The three boys plunged at the man together. He stopped short, and made
a motion to lower his rifle; but he was too late. The boys had
fastened on him as wolves fasten on a deer. He uttered a single,
stifled cry; then they all went down together in a mass of kicking
snowshoes and struggling limbs. The hunter's efforts were feeble, and
the boys had no trouble in over-powering him. Fred pinioned his arms,
and Maurice sat on his legs.
Macgregor peered into the man's face. "Why, this isn't one of that
gang!" he cried.
It had grown almost dark. Fred bent forward to look at the man.
"It's my brother!" he cried. "It's Horace!"
"What? It can't be!" cried Peter and Maurice together. They let go
their hold on their prisoner in order to look closer.
"I declare, I believe it is!" said Macgregor, stupefied.
It really was Horace Osborne, but he was almost unrecognizable in his
muffling _capote_, long hair, and a three months' growth of beard. He
had no idea who had thus attacked him, and he was in a towering rage.
"What do you mean by all this? Who are you, anyway?" he exclaimed,
sitting up in the snow. Then he looked more closely at his brother,
who was trying to say something, inarticulate, half laughing and half
crying.
"Fred!" he cried, in amazement. "Is that you? What on earth are you
doing here? Who's that with you? Peter Macgregor--and Maurice Stark!"
"We thought you might be dead!" Fred cried, and Peter and Maurice cut
in alternately:--
"Heard you were sick with smallpox--"
"Came up to find you--"
"Came in on skates, and--"
"A gang of outlaws turned us out of the cabin--"
"Found your diamonds."
"I don't half understand it all," said Horace, "but I see that you
fellows have acted like good friends. We can't get in the cabin, you
say? Well, you've a camp somewhere, haven't you?"
They started for the camp in the snow, and on the way Fred gave his
brother a somewhat incoherent account of what had taken place.
"You fellows certainly have acted like friends to me--like brothers,
rather!" said Horace. "I'll never forget it, boys!"
And he shook hands with them all round.
"Not a bit!" said Maurice, in embarrassment. "We were hoping that
you'd let us in on the ground floor of a diamond mine. Fred says there
was a whole bagful of diamonds that you had hidden in the cabin. What
do you suppose they're worth?"
"If they're all diamonds, perhaps a hundred thousand dollars," replied
Horace.
"Gracious!" gasped Maurice, and said no more.
But Fred's attention had been fixed on the pack that his brother
carried.
"What have you there, Horace?" he asked.
"Grub. Bacon, hardtack, tea, cold boiled beans. Why, I never thought
of it, but you must all be as hungry as wolves. Well, there's enough
for a square meal here, anyhow, and to-morrow we'll find some way of
getting those rascals out of the camp."
They built up the camp-fire, and Horace got out his provisions,
together with a couple of partridges he had shot late that afternoon.
But Macgregor, as medical adviser, refused to let them eat as much as
they wanted. A little tea and a few mouthfuls of meat were all he
permitted them to have; he promised, however, that they should have a
full meal in a couple of hours. He took the same ration himself; but
Horace ate heartily.
"But where have you been since you left the cabin?" Fred asked.
"At a lumber camp on the Abitibi, about forty miles from here," Horace
replied. "I've been convalescing."
"If we'd only known that there was anything of the sort so near,"
remarked Peter, "we'd have made for it ourselves."
"I stumbled on it by chance. However, I'd better explain in detail.
As you seem to have heard, I came sick to this trappers' shack. I'd
been in an Indian camp a week before, on the Nottaway River, where they
had had smallpox, but I've been vaccinated four or five times, and
never dreamed of danger. I didn't know what the matter with me was, in
fact, till the red spots began to appear.
"Of course the trappers were badly scared, especially after one of them
caught the disease and died. I can't tell you how sorry I was for that
death. I suppose I wasn't to blame, but I felt somehow responsible.
"The Indian cleared out, and I couldn't blame him. But I couldn't
afford to let the third man go. I was over the worst of it by that
time, but I was as weak as a kitten, and could hardly feed myself. If
he'd deserted me I should have died. I offered him any sum of money if
he would stick to me, and told him that I'd shoot him if I saw any sign
of his making off.
"I couldn't have aimed straight enough to hit him at a yard just then,
and I suppose he knew it. Anyhow, he disappeared one morning before I
was awake. He didn't take much with him except his gun and ammunition.
"I was gaining strength fast, and I was able to stagger about a little.
I could get water, and there was some grub in the shack. I knew that I
must get out at once, lest snow should come. I stayed four days; then
I took what grub I could carry, my rifle and a dozen cartridges, and
started. I left all my specimens, notebooks and everything, for I
didn't dare to carry an ounce more than I could help."
"But the diamonds? They didn't weigh many ounces," interrupted Maurice.
"I struck for the Abitibi," went on Horace, paying no attention to the
question, "and I was so weak that I couldn't make much speed. I had
been out five days, and my grub was pretty nearly gone, when I stumbled
into the lumbermen. They treated me like real Samaritans, took me in
and fed me, and I've been there convalescing ever since. Day before
yesterday I started back here to get my things. I had to travel
slowly, for I'm not overstrong yet, and I was hurrying on to get to the
cabin to-night when you pounced on me."
"If you had only taken the diamonds with you!" Fred lamented.
"I did," said Horace. He looked at the boys with a smile, and then
went on:--
"Those stones, my boy, that you saw in the cabin aren't diamonds. They
are quartz crystals and rather curious garnets, worth a few dollars at
the most. Here are the diamonds!"
He took a small leather pouch from an inner pocket; the boys jumped up
in excitement to look. From the pouch he took a small paper package,
unfolded it, and revealed nine small lumps, which ranged in size from a
small shot to a large pea. They looked like lumps of gum arabic, but
their edges and angles reflected brilliant sparks in the firelight.
"Those little things? Are they diamonds?" cried Fred, in some
disappointment.
"Little things? Why, if they were all perfect stones, they'd be worth
a small fortune. Unfortunately, the biggest has a flaw in it that you
can see even without cutting it, and some of the others are yellowish
and off color. It will take an expert to say what they 're worth. But
the great triumph is to have found diamonds up here at all."
"Yes, and there must be more where these came from," said Maurice,
brightening. "If you've discovered the beds--"
"I haven't, though," Horace returned. "Three of these stones I bought
from a camp of Ojibwas. The rest I found in the gravel of the
creek-beds, mostly along the Nottaway River, but none of them within a
quarter of a mile of another. Whenever I thought the gravel looked
promising, I sifted some of it. But I didn't find a trace of the blue
soil that always forms the diamond-beds; if there are diamond-beds up
here, they must be somewhere beyond the region that we have explored."
"But they must be here somewhere," cried Peter, "and there must be more
diamonds where you found those! I'll certainly come up here next
summer and try my own luck."
"I've thought of doing so myself; that is, if this lot turns out to be
any good. But getting back to town is the present problem, and we've
got to consider how to recapture the cabin and your outfit of supplies."
"But not before we eat again," said Fred.
Macgregor, who was as famished as any of them, consented, and they
prepared such a banquet as the three castaways had not seen since they
left the cabin. It almost exhausted the supplies that Horace had
brought, but it did them all a great deal of good. With a new feeling
of being able to grapple with the problem, they settled down to
consider the question of war.
"We might set fire to the cabin," Fred suggested, "and try to capture
the fellows when they rush out."
"Out of the question," declared Peter, "for, even if it worked, the
provisions would be burned up. I had thought of stopping up their
chimney during the night. The smoke would suffocate them in their
sleep, and we could go in and drag them out insensible."
"I am afraid it would waken them first," said Horace. "We'd have them
coming out with rifles. Now I'd been thinking that if we only had some
of your formaldehyde fumigator we could get them under control very
easily."
"So we could. A can of that stuff let through the roof would put them
into a dead stupor without waking them. The only risk would be that of
killing them all outright. There was a can of it left, too, but it's
in the cabin."
"No, it isn't!" cried Fred. "I put it outside in a hollow tree, so as
not to have the stuff in the house. I could get it in ten minutes."
"Fred, you're a diamond yourself!" Peter exclaimed. "If it's as you
say, we'll have them out of that cabin in a jiffy."
"Shall we try it to-night?" Maurice asked.
"Why not? It's nearly midnight, and they must be asleep," said Horace.
"I've no fancy for spending another night and day shivering here in the
snow. Besides, we're out of grub."
After some consultation, they put on their snowshoes and tramped off
toward the cabin. It was intensely cold, and very still and clear; a
brilliant moon had come up over the pines.
Fred easily found the hollow tree in which he had hidden the
disinfectant, and came back with the apparatus. There was an unopened
tin of formaldehyde complete with its little lamp almost full of spirit.
For some time they reconnoitered the cabin cautiously. A faint glow
shone through the skin window, but no sound either of man or dog could
be heard within.
It would not be possible to introduce the fumigator through the door or
window, and if it were lowered down the chimney, the draft would carry
the gas out again. But Maurice recollected the hole he had patched in
the roof; it could easily be opened again. He volunteered to set the
"smoker" going.
This was really the most dangerous part of the undertaking, for a
slight sound might bring out the ruffians, who would probably shoot
without much hesitation. Maurice took off his snowshoes, and carrying
the fumigator, plunged through the drifts toward the cabin.
Twenty yards away the party watched him from the thickets; Horace kept
the door covered with his rifle. The snow had drifted so deep that
Maurice climbed easily to the roof, crawled up the slope on hands and
knees, groped about, and began to scrape away the snow.
A moment later, he drew out the deer-hide patch, peered down the hole,
and then waved his hand reassuringly toward the woods. He struck a
match, lighted the spirit lamp, and then lowered the can cautiously by
a string about a yard long.
In another minute he was back with his friends. "They're dead asleep,"
he said, joyfully. "I could hear them snore. The formaldehyde began
to smell strong before I let it down. How long shall we leave it?"
"We don't want to kill them," said Horace.
"No danger," Peter remarked. "The draft from the big chimney will keep
clearing the air. I'd leave it till all the stuff is vaporized--say, a
couple of hours. The only thing I dread is that some one may wake up;
but then, he wouldn't know what the smell was, and the spirit flame is
so pale that it's almost invisible."
They watched the cabin intently. All remained deathly quiet. It was
very cold as they crouched there in the snow. Horace kept his rifle
ready, but finally his vigilance slackened. They walked about to keep
from freezing, talked in whispers, and still watched the silent hut.
Suddenly Horace clutched Fred's arm.
"Look!" he cried. "The cabin's on fire!"