Night began to settle.  The monotonous forest of trees became indistinct; for half an hour the rain fell in sheets—­ghostly white in the dusk.  It became difficult now to evade the roots and holes.  It grew colder, yet there was no breeze.  Still the gaunt figure of the trapper ahead of them led on without pity.  They followed him blindly—­now stumbling in the shadows—­some of these proved to be mud—­others water—­still others the soaked underbrush.  Whatever they stumbled into now the sensation was the same.

“Sam!” called Alice feebly.

“Yes, dear,” came his voice ahead.  He fell out of line and waited for her, bent and dripping under his pack.  She looked at him, her mouth trembling and he patted her cheek with a numb hand.  “A little more—­only a little more courage, dear,” he said kindly; “Holt tells me we are near Bear Pond.  You have been so plucky.”

“And so have you—­Sam,” she faltered.  He smiled wearily, turned away from her and regained his place in the line.

The rain ceased—­the trees grew shorter; hemlock and spruce resolved themselves into a stunted horizon of tamarack; then came a glimmering light through an open space and a sheet of water, glistening like steel, appeared ahead of them and they emerged suddenly upon a hard, smooth point of sand.

“Bear Pond!” the trapper announced cheerily as he halted.  “Here we be, by whimey!  I was afeared some of ye’d give out, but I dassent stop a minute.  You folks’ll begin to feel better soon’s we git a fire started.”

Already Holcomb’s and the Clown’s axes were being swung with a will.  They soon emerged from the forest dragging out on the smooth sand spit, where the line of tamaracks ended, enough dry timber for a fire which the trapper soon roused into a welcome blaze.  He used but one match—­often he travelled a week on seven.  When they were wet he rubbed them in his hair.

Again the sharp whack of the axes cut out a ridgepole and two forked supports.  Before it grew dark they had a snug lean-to built and covered with boughs at the edge of the tamaracks—­out of the wind.  Here, after a warm meal, they passed the first night of their flight.  The women shared one side of the lean-to, grateful for the dry blankets; the men, tired from their heavy loads, crept in noiselessly in their sock feet beside them and were soon asleep.  The old dog waited patiently until they were settled, then entered and lay down in the only space left.  Back of them, far away over the horizon of the wilderness, the sky was pink.

Alice Thayor slept soundly until midnight, then she lay awake until the first glimmer of dawn.  She half rose upon her elbow and looked calmly at the face of her husband asleep next to her.  It seemed strange to her to be sleeping next to him.  His face was drawn and haggard; he breathed heavily.  Margaret was curled next to her on the other side, the curve of her lovely mouth showing above the coarse edge of the horse blanket.