“I’m so co-old!” shivered Margy. “I don’t see any smoke coming out of a chimney. I don’t believe any one lives there.”
“I don’t see any chimney,” declared Ward, trying to brush the snow away from before his face so that he could see clearly—a hopeless task.
“Well, some one must live there,” said Fred, impatiently. “Hurry up, or we’ll freeze standing here.”
It was dark now, and they were stiff and tired. Their clothes were damp and their gloves soaked through. Worse still, they were hungry, and Artie, who had often sighed to be an explorer, began to wonder whether he was going to starve to death in the snow.
Fred led the way toward the building and the others followed him, longing for the sight of a bright fire and a lighted lamp. The ground was humpy, and Margy began to cry when she fell down.
“I’m so tired,” she sniffed, as Polly pulled her up. “If any one lives in that house they’re not at home, because it’s dark.”
“Perhaps there’s a light at the back,” said Fred. “Maybe they only have a light in the kitchen.”
“Do you know what I think, Fred?” called Polly, raising her voice above the wind which still buffeted them unmercifully. “I think that is a barn! It doesn’t look like a house to me.”
“If it’s a barn, that means there’s a house near here,” shouted Fred. “That’s good luck.”
But when they had reached the barn—for it was a barn, after all—another disappointment awaited them. The building was open on both sides, and the wind swept through the wide doorways and hurled the snow into the corners, where it lay in heaps.