Many a trapper on reaching one of his huts where he has carefully cachedaway his flour and bacon to serve in an emergency, has found that it hasbeen raided in his absence by wolverines, who have spoiled what theycould not destroy. The camp of our friends on the Porcupine River hadbeen visited on several occasions by wolverines, but they had merelycontented themselves with prowling about the fox-kennels and on oneoccasion ripping open a fish-pound and devouring all the supply of foxfood contained therein.
"I'll bet that fellow has smelled the blood of the black fox on thatrascal's sled and is on his track," exclaimed Tom, as the boys stoodlooking at the often anathemized footprints.
"In that case he may get to the carcass before we do," remarked Jack.
"Not very probable," said Tom; "you can be sure that a man carrying avaluable skin like that would guard it day and night, and----"
He stopped short and his brown face grew confused. It had just occurredto him that to guard the black fox day and night was just what theyought to have done. Jack noticed his confusion.
"Cheer up, old fellow," he struck in consolingly, "it couldn't behelped, and----"
"But don't you see that that is just what we can't explain to UncleDacre and Mr. Chillingworth?" demanded Tom. "How are we to get them tosee that it couldn't be helped?"
Jack looked rather helpless.
"But we'll get it back,--at least we'll get the skin,--if we ever catchup with this chap," he insisted.
"Yes, and that 'if' looks as big as the Washington Monument to me rightnow," responded Tom, "but come on. Hit up the trail again. I wonder howmuch ahead of us he is, anyhow?"
"Funny we haven't struck any of his camps yet. He must have stopped toeat."
"The very fact that he hasn't shows what a hurry he is in, but if hekeeps on at this rate his dogs will give out."
"And that will give us our chance?"
"Exactly. He must guess that we are on his track and is going to driveahead like fury."
"But he can get fresh dogs."
"Not without entering a settlement, and I guess he wouldn't take achance on doing that just yet."
"If only we could get another dog team and a good guide, we could runhim down without trouble."
"I'm not so certain of that, but anyhow I'd rather have the dogs thanthe guide. A blind man could follow this trail."
After this they pushed on in silence, watching as they went the stealthytracks of the wolverine following, like themselves, the unknown marauderof the night.
CHAPTER VI--STOPPING TO REST.
Large natures are apt to take heavy blows more calmly, at any rate sofar as outward appearances are concerned, than smaller ones. The Dacreboys, broadened and deepened by their adventurous lives, were not ascast down over the disaster that had befallen them as might have beenmany lads less used to meeting hardships and difficulties and fightingthem as American boys should.
Therefore it was that, keen as was their interest in the stake that layahead of them, they yet found time to notice the sights about them andto talk as they moved along over the snow much as they might have doneunder quite ordinary circumstances.
If anything, Jack had shown his anger and chagrin more perceptibly thanTom when the blow had first fallen. But now he was in as perfect commandof his faculties as his elder brother. He was able even to crack a jokenow and then with seeming indifference to the object of their journeyand the perils that might lie in front of them, perhaps just around thenext turn of the trail, for all that they knew.
As for Tom, following the calm, almost stoical way with which he had metthe discovery of their loss, he had become possessed of an unconquerabledesire to find the man who had robbed them and if possible hand him overto the authorities. Failing this, Tom found himself possessed of a grim,bulldog determination to make the man give up the spoils. As for the manhimself, he felt no wish to punish him under those circumstances. Thatwas for the law to do. The main thing was to get back the black fox'sskin, for he was sure the creature had been killed.
At about noontime Tom called a halt. Jack was for pressing right onwithout stopping to eat, but Tom would not allow this.
"It's no use two fellows wearing themselves out," he said; "we shallwork all the better for having stopped to 'fire up.'"
"Well, it looks to me like so much lost time," observed Jack, sitingdown, 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 noticeit.
He set Jack to work hacking fragments from a dead hemlock which wasstill upstanding, for, although there were plenty of fallen trees about,timber that has been lying on the ground is never such good kindling asupstanding deadwood, because it is almost sure to be damp. While Jackwas about this task, Tom cleared a space in the snow, and then he drewfrom 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 thepermanency of the fire, Tom filled the pot with snow and then set amatch to the pile of shavings. They had been raked together lightly andthe 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 shotthe cheery red flames, and the blue smoke curled merrily away as thewood crackled joyously. There is magic in a fire in the woods. In atrice a match and dry timber can convert a cheerless camp into a placefit for human habitation and happiness.
The snow was melted by the time the kindling had died down and Tom couldmake a bed of red coals. In these he set the pot once more, this timewith tea added to the boiling water. It was sweetened with some of aprecious store of molasses, carried in a bottle and used as a specialluxury. As for milk, even of the condensed variety, the Bungalow Boys ontheir trips along the trap line had long since learned to do without it.
With jerked deer meat, prepared the week before, and some soggyflapjacks baked in an aluminum oven, they made a satisfactory meal. Byway of dessert, each boy stuffed some dried apricots into his mouth tochew as they moved along. Thus refreshed, thongs were tightened, dufflepacked, and they were once more ready for the trail.
All that afternoon they followed along the man of mystery's track, butin no place could they find a spot where he had paused to camp. He musthave eaten whatever refreshment he had while riding on his sled or whileon foot, for no traces of a fire or a resting place could the boys' eyesdiscover.
One clew alone the thief had left behind him, and that was in the formof numerous stubs of cigarettes which had been rolled by hand out ofcoarse yellow paper. But outside of this sign there was nothing but thesled marks to guide them. One thing about the trail that has not yetbeen 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 hadcome, and in places the two tracks could be seen where the sled hadswung out a little.
After a time they found that a snow storm, which must have fallen in thevicinity 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 offsomewhere on his journey to their camp, but they cared little for this.It was his fresh trail that they were following hot upon, like houndsupon the scent.
All the way, too, went the trail of the wolverine, and, judging from thetracks, the boys guessed that the animal had been traveling fast. Thislooked ominous, for the wolverine is not, as a rule, an energeticanimal, and proved at least to Tom's mind that the robber must betraveling very quickly.
He pointed this out to Jack, who agreed with him. But neither of theboys 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 entertheir 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 thattime of year in the northern wilds the evening sets in
early.
Above their heads, from the darkening canopy of the sky, the stars, amillion pin points of light, began to shine. The snow turned a dull,steely blue as the light shut in. A slight breeze stirred in thehemlocks and spruces. It began to grow noticeably colder, too.
But as the daylight died another light, a wonderful mystic glory ofradiance, began to glow in the northern sky. Against its wavering,shimmering, unearthly splendor every twig on every tree stood out asthough carved in blackest ebony. The brush was shrouded in deepestsable, and the shadows lay upon the snow as black as a crow's wing.
Everywhere was a deep, breathless hush, except where the light windcaused a huddled mass of snow on an interlaced branch to slipground-ward. The great solitudes appeared to be composing themselves forsleep. On the hard, frozen surface the boys' snowshoes creaked almostmetallically as they pressed on, following in the dimming light the twoparallel 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. Howlong they could not guess. They passed a small stream. In the silencethey could hear the ice "crack-cracking!" with that startling sound thatis one of the most mystic of the voices of the woods. It grew bitterlycold. Tom began to look anxiously about him. They must find a lodgingfor the night. The question of sleeping in the open did not bother him.Timber was plenty, and they could make an evergreen shelter and soonhave a roaring fire to warm their blood. He was merely prospecting for aplace that looked a likely one.
And then, suddenly, something happened that sent an involuntary chillrunning up and down the spines of both boys.
From the westward, through the long, melancholy aisles ofstraight-trunked trees, the sound had come. Out of the silence it wasborne with a chilling forboding to them. It was a long-flung,indescribably forlorn sound, and seemed to fill the silences, comingfrom no definite spot after an instant's listening.
It deepened and swelled, died away and rose like the sound of distantchurch bells. Then, while they stood listening, involuntarily brought toa swift, startled halt, it died out uncannily, sinkingly, and thesilence 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 abroadseeking their meat from God.
CHAPTER VII--IN THE TRAPPER'S HUT.
Now, to a reader who has never been a woodsman, who has never penetratedthe silences that lie north of Fifty-three, the word "wolves" conveys adistinct impression of uneasiness.
The cold fact is that the northern woodsman stands rather in contempt ofwolves. He has no use for them, but he does not fear them; and thewolves for their part--except in some startling exceptions--leavemankind alone.
The boys had been long enough in the Northland to share this feeling,and it was not fear that brought them to a halt at the long, melancholyululation that told them of the "gray brothers" wishing each other "goodhunting." It was quite another feeling: the sense of their isolation,that the moaning cry had brought sharply home to them, the loneliness ofthe solitudes about them, the possibly dangerous nature of their quest.
"Wow! but that sound always makes me shiver," said Jack, glancing abouthim, as if he expected to see a gray head pop out from behind the treesat any moment.
"Yes, it never sounded very good to me, even when we were lying snuglyin our bunks on the good old _Yukon Rover_," agreed Tom. "I wish wecould find some trapper's shack or hut hereabouts. I wouldn't mindmaking a good camp with some company around, for to-night anyhow."
"Why, you talk as if we might be a long time in the woods," said Jack,in rather dismayed tones.
"And so we may be, for it is up to us now to keep on that trail till wefind the man that made it, or else run it out."
Jack did not make any reply to this. His spirits had been good all day,and he had looked upon the chase rather in the light of an enjoyableadventure than anything else.
But now the twilight desolation, the fading line of light in the westand the long howl of hunting wolves, which ever and anon swelled anddied out in the distance as they stood there, combined to give him asense of forboding and creepiness.
Tom's cheery voice aroused him.
"We can push on a way yet, anyhow," his elder brother was saying; "evenhalf a mile farther will be better than nothing, and who knows that wemay not come on some Indian camp or trapper's shack, where we can get ahot supper and find, maybe, some news of our visitor."
Jack, thus admonished, roused himself. By an effort he put aside hisgloomy thoughts. Side by side through the trees the two youngadventurers forged ahead. But Jack soon began to sag behind. It wasplain that he was beginning to get fagged. It was small wonder. They hadcome thirty-five miles that day, as Tom's speedometer showed, which is afair journey for a grown man, let alone boys. A seasoned woodsman canmake fifty miles a day on snowshoes and pull up with no feeling but ahuge appetite. But, although the boys were well muscled and used tofollowing the trail, they could not hope to compete with the lifelongrangers of the forest in endurance.
Tom was just thinking of making camp right where they then were, in agrove of hemlocks and stunted spruces, when he gave a sudden cry of joy.
"Hurray! Jack, old boy! Talk about luck!"
"What's up?"
"Don't you know yet?"
"I do not."
"Then you are a worse woodsman than I thought you."
"You might explain. Have you gone crazy?"
"Not just yet. Don't you smell anything?"
"Um--a-h-h-h! Yes, I do. Smoke."
"Wood smoke, Jack, and wood smoke means a fire, and fire means a humanbeing."
"Yes, and a human being may--mean--may mean----"
"Well?"
"A human being that may make us a lot of trouble; for instance, the manwho stole that skin!"
"Cracky! It may be he! Wait right here till I creep ahead a little."
Dodging here and there behind tree trunks, Tom stole cautiously forward.He made not a sound as he went except when now and again the snowcreaked under his feet. As he moved, he was doing some rapid thinking.
All day long they had been striving with all their strength to get nearthe man of the long trail who had stolen their black fox skin. Yet nowthat he might be at hand, almost within earshot of them, Tom found hisheart pounding in a most uncomfortable way. What kind of a man might hebe? Perhaps some desperado who could easily overpower them. Perhapsthere were even a gang of them.
All these discomforting thoughts kept popping into Tom's mind as he madehis way onward as cautiously as a scout. But suddenly, as he bentforward, his rifle that he carried slung by a bandolier over hisshoulders bumped his back. It was like a dose of magic elixir andbrought his courage back in a flash.
"Well," he thought, "if that rascal wants trouble, he can----"
He came to a quick halt.
"Here's the end of the trail!" he gasped.
Before him, not ten rods away and just over a slight rise, which hadprevented his seeing it before, was a small log hut.
It stood on the brink of a little lake, the latter, of course, frozenmany inches thick. About it was a clearing where the logs to build ithad been felled. But what brought Tom up with a round turn was the sightof sleigh tracks leading up to the door.
From the chimney a thin wisp of bluish smoke was curling, undoubtedlythe subtle aroma they had sensed at a distance. Tom stood as still as agraven image for a minute, listening intently. Over everything about himhung the hush of the wilderness at nightfall.
For a space he stood thus, and then, giving his rifle a quick hitch sothat it would be in readiness to his hand, he strode forward on hissnowshoes with long, certain strides.
CHAPTER VIII--THE GHOSTLY CRY.
There was a big wood pile at one side of the hut, from which the ownerevidently drew for his fuel supply. Tom used this as a sort of screen toconceal h
is advance, and, slipping behind it, gained a place where,through a chink in the logs, he could gaze into the interior. It wasdeserted. Of that he was sure immediately after his first glance, forthe shack consisted only of the one room.
Having made sure of this, he continued his way around to the front ofthe place, and then discovered to his astonishment that the sled trackswent straight onward through the snow. It was easy for him to guess thatthe man they were pursuing had camped for a short time in the hut,cooked himself a meal and left the fire in the stove burning. When hesaw several brown-paper cigarette butts lying scattered on the snow infront of the place, the identity of the visitor to the lonely hut becamea certainty.
The problem of a place to pass the night was thus solved, for it is therule of the waste places that the benighted traveler may make himself athome whenever he happens to come across a shelter. Tom gave a loud"Hullo!" and there came back an answering hail from Jack. In a fewminutes the younger of the Bungalow Boys was at Tom's side.
"Well, here's our hotel, all ready and fixed up for us, even the firelighted in readiness for us," laughed Tom as Jack came up.
"But what does the owner say about it?"
"Not being at home just at present, he hasn't anything to say; however,our friend of the black fox skin stopped here, rested his bones, fed hisdogs, to judge from all the litter around, and then passed on."