"You ought to been a lawyer," said the packer, releasing his breath. There
was less strain in his voice. It broke with feeling. "You put up a mighty
strong case for your way of looking at it. I don't say it's best. There,
if you will have it! Sonny--my son! It--it's like startin' a snow-slide."

The sick man broke down and sobbed childishly.

"Take it quietly! Oh, take it quietly!" Paul shivered. "I have known it a
long time."

Hours later they were still awake, the packer in his bunk, Paul in his
blankets by the winking brands. The pines were moving, and in pauses of
the wind they could hear the incessant soft crowding of the snow.

"When they find us here in the spring," said the packer humbly, "it won't
matter much which on us was 'Mister' and which was 'John.'"

"Are you thinking of that!" Paul answered with nervous irritation. "I
thought you had lived in the woods long enough to have got rid of all that
nonsense!"

"I guess there was some of it where you've been living."

"We are done with all that now. Go to sleep,--Father." He pronounced the
word conscientiously to punish himself for dreading it. The darkness
seemed to ring with it and give it back to him ironically. "Father!"
muttered the pines outside, and the snow, listening, let fall the word in
elfin whispers. Paul turned over desperately in his blankets. "Father!" he
repeated out loud. "Do _you_ believe it? Does it do you any good?"