The idea had struck Toby that with some of his best chums he surprise this jolly Uncle Caleb, who was a well-known professor among scientists. Many times the boy had received a warm invitation to run up and visit the old gentleman, as well as fetch a friend or two along, but until this winter Toby had somehow never entertained the idea of doing so.
Once it took hold of him, and he became wildly enthusiastic over it. When he mentioned the scheme to Elmer, as well as two other scouts, they fell in with it so quickly that the plans were soon arranged.
Accordingly, immediately after Christmas the four lads had taken a train for the north, and about noon dropped off at a lonely station, where the operator was a new hand, and had never even heard of Uncle Caleb, so that the boys hardly knew which way to turn. Just then they happened to run across a lanky boy with a grinning face, whom Elmer "pumped," with the result that they were directed to follow certain landmarks, turn ever so many times until they came to a frozen creek, up which if they headed a mile they would discover the cabin they sought.
They had been following that same frozen stream more than two hours, and there was not the slightest sign of anything in the way of a shack or cabin. In fact, it looked as though they had managed to tramp into the very heart of what seemed to be a trackless forest. In every direction stretched that never ending array of tall and little trees, each snow splashed; for there were several inches of the white feathery covering on the ground, what Elmer called fine "tracking snow;" if only they had been hunting game instead of a shelter.
Though all of the scouts kept constantly on the alert they had failed to detect the first sign of human presence. Not a shout or a gunshot had they heard; in vain had they searched the snowy ground for the welcome trail of a trapper going to or coming home after visiting his line of snares.
No wonder then that some of the boys had begun to believe they were tricked by that glib-tongued native lad, who had chuckled so disagreeably as he accepted the silver quarter Elmer thrust in his grimy palm.
All of them bore heavy loads. For the most part these consisted of extra clothes of course for use in case of extreme cold weather; but two of them also carried guns; and Toby had strapped on his pack a pair of snow-shoes his uncle had once presented to him, but which the boy had never found a good chance to use, though he hoped the time had now arrived for putting them to some service.
"I've been trying to figure things out," Elmer told them, as they sat down on a log to rest, while trying to decide which way they should turn; "and while I'm liable to be mistaken just as much as anybody else, I really think we'd have a better chance to find that cabin, or run across some sign of Toby's uncle, if we quit following this creek bed, and turned sharply to the right."
Now Elmer was not only the leader of the Wolf Patrol when at home, but had long ago qualified for the position of assistant scout master of the troop. When the regular scout master, a young man named Mr. Roderic Garrabrant, chanced to be absent, which frequently happened, the boys looked to Elmer to guide and direct them.
Consequently the three who were now in his company had come to look for great things from their chum; and Elmer often found it a difficult task to satisfy their expectations. And so it was he had in the start given them to understand that he could make mistakes as well as the next one, and they must not think him infallible.