Chapter XXV.
THE PERILS OF A MIDNIGHT SEARCH.
The next morning snow was falling, and the wind was blowing furiously.
"This ought to bring us some small birds, and maybe an owl or two,"said Tug, as he watched the dense clouds of snow hurled along from thenorthern waste of ice.
"Do you think you would dare to go out to the traps, or could findthem in this gale?" Aleck asked.
"I reckon so; and while I'm gone you take the gun and see if you can'tfind snow-birds among the hemlocks."
"What'll you do if those dogs get after you? They're perfectly savagewith hunger. It don't take much wildness or long famine to turn a dogback to a wolf, and we've got to look out for these curs as if theywere wild beasts."
"You're right," Tug assented. "But I hardly think they'll be out onthe ice in this storm; you are more likely to meet them in the woods.At any rate, we must have something to eat, and it's my business totend those traps, wolves or no wolves. If I go under, why, there's oneless mouth to feed."
So Tug and Aleck went away into the storm, one out upon the wide whitedesert, the other wading up the drifted slopes to the woods.
Katy and Jim stayed at home, sitting comfortably in the house. She wasreading aloud from an old newspaper they had found lying in a corner,when there came plainly to her ears the twittering of small birds.
"Listen, Jimkin. Did you hear that?"
"Snow-birds!" the boy exclaimed. "Right on the roof, too, and nary atrap!"
"Let us go out," said Katy, eagerly. "Perhaps we could catch one ortwo somehow."
So they crept out, and saw that the thick hemlock growing beside thebig rock was covered with small birds. Some were hiding away from the"cauld blast" in the nooks between the dense branches; some werehanging upon the little cones, swinging and clinging like acrobats;some were taking short flights through the smoke to warm their toes,or sitting on the bare rock near the top of the chimney. They were oftwo kinds, but all equally happy and unconcerned.
"If I only had the gun I could knock over about twenty at once," Jimwhispered. "I believe I could even kill a lot with my pea-shooter."
"Could you? Well, Jimkin, I've got some strong rubber cord in mytrunk, and you might make one of those horrid forked-stick things."
"That's a splendid idea, Katy. Get your rubber, and I'll cut a stick.Hurry up!"
Ten minutes afterwards the weapon was ready. But now it occurred toJim that he had no "peas" for his "shooter." So he and Katy bothhurried down to where they knew there was a bit of beach not coveredby ice. They scraped away the new snow, and raked up double handfulsof small pebbles.
Jim's hands grew so cold during this operation that he had to go inand warm them before he could handle his "rubber gun." But the birdsstill stayed in the trees, as is their custom when a heavy snow-stormis raging, and the excited young hunter waited only long enough to getthe stiffest of his fingers into decent shape.
Creeping around to the rear side of the rock, he climbed slowly upuntil he could peer over the edge, and found himself not more than adozen feet away from the little feathered group sitting by thechimney-top. Taking the best of aim, and pulling the rubber as farback as it would go, he let fly, and one of the largest of the birdstumbled over the edge. The boy had hard work to refrain from shoutingwith pride at this early success, though he wasn't sure he had killedthe bird.