He marked the course on the map, and the boys studied it in silence. The sun had risen by this time, but the boys were not anxious to break camp and start on that journey which would perhaps prove fatal to all of them. They lingered, talking, discussing, hesitating, reluctant to make the start.
Fred had not contributed a single word to the discussion. He had barely managed to swallow a little breakfast, and was too miserable to join in the talk. He knew how slim their chances were; he imagined how the party would struggle on, growing weaker daily, until—
If only they had a canoe! If only they could run the robbers down and ambush them in their turn! And as he puzzled on the problem, an idea—an inspiration—flashed into his mind.
He bent over, and studied the map intently for a second.
"Look! Look here!" he cried, wildly. "What fools we are! We can overtake those fellows—catch 'em—cut 'em off before they get anywhere—and get back our grub, and the foxes, and the canoe—everything—why—"
"What's that? What do you mean?" cried Horace and Mac together.
Fred placed a trembling finger on the map.
"See, this is where we are, isn't it? Those thieves will go down here to the mouth of the Smoke River, and turn up it to their camp. They didn't have much outfit with them; so they'll go back to their shanty. It's about fifty miles round by the way they'll go, but if we cut straight across country—this way—we'd strike the Smoke in twenty-five miles, and be there before them."
"I do believe you've hit something, Fred!" Mac exclaimed.
In fact, the Smoke and the Missanabie Rivers made the arms of an acute angle. Between twenty and thirty miles straight to the northwest would bring them out on the former stream somewhere in the neighborhood of "Buck Rapids."