"It kind of startles you to find guts in folks when you're up against it. You can't help it. Maybe it's conceit makes you feel that way," he went on quietly. "Those two boys of mine, and An-ina. You couldn't beat 'em. Nothing could. When Oolak dropped over the side of a canyon, with most of the outfit the reindeer went with him. You see, we'd rid ourselves of the dogs. We couldn't feed 'em. Well, I guessed the end had come. But it hadn't. Julyman and An-ina took up the work of hauling, while I carried Marcel. Only they hauled Oolak instead of the outfit. They hauled him for nigh on a month, and we lived on dog meat till it got putrid, and even then didn't feel like giving it up. I didn't have to worry a thing except for their sanity. You see, they were Indian for all their grit, and—I just didn't know. It was tough, Doc! Oh, gee! it was tough! And when you've read the stuff I've doped out for headquarters you won't need me to talk if you've two cents of imagination about you. If you'd asked me awhile back, when I asked you about Nita, and my little girl, and you told me they were good and happy, and crazy to have me back, as I said, I'd have cried like a kid. Yes, and I guess you'd have needed a gun to hold me here while you hacked those slabs off my feet. But it's right now. My head was never clearer, and there's just one thought in it. It's to get back to Deadwater."
The doctor listened with a surge of feeling driving through his heart. His own words, the words he had told to the man whom he knew at the time to be floundering on the edge of a complete mental breakdown, were ringing through his brain. He had lied. He had had to lie. And now——
He took refuge in his pipe. He knew he would need it. He filled it from the pouch which had become common between them and urged Steve to do the same. In a few moments both men were smoking in an atmosphere of perfect calm.
"You were pretty bad that time," Ross said steadily. "Yes, I don't guess you know how bad you were."
"I think I do—now."
The doctor seemed to be absorbed in pressing down the tobacco in his pipe. He struck another match.
"The strain had been so big the break must have come if you'd had to go on," he said, blowing smoke till it partly obscured his patient's unflinching eyes. "You were weak—physically. There was nothing to support your nerve and brain. It was in your eyes. You scarcely recognized us. You hardly knew what our presence meant to you. And, later, the reaction made things even worse for you. A shock, and the balance would have gone hopelessly. So—I lied to you!"
"You—lied to me?"
The pipe had been suddenly jerked from Steve's lips. He was sitting up. A sudden fierce light had leapt to his eyes.
The Scotsman, too, had removed his pipe. His eyes were squarely confronting the other. All his mental force and bodily energy were summoned to his aid.