great weight against the collar and pull until his footing gave way.

The third dog of the team was Slasher, a gaunt, untamed malamute, red-eyed and vicious—a throwback to the wolf. His former owner, tired of fighting him over the trails, was on the point of shooting him when Connie interceded, and offered to buy him.

"Why, son, he'd eat ye alive!" said the man; "an' if harm was to come to Sam Morgan's boy through fault of a man-eatin' wolf-dog which same he'd got off o' me, why, this here Alaska land 'ud be too small to hold me. No, son, I guess we'll jest put him out o' the way o' harmin' folks." But the boy persisted, and to the unspeakable amazement of the man, walked up and loosened the heavy leather muzzle.

White fangs an inch long gleamed wickedly as the boy patted his head, but the vicious, ripping slash which the onlookers expected did not follow. The crouching dog glared furtively, with back curled lips—suspicious. Here was something he did not understand—this man-brute of small size who approached him bare-handed and without a club. So he glared red-eyed, alert for some new trick of torture. But nothing happened, and presently from the pocket of his parka this strange man-brute drew a piece of smoked fish which the dog accepted from his bare fingers with a lightning-like click of polished fangs, but the fingers did not jerk away in fear even though the fangs closed together a scant inch from their ends.

A piece of ham rind followed the fish and the small man-brute reached down and flung the hated muzzle far out into the snow, and with it the collar and the thong lash.

The wolf-dog rose for the first time in his life unfettered. He shook himself and surveyed the astonished group of men. The stiff, coarse hair along his spine stood erect and he uttered a low throaty growl of defiance; then he turned and stalked toward the boy, planting his feet deliberately and stiffly after the manner of dogs whose temper quivers on a hair-trigger. Guns were loosened in the holsters of the men, but the boy smiled and extended his hand toward the dog, which advanced, the very personification of savage hate.

The men gasped as the pointed muzzle touched the small bared hand and a long, red tongue shot out and licked the fingers. At the sound, the dog placed himself before the boy and glared at them, and then quietly followed Connie to the corral at the rear of the log store.

"He's yours, son," exclaimed the prospector, as the boy joined them. "No, I won't take no pay for him. You saved his life, an' he b'longs to you—only be careful. Don't never take your eyes off him. I don't trust no malamute, let alone that there Slasher dog."

With the lengthening of the days the Northland began to feel the approach of spring. Snow melted on the more exposed mountain slopes, and now and then the trails softened, so that men camped at midday.

Connie found time to take short excursions with his team up the neighbouring gulches, occasionally spending the night in the cabin of some prospector.

He was beginning to regard himself as a "sure enough sourdough" now, and could talk quite wisely of cradles and rockers, of sluices and riffles, and pay dirt and bed rock.

Then, one day when the store was full of miners and prospectors awaiting the mail, Waseche Bill burst into the room with the story of his big strike on Ten Bow. Instantly pandemonium broke loose. Men in a frenzy of excitement threw their outfits onto sleds and swung the dogs onto the ice trail of the river, struggling and fighting for place.

McDougall, with his mail team of ten fast malamutes, bet a thousand dollars he would beat out Dutch Henry's crack Hudson Bays. Men came down from the hills and joined the stampede, and by evening a hundred dog teams were on the trail.

During the excitement, Waseche Bill sought out Connie and drew him to one side:

"Listen, son," whispered Waseche, speaking hurriedly, and to the point, "git in on this, d'yo heah? Quick now, git out yo' dogs an' hit the trail. Old Boris'll take yo' theh. The's always one mo' pull in a good dog, an' he'll unde'stand. I've been wo'kin' Ten Bow fo' six months, an' he knows the sho't-cut. Keep up yo' nerve, an' follow that dog. He'll swing off up Little Rampa't, an' the othe's will keep to the big riveh—but it's the long way 'round. It's only 'bout eighty mile by the sho't-cut, an' a good two hund'ed by the riveh. I come down the long way so's to have a smooth trail fo' my new lead dog. The other's a rough trail, over ridges an' acrost gulches, up hill an' down, but yo' c'n make it! Boris, he'll see yo' through. An' when yo' strike Ten Bow—yo'll know it, 'cause it's the only valley that shows red rock—swing no'th 'til yo' come to a big split rock, an' theh yo'll find my stakes.

"Now, listen! My claim'll be Discovery." The man lowered his voice yet more: "An' yo' stake out One Below Discovery—below, mind. 'Cause she's a sho' winneh, an' togetheh we'll have the cream o' the gulch—me an' yo' will."

Many outfits passed Connie on the trail; the men laughing and joking, good-naturedly urged the boy onward. He only laughed in return, as he encouraged his ill-matched team—Big Mutt plunging against the collar, Slasher pulling wide with the long jumps of the wolf-dog, and old Boris with lowered head, in the easy lope of the born leader. Mile after mile they covered on the smooth trail of the river, and it seemed to the boy as if every outfit in Alaska had passed him in the race. But he urged the dogs onward, for the fever was in his blood—and like his father before him, he was answering the call of gold.

Suddenly, without a moment's hesitation, old Boris swerved from the trail and headed for the narrow cleft between two towering walls of rock, which was the mouth of Little Rampart. On and on they mushed, following the creek bed which wound crookedly between its precipitous sides.

Again old Boris swerved. This time it was to head up a steep, narrow pass leading into the hills. Connie had his hands full at the gee-pole, for it was dark now—not the black darkness of the States, but the sparkling, star-lit dark of the aurora land.

He camped at midnight on a flat plateau near the top of a high divide. Morning found him again on the trail. He begrudged every minute of inaction, for well he knew the fame of McDougall's mail dogs, and Dutch Henry's Hudson Bays. It turned warmer. The snow slumped under foot, and he lost two hours at midday, waiting for the stiffening chill of the lengthening shadows.

On the third day it snowed. Not the fierce, cutting snow of the fall and winter, but large, feathery flakes, that lay soft and deep on the crust and piled up in front of the sled. That night he camped early, for both boy and dogs were weary with the trail-strain.

During the night the snow stopped falling and the wind rose, driving it into huge drifts. Progress was slow now and every foot of the trail was hard-earned. Old Boris picked his way among boulders and drifts with the wisdom of long practice. Slasher settled down to a steady pull, and Big Mutt threw himself into the collar and fairly lifted the sled through the loose snow. Toward noon they slanted into a wide valley, and the tired eyes of the boy brightened as they saw the bold outcropping of red rock. Then immediately they grew serious, and he urged the dogs to greater effort, for, far down the valley, dotting the white expanse of snow, were many moving black specks.

Old Boris turned toward the north, and the boy saw the huge