her, and to his unspoken inquiry her lips formed themselves into a round red oh and she nodded to the opposite side of her table i beg your pardon he said seating himself may i give you my card he felt as if there was something brutally indecent in what he was doing and the knowledge of it sent a red flush to his cheeks the girl read his name smiled across the table at him and with a pretty gesture motioned him to bring his cup and share her tea with her he returned to his table and when he came back with the cup in his hand she was writing on one of the pages of the tablet which she passed across to him you must pardon me for not talking he read i can hear you very well but i unfortunately am a mute he could not repress the low ejaculation of astonishment that came to his lips and as his companion lifted her cup he saw in her face again the look that had stirred him so strangely when he stood in the window of the hotel windsor

howland was not a man educated in the trivialities of chance flirtations he lacked finesse and now he spoke boldly and to the point the honest candour of his gray eyes shining full on the girl i saw you from the hotel window to-night he began and something in your face led me to believe that you were in trouble that is why i have ventured to be so bold i am the engineer in charge of the new hudson bay railroad just on my way to le pa from chicago i'm a stranger in town i've never been in this-this place before it's a very nice tea-room an admirable blind for the old opium stalls behind those walls. In a few terse words he had covered the situation, as he would have covered a similar situation in a business deal. He had told the girl who and what he was, had revealed the cause of his interest in her, and at the same time had given her to understand that he was aware of the nature of their present environment. Closely he watched the effect of his words, and in another breath was sorry that he had

so blunt. The girl's eyes traveled swiftly about her. He saw the quick rise and fall of her bosom, the swift fading of the color in her cheeks, the affrighted glow in her eyes as they came back big and questioning to him. I didn't know, she wrote quickly and hesitated. Her face was as white now as when Howland had looked on it through the window. Her hand trembled nervously. Her hand trembled nervously, and for an instant her lip quivered in a way that set Howland's heart pounding tumultuously within him. "'I am a stranger, too,' she added. "'I have never been in this place before.

I came because—' She stopped, and the catching breath in her throat was almost a sob as she looked at Howland. He knew that it took an effort for her to write the next words. "'I came, because you're not. You came. Why? he asked. His voice was low and assuring. Tell me, why.

He read her words as she wrote them, leaning half across the table in his eagerness. I am a stranger, she repeated. I want someone to help me. Accidentally, I learned who you were and made up my mind to see you at the hotel. But when I got there, I was afraid to go in. Then I saw you in the window. After a little you came out, and I saw you enter here. I didn't know what kind of place it was, and I followed you.

Won't you please go with me to where I am staying, and I will tell you?' She left the sentence unfinished, her eyes pleading with him. Without a word he rose and seized his hat. "'I will go, miss,' he left. laughed frankly into her face, inviting her to write her name. For a moment she smiled back at him, the color brightening her cheeks. Then she turned and hurried down the stair. Outside, Howland gave her his arm.

His eyes, passing above her, caught again the luring play of the Aurora in the north. He flung back his shoulders, drank in the fresh air, and laughed in the buoyancy of the new life that he felt. it's a glorious night he exclaimed the girl nodded and smiled up at him her face was very near to his shoulder ever more beautiful in the white light of the stars they did not look behind them neither heard the quiet fall of moccasined feet a dozen yards away neither saw the gleaming eyes and the thin dark face of jean croiss the half-breed as they were walked swiftly in the direction of the Saskatchewan. End of Chapter 2. Recording by Roger Maline.

Chapter 3 of the Danger Trail. This Libervox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Roger Maline. The Danger Trail by James Oliver Kerwood. Chapter 3. The Mysterious Attack. Howland was glad that for a time there was an excuse for his silence. It began to dawn on him that this was an extraordinary adventure for a man on whose shoulders rested the responsibilities of one of the greatest engineering tasks on the continent,

and who was due to take a train for the seat of his operations at eight o'clock in the morning. Inwardly, he was experiencing some strange emotions. Outwardly, he smiled, as he thought of what Van Horn would say if he knew the circumstances. He looked down at his companion, saw the sheen of her hair as it rippled out from under her fur turban, studied the soft contour of her cheek and chin, without himself being observed, and noticed, incidentally,

that the top of the bewitching head beside him came just about to a level with his cigar which he was smoking. He wondered if he were making a fool of himself. If so, he assured himself that there was at least one compensation. This night and Prince Albert would not be so uninteresting as it had promised to be earlier in the evening. Where the river ferry was half drawn up on the shore, its stern, frozen in the ice, he paused and looked down at the girl in quiet surprise. She nodded, smiling,

and motioned across the river. "'I was over there once to-night,' said Howland aloud. "'Didn't see any houses and heard nothing but wolves. Is that where we're going?' her white teeth gleamed at him and he was conscious of a warm pressure against his arm as the girl signified that they were to cross his perplexity increased on the farther shore the forest came down to the river's edge in a black wall of spruce and balsam beyond that edge of the wilderness he knew that no part of prince albert intruded it was possible that across from them was a squatter's cabin and yet if this were so and the girl was going to it, why had she told him that she was a stranger in the town? And why had she come to him for the assistant she promised her request of him, instead of seeking it of those whom she knew?

He asked himself these questions without putting them in words, and not until they were climbing up the frozen bank of the stream, with the shadows of the forest growing deeper about them, did he speak again. "'You told me you were a stranger,' he said. stopping his companion where the light of the stars fell on the face which she turned up to him she smiled and nodded affirmatively you seem pretty well acquainted over here he persisted where are we going this time she responded with an emphatic negative shake of her head at the same time pointing with her free hand to the well-defined trail that wound up from the ferry landing into the forest earlier in the day howland had been told that this was the great north trail that led into the vast wilderness beyond the saskatchewan two days before the factor from laqbin the chippewan and the crees had come in over it its hard crust bore the marks of the sledges of jean croiss and the men from the lac l'la range country since the big snow which had fallen four feet deep ten days before a forest man had now and then used this trail on his way down to the edge of civilization but none from prince albert had traveled it in the other direction howland had been told this at the hotel and he shrugged his shoulders in candid bewilderment as he stared down into the girl's face

she seemed to understand his thoughts and again her mouth rounded itself into that bewitching red o which gave to her face an expression of tender entreaty of pathetic grief that the soft lips were powerless to voice the words which she wished to speak. Then, suddenly, she darted a few steps from Howland, and with the toe of her shoe formed a single word in the surface of the snow. She rested her hand lightly on Howland's shoulder, as he bent over to make it out in the elusive starlight. "'Camp!' he cried, straightening himself. "'Do you mean to say you're camping out here?'

she nodded again and again delighted that he understood her there was something so childishly sweet in her face in the gladness of her eyes that howland stretched out both his hands to her laughing aloud you he exclaimed you camping out here with a quick little movement she came to him still laughing with her eyes and lips and for an instant he held both her hands tight in his own her lovely face was dangerously near to him he felt the touch of her breath on his face for an instant caught the sweet scent of her hair never had he seen eyes like those that glowed up at him softly filled with the gentle starlight never in his life had he dreamed of a face like this so near to him that it sent the blood leaping through his veins in strange excitement he held the hands tighter and the movement drew the girl closer to him until for no more than a breath he felt her against his breast in that moment he forgot all sense of time and place forgot his old self jack howland practical unromantic master builder of railroads forgot everything but this presence of the girl the warm pressure against his breast the lure of the great brown eyes-yrevelder of the girl-the warm pressure against his breast the lure of the great brown eyes that had come so unexpectedly into his life. In another moment he had recovered himself.

He drew a step back, freeing the girl's hands. I beg your pardon, he said softly. His cheeks burned hotly at what he had done, and turning squarely about, he strode up the trail. He had not taken a dozen paces, when far ahead of him he saw the red glow of a fire. Then a hand was a hand. caught his arm, clutching at it almost fiercely, and he turned to meet the girl's face,

white now with a strange terror. "'What is it?' he cried. "'Tell me!' He caught her hands again, startled by the look in her eyes. Quickly she pulled herself away. A dozen feet behind her, in the thick shadows of the forest trees, something took shape and movement. In a flash, Howland saw a huge force.

form leap from the gloom and caught the gleam of an uplifted knife there was no time for him to leap aside no time for him to reach for the revolver which he carried in his pocket in such a crisis one's actions are involuntary machine-like as if life hovering by a thread preserves itself in its own manner and without thought or reasoning on the part of the creature it animates for an instant howland neither thought nor reasoned had he done so he would probably have met his mysterious assailant pitting his naked fists against the knife but the very mainspring of his existence which his self-preservation called on him to do otherwise before the startled cry in his lips found utterance he flung himself face downward in the snow the move saved him and as the other stumbled over his body pitching headlong into the trail he snatched forth his revolver before he could fire there came a roar like that of a beast from behind him and a terror like that of a beast from behind him and a terror A terrific blow fell on his head. Under the weight of a second assailant he was crushed to the snow. His pistol slipped from his grasp and two great hands choked a despairing cry from his throat. He saw a face over him, distorted with passion, a huge neck, eyes that named like angry garnets. He struggled to free his pinioned arms, to wrench off the death grip at his throat, but his efforts were like those of a a child against a giant. In a last terrible attempt, he drew up his knees inch by inch under the weight

of his enemy. It was his only chance, his only hope. Even as he felt the fingers about his throat, sinking like hot iron into his flesh, and the breath slipping from his body, he remembered this murderous knee-punch taught to him by the rough fighters of the inland seas. And with all the life that remained in him he sent it crushing into the other's abdomen it was a moment before he knew that it had been successful before the film cleared from his eyes and he saw his assailant groveling in the snow he rose to his feet dazed and staggering from the effect of the blow in his head and the murderous grip at his throat half a pistol shot down the trail he saw indistinctly the twisting of black objects in the snow and as he stared one of the objects came toward him do not fire monsieur howland he heard a voice call it is i jean croisset a friend blessed saints that was-what do you call him close him close call the half-breed's thin dark face came up smiling out of the white gloom for a moment howland did not see him scarcely heard his words wildly he looked about him for the girl she was gone I happened here, just in time, with a club, continued Clause.

Come, we must go. The smile had gone from his face, and there was a commanding firmness in the grip that fell on the young engineer's arm. Howland was conscious that things were twisting about him and that there was a strange weakness in his limbs. Dumbly he raised his hands to his head, which hurt him until he felt. as if he must cry out in his pain. The girl! he gasped weakly. Kossay's arm tightened about his waist. She is gone, Howland heard him say.

And there was something in the half-breed's low voice that caused him to turn unquestioningly and stagger along beside him in the direction of Prince Albert. And yet, as he went, only half-conscious of what he was doing and leaning more and more heavily on his companion, he knew that it was more than the girl's disappearance that he wanted to understand.

For as the blow had fallen on his head, he was sure that he had heard a woman scream. And as he lay in the snow, dazed and choking, spending his last effort in his struggle for life, there had come to him, as if from an infinite distance, a woman's voice. And the words that it had uttered, pounded in his tortured brain now as his head dropped weakly against Cosset's shoulder.

"'Mondieu, you are killing him! Killing him!' He tried to repeat them aloud, but his voice sounded only in an incoherent murmur. Where the forest came down to the edge of the river, the half-breed stopped. "'I must carry you, Monsieur Howland,' he said, and as he staggered out on the ice with his inanimate burden, he spoke softly to himself, The saints preserve me, but what would the sweet Mely say if she knew the Jean-Coiset had come so near to losing the life of this monsieur le engineer? Sommonde a plan de foo! End of Chapter 3. Recording by Roger Malin.

Chapter 4 of the Danger Trail This Livervox recording is in the public. domain. Recording by Roger Maline. The Danger Trail by James Oliver Kerwood. Chapter 4. The Warning In only a subconscious sort of way was howl and cognizant of anything more that happened that night. When he came back into a full sense of his existence, he found himself in his bed at the hotel. A lamp was burning low on the table. A glance showed him that the room was

empty. He raised his head and shoulders from the pillows on which they were resting, and the movement helped to bring him at once into a realization of what had happened. He was hurt. There was a dull, aching pain in his head and neck, and when he raised an inquiring hand, it came in contact with a thick bandage. He wondered if he were badly hurt and sank back again on the pillows, lying with his eyes staring at the faint glow of the lamp. Soon there came a sound at the door, and he twisted his head, grimacing with the pain it caused him. Jean was looking in at him. Ah, monsieur is awake, he said, seeing the wide open eyes. He came in softly, closing the door behind him. "'Mondieu, but if it had been a heavier club by the weight of a pound, you would have gone into

the blessed hereafter he smiled approaching with noiseless tread he held a glass of water to howland's lips is it bad cuisse so bad that you will be in bed for a day or so monsieur that is all impossible cried the young engineer i must take the eight o'clock train in the morning i must be in le pas it is five o'clock now interrupted jean softly do you feel like going howland straightened himself and fell back suddenly with a sharp cry the devil he exclaimed after a moment he added there will be no other train for two days as he raised a hand to his aching head his other closed tightly about jean's lithe brown fingers i want to thank you for what you did coerce i don't know what happened i don't know what happened i don't know what happened i don't know who they were or why they tried to kill me there was a girl i was going with her he dropped his hand in time to see the strange fire that had leaped into the half-breed's eyes in astonishment he half-lifted himself again his white face questioning do you know he whispered eagerly who was she why did she lead me into that ambush why did they attempt to kill me the questions shot from him excitedly and he knew from what he saw in the other's face that cuisse could have answered them yet from the thin tense lips above him there came no response with a quick movement the half-breed drew away his hand and moved toward the door half-way he paused and turned monsieur i have come to you with a warning do not go to le pas and turned

monsieur i have come to you with a warning do not go to le pa do not go to the big railroad camp on the wakusco return into the south for an instant he leaned forward his black eyes flashing his hands clenched tightly at his sides perhaps you will understand he cried tensely when i tell you this warning is sent to you by the little melisse before howland could recover from his surprise quassay had passed swiftly through the door the engineer called his name but there came no response other than the rapidly retreating sound of the northerner's moccasined feet with a grumble of vexation he sank back on his pillows the fresh excitement had set his head in a whirl again and a feverish heat mounted into his face for a long time he lay with his eyes closed trying to clear for himself the mystery of the preceding night the one thought which obsessed him was that he had been duped his lovely acquaintance of the preceding evening had ensnared him completely with her gentle smile and her winsome mouth and he gritted his teeth grimly as he reflected how easy he had been deliberately she had lured him into the ambush which would have proved fatal for him had it not been for jean croiss and she was not a mute he had heard her voice when that death-grip was tightest about his throat there had come to him that terrified cry mon die you are killing him killing him

his breath came a little faster as he whispered the words to himself they appealed to him now with the significance which he had not understood at first he was sure that in that cry there had been real terror almost he fancied as he lay with his eyes shut tight that he could still hear the shrill note of despair in the voice the more he tried to reason the situation the more inexplicable grew the mystery of it all if the girl had calmly led him into the ambush why in the last moment when success seemed about to crown her duplicity had she cried out in that agony of terror in howland's heated brain there came suddenly a vision of her as she stood beside him in the white trail he felt again the thrill of her hands the touch of her breast for a moment against his own saw the gentle look that had come into her deep pure eyes the pathetic tremor of the lips which seemed bravely striving to speak to him was it possible that face and eyes like those could have led him into a death trap despite the evidence of what had happened he found himself filled with doubt and yet after all she had lied to him for she was not a mute he turned over with a groan and watched the door when coassee returned he would insist on knowing more about the strange occurrence for he was sure that the half-breed could clear away at least a part of the mystery vainly as he watched and waited he racked his mind to find some reason for the murderous attack on himself who was the little melisse whom cuisse declared had sent the warning so far as he could remember he had never known a person by that name

and yet the half-breed had uttered it as though it would carry a vital meaning to him perhaps you will understand he had said and howland strove to understand until his brain grew dizzy and a nauseous sickness overcame him the first light of the day was falling faintly through the window when footsteps sounded outside the door again it was not coasse who appeared this time but the proprietor himself bearing with him a tray on which there was toast and a steaming pot of coffee he nodded and smiled as he saw howland half sitting up bad fall you had he greeted drawing a small table close beside the bed this snow is treacherous when you're climbing among the rocks when it caves in with you on the side of a mountain you might as well make up your mind you're going to get a good bump good thing coasse was with you for a few moments howland was speechless yes it was a bad fall he replied at last looking sharply at the other where is cuisse gone he left an hour ago with his dogs funny fellow that coasse came in yesterday from the la calrange country a hundred miles north goes back to-day no one no apparent reason for his coming none for his going that i can see do you know anything about him asked howland a little eagerly no he comes in about once or twice a year the young engineer munched his toast and drank his coffee for some moments in silence then casually he asked did you ever hear of a person by the name of melisse

melees melees meleese repeated the hotel man running a hand through his hear it seems to me that the name is familiar and yet i can't remember he caught himself in sudden triumph ah i have it two years ago i had a kitchen woman named melisse howland shrugged his shoulders this was a young woman he said The Malesce we had is dead, replied the proprietor cheerfully, rising to go. I'll send up for your tray in half an hour or so, Mr. Howland. Several hours later, Howland crawled from his bed and bathed his head in cold water. After that he felt better, dressed himself, and went below. His head pained him considerably, but beyond that, and an occasional nauseous sensation, the injury he had received in the fight caused him no very great distress.

He went in to dinner, and by the middle of the afternoon was so much improved that he lighted his first cigar and ventured out into the bracing air for a short walk. At first it occurred to him that he might make inquiries at the Chinese restaurant regarding the identity of the girl whom he had met there, but he quickly changed his mind and crossing the river he followed the country. trail which they had taken the preceding night. For a few moments he contemplated the marks of the conflict in the snow. Where he had first seen the half-breed, there were blotches of blood on the crust.

Good for Coase, Howland muttered. Good for Coase! It looks as though he used a knife! He could see where the wounded man had dragged himself up the trail, finally staggering to his feet, and with a little bit of the road. With a caution which he had not exercised a few hours before, Howland continued slowly between the thick forest walls, one hand clutching the butt of the revolver in his coat pocket. Where the trail twisted abruptly into the north, he found the charred remains of a campfire

in a small open, and just beyond it a number of birch toggles, which had undoubtedly been used in place of tent stakes. With the toe of his boot he kicked among the ashes and half-burned bits of wood. There was no sign of smoke, not a living spark to give evidence that human presence had been there for many hours. There was but one conclusion to make. Soon after their unsuccessful attempt on his life, his strange assailants had broken camp and fled.

With them, in all probability, had gone the girl whose soft eyes and sweet face had had lured him within their reach. But where had they gone? Carefully he examined the abandoned camp. In the hard crust were the imprints of dog's claws. In several places he found the faint, broad impression made by a toboggan. The marks at least cleared away the mystery of their disappearance. Sometime during the night they had fled by dog sledge into the north.

He was tired when he returned to the hotel, and it was rather with a sense of disappointment than pleasure that he learned the work train was to leave for Le Paix late that night instead of the next day. After a quiet hour's rest in his room, however, his old enthusiasm returned to him. He found himself feverishly anxious to reach Le Pa and the big camp on the Wicucusco. Casse's warning for him to turn to him. back into the south, instead of deterring him, urged him on. He was born a fighter. It was by fighting that he had forced his way round by round up the ladder of success,

and now the fact that his life was in danger, that some mysterious peril awaited him in the depths of the wilderness, but added a new and thrilling fascination to the tremendous task which was ahead of him. He wondered if this same peril had beset great, and Thorn, and if it was the cause of their failure, of their anxiety to return to civilization. He assured himself that he would know when he met them at Le Pa. He would discover more when he became a part of the camp in the Wakusco, that is, if the half-breed's warning held any significance at all, and he believed that it did.

Anyway, he would prepare for developments. So he went to a gun shop, bought a lull, long-barreled six-shooter and a holster, and added to it a hunting-knife like that he had seen carried by Cossé. It was near midnight when he boarded the work train, and Don was just beginning to break over the wilderness when it stopped at Etomami, from which point he was to travel by hand car over the sixty miles of new road that had been constructed as far north as Le Pa. For three days the car had been waiting for the new chief of the road, but neither greggson nor thorn was with it mr gregson is waiting for you at lepah said one of the men who had come with it thorn is at wakusco

for the first time in his life howland now plunged into the heart of the wilderness and as mile after mile slipped behind them and he sped deeper into the peopeless desolation of ice and snow and forest his blood leaped in swift excitement, in the new joy of life which he was finding up here under the far-north skies. Seated on the front of the car, with the four men pumping behind him, he drank in the wild beauties of the forests and swamps through which they slipped, his eyes constantly on the alert for signs of the big game which his companions told him was on all sides of them. Everywhere about them lay white winter. The rocks, the trees, the tree, and the trees. trees and the great ridges which in this north country are called mountains were covered with four feet of snow and on it the sun shone with dazzling brilliancy but it was not until a long grade brought them to the top of one of these ridges and howland looked into the north that he saw the wilderness in all of its grandeur

as the car stopped he sprang to his feet with a joyous cry his face aflame with what he saw ahead of him stretching away under his eyes mile after mile was the vast white desolation that reached to hudson bay in speechless wonder he gazed down in the unblazed forests saw plains and hills unfold themselves as his vision gained distance followed a frozen river until it was lost in the bewildering picture and let his eyes rest here and there on the glistening snow-smothered bosoms of lakes rimmed in by walls of black forest this was not the wilderness as he had expected it to be nor as he had often read of it in books it was not the wilderness that gregson and thorn had described in their letters it was beautiful it was magnificent his heart throbbed with pleasure as he gazed down on it the flush grew deeper in his face and he seemed hardly to breathe in his tense interest one of the four on the car was an old indian and it was he strangely enough who broke the silence he had seen the look on howland's face and he spoke softly close to his ear twenty thousand moose down there twenty thousand caribou no man no house more twenty thousand miles howland even quivering in his new emotion looked into the old man no house more twenty thousand miles warrior's eyes filled with the curious thrilling gleam of the spirit which was stirring within himself then again he stared straight out into the unending distance as though his vision would penetrate far beyond the last of that visible desolation

on and on even to the grim and uttermost fastnesses of hudson bay and as he looked he knew that in these moments there had been born in him a new spirit a new spirit a new new being that no longer was he the old jack howland whose world had been confined by office walls and into whose conception of life there had seldom entered things other than those which led directly toward the achievement of his ambitions the short northern day was nearing an end when once more they saw the broad saskatchewan twisting through a plain below them and on its southern shore the few log buildings of lepah hemmed in on three sides by the black forests of balsam and spruce. Lights were burning in the cabins, and in the Hudson Bay Post store, when the car was brought to a halt, half a hundred paces from a squat, log-built structure, which was more brilliantly illuminated than any of the others. That's the hotel, said one of the men.

Gregson's there! A tall, fur-clad figure hurried forth to meet Howland as he watched. walked briskly across the open it was greggson as the two men gripped hands the young engineer stared at the other in astonishment this was not the greggson he had known in the chicago office round-faced full of life as active as a cricket never so glad to see anyone in my life howland he cried shaking the other's hand again and again another month and i'd be dead Isn't this a hell of a country? I'm falling more in love with it at every breath, Gregson. What's the matter? Have you been sick? Gregson laughed as they turned toward the lighted building.

It was a short, nervous laugh, and with it he gave a curious, sideways glance at his companion's face. Sick? Yes, sick of the job. If the old man hadn't sent us relief, Thorne and I would have thrown up the whole thing in another four weeks. I'll warrant you'll get your everlasting fill of log shanties and half-breeds and moose meat and this infernal snow and ice before spring comes. But I don't want to discourage you. Can't discourage me, laughed Howland cheerfully.

You know I never cared much for theaters and girls. added slyly, giving Gregson a good-natured nudge. How about him up here? Nothing, not a cursed thing. Suddenly his eyes lighted up. By George Howland, but I did see the prettiest girl I ever laid my eyes on today. I'd give a box of pure Havana's, and we haven't had one for a month, if I could know who she is. They had entered through the low door of the log boarding-house,

and Gregson was throwing off his heavy coat. A tall girl, with a fur hat and muff, queried Howland eagerly. Nothing of the sort! She was a typical northerner, if there ever was one, straight as a birch, dressed in fur cap and coat, short caribou's skin skirt and moccasins, and with a braid hanging down her back as long as my arm. Lord, but she was pretty.

Isn't there a girl somewhere up around our camp named Malesce? asked Howland casually. Never heard of her, said Gregson. Or a man named Cosset? Never heard of him. The deuce, but you're interesting, laughed the young engineer, sniffing at the odors of cooking supper. i'm as hungry as a bear from outside there came the sharp cracking of a sledge driver's whip and greggson went to one of the small windows looking out upon the clearing in another instant he sprang toward the door crying out to howland by the god of love there she is old man quick if you want to get a glimpse of her he flung the door opened and howland hurried to his side

there came another crack of the whip a loud shout and a sledge drawn by six dogs sped past them into the gathering gloom of the early night from howland's lips too there fell a sudden cry for one of the two faces that were turned toward him for an instant was that of cuisse and the other white and staring as he had seen it that first night in prince albert was the face of the beautiful girl who had lured him into the ambush on the great north trail end of chapter four recording by roger maline chapter five of the danger trail This Libravox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Roger Maline The Danger Trail by James Oliver Kerwood. Chapter 5. Howland's Midnight Visitor For a moment after the swift passing of the sledge,

it was on Howland's lips to shout Cosset's name. As he thrust Gregson aside and leaped out into the night, he was impelled with a desire to give chase, to overtake in some ways. the two people who, within the space of 48 hours, had become so mysteriously associated with his own life, and who were now escaping him again. It was Gregson who recalled him to his senses. I thought you didn't care for theaters, and girls, Howland, he exclaimed banteringly, repeating Howland's words of a few minutes before. A pretty face affects you a little differently up here,

huh? Well, after you've been in this fag end of the universe for a month or so, you'll learn—' Howland interrupted him sharply. Did you ever see either of them before, Gregson? Never until today. But there's hope, old man. Surely we can find someone in the place who knows them. Wouldn't it be jolly good fun of Jack Howland, Esquire, who has never been interested in theaters and girls, should come up into these godforsaken regions and develop a case of love at first sight? By the Great North Trail, I tell you it may not be as uninteresting for you as it has been for Thorn and me, if I had only seen her sooner. Shut up, growled Howland, betraying irritability for the first time.

Let's go into supper. Good! And I move that we investigate these people while we are smoking a-upil. our after-suffer cigars. It will pass our time away, at least. Your taste is good, Gregson, said Howland, recovering as good humor as they seated themselves at one of the rough board tables in the dining-room. Inwardly, he was convinced it would be best to keep to himself the incidents of the past two days and nights. It was a beautiful face. And the eyes, added Gregson, his own gleaming with enthusiasm.

she looked at me squarely this afternoon when she in that dark fellow passed and i swear they're the most beautiful eyes i ever saw and her hair do you think that she knew you asked howland quietly gregson hunched his shoulders how the deuce could she know me then why did she look at you so squarely trying to flirt do you suppose surprise shot into greggson's face by thunder no she wasn't flirting he exclaimed i'd stake my life on that a man never got a clearer more sinless look than she gave me and yet why deuce take it she stared at me i didn't see her again after that but the dark fellow was in here half the afternoon and now that i come to think of it he did show some interest in me why do you ask just curiosity replied howland i don't like flirts neither do i said gregson musingly their supper came on and they conversed but little until its end howland had watched his companion closely and was satisfied that he knew nothing of coasse or the girl the fact puzzled him more than ever how gregson and thorn two of the best engineers in the country could voluntarily surrender a task like the building of the hudson bay railroad simply because they were tired of the country was more than he could understand it was not until they were about to leave the table that howland's eyes accidentally fell on gregson's left hand he gave an exclamation of astonishment when he saw that the little finger was missing

gregson jerked the hand to his side a little accident he explained you'll meet em up here howland before he could move the young engineer had caught his arm and was looking closely at the hand a curious wound he remarked without looking up funny i didn't notice it before your finger was cut off lengthwise and here's the scar running half-way to your wrist how did you do it he dropped the hand in time to see a nervous flush in the other's face why uh fact is howland it was shot off several months ago in an accident of course he hurried through the door continuing to speak over his shoulder as he went now for those after-suffer cigars and our investigation as they passed from the dining-room into that part of the inn which was half-bar and half lounging-room already filled with smoke and a dozen or so picturesque citizens of lupah the rough-jowled proprietor of the place motioned to howland and held out a letter this came while you was at supper mr howland he explained the engineer gave an inward start when he saw the writing on the envelope and as he tore it open he turned so that gregson could see neither his face nor the slip of paper which he drew forth there was no name at the bottom of what he read it was not necessary for a glance had told him that the writing was that of the girl whose face he had seen again that night and her words to him this time despite his caution drew a low whistle from his lips forgive me for what i have done the note ran believe me now your life is in danger and you must go back to etumami to-morrow

if you go to the wakusko camp you will not live to come back the devil he exclaimed what's that asked gregson edging around him curiously. Howland crushed the note in his hand and thrust it into one of his pockets. A little private affair, he laughed. Come, Gregson, let's see what we can discover. In the gloom outside, one of his hands slipped under his coat and rested on the butt of his revolver. Until ten o'clock, they mixed casually among the populace of Le Pa. Half a hundred people had seen Coase and his beautiful command.

companion, but no one knew anything about them. They had come that afternoon on a sledge, had eaten their dinner and supper at the cabin of a Scotch tie-cutter named MacDonald, and had left on a sledge. She was the sweetest thing I ever saw, exclaimed Mrs. MacDonald, rapturously. Only she couldn't talk. Two or three times she wrote things to me on a slip of paper. Couldn't talk.

repeated Gregson as the two men walked leisurely back to the boarding-house. What the deuce do you suppose that means, Jack? I'm not supposin, replied Howland indifferently. We've had enough of this pretty face, Gregson. I'm going to bed. What time do we start in the morning? As soon as we've had breakfast, if you're anxious. I am. Good night. Howland went to his room. room, but it was not to sleep. For hours he sat wide awake, smoking cigar after cigar, and thinking.

One by one he went over the bewildering incidents of the past two days. At first they had stirred his blood with a certain exhilaration, a spice of excitement which was not at all unpleasant. But with this excitement there was now a peculiar sense of oppression. The attempt that had already been made in his life, together with the persistent warnings for him to return into the south, began to have their effect. But Howland was not a man to surrender to his fears, if they could be called fears. He was satisfied that a mysterious peril of some kind awaited him at the camp in the Wicuco, but he gave up trying to fathom the reason for this peril, excepting in his business-like way the fact that it did exist, and that in a short

time it would probably explain itself. The one puzzling factor which he could not drive out of his thoughts was the girl. Her sweet face haunted him. At every turn he saw it, now over the table in the opium den, now in the white starlight of the trail, again as it had looked at him for an instant from the sledge. Vainly he strove to discover for himself the lurchase. The lurcheroying of sin in the pure eyes that had seemed to plead for his friendship, in the soft lips that had lied to him because of their silence. Please forgive me for what I have done. He unfolded the crumpled note and read the words again and again.

Believe me now! She knew that he knew that she had lied to him, that she had lured him into the danger from which she now wished to save him. his cheeks burned if a thousand perils threatened him in the wakusco he would still go he would meet the girl again despite his strongest efforts he found it impossible to destroy the vision of her beautiful face the eyes soft with appeal the red mouth quivering and with lips parted as if about to speak to him the head as he had looked down on it with its glory of shining hair all had burned themselves on his soul in a picture too deep to be eradicated if the wilderness was interesting to him before it was doubly so now because that face was a part of it because the secret of its life of the misery that it had half confessed to him was hidden somewhere out in the black mystery of the spruce and balsam forests. He went to bed, but it was a long time before he fell asleep. It seemed to him that he

had scarcely closed his eyes when a pounding on the door aroused him, and he awoke to find the early light of dawn creeping through the narrow window of his room. A few minutes later he joined Gregson, who was ready for breakfast. The sledge and dogs are waiting, he greeted. As the they seated themselves at the table, he added. I've changed my mind since last night, Howland. I'm not going back with you. It's absolutely unnecessary, for Thorn can put you on to everything at the camp, and I'd rather lose six-month salary than take that sledge ride again.

You won't mind, will you? Howland hunched his shoulders. To be honest, Gregson, I don't believe you'd be particularly cheerful, company what sort of fellow is the driver we call him jack pine a cree indian and he's the one faithful slave of thorn and myself at wakusco hunts for us cooks for us and watches after things generally you'll like him all right howland did when they went out to the sledge after their breakfast he gave jack pine a hearty grip of the hand and the crees's dark face like it up with something like pleasure when he saw the enthusiasm in the young engineer's eyes when the moment for parting came Gregson pulled his companion a little to one side his eyes shifted nervously and Howland saw that he was making a strong effort to assume an indifference which was not at all Gregson's natural self just a word howland he said you know this is a pretty rough country up here some tough people in it who wouldn't mind cutting a man's throat or sending a bullet through him for a good team of dogs and a rifle i'm just telling you this so you'll be on your guard have jack pine watch your camp nights he spoke in a low voice and cut himself short when the indian approached

howland seated himself in the middle of the six-foot toboggan waved his hand to greggson then with a wild hallooo and a snapping of his long caribou gut whip jack pine started his dogs on a trot down the street running close beside the sledge howland had lighted a cigar and leaning back in a soft mass of furs began to enjoy his new experience hugely day was just fairly breaking over the forests when they turned into the wood white trail, already beaten hard by the passing of many dogs and sledges, that led from La Pa for a hundred miles to the camp on the Wakusco. As they struck the trail, the dogs strained harder at their traces, with Jack Pine's whip curling and snapping over their backs, until they were leaping swiftly and with unbroken rhythm of motion over the snow. Then the creed gathered in his whip and ran close to the leader's flank, his moccasined feet taking the short, quick, light steps of the trained forest runner, his chest thrown a little out, his eyes on the

twisting trail ahead. It was a glorious ride, and in the exhilaration of it, Howland forgot to smoke the cigar that he held between his fingers. His blood thrilled to the tireless effort of the grayish yellow pack of magnificent brutes ahead of him. he watched the muscular play of their backs and legs the eager outreaching of their wolfish heads their half-gaping jaws and from them he looked at jack pine there was no effort in his running his black hair swept back from the gray of his cap like the dogs there was music in his movement the beauty of strength of endurance of manhood born to the forests and when the dogs there was music in his movement the beauty of strength of endurance of manhood born to the forests and when the dogs finally stopped at the foot of a huge ridge, panting and half exhausted. Howland quickly leaped from the sledge, and for the first time spoke to the Indian. That was glorious, Jack Pine, he cried.

But good lord, man, you'll kill the dogs. Jack Pine grinned. They go sixty mile in a day like that, he grinned. Sixty miles! in his admiration for the wolfish-looking beasts that were carrying him through the wilderness howland put out a hand to stroke one of them on the head with a warning cry the indian jerked him back just as the dog snapped fiercely at the extended hand no touch husky he exclaimed him half wolf half dog work hard but no like to be touch wow exclaimed howland and they're the sweetest looking pups i ever laid eyes on i'm certainly running up against some strange things in this country he was dead tired when night came and yet never in all his life had he enjoyed a day so much as this one twenty times he had joined jack pine and running beside the sledge in their intervals of rest he had even learned to snap the thirty-foot caribou gout lash of the dog whip

he had asked a hundred questions had insisted on jack pine smoking a cigar at every stop and had been so happy and so altogether companionable that half of the crees hereditary reticence had been swept away before his unbounded enthusiasm he helped to build their balsam shelter for the night ate a huge supper of moose meat hudstone biscuits beans and coffee and then just as he had stretched them from the night he helped to build their balsam shelter for the night ate a huge supper of moose meat hutsone biscuits beans and coffee and then just as he had stretched himself out in his furs for the night he remembered greggson's warning he sat up and called to jack pine who was putting a fresh log on the big fire in front of the shelter greggson told me to be sure and have the camp guarded at night jack pine what do you think about it the indian turned with a queer chuckle his leathery face wrinkled in a grin gregson he'm very much fraid he replied no bad man here all down there and in camp we kept watch every night he'm afraid i guess so maybe afraid of what for a moment jack pine was silent half bending over the fire then he held out his left hand with the little finger doubled out of sight and pointed to it with his other hand and pointed to it with his other hand hand. Maybe him finger accident, maybe not, he said. A dozen eager questions brought no further suggestions from Jack Pine. In fact, no sooner had the words fallen from his driver's lips,

than Howland saw that the Indian was sorry he had spoken them. What he had said strengthened the conviction which was slowly growing within him. He had wondered at Gregson's strange demeanor, his evident anxiety to get out of the country, and lastly at his desire not to return to the camp on the Waucusco with him. There was but one solution that came to him. In some way which he could not fathom, Gregson was associated with the mystery which enveloped him, and adding the senior engineer's nervousness to the significance of Jack Pine's words, he was confident that the missing finger had become a factor in the enigma. how should he find thorn surely he would give him an explanation if there was an explanation to give or was it possible that they would leave him without warning to face a situation which was driving them back to civilization

he went to sleep giving no further thought to the guarding of the camp a piping hot breakfast was ready when jack pine awakened him and once more the exhilarating excitement of their swift race through the forest forest relieved him of the uncomfortable mental tension under which he began to find himself. During the whole of the day, Jack Pine urged the dogs almost to the limit of their endurance, and early in the afternoon assured his companion that they would reach the Wacoisco by nightfall. It was already dark when they came out of the forest into a broad stretch of cutting beyond which Howland caught the glimmer of scattered lights. At the farther edge of the clearing, the Cree brought his dogs to a halt,

close to a large log-built cabin, half-sheltered among the trees. It was situated several hundred yards from the nearest of the lights ahead, and the unbroken snow about it showed that it had not been used as a habitation for some time. Jack Pine drew a key from his pocket, and without a word unlocked and swung open the heavy door.

Damp, cold air swept into the faces of the two as they stood for a moment peering into the gloom. Howland could hear the Cree chuckling in his inimitable way as he struck a match, and as a big hanging oil lamp flared slowly into light, he turned a grinning face to the engineer. "'Gregson, I'm Thorne, he made the least. cabin when first come to camp he said softly no be near much noise fine place in woods where be quiet nights live here time then gregson and thoram go live in camp

say too far away from man but that not so thorn frayed gregson frayed he hunched his shoulders again as he opened the door of the big box stood which stood in the room howland asked no questions but stared about him everywhere he saw evidences of the taste and one-time tenancies of the two senior engineers heavy bare rugs lay on the board floor the log walls hewn almost to polished smoothness were hung with half a dozen pitchers in one corner was a bookcase still filled with books in another a lounge covered with furs. And in this side of the room was a door which Howland supposed must open into the sleeping apartment. A fire was roaring in the big stove

before he finished his inspection, and as he squared his shivering back to the heat, he pulled out his pipe and smiled cheerfully at Jack Pine. "'Afraid, huh? And am I to stay here?' "'Gregson on Thorne,' said, yes well jack pine you just hustle over to the camp and tell thorn i'm here will you for a moment the indian hesitated then went out and closed the door after him

afraid exclaimed howland when he had gone now what the devil are they afraid of it's deuced queer gregson and ditto thorn if you're not the cowards i'm half believing you to be you won't won't leave me in the dark to face something from which you are running away. He lighted a small lamp and opened the door leading into the other room. It was, as he had surmised, the sleeping chamber. The bed, a single chair, and a mirror, and stand were its sole furnishing. Returning to the larger room, he threw off his coat and hat and seated himself comfortably before the fire. Ten minutes later the door opened again. and Jack Pine entered.

He was supporting another figure by the arm, and as Howland stared into the bloodless face of the man who came with him, he could not repress the exclamation of astonishment which rose to his lips. Three months before he had last seen Thorn in Chicago, a man in the prime of life, powerfully built, as straight as a tree, the most efficient and highest-paid man in the company's employ. how often had he envied thorne for years he had been his ideal of a great engineer and now he stood speechless slowly as if the movement gave him pain thorn slipped off the great fur coat from about his shoulders one of his arms was suspended in a sling his huge shoulders were bent his eyes wild and haggard

The smile that came to his lips as he held out a hand to Howland gave to his death-white face an appearance even more ghastly. "'Hello, Jack,' he greeted. "'What's the matter, man? Do I look like a ghost?' "'What is the matter, Thorne? I found Gregson half dying at LePaw, and now you—' "'It's a wonder you're not reading my name on a little bored slab instead of seeing yours truly in flesh and blood, Jack, laughed Thorne nervously.

A ton of rock, man! A ton of rock! And I was under it! Over Thorne's shoulder, the young engineer caught a glimpse of the Cree's face. A dark flash had shot into his eyes. His teeth gleamed for an instant between his tense lips in something that might have been a sneer. Thorne sat down, rubbing his hands before the fire. "'We've been unfortunate, Jack,' he said slowly. Gregson and I have had the worst kind of luck since the day we struck this camp, and were no longer fit for the job.

It will take us six months to get on our feet again. You'll find everything here in good condition. The line is blazed straight to the bay. we've got three hundred good men plenty of supplies and so far as i know you'll not find a disaffected hand on the wikusco probably gregson and i will take hold of the lepah end of the line in the spring it's certainly up to you to build the roadway to the bay i'm sorry things have gone badly replied howland he leaned forward until his face was close to his companions thorne is there a man up here named cuace or a girl called melisse he watched the senior engineer closely nothing to confirm his suspicions came into thorne's face thorne looked up a little surprised at the tone of the other's voice not that i know of jack there may be a man named Kwasse among our 300 workers. You can tell by looking at the payroll. There are 15 or 20 married men

among us, and they have families. Gregson knows more about the girls than I. Anything particular? Just a word I've got for them, if they're here, replied Howland carelessly. Are these my quarters? If you like them. When I got them, when I got them, hurt we moved up among the men brought us into closer touch with the working end you know you and gregson must have been laid up at about the same time said the young engineer that was a painful wound of gregson's i wonder who the deuce it was who shot him funny that a man like gregson should have an enemy thorn sat up with a jerk there came the rattle of a pan from the stove and howland turned his head in time to see jack pine staring at him as though he had exploded a mine under his feet who shot him gasped the senior engineer why uh didn't gregson tell you that it was an accident why should he lie thorn a faint flush swept into the other's pallid face for a moment there was a penetrating glare in his eyes as he looked at howland jack pine still stood silent and motionless beside the stove he told me that it was an accident said thorne at last funny was all that howland said turning to the indian as though the matter was of no importance

ah jack pine i'm glad to see the coffee pod on i've got a box of the blackest and mildest portaricans you ever laid eyes on in my kit thorn and we'll open em up for a good smoke after supper hello why have you got boards nailed over that window for the first time howland noticed that the thin muslin curtain which he thought had screened a window concealed in place of a window a carefully filled a window a carefully filled a a fitted barricade of plank. A sudden thrill shot through him as he rose to examine it. With his back toward Thorn, he said, half laughing, "'Perhaps Gregson was afraid that the fellow who clipped off his finger would get him through the window, huh?' He pretended not to perceive the effect of his words on the senior engineer.

The two sat down to supper, and for an hour after they had finished, they smoked and talked on the business of the camp. It was ten o'clock when Thorn and Jackpine left the cabin. No sooner had they gone than Howland closed and barred the door, lighted another cigar, and began pacing rapidly up and down the room. Already there were developments. Gregson had lied to him about his finger. Thorne had lied to him about his own insubes.

injuries whatever they were he was certain of these two things and of more the two senior engineers were not leaving the wakisco because of mere dissatisfaction with the work and country they were fleeing and for some reason they were keeping from him the real motive for their flight was it possible that they were deliberately sacrificing him in order to save themselves he could not bring himself to believe this notwithstanding the evidence against them both were men of irreproachable honor thorn especially was a man of indomitable nerve a man who would be the last in the world to prove treacherous to a business associate or a friend he was sure that neither of them knew of cuisse or of the beautiful girl whom he had met at prince albert which led him to believe that there were other characters in the strange plot in which he had become involved besides those whom he had encountered in the great north trail again he examined the barricaded window and he was more than ever convinced that his chance hit at thorn had struck true he was tired from his long day's travel but he was tired from his long day's travel but little inclination to sleep came to him and stretching himself out in the lounge with his head and shoulders bolstered up with furs he continued to smoke and think he was surprised when the little clock tinkled the hour of eleven he had not seen the clock before now he listened to the faint monotonous ticking it made close to his head until he felt an impelling drowsiness creeping over him and he closed his eyes He was almost asleep when it struck again, softly, and yet with sufficient loudness to arouse him.

It had struck twelve. With an effort, Howland overcame his drowsiness and dragged himself to a sitting posture, knowing that he should undress and go to bed. The lamp was still burning brightly, and he arose to turn down the wick. Suddenly he stopped. To his dulled senses, there were a little. came distinctly the sound of a knock at the door. For a few moments he waited, silent, and motionless.

It came again, louder than before, and yet in it there was something of caution. It was not the heavy tattoo of one who had come to awaken him on a matter of business. Who could be his midnight visitor? Softly, Howland went back to his heavy coat and slipped his small revolver into his hip pocket. the knock came again then he walked to the door shot back the bolt and with his right hand gripping the butt of his pistol flung it wide open

for a moment he stood transfixed staring speechless at a white startled face lighted up by the glow of the oil lamp bewildered to the point of dumbness he backed slowly holding the door open and there entered the one person in all the world whom he wished most to see she who had become so strangely a part of his life since that first night at prince albert and whose sweet face was holding a deeper meaning for him with every hour that he lived he closed the door and turned still without speaking and impelled by a sudden spirit that sent the blood thrilling through his veins he held out both hands to the girl for whom he held out both hands to the girl for whom he had held out both hands to the girl for whom he was. he now knew that he was willing to face all of the perils that might await him between civilization and the bay. End of Chapter 5. Recording by Roger Maline. Chapter 6 of the Danger Trail This Libervox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Roger Maline

The Danger Trail by James Oliver Kerrwood. Chapter 6 The Love of a Man for a moment the girl hesitated her ungloved hands clenched on her breast her bloodless face tense with a strange grief as she saw the outstretched arms of the man whom her treachery had almost lured to his death then slowly she approached and once more howland held her hands clasped to him and gazed questioningly down into the wild eyes that stared into his own why did you run away from me were the first words that he spoke they came from him gently as if he had known her for a long time in them there was no tone of bitterness in the warmth of his gray eyes there was none of the denunciation which he might have expected he repeated the question bending his head until he felt the soft touch of her hair on his lips why did you run away from me she drew away from him her eyes searching his face i lied to you she breathed her words coming to him in a whisper i lied the words caught in her throat he saw her struggling to control herself to stop the quivering of her lip the tremble in her voice in another moment she had broken down and with a low sobbing cry sank in a time

chair beside the table and buried her head in her arms. As Howland saw the convulsive trembling of her shoulders, his soul was flooded with a strange joy, not at this sight of her grief, but at the knowledge that she was sorry for what she had done. Softly he approached. The girl's fur cap had fallen off. Her long, shining braid was half undone, and its silken strands fell over her shoulder and glistened in the lamp glow on the table. His hand hesitated and then fell gently on the bowed head. Sometimes the friend who lies is the only friend who's true, he said. I believe that it was necessary for you to lie.

Just once his hand stroked her soft hair, then, catching himself, he went to the opposite side of the narrow table, and sat down. When the girl raised her head, there was a bright flush in her cheeks. He could see the damp stain of tears on her face, but there was no sign of them now in the eyes that seemed seeking in his own the truth of his words, spoke in a few moments before. "'You believe that?' she questioned eagerly. "'You believe that it was necessary for me to lie?' she leaned a little toward. She leaned a little toward. him, her fingers twining themselves about one another nervously as she waited for him to answer. "'Yes,' said Howland. He spoke the one word with a finality that sent a gladness into the soft brown eyes across from him. "'I believe that you had to lie to me.'

His low voice was vibrant with unbounded faith. Other words were on his lips, but he forced them back. A part of what he might have said, a part of the strange, joyous tumult in his heart, betrayed itself in his face, and before that betrayal the girl drew back slowly, the color fading from her cheeks. "'And I believe you will not lie to me again,' he said. She rose to her feet and flung back her hair, looking down on him in the manner of one who had never before met this kind of man, and knew not what to make of him. "'No, I will not lie to you again,' she replied more firmly.

"'Do you believe me now?' "'Yes.' "'Then go back into the south. "'I have come to tell you that again to-night, "'to make you believe me. "'You should have turned back to Lipa. "'If you don't go to-morrow—' "'Her voice seemed to choke her,

and she stood without finishing, leaving him to understand what she had meant to say. In an instant, Howland was at her side. Once more, his old, resolute fighting blood was up. Firmly he took her hands again, his eyes compelling her to look up at him. "'If I don't go to-morrow, they will kill me,' he completed, repeating the words of her note to him.

"'Now, if you are going to be honest with me, Tell me this. Who is going to kill me? And why? He felt a convulsive shudder passed through her, as she answered. I said that I would not lie to you again. If I cannot tell you the truth, I will tell you nothing. It is impossible for me to say why your life is in danger.

But you know? Yes. He seated her again in the chair beside the table and sat down. opposite her. Will you tell me who you are? She hesitated, twisting her fingers nervously in a silken strand of her hair. Will you? he persisted. If I tell you who I am, she said at last, you will know who is threatening your life.

He stared at her in astonishment. The devil you say! The word slipped from his lips before he could stop them. For a second time, the girl rose from her chair. "'You will go?' she entreated. "'You will go to-morrow?' Her hand was on the latch of the door. "'You will go?'

He had risen and was lighting a cigar over the chimney of the lamp, laughing he came toward her. "'Yes, surely I am going, to see you safely home.' suddenly he turned back to the lounge and belted on his revolver and holster when he returned she barred his way defiantly her back against the door you cannot go why because he caught the frightened flutter of her voice again because they will kill you the low laugh that he breathed in her hair was more of joy than fear i am glad that you care he whispered to her softly you must go she still persisted with you yes he answered no no to-morrow you must go back to lepah back into the south will you promise me that perhaps he said i will tell you soon she surrendered she surrendered to the determination in his voice,

and allowed him to pass out into the night with her. Swiftly she had led him along a path that ran into the deep gloom of the balsam and spruce. He could hear the throbbing of her heart and her quick, excited breathing as she stopped, one of her hands clasping him nervously by the arm. "'It is not very far from here,' she whispered. "'You must not go with me.'

"'If they saw me with you, At this hour, he felt her shuddering against him. Only a little farther, he begged. She surrendered again, hesitatingly, and they went on, more slowly than before, until they came to where a few faint lights in the camp were visible ahead of them. Now you must go. Howland turned as if to obey. In an instant the girl was at his side.

You have not promised. she entreated will you go to-morrow in the lustre of the eyes that were turned up to him in the gloom howland saw again the strange sweet power that had taken possession of his soul it did not occur to him in these moments that he had known this girl for only a few hours that until to-night he had heard no word pass from her lips he was conscious only that in the space of those few hours something had come into his life which he had never known before and a deep longing to tell her this to take her sweet face between his hands as they stood in the gloom of the forest and to confess to her that she had become more to him than a passing vision in a strange wilderness filled him that night he had forgotten half of the strenuous lessons he had striven years to master success ambition the mere joy of achievement were for the first time sunk under a greater thing for him the pulsating human presence of this girl and as he looked down into her face pleading with him still in its white silent terror he forgot too what this woman was or might have been knowing only that to him she had opened a new and glorious world filled with a promise that stirred his blood like sharp wine he crushed her hands once more to his breast as he had done on the great north trail holding her so close that he could feel the throbbing of her bosom against him

he spoke no word and still her eyes pleaded with him to go suddenly he freed one of his hands and brushed back the thick hair from her brow and turned her face gently until what dim light came down from those stars above glowed in the beauty of her eyes in his own face she saw that which he had not dared to speak and from her lips there came a soft little sobbing cry No, I have not promised, and I will not promise, he said, holding her face so that she could not look away from him. Forgive me for—for doing this! And before she could move, he caught her for a moment close in his arms, holding her so that he felt the quick beating of her heart against his own, the sweep of her hair and breath in his face. This is why I will not go back, he cried softly. It is because I love you, love you. He caught himself, choking back the words,

and as she drew away from him, her eyes shone with a glory that made him half reach out his arms to her. You will forgive me, he begged. I do not mean to do wrong, only you must know why I shall not go back into the south, from her distance she saw his arms stretched like shadows toward her her voice was low so low that he could hardly hear the words she spoke but its sweetness thrilled him if you love me you will do this thing for me you will go to-morrow and you-you you-you will go to-morrow i he heard the tremulous quiver in her voice very soon you will forget that you have ever seen me. From down the path there came the sound of low voices. Excitedly the girl ran to

Howland, thrusting him back with her hands. Go, go, she cried tensely. Hurry back to the cabin. Lock your door, and don't come out again tonight. Oh, please, if you love me, please, go! The voices were approaching. Howland fancied that he, he said, he, he he could distinguish dark shadows between the thinned walls of the forest. He laughed softly. "'I am not going to run, little girl,' he whispered. "'See?' he drew his revolver so that it gleamed in the light of the stars. With a frightened gasp the girl pulled him into the thick bushes beside the path until they stood a dozen paces from where those who were coming down the trail would pass. There was a silence as Howland slipped his weapon back into its holster.

Then the voices came again, very near, and at the sound of them his companion shrank close to him, her hands clutching his arms, her white, frightened face raised to him in piteous appeal. His blood leaped through him like fire. He knew that the girl had recognized the voices, that they who were about to pass him were the mysterious enemies against whom she had warned him. Perhaps they were the two who had attacked him on the Great North Trail.

His muscles grew tense. The girl could feel them straining under her hands, could feel his body grow rigid and alert. His hand fell again on his revolver. He made a step past her, his eyes flashing, his face as set as iron, almost sobbing she pressed herself against his breast holding him back don't don't don't she whispered they could hear the cracking of brush under the feet of those who were approaching suddenly the sounds ceased not twenty paces away from his arms the girl's hands rose slowly to his shoulders to his face caressingly pleadingly her

her beautiful eyes glowed half with terror half with a prayer to him don't she breathed again so close that her sweet breath fell warm on his face don't if you-if you care for me gently he drew her close in his arms crushing her face to his breast kissing her hair her eyes her mouth i love you he whispered again and again the steps were resumed the voices died away then there came a pressure against his breast a gentle resistance and he opened his arm so that the girl drew back from him her lips were smiling at him and in that smile there was gentle accusation the sweetness of forgiveness and he could see that with these there had come also a flush into her cheeks and a dazzling glow into her eyes they are gone she said tremblingly yes they are gone he stood looking down into her glowing face in silence then They are gone, he repeated. They were the men who tried to kill me at Prince Albert. I have let them go, for you.

Will you tell me your name? Yes, that much, now. It is Meles. Meles! The name fell from him sharply. In an instant there recurred to him all the Casse had said. And there almost came from his lips, the half-breed's words, which had burned themselves in his memory.

"'Perhaps you will understand when I tell you this warning is sent to you by the little Melyse.' "'What had Cosset meant?' "'Melis,' he repeated, looking strangely into the girl's face. "'Yes, Melis!' She drew back from him slowly, the color fading from her cheeks, and as she saw the light in his eyes there burst from her a short, stifled cry. "'Now you understand! You understand why you must go back into the south,' she almost sobbed. "'Oh, I have sinned to tell you my name. But you will go, won't you? You will go, for me?'

"'For you I would go to the end of the earth,' interrupted Howland, his pale face near to her. But you must tell me why. I don't understand you. I don't know why those men tried to kill me in Prince Albert. I don't know why my life is in danger here. Clausey told me that my warning back there came from a girl named Melisse. I didn't understand him. I don't understand you.

It is all a mystery to me. So far as I know, I have never had enemies. i never heard your name until cuisse spoke it what did he mean what do you mean why do you want to drive me from the wakusco why is my life in danger it is for you to tell me these things i have been honest with you i love you i will fight for you if it is necessary but you must tell me tell me his breath was hot in her face and she stared at him as if what she heard robbed her of the power of speech won't you tell me he whispered more softly melisse she made no effort to resist him as he drew her once more in his arms crushing her sweet lips to his own meles won't you tell me suddenly she lifted her hands to his face and pushed back his head looking squarely into his eyes if i tell you she said softly and in telling you i betray those whom i love will you promise to bring harm to none of them but go go back into the south?

And leave you? Yes, and leave me. There was the faintest tremor of a sob in the voice which she was trying so hard to control. His arms tightened about her. I will swear to do what is best for you and for me, he replied. I will swear to bring harm to none whom you cared a shield. But I will not promise to leave you.

a soft glow came into the girl's eyes as she unclasped his arms and stood back from him i will think think she whispered quickly perhaps i will tell you to-morrow night here if you will keep your oath and do what is best for you and for me i swear it then i will meet you here at this time when the others are asleep but to-morrow you will be careful careful unconsciously she half reached her arms out to him as she turned toward the path you will be careful to-morrow promise me that i promise like a shadow she was gone he heard her quick steps running up the path saw her form as it disappeared in the forest gloom for a few moments longer he stood hardly breathing until he knew that she had gone beyond his hearing then he walked swiftly along the footpath that led to the cabin end of chapter six recording by roger maline chapter seven of the danger trail this livervox recording is in the public domain recording by roger maline the danger trail by james oliver curwood chapter seven the blowing of the coyote in the new excitement that pulsated with every fibre of his being howland forgot his own danger forgot his old caution and the fears that gave birth to it forgot everything in these moments but melisse and his own great happiness for he was happy happier than he had ever been in his life happier than he had ever been in his life happier than he had ever been in his life happier than he had been in his life happier than

than he had ever expected to be. He was conscious of no madness in this strange new joy that swept through his being like a fire. He did not stop to weigh with himself the unreasoning impulses that filled him. He had held Malesce in his arms. He had told her of his love, and though she had accepted it with gentle unresponsiveness, he was thrilled by the memory of that last look in her eyes which had spoken faith, confidence, and perhaps even more. And his faith in her had become as limitless as the blue space above him. He had known her for but a few hours, and yet in that time, it seemed to him that he had lived longer than in all of the years that had gone before.

She had lied to him, had divulged only a part of her identity, and yet he knew that there were reasons for these things. to-morrow night he would see her again and then-what would she tell him whatever it was it was to be a reward for his own love he knew that by the half-fearing tremble of her voice the sobbing catch of her breath the soft glow in her eyes impelled by that love would she confide in him and then would he go back into the south he laughed softly joyfully yes he would go back into the south he would go to the other end of the earth if she would go with him what was the building of this railroad now to that other great thing that had come into his life for the first time he saw duty in another light there were others who could build the road success fortune ambition in the old way he had seen them were overshadowed now by this love of a girl he stopped and lighted his pipe the fragrant odor of the tobacco the flavor of the warm smoke in his mouth helped to readjust him to cool his heated brain the old fighting instincts leaped into life again go into the south he asked himself the question once more and in the gloomy silence of the forest his low laugh fell again as he clenched his hands in anticipation of what was ahead of him

no he would build the road and in building it he would win this girl if it was given for him to possess her his saner thoughts brought back his caution he went more slowly toward the cabin keeping in the deep shadows and stopping now and then to listen at the edge of the clearing he paused for a long time there was no sign of life about the cabin abandoned by greggson and thorn it was probable that the two men who had passed along the path had returned to the camp by another trail and still keeping as much within the shadows as possible he went to the door and entered with his feet propped in front of the big box stove sat jack pine the indian rose as howland entered and something in the sullen gloom of his face caused the young engineer to eye him questioningly any one been here jack pine the old sledge driver gave his head a negative shake and hunched his shoulders pointing at the same time to the table on which lay a carefully folded piece of paper thorn he grunted howland spread out the paper in the light of the lamp and read my dear howland i forgot to tell you that our mail sledge starts for lepah to-morrow at noon and at noon and at a little bit of the lamp and read my dear howland i forgot to tell you that our mail sledge starts for lepah to-morrow at noon and at noon and at the and as I'm planning on going down with it, I want you to get over as early as you can in the morning.

Can you put on to everything in the camp between eight and twelve? Thorn. A whistle of astonishment escaped Howland's lips. Where do you sleep, Jack Pine? he asked suddenly. Cabin, in edge of woods, replied the Indian. How about breakfast? Thorne hasn't put me onto the grub line yet. thorn say you eat with him in morning i come early wake you after him go to-morrow eat here

you needn't wake me said howland throwing off his coat i'll find thorn probably before he's up good-night jack pine had half opened the door and for a moment the engineer caught a glimpse of his dark grinning face looking back over his shoulder he hesitated as if about to speak and then with a mouthful of his inimitable chuckles he went out after bolting the door howland lighted a small table lamp entering the sleeping-room and prepared for bed got to have a little sleep no matter if things are going off like a fourth of july celebration he grumbled and rolled between the sheets in spite of his old habit of rising with the breaking of dawn it was jack pine who awes wakened him a few hours later the camp was hardly astir when he followed the indian down among the log cabins to thorns quarters the senior engineer was already dressed sorry to hustle you so howland he greeted but i've got to go down with the mail just between you and me i don't believe the camp doctor is much on his job i've got a deuced bad shoulder and a worse arm and i'm going down to a good surgeon as fast as I can. Didn't they send Weston up with you? asked Howland. He knew that Weston was the best accident man in the company's employ.

Yes, Weston, replied the senior, eyeing him sharply. I don't mean to say he's not a good man, Howland, he amended quickly. But he doesn't quite seem to take hold of this hurt of mine. By the way, I looked over our payroll, and there is no co-say. on it. For an hour after breakfast, the two men were busy with papers, maps, and drawings relative to the camp work. Howland had kept in close touch with operations from Chicago, and by the time they were ready to leave for outside inspection, he was confident that he could take hold without the personal assistance of either Gregson or Thorne. Before that hour had passed, he was certain

of at least one other thing, that it was not incompetency that was taking the two senior engineers back to the home office. He had half expected to find the working end in the same disorganized condition as its chiefs. But if Gregson and Thorne had been laboring under a tremendous strain of some kind, it was not reflected in the company's work, as shown in the office records which the latter had spread out before him. that's a big six months work said thorn when they had finished good lord man when we first came up here a jack rabbit couldn't hop through this place where you're sitting and now see what we've got fifty cabins four mess halls two of the biggest warehouses north of winnipeg a post office a hospital three blacksmith shops and a shipyard a shipyard a shipyard exclaimed howland in genuine surprise sure with a fifty-ton ship half built and frozen stiff in the ice you can finish her in the spring and you'll find her mighty useful for bringing supplies from the head of the wakusco we're using horses on the ice now had a deuced hard time in getting fifty of em up from le pa

and besides all this we've got six miles of road-bed built to the south and three to the north we've got a sub-camp at each working end but most of the men still prefer to come in at night he dragged himself slowly and painfully to his feet as a knock sounded at the door that's macdonald our camp superintendent he explained told him to be here at eight he's a corker for taking hold of things a little wiry red-headed man hopped in as thorn threw open the door the moment his eyes fell on howland he sprang forward with outstretched hand smiling and bobbing his head howland of course he cried glad to see you five minutes late awful sorry but they're having the devil's own time over at a coyote we're going to blow this morning and that's what kept me from howland he whirled on the senior with the sudden movement of a cricket how's the arm thorne and if there's any mercy in your corpus tell me if jackpine brought me the cigarettes from lepah if he forgot them as the mail did i'll have his life as sure he brought them said thorne but how about this coyote mac i thought it was ready to fire so it is now the south ridge is scheduled to go on to up at ten o'clock. We'll blow up the big North Mountain sometime tonight. It'll make a glorious fireworks. One hundred and twenty-five barrels of powder and four fifty-pound cases of dynamite.

And if you can't walk that far thorn, we'll take you up on a sledge. Mustn't allow you to miss it. Sorry, but I'll have to, Mac. I'm going south with the mail. That's why I want you with Howland and me this morning. It'll be up to you to get him acquainted with every detail in camp. Bullie! exclaimed the little superintendent, rubbing his hands with brisk enthusiasm. Greggy and Thorne have done some remarkable things, Mr. Howland. You'll open your eyes when you see him. Talk about building railroads. We've got them all beat a thousand ways, tearing through forests, swamps, and those blooming ridge mountains. And here we are pretty near up at the end of the earth.

The new Transcontinental isn't in it with us. The— Ring off, Mac! exclaimed Thorne. And Howland found himself laughing down into the red, freckled face of the superintendent. He liked this man immensely from the first. He's a bunch of live wires, double-charged all the time, said Thorne in a low voice, as McDonald went out ahead of them. always like that happy as a boy most of the time loved by the men but the very devil himself when he's riled don't know what this camp would do without him this same thought occurred to howland a dozen times during the next two hours

mcdonald seemed to be the life and law of the camp and he wondered more and more at thorn's demeanor the camp chiefs and gang foreman whom they met seemed to stand in a certain awe of the same thing senior engineer, but it was at the little red-headed Scotchman's cheery words that their eyes lighted with enthusiasm. This was not like the old thorn, who had been the eye, the ear, and the tongue of the company's greatest engineering works for a decade past, and whose boundless enthusiasm and love of work had been the largest factors in the winning of fame that was more than national. He began to note that there was a strange nervousness about, about Thorne when they were among the men, an uneasy alertness in his eyes, as though he were looking for some particular face among those they encountered.

MacDonald's shrewd eyes observed his perplexity, and once he took an opportunity to whisper, I guess it's about time for Thorne to get back into civilization. There's something bad in his system. Weston told me yesterday that his injuries are coming along finally. I don't understand it. A little later they returned with Thorne to his room. I want Howland to see this South Coyote go up, said MacDonald. Can you spare him? We'll be back before noon. Certainly. Come and take dinner with me at twelve. That'll give me time to make memoranda of things I may have forgotten. Howland fancied that there was a certain tone of relief in the senior's voice, but he made no mention of it to the superintendent as they

walked swiftly to the scene of the blowout. The coyote was ready for firing when they arrived. The coyote itself, a tunnel of fifty feet dug into the solid rock of the mountain, and terminating in a chamber packed with explosives, was closed by masses of broken rock, rammed tight, and McDonald showed his companion where the electric wire. passed to the fuse within. It's a confounded mystery to me why Thorne doesn't care to see this bridge blown up, he exclaimed after they had finished the inspection. We've been at work for three months drilling this coyote, and the bigger one to the north.

There are four thousand square yards of rock to come out of there, and six thousand out of the other. You don't see shots like those three times in a lifetime, and there'll not be a lot of another for us between here and the bay. What's the matter with Thorne? Without waiting for a reply, MacDonald walked swiftly in the direction of a ridge to the right. Already, guards had been thrown out on all sides of the mountain, and their thrilling warnings of, fire, fire, shouted through megaphones of birch bark, echoed with ominous meaning through the still wilderness, where for the time all were had ceased. On the top of the ridge, half a hundred of the workmen had already assembled, and as Howland and the superintendent came among them, they fell back from around a big, flat boulder

on which was stationed the electric battery. McDonald's face was flushed, and his eyes snapped like dragonflies, as he pointed to a tiny button. "'God, but I can't understand why Thorne doesn't care to see this,' he said, again. Think of it, man, seven thousand five hundred pounds of powder and two hundred of dynamite. A touch of this button, a flash along the wire, and the fuse is struck. Then, four or five minutes, and up goes a mountain that has stood here since the world began. Isn't it glorious? He straightened himself and took off his hat. Mr. Howland, will you press the button?

With a strange thrill, Howland bent over the battery. His eyes turned to the mass of rock, looming sullen and black half a mile away, as if bidding defiance in the face of impending fate. Tremblingly his finger pressed on the little white knob, and a silence like that of death fell on those who watched. One minute, two, three, five, passed, while in the bowels of the mountain, the fuse was sizzling to its end. Then there came a puff, something like a cloud of dust rising skyward, but without sound,

and before its upward belching had ceased, a tongue of flame spurred it out of its crest, and after that, perhaps two seconds later, came the explosion. There was a rumbling and a jarring, as a few, a few years. the earth were convulsed underfoot. Volumes of dense black smoke shot upward, shutting the mountain in an impenetrable pall of gloom, and in an instant these rolling, twisting volumes of black became lurid, and an explosion like that of a thousand great guns rent the air.

As fast as the eye could follow, sheets of flames shot out of the sea of smoke, climbing higher and higher, in lightning flashes until the lurid tongues licked the air a quarter of a mile above the startled wilderness explosion followed explosion some of them coming in hollow reverberating booms others sounding as if in mid-air the heavens were filled with hurtling rocks solid masses of granite ten feet square were thrown a hundred feet away rocks weighing a ton were hurled still fire rocks weighing a ton were hurled still farther as if they were no more than stones flung by the hand of a giant chunks that would have crashed from the roof to the basement of a skyscraper dropped a third and nearly half a mile away for three minutes the frightful convulsions continued then the lurid lights died out of the pall of smoke and the pall itself began to settle howland felt a grip on his arm dumbly he turned and looked into the white staring face of the superintendent his ears tingled every fiber in him seemed unstrung

macdonald's voice came to him strange and weird what do you think of that howland the two men gripped hands and when they looked again they saw dimly through dust and smoke only torn and shattered massacres of rocks where had been the giant ridge that barred the path of the new road to the bay howland talked but little on their way back to the camp the scene that he had just witnessed affected him strangely it stirred once more within him all of his old ambition all of his old enthusiasm and yet neither found voice in words he was glad when the dinner was over at thorns and with the going of the mail sledge and the senior engineer there came over him a still deeper sense of joy now he was in charge it was his road from that hour on he crushed mcdonald's hand in a grip that meant more than words when they parted in his own cabin he threw off his coat and hat lighted his pipe and tried to realize just what this all meant for him he was in charge in charge of the greatest railroad building job on earth he jack howland who less than twenty years ago was a barefooted half-starved urchin peddling papers in the streets where he was now famous and now what was this black thing that had come up to threaten his chances just as he had about won his great fight he clenched his hands as he thought again of what had already happened the cowardly attempt on his life the warnings and his blood boiled to fever heat that night after he had seen melisse he would know what to do

but he would not be driven away as gregson and thorn had been driven he was determined on that the gloom of night falls early in the great northern midwinter and it was already growing dusk when there came the sound of a voice outside followed a moment later by a loud knock at the door at howland's invitation the door opened and the head and shoulders of a man appeared something has gone wrong out at the north coyote sir and mr macdonald wants you just as fast as you can get out there he said he sent me down for you with a sledge mcdonald told me the thing was ready for firing said howland putting on his hat and coat what's the matter Bad packing, I guess. Heard him swearing about it. He's in a terrible sweat to see you. Half an hour later, the sledge drew up close to the place where Howland had seen a score of men packing bags of powder and dynamite earlier in the day. Half a dozen lanterns were burning among the rocks, but there was no sign of movement or life.

The engineer's companion gave a sudden sharp, crowsy. of his long whip and in response to it there came a muffled halloo from out of the gloom that's macdonald sir you'll find him right up there near that second light where the coyote opens up he's grilling the life out of half a dozen men in the chamber where he found the dynamite on top of the powder instead of under it all right called back howland starting up among the rocks hardly had he taken a dozen steps when a dark object shot out behind him and fell with a crushing force on his head with a groaning cry he fell forward on his face for a few moments he was conscious of voices about him he knew that he was being lifted in the arms of men and that after a time they were carrying him so that his feet dragged on the ground after that he seemed to be sinking down down Down, down, until he lost all sense of existence in a chaos of inky blackness. End of Chapter 7. Recording by Roger Maline.

Chapter 8 of the Danger Trail. This Livervox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Roger Maline. The Danger Trail by James Oliver Kerrwood. Chapter 8. The Hour of Death. A red, unwelial. blinking eye staring at him fixedly from out of impenetrable gloom, an ogreish, gleaming thing that

brought life back into him with a thrill of horror, was Howland's first vision of returning consciousness. It was dead in front of him, on a level with his face, a ball of yellow fire that seemed to burn into his very soul. He tried to cry out, but no sound fell from his lips. He strove to move, to fight himself away but there was no power of movement in his limbs the eye grew larger he saw that it was so bright it cast a halo and the halo widened before his own staring eyes until the dense gloom about it seemed to be melting away then he knew it was a lantern in front of him not more than ten feet away consciousness flooded him and he made another effort to cry out to free to free his arms from an invisible clutch that held him powerless. At first he thought this was the clutch of human hands. Then, as the lantern light revealed more clearly the things about him and the outlines of his own figure, he saw that it was a rope, and he knew that he was unable

to cry out because of something tight and suffocating about his mouth. The truth came to him swiftly. He had come up to the coyote on a sledge. Someone had struck him. He remembered that men had half-dragged him over the rocks, and these men had bound and gagged him and left him here, with the lantern staring him in the face. But where was he? He shifted his eyes, straining to penetrate the gloom.

Ahead of him, just beyond the light, there was a black wall. He could not move his head, but he saw where that same wall closed in on the left he turned his gaze upward and it ended with that same imprisoning barrier of rock then he looked down and the cry of horror that rose in his throat died in a muffled groan the light fell dimly on a sack two of them three a tightly packed wall of them he knew now what had happened he was imprisoned in the coyote and the sacks about him were filled with powder he was sitting on something hard a box fifty pounds of dynamite the cold sweat stood out in beads on his face glistening in the lantern glow from between his feet a thin white ghostly line ran out until it lost itself in the blackness under the lantern it was the fuse leading to the box of dynamite on which he was sitting. Madly, he struggled at the thongs that bound him

until he sank exhausted against the row of powder sacks at his back. Like words of fire, the last warning of Melyis burned in his brain, You must go, tomorrow, tomorrow, or they will kill you! And this was the way in which he was to die. There flamed before his eyes the terrible spectacle which he had witnessed a few hours before, the holocaust of fire and smoke and thunder that had disrupted a mountain, a chaos of writhing, twisting fury, and in that moment his heart seemed to cease its beating.

He closed his eyes and tried to calm himself. Was it possible that there lived men so fiendish as to condemn, him to this sort of death? Why had not his enemies killed him out among the rocks? That would have been easier, quicker, less troublesome. Why did they wish to torture him? What terrible thing had he done? Was he mad? Mad? And this all a terrible nightmare? A raving and unreal contortion of things in his brain? In this hour of death, question after question. and raced through his head and he answered no one of them he sat still for a time scarcely breathing there was no sound save the beating of his own heart then there came another almost unheard at first faint thrilling maddening tick tick tick it was the beating of his watch

A spasm of horror seized him. What time was it? The coyote was to be fired at nine o'clock. It was four when he left his cabin. How long had he been unconscious? Was it time now? Now? Was McDonald's finger already reaching out to that little white button which would send him into eternity?

He struggled again, gnashing, furiously at the thing which covered his mouth, tearing the flesh of his wrists as he twisted at the ropes which bound him, choking himself with his efforts to loosen the thong about his neck. Exhausted again he sank back, panting, half dead. As he lay with closed eyes, a little of his reason asserted itself. After all, was he such a coward as to go mad? tick tick his watch was beating at a furious rate was something wrong with it was it going too fast he tried to count the seconds but they raced away from him when he looked again his gaze fell on the little yellow tongue of flame in the lantern globe it was not the steady unwinking eye of a few minutes before there was a sputtering weakness about it now, and as he watched, the light grew fainter and fainter.

The flame was going out. A few minutes more, and he would be in darkness. At first the significance of it did not come to him. Then he straightened himself with a jerk that tightened the thong about his neck until it choked him. Hours must have passed since the lantern had been placed on that rock, else the oil would not be burned out of it now. for the first time howland realized that it was becoming more and more difficult for him to get breath the thing about his neck was tightening slowly inexorably like a hot band of steel and suddenly because of this tightening he found that he had recovered his voice this damned rawhide is pinching my adam's apple whatever had been about his mouth had slipped down and his words sounded

and choked in the rock-bound chamber. He tried to raise his voice in a shout, though he knew how futile his loudest shrieks would be. The effort choked him more. His suffering was becoming excruciating. Sharp pains darted like red-hot needles through his limbs. His back tortured him, and his head ached as though a knife had cleft the base of his skull.

the strength of his limbs was leaving him he no longer felt any sensation in his cramped feet he measured the paralysis creeping up his legs inch by inch driving the sharp pains before it and then a groan of horror rose to his lips the light had gone out as if that dying of the little yellow flame were the signal for his death there came to his ears a sharp hissing sound, a spark leaped up into the blackness before his eyes, and a slow, creeping glow came toward him over the rock at his feet. The hour, the minute, the second had come, and McDonald had pressed the little white button that was to send him into eternity. He did not cry out now. He knew that the end was very near, and in its nearness he found new strength. once he had seen a man walk to his death on the scaffold and as the condemned man had spoken his last farewell with the noose about his neck he had marvelled at the clearness of his voice at the fearlessness of this creature in his last moment on earth now he understood inch by inch the fuse burned toward him a fifth of the distance a quarter now a third

at last it reached a half was almost under his feet two minutes more of life he put his whole strength once again in an attempt to free his hands this time his attempt was cool steady masterful with death one hundred seconds away his heart gave a sudden bursting leap into his throat when he felt something give another effort and in the powder-choked vault there rang out a thrilling cry of triumph his hands were free he reached forward to the fuse and this time a moaning wordless sob fell from him faint terrifying with all the horror that might fill a human soul in its inarticulate note he could not reach the fuse because of the thong about his neck he felt for his knife he had left it in his room sixty seconds more forty thirty he could see the fiery end of the fuse almost at his feet suddenly his groping fingers came in contact with the coldy and the fused at his feet suddenly his groping fingers came in contact with the cold steel of his pocket revolver, and with a last hope he snatched it forth, stretching down his pistol arm until the muzzle of the weapon was within a dozen inches of the deadly spark. At his first shot, the spark leaped, but did not go out. After the second,

there was no longer the fiery, creeping thing on the floor, and, crushing his head back against the sacks, Howland sat for many minutes. as if death had in reality come to him in the moment of his deliverance. After a time, with tedious slowness, he worked a hand into his trousers' pocket, where he carried a penknife. It took him a long time to saw through the rawhide thong about his neck. After that, he cut the rope that bound his ankles.

He made an effort to rise, but no sooner had he gained his feet then his paralyzed limbs gave way under him, and he dropped in a heap on the floor. Very slowly the blood began finding its way through his choked veins again, and with the change there came over him a feeling of infinite restfulness. He stretched himself out, with his face turned to the black wall above, realizing only that he was saved, that he had outwitted his mysterious enemies again,

and that he was comfortable. He made no effort to think, to scheme out his further deliverance. He was with the powder and the dynamite, and the powder and the dynamite could not be exploded until human hands came to attach a new fuse. MacDonald would attend to that very soon, so he went off into a doze that was almost sleep.

In his half-consciousness, there came to him but one sound, that dreadful ticking of his watch he seemed to have listened to it for hours when there arose another sound the ticking of another watch he sat up startled wondering and then he laughed happily as he heard the sound more distinctly it was the beating of picks on the rock outside already mcdonald's men were at work clearing the mouth of the coyote in half an hour he would be out in the big breathing world again the thought brought him to his feet the numbness was gone from his limbs and he could walk about his first move was to strike a match and look at his watch half-past ten he spoke the words aloud thinking of melisse in an hour and a half he was to meet her on the trail would he be released in time to keep the trist how should he explain his imprisonment in the coyote so that he could leave mcdonald without further loss of time as the sound of the picks came nearer his brain began working faster if he could only evade explanations until morning and then reveal the whole dastardly business to macdonald

there would be time then for those explanations for the running down of his murderous assailants and in the while he would be able to keep his appointment with melisse he was not long in finding a way in which this scheme could be worked and gathering up the severed ropes and rawhide he concealed them between two of the powder sacks so that those who entered the coyote would discover no signs of his terrible imprisonment close to the mouth of the tunnel there was a black rent in the wall of rock made by a bursting charge of dynamite in which he could conceal himself when the men were busy examining the broken fuse he would step out and join them it would look as though he had crawled through the tunnel after them half an hour later a mass of rock rolled down close to his feet and a few moments after he saw a shadow a human form crawling through the hole it had left. A second followed, and then a third, and the first voice he heard was that of MacDonald. "'Give us the lantern, Bucky!' he called back,

and a gleam of light shot into the black chamber. The men walked cautiously toward the fuse, and Howland saw the little superintendent fall on his knees. "'What in hell?' he heard him. exclaim, and then there was a silence. As quietly as a cat, Howland worked himself to the entrance and made a clatter among the rocks. It was he who responded to the voice.

What's up, MacDonald? He coolly joined the little group. MacDonald looked up, and when he saw the new chief bending over him, his eyes stared in unbounded wonder. "'Howland!' he gasped. It was all he said. But in that one word and in the strange excitement in the superintendent's face, Howland read that which made him turn quickly to the men,

giving them his first command as General-in-Chief of the road that was going to the bay. "'Get out of the coyote, boys,' he said. "'We won't do anything more until morning.' to macdonald as the men went out ahead of them he added in a low voice guard the entrance to this tunnel with half a dozen of your best men to-night macdonald i know things which will lead me to investigate this to-morrow i'm going to leave you as soon as i get outside spread the report that it was simply a bad fuse understand he crawled out ahead of the superintendent and before mcdonald Donald had emerged from the coyote. He had already lost himself in the starlit gloom of the night, and was hastening to his trist with the beautiful girl, who, he believed, would reveal to him at least a part of one of the strangest and most diabolical plots that had ever originated in the

brain of man. End of Chapter 8. Recording by Roger Malene. Chapter 9 of the Danger Trail This Libervox recording is in the public domain. main recording by roger maline the danger trail by james oliver curwood chapter nine the trist it still lacked nearly an hour of the appointed time when howland came to the secluded spot in the trail where he was to meet melees concealed in the deep shadows of the bushes he seated himself in the end of a fallen spruce and loaded his pipe taking care to light it with the flare of the man match hidden in the hollow of his hands. For the first time since his terrible experience in the coyote, he found himself free to think, and more than ever he began to see the necessity of coolness and of judgment in what he was about to do. Gradually, too, he fought himself back into his old faith in Milius.

His blood was tingling at fever heat in his desire for vengeance, for the punishment of the human fiends who had attested. attempted to blow him to Adams, and yet at the same time there was no bitterness in him toward the girl. He was sure that she was an unwilling factor in the plot, and that she was doing all in her power to save him. At the same time he began to realize that he should no longer be influenced by her pleading. He had promised, in return for her confidence this night, to leave unpunished those whom she wished to shield. he would take back that promise.

Before she revealed anything to him, he would warn her that he was determined to discover those who had twice sought to kill him. It was nearly midnight when he looked at his watch again. Was it possible that Melisse would not come? He could not bring himself to believe that she knew of his imprisonment in the coyote, of this second attempt on his life.

And yet, if she did, He rose from the log and began pacing quickly back and forth in the gloom, his thoughts racing through his brain with increasing apprehension. Those who had imprisoned him had learned of his escape an hour ago. Many things might have happened in that time. Perhaps they were fleeing from the camp. Frightened by their failure and, fearing the punishment which would be theirs if discovered, it was not improbable that even now they were many miles from the Wicusco,

hurrying deeper into the unknown wilderness to the north, and Melyse would be with them. Suddenly he heard a step, a light, running step, and with a recognizing cry, he sprang out into the starlight to meet the slim, panting, white-faced figure that ran to him from between the thick walls of forest trees. "'Melees?' he exclaimed softly. He held out his arms and the girl ran straight into them,

thrusting her hands against his breast, throwing back her head so that she looked up into his face with a great, staring, horror-filled eyes. "'Now, now!' she sobbed. "'Now will you go?' Her hands left his breast and crept to his shoulders. slowly they slipped over them and as howland pressed her closer his lips silent she gave an agonized cry and dropped her head against his shoulder her whole body torn in a convulsion of grief and terror that startled him you will go she sobbed again and again you will go you will go he ran his fingers through her soft hair crushing his face close to hers

no i am not going dear he replied in a low firm voice not after what happened to-night she drew away from him as quickly as if he had struck her freeing herself even from the touch of his hands i heard what happened an hour ago she said her voice choking her i overheard them talking she struggled hard to control herself you must leave the camp to-night in the gloom she saw howland's teeth gleaming there was no fear in his smile he laughed gently down into her eyes as he took her face between his hands again i want to take back the promise that i gave you last night melisse i want to give you a chance to warn any whom you may wish to warn i shall not return into the south from this hour begins the hunt for the cowardly devils who have tried to murder me before dawn every man in the wakusco will be in the search and if we find them there shall be no mercy will you help me or she struck his hands from her face springing back before he had finished he saw a sudden change of expression her lips grew tense and firm from the death whiteness of her face there faded slowly away the look of soft pleading the quirk lines of fear there was a strangeness in her voice when she spoke something of the hard determination which howland had put in his own and yet the tone of it lacked his gentleness and love will you please tell me the time the question was almost startling howland held the dial of his watch to the light of the stars it is a quarter past midnight

the faintest shadow of a smile passed over the girl's lips are you certain that your watch is not fast she asked in speechless bewilderment howland stared at her because it will mean a great deal to you and to me if it is not a quarter past midnight continued maylise a growing glow in her eyes suddenly she approached him and put both of her warm hands to his face holding down his face holding down his arms with her own. "'Listen,' she whispered. "'Is there nothing, nothing that will make you change your purpose, that will take you back into the south, tonight?' The nearness of the sweet face,

the gentle touch of the girl's hands, the soft breath of her lips, sent a maddening impulse through Howland to surrender everything to her. For an instant he wavered. There might be one, just one, just one thing that would take me away tonight, he replied, his voice trembling with the great love that thrilled him. For you, Melyse, I would give up everything, ambition, fortune, the building of this road.

If I go to-night, will you go with me? Will you promise to be my wife when we reach Lippa? A look of ineffable tenderness came into the beautiful eyes so near to his own. that is impossible you will not love me when you know what i am what i have done he stopped her have you done wrong a great wrong for a moment her eyes faltered then hesitatingly there fell from her lips i don't know i believe i have but it's not that it's not that it's not that "'Do you mean that I have no right to tell you I love you?' he asked. "'Do you mean that it is wrong for you to listen to me?' "'I—I took it for granted that you were a girl that—' "'No, no, it is not that,' she cried quickly, catching his meaning.

"'It is not wrong for you to love me.' Suddenly she asked again, "'will you please tell me what time it is? now? He looked again. Twenty-five minutes after midnight. Let us go farther up the trail, she whispered. I am afraid here. She led the way, passing swiftly beyond the path that branched out to his cabin. Two hundred yards beyond this, a tree had fallen on the edge of the trail, and seating herself on it, Melyse motioned for him to sit down beside her. Howland's back was to the thick bushes behind them. He looked at the girl, but she had turned away her face. Suddenly she sprang from the log and stood in front of him.

Now, she cried, now! And at that signal, Howland's arms were seized from behind, and in another instant he was struggling feebly in the grip of powerful arms which had fastened themselves about him like wire cable, and the cry that rose to his lips was throttled by a hand over his mouth. For an instant he caught a glimpse of the girl's white face as she stood in the trail. Then strong hands pulled him back, while others bound his wrists and still others held his legs. Everything had passed in a few seconds. Helplessly bound and gagged, he lay on his back. in the snow listening to the low voices that came faintly to him from beyond the bushes he could understand nothing that they said and yet he was sure that he recognized among them the voice of melisse the voices became fainter he heard retreating footsteps and at last they died away entirely through a rift in the trees straight above him the white cold stars of the night gleamed down on

him and howland stared up at them fixedly until they seemed to be hopping and dancing about in the skies he wanted to swear yell fight in these moments that he lay on his back in the freezing snow a million demons were born in his blood the girl had betrayed him again this time he could find no excuse no pardon for her she had accepted his life love had allowed him to kiss her, to hold her in his arms, while beneath that hypocrisy, she had plotted his downfall a second time. Deliberately she had given the signal for attack, and now—he heard again the quick running step that he had recognized on the trail. The bushes behind him parted, and in the white starlight Melyse fell on her knees at his side, her glorious face bending over him in a grief that he had never seen in it before, her eyes shining on him with a great love.

Without speaking, she lifted his head in the hollow of her arm and crushed her own down against it, kissing him and softly sobbing his name. Goodbye, he heard her breathe. Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye. He struggled to cry out as she loved. lowered his head back on the snow, to free his hands, to hold her with him. But he saw her face only once more, bending over him, felt the warm pressure of her lips to his forehead, and then again he could hear her footsteps hurrying away through the forest.

End of Chapter 9. Recording by Roger Maline. Chapter 10 of the Danger Trail This Libervox recording is in the public domain. recording by Roger Maline The Danger Trail by James Oliver Kerwood Chapter 10 A Race Into the North

That Melisse loved him That she had taken his head in her arms And had kissed him Was the one consuming thought in Howland's brain For many minutes after she had left him bound And gagged in the snow That she had made no effort to free him Did not at first strike him as significant

He still felt the sweet, warm touch of her lips, the pressure of her arms, the smothering softness of her hair. It was not until he again heard approaching sounds that he returned once more to a full consciousness of the mysterious thing that had happened. He heard first of all the creaking of a toboggan on the hard crust, then the pattering of dog's feet, and after that the voices of men. The sounds stopped on the trail a dozen feet away from him. With a strange thrill, he recognized Cossé's voice. You must be sure that you make no mistake, he heard the half-breed say. Go to the waterfall at the head of the lake and heave down a big rock where the ice is open and the water boiling.

Track up the snow with a pair of Monsieur Howland's high-heeled boots and leave his hat tangled in the bushes. Then tell the superintendent that he stepped on the stone and that it rolled down and toppled him into the chasm. They could never find his body, and they will send down for a new engineer in place of the lost monsieur. Stupified with horror, Howland strained his ears to catch the rest of the cold-blooded scheme

which he was overhearing, but the voices grew lower, and he understood, no more that was said until Crosse, coming nearer, called out, "'Help me with the monsieur before you go, Jack Pine. He is a dead weight with all those raw hides about him.' As coolly as though he were not more than a chunk of stove-wood, Cosset and the Indian came through the bushes, seized him by the head and feet, carried him out into the trail, and laid him lengthwise on the sledge.

I hope you have not caught cold lying in the snow, monsieur, said Clause, bolstering up the engineer's head and shoulders and covering him with heavy furs. We should have been back sooner, but it was impossible. Hula, Wunga! he called softly to his lead dog. Get up there, you wolfhound! As the sledge started, with Clausee running close to the leader, Howland heard the low snapping of a whip behind him, and another voice urging on other dogs. With an effort that almost dislocated his neck, he twisted himself so he could look back of him. A hundred yards away, he discerned a second team following in his trail.

He saw a shadowy figure running at the head of the dogs, but what there was on the sledge, or what it meant, he could not see or surmise. mile after mile the two sledges continued without a stop cosay did not turn his head no word fell from his lips except an occasional signal to the dogs the trail had turned now straightened to the north and soon howland could make out no sign of it but knew only that they were twisting through the most open places in the forests and that the play of the polar lights was never over his left shoulder or his right, but always in his face. They had traveled for several hours when Cossé gave a sudden shrill shout to the rearmost sledge and halted his own.

The dogs fell in a panting group on the snow, and while they were resting, the half-breed relieved his prisoner of the soft buckskin that had been used as a gag. "'It will be perfectly safe for you to talk now, monsieur, and to shout as loudly as you please,' he said. said. "'After I have looked into your pockets, I will free your hands so that you can smoke. Are you comfortable?' "'Comfortable, be damned,' were the first words that fell from Howland's lips,

and his blood boiled at the sociable way in which Cuisre grinned down into his face. "'So you're in it, too, eh? And that lying girl!' The smile left Cosset's face. do you mean melisse monsieur howland yes crocet leaned down with his black eyes gleaming like coals do you know what i would do if i was her monsieur he said in a low voice and yet one filled with a threat which stilled the words of passion which the engineer was on the point of uttering do you know what i would do i would kill you kill you inch by inch torture you that is what i would do for god's sake quase tell me why why quesay had found howland's pistol and freed his hands and the engineer stretched them out entreatingly i would give my life for that girl quassay i told her so back there and she came to me when i was in the snow and he caught himself adding to what he had left incomplete there is a mistake croce i am not the man they want to kill quesay was smiling at him again

smoke and think monsieur it is impossible for me to tell you why you should be dead but you ought to know unless your memory is shorter than a child's he went to the dogs stirring them up with the cracking of his whip and when howland turned to look back he saw a bright flare of light where the other sledge had stopped a man's voice came from the farther gloom calling to coasse in french he tells me i am to take you on alone said quasset after he had replied to the word spoken in a patois which howland could not understand they will join us again very soon they exclaimed howland how many will it take to kill me my dear the half-breed smiled down into his face again you may thank the blessed virgin that they are with us he replied softly if you have any hope outside of heaven monsieur it is on that sledge behind as he went again to the dogs straightening the leader in his traces howland stared back at the firelit space in the forest gloom he could see a man adding fuel to the blaze and beyond him shrouded in the deep shadows of the trees an indistinct tangle of dogs and sledge as he strained his eyes to discover more there was a movement beyond the figure over the fire and the young engineer's heart leaped with the young engineer's heart leaped with a sudden thrill. Crosse's voice sounded in a shrill shout behind him, and at that warning

cry in French, the second figure sprang back into the gloom. But Howland had recognized it, and the chilled blood in his veins leaped into warm life again at the knowledge that it was Melyse who was trailing behind them on the second sledge. When you yell like that, give me a little warning, if you please, Jean, he said, speaking as coolly as though he had not recognized the figure that had come for an instant into the firelight. It is enough to startle the life out of one. It is our way of saying goodbye, monsieur, replied Coussay with a fierce snap of his whip. Hula, get along there! he cried to the dogs, and in half a dozen breaths the fire was lost to view.

Don comes at about eight o'clock in the northern midwinter. beyond the fiftieth degree the first ruddy haze of the sun begins to warm the southeastern skies at nine and its glow had already risen above the forests before quassay stopped his team again for two hours he had not spoken a word to his prisoner and after several unavailing efforts to break the other's taciturnity howland lapsed into a silence of his own when he had brought his tired dogs to a halt quassay spoke for the first time we are going to camp here for a few hours he explained if you will pledge me your word of honor that you will make no attempt to escape i will give you the use of your legs until after breakfast monsieur what do you say have you a bible quesay no monsieur but i have you a bible no monsieur but i have the cross of our virgin given to me by the missioner at york factory then i will swear by it i will swear by all the crosses and all the bibles in the world that i will make no effort to escape i am paralyzed cuisse i couldn't run for a week quesay was searching in his pockets mon dieu he cried excitedly i could have been for a week coasse was searching in his pockets mon dieu he cried excitedly i was a little have lost it ah come to think monsieur i gave the cross to my marianne before i went into the south but i will take your word and who is marianne jean will she also be in at the kill

merrienne is my wife monsieur ah my belle marianne my chri the daughter of an indian princess and the granddaughter of a chef de battalion monsieur. Could there be better than that? And she is beautiful, monsieur, with hair like the top side of a raven's wing with the sun shining on it, and—' You love her a great deal, Jean. Next to the Virgin, and it may be a little better. Quasse had severed the rope about the engineer's legs, and as he raised his glowing eyes, Howland reached out and put both hands on his shoulders. "'And in just that way, I love Melisse,' he said softly. "'Jean, won't you be my friend? I don't want to escape. I'm not a coward. Won't you think of what your Marianne might do and be a friend to me? You would die for Marianne if it were necessary,

and I would die for the girl back on that sledge. He had staggered to his feet and pointed into the forests through which they had come. I saw her in the firelight, Jean. Why is she following us? Why do they want to kill me? If you would only give me a chance to prove that it is all a mistake, that I— Cosset reached out and took his hand. Monsieur, I would like to help you.

you, he interrupted. I liked you that night we came in together from the fight on the trail. I have liked you since. And yet, if I was in their place, I would kill you even though I like you. It is a great duty to kill you. They did not do wrong when they tied you in the coyote. They did not do wrong when they tried to kill you on the trail. But I have taken a solemn oath to tell you nothing.

nothing beyond this so as long as you are with me and that sledge is behind us your life is not in danger i will tell you nothing more are you hungry monsieur starved said howland he stumbled a few steps out into the snow the numbness in his limbs forcing him to catch at trees and saplings to save himself from falling he was astonished at cuisse's words and more confused than ever at the half-breed's assurance that his life was no longer in immediate peril to him this meant that melisse had not only warned him but was now playing an active part in preserving his life and this conclusion added to his perplexity who was this girl who a few hours before had deliberately lured him among his enemies and who was now fighting to save him the question held a deeper significance for him than when he had asked himself this same thing at prince albert and when cuisse called for him to return to the camp-fire and breakfast he touched once more the forbidden subject jean i don't want to hurt your feelings he said seating himself on the sledge but i've got to get a few things out of my system i believe this melisse of yours is a bad woman like a flash quesay struck at the bait which howland threw out to him he leaned a little forward a hand quivering on his knife his eyes flashing fire involuntarily the engineer recoiled from that animal-like crouch from the black rage which was growing each instant in the half-breed's face

yet cuisse spoke softly and without excitement even while his shoulders and arms were twitching like a forest cat about to spring monsieur no one in the world must say that about my marianne and next to her they must not say it about melisse "'Up there,' and he pointed still farther into the north, "'I know of a hundred men between the Athabasca and the bay "'who would kill you for what you have said. "'And it is not for Jean Quasset to listen to it here. "'I will kill you unless you take it back.' "'God!' breathed Howland. "'He looked straight into Cosset's face.

"'I'm glad. It's so—' jean he added slowly don't you understand man i love her i didn't mean what i said i would kill for her too jean i said that to find out what you would do slowly coessie relaxed a faint smile curling his thin lips if it was a joke monsieur it was a bad one it wasn't a joke cried howland it was a serious effort to make you tell me something about melisse listen jean she told me back there that it was not wrong for me to love her and when i lay bound and gagged in the snow she came to me-and and-kissed me i don't understand quesay interrupted him did she do that monsieur i swear it then you are fortunate smiled jean softly for i will stake my hope in the blessed hereafter that she has never done that to another man monsieur but it will never happen again i believe that it will unless you kill me and i shall not hesitate to kill you if i think that it is likely to happen again there are others who would kill you knowing that it has happened but once but you must stop this talk monsieur if you persist i shall put the rawhide over your mouth again and if i object fight

you have given me your word of honor up here in the big snows the keeping of that word is our first law if you break it i will kill you good lord but you're a cheerful companion exclaimed howland laughing in spite of himself do you know crossay this whole situation has a good deal of humor as well as tragedy about it i must be a most important cuss whoever i am ask me who i am quasse and who are you monsieur i don't know jean fact i don't i used to think that i was a most ambitious young cub in a big engineering establishment down in chicago but i guess i was dreaming funny dream wasn't it thought i came up here to build a road somewhere through these infernal—no, I mean these beautiful snows! But my mind must have been wandering again. Ever hear of an insane asylum, Quasay? Am I in a big stone building with iron bars at the windows?

And are you my keeper? Just come in to amuse me for a time? It's kind of you, Quase, and I hope that someday I shall get my mind back so that I can thank you decently. Perhaps you'll go, mad some day, Jean, and dream about pretty girls and railroads, and forests and snows, and then I'll be your keeper. Have a cigar? I've got just two left. "'Mon dieu,' gasped Jean.

"'Yes, I will smoke, monsieur.' "'Is that moose state good?' "'Fine. I haven't eaten a mouthful since years ago, when I dreamed that I sat on a case of dynamite just about to blow up. Did you ever sit on a case of dynamite just about to blow up, Jean? No, monsieur, it must be unpleasant. That dream was what turned my hair white, Jean.

See how white it is? Whiter than the snow. Croisse looked at him a little anxiously as he ate his meat, and at the gathering unrest in his eyes, Howland burst into a laugh. Don't be frightened. in jean he spoke soothingly i'm harmless but i promise you that i'll become violent unless something reasonable occurs pretty soon hello are you going to start so soon

right away monsieur said cuisse who was stirring up the dogs will you walk and run or ride walk and run with your permission you have it monsieur but if you attempt to escape i must shoot you. Run on the right of the dogs, even with me. I will take this side. Until Cossé stopped again in the middle of the afternoon, Howland watched the backward trail for the appearance of the second sledge, but there was no sign of it. Once, he ventured to bring up the subject to Cosset, who did no more than reply with a hunch of his shoulders and a quick look which warned the engineer to keep his silence. After their second means, he was a second meeting, he was a the journey was resumed and by referring occasionally to his compass howland observed that the trail was swinging gradually to the eastward long before dusk exhaustion compelled him to ride once more on the sledge quassay seemed tireless and under the early glow of the stars and the red moon he still led on the worn pack until at last it stopped on the summit of a mountainous ridge with a vast plain stretching into the north as far as the eyes could see through the white gloom

the half-breed came back to where howland was seated on the sledge we are going but a little farther monsieur he said i must replace the rawhide over your mouth and the thongs about your wrists i am sorry but i will leave your legs free thanks said howland but really it is unnecessary i am properly subdued to the fact that fate is determined to play out this interesting game of ball with me and no longer knowing where i am i promise you to do nothing more exciting than smoke my pipe if you will allow me to go along peaceably at your side quosey hesitated you will not attempt to escape and you will hold your tongue he asked yes jean drew forth his revolver and deliberately cocked it bear in mind monsieur that i will kill you if you break your word you may go ahead and he pointed down the side of the mountain end of chapter ten recording by roger maline chapter eleven of the danger trail this libervox recording is in the public domain recording by roger maline the danger trail by james oliver curwood chapter eleven the house of the red death half-way down the ridge a low word from cuisse stopped the engineer jean had toggled his team with a stout length of Babiche on the mountaintop,

and he was looking back when Howland turned toward him. The sharp edge of that part of the mountain from which they were descending stood out in a clear-cut line against the sky, and on this edge the six dogs of the team sat squat on their haunches, silent and motionless, like strangely carved gargoyles placed there to guard the limitless plains below. Howland took the pipe from his mouth as he watched the staring interest of Cosset.

From the man, he looked up again at the dogs. There was something in their sphinx-like attitude, in the moveless reaching of their muzzles out into the wonderful starlet mystery of the still night, that filled him with an indefinable sense of awe. Then there came to his ears the sound that had stopped Cosset, a low, moaning, wine which seemed to have neither beginning nor end, but which was borne in on his senses, as though were a part of the soft movement of the air he breathed.

A note of infinite sadness, which held him startled and without movement, as it held Jean-Coiset. And just as he thought that the thing had died away, the wailing came again, rising higher and higher, until at last there rose over him a single long howl that chilled the blood to its very marrow.

It was like the wolf-howl of that first night he had looked on the wilderness, and yet unlike it. In the first it had been the cry of the savage, of hunger, of the unending desolation of life that had thrilled him. In this it was death. He stood shivering as Casse came down to him, his thin face shining white in the starlight. There was no other sound, save the excited beating of life in their own bodies when Jean spoke. monsieur our dogs howl like that only when someone is dead or about to die he whispered it was wunga who gave the cry he has lived for eleven years and i have never known him to fail there was an uneasy gleam in his eyes i must tie your hands monsieur but i have given you my word jean your hands monsieur your hands monsieur there is already death below us in the plain or it is to come very soon i must tie your hands howland thrust his wrists behind him and about them jean twisted a thong of babiche

i believe i understand he spoke softly listening again for the chilling wail from the mountain top you are afraid that i will kill you it is a warning monsieur you might try but i should probably kill you as it is he shrugged his shoulders as he led the way down the ridge as it is there is small chance of jean quose answering the call may those saints of yours preserve me jean but this is all very cheerful grunted howland half laughing in spite of himself now that i'm tied up again who the devil is there to die but me that is a hard question monsieur replied the half-breed with grim seriousness perhaps it is your turn i half believe that it is scarcely were the words out of his mouth when there came again the moaning howl from the top of the ridge you're getting on my nerves jean you and that accursed dog silence monsieur out of the grim loneliness at the foot of the mountain there loomed a shadow which at first howland took to be a huge mass of rock a few steps farther and he saw that it was a building croisset gripped him firm by the arm. Stay here, he commanded.

I will return soon. For a quarter of an hour, Howland waited. Twice in that interval, the dog howled above him. He was glad when Clausey appeared out of the gloom. It is as I thought, monsieur. There is death down here. Come with me. The shadow of the big building shrouded them as they approached.

howland could make out that it was built of massive logs and that there seemed to be neither door nor window on their side and yet when jean hesitated for an instant before a blotch of gloom that was deeper than the others he knew that they had come to an entrance coasse advanced softly sniffing the air suspiciously with his thin nostrils and listening with howland so close to him that their shoulders touched from the top of the mountain there came again the mournful death-song of old wunga and jean shivered howland stared into the blotch of gloom and still staring he followed coce entered and disappeared in it about them was the stillness and the damp smell of desertion there was no visible sign of life no breathing no movement but their own and yet howland could feel the half-breed's hand clutch him nervously by the arm as they went step by step into the black and silent mystery of the place soon there came a fumbling of cuisse's hand at a latch and they passed through a second door then jean struck a match half a dozen steps away was a table and on the table a lamp quesset lighted it and with a quiet laugh faced the engineer they were in a low dungeon-like chamber without a window and with but the one door through which they had entered the table two chairs a stove and a bunk built against one of the log walls were all that howland could see

but it was not the barrenness of what he imagined was to be his new prison that held his eyes in staring inquiry on croisset it was the look in his companion's face the yellow pallor of fear a horror that had taken possession of it the half-breed closed and bolted the door and then sat down beside the table his thin face peering up through the sickly lamp glow at the engineer monsieur it would be hard for you to guess where you are howland waited if you had lived in this country long monsieur you would have heard of la meson de mor rouge the house of the red death as you would call it that is where we are in the dungeon room it is a hudson bay post abandoned almost since i can remember when i was a child the smallpox plague came this way and killed all the people. Nineteen years ago the red plague came again, and not one lived through it in this post de mort rouge. Since then it has been left to the weasels and the owls. It is shunned by every living soul between the Athabasca and the bay. That is why you are safe here. Ye gods, breathed Howland. Is there a

Anything more, Quosier? Safe from what, man? Safe from what? From those who wish to kill you, monsieur? You would not go into the south, so La Belle Melisse has compelled you to go into the north. Comprehane you? For a moment, Howland sat as if stunned.

Do you understand, monsieur? persisted Cosset, smiling. I think I do, replied Howland, tensely. You mean Melyse? Jean took the words from him. I mean that you would have died last night, monsieur, had it not been for Melis? You escaped from the coyote, but you would not have escaped from the other. That is all I can tell you.

But you will be safe here. Those who seek your life will soon believe that you are done. dead, and then we will let you go back. Is that not a kind fate for one who deserves to be cut into bits and fed to the ravens? You will tell me nothing more, Jean, the engineer asked. Nothing, except that while I would like to kill you, I have sympathy for you. That, perhaps, is because I once lived in the South. For six years I was with the company in Montreau.

all where i went to school he rose to his feet tying the flap of his caribou skin coat about his throat then he unbolted and opened the door faintly there came to them as if from a great distance the wailing grief of wunga the dog you said there was death here whispered howland leaning close to his shoulder there is one who has lived here since the last plague replied Clause, under his breath. He lost his wife and children, and it drove him mad. That is why we came down so quietly. He lived in a little cabin out there in the edge of the clearing, and when I went to it to-night, there was a sapling over the house with a flag at the end of it.

When the plague comes to us, we hang out a red flag as a warning to others. That is one of our laws. The flag is blown to tatters by the winds. He is dead. Howland shuddered. Of the smallpox? Yes.

For a few moments they stood in silence. Then, Cosset added, You will remain here, monsieur, until I return. He went out, closing and barring the door from the other side, and Howland seated himself again in the chair. beside the table. Fifteen minutes later the half-breed returned, bearing with him a good-sized pack and a two-gallon jug. There is wood back of the stove, monsieur. Here is food and water for a week, and furs for your bed. Now I will cut those thongs about your wrists.

Do you mean to say you're going to leave me here alone in this wretched prison? cried Howland. mon dieu is it not better than a grave monsieur i will be back at the end of a week the door was partly open and for the last time there came to howland's ears the morning howl of the old dog on the mountain top almost threateningly he gripped croiss's arm jean if you don't come back what will happen he heard the half-breed chuckling you will die you will die monsieur pleasantly and taking your own time at it which is much better than dying over a case of dynamite but i will come back monsieur good-bye again the door was closed and bolted and the sound of cuisse's footsteps quickly died away beyond the log walls many minutes passed before howland thought of his pipe or a fire then shiveringly he went to seek the fuel which jean had told him was behind the stove the old bay stove was soon roaring with the fire which he built and as the soothing fumes of his pipe impregnated the damp air of the room he experienced a sensation of comfort which was in strange contrast to the exciting happenings of the past few days at last he was alone with nothing to do for a week but eat sleep and smoke he had plenty of tobacco and an inspection of the pack showed that croce had left him well stocked with food tilted back in a chair with his feet on the table he absorbed the cheerful heat from the stove sent up clouds of smoke

and wondered if the half-breed had already started back into the south what would mcdonald say when jack pine came in with the report that he had slipped to his death in the waterfall probably his first move would be to send the most powerful team on the wakusco in pursuit of greggson and thorn the departing engineers would be compelled to return and then he laughed aloud and began pacing back and forth across the rotted floor of his prison as he pictured the consternation of the two seniors and then a flush burned in his face and his eyes glowed as he thought of melisse in spite of himself she had saved him from his enemies and he blessed cuisse for having told him the meaning of this flight into the north once again she had betrayed him but this time it was to save his life and his heart leaped in joyous faith at this proof of her love for him he believed that he understood the whole scheme now even his enemies would think him dead they would leave the wakusco and after a time when it was safe for him to return he would be given his freedom with the passing of the hours gloomier thoughts shadowed these anticipations in some mysterious way melisse was closely associated with those who sought his life and if they disappeared she would disappear with them he was convinced of that and then could he find her again would she go into the south to civilization or deeper into the untravelled wildernesses of the north in answer to his question there flashed through his mind the words of jean

monsieur i know of a hundred men between athabasca and the bay who would kill you for what you have said yes she would go into the north somewhere in that vast desolation of which jean had spoken he would find her even though he spent half of his life in the search it was past midnight when he spread out the furs and undressed for bed he opened the stove door and from the bunk watched the faint flickerings of the dying firelight on the log walls as slumber closed his eyes he was conscious of a sound the faint hungerful wailing cry to which he had listened to that first night near prince albert it was a wolf and drowsily he wondered how he could hear the cry through the thick log walls of his prison the answer came to him the moment he opened his eyes hours later a bit of pale sunlight was falling into the room and he saw that it entered through a narrow aperture close up to the ceiling after he had prepared his breakfast he dragged the table under this aperture and by standing on it was enabled to peer through a hundred yards away was the black edge of the spruce and balsam forest between him and the forest half smothered in the deep snow was a cabin and he shuddered as he saw floating over it the little red signal of death of which quassay had told him the night before with the breaking of this day the hours seemed of interminable length for a time he amused himself by searching every corner and crevice of his prison-room but he found nothing of interest beyond what he had already discovered

he examined the door which cuisse had barred on him and gave up all hope of escape in that direction he could barely thrust his arm through the aperture that opened out on the plague-stricken cabin for the first time since the stirring beginning of his adventures at prince albert a sickening sense of his own impotency began to weigh on howland he was a prisoner penned up in a desolate room in the heart of a wilderness and he jack howland a man who had always taken pride in his physical prowess had allowed one man to place him there his blood began to boil as he thought of it now as he had time and silence in which to look back on what had happened he was enraged at the pictures that flashed one after another before him he had allowed himself to be used as nothing more than a pawn in a strange and mysterious game It was not through his efforts alone that he had been saved in the flight on the Saskatchewan Trail. Blindly he had walked into the trap at the coyote. Still more blindly, he had allowed himself to be led into the ambush at the Wachusco camp. And more like a child than a man, he had submitted himself to Jean-Coiset.

He stamped back and forth across the room, smoking viciously, and his face grisive. grew red with the thoughts that were stirring venom within him. He placed no weight on circumstances. In these moments he found no excuse for himself. In no situation had he displayed the white feather, at no time had he felt a thrill of fear. His courage and recklessness had terrified Melyse, had astonished Cuis.

And yet, what had he done? From the beginning, from the moment he found, first placed his foot in the Chinese cafe, his enemies had held the whip hand. He had been compelled to play a passive part. Up to the point of the ambush on the Wicosco Trail, he might have found some vindication for himself. But this experience with Jean Coase, it was enough to madden him now that he was alone to think about it. Why had he not taken advantage of Jean, as Jack and the Frenchman had taken advantage of him. He saw now what he might have done.

Somewhere, not very far back, the sledge carrying Melyse and Jackpine had turned into the unknown. They too were alone. Why had he not made Cosset a prisoner instead of allowing himself to be caged up like a weakling? He swore aloud as there dawned on him more and more a realization of the opportunity he had

lost. At the point of a gun, he could have forced Quasse to overtake the other sledge. He could have surprised Jack Pine, as they had surprised him on the trail. And then? He smiled, but there was no humor in the smile. He at least would have held the whip hand. And what would Melisse have done? He asked himself question after question, answering them quickly and decisively in the same breath. Melyse loved him. He would have staked his life on that. His blood leaped as he felt again the thrill of her kisses

when she had come to him as he lay bound and gagged beside the trail. She had taken his head in her arms, and through the grief of her face he had seen shining the light of a great love that had glorified it for all time for him. She loved him. and he had let her slip away from him had weakly surrendered himself at a moment when everything that he had dreamed of might have been within his grasp with jack pine and cuisse in his power he went no further was it too late to do these things now quesay would return with a sort of satisfaction it occurred to him that his actions had disarmed the frenchman of suspicion he believed that it would be easy to overcome cuisse to force him to follow in the trail of melisse and jack pine and that trail it would probably lead to the very stronghold of his enemies

but what of that he loaded his pipe again puffing out clouds of smoke until the room was thick with it that trail would take him to melisse wherever she was heretofore his enemies had come to him now he would go to them with cuisse in his power and with none of his enemies aware of his presence everything would be in his favor he laughed aloud as a sudden thrilling thought flashed into his mind as a last resort he would use jean as a decoy he foresaw how easy it would be to bring melisse to him to sequoise. His own presence would be like the dropping of a bomb at her feet. In that moment, when she saw what he was risking for her, that he was determined to possess her, would she not surrender to the pleading of his love? If not, he would do the other thing, that which had brought the joyous laugh to his lips. All was fair in war and love, and theirs was a game of love. Because of her love for him, Melyse had kidnapped him from his post of duty,

had sent him a prisoner to this deathhouse in the wilderness. Love had exculpated her. That same love would exculpate him. He would make her a prisoner, and Jean should drive them back to the Wachusco. Melyes herself had set the pace, and he would follow it. And what woman, if she loved a man, would not surrender after this in their sledge trip he would have her to himself for not only an hour or two but for days surely in that time he could win there would be pursuit perhaps he might have to fight but he was willing and a trifle anxious to fight he went to bed that night and dreamed of things that were to happen

a second day a third night and a third day came with each hour grew his anxiety for jean's return at times he was almost feverish to have the affair over with he was confident of the outcome and yet he did not fail to take the frenchman's true measurement he knew that jean was like live wire and steel as agile as a cat more than a match with himself in open fight despite his own superior weight and size he devised a dozen schemes for jean's undoing one was to leap on him while he was eating another to spring on him and choke him into partial insensibility as he knelt beside his pack or fed the fire a third to strike a blow from behind that would render him powerless but there was something in this last that was repugnant to him he remembered that jean had saved his life that in no instance had he given him physical pain he would watch for an opportunity take advantage of the frenchman as cuisse had taken advantage of him but he would not hurt him seriously it should be as fair a struggle as jean had offered him and with the handicap in his favor the best man would win. On the morning of the fourth day, Howland was awakened by a sound that came through the aperture in the wall. It was the sharp yelping bark of a dog, followed an instant later by the

sharper crack of a whip and a familiar voice. Jean-Coiset had returned. With a single leap he was out of his bunk. Half-dressed, he darted to the door and crouched there the muscles of his arms. tightening, his body tense with the gathering forces within him. The spur of the moment had driven him to quick decision. His opportunity would come when Jean-Quice passed through that door. End of Chapter 11. Recording by Roger Maline. Chapter 12 of the Danger Trail.

This Librevox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Roger Maline. The Danger Trail, by James Oliver Kerwood. Chapter 12 The Fight Beyond the door Howland heard Jean pause.

There followed a few moments silence as though the other were listening for sound within. Then there came a fumbling at the bar and the door swung inward. "'Bonjour, monsieur!' called Jean's cheerful voice as he stepped inside.

"'Is it possible you are not up with all this dog barking and his eyes had gone to the empty bunk despite his cheerful greeting howland saw that the frenchman's face was haggard and pale as he turned quickly toward him he observed no further than that but flung his whole weight on the unprepared cuisset and together they crashed to the floor there was scarce a struggle and jean lay still he was flat on his back his arms pinioned to his sides and bringing himself astride the frenchman's body so that each knee imprisoned an arm howland coolly began looping the babiche thongs that he had snatched from the table as he sprang to the door behind howland's back jean's leg shot suddenly upward in a quick choking clutch of steel-like muscle they gripped about his neck like powerful arms and in another instant he was twisted backward with a force that sent him half neck-broken to the opposite wall he staggered to his feet dazed for a moment and jean cuisse stood in the middle of the floor his caribou-skin coat thrown off his hands clenched his eyes darkening with a dangerous fire as quickly as it had come the fire died away and as he advanced slowly his shoulders hunched over his white teeth gleamed in a smile howland smiled back and advanced to meet him there was no humor no friendliness in the smiles both had seen that flash of teeth and deadly scintillation of eyes at other

times, both knew what it meant. "'I believe that I will kill you, monsieur,' said Jean softly. There was no excitement, no tremble of passion in his voice. "'I have been thinking that I ought to kill you. I almost made up my mind to kill you when I came back to this Maison de Moche Rouge. It is the justice of God that I kill you. the two men circled like beasts in a pit howland in the attitude of a boxer jean with his shoulders bent his arms slightly curved at his side the toes of his moccasined feet bearing his weight suddenly he launched himself at the other's throat in a flash howling stepped a little to one side and shot out a crashing blow that caught jean on the side of the head and sent him flat on his back

half stunned cuisset came to his feet it was the first time that he had ever come into contact with science he was puzzled his head rang and for a few moments he was dizzy he darted in again in his old quick cat-like way and received a blow that dazed him this time he kept his feet i am sure now that i am going to kill you monsieur he said as coolly as before there was something terribly calm and decisive in his voice he was not excited he was not afraid his fingers did not go near the weapon in his belt, and slowly the smile faded from Howland's lips as Jean circled about him. He had never fought a man of this kind, never had he looked on the appalling confidence that was in his antagonist's eyes. From those eyes, rather than from the man, he found himself slowly retreating. They followed him, never taking themselves from his face. In them, the fire returned and grew deeper. Two dull red spots began to glow in Cosset's cheeks,

and he laughed softly when he suddenly leaped in so that Howland struck at him and missed. He knew what to expect now, and Howland knew what to expect. It was the science of one world pitted against that of another, the science of civilization against that of the wilderness. Howland was trained in his art. For sport, Jean had played with wounded links. His was the quickness of sight, of instinct, the quickness of the great North loon that had often played the same game with his rifle fire,

of the sledge dog whose ripping fangs carried death so quickly that eyes could not follow. A third and a fourth time he came within distance, and Howland struck and missed. i am going to kill you he said again to this point howland had remained cool self-possession in his science he knew to be half the battle but he felt in him now a slow swelling anger the smiling flash in jean's eyes began to irritate him the fearless taunting gleam of his teeth his audacious confidence put him on edge twice again he struck out swiftly but jean had come and gone like a dart his lithe body fifty pounds lighter than howland's seemed to be that of a boy dodging him in some tantalizing sport the frenchman made no effort at attack his were the tactics of the wolf at the heels of the bull moose of the lynx before the prongs of a cornered buck tiring worrying worrying ceaseless howland's striking muscles began to ache and his breath was growing shorter with the exertions which seemed to have no effect on for a few moments he took the aggressive rushing jean to the stove behind the table twice around the room striving vainly to drive him into a corner to reach him with one of the sweeping blows which quesay evaded with the lightning quickness of a hell-diver

when he stopped his breath came in wind-broken gasps jean drew nearer smiling ferociously cool i am going to kill you monsieur he repeated again howland dropped his arms his fingers relaxed and he forced his breath between his lips as if he were on the point of exhaustion there were still a few tricks in his science and these he knew were about his last cards. He backed into a corner, and Jean followed, his eyes flashing a steely light, his body growing more and more tense. Now, monsieur, I am going to kill you, he said in the same low voice.

I am going to break your neck. Howland backed against the wall, partly turned as if fearing the other's attack, and yet without strength to repel it. there was a contemptuous smile on cuisse's lips as he poised himself for an instant then he leaped in and as his fingers gripped at the other's throat howland's right arm shot upward in a deadly short-arm punch that caught his antagonist under the jaw without a sound jean staggered back tottered for a moment on his feet and fell to the floor fifty seconds later he opened his arm eyes to find his hands bound behind his back and Howland standing at his feet. "'Mondieu, but that was a good one,' he gasped, after he had taken a long breath or two.

"'Will you teach it to me, monsieur?' "'Get up,' commanded Howland. "'I have no time to waste, Corsay.' He caught the Frenchman by the shoulders and helped him to a chair near the table. then he took possession of the other's weapons including the revolver which jean had taken from him and began to dress he spoke no word until he was done do you understand what is going to happen quasse he cried then his eyes blazing hotly do you understand that what you have done will put you behind prison bars for ten years or more does it dawn on you that i'm going to take you back to the authorities and that as soon as we reach the wakusco i'll have twenty men back on the trail of these friends of yours a gray pallor spread itself over jean's thin face the great god monsieur you cannot do that cannot howland's fingers dug into the edge of the table

by this great god of yours qua se but i will and why not is it because melisse is among this gang of cut-throats and murderers pish my dear jean you must be a fool they tried to kill me on the trail tried it again in the coyote and you came back here determined to kill me you've held the whip hand from the first now it's mine i swear that if i take you back to the wakusco we'll get you all if monsieur yes if and that if jean was straining again against the table. It rests with you, Cossé. I will bargain with you. Either I shall take you back to the Waucusco, hand you over to the authorities, and send a force after the others, or you shall take me to Malesce. Which shall it be? And if I take you to Males, monsieur? Howland straightened, his voice trembling a little with excitement. If you take me to Melyse and swear to do as I say, I shall bring no harm to you or your friends. And Melyse? Jean's eyes darkened again.

You will not harm her, monsieur? Harm her! There was a laughing tremor in Howland's voice. Good God, man, are you so blind that you can't see that I am doing this because of her? I tell you that I love her, and that I am willing to die in fighting for her. Until now I haven't had the chance. You and your friends have played a cowardly underhand game, Quasse. You have taken me from behind at every move,

and now it's up to you to square yourself a little, or there's going to be hell to pay. Understand? You take me to my lease, or there'll be a clean-up that will pull-up that will put you in the whole bunch out of business. Harm her! Again, Howland laughed, leaning his white face toward Jean.

Come, which shall it be, Quasse? A cold glitter, like the snap of sparks from striking steels, shot from the Frenchman's eyes. The grayish pallor went from his face. His teeth gleamed in the enigmatic smile that had half-unded howland in the ferns. fight you are mistaken in some things monsieur he said quietly until to-day i have fought for you and not against you but now you have left me but one choice i will take you to melisse and that means good cried howland

la la monsieur not so good as you think it means that as surely as the dogs carry us there you will never come back mon dieu your death is certain howland turned briskly to the stove hungry jean he asked more companionably let's not quarrel man you've had your fun and now i'm going to have mine have you had breakfast i was anticipating that pleasure with you monsieur replied jean with grim humor and then after i had fed you you were going to kill me my dear jean laughed howland flopping a huge caribou steak on the naked top of the sheet-iron stove. Real nice fellow you are, huh? You ought to be killed, monsieur. So you've said before. When I see Melyse, I'm going to know the reason why, or...

Or what, monsieur? Kill you, Jean. I've just about made up my mind that you ought to be killed. If anyone dies up here where we're going, Quas say, it will be you, first of all. Jean remained silent. A few minutes later, Howland brought the caribou steak, a dish of flour cakes, and a big pot of coffee to the table. Then he went behind Jean and untied his hands.

When he sat down at his own side of the table, he cocked his revolver and placed it beside his tin plate. Jean grimaced and shrugged his shoulders. "'It means business,' said his captor, warningly. "'If at any time I think you deserve it, I shall shoot you in your tracks, Quasse, so don't arouse my suspicions.' "'I took your word of honor,' said Jean sarcastically. "'And I will take yours to an extent,' replied Howland, pouring the coffee. Suddenly he picked up the revolver.

You never saw me shoot, did you? See that cup over there? He pointed to a small tin pack cup, hanging to a nail on the wall, a dozen paces from them. Three times without missing, he drove bullets through it and smiled across the Quassay.

I am going to give you the use of your arms and legs, except at night, he said. mon dieu it is safe grunted jean i give you my word that i will be good monsieur the sun was up when cuisse led the way outside his dogs and sledge were a hundred yards from the building and howland's first move was to take possession of the frenchman's rifle and eject the cartridges while jean tossed chunks of caribou flesh to the huskies when they were ready to start jean turned slowly and half reached out a mittened hand to the engineer monsieur he said softly i cannot help liking you though i know that i should have killed you long ago i tell you again that if you go into the north there is only one chance in a hundred that you will come back alive great god monsieur up where you wish to go the very trees will fall on you and the carrion ravens pick out your eyes and that chance that one chance in a hundred monsieur i will take interrupted howland decisively i was going to say monsieur finished jean quietly that unless accident has befallen those who left warkisco yesterday

that one chance is gone if you go south you are safe if you go into the north you are no better than a dead man there will at least be a little fun at the finish laughed the young engineer come jean hit up the dogs mon dieu i say you are a fool and a brave man said cuisse and his whip twisted sinuously in mid-air and crack in sharp command over the yellow backs of the huskies. End of Chapter 12. Recording by Roger Maline. Chapter 13 of the Danger Trail. This Libervox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Roger Maline.

The Danger Trail by James Oliver Kerrwood. Chapter 13. The Pursuit. behind the sledge ran howland to the right of the team ran jean once or twice when cuisse glanced back his eyes met those of the engineer he cracked his whip and smiled and howland's teeth gleamed back coldly in reply a mutual understanding flashed between them in these glances in a sudden spurt howland knew that the frenchman could quickly put distance between them but not a doubt a doubt that the frenchman could quickly put distance between them but not a distance that his bullets could not cover in the space of a breath he had made up his mind to fire deliberately and with his greatest skill if coce made the slightest movement toward escape if he was compelled to kill or wound his companion he could still go on alone with the dogs for the trail of melisse and jack pine would be as plain as their own which they were following back into the south for the second time since coming into the north he felt the blood leaping through his veins as on that first night in prince albert when from the mountain he had heard the lone wolf and when later he had seen the beautiful face through the hotel window howland was one of the few men who possess unbounded confidence in themselves who place a certain pride in their physical as well as their mental capabilities and he was confident now

his successful and indomitable fight over obstacles in a big city had made this confidence a genuine part of his being it was a confidence that flushed his face with joyous enthusiasm as he ran after the dogs and that astonished and puzzled jean mon dieu but you are a strange man exclaimed the frenchman when he brought the dogs down to a walk after a half-mile run blessed saints monsieur you are laughing and i swear it is no laughing matter shouldn't a man be happy when he is going to his wedding jean puffed howland gasping to get back the breath he had lost but not when he is going to his funeral monsieur if i were one of your blessed saints i'd hit you over the head with a thunderbolt coessay good lord what sort of a heart have you got inside of your jacket man up there where we're going is the sweetest little girl in the whole world i love her she loves me why shouldn't i be happy now that i know i'm going to see her again very soon and take her back into the south with me the devil grunted jean perhaps you're jealous coerce suggested howland great scott i hadn't thought of that i've got one of my own to love monsieur and i wouldn't trade her for all else in the world damned if i can understand you swore the engineer you appear to be half human you say you're in love and yet you'd rather risk your life than help out milise and me what the deuce does it mean that's what i'm doing monsieur helping melisse i would have done her a greater service if i had killed you back there in the trail and strip your body for those things that would be foul enough to eat it

i have told you a dozen times that it is god's justice that you die and you are going to die very soon monsieur no i'm not going to die jean i'm going to see melisse and she's going back into the south with me and if you're real good you may have the pleasure of driving us back to the warkusco qua se and you can be my best man at the wedding what do you say to that that you are mad or a fool retorted jean cracking his whip viciously the dog swung sharply from the trail heading from their southerly course into the north-west we will save a day by doing this explained cuisse at the other sharp word of inquiry we will hit the other trail twenty miles west of here while by following back to where they turned we would travel sixty miles to reach the same point. That one chance in a hundred which you have depends on this, monsieur. If the other sledge has passed... He shrugged his shoulders and started the dogs into a trot.

"'Look here!' cried Howland, running beside him. "'Who is with this other sledge?' "'Those who tried to kill you on the trail, "'and at the coyote, monsieur,' he answered quickly. howland fell half a dozen paces behind by the end of the first hour he was compelled to rest frequently by taking to the sledge and their progress was much slower jean no longer made answer to his occasional questions doggedly he swung on ahead to the right and a little behind the team leader and howland could see that for some reason quasset was as anxious as himself to make the best time possible his own impatience increased as the morning lengthened jean's assurance that the mysterious enemies who had twice attempted his life were only a short distance behind them or a short distance ahead set a new and desperate idea at work in his brain he was confident that these men from the wakusco were his chief menace and that with them once out of the way and with the frenchman in his power the fight which he was carrying was carrying

into the enemy's country would be half one. There would be then no one to recognize him but Melyse. His heart leaped with joyous hope, and he leaned forward on the sledge to examine Cosset's empty gun. It was an automatic, and Cosset, glancing back over the loping backs of the huskies, caught him smiling. He ran more frequently now, and longer distances, and with the passing of each mile his determination to strike a decisive blow increased if they reached the trail of melisse and jack pine before the crossing of the second sledge he would lay in wait for his old enemies if they had preceded them he would pursue and surprise them in camp in either case he would possess an overwhelming advantage with the same calculating attention to detail that he would have shown in the arrangement of plans for the building of a tunnel or a bridge, he drew a mental map of his scheme and its possibilities. There would be at least two men with the sledge, and possibly three.

If they surrendered at the point of his rifle, without a fight, he would compel Jean to tie them up with dog traces while he held them under cover. If they made a move to offer resistance, he would shoot. With the automatic, he could kill or wound the thwart. three before they could reach their rifles, which would undoubtedly be on the sledge. The situation had now reached a point where he no longer took into consideration what these men might be to Malesce. As they continued into the northwest, Howland noted that the thicker forest was gradually clearing into wide areas of small banshan pine, and that the rock ridges and dense swamps which had impeded their progress were becoming less numerous.

An hour before noon, after a tedious climb to the top of a frozen ridge, Quasse pointed down into a vast level plain lying between them and other great ridges far to the north. That is a bit of the barren lands that creeps down between those mountains off there, monsieur, he said. Do you see that black forest that looks like, like a charred log in the snow to the south and west of the mountains? That is the break that leads into the country of the Athabasca. Somewhere between this point and that, we will strike the trail. Mordieu, I had half expected to see them out there on the plain. Who? May lise and Jack Pine,

or—no, the others, monsieur. Shall we have dinner here? not until we hit the trail replied howland i'm anxious to know about that one chance in a hundred you've given me hope of quessay if they have passed if they are ahead of us you might just as well stand out there and let me put a bullet through you monsieur he went to the head of the dogs guiding them down the rough side of the ridge while howland steadied the toboggan from behind for three-quarters of an hour they traversed the low bush of the plain and silence from every rising snow hummock jean scanned the white desolation about them and each time as nothing that was human came within his vision he turned toward the engineer with a sinister shrug of his shoulders once three moving caribou a mile or more away brought a quick cry to his lips and howland noticed that a sudden flash of excitement came into his own his face, replaced in the next instant by a look of disappointment. After this, he maintained a more careful guard over the Frenchman. They had covered less than half of the distance to the Caribou Trail,

when, in a small open space free of bush, Quaset's voice rose sharply, and the team stopped. "'What do you think of it, monsieur?' he cried, pointing to the snow. "'What do you think of that?' barely cutting into the edge of the open was the broken crust of two sledge trails for a moment howland forgot his caution and bent over to examine the trails with his back to his companion when he looked up there was a curious laughing gleam in jean's eyes mon dieu but you are careless he exclaimed be more careful monsieur i may give myself up to another temptation like that the deuce you say cried howland springing back quickly i'm much obliged jean if it wasn't for the moral effect of the thing i'd shake hands with you on that? How far ahead of us do you suppose they are? Quasse had fallen on his knees in the trail. The crust is freshly broken, he said after a moment. They have been gone not less than two or three

hours, perhaps since morning. See this white glistening surface over the first trail, monsieur, like a billion needle points growing out of it? That is the work of three or four days cold, the first sledge passed that long ago howland turned and picked up cuisse's rifle the frenchman watched him as he slipped a clip full of cartridges into the breach if there's a snack of cold stuff in the pack dig it out he commanded we'll eat on the run if you've got anything to eat if you haven't we'll go hungry we're going to overtake that sledge sometime this afternoon or to-night or bust. "'The saints be blessed, then we are most certain to bust, monsieur,' gasped John. "'And if we don't, the dogs will—' "'No, it is impossible.' "'Is there anything to eat?'

"'A morsel of cold meat, that is all. "'But I say that it is impossible. That sledge—' Howland interrupted him with an impatient gesture. and i say that if there is anything to eat in there get it out and be quick about it quase we're going to overtake those precious friends of yours and i warn you that if you make any attempt to lose time something unpleasant is going to happen understand jean had bent to unstrap one end of the sledge pack and an angry flash leaped into his eyes at the threatening tone of the engineer's voice for a moment he seemed on the point of speech but caught himself and in silence divided the small chunk of meat which he drew from the pack giving the larger share to howland as he went to the head of the dogs only once or twice during the next hour did he look back and after each of these glances he redoubled his efforts at urging on the huskies before they had come to the edge of the black banschen forest which jean had pointed out from the farther side of the plain howland saw that the pace was telling on the team

the leader was trailing lame and now and then the whole pack would settle back in their traces to be urged on again by the fierce cracking of cuisset's long whip to add to his own discomfiture howland found that he could no longer keep up with jean and the dogs and with his weight added to the sledge the huskies settled down into a tugging walk thus they came into the deep low forest and jean apparently oblivious of the exhaustion of both man and dogs walked now in advance of the team his eyes constantly on the thin trail ahead howland could not fail to see that his unnecessary threat of a few hours before still rankled in the frenchman's mind and several times he made an effort to break the other's taciturnity but jean strode on in moody silence answering only those things which were put to him directly and speaking not an unnecessary word at last the engineer jumped from the sledge and overtook his companion hold on jean he cried i've got enough you're right and i want to apologize we're busted that is the dogs and i are busted and we might as well give it up until we've had a feed what do you say i say that you have stopped just in time monsieur replied quesse with purring softness another half-hour and we would have been through the forest and just beyond that in the edge of the plain are those whom you seek melisse and her people that is what i started to tell you back there when you shut me up mon dieu if it were not for melisse i would let you go on

and then what would happen then monsieur if you made your visit to them in broad day listen jean lifted a warning hand faintly there came to them through the forest the distant baying of a hound that is one of our dogs from the mackenzie country he went on softly an insinuating triumph in his low voice now monsieur that i have brought you here what are you going to do shall we go on and take dinner with those who are going to kill you or will you wait a few hours eh which shall it be for a moment howland stood motionless stunned by the frenchman's words quickly he recovered himself his eyes burned with a metallic gleam as they met the half taunt in cuiss's cool smile if i had not stopped you we would have gone on he questioned tensely to be sure monsieur retorted cuisse still smiling you warned me to lose no time that something would happen if i did with a quick movement howland drew his revolver and levelled it at the frenchman's heart if you ever prayed to those blessed saints of yours do it now jean I'm going to kill you, he cried fiercely. End of Chapter 13.

Recording by Roger Maline. Chapter 14 of the Danger Trail. This Libervox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Roger Maline. The Danger Trail by James Oliver Kerrwood. Chapter 14. The gleam of the light. In a single breath. the face of jean cuisse became no more than a mask of what it had been the taunting smile left his lips and a gray pallor spread over his face as he saw howland's finger crooked firmly on the trigger of his revolver

in another instant there came the sound of a metallic snap damnation an empty cartridge howland exclaimed i forgot to load after those three shots at the cup it's coming this time jean purposely he snapped the second empty cartridge the great god gasped jean monsieur from deep in the forest came again the baying of the mackenzie hound this time it was much nearer and for a moment howland's eyes left the frenchman's terrified face as he turned his head to listen they are coming exclaimed monsieur i swear to again howland's pistol covered his heart then it is even more necessary that i kill you he said with frightful calmness i warned you that i would kill you if you led me into a trap the dogs are bushed there is no way out of this but to fight if there are people coming down the trail listen to that this time from still nearer came the shout of a man and and then of another, followed by the husky's sharp yelping as they started afresh on the trail. The flush of excitement that had come into Howland's face paled until he stood as white as the Frenchman. But it was not the whiteness of fear. His eyes were like blue steel flashing in the sunlight.

There is nothing to do but fight, he repeated even more calmly than before. If we were a mile or two back there, it could all happen as I planned it, but here— "'They will hear the shots,' cried Jean. "'The post is no more than a gunshot beyond the forest, "'and there are plenty there who would come out to see what it means. "'Quick, monsieur, follow me. "'Possibly they are hunters going out to the trap-lines. "'If it comes to the worst—'

"'What then?' demanded Howland. you can shoot me a little later temporized the frenchman with a show of his old coolness mon dieu i am afraid of that gun monsieur i will get you out of this if i can will you give me the chance or will you shoot i will shoot if you fail replied the engineer barely were the words out of his mouth when cuisset sprang to the head of the dogs seized the leader by his neck trace and half dragged the team and sledge through the thick bush that edged the trail a dozen paces farther on the dense scrub opened into the clearer run of the low-hanging bansion through which jean started at a slow trot with howland a yard behind him and the huskies following with human-like cleverness in the sinuous twistings of the trail which the frenchman marked out for them they had progressed not more than three hundred yards when there came to them for a third time the hallooing of a voice with a sharp hop hop and a low crack of his whip jean stopped the dogs the virgin be praised but that is luck he exclaimed they have turned off into another trail to the east monsieur if they had come on to that break in the bush where we dragged the sledge through he shrugged his shoulders with a gasp of relief sacre they would not be fools enough to pass it without wondering howland had broken the breach of his revolver and was replacing the three empty cartridges with fresh ones there will be no mistake next time he said holding out the weapon

you were as near your death a few moments ago as ever before in your life quassay and now for a little plain understanding between us until we stopped out there i had some faith in you now i have none i regard you as my worst enemy and though you are deuced near to your friends i tell you that you are never in a tighter box in your life if i fail in my mission here you shall die if others come along that trail before dark and run us down i will kill you unless you make it possible for me to see and talk with melisse i will kill you your life hangs on my success with my failure your death is as certain as the coming of night i am going to put a bullet through you at the slightest suspicion of treachery under the circumstances what do you propose to do? I am glad that you changed your mind, monsieur, and I will not tempt you again. I will do the best that I can, said Jean.

Through a narrow break in the tops of the banshan pines, a few feathery flakes of snow were falling, and Jean lifted his eyes to the slit of gray sky above them. Within an hour it will be snowing heavily, he affirmed. If they do it. not run across our trail by that time, monsieur, we shall be safe. He led the way through the forest again, more slowly and with greater caution than before, and whenever he looked over his shoulder, he caught the dull gleam of Howland's revolver,

as it pointed at the hollow of his back. "'The devil, but you make me uncomfortable,' he protested. "'The hammer is up, too, monsieur.' yes it is up said howland grimly and it never leaves your back quessay if the gun should go off accidentally it would bore a hole clean through you half an hour later the frenchman halted where the banctions climbed the side of a sloping ridge if you could trust me i would ask to go on ahead whispered jean this ridge this ridge shuts in the plain monsieur and just over the top of it is an old cabin which has been abandoned for many years there is not one chance in a thousand of there being any one there though it is a good fox ridge at this season from it you may see the light and may lease his window at night he did not stop to watch the effect of his last words but began picking his way up the ridge with the dogs tugging at his heels at the top he swung sharply between two huge masses of snow-covered rock and in the lee of the largest of these almost entirely sheltered from the drifts piled up by easterly winds they came suddenly on a small log hut

about it there were no signs of life with unusual eagerness jean scanned the surface of the snow and when he saw that there was trail of neither man nor beast in the unbroken crust a look of relief came into his face mon dieu so far i have saved my hide he grinned now monsieur look for yourself and see if jean quose has not kept his word a dozen steps had taken him through a screen of shrub to the opposite slope of the ridge with outstretched arm he pointed down into the plain and as howland's eyes followed its direction he stood throbbing with sudden excitement less than a quarter of a mile away sheltered in a dip of the plain were three or four log buildings rising black and desolate out of the white waist one of these buildings was a large structure similar to that in which howland had been imprisoned and as he looked a team and sledge appeared from behind one of the cabins and halted close to the wall of the large building the driver was plainly visible and to howland's astonishment he suddenly began to ascend the side of this wall for the moment howland had not thought of a stair jean's attitude drew his eyes the frenchman had thrust himself half out of the screening bushes and was staring through the telescope of his hands with an exclamation he turned quickly to the engineer look monsieur do you see that man climbing the stair i don't mind telling you that he is the one who hit you over the head on the trail and also one of those who shut you up in the coyote

those are his quarters at the post and possibly he is going up to see melisse if you were much of a shot you could settle a score or two from here monsieur the figure had stopped evidently on a platform midway up the side of the building he stood for a moment as if scanning the plane between him and the mountain then disappeared howland had not spoken a word but every nerve in his body tingled strangely you say melisse is there he questioned hesitatingly and he who is that man jean shrugged his shoulders and drew himself back into the bush turning leisurely toward the old cabin no monsieur i will not tell you that he protested i have brought you to this place i have pointed out to you the stair that leads to the room where you will find melisse you may cut me into ribbons for the ravens but i will tell you no more again the threatening fire leaped into howland's eyes i will trouble you to put your hands behind your back quace he commanded i am going to return a certain compliment of yours by tying your hands to tieing your hands to you to put your hands behind your back quace he commanded i am going to return a certain compliment of yours by tying your hands with this piece of babiche which you used on me after that and after that monsieur urged jean with a touch of that old taunt in his voice and stopping with his back to the engineer and his hands behind him after that

you will tell me all that i want to know finished howland tightening the thong about his wrists he led the way then to the cabin the door was closed but opened readily as he put his weight against it the single room was lighted by a window through which a mass of snow had drifted and contained nothing more than a rude table built against one of the log walls three supply boxes that had evidently been employed as stools and a cracked and rust-eaten sheet-iron stove that had from all appearances long passed into disuse. He motioned the Frenchman to a seat at one end of the table. Without a word, he then went outside, securely toggled the leading dog, and returning, closed the door, and seated himself at the end of the table opposite Jean. The light from the open window fell full on Casse's dark face and shone in a silvery streak along the top of Howland's revolver, as the muscle of it rested casually on a line with the other's breast.

There was a menacing click as the engineer drew back the hammer. Now, my dear Jean, we're ready to begin the real game, he explained. Here we are, high and dry, and down there, just far enough away to be out of hearing of this revolver when I shoot, are those we're going to play against. So far, I've been completely in the dark, I know of no reason why I shouldn't go down there openly and be welcomed and given a good supper. And yet, at the same time, I know that my life wouldn't be worth a tinker's dam if I did go down.

You can clear up the whole business, and that's what you're going to do. When I understand why I am scheduled to be murdered on sight, I won't be handicapped as I now am. So, go ahead and speed. If you don't, I'll blow your head off." Jean sat unflinching, his lips drawn tightly, his head set square and defiant. "'You may shoot, monsieur,' he said quietly. "'I have sworn on a cross of the Virgin to tell you no more than I have. You could not torture me into revealing what you ask.'

slowly howland raised his revolver once more cuisse will you tell me no monsieur a deafening explosion filled the little cabin from the lobe of jean's ear there ran a red trickle of blood his face had gone deathly pale but even as the bullet had stung him within an inch of his brain he had not flinched will you tell me quace this time the black pit of the engineer's revolver centered squarely between the frenchman's eyes no monsieur the eyes of the two men met over the blue steel with a cry howland slowly lowered his weapon good god but you're a brave man jean quose he cried i'd sooner kill a dozen men that i know than you he rose to his feet and went to the door there was still but little snow in the air to the north the horizon was growing black with the early approach of the northern night with a nervous laugh he returned to Jean. "'Duce take it if I don't feel like apologizing to you,' he exclaimed. "'Does your ear hurt?'

"'No more than if I had scratched it with a thorn,' returned Jean politely. "'You are good with the pistol, monsieur. I would not profit by killing you, just now,' mused Howland, seating himself again on the box, and resting his chin in the palm of his hand as he looked across at the other. But that's a pretty good intimation that I'm desperate and mean business, Quasse. We won't quarrel about the things I've asked you.

What I'm here for is to see Melyse. Now, how is that to happen? For the life of me, I don't know, replied Jean, as calmly as though a bullet had not nipped the edge of his ear a moment before. there is only one way i can see monsieur and that is to wait and watch from this mountain top until melisse drives out her dogs she has her own team and in ordinary seasons frequently goes out alone or with one of the women at the post mon dieu she has had enough sledge riding of late and i doubt if she will find pleasure in her dogs for a long time i had planned to use you said howland but i've lost faith in you honestly coasse i believe you would stick me in the back almost as quickly as those murderers down there not in the back monsieur smiled the frenchman unmoved i have had opportunities to do that no since that fight back there i do not believe that i want to kill you

but i would be a fool to trust you isn't that so not if i gave you my word that is something we do not break up here as you do down among the wakrisco people and farther south but you murder people for pastime eh my dear jean quoseph shrugged his shoulders without speaking see here quase said howland with sudden earnestness i'm almost tempted to take a chance with you will you go down to the post to-night in some way gain access to me lease and give her a message from me and the message what would it be it would bring me lease up to this cabin to-night are you sure monsieur i am certain that it would will you go no monsieur the devil take you cried howland angrily if i was not certain that i would need you later i'd garret you where you sit he rose and went to the old stove it was still capable of holding fire and as it had grown too dark outside for the smoke to be observed from the post he proceeded to prepare a supper of hot coffee and meat jean watched him in silence and not until food and food and drink were on the table, did the engineer himself break silence. "'Of course, I'm not going to feed you,' he said curtly,

"'so I'll have to free your hands. But be careful!' He placed his revolver on the table beside him, after he had freed Cuisay. "'I might assassinate you with a fork,' chuckled the Frenchman softly, his black eyes laughing over his coffee cup. I drink your health, monsieur, and wish you happiness. You lie, snapped Howland. Jean lowered the cup without drinking. Is the truth, monsieur, he insisted.

Since that beautiful fight back there, I cannot help but wish you happiness. I drink also to the happiness of Melyse, also to the happiness of those who tried to kill you, you on the trail and at the coyote. But, mon dieu, how is it all to come? Those at the post are happy because they believe that you are dead. You will not be happy until they are dead.

And Melisse, how will all this bring happiness to her? I tell you that I am as deep in trouble as you, Monsieur Howland. May the Virgin strike me dead if I'm not. he drank his eyes darkening gloomily in that moment there flashed into howland's mind a memory of the battle that jean had fought for him on the great north trail you nearly killed one of em that night at prince albert he said slowly i can't understand why you fought for me then and won't help me now but you did and you're afraid to go down there until i have re-grown a-i grown beard interrupted jean with a low chuckling laugh you would not be the only one to die if they saw me again like this but that is enough monsieur i will say no more i really don't want to make you uncomfortable jean howland apologized as he secured the frenchman's hands again after they had satisfied their hearty appetites but unless you swear by your virgin or something else that you will make you make no attempt to call assistance, I shall have to gag you. What do you say?

I will make no outcry, monsieur. I give you my word for that. With another length of Babiche, Howland tied his companion's legs. I'm going to investigate a little, he explained. I am not afraid of your voice, for if you begin to shout, I will hear you first. But with your legs free, you'll might take it into your head to run away. Would you mind spreading a blanket on the floor, monsieur? If you are gone long, this box will grow hard and sharp.

A few minutes later, after he had made his prisoner as comfortable as possible in the cabin, Howland went again through the fringe of scrub bush to the edge of the ridge. Below him, the plane was lost in the gloom of night. He could see nothing of the buildings at the post, but two or three lights gleaming faintly through the darkness. Overhead there were no stars.

Thickening snow shut out what illumination there might have been in the north, and even as he stood looking into the desolation to the west, the snow fell faster, and the lights grew fainter and fainter until all was a chaos of blackness. In these moments a desire that was almost madness, swept over him. Since his fight with Jean, the swift passing of events had confined his thoughts to their one objective, the finding of Melisse and her people. He had assured himself that his every move was to be a cool and calculating one, that nothing, not even his great love, should urge him beyond that reason which had made him a master-builder among men, as he stood with the

snow falling heavily on him, he knew that his trail would be covered before another day, that for an indefinite period he might safely wait and watch for Malesse on the mountain top, and yet slowly he made his way down the side of the ridge. A little way out there in the gloom, barely beyond the call of his voice, was the girl for whom he was willing to sacrifice all that he had ever achieved in life. With each step the desire in him grew, the impulse to bring himself nearer to her, to steal across the plain,

to approach in the silent smother of the storm until he could look on the light which Jean-Coiset had told him would gleam from her window. He descended to the foot of the ridge and headed into the plain, taking the caution to bury his feet deep in the snow that he might have a trick. to guide him back to the cabin.

At first he found himself impeded by low bush. Then the plane became more open, and he knew that there was nothing but the night and the snow to shut out his vision ahead. Still, he had no motive, no reason for what he did. The snow would cover his tracks before morning. There would be no harm done, and he might get a glimpse of the light.

of her light it came on his vision with the suddenness that set his heart leaping a dog barked ahead of him so near that he stopped in his tracks and then suddenly there shot through the snow gloom the bright gleam of a lamp before he had taken another breath he was aware of what had happened a curtain had been drawn aside in the chaos ahead he was almost on the wall of the wall of the wall of the post and the light gleamed from high up from the head of the stair for a space he stood still listening and watching there was no other light no other sound after the barking of the dog about him the snow fell with fluttering noiselessness and it filled him with a sensation of safety the sharpest eyes could not see him the keenest ears could not hear him and he advanced again until before him there rose out of the gloom a huge shadowy mass that was blacker than the night itself the one lighted window was plainly visible now its curtain two-thirds drawn and as he looked a shadow passed over it was it a woman's shadow the window darkened as the figure within came nearer to it and howland stood with clenched hands and wildly beating heart almost ready to call out softly a name a little nearer one more step and he would know he might throw a chunk of snow crust a cartridge from his belt and then the shadow disappeared dimly howland made out the snow-covered

stair, and he went to it and looked up. Ten feet above him, the light shone out. He looked into the gloom behind him, into the gloom out of which he had come. Nothing, nothing but the storm. Swiftly he mounted the stair. End of Chapter 14, recording by Roger Malin. Chapter 15 of the Danger Trail This Libravox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Roger Maline The Danger Trail by James Oliver Kerwood. Chapter 15 in the bedroom chamber.

Flattening himself closely against the black logs of the wall, Howland paused on the platform at the top of the stair. His groping hand touched the jam of a door, and he held his breath, when his fingers incautiously rattled, the steel of a latch. In another moment he passed on, three paces, four, along the platform, at last sinking on his knees in the snow, close under the window. His eyes searched the lighted room an inch at a time. He saw a section of wall at first, dimly illuminated. Then a small table near the window covered with books and magazines, and beside it a reclining chain. And beside it, a reclining

buried thick under a great white bare robe. On the table, but beyond his vision, was the lamp. He drew himself a few inches more through the snow, leaning still farther ahead, until he saw the foot of a white bed. A little more, and he stopped, his white face close to the window-pane. On the bed, facing him, sat Melisse.

Her chin was buried in the cup of her hands, and he noticed that she was in a dressing-gown and that her beautiful hair was loosed and flowing in glistening waves about her, as though she had just brushed it for the night. A movement, a slight shifting of her eyes, and she would have seen him. He was filled with an almost mastering impulse to press his face closer, to tap on the window, to draw her eyes to him. But even as his hand rose to do the bidding of that impulse,

something restrained him. slowly the girl lifted her head and he was thrilled to find that another impulse drew him back until his ghostly face was a part of the elusive snow-gloom he watched her as she turned from him and threw back the glory of her hair until it half hid her in a mass of copper and gold from his distance he still gazed at her choking and undecided while she gathered it in three heavy strands and plaited it into a shining braid for an instant his eyes wandered beyond her presence the room was empty he saw a door and observed that it opened into another room which in turn could be entered through the platform door behind him with his old exactness for detail he leaped to definite conclusion these were melisse's apartments at the post separated from all others and melisse was preparing to retire for the night if the outer door was not locked and he entered what danger could there be of interruption it was late the post was asleep he had seen no light but that in the window through which he was staring the thought was scarcely borne before he was at the platform door the latch clicked gently under his fingers cautiously he pushed the door inward and thrust in his head and shoulders the air inside was cold and frosty he reached out an arm to the right and his hand encountered the rough-hewn surface of a wall he advanced a step and reached out to the left there too his hand touched a wall

he was in a narrow corridor ahead of him there shone a thin ray of light from under the door that opened into melisse's room nerving himself for the last move he went boldly to the door knocked lightly to give some warning of his presence and entered melees was gone he closed the door behind him scarce believing his eyes then at the far end of the room he saw a curtain undulating slightly as if from the movement of a person on the other side of it melees he called softly white and dripping with snow his face bloodless in the tense excitement of the moment he stood with his arms half reaching out when the curtain was thrust aside and the girl stood before him at first she did not recognize him in his ghostly storm-covered disguise but before the startled cry that was on her lips found utterance the fear that had blanched her face gave place to a swift sweeping flood of color. For a space there was no word between them as they stood separated by the breadth of the room.

Howland, with his arms held out to her in pleading silence, Mayleese with her hands clutched to her bosom, her throat a tremble with strange sobbing notes that made no more sound than the fluttering of a bird's wing. And Howland, as he came across the room to her, found no words to say. none of the things that he had meant to whisper to her, but drew her to him and crushed her close to his breast,

knowing that in this moment nothing could tell her more eloquently than the throbbing of his own heart, the passionate pressure of his face to her face, of his great love, which seemed to stir into life the very silence that encompassed them. It was a silence broken after a moment by a short, choking cry,

The quick-breathing terror of a face turned suddenly up to him, robbed of its flush and quivering with a fear that still found no voice in words. He felt the girl's arm straining against him for freedom. Her eyes were filled with a staring, questioning horror, as though his presence had grown into a thing of which she was afraid. The change was tonic to him. This was what he had expected. the first terror at his presence, the struggle against his will,

and there surged back over him the forces he had reserved for this moment. He opened his arms, and Melyse slipped from them, her hands clutched again in the clinging drapery of her bosom. "'I have come for you, Melis,' he said as calmly as though his arrival had been expected. "'Jean is my prisoner!' I forced him to drive me to the old cabin up in the mountain. and he is waiting there with the dogs. We will start back tonight. Now!

Suddenly he sprang to her again, his voice breaking in a low pleading cry. My God, don't you see now how I love you? He went on, taking her white face between his two hands. Don't you understand, M'lis? Jean and I have fought. He is bound hand and foot up there in the cabin. and i am waiting for you for you he pressed her face against him her lips so close that he could feel their quavering breath i have come to fight for you if you won't go he whispered tensely

i don't know why your people have tried to kill me i don't know why they want to kill me and it makes no difference to me now i want you i've wanted you since that first glimpse of your face through the window since the fight on the trail every minute every hour and i won't give you up as long as i'm alive if you won't go with me if you won't go now to-night he held her closer his voice trembling in her hair if you won't go i'm going to stay with you there was a thrillingly decisive note in his last words a note that carried with it more than all he had said before and as melisse partly drew away from him again she gave a sharp cry of protest no no no she panted her hands clutching at his arm you must go back now now she pushed him toward the door and as he backed a step looking down into her face he saw the choking tremble of her white throat heard again the fluttering terror in her breath they will kill you if they find you here she urged they think you are dead that you fell through the ice and were drowned if you don't believe me if you don't believe that i can never go with you tell jean her words seemed to choke her as she struggled to finish tell jean what he questioned softly. "'Will you go, then?' she cried with sobbing eagerness, as if he already understood her.

"'Will you go back if Jean tells you everything? Everything about me? About—' "'No,' he interrupted. "'If you only knew, then you would go back and never see me again. You would understand.' "'I will never understand,' he interrupted again. I say that it is you who do not understand, Melyse. I don't care what Jean would tell me. Nothing that has ever happened can make me not want you. Don't you understand?

Nothing I say, nothing that has happened, that can ever happen, unless— For a moment he stopped, looking straight into her eyes. Nothing, nothing in the world, Melyis, he repeated, almost a moment. in a whisper. Unless you did not tell me the truth back on the trail at Wauquisco when you said that it was not a sin to love you. And if I tell you, if I confess that it is a sin, that I lied back there, then will you go? She demanded quickly. Her eyes flamed on him with a strange light. No, he said calmly. I would not believe you. But it is the first. truth i lied lied terribly to you i have sinned even more terribly and and you must go don't you understand me now if someone should come and find you here

there would be a fight he said grimly i have come prepared to fight he waited a moment and in the silence the brown head in front of him dropped slowly and he saw a tremor pass through the slid splendor form, as if it had been torn by an instant's pain. The pallor had gone from Howland's face. The mute surrender in the bowed head, the soft sobbing notes that he heard now in the girl's breath, the confession that he read in her voiceless grief, set his heart leaping, and again he drew her close into his arms and turned her face up to his own. There was no resistance now, no word. no pleading for him to go. But in her eyes he saw the prayerful entreaty with which she had come to him on the Wakusco Trail,

and in the quivering red mouth the same torture and love and half surrender that had burned themselves into his soul there. Love, triumph, undying faith shone in his eyes, and he crush her face closer until the lovely mouth lay pouted like a crimson road. for him to kiss. You, you told me something that wasn't true, once, back there, he whispered, and you promised that you wouldn't do it again. You haven't sinned, in the way that I mean, and in the way that you want me to believe. His arms tightened still more about her, and his voice was suddenly filled with a tense, quick eagerness.

Why don't you tell me everything? asked. You believe that if I knew certain things, I would never want to see you again, that I would go back into the south. You have told me that. Then, if you want me to go, why don't you reveal these things to me? If you can't do that, go with me to-night. We will go anywhere, to the ends of the earth.' He stopped at the look that had come into her face. Her eyes were turned to the window. He saw them filled with a strange terror, and involuntarily his own followed them

to where the storm was beating softly against the window-pane. Close to the lighted glass was pressed a man's face. He caught a flashing glimpse of a pair of eyes staring in at them, of a thick, wild beard whitened by the snow. He knew the face. When life seemed slipping out of his face, seemed slipping out of his throat, he had looked up into it that night of the ambush on the Great North Trail. There was the same hatred, the same demonic fierceness in it now.

With a quick movement, Howland sprang away from the girl and leveled his revolver to where the face had been. Over the shining barrel he saw only the taunting emptiness of the storm. Scarcely had the face disappeared when there came the loud shout of a man. the horse calling of a name, and then of another, and after that the quick, furious opening of the outer door. Howland whirled his weapon pointing to the only entrance. The girl was ahead of him, and with a warning cry, he swung the muzzle of his gun upward.

In a moment she had pushed the bolt that locked the room from the inside, and had leaped back to him, her face white, her breath breaking in fear. she spoke no word but with a moan of terror caught him by the arm and pulled him past the light and beyond the thick curtain that had hidden her when he had entered the room a few minutes before they were in a second room palely lighted by a mass of coals gleaming through the open door of a box stove and with a second window looking out into the thick night fiercely she dragged him to this window her fingers biting deep into the flush of his arm you must go through this she cried chokingly quick oh my god won't you hurry won't you go howland had stopped from the blackness of the corridor there came the beat of heavy fists on the door and the rage of a thundering voice demanding admittance from out in the night it was answered by the sharp barking of a dog and the shout of a second voice why should i go he asked i told you a few moments ago that i had come prepared to fight melees i shall stay and fight "'Please, please go,' she sobbed, striving to pull him nearer to the window. "'You can get away in the storm. The snow will cover your trail. If you stay, they will kill you, kill you.'

"'I prefer to fight and be killed rather than to run away without you,' he interrupted. "'If you will go,' she crushed herself against his breast. "'I can't go, now, this way.' She urged. "'But I will come to you. I promise that. I will come to you.' For an instant her hands clasped his face.

"'Will you go if I promise you that?' "'You swear that you will follow me, that you will come down to the Wakusco? My God, are you telling me the truth, Malesse?' "'Yes, yes, I will come to you, if you go now.' She broke from him, and he heard her fumbling at the window. "'I will come. I will come, but not to O'Cusco. They will follow you there. Go back to Prince Albert, to the hotel where I looked at you through the window.

I will come there, some time, as soon as I can.' A blast of cold air swept into his face. He had thrust his revolver into its holster, and now again for an instant he helped, held me least close in his arms. "'You will be my wife?' he whispered. He felt her throbbing against him. Suddenly her arms tightened around his neck. "'Yes, if you want me then.

If you want me after you know what I am. Now go, please, please go!' He pulled himself through the window, hanging for a last moment to the ledge. If you fail to come, within a month, I shall return, he said. Her hands were at his face again. Once more, as on the trail at Le Pa, he felt the sweet pressure of her lips. I will come, she whispered. Her hands thrust him back and he was forced to drop to the snow below.

Scarcely had his feet touched when there sounded the fierce yelp of a dog close to him. him. And as he darted away into the smother of the storm, the brute followed at his heels, barking excitedly in the manner of the mongrel curs that had found their way up from the south. Between the dog's alarm and the loud outcry of men, there was barely time in which to draw a breath. From the stair platform came the rapid fuselot of rifle shots that sang through the air above Howland's head and mingled with the fire was a hoarse voice urging on the cur that followed within a leap of his heels. The presence of the dog filled the engineer with a fear that he had not anticipated. Not for an instant did the brute give slack to his tongue as they raced through the night,

and Howland knew now that the storm and the darkness were of little avail in his race for life. There was but one chance, and he determined to take it. Gradually he slackened his pace, drying and cocking his revolver. Then he turned suddenly to confront the yelping nemesis behind him. Three times he fired in quick succession at a moving blot in the snow gloom, and there went up from that blot, a wailing cry that he knew was caused by the deep bite of lead. Again he plunged on, a muffled shout of defiance on his lips. never had the fire of battle raged in his veins as now back in the window listening in terror praying for him was melisse

the knowledge that she was there that at last he had won her and was fighting for her stirred him with a joy that was next to madness nothing could stop him now he loaded his revolver as he ran slackening his pace as he covered greater distance for he knew that in the storm his trail could be followed scarcely faster than a walk he gave no thought to jean croisset bound hand and foot in the little cabin on the mountain even as he had clung to the window for that last moment it had occurred to him that it would be folly to return to the frenchman melees had promised to come to him and he believed her and for that reason jean was no longer of use to him alone he would lose himself in that wilderness alone work his way into the south trusting to his revolver for food and to his compass and the matches in his pocket for life there would be no sledge-trail for his enemies to follow no treachery to fear it would take a thousand men to find him after the night's storm had covered up his retreat, and if one should find him, they too would be alone to fight it out. For a moment he stopped to listen and stare futilely into the blackness behind him. When he turned to go on, his heart stood still. A shadow had loomed

out of the night, half a dozen paces ahead of him, and before he could raise his revolver, the shadow was lightened by a sharp flash of fire. Howland staggered back, his fingers loosening their grip on his pistol, and as he crumpled down into the snow, he heard over him the hoarse voice that had urged on the dog. After that there was a space of silence, of black chaos in which he neither reasoned nor lived, and when there came to him faintly the sound of other voices. finally all of them were lost in one, a moaning, sobbing voice that was calling his name again and again, a voice that seemed to reach to him from out of an infinity of distance, and that he knew was the

voice of Melisse. He strove to speak, to lift his arms, but his tongue was as lead, his arms as though fettered with steel bands. The voice died away. He lived through a cycle of speechless, painless night into which finally a gleam of dawn returned. He felt as if years were passing in his efforts to move, to lift himself out of chaos. But at last he won.

His eyes opened. He raised himself. His first sensation was that he was no longer in the snow, and that the storm was not beating into his face. Instead there encompassed him a damp dungeon-like chill. Everywhere there was blackness. Everywhere, except in one spot, where a little yellow eye of fire watched him and blinked at him.

At first he thought that the eye must be miles and miles away, but it came quickly nearer and still nearer Until at last he knew that it was a candle burning with the silence of a death taper, a yard or two, beyond his feet. End of Chapter 15. Recording by Roger Malene Chapter 16 of the Danger Trail This Librevox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Roger Maline

The Danger Trail by James Oliver Kerrwood Chapter 16. Jean's Story It was the candlelight that dragged Howland quickly back into consciousness and pain. He knew that he was no longer in the snow. His fingers dug into damp earth as he made an effort to raise himself, and with that effort it seemed as though a red-hot knife had cleft him from the top of his skull to his chest. The agony of that instant's pain,

drew a sharp cry from him, and he clutched both hands to his head, waiting and fearing. It did not come again, and he sat up. A hundred candles danced and blinked before him like so many taunting eyes, and turned him dizzy with a sickening nausea. One by one, the lights faded away after that, until there was left only the steady glow of the real candle. The fingers of Howland's right hand were a single. sticky when he drew them away from his head, and he shivered.

The tongue of flame leaping out of the night, the thunderous report, the deluge of fire that had filled his brain, all bore their meaning for him now. It had been a close call, so close that shivering chills ran up and down his spine, as he struggled little by little to lift himself to his knees. His enemy's shot had grazed his head. A quarter of an inch more, more, an eighth of an inch even, and there would have been no awakening. He closed his eyes for a few

moments, and when he opened them, his vision had gained distance. About him, he made out indistinctly the black encompassing walls of his prison. It seemed an interminable time before he could rise and stand on his feet and reach the candle. Slowly he felt his way along the wall until he came to a low, heavy door, barred from him. the outside, and just beyond this door he found a narrow aperture cut through the decaying logs. It was a yard in length and barely wide enough for him to thrust through an arm. Three more of these narrow slits in his prison walls he found before he came back again to the door. They reminded him of the hole through which he had looked out on the plague-stricken cabin at the

Maison de Mont Rouge, and he guessed that through them, came what little fresh air found its way into the dungeon near the table on which he replaced the candle was a stool and he sat down carefully he went through his pockets his belt and revolver were gone he had been stripped of letters and papers not so much as a match had been left him by his captors he stopped in his search and listened faintly there came to him the ticking of his watch. He felt in his watch pocket. It was empty. Again, he listened. This time he was sure that the sound came from his feet, and he lowered the candle until the light of it glistened on something yellow an arm's distance away. It was his watch, and close beside it lay his leather wallet. What money he had carried in the pocketbook was untouched, but his personal concern. cards and half a dozen papers that it had contained were gone he looked at the time the hour hand pointed to four was it possible that he had been unconscious for more than six hours

he had left jean on the mountain top soon after nightfall it was not later than nine o'clock when he had seen melisse seven hours again he lifted his hands to his head his hair was stiff and matted with blood it had congealed thickly on his cheek and neck and had soaked the top of his coat he had bled a great deal so much that he wondered he was alive and yet during those hours his captors had given him no assistance had not even bound a cloth about his head did they believe that the shot had killed him and that he was already dead when they flung him into the dungeon or was this only one other instance of the barbaric brutishness of those who so insistently sought his life the fighting blood rose in him with returning strength if they had left him a weapon even the small knife they had taken from his pocket he would still make an effort to settle a last score or two but now he was helpless there was however a ray of hope in the possibility that they believed him dead if they who had flung him into the dungeon believed this then he was safe for several hours no one would come for his body until broad day and possibly not until the following night when a grave could be dug and he could be carried out with some secrecy in that time if he could escape from his prison he would be well in his way to the wakusco he had no doubt that jean was still a prisoner on the mountain top the dogs and sledge were there and both rifles were where he had concealed them

it would be a hard race a running fight perhaps but he would win and after a time melisse would come to him away down at that little hotel in the saskatchewan he rose to his feet his blood growing warm his eyes shining in the candlelight the thought of the girl as she had come to him out in the night put back into him all of his old fighting strength all of his unconquerable hope and confidence she had followed him when the dogs yelped at his heels as the first shots had been fired she had knelt beside him in the snow as he lay bleeding at the feet of his enemies he had heard her voice calling to him had felt the thrilling touch of her arms the terror and love of her lips as she thought him dying she had given herself to him and she would come to him his lady of the snows if he could escape he went to the door and shoved against it with his shoulder it was immovable again he thrust his hand and arm through the first of the narrow ventilating apertures the wood with which his fingers came in contact was rotting from moisture and age and he found that he could tear out hands of it. He fell to work, digging with the fierce eagerness of an animal. At the rate the soft pulpy wood gave way, he could win his freedom long before the earliest risers at the post were awake. A sound stopped him, a hollow cough from out of the blackness beyond the dungeon

wall. It was followed an instant later by a gleam of light, and Howland darted quickly back to the table. He heard the slipping of a bolt outside the door, and it flashed on him then that he should have thrown himself back into his old position on the floor. It was too late for this action now. The door swung open, and a shaft of light shot into the chamber. For a space, Howland was blinded by it, and it was not until the bearer of the lamp had advanced halfway to the table that he recognized his visitor as Jean-Coiset. the frenchman's face was wild and haggard his eyes gleamed red and bloodshot as he stared at the engineer mon dieu i had hope to find you dead he whispered huskily he reached up to hang the big oil lamp he carried to a hook on the log ceiling and howland sat amazed at the expression on his face jean's great eyes gleamed like living coals from out of a large eyes gleamed like living coals from out of a

death mask. Either fear or pain had wrought deep lines in his face. His hands trembled as he steadied the lamp. The few hours that had passed since Howland had left him a prisoner on the mountaintop had transformed him into an old man. Even his shoulders were hunched forward with an air of weakness and despair as he turned from the lamp to the engineer. I had hoped to find you dead, monsieur, he repeated in a voice so low it could not have been heard beyond the door. That is why I did not bind your wound and give you water when they turned you over to my care. I wanted you to bleed to death. It would have been easier for both of us. From under the table he drew forth a second stool and sat down opposite Howland.

The two men stared at each other over the sputtering remnant of the candle. Before the engineer had recovered from his astonishment at the sudden appearance of the man, whom he believed to be safely imprisoned in the old cabin, Casse's shifting eyes fell on the mass of torn wood under the aperture. "'Too late, monsieur,' he said meaningly. "'They are waiting up there now. "'It is impossible for you to escape.' "'That is what I thought about you,' replied Howland, forcing himself to speak coolly.

"'How did you manage it?' "'They came up to free me soon after they got you, monsieur. "'I am grateful to you for thinking of me, "'for if you had not told them, I might have stayed there and starved like a beast in a trap.' "'It was Melyse,' said Howland. "'I told her.' jean dropped his head in his hands i have just come from melisse he whispered softly she sends you her love monsieur and tells you not to give up hope the great god if she only knew if she only knew what is about to happen no one has told her she is a prisoner in her room and after that after that out on the plane when she came to you and fought like one gone mad to save you

they will not give her freedom until all is over what time is it monsieur a clammy chill passed over howland as he read the time a clammy chill passed over howland as he read the time half-past four the frenchman shivered his fingers clasped and unclasped nervously as he leaned nearer his companion the virgin bear me witness that i wish i might strike ten years off my life and give you freedom he breathed quickly i would do it this instant monsieur i would help you to escape if it were in any way possible but they are in the room at the head of the stair waiting at six something seemed to choke him and he stopped at six what then urged howland my god man what makes you look so what is to happen at six jean stiffened a flash of the old fire gleamed in his eyes and his voice was steady and clear when he spoke again i have no time to lose in further talk like this monsieur he said almost harshly they know now that it was i who fought for you and for melisse on the great north trail they know that it is i who saved you at wakusco melisse can no more save me than she can save you and to make my task a little harder they have made me their messenger and again he stopped choking for words what insisted howland leaning toward him his face as white as the tallow in the little dish on the table their executioner monsieur with his hands gripped tightly on the table in front of him jack howland sat as rigid as though an electric shock had passed through him great god he gasped

first i am to tell you a story monsieur continued cuisselle leveling his reddened eyes to the engineers it will not be long and i pray the virgin to make you understand it as we people of the north understand it it begins sixteen years ago i shall understand jean whispered howland go on it was at one of the company's posts that had happened jean began and the story has to do with le monsieur the factor and his wife l'ange blanc that is what she was called monsieur the white angel mon dieu how we loved her not with a wicked love monsieur but with something very near to that which we give our blessed virgin and our love was but a pitiful thing when compared with the love of these two each for the love for the love of these two each for the the other. She was beautiful, gloriously beautiful, as we know women up on the big snows, like Melisse, who was the youngest of their children. Ours was the happiest post in all this great Northland, monsieur, continued Crosse, after a moment's pause, and it was all because of this woman and the man, but mostly because of the

woman. And when the little Melisse came, she was the first white girl, a baby that any of us had ever seen. Our love for these two became something that I fear was almost a sacrilege to our dear lady of God. Perhaps you cannot understand such a love, monsieur. I know that it cannot be understood down in that world which you call civilization, for I have been there and have seen. We would have died for the little Melyse, and the other Males, her mother. And also, monsieur, we would have killed our own brothers had they as much as spoken a word against them, or cast at the mother even as much as a look which was not the purest.

That is how we loved her sixteen years ago this winter, monsieur, and that is how we love her memory still. She is dead? uttered Howland, forgetting in these tense moments the significance Jean's story might hold for him. yes she is dead monsieur shall i tell you how she died corsay sprang to his feet his eyes flashing his lithe body twitching like a wolf's as he stood for an instant half leaning over the engineer shall i tell you how she died monsieur he repeated falling back on his stool his long arms stretched over the table it happened like this sixteen years ago when the little melisse was four years old and the oldest of the three sons was fourteen that winter a man and his boy came up from churchill he had letters from the factor at the bay and our factor and his wife were a man and his boy came up from churchill he had letters from the factor at the bay and our factor and his wife wife opened their doors to him and to his son, and gave them all that it was in their power to give. "'Mondieu, this man was from that glorious civilization of yours, monsieur,

from that land to the south where they say that Christ's temple stand on every four corners, but he could not understand the strange God and the strange laws of our people. For months he had been away from the companionship of women, and in this great wilderness the factor's wife came into his life as the flower blossoms in the desert ah monsieur i can see now how his wicked heart strove to accomplish the things and how he failed because the glory of our womanhood up here has come straight down from heaven and in failing he went mad mad with that passion of the race i have seen in montreal and then ah the great god monsieur do you not understand what happened next quesais lifted his head his face twisted in a torture that was half grief half madness and stared at howland with quivering nostrils and heaving chest in his companion's face he saw only a dead white pallor of waiting of half comprehension he leaned over the table again controlling himself by a mighty effort it was at that time when most of us were out among the trappers just before our big spring caribou roast when the forest people came in with their furs monsieur

the post was almost deserted do you understand the woman was alone in her cabin with the little melisse and when we came back at night she was dead yes monsieur she killed herself leaving a few written words to the factor telling him what had happened the man and the boy escaped on a sledge after the crime mon dieur how the forest people leaped in person suit. Runners carried the word over the mountains and through the swamps, and a hundred sledge party searched the forest trails for the man-fean and his son. It was the factor himself and his youngest boy who found them, far out on the Churchill Trail. And what happened then, monsieur? Just this. While the man-feant urged on his dogs, the son fired back with a rifle, and one of bullets went straight through the heart of the pursuing factor, so that in the space of one day and one night the little Malesse was made both motherless and fatherless by these

two whom the devil had sent to destroy the most beautiful thing we had ever known in this north. Ah, monsieur, you turn white. Does it bring a vision to you now? Do you hear the crack of that rifle? Can you see? My God, gasped Howland. Even now, he understood nothing of what this tragedy might mean to him,

forgot everything but that he was listening to the terrible tragedy that had come to the woman who was the mother of the girl he loved. He half rose from his seat as Cuezé paused, his eyes glittered, his death-white face was set in tense, fierce lines. His fingernails dug into the board table as he demanded, What happened then, Quasse? Jean was eyeing him like an animal. His voice was low.

They escaped, Monsieur. With a deep breath, Howland sank back. In a moment he leaned again toward Jean, as he saw come into the Frenchman's eyes, a slumbering fire that a few seconds later blazed into vengeful malignity when he drew slowly from an inside pocket of his coat, a small parcel wrapped and tied in soft buckskin.

They have sent you this, monsieur, he said. At the very last, they told me, let him read this. With his eyes on the parcel, scarcely breathing, Howland waited while with exasperating slowness, Quasset's brown fingers untied the cord that secured it. First, you must understand what this means, meant to us in the north monsieur said jean his hands covering the parcel after he had finished with the cord we are different who live up here different from those who live in montreal and beyond

with us a lifetime is not too long to spend in avenging a cruel wrong it is our honor of the north i was fifteen then and had been fostered by the factor and his wife since the the day my mother died of the small-pox, and I dragged myself into the post, almost dead of starvation. So it happened that I was like a brother to Melis and the other three. The years passed, and the desire for vengeance grew in us as we became older, until it was the one thing that we most desired in life, even filling the gentle heart of Melis, whom we sent to school in Montreal when she was eleven, when she was eleven monsieur it was three years later while she was still in montreal that i went on one of my wandering searches to a post at the head of the great slave and there monsieur there quassay had risen his long arms were stretched high his head thrown back his upturned face aflame with a passion that was almost that of prayer

monsieur i thank the great god in heaven that it was given to jean quose to meet one of those whom we had pledged our lives to find and i slew him he stood silent eyes partly closed still as if in prayer when he sank into his chair again the look of hatred had gone from his face it was the father and i killed him monsieur killed him slowly telling him of what he had done as i choked the life from him and then a little at a time i let the life back into him forcing him to tell me where i would find his son the slayer of melissa's father and after that i closed on his throat until he was dead and my dogs dragged his body through three hundred miles of snow that the others might look on him and know that he was dead that was six years ago monsieur howland was scarcely breathing and the other the sun he whispered densely you found him quessay you killed him what would you have done monsieur howland's hands gripped those that guarded the little parcel i would have killed him jean he spoke slowly deliberately i would have killed him i am glad of that monsieur jean was unwrapping the buckskin fold after fold of it until at last there was revealed a roll of pay paper soiled and yellow along the edges these pages are taken from the day-book at the post where the woman lived he explained softly smoothing them under his hands

each day the factor of a post keeps a reckoning of incidents as they pass as i have heard that sea captains do on shipboard it has been a company law for hundreds of years we have kept these pages to ourselves monsieur they tell of what happened at our post sixteen years ago this winter as he spoke the half-breed came to howland's side smoothing the first page on the table in front of him his slim forefinger pointing to the first few lines they came on this day he said his breath close to the engineer's ear these are their names monsieur the names of the two who destroyed the paradise that our blessed lady gave to us many years ago? In an instant, Howland had read the lines. His blood seemed to dry in his veins and his heart to stand still. For these were the words, he read, On this day there came to our post, from the Churchill Way,

John Howland and his son. With a sharp cry he sprang to his feet, overturning the stool, facing croissé his hands clenched his body bent as if about to spring jean stood calmly his white teeth agleam then slowly he stretched out a hand monsieur jean howland will you read what happened to the father and mother of the little melisse sixteen years ago will you read and understand why your life was sought on the great north trail why you were placed on a case of dynamite in the wakusco coyote and why with the coming of this morning's dawn at six he paused shivering howland seemed not to notice the tremendous effort quassay was making to control himself with the dazed speechlessness of one recovering from a sudden blow he turned to the table and bent over the papers that the frenchman had laid out before him five minutes later he raised his head his face was as white as chalk deep lines had settled about his mouth as a sick man might he lifted his hand and passed it over his face and threw his hair but his eyes were a fire involuntarily jean's body gathered itself as if to meet a tack i have read it he said huskily as though the speaking of the words caused him a great effort

i understand now my name is john howland and my father's name was john howland i understand there was silence in which the eyes of the two men met i understand repeated the engineer advancing a step and you jean quose do you believe that i am that john howland the john howland the son who he stopped waiting for jean to comprehend to speak monsieur it makes no difference what i believe now i have but one other thing to tell you here and one thing to give to you replied said Jean. Those who have tried to kill you are the three brothers. Melisse is their sister. Ours is a strange country, monsieur, governed since the beginning of our time by laws which we have made ourselves. To those who are waiting above, no torture is too great for you. They have condemned you to death. this morning exactly as the minute hand of your watch counts off the hour of six you will be shot to death through one of those holes in the dungeon walls and this this note from melisse is the last thing i have to give you he dropped a folded bit of paper on the table mechanically howland reached for it stunned and speechless cold with the horse

of his death sentence, he smoothed out the note. There were only a few words, apparently written in great haste. I have been praying for you all night. If God fails to answer my prayers, I will still do as I have promised, and follow you. Melyse, he heard a movement and lifted his eyes. Jean was gone. The door was swinging slowly inward. He heard the wooden bolt slip into place, and after that there was not even the sound of a moccasined foot stealing through the outer darkness.

End of Chapter 16. Recording by Roger Maline Chapter 17 of the Danger Trail This Libravox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Roger Maline The Danger Trail by James Oliver Kerwood Chapter 17 Melisse

For many minutes Howland stood waiting as if life had left him. His eyes were on the door, but unseeing. He made no sound, no movement again toward the aperture in the wall. Fate had dealt him the final blow, and when at last he roused himself from its first terrible effect, there remained no glimmering of hope in his breast, no thought of the battle he had been making for freedom.

a short time before. The note fluttered from his fingers, and he drew his watch from his pocket and placed it on the table. It was a quarter after five. There still remained forty-five minutes. Three-quarters of an hour, and then, death. There was no doubt in his mind this time.

Even in the coyote, with eternity staring him in the face, he had hoped and fought for life. But here there was no hope. There was to be no fighting. Through one of the black holes in the wall, he was to be shot down, with no chance to defend himself, to prove himself innocent.

And Melisse, did she, too, believe him guilty of that crime? He groaned aloud and picked up the note again. Softly he repeated her last words to him. If God fails to answer my prayers, I will still do as I have promised and follow you. Those words seemed to cry aloud his doom. Even Melisse had given up hope. And yet, was there not a deeper significance in her words?

He started as if someone had struck him, his eyes agleam. I will follow you. He almost sobbed the words this time. His hands trembled and he dropped the paper again on the table. and turned his eyes in staring horror toward the door what did she mean would melisse kill herself if he was murdered by her brothers he could see no other meaning in her last message to him and for a time after the chilling significance of her word struck his heart he scarce restrained himself from calling aloud for jean if he could but send a word back to her tell her once more of his great love that the winning of that love was ample reward for all he had lost and was about to lose and that it gave him such happiness as he had never known even in this last hour of his torture twice he shouted for croisset but there came no response save the hollow echoings of his own voice in the subterranean chambers after that he began to think more sanely

if melisse was a prisoner in her room it was probable that cuisse who is now fully recognized as a traitor at the post could no longer gain access to her in some secret way melisse had contrived to give him the note and And he had performed his last mission for her. In Howland's breast there grew strongly a feeling of sympathy for the Frenchman. Much that he had not understood was clear to him now. He understood why Melisse had not revealed the names of his assailants at Prince Albert and Waccosco. He understood why she had fled from him after his abduction, and why Jean had so faithfully kept secrecy for her sake.

she had fought to save him from her own flesh and blood and jean had fought to save him and in these last minutes of his life he would like to have had croisset with him that he might have taken his hand and thanked him for what he had done and because he had fought for him and melisse the frenchman's fate was to be almost as terrible as his own it was he who would fire the fatal shot at six o'clock not the brothers but jean would be his executioner and murderer. The minutes passed swiftly, and as they went, Howland was astonished to find how coolly he awaited the end. He even began to debate with himself as to through which hole the fatal shot would be fired. No matter where he stood, he was in the light of the big hanging lamp. There was no obscure or shadowy corner in which, for a few moments,

he might elude his executioner. He even smiled when the thought occurred to him that it was possible to extinguish the light and crawl under the table, thus gaining a momentary delay. But what would that delay avail him? He was anxious for the fatal minute to arrive and be over. There were moments of happiness

when, in the damp horror of his death-chamber, there came before him visions of Malesse, grown even sweeter and more lovable. now that he knew how she had sacrificed herself between two great loves the love of her own people and the love of himself and at last she had surrendered to him was it possible that she could have made that surrender if she like her brothers believed him to be the murderer of her father the son of the man fiend who had robbed her of a mother it was impossible he told himself she did not believe him guilty and yet why had she not given him some such word in her last message to him his eyes travelled to the note on the table and he began searching in his coat pockets in one of them he found the worn stub of a pencil and for many minutes after that he was oblivious to the passing of time as he wrote his last words to melisse when he had finished he folded the paper and placed it under his watch at the final moment before the shot was fired he would ask jean to take it his eyes fell on his watch-dial and a cry burst from his lips

it lacked but ten minutes of the final hour above him he heard faintly the sharp barking of dogs the hollow sound of men's voices a moment later there came to him an echo as of swiftly tramping feet and after that silence jean he called tensely ho jean quassay he cut up the paper and ran from one black opening to another he cut up the paper and ran from one black opening to another calling the Frenchman's name. As you love your God, Jean, as you have a hope of heaven, take this note to Melisse, he pleaded. Jean, Jean Coase! There came no answer, no movement outside, and Howland stilled the beating of his heart to listen.

Surely Coase was there! He looked again at the watch he held in his hand. In four minutes the shot would be fired. a cold sweat bathed his face he tried to cry out again but something rose in his throat and choked him until his voice was only a gasp he sprang back to the table and placed the note once more under the watch two minutes one and a half one with a sudden fearless cry he sprang into the very center of his prison and flung out his arms with his own and a half one with a sudden fearless cry he sprang into the very center of his prison and flung out his arms with his arms with his arms with his arm. his face to the hole next to the door. This time his voice was almost a shout. Jean-Crosse, there is a note under my watch on the table. After you have killed me, take it to Melisse. If you fail, I shall haunt you to your grave. Still, no sound, no gleam of

steel pointing at aim through the black aperture. Would the shot come from behind? Tick. Tick, tick, tick. He counted the beating of his watch up to twenty. A sound stopped him then, and he closed his eyes, and a great shiver passed through his body. It was the tiny bell of his watch, tinkling off the hour of six. Scarcely had that sound ceased to ring in his brain,

when from far through the darkness beyond the wall of his prison, there came a creaking noise, as if a heavy door had been swung slowly on its hinges, or a trap opened. Then voices, low, quick, excited voices. The hurrying tread of feet, a flash of light shooting through the gloom. They were coming! After all it was not to be a private affair, and Jean was to do his killing as the hangman's job is done in civilization,

before a crowd. Howland's arms dropped to his side. This was more terrible than the other, this seeing and hearing of preparation, in which he fancied that he heard the click of Cuis' gun as he lifted the hammer. Instead, it was a hand fumbling at the door. There were no voices now,

only a strange moaning sound that he could not account for. In another moment it was made clear to him. The door swung open, and the white-robed figure of Melyse sprang toward him with a cry that echoed through the dungeon chambers. What happened then, the passing of white faces beyond the doorway, the subdued murmur of voices, were all lost to Howland in the knowledge that at the last moment they had let her come to him, that he held her in his arms, and that she was crushing her face to his breast and sobbing things to him which he could not understand. Once or twice in his life he had wondered if realities might not be dreams,

and the thought came to him now when he felt the warmth of her hands, her face, her hair, and then the passionate pressure of her lips on his own. He lifted his eyes, and in the doorway he saw Jean-Coisé, and behind him a wild, bearded face, the face that had been over. over him when life was almost choked from him on the great north trail and beyond these two he saw still others shining ghostly and indistinct in the deeper gloom of the outer darkness he strained melisse to him and when he looked down into her face he saw her beautiful eyes flooded with tears and yet shining with a great joy her lips trembled as she struggled to speak then suddenly she broke from his arms and ran to the door and jean croisset came between them with the wild bearded man still staring over his shoulder monsieur will you come with us said jean the bearded man dropped back into the thick gloom and without speaking howland followed coasse his eyes on the shadowy form of melisse the ghostly faces turned from the light

and the tread of their retreating feet marked the passage through the blackness. Jean fell back beside Howland, the huge bulk of the bearded man three paces ahead. A dozen steps more, and they came to a stair, down which a light shone. The Frenchman's hand fell detainingly on Howland's arm, and when a moment later they reached the top of the stairs, all had disappeared, but Jean and the bearded man. man. Dawn was breaking, and a pale light fell through the two windows of the room they had entered. On a table burned a lamp, and near the table were several chairs. To one of these, Quasse motioned the engineer,

and as Howland sat down, the bearded man turned slowly and passed through a door. Jean shrugged his shoulders as the other disappeared. "'Mond Dieu! That means that he leaves a man. it all to me, he exclaimed. I don't wonder that it is hard for him to talk, monsieur. Perhaps you have begun to understand? Yes, a little, replied Howland. His heart was throbbing as if he had just finished climbing a long hill.

That was the man who tried to kill me. But Melisse, the—' He could go no further. Scarce breathing, he waited for you. Jean to speak. "'It is Pierre Toro,' he said, eldest brother to Melis. "'It is he who should say what I am about to tell you, monsieur. But he is too full of grief to speak.

"'You wonder at that? And yet I tell you that a man with a better soul than Pierre Tarot never lived, though three times he has tried to kill you. Do you remember what you asked me a short time ago, monsieur, if I thought that you were the John Howland who murdered the father of Melisse 16 years ago? God saints, and I did until hardly more than half an hour ago, when someone came from the South and exploded a mine under our feet.

It was the youngest of the three brothers. Monsieur, we have made a great mistake. and we ask your forgiveness. In the silence the eyes of the two men met across the table. To Howland it was not the thought that his life was saved that came with the greatest force, but the thought of Melisse, the knowledge that in that hour when all seemed to be lost, she was nearer to him than ever. He leaned half over the table, his hands clenched, his eyes blazing.

Jean did not understand, for he went, on quickly. I know it is hard, monsieur. Perhaps it will be impossible for you to forgive a thing like this. We have tried to kill you, kill you by a slow torture, as we thought you deserved. But think for a moment, monsieur, of what happened up here sixteen years ago this winter. I have told you how I choked life from the man-feaned. So I would have choked a-mobile. So I would have choked life from you, if it had not been for Melisse. I too am guilty. Only six years ago we knew that the right John Howland, the son of the man I slew, was in Montreal, and we sent to seek him this youngest brother, for he had been a long time at school with Melis and knew the ways of the

South better than the others. But he failed to find him at that time, and it was only a short while ago that this brother located you. As our blessed lady is my witness, monsieur, it is not strange that he should have taken you for the man we sought, for it is singular that you bear him out like a brother and looks, as I remember the boy. It is true that Francois made a great error when he sent word to his brothers, suggesting that if either Gregson or Thorn was put out of the way,

you would probably be sent into the north. i swear by the virgin that melisse knew nothing of this monsieur she knew nothing of the schemes by which her brothers drove greggson and thorn back into the south they did not wish to kill them and yet it was necessary to do something that you might replace one of them monsieur they did not make a move alone but that something happened greggson lost a finger thorn was badly hurt as you know No. Bullets came through their window at night. With Jack Pine and their employ, it was easy to work on them, and it was not long before they sent down asking for another man to replace them. For the first time a surge of anger swept through Howland. They're cowards, he exclaimed. A pretty pair, Casse, to crawl out from under a trap to let another in at the top. "'Perhaps not so bad as that,' said Jean.

"'They were given to understand that they, and they alone, were not wanted in the country. "'It may be that they did not think harm would come to you, and so kept quiet about what had happened. "'It may be, too, that they did not like to have it known that they were running away from danger. "'Is not that human, monsieur?' "'Anyway, you were detainee. tale to come, and not until then did Melisse know of all that it occurred. The Frenchman stopped for a moment. The glare had faded from Howland's eyes.

The tense lines in his face relaxed. I believe I understand everything now, Jean, he said. You traced the wrong John Howland, that's all. I love Melisse, Jean. I would kill mellis, Jean. i would kill john howland for her i want to meet her brothers and shake their hands i don't blame them they're men but somehow it hurts to think of her of melisse as as almost a murderer my deieu monsieur has she not saved your life listen to this it was then when she knew what had happened that melisse came to me whom she had made the happiest man in the world because it was she who brought my marianne over from churchill on a visit especially that i might see her and fall in love with her monsieur which i did melees came to me to jean crocey and instead of planning your murder monsieur she schemed to save your life with me

who would have cut you into bits no larger than my finger and fed you to the carrion ravens who would have choked the life out of you until your eyes bulged in death as i choked that one up on the great slave do you understand monsieur it was melisse who came and pleaded with me to save your life before you had left chicago before she had heard more of you than your name before quesay hesitated and stopped before what jean before she had learned to love you monsieur god bless her exclaimed howland you believe this monsieur as i believe in a god then i will tell you what she did monsieur he continued in a low voice the plan of the brothers was to make you a prisoner near prince albert and bring you north i knew what was to happen then it was to be a beautiful vengeance monsieur a slow torturing death on the spot where the crime was committed sixteen years years ago. But Melisse knew nothing of this. She was made to believe that up here, where the mother and father died, you would be given over to the proper law, to the mounted police who come this way now and then. She is only a girl, monsieur, easily made to believe strange

things in such matters as these, else she would have wondered why you were not given to the officers in prince albert it was the eldest brother who thought of her as a lure to bring you out of the town into their hands and not until the last moment when they were ready to leave for the south did she overhear words that aroused her suspicions that they were about to kill you it was then monsieur that she came to me and you jean on the day that marianne promised to become my wife monsieur i promised in our blessed lady's name to repay my debt to melisse and the manner of payment came in this fashion jack pine too was her slave and so we worked together two hours after melisse and her brothers had left for the south i was following them shaven of beard and so changed that i was not recognized in the fight on the great north trail melisse thought that her brothers would make you a prisoner that night without harming you her brothers told her how to bring you to their camp she knew nothing of the ambush until they leaped on you from cover not until after the fight when in their rage at your escape, the brothers told her that they had intended to kill you,

did she realize fully what she had done? That is all, monsieur. You know what happened after that. She dared not tell you at Waciscoe who your enemies were, for those enemies were of her own flesh and blood, and dearer to her than life. She was between two great loves, monsieur, the love for her brothers,

and again, Jean hesitated. "'And her love for me,' finished Howland. "'Yes, her love for you, monsieur.' The two men rose from the table, and for a moment stood with clasped hands in the smoky light of lamp and dawn. In that moment neither heard a tap at the door leading to the room beyond, nor saw the door move gently inward, and Melyse, hesitating, framed in the opening.

It was Howland who spoke first. I thank God that all these things have happened, Jean, he said earnestly. I am glad that for a time you took me for that other John Howland, and that Piero and his brother's scheme to kill me at Prince Albert and Wachisco. For if these things had not occurred as they have, I would never have seen Melyse. And now, Jean? His ears caught sound of movement, and he turned in time to see Melisse

slipping quietly out. Melisse, he called softly. Melisse! In an instant he had darted after her, leaving Jean beside the table. Beyond the door there was only the breaking gloom of the gray mornings, but it was enough for him to see faintly the figure of the girl he loved,

half turned, half waiting for him. With a cry of joy, he sprang forward and gathered her close in his arms. "'Melisse! My Melyse!' he whispered. After that there came no sound from the donlit room beyond, but Jean-Coiselle, still standing by the table, murmured softly to himself, "'Our blessed lady be praised, for it is all as Jean-Coiselle. would have it. And now I can go to my Marianne. End of Chapter 17.

End of the Danger Trail by James Oliver Kerwood.