It was only in Ralph's presence that Kitty's pride sufficed to bear her up. When she and Jim returned to the shacks she collapsed again, and Jim had no difficulty in reasserting his parental authority. When the sudden hue and cry was raised after Ralph, Jim ordered her to remain behind locked doors while he went to investigate. She dared not disobey him. She awaited his return in a state bordering on distraction; her quick imagination running ahead to picture horrors overtaking the man she loved. On his coming in she read in his face that the worst had not happened—but less than the worst was bad enough.

Little by little she wormed out of him all that he had learned. Jim affected to make light of the matter, insisting that Ralph was getting no more than his due. Kitty's truer instinct warned her that the young man was in the hands of deadly and unscrupulous enemies, who would stop at nothing, so they thought themselves safe. Supper in the shack was a ghastly pretence for her. Her hands shook so that she could scarcely lift the dishes. Her distracted eyes saw nothing they were turned on, all her faculties being concentrated on listening for sounds from the point. Jim, exasperated beyond bearing by the sight of her distress, lost his temper and stormed at her, with inconsistency worse than that he accused her of.

Fortunately for her it was Jim's habit to turn in almost immediately after eating. Not even the extraordinary sequence of events this day could keep him up an hour longer than his time. He refused to return to the point, from a secret fear perhaps of learning something that would shake the philosophic stand he had taken. He retired to his bunk in the kitchen, and Kitty locked herself in her own room.

Here she was at least free to listen without being sworn at. She flung herself across her bed with her head on the window-sill. The night was absolutely still except for the tireless voice of the brook. Its senseless chatter and brawl drove her wild. She could hear nothing above it. To be obliged to wait and listen, practically a prisoner, with only her imagination free to create the worst—real madness lay that way. If they were going to carry him off bound and helpless, she knew she must follow or die. She rose and listened at the door. Jim was snoring like an exhaust pipe. "He can sleep!" she thought, amazed. Catching up a shawl, she slipped out of the window the way Nahnya had gone.

Her flying moccasined feet fell noiselessly on the earth. She ran around the house, and down the trail toward the river. It was not yet dark. Fearful of being seen, she struck off the trail and ran doubled up under the willow branches like a partridge in cover. Every few seconds she stopped short, holding her breath in the effort to hear. The turmoil of the brook still drowned all other sounds. A suggestion of men's voices and coarse laughter only tantalized her ears. Yesterday if anybody had told Kitty she would be spying on a camp of rough men and listening to their talk she would have covered her head in shame. She never thought of shame now.

She came closer and closer by little runs until no more than twenty yards separated her from their camp. She could see the light of their fire reflected on the high branches overhead. Here she crouched down behind a thick screen of leaves, prepared to spend the night if need be. For a while she could hear nothing. She began to fear that they must have gone after all, taking him. Suddenly a disembodied voice fell upon her ears.

"He's come to," it said. "Try him again."

Kitty's heart stood still at the picture this called up. There was a pause; then another voice said brutally:

"Will you tell?"

She had no clue to the scene of her previous knowledge, but her intuition told her what was taking place. Another pause, and a soft, torn groan reached Kitty's ears. She sprang up, electrified. Gone were all maidenly modesties and shrinkings. Fiery-eyed and self-forgetful as a mother-animal whose young are threatened, she crashed through the branches, and stood among the men, crying:

"Let him alone, you cowards!"

Joe Mixer, Stack, and Crusoe Campbell fell back, dumfoundered. The half-breed, who slept by the fire, woke up, and partly raised himself, blinking at her stupidly. Kitty saw only Ralph. He hung limply on the rope that bound him to the tree. His face was ghastly, his breath came in gasps; and the sweat of pain had left wet channels in front of his ears and down his neck. Kitty flew to him with a moan of commiseration, and fumbled helplessly with the knots of the rope.

The men recovered from their surprise. Knowing that Jim had a daughter, it was not hard for them to explain Kitty's presence. As men must needs do everywhere in the presence of a genuinely angry woman, they looked silly and sheepish.

"Stand away from there, young lady!" growled Joe.

"You unspeakable coward!" cried Kitty, in her hushed and thrilling voice.

Joe flushed darkly. "Go back to your father," he said. "This is no place for you!"

Kitty paid no further attention to him.

"If he finds you here and cuts up rough, mind I warned you," blustered Joe. "These men will bear me out."

Neither the thought of her father's anger, nor anything else, could deter Kitty now. She worked desperately at the knots.

"Go back, Kitty," whispered Ralph between his pale lips. "You can't do any good!"

"Oh, my dear!" murmured Kitty on the passionately solicitous note of a mother to her hurt child.

"Campbell, take her away from there!" ordered Joe.

The long-haired nondescript grinning witlessly pinned Kitty's elbows to her sides from behind, and drew her away from the tree. She was helpless. Her eyes flashed.

"I'm not afraid of you—any of you!" she cried.

"You get this matter wrong, Miss," said Joe, with an offensive servility. "This fellow did us an injury. He is our rightful prisoner. But I don't want to be hard on him. I offered him his release on fair terms. If he don't take 'em, 'tain't my fault, is it?"

"Tell this man to take his hands off me, and I'll speak to you," said Kitty indignantly.

At a nod from Joe, Crusoe released her.

"What terms?" Kitty demanded to know.

"You tell him he's foolish," said Joe fawningly. "Maybe he'll listen to you. You tell him to tell me what I want to know, and I'll trouble him no further."

"What do you want to know?"

"Only where the girl Annie Crossfox lives."

The suddenness and completeness of the surprise almost undid Kitty. She swayed a little as under a physical blow. Her cheeks blanched. "Annie Crossfox?" she murmured.

"I have business with her," Joe went on. "I can find her anyway, but I'm in a hurry. Let him tell me, and I'll set him loose."

Kitty was torn into shreds by her conflicting emotions. It nearly killed her to see Ralph suffering so—and it turned her into ice to think that it was for Nahnya's sake he was bearing it. She was terrified, too, knowing that the secret was in her own keeping. Strange and dreadful consequences must depend upon it for Ralph to be willing to stake his life. Kitty saw plainly enough that they would kill him before he told.

Little Stack was watching Kitty with ferret-like sharpness. Suddenly he cried out: "She knows herself!"

Kitty felt as if a net had suddenly been cast over her head, entangling her inextricably.

Stack sprang up, and looking from Ralph to Kitty with a timorous, malignant smile, whispered in Joe's ear. Joe nodded in high satisfaction.

"So you know where he got his gold, and where the girl is hidden?" said Joe, leering at Kitty.

"No! No!" she protested desperately. "I know nothing!"

Her terror-stricken face betrayed her. Joe merely laughed. "Very good," he said, "you can make him tell us then, or tell us yourself."

Kitty's first impulse was to fly. She saw, however, that they meant to work on her through Ralph, and then nothing could have dragged her from the spot. Ralph's right arm had been freed, and it hung down outside the ropes that bound him. Joe grasped the helpless wrist. Kitty saw a quiver pass through Ralph; saw him try to stiffen his fainting body; saw the muscles stand out on his jaw as he clenched his teeth.

"Don't! Don't!" she cried wildly. "That's his hurt arm!" Crusoe Campbell's great hand pressed her back from rushing to Ralph's aid.

"I just give him a little osteopathy," said Joe grinning.

Kitty had dressed that shoulder every day; a vivid picture of the angry, throbbing flesh was before her. She had hardly dared touch it with her delicate fingers, and now she saw the butcher about to wreak his strength on it. An agonizing pain struck through her own frame. She nearly swooned.

Joe, watching Kitty with a sidelong smile, gave the arm a little twist. Kitty saw Ralph's eyes roll up with the pain. He made no sound.

"For a starter," said Joe. "Better tell before he gets worse!"

He lifted the arm again.

"Stop! Stop!" screamed Kitty. "I'll tell!" She sank to the ground and covered her face.

Ralph, half stupefied with pain and nausea, looked at Kitty with a dull wonder. He did not suspect that she knew the secret.

"Will you promise to let him go if I tell you?" murmured Kitty.

"I promise to let him go if you tell the truth," said Joe.

On the ground, with her hands clenched in her lap and her head bowed, Kitty began her tale breathlessly, as if she dared not pause to think of what she was doing. "About half a mile this side of the Grumbler rapids there is a stream comes in on the north side. You will know it by a large, flat rock beside the river. That is where you land. You will find a trail up the mountain beside the stream. You follow it until you come out of the forest at the foot of a big peak that sticks up like a thumb."

The men hung breathlessly on her words. The painstaking details carried conviction. Little Stack wrote it down in a notebook. With her first words a new horror was born in Ralph's face. He forgot his weakness.

"Near the place where you come out of the fores............