"Shall we try it to-night?" Maurice asked.
"Why not? It's nearly midnight, and they must be asleep," said Horace. "I've no fancy for spending another night and day shivering here in the snow. Besides, we're out of grub."
After some consultation, they put on their snowshoes and tramped off toward the cabin. It was intensely cold, and very still and clear; a brilliant moon had come up over the pines.
Fred easily found the hollow tree in which he had hidden the disinfectant, and came back with the apparatus. There was an unopened tin of formaldehyde complete with its little lamp almost full of spirit.
For some time they reconnoitered the cabin cautiously. A faint glow shone through the skin window, but no sound either of man or dog could be heard within.
It would not be possible to introduce the fumigator through the door or window, and if it were lowered down the chimney, the draft would carry the gas out again. But Maurice recollected the hole he had patched in the roof; it could easily be opened again. He volunteered to set the "smoker" going.
This was really the most dangerous part of the undertaking, for a slight sound might bring out the ruffians, who would probably shoot without much hesitation. Maurice took off his snowshoes, and carrying the fumigator, plunged through the drifts toward the cabin.
Twenty yards away the party watched him from the thickets; Horace kept the door covered with his rifle. The snow had drifted so deep that Maurice climbed easily to the roof, crawled up the slope on hands and knees, groped about, and began to scrape away the snow.
A moment later, he drew out the deer-hide patch, peered down the hole, and then waved his hand reassuringly toward the woods. He struck a match, lighted the spirit lamp, and then lowered the can cautiously by a string about a yard long.
In another minute he was back with his friends. "They're dead asleep," he said, joyfully. "I could hear them snore. The formaldehyde began to smell strong before I let it down. How long shall we leave it?"