“Lead on,” he said.
She led the way in silence. Carefully pushing the branches aside, indicating by a downward glance a spot where the footing was uncertain, testing a half rotted log and rejecting it as treacherous, she played the part of a perfect guide until, with an air of finality, she parted the spruce branches to exclaim:
“There!”
As Johnny lowered his burden to the earth he found himself astonished at the sight before him. He had expected to see a hunter’s lodge of some proportions, at least a homeseeker’s cabin in fair state of preservation. Instead he found a mere lodge built of poles, bark and boughs. Walled in on three sides, with one side open to the campfire, it formed but a temporary abode.
“What can these people be doing in such a place and so far from the haunts of man?” he asked himself.
He was destined to ask that question many times in the weeks that were to come.
But now his thoughts were broken off. The girl was speaking.
“Grandfather, this is the young man,” she said simply as she nodded toward Johnny. “He’s bringing his own venison.”
“She had a hand in it,” said Johnny modestly as a great, grizzled six-foot Scotchman, stooping low that he might pass out of the lodge, gave him a smile and offered a hand.
“He killed the caribou.” The girl’s laugh was low and pleasing. “After he had killed him I shot him twice just to make sure he was dead.”