“See what?”

“The white thing.”

Barney stared.  The Major’s face was noncommittal.

Bruce told them of his experience.

“He’s been seeing a ghost,” declared Barney, with a laugh.

“On the contrary,” said the Major slowly, “I think he hasn’t.  There are white creatures in the Arctic; just such ones as he has described.  I have seen them myself.  No, not white bears, either.  But I have never seen them this far South.  I will not say now what I think Bruce saw but I will say I do not think it was an Indian.”

“Look!” exclaimed Barney suddenly in a whisper.

He pointed to a thin column of smoke that was rising over the tree-tops, to the left of the wheat-field.

“Listen!” whispered Bruce.  “Somebody’s chopping wood.”  The freshening wind brought the sound of the axe plainly to their ears.  A second later they heard the distant laugh of a child.

“Come on,” said the Major, throwing his roll of blankets at the foot of a tree.  “Where there’s children there’s no danger.  Maybe they’ll have hot-cakes for breakfast!”

A moment later found the three of them stealing silently through the forest.

What they saw as they peered into the clearing brought them up standing.  A man wielded an axe before a cabin.  He was tall and strong, smooth-shaven and clean.  No Indian, but a white man.  His clothing was of white-tanned buckskin.  The cabin was of logs, but large, with a comfortable porch and several windows.  The panes of the windows seemed near-glass.  It was impossible to tell, from where they stood, whether the two laughing children who played by the door were white or half-breeds.  The appearance at that door of a neatly-dressed Indian woman seemed to settle that question.

The three men had gone half-way across the narrow clearing, before the man, looking up from his work, saw them.  Instantly his face blanched.  With a quick step backward, he reached for a rifle that stood by the door.  Then the arm fell limp by his side.

“Well, you’ve come!” he said in a lifeless tone.  “I could have killed you, one or two of you, but I won’t.  I may be a thief, but not a murderer.  Besides, there are probably more of you back there in the trees.”

“On the contrary,” smiled the Major, “we are only three.  We are not armed.  So you see you might easily kill us all.  But why you should want to, and why you expected us, when the last thing we thought to do was to land in your wheat-field last night, is more than I can guess.”

“Landed?” The man’s face showed his bewilderment.

“I know,” exclaimed Bruce impulsively, “I’ll explain.  You’re Timmie—­Timmie—­” he hesitated.  “Well, anyway, that’s your first name.  I know all about you—­”

Again the man’s trembling hand half-reached for the rifle.

“Then—­then you have—­come for me,” he choked.

Bruce, realizing his mistake, hastened to correct it.