week. Business was dull just
then.

At half-past nine he met Maurice and Peter, who were waiting for him
with impatience. Macgregor had already left his toboggan at a
sporting-goods store to be equipped with runners for use on ice. But
there remained an immense amount of shopping to do, and all the things
had to be purchased at half a dozen different places. Together they
went the rounds of the shops with a list from which they checked off
article after article,--ammunition, sleeping-bags, moccasins, food,
camp outfit,--and they ordered them all sent to Macgregor's rooms by
special delivery.

At four o'clock in the afternoon the boys went back, and found the room
littered with innumerable parcels of every shape and size. Only the
toboggan had not arrived, though it had been promised for the middle of
the afternoon.

"Gracious! It looks like a lot!" exclaimed Maurice, gazing about at
the packages.

"It won't look like so much when they're stowed away," replied Peter.
"Let's get them unwrapped, and, Fred, you'd better go down and hurry up
that toboggan. Stand over them till it's done, for we must have it
before six o'clock."

Fred hurried downtown again. The toboggan was not finished, but the
work was under way. By dint of furious entreaties and representations
of the emergency Fred induced them to hurry it up. It was not a long
job, and by a quarter after five Fred was back at Mac's room,
accompanied by a messenger with the remodeled toboggan.

The toboggan was of the usual pattern and shape, but the cushions had
been removed, and a thirty-foot moose-hide thong attached for hauling.
It was fitted with four short steel runners, only four inches high,
which could be removed in a few minutes by unscrewing the nuts, so that
it could be used as a sledge on ice or as a toboggan on deep snow.

During Fred's absence the other boys had been busy. All the kit was
out of the wrappers, and the room was a wilderness of brown paper.
Everything had been packed into four canvas dunnage sacks, and now
these were firmly strapped on the toboggan. The rifles and the
snowshoes were similarly attached, so that the whole outfit was in one
secure package. They hauled this down to the railway station
themselves to make sure that there would be no delay, and dispatched it
by express to Waverley, where they intended to leave the train. It was
then a few minutes after six.

[Illustration: THE OTHER BOYS HAD BEEN BUSY]

"