With that the mountaineer took Tom's bag and disappeared over a sort of cliff. Ten minutes later he returned with the bag full of a rude meal, made by grinding corn in a big coffee mill of the kind that grocers use.

"Now you jest stay here fer ten minutes or so an' I'll be back with the other sack. It's a good deal bigger'n this 'un, but I kin tote a good deal more'n you kin, an' you'll need all the meal you kin git."

"Wait a minute," said Tom. "How much am I to pay for this meal? I have only two dollars with me and perhaps it will not be enough."

"Well, you see, Tom, I done tole you you needn't pay nothin' fer it, but you wouldn't have it that way on no account. So I reckon I'll charge you the same price I pay when I buy that sort o' meal from the still. That's a dollar fer them two bags."

"That's very cheap," said Tom. "Are you sure it's a proper price?"

"Sartin' sure," answered the man. "You see it's a mighty poor sort o'

meal--jest soft mounting corn ground up like in a coffee mill to make whiskey out'n. You'll have to wet it up mouty soft like to make it stick together fer bread, an' I'll tell you a trick about that. You jest wet it up with boilin' hot water. That sort o' cooks it like. Make it very wet an' don't mind even ef a little o' the water stan's on top o' the dough in the pan. That'll cook away an' your bread'll be all the better fer it. But a dollar is a high price fer it."

By the time the second bag of meal came it was high time for the pair to start if they were to reach Camp Venture before daylight. But the mountaineer knew all the short cuts, and better still, all the easy cuts--paths that gave a minimum of up-hill work while presenting other advantages of importance. At one point, for example, he led Tom to a spot where there was a steep shelving rock, completely coated with hard ice.

"Now," he said, "You an' me couldn't go down that slide without breakin'

every bone we've got. But we kin slip our meal bags down it 'thout no hurt to n.o.body. Then I'll show you a way round it, so's we kin git the meal agin."

With that he placed his meal bag in position, gave it a little push, and instantly it disappeared down the hill in the darkness. Tom did the same with his bag, and then, striding off to the right, the mountaineer led the way by a difficult but practicable path around the rock to a point quite a quarter of a mile below, where the two found their bags of meal safely reposing in a snow bank.

This was repeated at several points on the journey, while at other points where the bags could not be thus slidden down, because of an insufficient incline, it was easy for the two to drag them as they walked and this they did. As the way was almost entirely down hill, there was very little of what the mountaineer called "toting" to be done.

About three o'clock in the morning the two reached the brow of that cliff under which the boys had made their first temporary encampment, and which const.i.tuted the mountainside limit of Camp Venture. There they parted, the mountaineer protesting his eager desire to hurry back and "look arter the little gal."

"Wait a minute," said Tom. "I've paid you for this meal, but I haven't paid you for carrying it down the mountain or for the risk you've taken in doing that."

"I don't want no pay, Tom," protested the man with eagerness. "I hain't fergot that you put me on pay-roll jest in the nick o' time."

"That's all right," said Tom. "But I took two dollars with me and I expected to pay all of it for the meal. Now I want you to take the remaining dollar to the 'little gal' as a present from Tom. There, don't stop to say anything or you'll be late in getting back," added Tom, as he pressed the dollar bill into the man's hands.

"Well, all I'll stop to say, Little Tom," said the mountaineer, "is this: Ef you git out'n meal agin, you come to the same place I found you in. I'll keep a look out fer you there every day. An' ef they's war made on you it won't be long before I'm takin' a hand on your side with my rifle, an' it don't make no difference whatsomever who it is that's a fightin' of you."

CHAPTER XXV

_A Difficulty_

Little Tom was now in a quandary. He was on the bluff overlooking and south of the camp, but he did not know how to get into the camp. To walk in would be dangerous, of course. The sentinel might mistake him for an enemy and shoot at him. A high wind was blowing from the direction of Camp Venture, so that no call of Tom's could be heard there. It was a little after three o'clock in the morning, very dark, very cold, and Tom was very tired with his labor in bringing the meal down the mountain.

Finally an idea dawned in his mind.

"If I can't go to Camp Venture I can at any rate bring Camp Venture to me," he said to himself. With that he collected some of the dry broom straw that protruded above the snow and such sticks and other combustibles as he could find, and set to work to build a fire.

"When the sentinel sees a fire here," he said to himself, "he'll call the other boys, and they'll all get their guns and come out here to see what's the matter. I'll stand up in the full glare of the light and on the camp side of the fire, so that they can recognize me."

His plan worked to perfection. It was not five minutes after he got a good blaze going before the whole company surrounded him.

"What is it, Tom?" they cried. "Why did you build a fire here?"

"Wait!" said Tom. "There are two bags of corn meal down there just under the bluff. Some of you go and carry them to the house. I'm fearfully tired and cold."

The boys quickly saw how true this was, and they plied the poor, exhausted fellow with no more questions. He strode away to the hut, entered it, threw down his remaining partridges, set his gun in its customary place and stood for a few minutes with his back to the big fire, warming himself. Presently, when the boys all came in with the bags of meal, Jack, seeing the look of almost helpless exhaustion in Tom's face, himself removed the blanket from the boy's shoulders, untied it and spread it out upon the bunkful of broom straw, for by this time Ed had got all their bedding dry again.

Meantime the Doctor went to a kettle that sat near the fire, placed it upon some very hot coals, and a minute later dipped up a tin cup of its contents.

"Here, Tom, drink this," he said. "It'll do you good and give you strength."

It was a soup that Ed had made--or a broth rather--from the bones and sc.r.a.ps of their bear dinners, and to Tom's exhausted system it seemed wonderfully refreshing. Meantime Harry asked:

"Are your feet frozen, Tom?"

"No," answered the boy. "They are scarcely at all cold. You see, I've been using them too vigorously for that. But they are dreadfully sore and tired."

With that Harry filled their one foot tub with hot water and directing Tom to sit down Harry himself removed the boy's boots and socks, felt of his feet to make sure that they were not frosted, and placed them in the hot water. The Doctor applauded the performance and when it was over, and Tom's whole body was warm again, the boys rolled him up, not in his own blanket alone, but in all the other blankets there were in the camp and tumbled him into his bunk.

"There now!" said Jack, "sleep till you wake of your own accord. We'll all keep as still as mice."

"No, don't," said Tom. "I shall sleep better if you go on talking as usual. Then I'll know when I half wake that I'm here in camp and I'll go to sleep again easily." Then, after the boys thought him asleep Tom turned over and said, with much solicitude in his voice:

"Boys, I'm sorry I broke up your sleep so early this morning, but I couldn't very well help myself."

"Never you mind about that," said Jim Chenowith. "You're on duty now,--sleep duty,--and if you don't shut up and go to sleep I'll pour buckets of cold water over you. We're not suffering for sleep just because we were waked up an hour or so earlier than usual."

Tom was too tired to argue or to resist. He turned over on his side and a minute later he was asleep.

Meantime the boys busied themselves with breakfast. Ed was still the head cook, partly because he knew more about cooking than any body else did, and partly because the Doctor still refused to let him work with an axe. But all the boys helped him with this meal, as they always did when they were in the house at the time of the preparation of meals.

"How long will it be, Doctor, before Tom will wake up hungry?" asked Ed solicitously.

"Not more than two hours at farthest," answered the Doctor. "But why?"

"Well, I want to have something ready for him when he wakes--something hot and appetizing."

And Ed accomplished his purpose. He gave the other boys their breakfast of broiled bear's meat and ash cakes and then he set to work on Tom's breakfast. He dressed two of the quails and laid them aside. Then he mixed some of the meal and made pones of it, baking them in a skillet.

When Tom began to stir restlessly Ed raked out a fine bed of clean coals and placed the two quails upon them to broil. They required very close and constant attention, of course, to prevent burning, and just as Ed was finally taking them off the fire Tom sat up in his bunk and asked:

"h.e.l.lo, Ed! what's up? You've got something there that smells mighty good to a hungry fellow like me. What is it?"

"I'll answer your questions one at a time," answered Ed. "'What's up?'

Why, you are, of course. 'What is it'--that I'm cooking? You just get out of bed and see."

Tom obeyed. Creeping stiffly out of bed he seized the foot tub that had stood there for two hours or more and felt of the water. It was by this time sharply cold. Tom stripped off his clothing, soused his head into the water and then taking a sponge, sluiced his whole body with the nearly freezing liquid. A rapid rub down followed, and Tom called out:

"Now, Ed, bring on your breakfast as soon as you can. I'm nearly starved."

With that he slipped again into his clothing and a minute later was devouring a quail and a big pone of very coa.r.s.e corn bread which Ed had b.u.t.tered with the scant remains of the ante-Christmas bacon drippings.