CHAPTER XXIV

RAFE IS CROSS

Sammy Pinkney awoke to hear barking. But it was not Tom Jonah, as he had dreamed it was. He was chilly, too, and when his eyes got used to the semi-darkness of the cave he was sleeping in, Sammy discovered that Rafe had deliberately removed the share of the bedclothes that had been over Sammy and spread them over himself.

"Aw, say!" muttered Sammy. "Ain't he fresh?"

Then Rafe barked again.

"He certainly has one fierce cold!" muttered Sammy. "I ain't got the heart to start nothing on him."

Instead he got up and crept over, to the fireplace where there were still some red embers. Rowdy, or somebody, had evidently been up more than once to put fuel on the fire, and now Sammy did the same and blew the coals until the wood caught and blazed.

Beside the fireplace was a great stack of billets of seasoned wood.

Evidently this cave had been used as a living place for a long time; or perhaps it had merely been stocked with fuel for a long time.

Sammy hoped it was well stocked with food, too. For Sammy was hungry, right then! It seemed to him that the rabbit stew had been eaten a long time before. There was no clock; but judging from the way he felt he thought he must have slept the clock around.

He wondered if the storm had ceased. Was there likelihood of their being able to get back to Red Deer Lodge this morning (if it was morning), or would they have to remain until some one came to dig them out?

The fire having sprung up now, and the flickering light aiding him to see his way about the cavern, Sammy moved toward the entrance. This aperture beside the huge bowlder was scarcely higher than Sammy himself. Before it Rowdy and Rafe, the two strange boys, had hung a piece of matting. When Sammy pulled this matting away he saw snow--snow that filled the hole "chock-er-block," as he expressed it.

"Je-ru-sa-_lem_!" muttered the startled Sammy, "I guess it did snow some. How are we ever going to dig out of here?"

There was a slab of wood standing beside the opening, leaning against the rock. Sammy seized this and began to dig desperately at the snow.

So interested did he become in digging through the bank that filled the cave entrance that he did not pay much attention to where he flung the snow behind him. He was still digging like a woodchuck when Rowdy's voice reached him:

"What are you trying to do? Going to fill this cave with snow?"

"Say!" said Sammy, "it's getting-up time. And there's an awful lot of snow here. I guess we're buried alive, that's what I guess!"

Just then Rafe coughed again, and his brother hopped up and went to him.

"Don't scatter that snow all about, Sammy," he commanded. Then to Rafe: "What's the matter, Rafe, dear? Don't you feel any better?"

"I'm--I'm chilly," chattered the boy with the cough.

"I'll cover you up better," said Rowdy, getting his own blanket. "And we'll have more fire and some breakfast. Are you hungry, Rafe?"

"I'm thirsty," said Rafe, rather whiningly. "I want some--some coffee."

"I'll make some right away. Don't be sick, now, Rafe. I don't see what we should do for you if you got sick. What _are_ you scratching for?"

"Because I itch," replied Rafe drowsily.

But he snuggled down under the coverings until the coffee should be made. He seemed in a pleasanter humor, at least, than on the evening before.

Rowdy bustled about, making coffee and stirring up some kind of bread by the light of the fire. Soon the fuel heaped upon the blaze made the cave warm again, although the smoke set them all to coughing.

The two little girls woke up. Dot demanded a light.

"I don't like this old smoky fire to see by," she complained. "Why don't you keep your fire in a stove, Rowdy?"

"Haven't a stove," replied Rowdy promptly. "How did you girls sleep?"

"All right, I guess," Tess replied. "What are you doing, Sammy? Can we go home this morning?"

Sammy was still digging. He tramped the snow into a corner behind him.

But the more snow he dug out of the hole the more there seemed to be.

He took a round stick as tall as he was himself and pushed it up through the s...o...b..nk, and it let in no light at all.

"Je-ru-sa-_lem_!" he cried. "There's all the snow in the world blown into this hole, I guess. We'll never get out of here!"

"Oh!" squealed Dot, "don't say that, Sammy. Of course we must get out.

It's coming Christmas, you know, and I've got to finish my motto that I'm making for Ruthie. It's got to be done, and I didn't bring it with me."

"But," said Tess, yet with some hesitation now, "the folks will surely come to find us. Don't you say so, Rowdy?"

"If they know where you are," said Rowdy.

"But we didn't tell 'em," growled Sammy, coming to the fire to get warm.

"That'll be all right," Dot declared, seeing no difficulty. "Tom Jonah will find us. You know, we never can hide from Tom Jonah."

Tess explained to Rowdy that Tom Jonah was a dog, and a very good dog, too. But she secretly had some doubts, as did Sammy, that the old dog would be able to find them away down at the bottom of this hole where they had coasted. She was careful to say nothing to frighten Dot, or to discourage her.

They were all much interested in Rowdy's preparations for breakfast.

He produced a strip of bacon and he fried some of this in a pan while the bread was cooking. There was no b.u.t.ter, and the coffee was rather muddy; but not even Dot complained, as long as she got her share.

While they ate, they talked. At least, Rowdy and the visitors talked.

Rafe drank the coffee and ate his share of the breakfast, and then went back to the bed and heaped almost all the coverings over him. He had little red specks on his chest and arms, and he said he could not get warm.

Sammy was desirous of getting out through the cave entrance to see if it had stopped snowing and what the prospect was for clear weather.

But he dug for an hour after breakfast without accomplishing much.

Then Rowdy came to help him.

"I tell you what I think," said the Milton boy, in a low voice, so the girls would not hear. "I b'lieve all that snow that was up on that hill has just come tumbling down before this cave--so there!"

"An avalanche!" gasped Rowdy.

"I don't know what you call it. But that's what I think," repeated Sammy. "We'll never dig out of here in this world."

"But I guess we've got to," said Rowdy sharply. "We can't live here long."

"It ain't a bad sort of a place," said Sammy cheerfully. "I guess Robinson Crusoe didn't have a better cave."