It was a lantern in front of him, not more than ten feet away.

Consciousness flooded him, and he made another effort to cry out, to free his arms from an invisible clutch that held him powerless.
At first he thought this was the clutch of human hands; then as the lantern-light revealed more clearly the things about him and the outlines of his own figure, he saw that it was a rope, and he knew that he was unable to cry out because of something tight and suffocating about his mouth.
The truth came to him swiftly.

He had come up to the coyote on a sledge.
Some one had struck him.

He remembered that men had half-dragged him over the rocks, and these men had bound and gagged him, and left him here, with the lantern staring him in the face.

But where was he?
He shifted his eyes, straining to penetrate the gloom.