The boat was half filled when the girl, dropping her paddle, began to bale. The men toiled unremittingly at the oars.
“Wind’s with us. Be there soon,” Johnny said cheeringly.
“Wa-roo!” answered the dog. Standing high in the prow, he appeared to direct their course.
They were still half a boat length from shore when with a mighty leap the dog, clearing the boat, landed on the ice that edged the water and at once shot away into the forest.
“Tico! Tico!” the girl cried. “Come back! Come back!”
Wind and water drowned her cries. The dog did not return.
“All we can do is to follow him,” said Johnny as he made the boat fast to a bough that hung far out over ice and water, then tested the ice with an axe.
“Here, let me have those,” he said as Gordon Duncan was about to throw his bundle of bows and arrows ashore.
“Guess you better carry them,” said Gordon Duncan. “Can’t be too careful of your artillery in such a land.”
After a dangerous slide or two they were on land.