"But matches won't show us the way to Roebach's camp," complained Mark.
"Don't croak, old boy," advised Jack. "Let's have that bottle of cosmolene I saw you tuck in your pocket there at the Snowbird."
"I was taking that to the professor. He said he would want it," said
Mark. "What's it good for?"
"You'll come pretty near seeing in a minute, Mark," returned the quick-thinking Jack. "Here, Andy! let me have that woolen scarf you wear. You'll have to say good-bye to it—bid it a fond farewell."
"I'm sort of friendly to that scarf, youngster," said the hunter.
"What's to be done to it?"
"It's going to become a lamp wick right here and now," declared young
Darrow, promptly. "So! I've got the cosmolene smeared on it already.
There! that's the last of it. Now a match, Andy."
"Joshua!" grumbled the hunter. "It is good-bye, I guess!" The match flared up. Jack touched it to the greasy woolen cloth. It began to burn brightly and steadily at once.
"Now, you all hunt around for the things we dropped. If we can find them we'll push out right away for the camp and the professor. You know he'll be worried about us, just as we are worried about him!"
With the light of the improvised torch flaring about them they saw what manner of place they were in. The huge trunk of the fallen tree had not entirely shut them in the hole. Mark got in position to climb out beside the tree-trunk.
There was a small, tough root sticking out of the bank above his head. He leaped to catch it with one hand, intending to scramble out by its aid.