"My dad would have got out, and, you bet, so will I!"
"If I can't walk out, I'll crawl out, or climb out, or dig out! My dad would have got out, and, you bet, so will I! He wasn't afraid to tackle big things—he was ready for 'em. What got him was a little thing—just a little piece of loose ice on a smooth trail—he wasn't looking for it—that's all. But, at that, when he pitched head first into Ragged Falls canyon that day, he died like a man dies—in the big outdoors, with the mountains, and the pine trees, and the snow! And that's the way I'll die! If I never get out of this hole, when they find me they won't find me in this sleeping bag—'cause I'll work to the end of my grub. I'll dig, and chop, and hack a way out till my grub's gone, then I'll—I'll eat Mac's dogs—and when they're gone I'll—No! By Jimminy! I won't eat old Boris, nor Slasher, nor Mutt—I'll—I'll starve first!" He reached for the flap of his sleeping bag, and as he drew it over his head there came, faint and far from the rim-rocks, the short, sharp bark of a starving fox.
CHAPTER VIII
WASECHE BILL TO THE RESCUE
When Waseche Bill sent his dogs flying over the surface of the glacier in answer to the bell-like call of old Boris, he fully expected that the end of a half-hour would find him at the dog's side. Sound carries far in the keen northern air, and the man urged his team to its utmost. As the sled runners slipped smoothly over the ice and frozen snow, his mind was filled with perplexing questions. How came old Boris into the Lillimuit? Had he deserted the boy and followed the trail of his old master?
"No, no!" muttered the man. "He wouldn't pull out on the kid, that-a-way—an', what's mo', if he had, he'd of catched up with me long befo' now."
Was it possible that the boy had taken the trail? The man's brow puckered. What was it Joe said, that night in Eagle?
"S'pose he follers ye?"