The missing knife made his situation even more desperate than he had supposed it was. With a knife he might have fashioned a bow such as he had once seen Glen Drake use for lighting a fire; as it was, he should have to keep warm as best he could.
The first thing he did was to choose a convenient hollow that was protected at the back by the hill and on the sides by birches and the willows. Then, breaking off a quantity of branches, he fashioned a rude but effective windbreak for the front. By the time he had finished doing that work it was twilight, and a cool wind was blowing across the pond.
Don opened the package of food that the good lady at the farmhouse had given him. There were bread and cheese and three small ginger cakes; and when he had eaten half the food and put the rest by till morning he felt a good deal better. Pulling his coat up round his neck, he snuggled down on the light branches with which he had carpeted the floor of his bower and prepared to wait for morning.
All light had faded from the sky, and the wind was rising steadily. Loose twigs all round him tapped incessantly against one another in tune with the wind. Don shivered and forgot the dull pain in his ankle.
Out in the pond and down close to the shore on both sides of the cove he could hear strange little splashes, and in the thickets behind him a pair of owls were calling every now and then. If it had not been for thoughts of Aunt Martha, Don might really have enjoyed his experience. He did not doubt that he should be able to walk in the morning, and he rather liked being out alone as Glen Drake had been many, many times.
Once he dozed off and awoke some time later, feeling cold and hungry. The twigs were tapping all about him; somewhere far to the south a hound was baying mournfully; and in front of him the moon had covered the pond with a silvery sheen.
Again Don dozed off, and then awoke with a violent start. Somebody—or something—was moving about in the underbrush on the slope above him. Then a stone rattled down and bounded into the water. Startled at the loud splash it made, Don gave an involuntary exclamation. An instant later he heard someone call his name.
“O Don!” the call was repeated.
Don sat up. “Who is it?” he shouted in reply.
“Yer safe and sound? Praise be for that!”