Philip Steele of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police

ho aroused Phili

storm has cleared and it will be fine traveling. Eh-you have n

e direction of the box. He was criminal enough to hope t

"There were tracks close up t

e. At nine o'clock Pierrot bolted the door and the two set off into the south and west. On the third day they swung to the eastward to strike the Indians living along Reindeer Lake, and on the sixth cut a trail by compass straight for Nelson House. A week later they arrived at the pos

tor MacGregor told him, after he had

first time the thought amused him, and then it maddened him. He had played the part of an idiot, and all because there had been born within him a love of adventure and the big, free life of the open. No wonder some of his old club friends regarded him as a scapegrace and a ne'er-do-well. He had thrown away position, power, friends and home as carelessly as he might have tossed away the end of a cigar. And all-for this! He looked about his cramped quarters, a half sneer on his lips. He had tied himself to this! To his ears there came faintly the thunder of galloping hoofs. Se

pacing back and fort

wn," he said. "Take it ea

ounted. As Philip had once heard the commissioner say, "Every man in the service is a king-but there are different degrees of kings," and for a barracks man to be asked to sit in the inspector's office and smoke was a sensational breach of the usual code. But as he had distinctly heard the inv

his pockets, a twinkle in the cold, almost colorless eyechuckling, companionable laugh, such as finds its vent in

"The commissioner sent 'em up to me from Regina. Nothing like a good cigar o

unted the dozen gnarled and scrubby trees, as had become a habit with him; rested his eyes upon the black and shriveled remnants of summer flower-bed

d when the inspector turned, Philip observed a thing that he had never seen before-a flush in MacGregor's face. His pale eyes gle

ords that would have thrilled him more deeply than those which he had spoken. Beauty-proof! Did MacGregor know? Was

ty-p

ments before. But there was a strange tenseness in his fa

words, looking keenly at the o

hink y

I am. Inspector. That

n, without lifting his eyes from the picture, he said: "I am going to put you up against a queer case, Steele, and the strangest thing about it is its very simplicity. It's a job f

" agreed

that your father is Philip Steele, the big Chicago banker. I know that you are up here for romance and adventure rather than for any other thing there is in the service. I know, too, that you are no prairie chicken, and that most of your life

irreverently. "Had you any-any particular reason for suppos

esk. "You've seen so many pretty faces, Steele, and you've associated

e flush grew deeper in his cheeks, a

to send you up to the Wekusko camp, above Le Pas, to bring down a prisoner. The man is her husband, and he almost killed Hodges, who is chief of construction up there. The minimum he'll get is ten years, and this woman is moving heaven and earth to save him. So help me God, Steele, if I was one of the youngsters,

one out. Then he added: "If you'll do this, Steele-a

graph across the desk. "That's she.

youthful, so filled with childish prettiness that an exclamation of surprise rose to his lips. Under other circumstances he would have sworn that it was the pictu

to keep an unnatural break out of his voice. "But there has been little change-almost none. H

ose, and

e?" he asked, after a

rrupted the inspector, still

ring him back. Whatever happe

lse-a stifled, choking breath, a sound that made him turn his he

ehind him. "You're up against something queer this time, Philip Steele, I'll wag

ing hoofs and the voice of Sergeant Moody thundering instructions to the rookies. Moody had a heart like flint and would have faced blazing ca

two faces that had played their part in his life-the face of the girl at home, as beautiful as a Diane de Poitiers, as soulless as a sphinx, who had offered herself to him in return for his name and millions, and of that other which he had met away up in the frozen bar