And then, wearied with the exertion, Bobby fell into deep and strength-restoring slumber, and Skipper Ed joined the others to cheer their hearts with the good news that Bobby's illness had passed its climax, and to rejoice with them over a meager breakfast.
With the passing days Bobby grew rapidly stronger, and the others were able to be out and at their duties again. And in due time Bobby, too, was out on the rocks enjoying the sunlight, with his old vigor daily asserting itself.
But hours of sunshine were few now, and more often than not the sky was leaden and somber, and the wind blew raw and cold, and already the clouds were spitting snow. The fishing season had passed almost before they realized it. The weeks of idleness had been costly ones, and when the time came for them to return to the cabins at the head of Abel's Bay, and make ready for winter, they had garnered little of the harvest that had promised so well.
"Every season can't be a good one for us," remarked Skipper Ed as they struck their camp. "Better luck next year; better luck. And we should be mighty thankful we're all alive and all well. That's good luck—good luck, after all."
But they were to be denied many things that winter that the fish they had not caught would have brought them. The little luxuries in which they had always indulged occasionally were not to be thought of; and pork, which is almost a necessity, was to become a rarity and a luxury to them, and there were to be times when even the flour barrel would be empty.
But this was a part of the ups and downs of their life, and one and all they accepted the condition cheerfully, for who, they said, does not have to endure privations now and again? And they had always done very well in other years, and the needs of life are small; and so they had no complaint to make. Comfort and privation are, after all, measured largely by contrast, and what to them would have been comfortable and luxurious living would have seemed to you and me little less than unendurable hardship.
Bobby and Jimmy were as glad, now, to return to the snug cabins as they had been to set out for Itigailit Island in the summer, and as they looked back over the few short weeks, the July day when they had their adventure with the bear seemed to them a long, long while ago.
And when the boats were loaded Bobby ran up to say good-bye for a season to the cairn and the dead man mouldering beneath it, and to the wide open sea, and the misty horizon out of which he had drifted, and then they hoisted sail and were off.
Another long winter with its bitter cold and drifting snow, its joys and its hardships and adventures, was at hand.