“The snow is still crumbling and falling where he stepped,” said Wabi.  “Watch that little chunk, Rod.  See—­it’s slipping—­down—­down—­there!  It was an old bull—­a big fellow—­and he passed here less than an hour ago.”

Signs of the night carnival of the wild things now became more and more frequent as the hunters advanced.  They crossed and recrossed the trail of a fox; and farther on they discovered where this little pirate of darkness had slaughtered a big white rabbit.  The snow was covered with blood and hair and part of the carcass remained uneaten.  Again Wabi forgot his determination to waste no time and paused to investigate.

“Now, if we only knew what kind of a fox he was!” he exclaimed to Rod.  “But we don’t.  All we know is that he’s a fox.  And all fox tracks are alike, no matter what kind of a fox makes them.  If there was only some difference our fortunes would be made!”

“How?” asked Rod.

Mukoki chuckled as if the mere thought of such a possibility filled him with glee.

“Well, that fellow may be an ordinary red fox,” explained the Indian youth.  “If so, he is only worth from ten to twenty dollars; or he may be a black fox, worth fifty or sixty; or what we call a ’cross’—­a mixture of silver and black—­worth from seventy-five to a hundred.  Or—­”

“Heap big silver!” interrupted Mukoki with another chuckle.

“Yes, or a silver,” finished Wabi.  “A poor silver is worth two hundred dollars, and a good one from five hundred to a thousand!  Now do you see why we would like to have a difference in the tracks?  If that was a silver, a black or a ‘cross,’ we’d follow him; but in all probability he is red.”

Every hour added to Rod’s knowledge of the wilderness and its people.  For the first time in his life he saw the big dog-like tracks made by wolves, the dainty hoof-prints of the red deer and the spreading imprints of a traveling lynx; he pictured the hugeness of the moose that made a track as big as his head, discovered how to tell the difference between the hoof-print of a small moose and a big caribou, and in almost every mile learned something new.

Half a dozen times during the morning the hunters stopped to rest.  By noon Wabi figured that they had traveled twenty miles, and, although very tired, Rod declared that he was still “game for another ten.”  After dinner the aspect of the country changed.  The river which they had been following became narrower and was so swift in places that it rushed tumultuously between its frozen edges.  Forest-clad hills, huge boulders and masses of rock now began to mingle again with the bottoms, which in this country are known as plains.  Every mile added to the roughness and picturesque grandeur of the country.  A few miles to the east rose another range of wild and rugged hills; small lakes became more and more numerous, and everywhere the hunters crossed and recrossed frozen creeks.