“Jiminy crickets!” exclaimed Jim, “I thought we were goners that time.”
“Gosh, yes!” assented Tom. “One of ’em stepped on me, but I guess these furs saved me. Say, what’s the matter with us? We didn’t kill a single one.”
“Search me,” replied Jim, “I don’t see how we missed.”
“Me say hitum, sure Mike!” cried Unavik who was searching the trampled snow where the beasts had passed.
The boys hurried to his side and glancing down, saw big splashes of crimson on the snow. Evidently they had not missed. Racing after the Eskimo they hurried as fast as they could travel towards the distant barking of the dogs. As they leaped the crest of a hummock, Unavik uttered a sharp cry, and the boys shouted with delight as they saw a big black bull lying half buried in a snow drift where he had fallen.
“We got one anyway!” cried Tom as they hurried on. “Say, we are in luck!”
Once again they found the oxen at bay and, this time when they fired, two of the creatures were left behind when the herd galloped off.
“Gee, that’s enough!” declared Jim, as panting and utterly exhausted the boys seated themselves on one of the dead oxen. “I’m all in. These clothes were never made for sprinting.”
“Get the dogs, Unavik,” said Tom. “No use in killing more. We can’t even get these three in to the village. We’ll wait here for you.”
The Eskimo started off, but there was no need for him to recall his pack. The musk oxen were thoroughly frightened and demoralized and had fled over hill and dale into the vast white waste, and the dogs, realizing that the creatures could not be brought to bay again with the scent of blood behind them, came trotting back towards the dead oxen.