San Antonio light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1911-1993, 1923-09-20

The trails Of these two trapperS
| often crossed, in the weeks to come
They kept close track of each others
schedules, and they soon worked out
a system whereby they could meet
at the Forks cabin at almost every
circuit.
No longer did Ned 90 about his
work in the flimsy clothes of the
city. Out of the pelts he had dried
Bess helped TO make him garments
and moccasins as warm and service
able as her own, supplied through
an unexpected burst of generosity ON
Doomsdorf's part soon after their ar
rival on the island. They brought
their hardest problems to the Forks
cabin and solved them together.
Day after day the snow sifted
down, ever laying a deeper covering
over the island, bending down the
limbs Of the strong trees, obscuring
all things under this cold infinity Of
white. The traps had to be labori-
ously dug out and reset, again and
again.
When the skies cleared, an un.
dreamed degree of cold took posses
sion of the land. The fingers froze
in the instant that the fur gloves
were removed, and the hottest fires
could hardly warm the cabins. And
on these clear, bitter nights the North
ern Lights were an ineffable glory in
the sky.
Their bodies built up to endure
even such hardship as this. This
fact that the snow at last packed was
a factor, too: they were able to skim
over the white crust at pace even
faster than the best time they had
made in early fall.
The result was that at last the
companionship between Bess and Ned,
forgotten in the dread horror of the
early winter months, was revived.
Again they had pleasant hours about
the stove at the Forks cabin, some
times working at pelts, sometimes
even enjoying the unheard-of luxury
of few minutes of idleness.
Very naturally, and scarcely aware
of the fact themselves, they had come
to be the best of companions.
Ned's hours with Lenore, however.
gave him less satisfaction than they
had at first. She somehow failed to
understand what he had been through.
Slowly, by the school of hardship,
and conquest over hardship. Ned Cor
net was winning a new self-mastery, a
new self-confidence to take the place
of the self-conceit that had brought
him to disaster. But the first real
of Weakening was also one of
peril-on the trapping trail one clear
afternoon toward the bitter close of
January
He had been quietly following that
portion of the trap line that followed
the timber belt between the Twelve
mile cabin and Forks cabin. and the |
blazed trail had led him into the depths |
Of a heavy thicket of young spruce. He |
had never felt more secure. The only |
hint of danger that the Red Gods af- |
forded him did not half penetrate his |
and did not in the least |
call him from his pleasant fancies. 1t |
was only a glimpse of green where the |
snow had been shaken from a compact |
little group Of sapling spruce just be-
side one of his sets. Likely the wind |
had caught the little trees just right
perhaps some unfortunate little fur
bearer, a marten perhaps. or a fisher,
itu anu
little trees in an effort to free himself
rom the trap. He walked up quietly.
coated the tree to which the trap chain
vas attached, bent and started to draw
he trap from the small, dem, thicket
whence some creature had dragged it.
He was only casually interested in
what manner of poor. frozen creature
would be revealed between the steel
avs. The beauty of the day had
wholly taken his mind from his work.
One moment. and the forest was
sleep about him; the little trees looked
;adly burdened with their loads of
NOW. The next, and the man was
hurled to the ground by n savage,
'narling thing that leaped from the CO.
'ert like the snow demon it was; and
white, cleaning fangs were flashing
oward his throat.
NH.
Except for the impeachment of the
rap on the creatures foot, there would
AVE been but one blow to that battle