"So I heard you say;" answered the boy, dryly. "But, how about breakfast?"
"Cook it, confound you! There it is. If you figger to pot me while I'm gittin' it, you lose. I'm a-goin' to set right here with this gun in my hand, an' the first move you make that don't look right—out goes yer light."
Connie prepared breakfast, while the other eyed him closely. And, as he worked, he kept up his air of bravado—but it was an air he was far from feeling. He knew Black Moran by reputation, and he knew that unless a miracle happened his own life was not a worth a gun-wad. All during the meal which they ate with Black Moran's eyes upon him, and a gun in his hand, Connie's wits were busy. But no feasible plan of escape presented itself, and the boy knew that his only chance was to play for time in hope that something might turn up.
"You needn't mind to clean up them dishes," grinned the man. "They'll burn dirty as well as clean. Git yer hat, now, an' we'll git this business over with. First, git them dogs in the cabin, an' the sled an' harness. Move lively, 'cause I got to git a-goin'. Every scrap of stuff you've got goes in there. I don't want nothin' left that could ever be used as evidence. It's clouded up already an' the snow'll take care of the tracks." As he talked, the two had stepped out the door, and Connie stood beside his sled about which were grouped his dogs. The boy saw that Leloo was missing, and glanced about, but no sign of the great wolf-dog was visible. "Stand back from that sled!" ordered the man, as he strode to its side. "Guess I'll jest look it over to see if you've got another gun." The man jerked the tarp from the pack, and seizing the rifle tossed it into the cabin. Then he slipped his revolver into its holster and picked up Connie's heavy dog-whip. As he did so Connie caught just a glimpse of a great silver-white form gliding noiselessly toward him from among the tree trunks. The boy noted in a flash that the cabin cut off the man's view of the wolf-dog. And instantly a ray of hope flashed into his brain. Leloo was close beside the cabin, when with a loud cry, Connie darted forward and, seizing a stick of firewood from a pile close at hand, hurled it straight at Black Moran. The chunk caught the man square in the chest. It was a light chunk, and could not have possibly harmed him, but it did exactly what Connie figured it would do—it drove him into a sudden rage—with the dog-whip in his hand. With a curse the man struck out with the whip, and as its lash bit into Connie's back, the boy gave a loud yell of pain.
At the corner of the cabin, Leloo saw the boy throw the stick. He saw it strike the man. And he saw the man lash out with the whip. Also, he heard the boy's cry of pain. As the man's arm drew back to strike again, there was a swift, silent rush of padded feet, and Black Moran turned just in time to see a great silvery-white shape leave the snow and launch itself straight at him. He saw, in a flash, the red tongue and the gleaming white fangs, and the huge white ruff, each hair of which stuck straight out from the great body.
A single shrill shriek of mortal terror resounded through the forest, followed by a dull thud, as man and wolf-dog struck the snow together. And then—the silence of the barrens.
It was long past noon. The storm predicted by Black Moran had been raging for hours, and for hours the little wizened man who had left the cabin before dawn had been plodding at the head of his dogs. At intervals of an hour or so he would stop and strain his eyes to pierce the boiling white smother of snow that curtained the back-trail. Then he would plod on, glancing to the right and to the left.
The over-burden of snow slipping from a spruce limb brushed his parka and he shrieked aloud, for the feel of it was a feel of a heavy hand upon his shoulder. Farther on he brought up trembling in every limb at the fall of a wind-broken tree. The snapping of dead twigs as the spruce wallowed to earth through the limbs of the surrounding trees sounded in his ears like—the crackling of flames—flames that licked at the dry logs of a—burning cabin. A dead limb cracked loudly and the man crouched in fear. The sound was the sound of a pistol shot from behind—from the direction of Black Moran.
"Why don't he come?" whispered the wizened man. "What did he send me alone for? Thought I didn't have the nerve fer—fer—what he was goin' to do. An' I ain't, neither. I wisht I had—but, I ain't." The man shuddered: "It's done by this time, an'—why don't he come? What did I throw in with him fer? I'm afraid of him. If he thought I stood in his way he'd bump me off like he'd squ'sh a fly that was bitin' him. If I thought I could git away with it, I'd hit out right now—but I'm afraid. If he caught me—" The wizened man shuddered and babbled on, "An' if he didn't, the Mounted would. An' if they didn't—" again he paused, and glanced furtively into the bush. "They is things in the woods that men don't know! I've heered 'em—an' seen 'em, too. They is ghosts! And they do ha'nt men down. They're white, an—it's beginnin' to git dark! Why don't Moran come? I'd ruther have him, than them—an' now there's another one of 'em—to raise out of the ashes of a fire! I'd ort to camp, but if I keep a pluggin' along mebbe I kin git to the Injun village. 'Taint fur, now—acrost this flat an' then dip down onto the river—What's that!" The man halted abruptly and stared. "It's one of 'em now!" he faltered, with tongue and lips that felt stiff. "An' it's covered with fine white ashes!" He knew that he was trembling in every limb, as he stared at the snow-covered object that stood stiffly beside the trail only a few yards ahead. "Nuthin' but a stump," he said, and laughed, quaveringly. "Sure—it's a stump—with snow on it. I remember that stump. No—it wasn't here where the stump was. Yes, it was. It looks different with the snow on it. Gosh, a'mighty, it's a ghost! No 'taint—'taint moved. That's the stump. I remember it. I says to Moran, 'There's a stump.' An' Moran says, 'Yup, that's a stump.'" He cut viciously at his dogs with the whip. "Hi yu there! Mush-u!"
At the door of the little cabin Connie Morgan stared wide-eyed at the thing that lay in the snow. Schooled as he was to playing a man's part in the drama of the last great frontier, the boy stood horror-stricken at the savage suddenness of the tragedy that had been enacted before his eyes. A few seconds before, he had been in the power of Black Moran, known far and wide as the hardest man in the North. And, now, there was no Black Moran—only a grotesquely sprawled thing—and a slush of crimson snow. The boy was conscious of no sense of regret—no thought of self-condemnation—for he knew too well the man's record. This man who had lived in open defiance of the laws of God and of man had met swift death at the hand of the savage law of the North. The law that the men of the outlands do not seek to explain, but believe in implicitly—because they have seen the workings of that law. It is an inexorable law, cruel, and cold, and hard—as hard as the land it governs with its implacable justice. It is the law of retribution—and its sentence is Pay.