Breakfast was soon dispatched, and then they put the camp in order. Before long they were on the river again, skating along rapidly, in order to warm up. They had gone scarcely a mile when bodies were warm and blood tingling.
“I hope it doesn’t snow until we get to the cabin,” Kent said.
“So do I,” Barry agreed. “A big fall would work against us.”
They had planned to eat one more outdoor meal, but they arrived close to Fox Point around the noon hour, so they had dinner in the country store there, eating sandwiches and drinking hot cocoa at a little table close to the round iron stove that threw out a splendid heat. They bought the coffee that they lacked and then started once more. At last they skated out on the broad expanse of ice that marked Lake Arrowtip.
“Here we are at last,” Mac whooped. “Let’s have a race down the lake to the cabin.”
“You can’t do it,” Barry objected. “See how that snow is spread out? You go a little way and then you have to walk across a snow bar and strike the ice on the other side. You just can’t keep going.”
“That’s all the better,” spoke up Kent. “It will be an obstacle race. Skate on the ice, run across the snow, and skate some more. Let’s line up and go!”
“I’m pulling the sled,” Barry reminded them. “But you fellows go to it and I’ll follow on. Are you ready? Get set. Go!”
The three racers were off like a shot, striking out across the clear ice of Lake Arrowtip. Coming to the soft snow that spread across their path, they leaped into it and ran through as fast as their skates would allow them to. Again they were out on clear ice, and for a time they skated furiously, with Mac slightly in the lead. Then another and longer island of snow slowed them down, and Tim tipped over, tumbling in the path of Kent, who had to swerve to avoid going down. By the time that Kent got on the ice again, Mac was far ahead and turned around in a swift circle and gave the race up, waiting for the others to catch up with him.
Barry skated on in a more leisurely manner, drawing the sled after him and taking in the beauty of Lake Arrowtip. He had visited the place in the spring and summer, but had never seen it in the grip of the New England winter. It presented now the picture of a broad flooring of ice, with the dark lines of pine and hemlock ringing it around. From the lake the hills ran up sharply, flowing into the mountains, blanketed with a thick white carpet of snow. Out in the middle of the lake stood Rake Island, a rugged little thumb of land covered with brush and timber and rough rocks.