Then they pulled the toboggan close beneath another large pine a few feet away, where it would be protected as well as conditions would permit from the storm, and covered the pack with a second strip of canvass. Then, throwing an armful of the dead branches on the fire, they waited until the flames were shooting well above the snow walls of the trench before piling on the larger pieces of the trunk. These being of good size, would last for several hours, and if they should fail to awake in time to replenish the fire, they knew that the thick sleeping bags would be ample protection from the cold.
“She don’t seem to be letting up any,” Jack asserted as he listened to the wind now fairly howling through the tops of the trees.
“You said it,” Bob agreed, “and I’ll bet it’s snowing an inch every fifteen minutes. Must be close on to a foot already. If it keeps it up like this all night, we’ll have mighty hard going tomorrow let me tell you,” he added.
“So will Nip, and that’s one comfort,” Jack declared, as he threw another log on the fire.
By eight o’clock everything was “shipshape,” as Bob put it, and crawling into the sleeping bags they pulled a heavy army blanket over them and were soon lulled to sleep by the sighing of the wind as the lofty spruces and pines bent their tops to its strength.
It must have been well after midnight when suddenly Bob awoke. The fire was about burned out, only a glowing bed of embers remaining. For a moment he lay wondering what had disturbed him. The wind still blew with undiminished fury, but he knew that some other sound had reached his ears. He did not, however, have to wonder long, for suddenly through the dense forest, above the wailing of the wind, came a sound which sent a shudder through his frame, for once before he had heard that cry while on a hunting trip with his father in Canada.
“It’s a timber wolf,” he whispered to himself. “Never knew they came so far south as this, but it’s probably only a stray one,” he thought as he turned over and shut his eyes. But a moment later he was brought to a sitting position as an answering howl far off to the left answered the first.
“There’s two of them at any rate,” he said half aloud, as he gave Jack a shake.
“Hey, what’s the matter?” Jack grunted sleepily, as he turned over and rubbed his eyes.
“Listen a minute and you’ll find out,” Bob replied, and even as he spoke another howl, this time nearer and more to the right, came to their ears.