Philip Steele of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police

dense spruce, and stood listening as there came to him faintly the distant howling of a dog. After all, had he done right? He laughed harshly and his hands clenched as he thought

Nome, he saw again what looked like yielding softness in her eyes-the grayish pallor in the colonel's face as he had looked upon the flirtation. Yes, he had done right. She had recovered herself in time, but she had taken a little bit of life from the colonel, and from him. She had broken his ideal-the ideal he had always hoped for, and had sought fo

since he knew well enough after the final remarks of that gentleman that he did not intend to sever his connection with the Northwest Mounted in the regular way. After that-He shrugged his shoulders as he thought of the fourteen months' of service still ahead of him. Until now his adventure as a member of the Royal Mounted had not grown monotonous for

alf-breed's log home. Philip kicked off his snow shoes and knocked at the door. In a moment

ees you-Mee

Pierrot's hands was done up in a sling, his face was thin and pale, and his dark eyes were sunken and lusterless. In the little wilderness home th

ed Pierrot again, his face lighting up with

Lac Bain. But what's up, old man-?" He pointed to Pierro

ing which-ugh!-has to be fixed with a knife, Mee-sair Philip. An' so I take her to the doctor over at Churchill, an' he fix her-an' she is growing well now, an' will soon come home. S

rt Churchill?" asked Philip,

his French. "I have been there since Novemb

his pipe and began filling it, with his back to the stove. "You saw people-strangers-at For

ce flashed up wit

with me to my cabin, and every day after that she come to see my Iowla an' the children. She wash little Pierre, an' cut his hair. She wash Jean an' Mabelle. She laugh an' sing an' hol' the baby, an' my Iowla laugh an' sing; an' she takes down my Iowla's hair, which is so long that it falls to her knees, an' does it up in a wonderful way an' says she would give everything she got if she could have that hair. An' m

den low cry Philip crushed the dainty fabric in a mass to his face. In that moment it seemed as though the sweetness of the woman herself was with him, stirring him at last to confess the truth-the thing which he had fought against so fiercely i

f his face was white. Pi

t lonely, too. There's a girl-down there-who wears a scarf like t

rrot softly. "It is the way I

come to his cabin. With Pierrot's promise to accompany him with dogs and sledge on his patrol th

e is not so much of an angel after all-that she is, perhaps, something li

had thrust a knife-point into his back

liar, once-twice-three times, and then if he said it again I would fight

autiful face out on the Churchill trail. He could find nothing but purity and sweetness until he came with her for that fatal hour or two into the company of Bucky Nome. And then, again, his blood grew hot. But-after all-was there not some little excuse for her? He thought of the hundreds of women he had known, and wondered if there was one among them all who had not at some time fallen into this same little error as Mrs. Becker. For the first time he began to look at himself. Mrs. Becker had laughed with Bucky Nome, her cheeks had grown a little flushed, her eyes had shone radiantly-but were those things a si

which Jacques had placed the silken scarf. His breath came quickly; in the dark his eyes shone; a tingling thrill of strange pleasure shot through him as his fingers touched the thing for which they were searching. He drew the scarf out, and returned to the stove with it, crushing it in both his hands. The sweetness of it came to him again like the woman's breath. It was the sweetness of her hair, of the golden coils massed in the firelight; a part of the woman herself, of her glorious eyes, her lips, her face-and suddenly he crushed the fabric to his own face, and stood there, trembling in the darkness, while Jacques Pierrot sle

ad of returning it to the box, put

f. "And it's the only thing, little gir