Jan's eyes searched
the water as they approached shore, and at last he saw what he had
expected to find--O'Grady's empty canoe drifting slowly away from the
beach. O'Grady and the Chippewayan were gone.
Over that half-mile portage Jan staggered with his eyes half closed and
his breath coming in gasps. The smoke blinded him, and at times the heat
of the fire scorched his face. In several places it had crossed the
trail, and the hot embers burned through their moccasins. Once Jackpine
uttered a cry of pain. But Jan's lips were set. Then, above the roar of
the flames sweeping down upon the right of them, he caught the low
thunder of Dead Man's Whirlpool and the cataract that had made the
portage necessary. From the heated earth their feet came to a narrow
ledge of rock, worn smooth by the furred and moccasined tread of
centuries, with the chasm on one side of them and a wall of rock on the
other. Along the crest of that wall, a hundred feet above them, the fire
swept in a tornado of flame and smoke. A tree crashed behind them, a
dozen seconds too late. Then the trail widened and sloped down into the
dip that ended the portage. For an instant Jan paused to get his bearing,
and behind him Jackpine shouted a warning.
Up out of the smoldering oven where O'Grady should have found his canoe
two men were rushing toward them. They were O'Grady and the Chippewayan.
He caught the gleam of a knife in the Indian's hand.
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