After that Miki DID understand. He knew that happiness had come to
all who were in that cabin.
Now that his world was settled, Miki took once more to hunting.
The thrill of the trail came back to him, and wider and wider grew
his range from the cabin. Again he followed Le Beau's old
trapline. But the traps were sprung now. He had lost a great deal
of his old caution. He had grown fatter. He no longer scented
danger in every whiff of the wind. It was in the third week of
Challoner's stay at the cabin, the day which marked the end of the
cold spell and the beginning of warm weather, that Miki came upon
an old dead-fall in a swamp a full ten miles from the clearing. Le
Beau had set it for lynx, but nothing had touched the bait, which
was a chunk of caribou flesh, frozen solid as a rock. Curiously
Miki began smelling of it. He no longer feared danger. Menace had
gone out of his world. He nibbled. He pulled--and the log crashed
down to break his back. Only by a little did it fail. For twenty-
four hours it held him helpless and crippled. Then, fighting
through all those hours, he dragged himself out from under it.
With the rising temperature a soft snow had fallen, covering all
tracks and trails.
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