“It looks as though we ought to do some watching at night,” Mac suggested, as they made their way around to the front of the lodge.
“We’ll talk it over a little later,” Barry promised, locking the front door of the lodge. “We’ve got to get our firewood in and prepare for the night. These days are short.”
Cutting wood and preparing for the night took them the rest of the brief winter afternoon, and then supper followed. The sun had gone down a dull and misty red, and the wind was moaning through the trees. There was every indication of a storm, and the boys were hoping that they would not be snowed in.
“I’ll put a splice on that broken sled runner,” Kent offered, as they sat at the supper table. He was the best carpenter of them all, and they were willing to let him do the mending.
“All right,” Barry agreed. “That will fix it so that we can use it on the way home. Whoever took our sled didn’t steal the canvas or the frying pan and the long coffee-pot handle, so he must have taken it just to scare us off.”
“He just gave the sled a polite boot into the gully,” grumbled Mac.
“Yes, and that gets under my skin,” cried Barry. “He came and stole our sled before he knew why we had come here to camp. I wouldn’t think so much of it if he had done that after we had been through the lodge, but he didn’t even give us that long. Something has got to be done, and we might just as well decide what it will be right here at this council of war.”
“Maybe we ought to take turns sitting up and looking out of the window,” Mac gave as his idea.
“A pretty cold, thankless job,” Kent shook his head. “Hang it all, we didn’t do a thing today about making better beds, and so far I haven’t enjoyed my sleep.”
“I’ll tell you what I have been thinking,” Barry said slowly. “I believe that we ought to move into the lodge.”