“We’re breaking even with ’em!” said Larry, lengthening the stride of the dog-trot by imperceptible degrees. “They’ve got a good mile of the snow trail to crawl over yet, and then another mile of the slush and mud. I believe we’re going to make it, after all.”
“Yes; but we’re a mile above the canyon, and this ridge will never take us down to it!” Purdick gasped out.
“Wait, and you’ll see,” was all Larry would say; but as he ran he was studying the lay of the land harder than he had ever boned Math. in the college year which had just ended. Far down the ridge little patches of dark green showed where a straggling vanguard of the firs had pushed its way a full half-mile above the normal timber, and it was toward the scattering and stunted trees that he was directing their flight.
“If you can manage to hold out until we get to those trees,” he called back to the lagging runner-up. “Think you can do it?”
Little Purdick didn’t stop to think; he was putting the whole battery of mind and will upon the business of keeping his legs waggling. Long before the tree patches were reached, those legs had become base deserters from the animal kingdom and had gone over bodily to the vegetable. Pumping for breath like a spent miler on a cinder path, Purdick could fancy that his legs were mere blocks of wood hung in some mysterious manner to his body by hinges that were sadly in need of oiling. But, just the same, they continued to waggle. That was the main thing.
None the less, when the race for Larry’s goal was won, Purdick was done, finished, écrasé, as our French friends would put it. Dropping down upon the snow crust, he could do nothing but gasp and groan, not so much from sheer exhaustion as in bitterness of heart because he had such scanty reserves of strength and endurance.
“That’s right; take it easy,” said Larry, whipping the short-handled axe from his belt. “This next shift is a one-man job.” And as he spoke he attacked first one and then another of the stunted trees with the axe and hacked them down in a few handy blows. “There are the toboggans,” he jerked out; “now for the brakes,” and in a few minutes more he had two smaller trees down and trimmed to bare sticks with stubby branches left at the butts and the stubs sharpened to points.
Purdick sat up, rubbing the calves of his legs.
“Great Peter!” he exclaimed; “do you mean that we’re going to slide down on those trees?”
Larry chuckled.