Conley got slowly to his feet.
“That’s right—lost in the woods,” he said, in a flat voice. “I call it to mind now. Kinder lost my way, I reckon.”
He put on his snowshoes with fumbling hands, breathing heavily and muttering to himself the while.
“I’ll tote this along for you,” said Young Dan, laying a hand on the lumpy sack.
The other snatched it from him and shouldered it.
“Guess I kin carry that myself!” he exclaimed.
Young Dan went in front, sensing the way in the dark. Andy went next, making heavy weather of it with his stiff leg. Jim Conley brought up the rear, plunging and grumbling and frequently falling. They reached the camp at last. Young Dan left the door open behind him and went straight to the hearth and stove and fed both with fuel. Andy Mace, exhausted by his stiff-legged efforts and the pain of them, sank to the floor and lay flat as soon as he had crossed the threshold. Then Jim Conley floundered hurriedly and unsteadily from the cold outer gloom into the warm inner darkness, sack on shoulder. He tripped over Andy’s prostrate form and pitched forward to his hands and knees, and the lumpy sack hurtled from his shoulder and struck the floor with a smashing crash.
Young Dan threw a roll of birch bark on the open fire, and in a few seconds the camp was luridly illuminated; and then he saw his partner and Conley on the floor, Andy sitting bolt-upright and the latter facing him on all-fours, glaring in rage and astonishment at each other; and beyond them he saw the lumpy sack squashed to half its former bulk and leaking puddles of gin. The sight was too much for his sense of humor, tired and hungry though he was. He laughed until tears melted the ice on his eyelashes and his knees sagged beneath him. He sat down weakly on a convenient chair and continued to laugh helplessly until sudden and violent action on the floor recalled him to a more serious aspect of the affair. Conley had grabbed Andy Mace by the beard with his left hand and by the windpipe with his right, at the same time flinging his whole weight forward; and the old woodsman had smashed in two life-sized wallops on the sides of Conley’s head, one with his right fist and one with his left, even as he sank beneath the younger man’s hands.
Young Dan jumped to the struggle. His snowshoes were still on his feet. He gripped Conley with both hands by the neck of his several coats and shirts, wrenched him clear of Andy and thumped him violently on the floor, face-downward.
“Quit it!” cried Conley. “Lemme be, cantcher!”