"Oh, well, there's nothing to worry about. We don't quite own the earth; though one might come to think along that line after living here a spell."

Nothing more was said; but both men plied their paddles with strong, sweeping strokes that drove the canoe onward at a rare pace. When she grounded, Power sprang ash.o.r.e, and did not wait, as was his wont, to help with the packages. Already he felt anxious, because Nancy had not appeared in or about the hut, and the dog was now plainly visible, lying in front of the open door.

"Nancy!" he shouted.

There was no answer; but Guess rose, yawned, and stretched his limbs, his vigil being ended. Power shouted again, more loudly, and Granite, having drawn the canoe high and dry, joined him, leaving the unloading of the provisions until a less troubled moment.

"It ain't jest like Mrs. Power not ter be within hail," said the guide.

"Hurry up to the shack, Mr. Power, an' put Guess on her trail if she ain't havin' a snooze in the back room."

"She wouldn't be asleep at this hour. And you saw her, you said?"

"I might ha been mistook. My eyes ain't so good as they was."

Power broke into a run, and Granite followed slowly, those keen eyes of his, which ill-deserved the charge he had levied against them, searching the trees and the broken ground behind the hut for some sign of the two people whom he had undoubtedly observed.

With one last cry of "Nancy!" Power hurried past the dog, who was greeting him with tail-wagging and a rumbling growl which meant, "I'm glad you've come back, but why didn't you come sooner?" He peered through the doorway into the room beyond, and his glance fell on the note, resting on the table beside the gun.

"Oh, it's all right," he announced, in a tone of vast relief. "Someone has called her away, and here is the explanation."

Meanwhile, the dog was obviously inviting his master to a scouting expedition among the trees and brushwood to the left of the cabin's front, and Granite was so puzzled by the animal's behavior that he paid no heed to Power during the next few seconds; moreover, the fact that Nancy had left a written message showed that, although something unusual might have occurred, it was not necessarily alarming. Then he heard a queer sort of sob, or groan, and, glancing at Power, saw that in his face which brought a dismayed question to his own lips.

"G.o.d A'mighty, Mr. Power, what's got ye?" he cried.

Power made no reply. He seemed as though stricken with a palsy. He absolutely reeled, and would have tumbled headlong had he not, by chance, staggered back against the jamb of the door. Granite caught him by the arm lest he should fall, and Nancy's letter dropped from his nerveless fingers, and fluttered to the ground.

"Don't give way like that," urged the guide. "She ain't dead, anyhow.

Has she left you bad news?"

Power looked at the man as though he did not recognize him. A baleful light gleamed in his eyes. Had Willard been present then, it was not he who would have been the slayer, unless he contrived to be extraordinarily quick with his weapons.

"She has gone," he said, in the monotone of tragedy; for there are moments in life when the voice loses its flexible notes, and mere speech becomes a mechanical effort.

"Gone?" echoed Granite. "Wall, I allow she'll come back?"

"No, she has left me forever. She says so."

"What, in that theer bit o' writin'?"

"Yes."

"Mr. Power, air you joshin' me, er what?"

Power drew a deep breath. The dizziness which had benumbed his faculties was pa.s.sing, and fortunately so; for his sympathetic companion, despairing of obtaining any lucid statement from this dazed man, was stooping to pick up the letter.

"No," he managed to say. "You must not read that. It is meant for me alone. But give it to me. I--I am afraid of falling. My head----"

Vastly puzzled, the guide handed him the half-folded sheet of paper. The bald explanation that Mrs. Power had "left" her husband "forever"

sounded like the wildest variety of moon-madness. In Granite's own phrase, he had never before clapped eyes on two sich genuwine love-birds as Nancy and Derry, not in all his born nateral, and to be told that one had deserted the other merely went to prove that the speaker had gone plumb crazy. For a time, indeed, he was convinced that Power was suffering from a slight sunstroke, because they had paddled nearly two miles while facing the sun, whose rays were reflected in a glowing path on the surface of the lake. Such attacks, though infrequent, were not unknown in that high region. When reaction set in, and Mrs. Power returned, the patient would become violently sick, and a few hours of complete rest would complete his cure.

"Jest go right inside an' set yerself daown," he said cheerfully. "Me an' the dawg'll git on Madam's trail in a brace o' shakes. We'll bring her back, you bet, an' ef you kinder feel as though you'd swallered a live rabbit, wall, let it bolt!"

Power uttered no protest. If he was capable of any definite sensation, it was one of relief that the friendly guide meant to leave him alone.

He stumbled into the hut, and collapsed on a chair, burying his face in his hands. He heard Peter's lively command to the dog, "After her, Guess! Hark to it, Pup! Keep yer nose to the ground, an' I'll do the rest," as if the man's voice and the eager whimpering of the hound had traveled through a long tunnel before reaching his ears. The sounds of the chase soon died away among the trees. A great silence fell, and seemed to wrap him in a pall that would never unfold again. Fearing lest his brain might yield under the strain, he spread the letter open on the table, and read it many times. At first eyes and mind were equally incapable of mastering its contents; but a subconscious knowledge that he must either understand those vague words or go mad in time enabled their sense to penetrate the gathering mists.

And this is what he read:

"Derry, I am leaving you. Mr. Willard has followed us. He is here with me now. He has forced me to believe that duty demands my return to Hugh Marten; so I am going. It is best so. Derry, don't grieve for me. If I thought----[these three words were canceled].

Derry, forgive me. I can write no more. My poor heart is breaking.

"NANCY."

Slowly, through a haze of pain, certain incongruities were revealed in the curt, disconnected sentences. Never before, in all the years he had known her, had Nancy alluded to her father as "Mr. Willard." Even during these later days, when the discovery of a parent's treachery was a prime factor in her seemingly irrevocable decision to dissolve her marriage, she spoke of him invariably in terms of affection. Indeed, Power had practised some measure of duplicity by pretending to agree with her hopeful prophecy of a speedy reconciliation between Willard and himself.

He believed he had summed up the man's character only too well. Such a mean nature would a.s.suredly remain stubborn in its hostility; in fact, he was prepared to encounter greater difficulties and annoyance from Willard than from Marten, and meant to persuade Nancy to take a world-tour of some years' duration as soon as the divorce was secured, and they were legally married. Why, then, should it be "Mr. Willard" who had followed them, and not "my father," or "Dad"?

And what an extraordinary plea she had put forward to excuse her precipitate flight? "He has forced me to believe that duty demands my return to Hugh Marten!" When had woman ever convinced herself more thoroughly than Nancy that "duty" did not "demand" the sacrifice of her whole life? Had she not weighed "duty" in the balance, and found it wanting, before she cast all other considerations to the winds, and fled from Newport with the man she loved? But "Mr. Willard" had "forced" that view upon her. Forced! A strange word! Had he threatened to murder her?

Had she written that letter at the dictation of a maniac? Why, of course! The notion stung Power to the quick, and he groaned aloud. How cra.s.s and blind had been his anguished spirit when first it quivered under the shock of her disappearance! How much wiser and saner was Peter Granite! Even Guess, the dog, read the riddle aright, and had urged instant action. And how fortunate that these two faithful friends had raced off in pursuit rather than wait at the cabin until belated reason shed its light on the brain of the one person in the world Nancy must have trusted to understand her dilemma. At the thought of his failure to grasp the essential elements of a mystery that was simplicity itself when a.n.a.lyzed in cold logic, the blood rushed through his veins like a stream of molten metal, and he leaped to his feet, all afire now to be up and doing. He ran out, and was plunging wildly into the tangle of forest and scrub, when it occurred to him that undirected search in that wilderness was worse than useless. He was no Indian, skilled in jungle lore, that he should discern the tracks of pursued and pursuers, and follow them unerringly. Better possess his soul in patience until some sight or sound announced the return of Peter--with Nancy. Oh, yes, Peter and the dog would soon overtake that vengeful old man and his terrified victim! Pray Heaven there might be no opportunity given Willard to do evil to the girl who had thwarted his plans! Yet how often had the chance to do ill deeds made ill deeds done. Power wilted now under a horrible doubt which brought fresh tortures. He listened for the distant pistol-shot which might shatter his new-found hope. Perforce, he stilled his frenzy, and stood in anguished silence.

But no sound of death-dealing weapon jarred on the brooding solitude of that lake amid the hills; the earliest intimation he received of the real nature of his loss was when Granite and the dog came back--alone.

He strode a few paces to meet his allies, and in that moment of black despair the pride of his manhood sustained him, and choked the bitter words, the fierce ravings, the storming of the very heavens, which tore and raged for utterance, yet were so futile and helpless in the one way that mattered--the rescue of his lost love.

"So, then, you could not overtake them?" he said, and, if Granite had not seen Power when the blow fell, he would never have estimated the volcanic fury of the furnace hidden under Power's unemotional voice and manner.

"No, sir," came the quiet answer. "Thar was hosses in waitin', three hosses. They've circled the head of the lake, an' I saw Mrs. Power's dress as they rode away from the hotel."

The perplexed guide deemed it best to blurt out the actual facts. He thought, and rightly so, that any attempt to minimize the full extent of the tragedy would only add to Power's suffering when he knew the truth.

Nor was he comforted in the least by the unnatural calm with which his news was received.

"But, look-a here, Mr. Power!" he protested earnestly. "I'm ready to swear on the biggest Testament ever prent that your good lady didn't vamoose of her own free will. Leave you? Gol-darn it, that's a bit too rich fur me ter believe! Who's tuk her, anyhow? Why did she go? What sort of a spiel did the cuss put up that she walked off with him--when she had a gun, an' Guess was here, an' she must ha seen you an' me comin' in the canoe?"

"The man was her father. This quarrel is between him and me. Peter, we must cross the lake at once. We can hire horses at the hotel?"

Granite shook his head sorrowfully. The affair was beyond his comprehension; but it was his business to undeceive his employer if he was counting on the chance of overtaking the vanished pair.

"Sorry," he said. "This yer plot was well laid. They run three nags at the hotel, an' the hull blamed bunch hit the pike fur Racket."

Racket was the nearest station, the terminus of a short railway serving the Forked Lake district. It lay six miles away! With the start Willard had secured, he would be at the rail-head before the others had crossed the lake. But Power knew he would go mad if compelled to remain in the cabin when Nancy was not there, and Granite made no further effort to detain him.

"We'll travel a heap quicker if we unload them stores," was all he said, and Power turned instantly to help in the work. When Peter had occasion to enter the cabin, he examined the gun, and found the two cartridges.

"Gosh!" he muttered. "She tuk 'em out herself. I allow she didn't want ter shoot her own father; but she must hev' d.a.m.n well felt like it!"

Then he eyed the dog.

"Wish you could talk, Pup," he said. "Your long lugs heerd what pa.s.sed atween them two, an' I guess it kinder tried you good hard ter keep yer teeth outen that old sinner's leg."

Power spoke no word until the canoe rested by the side of the small landing-stage provided by the hotel. Bidding the guide await his return, he hastened into the building, and found the proprietor. Yes, a Mr.