Philip Steele of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police

by James Oliver Curwood

From beside his prisoner in the deep gloom Philip saw Thorpe and his wife come out of the cabin a minute later and hurry away through the night. Then he dragged the guard into the prison, relocked the door, left the key in the lock, and returned to Hodges' office to replace the old clothes for his uniform. Not until he stood looking down upon the dead body again did the enormity of his own offense begin to crowd upon him. But he was not frightened nor did he regret what he had done. He turned out the light, sat down, coolly filled his pipe, and began turning the affair over, detail by detail, in his mind. He had, at least, followed Inspector MacGregor's injunction—he had followed his conscience. Hodges had got what he deserved, and he had saved a man and a woman.

But in spite of his first argument, he knew that MacGregor had not foreseen a tragedy of this sort, and that, in the eyes of the law, he was guilty of actively assisting in the flight of two people who could not possibly escape the penalty of justice—if caught. But they would not be caught. He assured himself of that, smiling grimly in the darkness. No one at Wekusko could explain what had happened.

He was positive that the guard had not recognized him, and that he would think one of Thorpe's friends had effected the rescue. And MacGregor—Philip chuckled as he thought of the condemning evidence in his possession, the strange orders which would mean dismissal for the inspector, and perhaps a greater punishment, if he divulged them. He would be safe in telling MacGregor something of what had occurred in the little cabin. And then, as he sat in this grim atmosphere of death, a thought came to him of M'sieur Janette's skull, of Bucky Nome, and of the beautiful young wife at Lac Bain.

If Mrs. Becker could know of this, too—if Bucky Nome, buried somewhere deep in the northern wilderness, could only see Hodges as he lay there, dead on the cabin floor! To the one it would be a still greater punishment, to the other a warning. And yet, even as he thought of the colonel's wife and of her flirtation with Nome, a vision of her face came to him again, filled with the marvelous sweetness, the purity, and the love which had enthralled him beside the campfire. In these moments it was almost impossible for him to convince himself that she had forgotten her dignity as a wife even for an hour. Could he have been mistaken? Had he looked at her with eyes heated by his own love, fired by jealousy? If she had smiled upon him instead of upon Bucky Nome, if her cheeks had flushed at his words, would he have thought that she had done wrong? As if in answer to his own questions, he saw again the white, tense face of the colonel, her husband, and he laughed harshly.

For several hours Philip remained in the shelter of Hodges' office. With early dawn he stole out into the forest, and a little later made his appearance in camp, saying that he had spent the night at Le Pas. Not until an hour later was it discovered that Hodges had been killed, the guard made a prisoner, and that Thorpe and his wife were gone. Philip at once took charge of affairs and put a strain on his professional knowledge by declaring that Thorpe had undoubtedly fled into the North. Early in the afternoon he started in pursuit.

A dozen miles north of the Wekusko camp he swung at right angles to the west, traveled fifteen miles, then cut a straight course south. It was three days later before he showed up at Le Pas, and learned that no one had seen or heard of Thorpe and his wife. Two days later he walked into MacGregor's office. The inspector fairly leaped from his chair to greet him.

“You got them, Steele!” he cried. “You got them after the mur—the killing of Hodges?”

Philip handed him a crumpled bit of paper.

“Those were your latest instructions, sir,” he replied quietly. “I followed them to the letter.”

MacGregor read, and his face turned as white as the paper he held. “Good God!” he gasped.