"She brave—she shoot, she hunt, she be dam' fine!" he added, and both Rod and Wabi burst out laughing. The young Indian looked at his compass by the light of a match.
"We'll strike straight across Lake Nipigon instead of following the shore. What do you say, Muky?" he called back.
The old pathfinder was silent. In surprise Wabi ceased paddling, and repeated his question.
"Don't you think it is safe?"
Mukoki wet his hand over the side and held it above his head.
"Wind in south," he said. "Maybe no get stronger, but—"
"If she did," added Rod dubiously, noting how heavily laden the canoe was, "we'd be in a fix, as sure as you live!"
"It will take us all of to-day and half of to-morrow to follow the shore," urged Wabi, "while by cutting straight across the lake we can make the other side early this afternoon. Let's risk it!"
Mukoki grunted something that was a little less than approval, and Rod felt a peculiar sensation shoot through him as the frail birch headed out into the big lake. Their steady strokes sent the canoe through the water at fully four miles an hour, and by the time broad day had come the forest-clad shore at Wabinosh House was only a hazy outline in the distance. The white youth's unspoken fears were dispelled when the sun rose, warm and glorious, over the shimmering lake, driving the chill from the air, and seeming to bring with it the sweet scents of the forests far away. Joyfully he labored at his paddle, the mere exhilaration of the morning filling his arms with the strength of a young giant. Wabi whistled and sang wild snatches of Indian song by turns, Rod joined him with Yankee Doodle and The Star Spangled Banner, and even the silent Mukoki gave a whoop now and then to show that he was as happy as they.
One thought filled the minds of all. They were fairly started on that most thrilling of all trails, the trail of gold. In their possession was the secret of a great fortune. Romance, adventure, discovery, awaited them. The big, silent North, mysterious in its age-old desolation, where even the winds seemed to whisper of strange things that had happened countless years before, was just ahead of them. They were about to bury themselves in its secrets, to wrest from it the yellow treasure it guarded, and their blood tingled and leaped excitedly at the thought. What would be revealed to them? What might they not discover? What strange adventures were they destined to encounter in that Unknown World, peopled only by the things of the wild, that stretched trackless and unexplored before them? A hundred thoughts like these fired the brains of the three adventurers, and made their work a play, and every breath they drew one of joy.