“Nopy!”
“Sled?” guessed Tess.
“No, it is not ‘sled,’” said the littlest girl.
“Stockin’s?” suggested Sammy. “I’ve got a hole in one o’ mine. Feels like my big toe was stranglin’ to death, so it does.”
“S-s-s—”
“Oh, stop!” shrieked Dot suddenly. “What’s that at the door?”
The two little girls shrieked again and scrambled behind the trunk of the tree. Sammy was just as scared as a child could be, but he sat right where he was and watched the dim light grow at the hole over which he had pulled the sled.
Something was scratching there, dragging the sled away from over the hole in the snowdrift. Sammy did not know that even the hungriest animal in the forest was snugly housed during this storm. The creatures of the wild do not hunt when the weather is so boisterous.
It might have been a wolf, or a bear, or a lynx, or a tiger, as far as the small boy knew. Just the same, having the responsibility of Tess and Dot on his mind, he had to stay and face the unknown.
Suddenly a voice spoke from without. It said with much disgust: