ng, falling, rising to his feet and
staggering among the tumbled rocks at the foot of the bluff--and then
almost in his ear came the sharp, quick sound of a rifle-shot and
another and another, at a second apart--the distress signal of the
Northland.

CHAPTER XLII

BUCKING THE STORM

Bill Carmody wheeled against the solid rock wall and frantically felt
his way along its broken surface. His groping hands encountered a cleft
barely wide enough to admit the passage of a man's body.

With a final effort he called again; instantly the high, clear tones of
the boy's voice rang in his ears from the depths of the rock cavern,
and the next moment small hands were tugging at his armpits.

"Oh! Bill, I knew you would come!" a small voice cried close to his
ear. "It was my last three shots. I've been shooting every little while
for hours and hours. Hold on! We've got to take off your snowshoes;
they won't come through the door."

A few minutes later the man sat upon the hard floor of the cave which
reeked of the rank animal odor of a long-used den. The place was bare
of snow and he leaned back against a soft, furry body while the boy
rattled on:

"I killed the _loup-cervier_! I chased him in here and shot him right
square through the head. And he never kicked--just slunked down in a
heap and dropped his rabbit. And now, if we had some matches, we could
build a fire--if we had some wood--and cook him. I'm hungry--aren't
you?"

The boy's utter disregard of the real seriousness of their plight, and
the naive way in which he accepted the coming of his friend as a matter
of course, irritated the man, who listened in scowling silence.

"Blood River Jack _was_ right," Charlie went on. "I thought he just
wanted a chance to sleep for a day. Pretty good storm, isn't it? Say,
Bill, how did he know it was going to snow?"

"Look here, young man," Bill replied wrathfully, "do you realize that
we are in a mighty bad fix, right this minute? And that it is your
fault? And that there was only about one chance in a thousand that I
would find you? And that if we ever get out of this, and your Uncle
Appleton don't give you a darn good whaling, I _will_?" The man felt a
small body press close against him in the darkness.

"Honest, Bill, I'm sorry," a subdued voice answered. "I thought Jack
was fooling, and I _did_ want to show 'em I could kill something bigger
than a rabbit. You aren't mad, are you, Bill? I hope Eth won't worry;
we