"I feel as if my head would burst," he said, staring about him stupidly.
After trying in vain to encourage him to further effort, Ted, who really felt no better, decided to push on alone.
"You stay here and rest, Hu," he said, "while I look around for a good place to camp. The matches are dry now and I think we can have a fire to-night."
It was now late in the afternoon and Ted realized that he must exert himself. Pushing forward, he chanced upon something like a trail, followed it for nearly a mile, and, just as the sun sank out of sight, he stole guardedly through an oak thicket, halted on its borders, and looked into an open space where a camp fire burned.
Everywhere in the little clearing there were evidences of a long sojourn. The stumps of several trees showed that the felling had been done months, perhaps a year or more, before. Curing hides hung against the trees; tools and cooking utensils lay about on the grass. A pot swung over the fire from a tripod of three long sticks, and in it there evidently simmered a savory stew. No dog was aroused by Ted's approach, and the boy looked long, without interruption, at everything, including the sole occupant of the clearing, an old man with a long white beard who sat on the ground near the fire, his back to the observer. Ted turned quietly, retraced his steps through the thicket, and hurried back over the trail.
"Oh, Hubert," he cried, as soon as he was within speaking distance, "I've found a camp and an old man cooking supper!"
But the younger boy merely looked up stupidly and spoke of his aching head. Resolutely employing all his remaining strength, Ted lifted Hubert to his feet, and, with his arm around him, coaxing and dragging, he forced him slowly along the trail toward the stranger's camp. Arrived within the fire-lighted circle just after night had fallen, he allowed Hubert to collapse upon the grass, and then, holding out appealing hands, he cried:
"Help us—please help us!"
The old man started up in amazement and, judging from the expression of his face, even alarm. He appeared not to have heard the approaching footsteps because of deafness, and now seemed to expect a further invasion of the privacy of his camp.
"Who're you?" he asked in a bewildered way. "Whur in the dickance did you boys come from?"