on returning to the cottage, the first thing that hugh did was to mark off the date on the calendar just as he had seen oscar do every morning.
“we mustn’t lose count of the days,” he said to dick.
“oh, there won’t be so many of them as all that,” dick answered.
hugh said nothing. oscar had talked to him more fully than to his comrade about the task of righting john edmonds’ affairs.
“it may not be so simple to put them in order as he hopes it will,” he had said, “so the time may be three weeks or a month or perhaps more. i will not hide from you the chance that, if there is very bad weather soon, i may not get back to you for some time. the snow can lie very deep in these valleys.”
“snow,” hugh had exclaimed, “why, it is only october!”
“remember it will be november in a week,” oscar replied, “and that this is a climate very different from yours. here the winter begins early and lasts long and we have to be ready for it. there are supplies enough to last until spring, i have made sure of that, and plenty of wood, so that there is no danger of your needing anything. i will come back to you as soon as i can, but at this season all plans go by the weather.”
so hugh had written a long letter to his father for oscar to send, explaining why mail must be uncertain and just what he was doing.
“i ought to learn a great deal from this experience,” he ended, “enough to make even you feel that i am fit for service in france. i am bound that i will make it before i am twenty-one.”
it did not look much like winter to-day, even though the woods were so bare and the hillsides so brown. the boys had arranged that they would hunt and fish as much as possible for the purpose of saving oscar’s stores for future use, and that they would go out alone on alternate days, so that the cottage might never be left unguarded. neither one was ever to go so far away that a certain signal of rifle shots could not call him back. it was agreed that hugh was to go shooting the first day, so, very blithely, he had made ready, shouldered his rifle and started forth.
he stopped a moment before the door to look down at the lake, which was very still this morning and very blue. he knew now why oscar had elected to start before the dawn, for two canoes were skimming over the quiet surface, pirate vessels, although not of the accepted type. often before hugh had seen them patrolling these waters that half-breed jake called his own, swift craft, dark and sinister, ready to shoot any man or sink any boat that ventured through harbin’s channel. harbin, he had learned, was an explorer who, fifty years ago, had coasted up and down red lake, mapping the islands and the bays and inlets. his boat had been wrecked in this channel: one could see its bleaching bones still wedged among the rocks, and he himself had perished at the hands of hostile indians. although the indians had now nearly vanished and civilization had, since then, been creeping steadily nearer, the upper reaches of red lake were still as wild, unexplored and perilous as in his day. but—thus hugh registered a vow within himself—they would soon be so no longer.
a long day’s tramp brought him fair sport, several partridges, two quail, but no sight of larger game. hugh was a good shot and did not often fail to bring down his quarry.
“i wish i could get a deer,” he thought, but knew that for that he must go out at night.
the air was so still and the woods so silent that it seemed he must be the only person within a hundred miles. there was a sleepy swaying of the branches above his head and a quiet rustle of the leaves under his feet, otherwise there was scarcely a sound. surely in this peaceful region there could be no such thing as quarreling and bloodshed. it was hard to believe that, only a few miles away, the dingy cabin clung to the slope of jasper peak and within it half-breed jake and his indian comrades were planning any sort of violence that would lead to the ruin of oscar’s cherished scheme.
“it must be a mistake,” hugh reflected almost aloud. “i believe i dreamed it. i don’t think this adventure is real.”
he had crossed a little brook, in the late afternoon, and was climbing the long slope beyond it when he realized that he was thirsty and that the route he was about to follow lay along the ridge, high above any water for many miles.
“i am not much of a woodsman,” he told himself. “i should have remembered to drink when i could. it would be better to go back.”
quickly he ran down the hill, making a good deal of noise as he crashed through the underbrush. he stooped long to drink at the edge of the pool and then stood up to continue his journey. he glanced across at his own trail coming down to the water’s edge on the other shore, stared at it a moment, then ran splashing through the stream to look again. close beside his own footprints and fresher even than they, were the marks of moccasined feet, as plain as those footprints of the big dog, nicholas, that he had seen once, as plain and much more ominous. some person had been following him through the wood, tracking him so closely and eagerly that he had not taken the pains to cover his own trail.
hugh stood still and looked and listened with every nerve tense, but there was nothing to be seen, nothing to be heard. the forest was as silent as a forest in a dream. he crossed the brook again, and climbed the hill hastily. more than once he turned his head quickly and looked back over his shoulder, but there was never a stirring leaf nor a snapping twig to prove that he was being followed. he made his way homeward in the straightest line possible, thinking deeply all the way.
time passed, the weather grew colder and the daylight shorter, but still the pirates made no move. only the blue haze of their smoke going up from jasper peak showed that they were still there, watching and ever watching. game began to be scarce in the restricted limit the boys allowed themselves for hunting, so that they fell to dipping deeper and deeper into oscar’s stores. everything was kept in the small shed backing up against the cottage with its door opening into the main room. this place was carefully inspected every day, according to instructions.
“for,” oscar had said, “if the fieldmice get in and chew up your bacon or a leak comes in the roof and spoils your flour and meal, where are you? in case of bad weather your lives might depend on these supplies being safe.”
the vigilance of nicholas sniffed out any overbold mouse that ventured within, while the boys’ watchfulness prevented any mischance from wind and rain, so that for a time all went well. they began, indeed, to feel such a sense of security that it did not seem possible anything could go amiss and it appeared that, when oscar returned, the report given him would be quite barren of adventure. hugh, however, thinking of those footprints by the stream, still remembered that what danger did lurk about them was bound to be unsuspected and unseen.
it had been, one day, hugh’s turn to replenish the empty larder so that he had spent the whole afternoon fishing about a mile from the cottage. dusk was just beginning, yet he lingered for “just one more bite,” since luck had not been good and he wished to carry home enough fish for one meal at least. he waited long for a nibble, shifting impatiently from foot to foot.
“it must be getting too cold for fishing,” he commented to himself. “why, it feels like winter all of a sudden; it has changed a great deal since morning.”
he had just pulled in a flopping trout and had dropped it into the basket when a sudden sound startled him so that he dropped his rod. it was the sharp crack of a rifle, followed immediately by a second and a third, the prearranged signal of alarm. the pirates had struck at last!
a mile is a long way to run when the course is over a heavily wooded ridge and through a valley of poplar thickets. hugh covered it in extraordinarily short time, although it seemed to him unnumbered hours. he was just coming, panting, up the last slope, when he met dick, equally breathless, running toward him.
“it’s hulda,” gasped his friend. “the indians are trying to drive her off; they have headed her away off yonder, over the hill.”
he pointed, for even as he spoke, they caught sight of hulda crossing a clearing, running with the awkward gait common to excited cows and lowing her amazement and dismay at the indignity put upon her.
“you strike across the ridge and i will run down into the valley,” directed dick. “i think i can head her off. they sha’n’t steal hulda!”
with a shout, the two boys plunged to the rescue. hugh was quick enough to reach her, halfway down the slope, but totally unable to check her course. the mild hulda, now thoroughly alarmed, came down the hill with a blind rush, blundered against him and rolled him head over heels. he picked himself up, unhurt, and ran after her in determined pursuit. indeed the pirates were not to be allowed the triumph of stealing hulda!
on the more open ground below dick succeeded in slowing her a little and nicholas, flying through the thickets, like a streak of white lightning, to leap and bark beneath her very nose, managed to turn her back up the hill. here the boys were able to gain on her terrified speed once more, and, on hugh’s closing in and turning her again, she ran close by dick, who triumphantly seized her by the halter and brought her to a standstill.
“i’ve got her,” he shouted to hugh, raising his arm high in signal of victory. “she’s—ouch!”
for a sharp report sounded from a thicket and a bullet, speeding just over dick’s head, nipped his uplifted hand. hugh, on coming up, found him applying his thumb to his mouth, as undisturbed as though he had scratched it with a pin. poor hulda still plunged and dragged at her halter, her sides heaving and her gentle eyes wide with fright.
“i was just coming up from the spring,” dick recounted as between them they led the cow homeward, “when i heard nicholas bark, so i ran around the corner of the cabin and there she was, just going over the hill a quarter of a mile away. at first i thought i could stop her alone, but when i saw the two indians driving her, i ran back and signaled for you. here, let’s lead her along the valley. i am out of breath chasing her up hills.”
“aren’t you hurt?” inquired hugh anxiously as they trudged along.
hulda still made the going difficult, jerking and snorting with excitement. her calm disposition, once completely roused, seemed almost impossible to soothe.
“pshaw, no, the bullet hardly touched me,” dick replied. “what surprises me is that they let us get her with only one shot fired. i don’t quite understand.”
“i wonder—” began hugh, then paused, for a thought had struck him.
it struck him so deeply that he dropped hulda’s rope and turned to run up the hill. there was a growing misgiving in his heart that turned swiftly to real terror as he sped along: it seemed as though he would never reach the summit. yet even while he was struggling up the slopes he began to see a red glow behind the trees that seemed to grow brighter and brighter. in spite of a contrary wind there was a queer suffocating smell in the air.
“dick, dick,” he called, “leave hulda; come quickly.”
the loss of forty cows could be nothing beside the disaster before him, as he reached the hilltop. scarlet flames licked across the roof of oscar’s cabin, with dense clouds of smoke rolling out toward the lake and with a single tall figure moving swiftly across the clearing, black against the brilliant blaze.
dick always maintained that jake shot twice at hugh as he raced across the clearing, but if he did so, hugh was quite unconscious of the fact.
“we can’t put it out—we can’t put it out—there is so little water!” he caught himself gasping aloud as he ran.
fortunately dick, when he came from the spring, had set down his full pail by the doorstep when he went to rescue hulda. dashing inside, hugh dragged the blankets from the bunks, plunged them into the water and then swung himself up over the eaves to the burning roof. blindly and furiously he beat at the flames, choking in the dense smoke, feeling sparks and coals burn through his coat, yet caring for nothing but that he must quench the fire. dick handed him up pail after pail of water from below; how he ever went and came from the spring so quickly was impossible to understand.
it was hugh who had the presence of mind to realize that the water must be husbanded and thrown upon the fire in well-aimed dipperfuls rather than poured pell-mell across the roof. it was dick who shouted up to him that he must try to drive the flames back from the cabin proper, since saving the blazing shed behind it was already beyond hope. how they toiled, now getting a little the better of the fire, now driven back by a fresh outburst of flame, too excited either to hope or to despair, feeling only one instinct—to fight. hours passed, they were drenched, blackened, their clothes singed, their hands and faces burned, they were exhausted; breathless, but at last victorious.
slowly the flames died down to smoldering ashes, the smoke cleared away, the last glowing coal was stamped upon, the last spark went out. hugh slid to the ground, finding his knees suddenly a little shaky, and stood looking happily into dick’s blackened face.
“we did it,” he said; “oscar’s got his cabin still.”
“yes,” the other assented a trifle quaveringly; “i thought once or twice it was really gone.”
“and now,” went on hugh, “where’s hulda?”
fires, it seemed, did not excite hulda in the least, for she was discovered grazing peacefully at the edge of the clearing, her former agitation entirely vanished. nicholas had followed the boys at first, but, after getting a few sparks in his furry coat, had decided to retreat and was sitting solemnly beside her, mounting guard. the cow’s stable, set at a little distance, was untouched by the flames, so hulda was driven in, her manner showing plainly that she was glad to get home again after the disturbing events of the last few hours. the boys lit a lantern and tended her together, as though she might escape again were one of them to minister to her alone. they made no comment on the fire, both seeming to avoid the subject as long as possible.
“it’s cold,” commented dick, once, shivering in his dripping garments, to which hugh replied:
“yes, and getting colder every minute.”
that was all of their conversation.
they finished at last and, coming out of the shed, closed the door very carefully behind them. not until they were halfway up the path to the cottage did either of them speak. yet the extent of their tragedy must be faced.
“there’s quite a hole in the roof,” observed dick, “but we can mend that easily enough.”
“and we can block up the store room door,” said hugh. “we’ll nail the whole thing over with boards to keep the cold out.”
they were quiet again—but at last dick burst out:
“hugh, do you realize that our supplies are burned, the shed and everything in it? that we haven’t one thing left to eat?”
“i know it,” replied hugh soberly. “i—i’ve been thinking about just that thing for the last hour.”
“they must have meant to do it all along,” observed dick. “they drove off hulda just for a blind. oh, that jake, that skulking blackguard!”
“oscar said they would choose the mean, crooked way,” hugh agreed. “he told me they would try some trick or other. i wish we could have guessed beforehand.”
“but oscar will be back soon,” insisted dick eagerly. “he must be back soon. gee, it’s cold!”
“yes,” returned hugh, “he may be back any day now.”
yet he spoke absent-mindedly, as though his thoughts were upon other things. it was because he was swinging the lantern as he went along and his attention had been suddenly caught by something unexpected. in the circle of yellow light he saw a whirling flurry of tiny flakes of snow.
