She bounded among them like a flash, singled out Wee Johnnie Tamarack, and proceeded to deluge the old man with an avalanche of words.  When finally she paused for sheer lack of breath, the old Indian, who had understood but the smallest fragment of what she had said, remained obviously unimpressed.  Whereupon the girl produced the letter, which she waved before his face, accompanying the act with another tirade of words of which the Indian understood less than he had of the previous outburst.

Wee Johnnie Tamarack took his orders only from MacNair.  MacNair had said, “Go to the school for provisions,” and to the school he must go.  Nevertheless, the sight of the letter impressed him.  For in the Northland His Majesty’s mail is held sacred and must be carried to its destination, though the heavens fall.

To the mind of Wee Johnnie Tamarack a letter was “mail,” and the fact that its status might be altered by the absence of His Majesty’s stamp upon its corner was an affair beyond the old man’s comprehension.

Therefore he ordered the other Indians to continue their journey, and, motioning the girl to a place on the sled, headed his dogs northward and sent them skimming over the back-trail.

Wee Johnnie Tamarack was counted one of the best dog-mushers in the North, and as the girl had succeeded in implanting in the old man’s mind an urgent need of haste, he exerted his talent to the utmost.  Mile after mile, behind the flying feet of the tireless malamutes, the sled-runners slipped smoothly over the crust of the ice-hard snow.

And at midnight of the second day they dashed across the smooth surface of the lake and brought up with a rush before the door of MacNair’s own cabin, which luckily had been spared by the flames.

It was a record drive, for a “two-man” load—­that drive of Wee Johnnie Tamarack’s, having clipped twelve hours from a thirty-six-hour trail.

MacNair’s door flew open to their frantic pounding.  The girl thrust the letter into his hand, and with a supreme effort told what she knew of the disappearance of Chloe and Big Lena.  Whereupon, she threw herself at full length upon the floor and immediately sank into a profound sleep.

MacNair fumbled upon the shelf for a candle and, lighting it, seated himself beside the table, and tore the envelope from the letter.  Never in his life had the man read words penned by the hand of a woman.  The fingers that held the letter trembled, and he wondered at the wild beating of his heart.

The story of the Louchoux girl had aroused in him a sudden fear.  He wondered vaguely that the disappearance of Chloe Elliston could have caused the dull hurt in his breast.  The pages in his hand were like no letter he had ever received.  There was something personal—­intimate—­about them.  His huge fingers gripped them lightly, and he turned them over and over in his hand, gazing almost in awe upon the bold, angular writing.  Then, very slowly, he began to read the words.