It was dark when they reached the location the guide had in mind—a rocky wall on one side of the river. At one point there was a split in the rocks. This was overgrown at the top with cedars and brushwood, forming something of a cave, ten or twelve feet wide and twice as deep, the bottom of which was of rock and fairly smooth.
"I camped here two winters ago," said John Barrow, as he called a halt. "I laced up the cedars above and they formed a fust-rate roof."
"I guess they are pretty well laced still," observed Dick. "They seem to hold the snow very well. But we won't dare to make a fire in there."
"We'll build a fire in front, in this hollow, Dick. That will throw a good deal of hot air into the place, and if we wrap ourselves in our blankets we'll be warm enough."
Everyone in the party was anxious to get out of the nipping wind, and they lost no time in entering the "cave," as Sam called it. The entrance was low, and by placing the two sleds in an upright position on either side they left an opening not over a yard wide. Directly in front of this the boys started a roaring fire, cutting down several dwarf cedars for that purpose.
"I don't much like the looks o' the sky to-night," observed John Barrow, after preparing one of the turkeys for cooking.
"Do you think there is a storm coming?" asked Tom.
"Looks to me like snow, an plenty of it."
"I hope it doesn't come until we reach Bear Pond," said Dick, "I don't want Dan Baxter and his crowd to get ahead of us."
"They won't have no better time o' it than we'll have," was the guide's grim comment. "Aint no fun trampin' over the mountains with the snow comin' down heavily; I can tell you that."