She looked at him for a minute. "Do you know where we are now?" she asked quietly.
He met her keen gaze calmly. "I do," he made laconic answer.
"Which way is Cariboo Meadows, then, and how far is it?" she demanded.
"General direction south," he replied slowly. "Fifty miles more or less. Rather more than less."
"And you've been leading me straight north!" she cried. "Oh, what am I going to do?"
"Keep right on going," Wagstaff answered.
"I won't—I won't!" she flashed. "I'll find my own way back. What devilish impulse prompted you to do such a thing?"
"You'll have a beautiful time of it," he said dryly, completely ignoring her last question. "Take you three days to walk there—if you knew every foot of the way. And you don't know the way. Traveling in timber is confusing, as you've discovered. You'll never see Cariboo Meadows, or any other place, if you tackle it single-handed, without grub or matches or bedding. It's fall, remember. A snowstorm is due any time. This is a whopping big country. A good many men have got lost in it—and other men have found their bones."
He let this sink in while she sat there on his horse choking back a wild desire to curse him by bell, book, and candle for what he had done, and holding in check the fear of what he might yet do. She knew him to be a different type of man from any she had ever encountered. She could not escape the conclusion that Roaring Bill Wagstaff was something of a law unto himself, capable of hewing to the line of his own desires at any cost. She realized her utter helplessness, and the realization left her without words. He had drawn a vivid picture, and the instinct of self-preservation asserted itself.
"You misled me." She found her voice at last. "Why?"