BESIEGED BY THE STORM KING
Tom Cameron and his two friends were so busy setting up a target and
throwing iced snow-balls at it, that they barely noticed the first
big flakes of the storm. But by and by these flakes passed and then a
wind of deadly chill swept down upon the camp and with it fine
pellets of snow--not larger than pin-points--but which blinded one
and hid all objects within ten feet.
"Come on!" roared Bob. "This is no fun. Let's beat it to the house."
"Oh, it can't last long this way," said Isadore Phelps. "My
goodness! did you ever see it snow harder in your life?"
"That I never did," admitted Tom. "I wonder if the girls have come
back?"
"If they haven't," said Bob, "they'd better wait where they are
until this flurry is over."
"I hope they have returned," muttered Tom, as they made their way
toward the rear of Snow Camp.
The snow came faster and faster, and thicker and thicker. Bob bumped
square into the side of one of the out-sheds, and roared because he
found blood flowing from his nose.
"What do you say about this?" he bellowed. "How do we know we're
going right?"
"Here!" cried Isadore. "Where are you fellows? I don't want to get
lost in the back yard."
Tom found him (he had already seized the half-blinded Bob by the
arm) and the three, arm in arm, made their way cautiously to the
kitchen porch. They burst in on Janey and Mary with a whoop.
"Have the girls got back?" cried Tom, eagerly.
"I couldn't tell ye, Master Tom," said Mary. "But if they haven't
come in, by the looks of you boys, they'd better."
Tom did not stop to remove the snow, but rushed into the great
central hall which was used as a general sitting room.
"Where's Helen--and Ruth--and the rest of them?" he demanded.
"Why, Thomas! you're all over snow," said Mr. Cameron, comfortably
reading his paper before the fire, in smoking jacket and slippers.
"Is it snowing?" queried Mrs. Murchiston, from the warmest nook
beside the hearth. "Aren't the girls out with you, Tom?"
"What's the matter, my son?" demanded his father, getting up
quickly. "What has happened?"
"I don't know that anything has happened," said Tom, swallowing a
big lump in his throat, and trying to speak calmly. "The girls have
not been with us. They went into the woods somewhere to get stuff for
their pillows. And it is snowing harder than I ever knew it to snow
before."
"Oh, Tom!" gasped the governess.
"Come! we'll go out and see about this at once," cried his father,
and began to get into his out-of-door clothing, including a pair of
great boots.
"Is it snowing very hard, Tom?" queried the lady, anxiously. "What
makes you look so?"
For Tom was scared--and he showed it. He turned short around without
answering Mrs. Murchiston again, and led the way to the kitchen. The
other boys had shaken off the snow and were hovering over the range
for warmth.
"Found 'em all right; didn't you?" demanded Bob Steele.
"No. They haven't come in," said Tom, shortly, and immediately Bob
began pulling on his coat again.
"Oh, pshaw!" said Isadore. "They'll be all right."
"Where are Jerry and the others?" Mr. Cameron asked the maids.
"Sure, sir," said Mary, who was peering wonderingly out of the
window at the thick cloud of snow sweeping across the pane, "sure,
sir, Jerry and the min went down in the swamp to draw up some back-logs.
And it's my opinion they'd better be in out of this storm."
"I agree with you, Mary," returned Mr. Cameron, grimly, as he opened
the door and saw for the first time just what they had to face. "But
perhaps they'll pick up the girls on their way home. Trust those
woodsmen for finding their way."
Tom and Bob followed him out of the house. They faced a wall of
falling snow so thick that every object beyond arm's length from them
was blotted out.
"Merciful heavens!" groaned Mr. Cameron. "Your sister and the girls
will never find their way through this smother."
"Nor the men, either," said Tom, shortly.
"Oh, I say!" exclaimed Bob, "It can't snow like this for long; can
it?"
"We have never seen a right good snowstorm in the woods," quoth Mr.
Cameron. "From what the men tell me, this is likely to continue for
hours. I am dreadfully worried about the girls--"
"What's that?" cried Tom, interrupting him.
A muffled shout sounded through the driving snow. In chorus Mr.
Cameron and the two boys raised their own voices in an answering shout.
"They're coming!" cried Bob.
"It is Long Jerry Todd and the men--hear the harness rattling?"
returned Tom, and he started down the steps in the direction of the
stables.
"Wait! we'll keep together," commanded Mr. Cameron. "I hope they
have brought the girls with them."
"Oh, but the girls didn't go toward the swamp," returned his son.
"They started due north."
"Shout again!" commanded Mr. Cameron, and the two parties kept
shouting back and forth until they met not far beyond the
outbuildings belonging to the lodge. The great pair of draught horses
were ploughing through the drifts and the three men were whooping
loudly beside them.
"Dangerous work this, for you, sir," cried Long Jerry. "You'd all
better remained indoors. It's come a whole lot quicker than I
expected. We're in for a teaser, Mr. Cameron. Couldn't scarce make
out the path through the woods."
"Have you seen the girls, Jerry?" cried Tom Cameron.
"Bless us!" gasped the tall guide. "You don't mean that any of them
gals is out of bounds?"
"All six of them went into the woods--toward the north--about two
hours ago. They went on snowshoes," said Tom.
The three woodsmen said never a word, but standing there in the
driving snow, at the heads of the horses, they looked at each other
for some moments.
"Well," said Jerry, at last, and without commenting further on Tom's
statement; "we'd best put up the horses and then see what's to be
done."
"To the north, Tom?" said his father, brokenly. "Are you sure?"
"Yes, sir. I am sure of it."
"Is there any house in that direction--within reasonable distance,
Jerry?" asked the gentleman.
"God bless us, sir!" gasped the guide. "I don't know of one betwixt
here and the Canadian line. The wind is coming now from the
northwest. If they are trying to get back to the camp they'll be
drifted towards the southeast and miss us altogether."
"Don't say that, Jerry!" gasped Tom. "We _must_ find them. Why,
if this keeps up for an hour they'll be buried in the drifts."
"Pray heaven it hold's off soon," groaned his father.
The men could offer them no comfort. Being old woodsmen themselves,
they knew pretty well what the storm foreboded. A veritable blizzard
had swept down from the Lakes and the whole country might be shrouded
for three or four days. Meanwhile, as long as the snow kept falling,
it would be utterly reckless to make search for those lost in the snow.
Jerry and his mates said nothing more at the time, however. They all
made their way to the stables, kicked the drift away from the door,
and got the horses into their stalls. They all went inside out of the
storm and closed the doors against the driving snow. In five minutes,
when the animals were made secure and fed, and they tried to open the
doors again, the wind had heaped the snow to such a height against
them that they could not get out.
Fortunately there was a small door at the other end of the barn, and
by this they all got out and made their way speedily across the
clearing to the house--Long Jerry leading the way. Tom and Bob
realized that they might easily have become lost in that short
distance had they been left to their own resources.
Mr. Cameron was very pale and his lips trembled when he stood before
the three woodsmen in the lodge kitchen.
"You mean that to try to seek for the girls now is impossible,
Jerry?" he asked.
"What do you think about it yourself, sir?" returned the guide. "You
have been out in it."
"I--I don't expect you to attempt what I cannot do myself--"
"If mortal man could live in it, we'd make the attempt without ye,
sir," declared Long Jerry, warmly. "But neither dogs nor men could
find their way in this smother It looks like it had set in for a big
blizzard. You don't know jest what that means up here in the
backwoods. Logging camps will be snowed under and mules, horses and
oxen will have to be shot to save them from starvation. The hunting
will be mighty poor next fall, for the deer and other varmints will
starve to death, too.
"If poor people in the woods don't starve after this storm, it will
be lucky. Why, the last big one we had the Octohac Company had a gang
of fifty men shoveling out a road for twenty miles so as to get tote
teams through with provisions for their camp. And then men had to
drag the tote teams instead of horses, the critters were so near
starved. Ain't that so, Ben?"
"Surest thing you know," agreed one of the other hands. "I remember
that time well. I was working for the Goodwin & Manse Company. There
was nigh a hundred of us on snow-shoes that dragged fodder from the
farmers along Rolling River to feed our stock on, and we didn't get
out enough logs that winter to pay the company for keeping the camp
open."
"That's the way on it, Mr. Cameron," said Long Jerry. "We got to sit
down and wait for a hold-up. Nothing else to do. You kin try
telephoning up and down the line to see if the girls changed their
route and got to any house."
But when Mr. Cameron tried to use the 'phone he found that already
there was a break somewhere on the line. He could get no reply.
They were besieged by the Storm King, and he proved to be a most
pitiless enemy. The drifting snow rose higher and higher about the
lodge every hour. The day dragged on its weary length into night, and
still the wind blew and the snow sifted down, until even the top
panes of the first floor windows were buried beneath the white mantle.