ung buck to tighten and convert the
d into a welter of consuming flame.
we urged the horses to a canter.
e get that son of a gun yet,” mut-
Hidson as I drew alongside. “If he
ninks he’s slipped that over he’s got another
suess coming. We'll hit for old Tremblay’s
page and jump him when he’s not expecting
16.

‘The bluff drew closer. A straggling pop-
ar slipped by . . . another, and another.
fidson mopped his forehead. “I don’t
telling you,” he admitted, “I had the
d up when I heard the click of those
locks in the creek. Come on,” he urged,

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TER EDITION

“we'll ride for that draw ahead there and
put that ridge between us and those damned
Beavers.”

It was dark when we clattered down a
rocky ravine past a scattering of luminous
Cree tepees and rode into the stronghold of
old man Tremblay, Pouce Coupe’s first
pioneer settler. “Them Beavers is sure
spilin’ for trouble,” growled the grey-
bearded veteran of the Sitting Bull wars
as he led us into a commodious log building
lighted by a roaring fire in a huge stone
fireplace and set before us a sumptuous meal
of bear’s ham and bannock. ““They’re cocky
as hell right now. And these here settlers
what’s come in over the Sturgeon Lake and
Edson trail is sure pilin’ up trouble for
themsel’s by being so almighty scared.”

Two weeks later we were huddled in a
draw a scant mile from the coulee through
which we’d ridden to beat the Beavers to it.
At Grande Prairie City—a huddle of halt
a dozen shacks and cabins—I’d loaded my
pack-train with goods for the Indian trade,
and returned with Hidson to old Tremblay’s.

Andree, the medicine man, captured by Provin-
cial Police by a daring ruse.

By the judicious distribution of coloured
cloth and ammunition two of old Tremblay’s
most reliable Cree scouts and hunters had
been persuaded to spy out the lay of the
land at the Beaver camp. The Wolf, and
most of the Beavers, they reported, were off
on a hunt towards the foothills, while And-
ree was living in Wolf’s tepee engaged in
some purification rites to ward off the ghosts
of a couple of Beavers who'd recently passed
to the Happy Hunting Grounds. That
morning Hidson had hitched two of his
horses to a borrowed democrat, struck south
to misiead any watchful Beavers, then,
circling north, we'd gone into hiding near
the camp to await darkness.
“Remember,” Hidson warned as we pre-

pared to break camp, “you'll slow down as
we reach the tepees, Mannie’ll drive on with
your pack-train and I'll try and sneak into
Wolf’s lodge and grab that damned
Andree.”

Hidson laid the whip across the team,
sending the democrat rolling across the
darkened prairie, all sound deadened by a
rising chinook and the muffling of the wheels
upon the snow. Ahead thudded the pack
horses, urged on by Mannie. The poplar
bluff loomed up and slipped swiftly by. At
last faint triangles of light leapt out of the
darkness. Above the roar of the chinook
echoed faintly the dull reverberations of a
tom-tom. “Andree!” Hidson whispered
hoarsely. “Trying to scare off the ghosts of
the dead Beavers... easy!” I eased the team
to a halt and Hidson melted into the dark-
ness.

My blood was pounding through my veins
as I awaited the outcome in considerable
doubt. Each moment I expected a frightened
shout to rouse the camp and bring a horde
of angry Beavers about our ears, but the
monotonous thump, thump of the medicine
drum continued to rise above the moaning
of the wind. Abruptly it ceased. A rosy
pathway shot momentarily athwart the
snow. A shadowy something moved between
me and the dimly lighted tepee. From the
darkness came the, sound of laboured

breathing. Ebony figures loomed up close,

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