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A silence ensued, fraught with poignant fear for Helen, as she gazed into Bo's whitening face She read her sister'stales of lost people who never were found

"Me an' Milt get lost every day," said Roy "You don't suppose anycountry It's nothin' for us to be lost"

"Oh! I was lost when I was little," said Bo

"Wal, I reckon it'd been better not to tell you so offhand like," replied Roy, contritely "Don't feel bad, now All I need is a peek at Old Baldy Then I'll have my bearin' Come on"

Helen's confidence returned as Roy led off at a fast trot He rode toward the westering sun, keeping to the ridge they had ascended, until once more he came out upon a proher and closer The dark forest showed round, yellow, bare spots like parks

"Not so far off the track," said Roy, as he wheeled his horse "We'll ht"

He led down off the ridge into a valley and then up to higher altitude, where the character of the forest changed The trees were no longer pines, but firs and spruce, growing thin and exceedingly tall, with few branches below the topht seemed to have come

Travel was arduous Everywhere indfalls that had to be avoided, and not a rod was there without a fallen tree The horses, laboring slowly, sometimes sank knee-deep into the brown duff Gray rew thick on the rotting logs

Helen loved this forest priloo wood, and sweet fragrance of spruce The great windfalls, where trees were jaery of the stor up a nu for place Even the trees fought one another! The forest was a place of htnings had split firs clear to the roots, and others it had circled with ripping tear fro wildness of the forest, in density and fallen timber, round and trees in her i ahead at the beautiful wilderness was denied her Thereafter travel became toil and the hours endless