“I’ll be all right in a minute,” the old fellow whispered; “get me off this rock and build a fire, quick. I’m frozen.”
But getting the injured hunter off the rocks without hurting him proved a difficult task. The sides were almost perpendicular, and Martin too weak to help himself at all. So, after several futile attempts, Larry was obliged to get the harnesses from the toboggan, fasten the draw strap under the hunter’s arms, and in this manner lower him over the side. Then the boy quickly gathered some sticks and made a hot fire.
During most of this time Martin remained inanimate, but he revived again when Larry had dragged him near the fire; and now he asked faintly for water. A few gulps of the melted snow water from Larry’s cup revived him perceptibly, and meanwhile the boy was chafing his cold hands, and had removed his moccasins and drawn his feet close to the fire.
Presently Martin asked feebly for food; but Larry shook his head. For once he had forgotten one of the old man’s reiterated instructions—that he should never go anywhere from camp without taking at least one ration with him. When he started out he had only expected to be gone a few hours, and in his perturbation he had forgotten to take anything to eat.
But the old hunter’s wits had not completely failed him.
“The moose,” he said faintly.
And then the boy remembered that a month’s supply of food, upon which the dogs were still feasting, was lying only a few feet away. So in a few minutes he had a huge slice of moose steak suspended on a stick over the fire, from which he cut off thin strips and fed to the ravenous hunter.
During this process he had time to observe the nature of Martin’s injury, although he was not quite sure of its exact location, as the hunter’s clothes were rent and blood-stained in many places.
“It’s my left leg,” Martin said, interpreting the boy’s anxious expression. “It’s all ripped to pieces. But it was the cold that was killing me. Now I’m getting warm and feeling stronger every minute. In another half hour I’ll be ready to take a ride home with you while the sun is high.”
By the time the steak was consumed Martin was sitting up, taking sips of hot water out of the tin cup from time to time. Every movement caused him great pain, but he strove stoically to conceal this from the boy.