Before leaving, they knelt in the trench and thanked God for His goodness in bringing them in safety through the great danger.
The freshly fallen snow made heavy going, and it was eight o’clock when they reached the tree which had been the last mark of the trail.
CHAPTER IX.
JACK GOES FISHING.
“Are you sure this is the tree?” Jack asked, as he carefully scanned the trunk of the big tree.
“Sure? Of course I am. Don’t you see where the bark is rubbed there?” Bob replied, pointing to an abrasion so slight that it is no wonder that it had escaped Jack’s eyes.
“I see it now all right,” the latter admitted, adding: “Now to see if we can find another one.”
But there is nothing like a heavy snow and wind storm to erase the tell-tale marks indicating the passage of a body through the woods. For fully a half hour they searched but, so far as any sign went, that mark was the end of the trail.
“Well, it’s go it blind or turn back and give it up. Which will it be?” Bob asked, as he announced his inability to pick up the trail again.
All traces of the storm, with the exception of the freshly fallen snow, had disappeared. Not a branch stirred in the still air and the sun, filtering through, fell with almost dazzling brightness on the virgin snow.
After a short discussion it was decided that they would go on until night, trusting to luck to pick up the trail. Failing to do so, they would start back the next morning.