and so would use that excuse to leave once he found Fisher.
Night came on too fast in this season of short days, but a full moon allowed them to continue after dark, until finally Clint decided to make camp. They tethered Devil, then dug out of the snow an area big enough to pitch their tent. The snow had not let up, and it reminded Elizabeth of the night they’d spent in the snowstorm back at White Pass.
Clint went into another fit of coughing and turned his back to her. Elizabeth turned to put her arms around him from behind. “What can I do, Clint?”
“Nothing.” He coughed again. “You wanted me to stop smoking. This sure has done it,” he added.
“Clint, maybe we should stay right here for a couple of days. You’re killing yourself.”
“I’ll make it.” There came another fit of coughing. “We’re too close now. I just hope…your brother is there and that he has a decent, warm cabin where we can stay.”
Suddenly Devil’s frantic, screaming whinnies roused both of them from their quiet conversation. They heard low growling just outside the tent.
“Wolves!” Clint exclaimed. He threw off his blanket and grabbed his rifle, cocking it and ducking outside.
“Clint!”
“Stay there!” he ordered.
At almost the same time Elizabeth heard much louder growling and barking, as well as literal screams of terror from deep in Devil’s throat. Wolves must be attacking him!
By the dim light of their lantern Elizabeth found Clint’s handgun, and against his orders, she, too, ducked outside just as Clint fired his rifle once, twice, three times. Elizabeth screamed when a wolf attacked Clint from behind. She heard growling behind her then, and she turned and fired, downing another of the vicious attackers.
Clint wrestled with the wolf that had attacked him, and two more of the animals rushed inside the tent, knocking over a lantern, which blazed up and started the tent on fire.
Elizabeth shot at yet another wolf, and the bright blaze of the tent fire frightened the rest away.
By then Clint had a choke hold on the wolf that had tried to maul him. He stood up and literally flung the choked wolf into the darkness, then scrambled to the burning tent to fling out some of their belongings, but the tent itself was too far ablaze to save it or the rest of what was inside.
Clint stumbled backward. “Liz!” he yelled.
“I’m right here!” Elizabeth hurried up to him. “I think I got one or two of them myself!”
Clint wrapped his arms around her. “I got three of them,” he panted, “plus the one I choked.”
By the light of the burning tent Elizabeth could see his face. Three deep scratches on his right cheek bled profusely. “Clint, you’re bleeding badly!”
He pulled away, putting a hand to his face, wiping at blood. “Thank God we left our heavy clothes and coats on. It could have been a lot worse.” He looked her over. “What about you?”
“I’m okay. Clint, what if they come back?”
He looked around into the darkness. “I don’t think they will, but we’d better spend the rest of the night on the raft.” He walked up to a still-frightened Devil, putting an arm around the horse’s neck and talking to him softly to calm him. “So much for God helping us finish this trip safely,” he spoke up to Elizabeth. “Now we don’t even have a tent to sleep under.” He broke into another fit of coughing. “We’ll have to just sleep under blankets and keep our heads covered.” He shook his head and looked over at Elizabeth. “We’re in quite a fix.”
Oh, what a test of faith. “Maybe God just wants us to realize that all we need is each other, Clint.”
Still panting, he shook his head. “Then He sure has a way of teaching a lesson.”
Chapter Forty-One
And he led them forth by the right way, that they might go to a city of habitation.
—Psalms 107:7
Elizabeth smeared more ointment onto the deep cuts along Devil’s neck per Clint’s orders. He’d brought along a supply of the greasy concoction purchased from a livery in Skagway in case his horses developed any kind of infection. Doctoring the horse made Elizabeth wonder about Red Lady and how the mare was doing. A part of her felt bad for talking Clint into giving up the horse, but it had been the Christian thing to do, and was just another reason she couldn’t help loving Clint.
After three more days of rafting, the scratches on Clint’s face seemed to