Seaforth said nothing, and he was a little graver than usual as they packed the tent and blankets on the remaining horse, and an extra load upon their own backs. A good many things might happen up there in the north, including snow-slides, floods and frost, or the downward rush of great trees in a brulee. That was possibly why he commenced a little jingling song of the music-halls when they took the trail again, but the white grandeur of the great peaks silenced him, or his breath gave out as they floundered into fern-choked forest which was further garnished with the horrible devil's club. Seaforth fell into a clump of it, and for several minutes his comments were venomous, for though he had been taught restraint in England and had further tuition in Canada of a grimmer description, little can be expected from the man who is gripped by that Satanic thorn.
It was half an hour before he went on again with his garments ensanguined as the result of Alton's treatment with the knife, and he gasped with relief when after a march of four miles, which occupied most of what was left of the day, they came out into the more open spaces of a big brulee. Some time in the hot autumn a fire had passed that way, and the great trees towered above them, stripped and blackened columns, that seemed to stretch between earth and sky. There was no limb left them, and they rose, majestic in their cylindrical symmetry, in apparently endless battalions, a vista of plutonic desolation. Underfoot there was charcoal, and feathery ashes that whirled aloft, and sprinkling the men with a fine grey powder slowly settled again.
Alton was white in ten minutes, a gritty mire defiled the horse's sides, and Seaforth floundered, coughing, ankle-deep at times, with livid circles where he had rubbed the grime away about his eyes. There was no sign of beast or bird, and the shuffle of weary feet and thud of hoofs rose muffled out of a great silence, until there was a stupendous crash somewhere in the distance. The charred trunks took up the sound, and while they flung it from one to another Alton sprang forward and smote the pack-horse with his fist.
"Jump!" he said hoarsely.
Next moment Seaforth felt himself hurled forward, and glancing over his shoulder when he found his footing again saw a big trunk tilt a little. It seemed to hang quivering for a second or two, then toppled further, and with a great humming came rushing down. Then there was a stunning crash, and he stood gasping, deafened, and bereft of sight, amidst a stifling cloud of dust which swept into his mouth and nostrils and almost suffocated him. When he could see anything again the horse was quivering, and the dust still rising from a shapeless pile a few yards behind him. Alton, who was black and grey to the ankles, took his hat off, shook it, and put it on again in a curious unconcerned fashion which suggested that he did it unconsciously.
"Those six feet make a big difference," said he. As he spoke there was a crash a little farther behind them, another ahead, and they stood still; Alton gripping the horse's bridle, Seaforth staring about him and scarcely breathing, while concussion answered concussion, until there was a silence that was almost bewildering again.
"Now," said Alton quietly, "we'll get out of this, though I don't know that we need worry, because that should have cleared out the shaky ones. When one goes, more of them generally follow. It wouldn't have grieved Hallam of the Tyee very much if we had been a yard or two farther back."
Seaforth was possibly a little shaken, for he answered as he might not otherwise have done. "I wonder if it would have displeased anybody else," he said.
Alton jerked the horse to a standstill and looked at him. "I don't think you meant that, Charley."
Seaforth noticed the glint in his comrade's eyes, and departed a little from veracity. "No," he said. "There are times when a man is apt to talk a little at random."