Presently a rifle shot rang out, and immediately another. A moment later Amesbury strode back for his toboggan, where the others were awaiting him, humming as he came:
“‘His body will make a nice little stew,
And his giblets will make me a little pie, too.’”
“Come along, fellows,” he called. “Two caribou the reward of vigilance. We’ll skin ’em.”
Just within the woods, at the edge of an open, wind-swept marsh, they left their toboggans, and a hundred yards beyond lay the carcasses of the two caribou Amesbury had killed.
“There was a band of a dozen,” he explained, as they walked out to the game. “I thought we could use about two of them very nicely.”
“Good!” remarked Ahmik, drawing his knife to begin the process of skinning at once.
“I’ll tell you what,” said Amesbury, “unless you chaps would like to help here, suppose you pitch the tent. We’ll not go any farther today.”
“That’s bully!” exclaimed Paul, who had been at the point of declaring his inability to walk another mile.