CHAPTER XXVI
DUG OUT
The boys realized that they had heavy work before them if they hopedto dig a way down through that mass of snow and reach the cleft in therocks.
"Just mark out where we have to get busy, Tolly Tip," called outBobolink, after they had put aside their packs, and primed themselvesfor work, "and see how we can dig."
"I speak for first turn with the snow shovel!" cried Jud. "It'll bringa new set of muscles into play, for one thing, and that means relief.I own up that my legs feel pretty well tuckered out."
The woodsman, however, chose to begin the work himself. After takinghis bearings carefully, he began to dig the snow shovel deep down, andcast the loosely packed stuff aside.
In order to reach the cleft in the rocks they would have to cut atunnel through possibly twenty feet or more of snow.
So impatient was Jud to take a hand that he soon begged the guide tolet him have a turn at the work. Tolly Tip prowled around, and some ofthe boys wondered what he could be doing until he came back presentlywith great news.
"'Tis smoke I do be after smellin' beyant there!" he told them.
"Smoke!" exclaimed Bobolink, staring up the side of the white hill."How can that be when there isn't the first sign of a fire?"
"You don't catch on to the idea, Bobolink," explained Paul. "He meansthat those in the cave must have some sort of fire going, and thesmoke finds its way out through some small crevices that lie under athin blanket of snow. Am I right there, Tolly Tip?"
"Ye sure hit the nail on the head, Paul," he was told by the guide.
"Well, that's good news," admitted Bobolink, with a look of relief onhis face. "If they've got enough wood to keep even a small fire going,they won't be found frozen to death anyhow."
"And," continued Jud, who had given the shovel over to Jack, "it takessome days to really starve a fellow, I understand. You see I've beenreading lately about the adventures of the Dr. Kane exploring companyup in the frozen Arctic regions. When it got to the worst they stavedoff starvation by making soup of their boots."
"But you mustn't forget," interposed Bobolink, "that their boots weremade of skins, and not of the tough leather we use these days. I'dlike to see Hank Lawson gnawing on one of _his_ old hide shoes, that'swhat! It couldn't be done, any way you fix it."
The hole grew by degrees, but very slowly. It seemed as though tonsand tons of snow must have been swept over the crest of the hill, tosettle down in every cavity it could find.
"We're getting there, all right!" declared Bobolink, after he hadtaken his turn, and in turn handed over the shovel to Paul.
"Oh! the Fourth of July is coming too, never fear!" jeered Jud, whowas in a grumbling mood.
"Why, Tolly Tip here says we've made good progress already," Tom Bettsdeclared, merely to combat the spirit manifested by Jud, "and thatwe'll soon be half-way through the pile. If it were three times as bigwe'd get there in the end, because this is a never-say-die bunch ofscouts, you bet!"
"Oh! I was only fooling," chuckled Jud, feeling ashamed of hisgrumbling. "Of course, we'll manage it, by hook or by crook. Show methe time the Banner Boy Scouts ever failed, will you, when they'd settheir minds on doing anything worth while? We're bound to getthere."
The work went on. By turns the members of the relief party appliedthemselves to the task of cutting a way through the snow heap, andwhen each had come up for the third time it became apparent that theywere near the end of their labor, for signs of the rock began toappear.
Inspired by this fact they took on additional energy, and the way thesnow flew under the vigorous attack of Jud was pretty good evidencethat he still believed in their ultimate success.
"Now watch my smoke!" remarked Tom Betts, as he took the shovel in histurn and proceeded to show them what he could do. "I've made up mymind to keep everlastingly at it till I strike solid rock. And I'll doit, or burst the boiler."
He had hardly spoken when they heard the plunging metal shovel strikesomething that gave out a positive "chink," and somehow that soundseemed to spell success.
"Guess you've gone and done it, Tom!" declared Jud, with somethinglike a touch of chagrin in his voice, for Jud had been hoping he wouldbe the lucky one to show the first results.
There was no slackening of their ardor, and the boys continued toshovel the snow out of the hole at a prodigious rate until every onecould easily see the crevice in the rocks.
"Listen!" exclaimed Jud just then.
"Oh! what do you think you heard?" asked Bobolink.
"I don't know whether it was the shovel scraping over the rock or ahuman groan," Jud continued, looking unusually serious.
They all listened, but could hear nothing except the cold wind sighingthrough some of the trees not far away.
"Let me finish the work for you, Tom," suggested Paul, seeing that TomBetts was pretty well exhausted from his labors.
"I guess I will, Paul, because I'm nearly tuckered out," admitted thepersistent worker, as he handed the implement over, and pushed back,though still remaining in the hole.
Paul was not very long in clearing away the last of the snow thatclogged the entrance to the old bears' den. They could then mark theline of the gaping hole that cleft the rock, and which served as anantechamber to the cavity that lay beyond.
"That does it, Paul," said Jack, softly; though just why he spoke halfunder his breath he could not have explained if he had been asked,except that, somehow, it seemed as though they were very close to somesort of tragedy.
The shovel was put aside. It had done its part of the work, and couldrest. And everybody prepared to follow Paul as he pushed after theguide into the crevice leading to the cave.
The smell of wood smoke was now very strong, and all of them couldcatch it.
So long as the entrapped boys had a fire there was no fear that theywould perish from the cold. Moreover, down under the rocks and thesnow the atmosphere could hardly be anything as severe as in the open.Indeed Paul had been in many caves where the temperature remainedabout the same day in and day out, through the whole year.
Coming from the bewildering and dazzling snow fields it was littlewonder that none of them could see plainly at the moment they startedinto the bears' den. By degrees, as their eyes became accustomed tothe semi-darkness that held sway below, they would be able todistinguish objects, and make discoveries.
Stronger grew the pungent odor of smoke. It was not unpleasant at all,and to some of the scouts most welcome, bearing as it did a message ofhope, and the assurance that things had not yet come to the laststretch.
Half turning as he groped his way onward, the guide pointed tosomething ahead--at least Paul who came next in line fancied thatTolly Tip was trying to draw his attention to that quarter.
In turn he performed the same office for the next boy, and thus theintelligence was passed along the line, from hand to hand.
They could, by straining their eyes, discover some half huddledfigures just beyond. A faint light showed where the dying fire lay;and even as they looked one of the partly seen figures was seen tostir, and after this they noticed that a little flame had started up.
Paul believed that the very last stick of wood was on the fire andnearing the end.
Bobolink could not help giving a low cry of commiseration. The soundmust have been heard by those who were huddled around the miserablefire, for they scrambled to their knees. As the tiny blaze sprang upjust then, it showed the scouts the four Stanhope boys looking pinchedand wan, with their eyes staring the wonder they must have felt atsight of the newcomers.
Hank was seen to jab his knuckles into his eyes as though unable fullyto believe what he beheld. Then he held out both hands beseechinglytoward the newcomers. They would never be able to forget the genuinepain contained in his voice as he half groaned:
"Oh! have you come to save us? Give us somethin' to eat, won't you?We're starvin', starvin', I tell you!"