"I've got it already," said Fred. "I reserved my holidays last summer, and things aren't busy in a real estate office at this time of year. I guess I could get two weeks if I wanted it. I'm spending most of my time now training for the five and ten miles."
"Could you skate a hundred and fifty miles in two days?" demanded Macgregor.
"I might if I had to—if it was a case of life and death."
"That's just what it is—a case of life and death, and possibly a fortune into the bargain!" cried Maurice. "You see—but Mac has the whole story."
The Scottish medical student went to the window, raised the blind and peered out at the wintry sky.
"No sign of snow yet," he said in a tone of satisfaction.
"What's that got to do with it?" demanded Fred, who was burning with curiosity by this time. "What's going on, anyway? Hurry up."
"Spoil the skating," said Macgregor briefly. "Well," he went on after a moment, "this is how I had the story.
"I live away up north of North Bay, you know, at a little place called Muirhead. I went home for a little visit last week, and the second day I was there they brought in a sick Indian from Hickson, a little farther north—sick with smallpox. The Hickson authorities wouldn't have him at any price, and they had just passed him on to us. The people at Muirhead didn't want him either. It wasn't such a very bad case of smallpox, but the poor wretch had suffered a good deal of exposure, and he was pretty shaky. Everybody was in a panic about him; they wanted to ship him straight down to North Bay; but finally I got him fixed up in a sort of isolation camp and looked after him myself."
"Good for you, Mac!" Fred ejaculated.