The passing of the rapids by the overland trail was all that their host had promised. Struggling over rocky, snow-packed slopes; slipping, sliding, buffeted by strong winds, beaten back by swinging overhanging branches of ancient spruce and firs, they made their way pantingly forward until at last, with a little cry of joy, Marian saw their own sleds in the trail ahead.
“That’s over,” she breathed. “How thankful I am that we did not attempt to make it with the sleds, or with our treasure on the backs of the deer. There would not have been left a fragment of our dishes as big as a dime. As for the sleds, well it simply couldn’t be done.”
“No-me,” sighed Attatak.
“I wonder how he could have brought them by the rapids?” Marian mused as she examined the sleds. There were flakes of ice frozen to the runners. She could only guess at the method he had used, only dimly picture the struggle it must have taken. Even as she attempted to picture the night battle, a great wave of admiration and trust swept over her.
“The treasure is safer in his hands than in ours,” she told herself.
“But, after it has left his hands?” questioned her doubting self.
“Oh well,” she sighed at last, “what must be, will be. The important thing after all is to reach the station before the Agent has started on his way.”
Again her brow clouded. What if there was no one to go back with her?
To dispel this doubt, she hastened to hitch her deer to her sled. Soon they were racing away over the trail, causing the last miles of their long journey to melt away like ice in the river before a spring thaw.
In the meantime a third startling revelation had come to Patsy. First she had discovered that at least one of the persons connected with the strange purple flame was a girl. Next she had found the red trail of blood that apparently was made by one of Marian’s slain deer, and which led to the door of their tent. The third discovery had nothing to do with the first two, nor with the purple flame. It was of a totally different nature, and was most encouraging.