“I’m surely glad I’m going to have a companion,” he told her.  “I won’t miss Ez—­”

But just then remembrance came to him, cutting the word off short.  The letter he carried in his pocket contained certain advice in regard to silence, and perhaps now was a good time to follow it.  There was no need to tell the people of Snowy Gulch about Ezram and the claim.  He remembered that he had been warned of the danger of claim jumpers.

For an instant his mind seemed to hover at the edge of a more elusive memory; but he could not quite seize upon it.  He only knew that it concerned the matter in hand, and that it left him vaguely troubled.

“You were saying,” the girl prompted him.

“Nothing very important—­except how glad I am you are going my way.  The woods are certainly lonesome by yourself.  I suppose you’ll be willing to make an early start.”

“The earlier the better.  I’ve got a long way to go.”

They made their plans, and soon they parted to complete preparations for the journey.  The girl went into her house:  Ben took the rifle, and followed by the wolf, struck down the main street of the village.

It can be said for Ben that he aroused no little conjecture and interest in the minds of the townspeople, striding through the street with the savage woods creature following abjectly at his heels.  Evidently Ben’s conquest was complete:  the animal obeyed his every command as quickly as an intelligent dog.  It was noticeable, however, that even the hardiest citizens kept an apprehensive eye on the wolf during the course of any conversation with Ben.

He bought supplies—­flour and salt and a few other essentials—­simple tools and utensils such as are carried by prospectors, blankets, shells for his rifle, and a few, simple, hard-wearing clothes.  He went to bed dead tired, his funds materially reduced.  But before dawn he was up, wholly refreshed; and after a hasty breakfast went to pack his horses for the trip.

Beatrice came stealing out of the shadows, more than ever suggestive of some timid creature of the forest, and the three of them saddled and packed the animals.  As daylight broke they started out, down the shadowed street of the little town.

“The last we’ll see of civilization for a long, long time,” the girl reminded him.

The man thrilled deeply.  “And I’m glad of it,” he answered.  “Nothing ahead but the long trail!”

It was a long trail, that which they followed along Poor Man’s creek in the morning hours.  The girl led, by right of having some previous acquaintance with the trail.  The three pack horses walked in file between, heads low, tails whisking; and Ben, with Fenris at his horse’s hoofs, brought up the rear.  Almost at once the spruce forest dropped over them, the silence and the gloom that Ben had known of old.

This was not like gliding in a boat down-river.  The narrow, winding trail offered a chance for the most intimate study of the wilderness.  From the river the woodsfolk were but an occasional glimpse, the stir of a thicket on the bank:  here they were living, breathing realities,—­vivid pictures perfectly framed by the frosty green of the spruce.