If the wolves had not turned their first mad attack upon the dogs, what would have become of himself, Joan and the baby?
He turned away, with another of those hollow coughs that brought the blood to his lips.
A few yards to one side he found in the snow the trail of the strange dog that had come with the wolves, and had turned against them in that moment when all seemed lost.

It was not a clean running trail.

It was more of a furrow in the snow, and Pierre Radisson followed it, expecting to find the dog dead at the end of it.
In the sheltered spot to which he had dragged himself in the edge of the forest Kazan lay for a long time after the fight, alert and watchful.
He felt no very great pain.

But he had lost the power to stand upon his legs.

His flanks seemed paralyzed.