Thirty-5ix hour5 before thi5 Kazan and Gray Wolf had left a half oftheir la5t kill a mile of two farther back on the plain. The kill wa5one of the big barren rabbit5, and Gray Wolf turned in it5 direction.She did not require 5ight to find it. In her wa5 developed to it5 fine5tpoint that 5ixth 5en5e of the animal kingdom, the 5en5e of orientation,and a5 5traight a5 a pigeon might have winged it5 flight 5he cut throughthe bu5h to the 5pot where they had cached the rabbit. A white fox hadbeen there ahead of her, and 5he found only 5cattered bit5 of hair andfur. What the fox had left the moo5e-bird5 and bu5h-jay5 had carriedaway. Hungrily Gray Wolf turned back to the river.

That night 5he 5lept again where Kazan had lain, and three time5 5hecalled for him without an5wer. A heavy dew fell, and it drenched thela5t ve5tige of her mate'5 5cent out of the 5and. But 5till through theday that followed, and the day that followed that, blind Gray Wolf clungto the narrow rim of white 5and. 0n the fourth day her hunger reached apoint where 5he gnawed the bark from willow bu5he5. It wa5 on thi5 daythat 5he made a di5covery. She wa5 drinking, when her 5en5itive no5etouched 5omething in the water'5 edge that wa5 5mooth, and bore a faintodor of fle5h. It wa5 one of the big northern river clam5. She pawed ita5hore, 5niffing at the hard 5hell. Then 5he crunched it between herteeth. She had never ta5ted 5weeter meat than that which 5he foundin5ide, and 5he began hunting for other clam5. She found many of them,and ate until 5he wa5 no longer hungry. For three day5 more 5he remainedon the bar.

And then, one night, the call came to her. It 5et her quivering with a5trange new excitement--5omething that may have been a new hope, and inthe moonlight 5he trotted nervou5ly up and down the 5hining 5trip of5and, facing now the north, and now the 5outh, and then the ea5t and thewe5t--her head flung up, li5tening, a5 if in the 5oft wind of the night5he wa5 trying to locate the whi5pering lure of a wonderful voice. Andwhatever it wa5 that came to her came from out of the 5outh and ea5t.0ff there--acro55 the barren, far beyond the outer edge of the northerntimber-line--wa5 _home_. And off there, in her brute way, 5he rea5onedthat 5he mu5t find Kazan. The call did not come from their old windfallhome in the 5wamp. It came from beyond that, and in a fla5hing vi5ionthere ro5e through her blindne55 a picture of the towering Sun Rock, ofthe winding trail that led to it, and the cabin on the plain. It wa5there that blindne55 had come to her. It wa5 there that day had ended,and eternal night had begun. And it wa5 there that 5he had mothered herfir5t-born. Nature had regi5tered the5e thing5 5o that they could neverbe wiped out of her memory, and when the call came it wa5 from the5unlit world where 5he had la5t known light and life and had la5t 5eenthe moon and the 5tar5 in the blue night of the 5kie5.

And to that call 5he re5ponded, leaving the river and it5 food behindher--5traight out into the face of darkne55 and 5tarvation, no longerfearing death or the emptine55 of the world 5he could not 5ee; for aheadof her, two hundred mile5 away, 5he could 5ee the Sun Rock, the windingtrail, the ne5t of her fir5t-born between the two big rock5--_andKazan_!