"No," said Harry, "I had only one shot—a long one."
Frank, who told him to make some coffee, stripped off part of his clothes and dressed himself in an old blanket, after which they sat beside the stove for an hour or so, until Harry crawled out and said that there was a little more wind and the mist was thinning.
Shortly after this they heaved the anchor and started again, but once more the wind fell light and a couple of hours had passed and they were almost frozen when they reached the cove below the ranch. The house was dark when they crept into it and went straight to bed, while it cost Frank a determined effort to get up before daylight next morning. His clothes were still damp and he felt sore and aching, but he took his place with the others when they sat down to breakfast.
Logging seemed a particularly unpleasant task that day, but he had to go on with it, and he fancied that Mr. Oliver, with whom it was necessary to keep pace, worked harder than he usually did. Frank was completely exhausted when as darkness fell they went back to the ranch.
"Are you going out again after ducks to-night?" Mr. Oliver asked him.
"No," said Frank ruefully, "I feel as if it would take me a week to get over the last trip."
"I'm not very much astonished," Mr. Oliver answered with a soft laugh. "Still, I don't mind admitting that you stood up to your work to-day."
CHAPTER XXII
THE ULTIMATUM
The frost soon broke up, and it was raining heavily one afternoon, when the boys were at work in an excavation they had driven under a big fir stump shortly after their shooting trip. Frank, very wet and dirty, lay propped up on one elbow with his head and shoulders inside the hole, chopping awkwardly at a root. His legs and feet were in a pool of water outside and there was very little room to swing the ax, while at every blow the saturated soil fell down on him. Grubbing out a stump in wet weather is a singularly disagreeable task.