“Don’t bother the poor fellow, and hold your tongue. Harry,” said the accountant, who now began to tread more cautiously as he approached the place where the traps were set.
“How many traps have you?” inquired Harry in a low tone.
“Three,” replied the accountant.
“Do you know I have a very strange feeling about my heels—or rather a want of feeling,” said Hamilton, smiling dubiously.
“A want of feeling! what do you mean?” cried the accountant, stopping suddenly and confronting his young friend.
“Oh, I daresay it’s nothing,” he exclaimed, looking as if ashamed of having spoken of it; “only I feel exactly as if both my heels were cut off, and I were walking on tip-toe!”
“Say you so? then right about wheel. Your heels are frozen, man, and you’ll lose them if you don’t look sharp.”
“Frozen!” cried Hamilton, with a look of incredulity.
“Ay, frozen; and it’s lucky you told me. I’ve a place up in the woods here, which I call my winter camp, where we can get you put to rights. But step out; the longer we are about it the worse for you.”
Harry Somerville was at first disposed to think that the accountant jested, but seeing that he turned his back towards his traps, and made for the nearest point of the thick woods with a stride that betokened thorough sincerity, he became anxious too, and followed as fast as possible.