But for those two footsteps she
would have sold us completely."
We had just reached the edge of a pine-forest. In woods of this
description the snow never reaches the ground except in the open spaces
between the trees, the dense foliage intercepting it in its fall. This
was a difficult part of our enterprise. Sperver dismounted to see our way
better, and placed me on his left so as not to be hindered by my shadow.
Here were large spaces covered with dead leaves and the needles and cones
of the fir-trees, which retain no footprint. It was, therefore, only in
the open patches where the snow had fallen on the ground that Sperver
found the track again.
It took us an hour to get through this thicket. The old poacher bit his
moustache with excitement and vexation, and his long nose visibly bent
into a hook. When I was only opening my mouth to speak, he would
impatiently say--
"Don't speak--it bothers me!"
At last we descended a valley to the left and Gideon pointing to the
track of the she-wolf outside the edge of the brushwood, triumphantly
remarked--
"There is no feint in this sortie, for once. We may follow this track
confidently.
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