ar-frost before them when they laughed and talked.

During the night something had been done to break out the road. Mr.
Jaroth's horses managed to trample the drifts into something like a hubbly
path for the broad sled-runners to slip oven They went on, almost always
mounting a grade, for four hours before they came to a human habitation.

The driver pointed his whipstock to a black speck before them and higher
up the hill which was sharply defined against the background of pure
white.

"Bill Kedders' hut," he said to Mr. Gordon. "'Tain't likely he's there
this time o' year. Usually he and his wife go to Cliffdale to spend the
winter with their married daughter."

"Just the same," cried Bob suddenly, "there's smoke coming out of that
chimney. Don't you see it, Uncle Dick?"

"The boy's right!" ejaculated Jaroth, with sudden anxiety. "It can't be
that Bill and his woman were caught by this blizzard. He's as knowing
about weather signs as an old bear, Bill is. And you can bet every bear in
these woods is holed up till spring."

He even urged the plodding horses to a faster pace. The hut, buried in the
snow to a point far above its eaves, was built against a steep hillside
at the edge of the wood, with the drifted road passing directly before its
door. When the pung drew up before it and the horses stopped with a sudden
shower of tinkling bell-notes, Mr. Jaroth shouted:

"Hey, Bill! Hey, Bill Kedders!"

There was no direct reply to this hail. But as they listened for a reply
there was not one of the party that did not distinguish quite clearly the
sound of weeping from inside the mountain hut.

CHAPTER XV

THE LOST GIRL

"That ain't Bill!" exclaimed Jaroth. "That's as sure as you're a foot
high. Nor yet it ain't his wife. If either one of them has cried since
they were put into short clothes I miss my guess. Huh!"

He hesitated, standing in the snow half way between the pung and the
snow-smothered door of the hut. Sheltered as it had been by the hill and
by the woods, the hut was not masked so much by the drifted snow on its
front. They could see the upper part of the door-casing.

"By gravy!" ejaculated Mr. Jaroth, "it don't sound human. I can't make it
out. Funny things they say happen up here in these woods. I wouldn't be a
mite surprised if that crying--or----"

He hesitated while the boys and girls, and even Mr. Gordon, stared
amazedly at him.

"Who do you think it is?" asked Uncle Dick finall