CHAPTER VI
GREEN EYES IN THE DARKNESS
So their flight continued all day, with brief rests for "changing horses," as it were. About twelve o'clock they were very hungry, and Nell decreed a short spell for dinner. They seemed to have the whole world to themselves. There was more brushwood and undergrowth in the woods now, not only fir trees, but many other sorts. More hiding ground for wild animals, too--but that was not a serious danger till the night should make them bold.
Nell unstrapped the little axe and looked about for a dead sapling of a birch tree; when she found it she bent it over double and split the bend with a sharp blow of the axe. Inside was white pith dry as powder; with this and dead sticks they made a small, round, red-hot fire, as the Indians do, first scraping a place bare on the edge of the bank where it was reasonably flat. Then they boiled tea in the billy-can, weak, but hot, putting a little molasses sugar into it to take off the bitterness. Some of this they gave to Robin when it was cooler--he was very fond of tea. For food they ate some pemmican and a bit of Nell's bread. They had brought what they could carry--which was not much, of course--then they would rely chiefly on soaked beans.
"We'll have bacon for supper," said Nell in a comforting voice. It went to her heart, rather, to see David eating the dried meat without a word of complaint; it was not very tempting, because, though nourishing, it was rather tasteless.
Robin had dried fish. That is the main food of dogs in the winter. Of course, when a deer is shot, or rabbits and hares are trapped--or even a fox--they get meat, but you cannot depend on it in the snow time: these creatures get scarce, because the hunting animals destroy them.
Next time they camped it was late afternoon, when the dusk was beginning to shadow the silent forest. They were very tired. Not so tired as an inexperienced pair would have been, but certainly very tired and stiff--the muscles of the legs suffered from these long hours of snowshoe work. But neither of them said a word. David would not have admitted it for the world, and Nell was too thankful for the successful day's journey to complain about aches.
The night camp was a more serious affair than the "dinner" one. First they scraped out a wide place on the bank just below a high pitch of rock. There was a good deal of rock about in places which would mean rapids and waterfalls presently, all sorts of inconveniences to stop the pace of their journey. But in this position they were glad of it, because it seemed to wall them off from the lonely woods, also it made a shelter from the chill wind that moaned through the spaces.
Then they gathered dead wood. At least, David did that while Nell unlashed the load and got out the sleeping bags, the bacon and frying-pan, and big, thick stockings to change into in case their feet were damp--which always was the case, and might mean frost-bite or, at least, serious chill, unless attended to.
They regularly walled themselves in from the forest. On one side was the rock wall, on the other the sled turned up on its side, and so making rather a good barrier in between the snow scraped up into a high fence, while the fourth side was open to the river--their icy, snow-covered road. Not every part of the banks was convertible in this practical way. You could go for long stretches and pass only masses of brushwood and rocks overhanging the course of the stream, but this place Nell's careful eye singled out as just right for a night camp.