The dogs sprang forward, and Tom and Jack sped after them on rapidly moving snow-shoes.
Crack! crack! went the dog whip.
“Boosh!” cried the old man, with whom the exclamation appeared to serve all purposes.
The dogs sprang forward, and Tom and Jack, relieved of their burdens which now lay on the sled, sped after them on rapidly moving snowshoes. Their chase of the unknown thief now began to look like business.
CHAPTER XI—THE NEW-FOUND FRIEND.
Old Joe Picquet came to an abrupt halt. All that morning they had followed the trail of the thief and had now arrived at a small lake, Dead Rabbit Lake.
“Boosh!” exclaimed the old man angrily, “I am one fool. Someteeng I jus’ see I nevaire notice before.”
He pointed down at the trail of the man they were pursuing.
“You look! You see something funny 'bout dat snowshoe?” he asked.
Both Tom and Jack examined the footmarks without seeing anything odd in them. It was then that Joe gave them an exhibition of his skill in trailing.