Large natures are apt to take heavy blows more calmly, at any rate so
far as outward appearances are concerned, than smaller ones. The Dacre
boys, broadened and deepened by their adventurous lives, were not as
cast down over the disaster that had befallen them as might have been
many lads less used to meeting hardships and difficulties and fighting
them as American boys should.
Therefore it was that, keen as was their interest in the stake that lay
ahead of them, they yet found time to notice the sights about them and
to talk as they moved along over the snow much as they might have done
under quite ordinary circumstances.
If anything, Jack had shown his anger and chagrin more perceptibly than
Tom when the blow had first fallen. But now he was in as perfect command
of his faculties as his elder brother. He was able even to crack a joke
now and then with seeming indifference to the object of their journey
and the perils that might lie in front of them, perhaps just around the
next turn of the trail, for all that they knew.
As for Tom, following the calm, almost stoical way with which he had met
the discovery of their loss, he had become possessed of an unconquerable
desire to find the man who had robbed them and if possible hand him over
to the authorities. Failing this, Tom found himself possessed of a grim,
bulldog determination to make the man give up the spoils. As for the man
himself, he felt no wish to punish him under those circumstances. That
was for the law to do. The main thing was to get back the black fox’s
skin, for he was sure the creature had been killed.
At about noontime Tom called a halt. Jack was for pressing right on
without stopping to eat, but Tom would not allow this.
“It’s no use two fellows wearing themselves out,” he said; “we shall
work all the better for having stopped to ‘fire up.’”
“Well, it looks to me like so much lost time,” observed Jack, siting
down, however, at the foot of a tree and loosening his snowshoe thongs.
This was in itself a sign of weariness, but Tom pretended not to notice
it.
He set Jack to work hacking fragments from a dead hemlock which was
still upstanding, for, although there were plenty of fallen trees about,
timber that has been lying on the ground is never such good kindling as
upstanding deadwood, because it is almost sure to be damp. While Jack
was about this task, Tom cleared a space in the snow, and then he drew
from his pack a blackened pot, which had boiled tea on many a trail.
When Jack had the kindling and some stouter bits of wood for the
permanency of the fire, Tom filled the pot with snow and then set a
match to the pile of shavings. They had been raked together lightly and
the heavier wood set up in somewhat the form of an Indian’s tepee.
The dry kindling caught as if it had been soaked in kerosene. Up shot
the cheery red flames, and the blue smoke curled merrily away as the
wood crackled joyously. There is magic in a fire in the woods. In a
trice a match and dry timber can convert a cheerless camp into a place
fit for human habitation and happiness.
The snow was melted by the time the kindling had died down and Tom could
make a bed of red coals. In these he set the pot once more, this time
with tea added to the boiling water. It was sweetened with some of a
precious store of molasses, carried in a bottle and used as a special
luxury. As for milk, even of the condensed variety, the Bungalow Boys on
their trips along the trap line had long since learned to do without it.
With jerked deer meat, prepared the week before, and some soggy
flapjacks baked in an aluminum oven, they made a satisfactory meal. By
way of dessert, each boy stuffed some dried apricots into his mouth to
chew as they moved along. Thus refreshed, thongs were tightened, duffle
packed, and they were once more ready for the trail.
All that afternoon they followed along the man of mystery’s track, but
in no place could they find a spot where he had paused to camp. He must
have eaten whatever refreshment he had while riding on his sled or while
on foot, for no traces of a fire or a resting place could the boys’ eyes
discover.
One clew alone the thief had left behind him, and that was in the form
of numerous stubs of cigarettes which had been rolled by hand out of
coarse yellow paper. But outside of this sign there was nothing but the
sled marks to guide them. One thing about the trail that has not yet
been mentioned is that the man was back-trailing. That is to say that,
on leaving the boys’ camp, he had followed the same path by which he had
come, and in places the two tracks could be seen where the sled had
swung out a little.
After a time they found that a snow storm, which must have fallen in the
vicinity during the night, had entirely wiped out the “coming” track,
leaving only the fresh marks of the “going” trail.
From this fact the boys deduced that the man might have turned off
somewhere on his journey to their camp, but they cared little for this.
It was his fresh trail that they were following hot upon, like hounds
upon the scent.
All the way, too, went the trail of the wolverine, and, judging from the
tracks, the boys guessed that the animal had been traveling fast. This
looked ominous, for the wolverine is not, as a rule, an energetic
animal, and proved at least to Tom’s mind that the robber must be
traveling very quickly.
He pointed this out to Jack, who agreed with him. But neither of the
boys said a word about turning back. They were far too nervy for that,
and, having started out, such an idea as quitting did not once enter
their heads. All that afternoon they kept grimly on.
At about three o’clock, or shortly thereafter, the sun grew dim and low.
Half an hour later only a pale twilight lingered about them, for at that
time of year in the northern wilds the evening sets in early.
Above their heads, from the darkening canopy of the sky, the stars, a
million pin points of light, began to shine. The snow turned a dull,
steely blue as the light shut in. A slight breeze stirred in the
hemlocks and spruces. It began to grow noticeably colder, too.
But as the daylight died another light, a wonderful mystic glory of
radiance, began to glow in the northern sky. Against its wavering,
shimmering, unearthly splendor every twig on every tree stood out as
though carved in blackest ebony. The brush was shrouded in deepest
sable, and the shadows lay upon the snow as black as a crow’s wing.
Everywhere was a deep, breathless hush, except where the light wind
caused a huddled mass of snow on an interlaced branch to slip
ground-ward. The great solitudes appeared to be composing themselves for
sleep. On the hard, frozen surface the boys’ snowshoes creaked almost
metallically as they pressed on, following in the dimming light the two
parallel lines that had begun to burn themselves into their brains.
They knew when they set out that it was going to prove a stern chase;
now they saw that unquestionably it was likewise to be a long one. How
long they could not guess. They passed a small stream. In the silence
they could hear the ice “crack-cracking!” with that startling sound that
is one of the most mystic of the voices of the woods. It grew bitterly
cold. Tom began to look anxiously about him. They must find a lodging
for the night. The question of sleeping in the open did not bother him.
Timber was plenty, and they could make an evergreen shelter and soon
have a roaring fire to warm their blood. He was merely prospecting for a
place that looked a likely one.
And then, suddenly, something happened that sent an involuntary chill
running up and down the spines of both boys.
From the westward, through the long, melancholy aisles of
straight-trunked trees, the sound had come. Out of the silence it was
borne with a chilling forboding to them. It was a long-flung,
indescribably forlorn sound, and seemed to fill the silences, coming
from no definite spot after an instant’s listening.
It deepened and swelled, died away and rose like the sound of distant
church bells. Then, while they stood listening, involuntarily brought to
a swift, startled halt, it died out uncannily, sinkingly, and the
silence shut down again.
“It’s the wolves!” said Tom in a low, rather awestruck voice.
The boy was right. The gray rangers of the big timbers were abroad
seeking their meat from God.