"Do you suppose any wild animal has attacked them, or frightened them, Mr. M'Graw?" Hedden asked.

"Lynx and them is holed up, all right," declared the backwoodsman with conviction. "Nothing would bother them while this storm lasts. But I declare I don't see why we ain't found 'em," he added, shaking his head. "Not if they come this way."

"I don't think they would have gone beyond this spot, do you?" Neale asked. "Here's the top of the hill. They must have started for this place with the sled."

"'Twould seem so," agreed Ike M'Graw.

"I doubt if they could have walked so far from the house," said Luke.

"'Twasn't snowin' like this when they was on the way. But if they come up here and slid down again, why didn't we find 'em on our way up?

Beats me!"

"Perhaps we should have brought Tom Jonah with us," Neale observed.

"He might have nosed them out."

"The old dog couldn't scurcely git through this here snow," said M'Graw. "I don't guess he can help us much till the storm's over. But let's go back. Them young ones must have turned out o' this road somewheres. Stands to reason the snow scared 'em and they started back. They must have got out o' this woodroad, and then--"

He slowly shook his head. His anxiety was shared by all. Wherever the children had gone, they were surely overtaken by the storm. If they had found some shelter-they might be safely "holed up" till the storm stopped. But if not, neither Ike M'Graw nor the others knew where to look for them.

And the blizzard was now sweeping so desperately across the ridge that the st.u.r.diest of the party could scarcely stand against it. Had it not been at their backs as they headed for Red Deer Lodge again, it is doubtful if they would have got to their destination alive.

The last few hundred yards the party made by holding hands and pulling each other through the drifts. It was a tremendous task, and even M'Graw was blown when Red Deer Lodge was reached.

Lawrence was the worst off of them all. Neale and Luke literally dragged him through the storm from the sheds to the rear door of the Lodge. He would probably have died in the drifts had he been alone.

The girls and Mrs. MacCall, as well as Mr. Howbridge, were awaiting the return of the searchers with the utmost anxiety. Not only were they disturbed over the loss of the three children, but the possibility of the men themselves not returning had grown big in their minds. The rapidity with which the snow was gathering and the fierceness of the gale threatened disaster to the searchers.

When M'Graw fell against the storm door at the rear of the house and burst it open, everybody within hearing came running to the back kitchen. When Ruth saw that they did not bring with them the two little girls and Sammy, she broke down utterly.

Her despair was pitiful. She had held in bravely until now. To think that they had come up here to Red Deer Lodge for a jolly vacation only to have this tragedy occur!

For that it was tragedy even Ike M'Graw now admitted. There was no knowing when the storm would cease. If the children had not been providentially sheltered before the gale reached this high point, it was scarcely possible that they would be found alive after the blizzard was over.

At this hour no human being could live for long exposed to the storm which gripped the whole countryside.

There was anxiety in the cave in the valley as well as at Red Deer Lodge about this same hour. But it must be confessed that the children who had taken refuge in the cave were mostly anxious about that rabbit stew!

Was there going to be enough to go around? And had Rowdy made the dumplings all right and seasoned the stew so that it would be palatable?

[Ill.u.s.tration: "The housekeeping arrangements of the cave were primitive."]

"Why, you're all sitting around here and sniffing at that stew every time I lift the pot cover like hungry dogs," declared Rowdy. "I guess if it doesn't turn out right, you'll eat me."

"Oh, no," said Dot. "We wouldn't like to do that, for we aren't cannon b.a.l.l.s."

"You aren't _what_?" cried the boy, amazed.

"Oh, dear, Dot! Why _will_ you get so mixed up in your words?" Tess wailed. "She doesn't mean 'cannon b.a.l.l.s,' Rowdy; she means cannibals.'

And we aren't. It is bad enough to have to eat rabbit when it looks so much like a cat."

This very much amused Rowdy and Sammy Pinkney; but Rafe, the grouchy brother, would not be even friendly enough to laugh at the smallest Corner House girl.

"I don't know what's got into him," said Rowdy. "He never was this way before."

Rafe lay on the bed of balsam branches, and when his brother tried to stir him up he growled and said: "Let me alone!" But when the stew was done he was ready for his share.

The housekeeping arrangements of the cave were primitive. There were a few odd plates and dishes. But knives and forks were not plentiful, and the tea had to be drunk out of tin cups, and there were only three of them.

There was condensed milk for the tea; and besides the dumplings which Rowdy had made, there were crackers and some cold cornbread left from a previous meal.

Rowdy seemed to be a pretty good cook for a boy of his age. And he was just as handy with dishes and in housekeeping matters as a girl.

The visitors praised his rabbit stew. They really had to do that because they ate so much of it. Rafe grumbled that they took more than their share.

"I'd like to know what's got into you!" Rowdy said to his brother in great disgust. "You are just as mean as poison ivy--so there!"

"I am not!"

"Yes, you are. And what are you scratching that way for?"

"Because my chest itches. What does anybody scratch for?" growled Rafe.

After eating, Rafe rolled up in a robe and went to sleep at one end of the bed. The others helped Rowdy clean up; and, as he said, "just to pay Rafe off for being so mean," they had dessert which Rafe had no part in. Rowdy produced a can of pears and they opened and ate them all!

"Je-ru-sa-_lem_!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Sammy, when this was finished, "ain't it fun living in a cave? I'd rather be here than up to that Red Deer Lodge place. Hadn't you, Tess?"

"No-o," admitted the honest but polite little girl. "I can't say just that. But I think Rowdy's cave is very nice, and we are having a very nice time here."

Dot frankly yawned. She had been doing that, off and on, all through supper.

"I'm afraid there won't be anybody to put my Alice-doll to bed tonight," she said. "And I haven't any nightgown with me. Why, Tess!

what shall we do?"

"I guess you wouldn't want to take off your clothes here. It isn't warm enough," said Rowdy.

"But can't we say our prayers?" murmured the startled Dot. "Of course, Tess and I spent the night once right out under a tree--didn't we, Tessie? Last summer, you know, when we went on that tour in our automobile. But we said our prayers first."

"I guess we'd all better say our prayers and go to bed," said Rowdy.

"This is a pretty big storm, and maybe it won't stop snowing for ever so long. The more we sleep, the less we'll know about it."

Therefore, a little later, the four joined the already slumbering Rafe upon the heaped up branches; wrapping themselves as best they could in the torn robes and pieces of carpet.

It was not a very comfortable bed or very nice bedding; but they were all too weary to criticize the shortcomings of Rowdy's cave. At least, it was shelter from the storm.