The men glanced curiously back, but the canoe did not stop, and it disappeared around a bend in the stream. But Tom, electrified with surprise and anxiety, rushed after it. Rounding the bend, he saw it far up the river, driving hard ahead with all the force of two strong paddlers, who were evidently determined not to stop for anything.
The ground along the shore was rough and tangled, and he could not pause to pick his way. He tripped and fell, blundering into thickets and morasses, struggling on, almost weeping at the thought of failure at the last inch.
He would certainly have failed; he could have never have overtaken the paddlers, but the canoe ran suddenly inshore. The men hastily unloaded her, shouldered the packs and the canoe itself, and started into the woods. Evidently they planned to portage to some other waterway.
Tom reached the spot of debarkation a few minutes after they had left it. He struck off on their well-marked trail, and, as they were bent double under their loads, he had no difficulty now in overtaking them. Dave Jackson was carrying the canoe, and he stared from under the inverted gunwale in utter astonishment when Tom breathlessly hailed him.
“Tom!” he exclaimed. “It isn’t possible. What in the world are you doing up here? Surely that wasn’t you who yelled at us from the shore?”
“Thank goodness, I’ve come up with you, Dave!” Tom gasped, almost dropping where he stood. “Hold on! Put down that canoe. I’ve been on the trail for days—got robbed—almost starved—trying to find you.”
Then he did drop, dizzily collapsing on a log. Dave set down the canoe, but his partner, a big, bearded prospector, growled impatiently.
“Got no time to stop, Jackson. All them fellows’ll get in ahead of us. If that young chap wants to talk to you, let him come along too.”
“I can’t go another inch,” Tom protested. “And you’ve got to come back with me, Dave. It’s awfully important. I’ve come from Coboconk Lake—your old homestead.”
Dave uttered an exclamation of surprise.