THE PERILS OF A MIDNIGHT SEARCH.
The next morning snow was falling, and the wind was blowing furiously.
"This ought to bring us some small birds, and maybe an owl or two,"
said Tug, as he watched the dense clouds of snow hurled along from the
northern waste of ice.
"Do you think you would dare to go out to the traps, or could find
them in this gale?" Aleck asked.
"I reckon so; and while I'm gone you take the gun and see if you can't
find snow-birds among the hemlocks."
"What'll you do if those dogs get after you? They're perfectly savage
with hunger. It don't take much wildness or long famine to turn a dog
back to a wolf, and we've got to look out for these curs as if they
were wild beasts."
"You're right," Tug assented. "But I hardly think they'll be out on
the ice in this storm; you are more likely to meet them in the woods.
At any rate, we must have something to eat, and it's my business to
tend those traps, wolves or no wolves. If I go under, why, there's one
less mouth to feed."
So Tug and Aleck went away into the storm, one out upon the wide white
desert, the other wading up the drifted slopes to the woods.
Katy and Jim stayed at home, sitting comfortably in the house. She was
reading aloud from an old newspaper they had found lying in a corner,
when there came plainly to her ears the twittering of small birds.
"Listen, Jimkin. Did you hear that?"
"Snow-birds!" the boy exclaimed. "Right on the roof, too, and nary a
trap!"
"Let us go out," said Katy, eagerly. "Perhaps we could catch one or
two somehow."
So they crept out, and saw that the thick hemlock growing beside the
big rock was covered with small birds. Some were hiding away from the
"cauld blast" in the nooks between the dense branches; some were
hanging upon the little cones, swinging and clinging like acrobats;
some were taking short flights through the smoke to warm their toes,
or sitting on the bare rock near the top of the chimney. They were of
two kinds, but all equally happy and unconcerned.
"If I only had the gun I could knock over about twenty at once," Jim
whispered. "I believe I could even kill a lot with my pea-shooter."
"Could you? Well, Jimkin, I've got some strong rubber cord in my
trunk, and you might make one of those horrid forked-stick things."
"That's a splendid idea, Katy. Get your rubber, and I'll cut a stick.
Hurry up!"
Ten minutes afterwards the weapon was ready. But now it occurred to
Jim that he had no "peas" for his "shooter." So he and Katy both
hurried down to where they knew there was a bit of beach not covered
by ice. They scraped away the new snow, and raked up double handfuls
of small pebbles.
Jim's hands grew so cold during this operation that he had to go in
and warm them before he could handle his "rubber gun." But the birds
still stayed in the trees, as is their custom when a heavy snow-storm
is raging, and the excited young hunter waited only long enough to get
the stiffest of his fingers into decent shape.
Creeping around to the rear side of the rock, he climbed slowly up
until he could peer over the edge, and found himself not more than a
dozen feet away from the little feathered group sitting by the
chimney-top. Taking the best of aim, and pulling the rubber as far
back as it would go, he let fly, and one of the largest of the birds
tumbled over the edge. The boy had hard work to refrain from shouting
with pride at this early success, though he wasn't sure he had killed
the bird.