day was just breaking when the boys bade farewell to doctor and mother merriam, and with a hot breakfast under their belts started for the trapping camp. as yet pat had given no hint as to where it was located, and walter and hal, respecting his reticence, forbore to ask questions. walter did venture to ask if they would reach there before dark.
"no," replied pat. "we'll have to make a camp to-night," and advanced no further information.
all their duffle and the supplies which pat was taking in were loaded on the toboggan, and to this pat had rigged a sort of harness so that two walking single file could drag it. this relieved them of packs. walter and hal each carried his rifle on the chance of picking up a rabbit on the way. the snow-shoes were slung over their backs, pat explaining that for a time they would follow a broken out lumber trail and it would be easier walking without the shoes than on them.
it was when they turned into this trail that the first suspicion of where they were bound for flashed through upton's mind, but he held his peace and settled to the task of doing his share of the pulling. and this proved to be no easy matter. the trail was but roughly broken out by the passage of lumber sleds, and it soon became necessary for one to steady the load to keep it from capsizing. it was slow, toilsome work, and when at the end of ten miles pat called a halt for a rest while he made four cups of hot pea soup by the simple process of melting snow and crumbling into it a roll of erbswurst the others were ready to declare that they had come twenty miles.
as he drank his soup and munched a cracker walter scanned his surroundings closely. presently he discovered what he sought, a partially obliterated blaze on a big tree just beyond and to the right of where they were squatting.
"i've got you now, old mr. foxy!" he cried. "this mysterious camp of yours is the cabin in smugglers' hollow, and we're going to camp to-night at little goose pond. more than that, your partner is alec smith. why didn't i guess it before? own up now, old crafty!"
quite unabashed, pat bestowed a grin on upton. "three bull's-eyes," he commented. "i've been wondering how long it would take you fellows to catch the scent. began to think i'd have to rub your noses in it."
"hurrah!" interrupted hal, who had been an eager listener. "i never thought of the hollow, and yet there is no place i should like to go to so much as that. say, walt, these heads of ours sure are thick. don't you remember that pat told us that first night in new york that alec was trapping, and the last he heard of him he was over in the hollow? well, we'd make good detectives, we would. i've done a lot of wondering about pat's partner and what sort of a fellow he would prove to be and whether or not we'd like him. and to think it's alec! if you weren't such a young and tender innocent i'd throw you in the snow and give you a shampoo. what do you say, walt, to doing it anyway?"
"come on!" cried pat, "the two of you, or all three!"
upton shook his head mournfully. "i'd like to, but it wouldn't be right. he isn't as big as the two of us, and so it wouldn't do at all. it would be the same as a big fellow picking on a little one. you know i thrashed him once for doing that very thing, and now if we should turn around and do it i'm afraid the force of my beautiful example would be wholly destroyed. i tell you what, you do it alone, hal."
"he's too small," declared hal. "that's why i wanted you to help. then my conscience would be only half guilty. i'm going to let him off this time with just a snowball."
suiting his action to the word he landed a big soft snowball full on the side of pat's head. pat made a rush for him, but walter thrust out a foot and sent him headlong into the snow, and before he could regain his feet hal was on him endeavoring to wash his face with snow. in a second there was the liveliest kind of a snow fight, upton and sparrer yelling encouragement with absolute impartiality. it ended with hal's smothered cry of "enough" and pat's allowing him up just in time to see walter and then sparrer unceremoniously pitched into the snow, by way of showing that all scouts are equal, pat explained, as he rubbed their faces.
panting and glowing from the frolic they put out the fire built to heat their soup and were ready to hit the trail again. from this point on the snow-shoes were an absolute necessity, for they left the lumber trail for another ten miles through the woods. this time they were not dependent on the blazed trees as they had been when they went that way in the fall, for some one had been over the trail since the last snowfall, evidently coming out from little goose. pat studied the tracks for a few minutes. then his face cleared. "it was big jim," said he. "i wonder now if he took a look in the hollow to see how alec was getting on. he may have been over to the gillicuddy camp, the trail from which comes in at the pond, you remember, but i have an idea he swung around to see alec. i wonder now where he saw that fox. i just took it for granted that it was around where he is cutting and didn't ask any questions for fear of letting the coon out of the hole about where we were going. then when i was alone with the doctor we both forgot all about jim, there were so many other things to talk about. it may be that he saw that silver gray somewhere along this trail. we'll keep our eyes peeled for signs."
"how do you know that big jim made these tracks?" asked walter, who had been studying them closely, hoping to find out for himself the clue which made pat so sure of his man, but unable to see anything distinctive save that they were of odd shape, being nearly round.
"by a combination of two things—the shape of the tracks and the length of the stride," replied pat. "jim always uses bear's-paw shoes, and i don't believe there are more than half a dozen other pairs in this neck of woods. then look at the length of the stride. it's a good three inches longer than mine, and there's nothing dainty about mine. there isn't a man in the woods who could take that stride and hold it but jim everly. so i'm as sure it was big jim as i am that if we don't get a hustle on we'll have to camp in the snow, and it'll be a lot more comfortable at the pond. we've got another long hike to-morrow, and we want to be in shape to do it."
for some miles the going was fairly level, and once they had got into the swing of the thing the boys found it comparatively easy. there were two or three mishaps, but these were counted part of the sport. about two miles from their destination they came to a spur of a mountain over which the trail led. in fact, it was the very spur on the other side of which spud ely had overrun the trail and got lost the fall previous. pat called a halt.
"it's going to be no small job to get this load up there," said he. "we can go around the spur, but to do that will add a good three miles, and in the valley it will be dark before we can reach camp. what do you think? are you game to try the hill?"
"the hill! the hill! follow me, comrades, up yonder heights, and drive the enemy from their guns!" shouted hal, striking a heroic attitude and pretending to flourish an imaginary sword.
"where lives the scout, by difficulties pressed,
who will admit a chicken heart possessed?
who will not rather bravely face the wust
and do and dare and conquer or go bust!"
"bravo!" cried walter.
"when dares our comrade coin and use a word like wust
we'll take his dare and see who'll scale yon hillside fust!
lead on, mr. malone. we'll make it or die in the attempt."
"all right, me brave scouts," replied pat. "up we go! 'tis a chance to see the kind of stuff that's in the likes of you, for 'twill be no child's play getting this load up there. and when we get up there where you see the bare rock watch your footing. that rock is slippery, and a fall there would be serious."
the next half hour was one of panting, sweating toil. in the first place, as soon as the grade began to rise sharply the boys found that the only way they could progress was by digging their toes into the snow through the toe holes in the shoes, which brought an added strain on the already weary muscles of the calves. it would have been bad enough in view of their inexperience if they had had nothing else to consider, but there was that heavy load, and it grew heavier every minute. as they got higher where the wind had had full sweep there was comparatively little snow, and in some places the bare rock was exposed. here they found it easier going without the snow-shoes than with them.
hauling and pushing they worked the toboggan up until at last the spur was crossed.
"gee whiz!" exclaimed hal. "i'm sweating like a butcher. that's what i call work."
"and we're doing it for fun," added upton. "funny what a difference the view-point makes. i suppose it's all in the way you look at it whether work is fun or fun is work. i can tell you one thing, and that is that i for one am mighty glad that there isn't another one of those things to cross to-day. i'm afraid i'd lie down and holler quits. what are you rubbing your legs for, sparrer?"
"just feeling of 'em to get wise if dey's all dere," replied sparrer.
the remainder of the trail to little goose was comparatively easy and they reached the familiar lean-to just as dusk was settling down, and there was more than one sigh of thankfulness as the shoes were kicked off for the last time.
"i'm tired enough to drop right down and go to sleep in the snow, but my little tummy won't let me," confessed hal. "ring for the waiter, please, and have him bring me a planked steak with half a chicken on the side, grapefruit salad, and a pot of coffee with real cream. wake me up when it comes."
"nothing doing," declared pat. "this isn't the waldorf astoria, but hotel de shivers; heat and food supplied only to those who pay in labor, all bills payable in advance."
"that's me!" hal seated himself on the pile of stuff and gave vent to an exaggerated sigh of contentment. "haven't i labored all day? tell the bellhop to take my stuff to my room. i think i'll have my dinner served there."
he ended with a grunt, the result of a sharp poke in the pit of his stomach from an axe handle. "to turn on the heat with," explained pat sweetly, thrusting the axe into hal's hands, and pointing to a pile of birch logs.
hal got to his feet with a groan and a grimace and followed upton who, with another axe, had already started for the wood-pile. "you're a slave driver! that's what you are, a flint-hearted slave driver," he grumbled, albeit with a twinkle that belied his words.
"my tummy, oh, my tummy!
it gives me such a pain!
i wonder will it ever
feel really full again!"
"that depends on how soon you get that wood split," grinned pat. "if you don't get a move on it will be so dark you can't see what you are doing, and i give you fair warning—no wood, no dinner."
"let it never be said i am ever a shirk
when a dinner depends on the way that i work,"
retorted hal, and forthwith fell to his task with a vim that put upton on his mettle to break even with him, for hal was no mean axeman, as pat well knew. the handling of an axe was one of the things which hal had learned, and learned well during his three summers in the woods. to the thorough woodsman an axe is a complete tool-chest. with it he can do almost anything that needs to be done from the cutting of fire-wood to the building of a log cabin.
sparrer was put to work pulling down the hemlock boughs which had been piled in front of the lean-to to keep out the snow, while pat unpacked things, started the fire and made preparations for the evening meal. this was sparrer's first experience in a lean-to, and when the boughs were out of the way he examined it with interest. the back and two ends were of logs, the front being open its whole width. the roof was of big sheets of hemlock bark laid overlapping and with a sharp pitch to the back.
on the ground about seven feet from the rear wall two six-foot logs about eight inches through had been staked end to end so that they reached from one side wall to the other. midway a similar log had been laid across to the rear wall, making two pens, as it were. these had been filled with small balsam boughs thrust at an angle, butts down, so that they "shingled," and packed closely. the result was two beds fifteen inches thick and so springy and comfortable that it made one sleepy just to look at them. it was perhaps three feet from the beds to the open front. in this space at one end was a table two feet square made by driving four stakes into the ground and nailing on a top made of a flattened sheet of cedar bark.
a little snow had sifted in through the protecting boughs and this sparrer swept out with a fir bough for a broom. pat, meanwhile, had a kettle of snow melting for water for soup and was mixing up a johnny-cake. the reflector oven was set before the fire to get heated and while sparrer helped bring in the wood which the two choppers had split pat sliced bacon and put it on to parboil in the frying-pan, having melted snow to make water enough to cover it.
"wot youse doing that for?" asked sparrer. "oi thought youse always fried bacon."
"to get some of the salt out of it, son," replied pat. "i'll fry it all right when the time comes. just you lay out the plates and cups where they will keep warm."
sparrer ranged the four agate-ware plates, which were really shallow pans so that soup could be served in them as well as dry food, against a stick where they would get warm but not too hot to handle. the erbswurst was crumbled into the now boiling water, a handful of julienne, or evaporated vegetables cut in thin strips, was added, the pan of johnny-cake was put in the oven and the four boys gathered around to watch and wait with many a hungry sniff. the soup was soon ready, and pat announced the first course. how good it did taste as they sat on their blanket rolls near enough to the fire to enjoy its warmth, each with a pan of the hot soup on his knees.
before this was finished pat poured off the water from the bacon and that was soon sizzling and throwing off that most delicious of all odors to a hungry woodsman.
"course number two!" called pat as he apportioned the brown slices among the four plates and then drew forth the johnny-cake, baked to a turn, a rich even brown all over with a heart of gold, the very sight of which brought forth gasps of delighted anticipation.
"what's course number three, mr. chef?" asked walter as he prepared to sink his teeth into his quarter of the corn bread.
"something worth saving your appetite for," replied pat, re-greasing the pan and pouring in the remainder of his batter for another cake. he poured off all but a little of the bacon fat from the big frying-pan, and then dropped into it a slice of meat which he had kept hidden under a towel.
"venison, by all that's great!" shouted hal as the meat began to sizzle on the hot iron. "why didn't you tell us you had venison, so that the thought of it would have helped us up that pesky hill?"
"tis the docthor's contribution to the joy av living," responded pat, deftly flipping the steak over to sear the other side. "but i mistrust yez have eaten so much already thot 'tis not the loikes av yez will be wanting more than maybe a wee bite. but never ye moind. 'tis meself will do justice to the docthor and his gift."
"don't you believe it!" roared the three in unison.
the steak and the second johnny-cake were done together and were finished together to the last scrap and crumb, and along with them went hot chocolate. there was a general loosening of belts, and then hal broke the silence of contentment which had fallen on the little group.
"my tummy, oh, my tummy!
it has now another pain!
i wish that it were empty
that it might be filled again,"
said he, gazing mournfully into his empty plate.
"them's my sentiments too," said walter, when the laugh that followed had subsided. "but any fellow who springs a thing like that has to pay for it. i move that hal wash the dishes. all in favor say aye."
three ayes made the woods ring. "all opposed say no!"
hal's "no!" was shouted at the top of his lungs.
"'tis a vote," declared walter. "mr. harrison will now attend to his duties and carry out the action of this assembly."
after the dishes were out of the way pat built a huge fire with three great backlogs one above another and slanting back to keep them from rolling down. they were held in place by braces at the back. in front of these smaller logs were piled, the backlogs reflecting the heat forward into the lean-to. then the blankets were spread on the rough beds, and with all their clothing on, including moccasins, four weary young woodsmen turned in for the night.
pat was asleep almost as soon as he touched the bed, and hal and upton were not far behind him. but to sparrer, tired as he was, the novelty of his surroundings was too great for immediate sleep, and for a long time he lay staring out at the flickering flames and above them at the brilliant stars, his active imagination keyed to a high pitch. it was like fairy-land to him. nothing seemed real. he had read and heard of these things, but that he, eddie muldoon, could actually be experiencing them, sleeping in a real hunter's camp in the dead of winter, tramping on snow-shoes through great lonely forests, eating such meals as he had never known before in all his short life—meals cooked over open fires in the great wonderful out-of-doors, couldn't be. and yet here he was.
the fire died down until only a deep glow, a warm ruddy glow which grew less and less, lighted the rough interior, and before it had quite vanished eddie had slipped from the real which seemed unreal to the unreal which so often seems real in the realm of dreams.
three times during the night pat crawled out of his blankets to put wood on the fire, but the other sleepers knew nothing of it. they slept the deep heavy sleep of healthy, tired boys and it mattered not to them that the temperature dropped until the very trees cracked and split with the cold. they were as warm and comfortable as if in their own beds at home. overhead the stars shone down on a great white world wherein the fire made but a flickering point of yellow light, and wherein was no sound save the heavy breathing of the sleepers, the sputter of hot coals snapping off into the snow, the occasional crack of a frost-riven tree, and the soft stamp of a snow-shoe rabbit gazing wonder-eyed at the dying embers.
