spruce and banskian pine thickened until they formed dark walls of forest and whenever they approached these patches Philip commanded Blake to take the middle of the river.  The width of the stream was a comforting protection.  It was seldom less than two hundred yards from shore to shore and frequently twice that distance.  From the possible ambuscades they passed only a rifle could be used effectively, and whenever there appeared to be the possibility of that danger Philip traveled close to Blake, with the revolver in his hand.  The crack of a rifle even if the bullet should find its way home, meant Blake’s life.  Of that fact the outlaw could no longer have a doubt.

For an hour before the gray dusk of Arctic night began to gather about them Philip began to feel the effect of their strenuous pace.  Hours of cramped inactivity on the sledge had brought into Celie’s face lines of exhaustion.  Since middle-afternoon the dogs had dragged at times in their traces.  Now they were dead-tired.  Blake, and Blake alone, seemed tireless.  It was six o’clock when they entered a country that was mostly plain, with a thin fringe of timber along the shores.  They had raced for nine hours, and had traveled fifty miles.  It was here, in a wide reach of river, that Philip gave the command to halt.

His first caution was to secure Blake hand and foot, with his back resting against a frozen snow-hummock a dozen paces from the sledge.  The outlaw accepted the situation with an indifference which seemed to Philip more forced than philosophical.  After that, while Celie was walking back and forth to produce a warmer circulation in her numbed body, he hurried to the scrub timber that grew along the shore and returned with a small armful of dry wood.  The fire he built was small, and concealed as much as possible by the sledge.  Ten minutes sufficed to cook the meat for their supper.  Then he stamped out the fire, fed the dogs, and made a comfortable nest of bear skins for himself and Celie, facing Blake.  The night had thickened until he could make out only dimly the form of the outlaw against the snow-hummock.  His revolver lay ready at his side.

In that darkness he drew Celie close up into his arms.  Her head lay on his breast.  He buried his lips in the smothering sweetness of her hair, and her arms crept gently about his neck.  Even then he did not take his eyes from Blake, nor for an instant did he cease to listen for other sounds than the deep breathing of the exhausted dogs.  It was only a little while before the stars began to fill the sky.  The gloom lifted slowly, and out of darkness rose the white world in a cold, shimmering glory.  In that starlight he could see the glisten of Celie’s hair as it covered them like a golden veil, and once or twice through the space that separated them he caught the flash of a strange fire in the outlaw’s eyes.  Both shores were visible.  He could have seen the approach of a man two hundred yards away.