Leaving them, he darted down the path again, reached the division of the trails, studying the prints closely which led away from this one. There, plain as day, step by step, he could see the print, plainer now than it had been when they started, showing that the snowfall had ended when the men got this far.
By the time he had rejoined the boys they had proceeded up the trail several hundred yards, finding the climb growing more difficult as they went, but undaunted by any such hardship.
At the crest of this high hill they looked down into another glen, but noticed that the tracks turned to the left to follow a small plateau which connected with another mountain in that direction.
Frank strained his eyes to discover any sign of habitation, but saw nothing that might indicate the presence of living beings. Not a sign of smoke, no hut nor cabin, just the snow everywhere, with these tracks leading across the plateau.
“Do you think we ought to make any effort to hide so as not to be seen as we go?” asked Buster.
“Hardly any use to try,” dryly remarked Frank. “We have to follow this trail, and our hope merely lies in the trees here and there which might protect us from being seen. I am wondering whether they might expect us to follow them.”
Lanky expressed the opinion that they expected the boys to break camp and start for home when they saw their cabin had been despoiled of all useful and necessary articles.
“Here’s where they drop into that valley,” Frank remarked when they had gone another quarter of a mile. “Wonder if this leads to a cabin or anything of the kind. Maybe it goes to a cave.”
“They’d fit well in a cave full of snakes!” snorted Paul Bird. “Just where they belong!”