e
had no clear impression of anything save that he swung his weight on
the steering-oar and wished his uncle were there to see. They emerged,
breathless, wet through, the boat filled with water almost to the
gunwale. Lighter pieces of baggage and outfit were floating inside the
boat. A few careful strokes on Shorty's part worked the boat into the
draw of the eddy, and the eddy did the rest till the boat softly touched
the bank. Looking down from above was Mrs. Breck. Her prayer had been
answered, and the tears were streaming down her cheeks.

"You boys have simply got to take the money," Breck called down to them.

Shorty stood up, slipped, and sat down in the water, while the boat
dipped one gunwale under and righted again.

"Damn the money," said Shorty. "Fetch out that whiskey. Now that it's
over I'm getting cold feet, an' I'm sure likely to have a chill."

In the morning, as usual, they were among the last of the boats to
start. Breck, despite his boating inefficiency, and with only his wife
and nephew for crew, had broken camp, loaded his boat, and pulled out
at the first streak of day. But there was no hurrying Stine and Sprague,
who seemed incapable of realizing that the freeze-up might come at any
time. They malingered, got in the way, delayed, and doubled the work of
Kit and Shorty.

"I'm sure losing my respect for God, seein' as he must 'a' made them two
mistakes in human form," was the latter's blasphemous way of expressing
his disgust.

"Well, you're the real goods, at any rate," Kit grinned back at him. "It
makes me respect God the more just to look at you."

"He was sure goin' some, eh?" was Shorty's fashion of overcoming the
embarrassment of the compliment.

The trail by water crossed Lake Labarge. Here was no fast current, but
a tideless stretch of forty miles which must be rowed unless a fair wind
blew. But the time for fair wind was past, and an icy gale blew in their
teeth out of the north. This made a rough sea, against which it was
almost impossible to pull the boat. Added to their troubles was driving
snow; also, the freezing of the water on their oar-blades kept one man
occupied in chopping it off with a hatchet. Compelled to take their turn
at the oars, Sprague and Stine patently loafed. Kit had learned how
to throw his weight on an oar, but he noted that his employers made a
seeming of throwing their weights and that they dipped their oars at a
cheating angle.

At the end of three h