Something greater than mere curiosity began to take possession of Carvel.  A whimsical humor became a fixed and deeper thought, an unreasoning anticipation that was accompanied by a certain thrill of subdued excitement.  By the time they reached the old beaver pond the mystery of the strange adventure had a firm hold on him.  From Beaver Tooth’s colony Baree led him to the creek along which Wakayoo, the black bear, had fished, and thence straight to the Gray Loon.

It was early afternoon of a wonderful day.  It was so still that the rippling waters of spring, singing in a thousand rills and streamlets, filled the forests with a droning music.  In the warm sun the crimson bakneesh glowed like blood.  In the open spaces the air was scented with the perfume of blue flowers.  In the trees and bushes mated birds were building their nests.  After the long sleep of winter nature was at work in all her glory.  It was Unekepesim, the Mating Moon, the Home-building Moon—­and Baree was going home.  Not to matehood—­but to Nepeese.  He knew that she was there now, perhaps at the very edge of the chasm where he had seen her last.  They would be playing together again soon, as they had played yesterday, and the day before, and the day before that, and in his joy he barked up into Carvel’s face, and urged him to greater speed.

Then they came to the clearing, and once more Baree stood like a rock.  Carvel saw the charred ruins of the burned cabin, and a moment later the two graves under the tall spruce.  He began to understand as his eyes returned slowly to the waiting, listening dog.  A great swelling rose in his throat, and after a moment or two he said softly, and with an effort,

“Boy, I guess you’re home.”

Baree did not hear.  With his head up and his nose tilted to the blue sky he was sniffing the air.  What was it that came to him with the perfumes of the forests and the green meadow?  Why was it that he trembled now as he stood there?  What was there in the air?  Carvel asked himself, and his questing eyes tried to answer the questions.  Nothing.  There was death here—­death and desertion, that was all.  And then, all at once, there came from Baree a strange cry—­almost a human cry—­and he was gone like the wind.

Carvel had thrown off his pack.  He dropped his rifle beside it now, and followed Baree.  He ran swiftly, straight across the open, into the dwarf balsams, and into a grass-grown path that had once been worn by the travel of feet.  He ran until he was panting for breath, and then stopped, and listened.  He could hear nothing of Baree.  But that old worn trail led on under the forest trees, and he followed it.