Already Elmer was casting about to see where they had better locate their camp. It was easy to say this would be for only one night, but how did they know? The threatening storm might swoop down with such force that it would virtually imprison them for a much longer stay. And so he considered it worth while to do the best possible while they had any choice of situation.
Elmer had had considerable experience, having spent a year up on a Canadian cattle ranch and wheat farm owned by an uncle, Elmer's father having been given charge of the property. There the boy had learned dozens of things that were apt to prove valuable to any one in the woods. Besides, he had made it a practice to pick up information wherever he went by asking questions, investigating for himself, and constantly increasing his stock of knowledge.
Looking in every quarter he presently decided that since they carried no tent, and it would be no easy task to make a brush shelter, their best move was to settle down in the lee of one of those cavities formed when a hurricane had toppled a number of giant trees over, with their roots, and the earth attached to the same, standing fully eight feet in the air.
There was a little choice about the matter, and Elmer picked out the one best suited to screen them from the northwest wind. The snow would surely come from that direction, and having a windbreak might mean considerable.
"Drop everything here, boys, and let's hustle to collect all the wood we can find. Don't stop short of darkness, because maybe we'll have to keep a fire going for several days. Just drag it handy, so we'll know where to find it, even if the snow comes two feet deep!"
"Whew! I sure hope it don't get us that way to start with," said Toby; "and us not knowing whether Uncle Caleb's shack is to the north, east or west. Don't I wish we'd run across him in the woods, and were toasting our shins alongside a fire in his comfy little place right now! Um! But the snow's coming faster than she was, fellows!"
"The more reason we should get busy," Elmer told him.
At that they started energetically to "make hay while the sun shone," as Lil Artha said, though he must himself have been convinced that the comparison was hardly a good one, judging from the grimace he gave when casting his eyes upward toward the leaden sky that frowned down upon them like a dome.
Fortunately there was no lack of wood handy. This had doubtless been one reason why Elmer had decided on pitching the camp where he did. Those fallen trees had in crashing to the ground broken many large limbs off, and all that was necessary for the campers to do was to drag these, one after another, to a convenient striking distance from the hole in which they intended spending the night.
All around it they banked up the loose wood, until Toby declared they had fully enough to do an army.