“Rory is as wide awake as a fox,” said Douglas to his daughter.  “He’s off at full speed now, and I don’t suppose he’d turn for me anyhow, if I did overtake him.”

“Let him go, father,” said the girl.  “Rory would have been dead long ago if there had been any killing him.  Besides, he may really be of some use to Mr. Pasmore—­one never can tell.  Do you know, dad, I’ve got an idea that somehow Mr. Pasmore is going to come out of this all right I can’t tell you why I think so, but somehow I feel as if he were.”

The rancher’s gaze seemed concentrated on the tiny iridescent and diamond-like crystals floating in the air.  There was a very sober expression on his face.  He only wished he could have been honestly of the same opinion.

The sun came out strong, and it was quite evident that Jack Frost had not many more days to reign.  Already he was losing that iron-like grip he had so long maintained over the face of Nature.  The horses were actually steaming, and the steel runners glided smoothly over the snow, much more easily, indeed, than they would have done if the frost had been more intense, as those accustomed to sleighing very well know.

There was a great silence all round them, and when on the open prairie, where the dim horizon line and the cold grey sky became one, they could almost have imagined that they were passing over the face of some dead planet whirling in space.  Only occasionally, where the country was broken and a few stunted bushes were to be met with, a flock of twittering snow-birds were taking time by the forelock, and rejoicing that the period of dried fruits and short commons was drawing to a close.

And now Dorothy saw that her father was struggling with sleep.  It was not to be wondered at, for it was the third day since he had closed an eye.  Without a word she took the reins from his hands, and in a few minutes more had the satisfaction of seeing him slumbering peacefully with his head upon his breast.  The high sides of the sleigh kept him in position.  When he awoke he found it was about eleven o’clock, and that once more they were in the wooded bluff country.

“You have let me sleep too long, Dorothy,” he said.  “It’s time we called a halt for breakfast Besides, we must send those breeds back.”

He whistled to Jacques, who called to Bastien, and in another minute or two the sleighs were pulled up.  The prisoners were then provided with food, and told that they were at liberty to depart By making a certain cut across country they could easily reach the township before nightfall.