"That beast's about as difficult to mistake as my black is." Then he returned to the loghouse, and presently put on Winston's old fur coat and tattered fur cap.

Had Winston seen his unpleasant smile as he did it, he would probably have wheeled the black horse and returned at a gallop, but the farmer was sweeping across the waste of whitened grass at least a league away by this time.

Now and then a half-moon blinked down between wisps of smoky cloud, but for the most part gray dimness hung over the prairie, and the drumming of hoofs rang stridently through the silence.

Winston knew a good horse, and had bred several of them--before a blizzard which swept the prairie killed off his finest yearlings as well as their pedigree sire--and his spirits rose as the splendid beast swung into faster stride beneath him.
For two weeks at least he would be free from anxiety, and the monotony of his life at the lonely homestead had grown horribly irksome.
Winston was young, and now, when for a brief space he had left his cares behind, the old love of adventure which had driven him out from England once more awakened and set his blood stirring.

For the first time in six years of struggle he did not know what lay before him, and he had a curious, half-instinctive feeling that the trait he was traveling would lead him farther than Montana.