Part 26 (1/2)

”Not on your life!” declared the irrepressible Isadore.

But just then Madge Steele got up and declared she had had enough. ”This hole in the ice is filling up with snow. We'll lose the fish we've already caught if we don't look out. Come on, Bobby, and get mine.”

So it was agreed to cut the fis.h.i.+ng short for that day, although The Fox declared she could have beaten them all in another hour.

However, they had a great load of the frozen fish. Besides what they had eaten for dinner, there were at least a hundred handsome fellows, and the boys had strung each fisher's catch on a birch twig which they had cut and trimmed while coming down to the lake that morning.

Tom and Ruth, left at the campfire to clean up after the mid-day meal, were shouting for them to come in. The girls left the boys to wind up the fishlines and ”strike camp,” as Ralph called taking down the pieces of canvas, and all hustled for the sh.o.r.e. They crowded around the fire, threw on more fuel, danced to get their feet warm, and called to the boys to hurry.

The five boys had their hands full in retrieving all the chairs, and canvas sheets, and fish lines, and sacks. When they got them all in and packed upon the bobsled for transportation, the snow was a foot deep on the ice and it was snowing so fast that one could not see ten feet into the swirling heart of the storm.

”I declare! it looks as though we were in a mess, with all this snow,”

complained Tom Cameron.

”And with all these girls,” growled Ralph Tingley. ”Wish we'd started an hour ago.”

”I don't know about starting _at all_,” observed Bobbins. ”Don't you see that the girls will give out before we're half-way there? We can't use snowshoes with the snow coming down like this. They clog too fast.”

”Oh, they'll have to wade the same as we do,” said Isadore.

”Yah! Wade! And us pulling this sled, too? I wish Preston had stayed with us. Don't you, Ralph?” asked his brother.

”Hus.h.!.+ don't let the girls hear you,” was the whispered reply.

Already the girls were comparing notes in a group around the fire. Now Madge turned and shouted for them:

”Come here, boys! Don't be mumbling together there. We have an idea.”

”If it's any good, let's have it,” answered Tom, cheerfully.

”It is good. It was born of experience. Some of us got all the tramping in a blinding snowstorm that we wanted a year ago. Never again! Eh, girls?”

”Quite right, Madge,” said Ralph. ”It is foolish to run into danger. We are all right here----”

”Why, the snow will drown out your fire in half an hour,” scoffed Isadore.

”And there isn't so much dry fuel.”

”I know where there is plenty of wood--and shelter, too!” cried Ruth, suddenly.

”So do I. At the lodge,” scoffed Belle.

”No. Nearby. Tom and I were just talking about it. Up that ravine yonder is the place where I fell over the cliff. And Jerry's cave is right there--one end of it.”

”A cave!” e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Helen. ”That would be bully.”

”If only we could have a good fire and get dry and warm again,” quoth Lluella, her teeth already chattering.

”I believe that would be best,” admitted Madge Steele. ”We never could get back to the lodge through this snow. The sh.o.r.e is so rough.”