Nicol remained only long enough to see the runners of the hindmost sled vanish in a flurry of powdered snow round the limits of a woodland bluff. Then he turned back to the dark old fort, and the mask under which he had so carefully concealed himself fell away. Straightway he returned to his store to flood his senses with the raw spirit which alone made his degenerate life tolerable.
Winter was howling about the old fort. Drifts were piled feet deep against every obstruction that stood in the way of the driving snow. The fort was closed up. Every habitation was made fast against the onslaught of the elements Life was unstirring.
Far out in the woods bayed the fierce, famished timber wolf. The lighter but more doleful howl of coyote seemed to reply from every point of the compass. And amidst the rack of savage chorus came the harsh human voice that had little the better of the animal world in the pleasing quality of its note.
A train of three dogs hauling a light sled broke from the shadows of the forest. A single human figure on snow-shoes laboured along beside it. It was a figure entirely unrecognizable, except that it was human.
There was no pause, no uncertainty. The train came on and halted at a word of command at the doorway of the fort. In a moment the human figure was beating with its fur-mitted fists upon the door that had weathered the ages of storm.
The door was flung wide from within, and the blear eyes of Nicol peered out into the night-light. In a moment an exclamation of recognition broke from him.
"Alroy!" he cried. "'Tough' Alroy!" Then something of gladness at the prospect of companionship lit his eyes with a happier light. "Say, come right in," he invited, almost boisterously. "I'll send along some neches to see to your darn train."
Tough needed no second invitation. He smelt warmth, rest, and there was the promise in his mind of a good "souse." For the time he had had enough of Unaga. He had had enough of his employer, Lorson Harris. He had had enough of snow and ice, and the merciless cold of the twilit trail. God! but he was glad to leave it all behind him for the warmth of Nicol's store, and the raw spirit he knew was to be found there in generous quantities.
Half an hour later, divested of his furs, clad only in rough buckskin and pea-jacket, with feet encased in thick reindeer moccasins, Tough sat over the trader's stove with a pannikin of evil smelling rye whisky in his hand.