“Yes,” said Hugh, “it’s surely a pretty sight, but on a clear day it’s prettier than it is now.”
“Yes,” said Jack, “I suppose so; but just think of the mystery of this fog. It might hide all sorts of things. Nobody can tell what there is beyond it.”
For a little while they sat there, looking at the view, and then came the question of getting down the steep hills to the shores of the lake.
“How are we going to get down, Joe?” asked Hugh. “If we start down here I’m afraid this wagon will get away from us, and nobody knows where it will go to. Can’t we get around to the road that goes down to the foot of the lake?”
“No,” said Joe, “it’s an awful long way down there; bad road, too; lots of gulches to cross, and maybe break a tongue, maybe break an axle.”
“Well,” said Hugh, “I don’t like this a little bit, but if there’s no other way, why, we’ll have to try it. Luckily there’s no load in the wagon, and maybe if we rough-lock the wheels and go mighty slowly we can make it; but if that wagon ever gets started with those horses ahead of it, it will sure kill the horses and smash the wagon.”
Getting out their ropes and a chain that there was in the wagon, they made preparations for locking the wheels.
“But, look here,” said Hugh; “locking wheels isn’t going to do us much good. Don’t you see that if we lock the wheels we’re just turning each pair into a pair of runners, and on this snow the wagon will go faster that way than it would if the wheels were free.”
Hugh got out the ax, however, and cutting a green quaking aspen stick lashed it to the wagon so that it dragged on the ground just in front of the hind wheels, and was held down by them. Then with Joe on foot, driving on the upper side of the wagon, and Hugh and Jack on foot with rope tied to the tail of the wagon, they slowly started down the hill. It was ticklish business. The slope was hard, grass-covered gravel, and on this were two or three inches of snow. Sometimes the drag held and sometimes it slid. Hugh and Jack tried hard to keep the tail of the wagon from swinging around and starting down hill backward. Gradually they worked their way down the hill, and presently, just as they were getting near a level piece of ground which promised easier going, the wagon began to slide, and for a little it looked as if it would get away from them. Joe was ready, however, and in response to Hugh’s shout, guided his horses into a thicket of young aspens, where the wagon stopped, and by cutting a road through these they worked down the slope until they found better traveling and got below the snow. Then Jack climbed back up the hill, got his horses, and followed the wagon.
He found that it had stopped on the shores of a little curving bay near the head of the lake, where there was good feed for the horses and plenty of wood. A little trout brook coming down from the hills tinkled pleasantly at one end of the meadow and was shaded by half a dozen ancient cottonwood trees. Joe and Hugh were putting up the tent as he reached the camp, and as soon as he had unsaddled he helped them.