After that, all Shannon's hopes and ambitions came down with a crash; and the day he found Blake gray in face with shame and rage, he offered Sergeant Stimson his services.

Now he was filled with an unholy content that he had done so, for he came of a race that does not forget an injury and has sufficient cause for a jealous pride in the virtue of its women.
He and Larry might have forgiven a pistol shot, but they could not forget the shame.
Suddenly he stiffened to attention, for though a man of the cities would probably have heard nothing but the wailing of the wind, he caught a faint rhythmic drumming which might have been made by a galloping horse.

It ceased, and he surmised, probably correctly, that it was trooper Payne returning.

It was, however, his business to watch the forking of the trail, and when he could only hear the thrashing of the birches, he moved his mittened hand from the bridle, and patted the restive horse.

Just then the bluff was filled with sound as a blast that drove a haze of snow before it roared down.