Okanagan nodded. "Yes," he said. "Somebody has saved me the trouble.
Two bullets in him."
Seaforth was almost past anger now, but the tea splashed from the can he still held as he realized the thoroughness of the work of their enemy.
"Then how are you going to pack Harry and the other things over the range?" he said.
Okanagan's face was almost expressionless. "We're not going to. It can't be done."
Seaforth said nothing. The last fall had shaken him severely, and he had realized since they started that the task before them was almost beyond the power of any two men, but had refused to contemplate what must happen if they failed in it. Now he could see that it was impossible, but dazed with utter weariness as he was he could not think consecutively, and only felt a numbing dismay that in some strange fashion softened the blow, while in place of considering the future his memory reverted without his will to the incidents of that strange journey. They rose blurred before him as the creations of an evil dream, the wild descent of a rapid, the desperate effort of the portage, the long hours of toil at the paddle, and endless unrolling of whitened pines that crawled by them through the snow. Now at least, when he could do no more, that stupendous toil was finished. Turning, he glanced at Alton, who had with apparent difficulty swallowed a little of the tea. He lay amidst the blankets with eyes closed, breathing unevenly.
"Then you'll go on to Somasco, Tom, and send back the boys for us.
They may be in time," he said.
Okanagan strode softly to the entrance of the tent and drew the canvas back. A moon hung red with frost in the pitiless heavens, the stars shone steelily, and it was evident that the cold of the icy North was laying its grip upon the valley.
"Harry wouldn't have much use for them when they came. There's an ice fringe round the boulders now," he said.
Seaforth stared out into the glittering night, and groaned, for he knew what happened to wounded men unsheltered from the frost. His voice was low and harsh as he asked, "Then what is to be done?"
Okanagan replaced the canvas before he answered quietly, "There's the canon."