“Oh, all right,” she said slowly. “Thanks. That’s surely the best way.”
She was thinking of the treasure left at the cabin. She had hoped to return by that route and claim it. Now that hope was gone.
CHAPTER XXII
A FRUITLESS JOURNEY
It was night; such a night as only the Arctic knows. Cold stars, gleaming like bits of burnished silver in the sky, shone down upon vast stretches of glistening snow. Out of that whiteness one object loomed, black as ink against the whiteness of its background.
Weary with five days of constant travel, Marian found herself approaching this black bulk. She pushed doggedly forward, expecting at every moment to catch a lightning-like zig-zag flash of purple flame shooting up the side of it.
The black bulk was the old dredge in Sinrock River. She had passed that way twice before. Each time she had hoped to find there a haven of rest, and each time she had been frightened away by the flash of the purple flame. Those mysterious people had left this spot at one time. Had they returned? Was the dredge now a place of danger, or a haven for weary travellers? The answer to this question was only to be found by marching boldly up to the dredge.
This called for courage. Born with a brave soul, Marian was equal to any emergency. Sheer weariness and lack of sleep added to this a touch of daring.
Without pausing, she drove straight up to the door. Reassured by the snow banked up against it, she hastily scooped away the bank with her snow-shoe, and having shoved the door open, boldly entered.
It was a cheerless place, black and empty. The wind whistled through the cracks where the planks had rotted away. Yet it was a shelter. Passing through another door, she found herself in an inner room that housed the boiler of the engine that had furnished power to the dredge. The boiler, a great red drum of rust, stood directly in front of her.
“Here’s where we camp,” she said to Attatak. “We can build a fire in the fire-box of the boiler and broil some steak. That will be splendid!”