vigorous exercise had brought

They had been in the woods for three weeks now.[344] They weren’t traveling as light as Phil had done the year before and the outfit included two canoes, well loaded. So they went slowly northward by easy stages, fishing the small streams and camping early. Gallatin had at first been in some doubt as to his partner’s physical fitness for severe work, but he soon found that he need have given himself no concern, for with every day a year seemed to be slipping away from John Kenyon, who insisted on taking his share of the burdens with a will that set Phil Gallatin’s mind at rest. And as they went farther into the wilderness, they made almost camp for camp the ones that Phil had made the year before. John Kenyon had hoped that Phil would take him into the Kawagama country. He wanted very much to see that waterfall on the south fork of the Birch River that Phil had spoken of. Kenyon had an eye for the beautiful.







For some time he had been wondering what course of action he would take if Phil refused to fall in with his plans, and had already begun to think that it was time to take Joe into his confidence; but he soon found that subterfuge was unnecessary, for Gallatin was directing their course with an unerring definiteness to his own farthest camp among the hills. John Kenyon guessed something of what was passing in the mind of the younger man, and over the camp-fire watched him furtively. The sun and wind had tanned him and the an appetite that had filled the hollows of his cheeks; but in spite of the glow of health and youth and the delight of their old friendship, a shadow still hung in Phil Gallatin’s eyes, which even the joy of the present could not dispel. Kenyon smoked quietly and asked subtle questions about their further pilgrimage.







“To-morrow we’ll reach the permanent camp, eh, Joe?” said Gallatin.







[345]







Keegón nodded.







“We’ll stay there for a while—fish and explore.”







As the time approached for his dénouement, Kenyon had a guilty sense of intrusion which tempered his delight in the possible success of the venture. But he remembered that he had had little to do in shaping the course of events or the direction of their voyage, except to modify the speed of their journeys so that Phil might reach the spot intended at the appointed time. Phil seemed drawn forward as though by a lodestar to his destination, as though some force greater than his own will was impelling him .







Kenyon had taken pains to keep a record by the calendar. It was the twenty-eighth of June. The next day Kenyon changed places with Phil and went in Joe’s canoe, when he took the old Indian into his confidence.