Ambrose dreaded to hear Peter call attention to the remarkable coincidence of Poly’s story following so close upon their own talk together.  He suspected that Peter would want to sit up and thrash the matter to conclusions.

At the bare idea of talking about it Ambrose felt as helpless and sullen as a convicted felon.

In this he underrated Peter’s perceptions.  Peter had lived in the woods for many years.  He intuitively apprehended something of the confusion in the younger man’s mind, and he was only anxious to let Ambrose understand that it was not necessary to say anything one way or the other.

But he overdid it a little, and when Ambrose saw that Peter was “on to him,” as he would have said, he became still more hang-dog and perverse.

They parted at the door of the store.  Peter went off to his family, while Ambrose closed the door of his own little shack behind him, with a long breath of relief.

Feeling as he did, it was torture to be obliged to support the gaze of another’s eye, however kindly.  So urgent was his need to be alone that he even turned his back on his dog.  For a long time the poor beast softly scratched and whined at the closed door unheeded.

Ambrose was busy inside.  As it began to grow dark he lit his lamp and carefully pinned a heavy shirt inside his window in lieu of a blind.

Since Peter and his family went to bed with the sun it would be hard to say whom he feared might spy on him.  One listening at the door might well have wondered what the activity inside portended.

Later Ambrose opened the door and, putting the dog in, proceeded cautiously to the store.  Satisfying himself from the sounds that issued through the connecting door that Peter and his family slept deeply, he lit a candle and quietly robbed the stock of what he required.  Then he wrote a note and pinned it beside the store door.

Carrying the bundles back to his cabin, he packed a grub-box and bore it down to the water.

His preparations completed, he went to his shack to bid good-by to his four-footed pal.  Job, instantly, comprehending that he was to be left behind, whimpered and nozzled so piteously that Ambrose’s heart began to fail.

“I can’t take you, old fel’!” he explained.  “You’re such a common-looking mutt.  Of course, I know you’re white clear through—­but a lady would laugh at you until she knew you!”

Even as he said it his heart accused him of disloyalty.  He suddenly changed his mind.

“Come on!” he whispered gruffly.  “We’ll chance our luck together.  If you open your head I’ll brain you!  Wait here a minute.”

Job understood perfectly.  He crept down to the lake shore at his master’s feet as quiet as a ghost.  Seeing the loaded boat he hopped delightedly into his accustomed place in the bow.

During June it never becomes wholly dark in the latitude of Lake Miwasa.  An exquisite dim twilight brooded over the wide water and the pine-walled shore.  The stars sparkled faintly in an oxidized silver sea.  There was no wind now, but the pines breathed like warm-blooded creatures.