“Ugh, I hate to go near it!” declared Tom.
“So do I, but we’ve got to,” said Jim. “Come on, Tom, we’re no babies or silly nervous girls. Brace up.”
Striving to control their nervous fears, the boys grasped the furs encasing that gruesome stiff arm and tugged. Presently, with a horrible, terrifying motion, the arm moved, the snow broke loose and the boys involuntarily screamed and jumped away as the body rolled over free from snow.
With wide eyes the two gazed upon the corpse and backed still farther off. The body, clad in furs, was that of a short, heavily built man, but the face, swarthy, black-bearded and black-browed, was frightful with the expression of fear and awful agony stamped upon it. At the first glance the boys saw with inexpressible horror that the whole side of the skull was crushed in and the scalp ripped off.
“Wha—wha—what killed him, I wo—wonder!” stammered Tom, his teeth chattering.
Jim, summoning all his courage, took a step nearer. “A bear!” he exclaimed, as he caught sight of a row of great gashes in the man’s neck and the ripped and torn back of the fur coat.
“Well, le—let’s get away from here,” stuttered Tom. “We ca—can’t do anything.”
Without replying Jim turned and with boyish terror of death gripping their hearts, and all their courage flown, the two raced away from the body.
Not until they had topped the next rise did they stop. Then, as they halted to regain their breaths, they noticed that the snow had almost ceased, the wind had gone down and they could see for a long distance across the white landscape.
A moment later Tom gave a glad cry. “Look Jim! Look!” he yelled. “We’re all right! see, over on that second hill! There’s some of the men!”