And every minute his heart thumped expectantly, and he sniffed the new air for signs of those he most desired to find.
Dawn was breaking in the sky when they came out of the swamp, and the first flush of the sun was lighting up the east when Breault headed his improvised craft for the sandbar upon which Nada and McKay had rested many hours before.
Breault was tired, but his eyes lighted up when he saw the footprints in the sand, and he chuckled--almost good humoredly.

As a matter of fact he was in a good humor.

But one would not have reckoned it as such in Breault.

A hard man, the forests called him; a man with the hunting instincts of the fox and the wolf and the merciless persistency of the weazel--a man who lived his code to the last letter of the law, without pity and without favoritism.

At least so he was judged, and his hard, narrow eyes, his thin lips and his cynically lined face seldom betrayed the better thoughts within him, if he possessed any at all.