"Driftwood? When do we go ashore?" laughed Marian.
"It's well to be prepared for anything," smiled Lucile. "Let's see what's in my prize package."
Marian leaned forward eagerly while Lucile untied a leather thong.
"Deerskins!" she cried exultantly. "Four of them! Enough for a sleeping-bag! And wrapped in a sealskin square which will protect us from the damp. I believe," she said thoughtfully, "that this native must have been planning a little trip up the coast, and if he was there must be other useful things in our ark, for an Eskimo never ventures far without being prepared for every emergency."
Once more they bent over the kiak, each one to search her corner.
"Another sack!" cried Lucile; "a hunting sack, with matches wrapped in oiled sealskin, a butcher knife, some skin-rope, a pair of boola balls with the strings, a fish line with hook and sinker; two big needles stuck in a bit of canvas. That's about all, but it's a lot."
"I've found a little circular wooden box," said Marian. "More food, I guess; probably the kind you can't eat without gagging. No," she cried, after a moment, "here's a big square of tea—the Russian kind, all pressed hard into a brick. There's enough for a dozen tea parties. Oh, joy! here are three pilot biscuits!"
"Pilot biscuits!" Lucile danced about on the ice.
These large brown disks of hardtack, so often despised, would not have been half so welcome had they been solid gold.
"Well, I guess that's about all," but Marian smiled. "I'm hungry already, but we daren't eat anything yet. We'll save these and eat the deer meat first that we brought along."