"But—you said—it was a favour, Mac—I——"
"Wheest, laddie, an' a favour it is. For McDougall's growin' auld f'r the trails. Theer's gude years ahead o' yon dogs, but I've na mind to gi' 'em the wark they need to keep 'em in fettle. An' dogs is oncommon like men—'gin they loaf aboot the streets o' town a spell they get lazy an' no 'count. But, wi' yersel' to put 'em ower the trail noo an' again, they'll be a team o' pleasure an' profit to ye. F'r they're braw dogs altogether an' t'would be shamefu' they should dwindle to the common herd o' scavage dogs."
And so, Connie, gracefully as he could in his confusion, granted McDougall's favour. But in doing so the small boy could not foresee—nor could any man in the cabin foresee—the chain of adventures into which the possession of the ten-team would lead him. For, had he not owned the ten-team, he would not have happened, just at the right moment, upon Big Dan McKeever, sergeant of the Royal North-West Mounted Police, at a time when the sergeant, with white, set face, battled against odds of a thousand to one, while fifty men looked helplessly out across the mile-wide field of heaving, crashing river ice when the spring break-up hit the mighty Yukon. And, if Sergeant McKeever—but all that has no part in this story.
In the little cabin on Ten Bow the hour was late, and the bearded men had arisen to go. As each passed through the door to seek his own cabin, he gripped hard the hand of Pete Mateese, and O'Brien, and Waseche Bill—and both hands of Connie Morgan—the boy who was a tillicum.
As they wended their way homeward in the midnight the little stars winked and glittered radiantly upon these big men of the North. While far away on the long bleak trail, the same little stars gleamed cold and hard upon a swiftly moving black speck where, with white face and terror-gripped heart, Mr. Squigg added friendly miles to the distance that separated Ten Bow from The Man Who Didn't Fit.
Transcriber's Notes:
Maintained original spelling and punctuation of the dialect.
Obvious printer errors have been corrected.