“Fine shot!” called Frank, turning to see who it was. Paul’s lucky shot had brought down the only bird.
Paul ran forward and picked up the only partridge that had been dropped from the covey.
“Shall we follow them around?” asked Frank, noting that the covey had come to ground again in another thicket. The boys were for it at once, and they started to steal forward.
This kept up for an hour, until they had circled the little valley and were almost back to the starting point, three birds having been dropped from a total of about thirty shots.
They decided the birds would make a partial lunch for them when the noon hour came, provided they had not yet reached the Parsons’ camp.
Back again to the arduous task of making the trail, though with enough food for conversation for two long hours.
“There’s a lake!” yelled Paul as they reached the top of a hill in the trail and saw a level, frozen, snow-covered plain. “That can’t be anything else, can it?”
“Must be Old Moose Lake,” decided Frank at once. “We have gone about the right distance. And look! Over there is smoke beyond that hill—there’s a camp there!”
The boys stood looking across the hills to this spot, and seeing the lake stretch away into the distance and lost to view without the opposite bank being seen.
A half-hour more along the trail and they were at the edge of the lake, where they could see two islands—for they stood out of the level plain with trees growing thereon, while no trees or growth were on the plain itself.