"You've come at last," grinned Hank, as Joe picked himself up and rose to an erect position. "Warn't it fair flyin'? Seemed to me as ef you was spreading your wings because you wasn't quite satisfied. But you ain't hurt, lad?"
"Not a bit; rather enjoyed it," sang out our hero.
"And ain't too much shook up? That sorter things kicks the breath outer a body."
"As fit as ever," grinned Joe, "and ready to continue. Where's the camp?"
"You're at the front door, as you might almost say," smiled the little hunter. "There it aer."
There it was indeed, almost nestling at the foot of the hill, and in any case within a few hundred yards. It took the little party but a few minutes to reach it.
"Will they have taken all or not?" asked Hank somewhat anxiously, as they came up to the place. "Ef so, it aer a bad lookout; ef not, why, things is beginning to move in our favour."
A deep-toned exclamation came from the Redskin, while his hawk-like face took on for one brief instant an appearance of sublime content.
"That's settled the matter," cried Hank. "You kin see as it aer all right, fer Beaver Jack stood to lose the hull of his pelts and the winter's work, which for him would be serious. He's seen that things aer all right."
"No take the pelts and the sleigh as they easy able to come back when they killed us," said Beaver Jack, his eyes twinkling.