“I believe they’re coming,” Bob said, straining his ears to the utmost to learn if they were approaching.
“Yes, they’re coming all right,” he declared a moment later, as the voices came decidedly nearer. “And, by the sound, there’s a lot of them,” and drawing a whistle from his pocket, he put it to his lips and blew with all his strength.
Almost immediately a faint whistle was heard from the direction of their camp.
“He heard us all right,” Bob declared, as he returned the whistle to his pocket. “Now we want to get back just as soon as our legs will take us there.”
As rapidly as possible they scrambled down to the ground, and fastening on their snow-shoes started off at a swinging trot, a pace which, on snow-shoes, covers ground with almost unbelievable speed.
“I don’t know as we really need to hurry so after all,” Bob panted, after they had covered about half the distance back. “It isn’t likely that many of them have snow-shoes, and they won’t be able to make much speed without them. Can you hear anything?”
For a moment they stood still and listened. Very faintly the murmur of voices reached their ears.
“There’s plenty of time,” Bob decided, as he started off again at a more moderate pace.
In a few minutes they reached the clearing and as Bob glanced at the place where the men had been at work when they had left a few hours before, he gave vent to a low chuckle.
“I’ll bet it’ll be a surprise to Ben when he doesn’t find a soul here,” he said as he started across the clearing toward the former cutting.