“I do not think that he will be here until the snow is gone. I never seem able to see him coming before then,” Grace replied, with the far-away look in her eyes which always came there when she spoke of her husband.
The next day it was blizzard again, and nearly another week wore itself out before news of the outside world reached the isolated household at Duck Flats.
Then it was Dan Semple and young Fricker who drove over with the mail, which had found its way, after many delays, to the post office at Pentland Broads. They had news also, and were eager to tell it as they sipped the hot coffee which Bertha insisted that they should come in and drink.
“I should just think that we did have a journey back from Rownton!” said Dan, in his jolly, boyish voice. “We should have been frozen to the sledge, I guess, if it hadn’t been for Fricker’s red hair; but, you know, they say that people with hair that colour never suffer from frostbite, so I kept as close to him as I could get, and that is how I escaped, and of course he was as warm as toast, lucky dog!”
“I hope that you won’t believe all he says, Miss Doyne,” said Fricker, blushing like a girl. “But it was really an awful journey, and it was next door to a miracle that we got back all right with the sledge.”
“Did you ever find out how the mistake came about?” asked Bertha, as she plied the two boys with more hot coffee and oatmeal cakes.
“We have made a pretty good guess at it,” said Dan, “but we shall have to wait until that chap Bradgate is on his feet before the mystery is cleared up, I suppose. When the police came over and took possession of that sledge which you drove to our place, they said that a sledge laden with foodstuffs had been found at old man Holman’s place over beyond West Creek. Holman is rather a shady customer, and he does not always speak the truth either; so of course we don’t know quite how much to believe of his story, and how much is merely trimming, so to speak. The old fellow says that on the night before Bradgate turned up here a man came to his place to put in for the night. The sledge was run back under the shanty—for it threatened more snow—and the man, who seemed very queer, came indoors, sat awhile by the stove, and then went to lie down on a lump of straw at the end of the shack, which is all the bed that old man Holman’s lodgers ever get. Very soon afterwards another sledge came along, this time with two men, and it was run into the shanty in front of the first, and the horses being put in the barn, the men came indoors to supper.”
“And a jolly good supper it was, too, according to old man Holman,” broke in Fricker, who was not disposed to let Dan do all the talking. “The old fellow said that the two men had brought their supper with them, and there was potted beef and fowl, cheese, ham, canned tongues, and I don’t know what besides, and drink enough to drown anyone. At any rate, it about drowned Holman’s wits; for when they took to card-playing after supper they cleaned the old man out of every cent piece he had got. Then I suppose they all went to sleep, being thoroughly tipsy, and they slept longer than they meant to do, for it had been daylight a good long time when they woke up, only to find that the man who had got there first had hitched his horses to the wrong sledge and had gone off with it.”
“Ah, that was because it stood first, I suppose,” said Bertha, laughing at the discomfiture which must have overtaken the other men when they found their mistake out.
“Just so,” said Dan, breaking in now, because Fricker was just then busy with his coffee-cup. “And the first man, who was Bradgate, was not over-clear in his head, poor chap; he evidently didn’t know anything about the sledge which came after his, and so hitched on to the first one and started with it. The men were in a royal rage when they found their sledge was gone, and threatened to shoot old man Holman for not having guarded their property better. But he isn’t the sort to take a thing of that kind in a very lamb-like spirit, so they got as good as they gave, and a little better; for the old fellow happened to have a shooting-iron handy, and he whipped it out and held up the pair of them. They climbed down a bit then, and said that they would ride after the sledge and make the other fellow give it up; but old man Holman, having got the drop on them, decided that he might as well get the money back which they had won from him overnight, so he told them that they might go when they had handed him over the money which they had won overnight by cheating. He had been wiser, though, if he had let well alone, for when he allowed them to put their hands in their pockets to get out the money, what they did was to pull out a couple of barkers, and then, of course, being two to one, old man Holman was done, and they rode off with his money in their pockets, and that is the last he has seen of them.”