The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1912-09-03

to find If It had begun to snow before Dixon left.''
 'tAn hour after he had gone you could not see your hand before your face,' replied Ledoq, preparing his pack. ''There is no doubt but that he circled out over Lac Bain. We will go that far together and then search alone"
 They went back over the mountain and stopped when instinct told them that they were opposite the spruce for ests of the lake. There they separated. Jan going as nearly as he could guess into the northwest, Ledoq trailing slow E and hopelessly into the south.
 It was no great sanEi11ca fnr Jan thia Struggle with the big snows for the happiness of Melisse. What it was to LedoQ no man ever guessed or knew, for it was not until the late spring SHOWS had gone that the people at Lac Bain found what the foxes and the wolves had left of him far to the south.
 Fearless1y Jan plunged into the white world of the lake. There was neither rock nor tree to guide him, for every where was the heavy ghost raiment of the Indian god. Day came, only lit tie lighter than the night. He crossed the lake, his snowshoes sinking ankle deep at every step, and once each half hour he fired a single shot from his rifle. He heard shots to the south and knew that it was Ledoq, each report coming to him more faintly than the last until they had died away entirely.
 Across the lake he struck the forest again, and his shouts echoed in futile inquiry in it's weird depths. At noon
 
 went on, carrying his rifle always upon his right shoulder, so that the steps of his right leg would be shortened and he would travel in a circle, as he believed Dixon had done.
 The storm thickened with the falling of night, and he burrowed himself a great hole in the soft snow and filled fit with balsam boughs for a bed. When he awakened, hours later, he stood up and thrust out his head and found himself buried to the armpfts. With the aid of his broad snowshoes he drew himself out until he stood knee deep in the surface.
 He lifted his pack. As he swung it before him, one arm thrust through a strap, he gave a startled cry. Half Of one side of the pack was eaten awayi A thin trickle of flour ran through his fingers upon the snow. He pulled out Q gnawed pound of bacon, a little tea, and that was all.
 Frantically he ripped the rent wider in his search, and when he stood up his wild face staring into the chaos about him, he held only the bit of bacon in his hand. In it were the imprints of tiny teeth-sharp little razor edged teeth that told him what had happen
 
 robbed him of his food!
 With one of his shoes he began dig ging furiously in the snow. He tore his balsam bed to pieces. Somewhere somewhere not very far away-the little animal must have cached its theft. He dug down until he came to the frozen earth. For an hour he worked and found nothing.
 Then he stopped. Over small fire he melted snow for tea and broiled a slice of the bacon, which he ate with the few biscuit crumbs he found in the pack. Every particle of four that he could find he scraped up with his knife and put into one of the deep pockets of his caribou coat. After that he set out in the direction in which he thought he would find Lac Bain.
 Still he shouted for Dixon and fred an occasional shot from his rife. By noon he should have struck the lake. Noon came and passed; the gloom of a second night fell upon him. He built himself a fire and ate two-thirds of what remained of the bacon. The handful of four in his pocket he did not disturb.
 It was still night when he broke his rest and struggled on. His first fears were gone. In place of them there filled him now grim sort of pleasure. A second time he was battling with death for Melisse. And this, after all, was not very hard fight for him. When he ate the last bit of his bacon he made up his mind what he would do when the end came. In the stock of his rifle he would scratch a few last words to Melisse. He even ar ranged the words in his brain-four of them-"AIelisse, I love you.'' He re- peated them to himself as he stagger- ed on, and that night beside the fire he built he began by carving her name.
 Tomorrow he said softly, "I will do the rest.''
 He was growing very hungry, but he did not touch the four. For six hours l he slept and then drank his fill of hot