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slovenly affair, tent half-stretched, dishes unwashed, everything in disorder; also, he saw a woman. Mercedes the man called her. She was Charles’s wife and Hal’s sister—a nice family party.
    Buck watched them apprehensively as they proceeded to take down the tent and load the sled. There was a great deal of effort about their manner, but no business-like method. The tent was rolled into an awkward bundle three times as large as it should have been. The tin dishes were packed away unwashed. Mercedes continually fluttered in the way of her men and kept up an unbroken chattering of remonstrance and advice. When they put a clothes sack on the front of the sled, she suggested it should go on the back; and when they had put it on the back, and covered it over with a couple of other bundles, she discovered overlooked articles which could abide nowhere else but in that very sack, and they unloaded again.
    Three men from a neighboring tent came out and looked on, grinning and winking at one another.
    â€œYou’ve got a right smart load as it is,” said one of them; “and it’s not me should tell you your business, but I wouldn’t tote that tent along if I was you.”
    â€œUndreamed of!” cried Mercedes, throwing up her hands in dainty dismay. “However in the world could I manage without a tent?”
    â€œIt’s springtime, and you won’t get any more cold weather,” the man replied.
    She shook her head decidedly, and Charles and Hal put the last odds and ends on top the mountainous load.
    â€œThink it’ll ride?” one of the men asked.
    â€œWhy shouldn’t it?” Charles demanded rather shortly.
    â€œOh, that’s all right, that’s all right,” the man hastened meekly to say. “I was just a-wonderin’, that is all. It seemed a mite top heavy.”
    Charles turned his back and drew the lashings down as well as he could, which was not in the least well.
    â€œAn’ of course the dogs can hike along all day with that contraption behind them,” affirmed a second of the men.
    â€œCertainly,” said Hal, with freezing politeness, taking hold of the gee pole with one hand and swinging his whip from the other. “Mush!” he shouted. “Mush on there!”
    The dogs sprang against the breastbands, strained hard for a few moments, then relaxed. They were unable to move the sled.
    â€œThe lazy brutes, I’ll show them,” he cried, preparing to lash out at them with the whip.
    But Mercedes interfered, crying, “Oh, Hal, you mustn’t,” as she caught hold of the whip and wrenched it from him. “The poor dears! Now you must promise you won’t be harsh with them for the rest of the trip, or I won’t go a step.”
    â€œPrecious lot you know about dogs,” her brother sneered; “and I wish you’d leave me alone. They’re lazy, I tell you, and you’ve got to whip them to get anything out of them. That’s their way. You ask anyone. Ask one of those men.”
    Mercedes looked at them imploringly, untold repugnance at sight of pain written in her pretty face.
    â€œThey’re weak as water, if you want to know,” came the reply from one of the men. “Plumb tuckered out, that’s what’s the matter. They need a rest.”
    â€œRest be blanked,” said Hal, with his beardless lips; and Mercedes said, “Oh!” in pain and sorrow at the oath.
    But she was a clannish creature, and rushed at once to the defense of her brother. “Never mind that man,” she said pointedly. “You’re driving our dogs, and you do what you think best with them.”
    Again Hal’s whip fell upon the dogs. They threw themselves against the breastbands, dug their feet into the packed snow, got down low to it, and put forth all their strength. The sled held as though it were an anchor. After two efforts, they stood still, panting. The whip was