"Get the luggage out, old man," said Dick. "We'll pad the hoof and see if we can find a cottage. We might, with luck, get a fellow with a horse to pull the bike to the top of the hill."
"I guess the job's beyond the powers of a gee-gee," remarked Athol, who, ankle-deep in snow, was unstrapping the luggage from the carrier. "We'll have a shot at hiking the show into the drift. It seems fairly firm snow on this side."
By dint of strenuous efforts the two lads succeeded in lifting the heavy side-car to the fringe of the road, leaving a space of less than six feet between the wheel of the car and the snow-bank on the opposite face of the track. Then, shouldering their belongings, the weather-bound travellers trudged stolidly up the hilly road.
"Here's a jamboree!" exclaimed Dick after a long silence. He was regaining his breath and with it his exuberant spirits. "We'll have something to remember. By Jove, isn't this a ripping country?"
"It's all very fine," said Athol guardedly, "but, remember, we may be held up for a fortnight. This stuff takes a jolly lot of thawing, you know. Hulloa! There's someone hammering."
"The child is correct," declared Dick with a laugh. "And hammering metal work. I believe our friend the horseman was a little out in his statements. There must be a human habitation of sorts, and, judging by the direction of the sounds—unless the acoustic properties of a snowstorm are erratic—the fellow is tinkering away on that hill on our right. Yes, old man, here's a gap in the hedge. It looks remarkably like a carriage drive."
For the last hundred yards the road was bounded by a raised bank surmounted by a thick laurel hedge. The gap that was just beginning to become visible resolved itself into a pathway barred by a tall gate tipped with a row of formidable spikes.
"Wonder there isn't an array of notice-boards of the 'Trespassers will be prosecuted' order," remarked Athol. "It seems to me that no one has used this path since it started snowing. However, it must lead somewhere, so let's investigate."
Lifting the rusty latch the two lads pushed hard against the gate. They had to force the bottom bars through eighteen inches of snow before they could open it.
The hammering noise was still maintained with hardly a break. The workman, whoever he might be, was certainly industrious.