"Guess he thinks it's Thanksgiving," Bob agreed as he hurried into his clothes, keeping one eye on the frosty landscape and fairly aching to make part of it. "Hurry up, fellows, let's go out and have a snow fight."

"You're on," agreed Joe, and then began the race to see who would get from their cottage to the hotel and to the breakfast table first.

They arrived there--at the breakfast table, that is--at one and the same time and ate as ravenously as though they had not broken their fast in a week. Mr. and Mrs. Layton watched them and smiled, wishing that they might once more eat with such l.u.s.ty appet.i.tes.

Before the boys had finished breakfast, it had begun to snow again, making the landscape appear more than ever blizzardy and bleak.

Eagerly the boys b.u.t.toned up heavy sweaters, prepared to fight the storm to a finish.

It seemed that they were not the only ones whom the storm had lured forth. There were a number of people gathered in front of the hotel and, since they seemed rather excited about something, three of the boys joined them to find out what the fuss was all about, Jimmy remaining behind for the time being to take a nail from his shoe.

"The telegraph wires are all down," said a man in response to Bob's question. "There's a man been raving around here like a crazy man, declaring he has to send a telegram. n.o.body can seem to make him understand that since the wires are all down such a thing is impossible."

"He might telephone," Joe suggested, but the man who had been their informant took him up quickly.

"They're down too," he said. "We're as marooned here, as far as any communication with the outside world is concerned, as though we were stranded on an island in the midst of the ocean. This storm has done considerable damage."

"I should say so," remarked Joe, as the gentleman turned to some one else and the boys started on a tour of the place to look over the prospect. "I'll call it some damage to knock down both telephone and telegraph wires at one fell swoop."

"That talk about our being just as badly off for communication with the outside world as though we were on an island isn't quite correct,"

observed Herb. "That fellow seemed to forget all about trains."

"I suppose he meant quick communication," said Bob. "We could send a message by wire in an hour or less, while it would take two or three times that time to send the same message by rail."

"That's so," agreed Herb, staring up at the wires which had fallen beneath their weight of snow. "I'd hate to _have_ to get a message through for any reason just now. But look," he added, pointing to the hotel. "Our aerials are still up anyway."

"I wonder who the fellow was who was so anxious to telegraph," said Joe, after a few minutes. "He must think himself in bad luck."

Bob brought his gaze from the damaged wires and stared at the boys, and at Jimmy who just then came puffing up.

"Say, I bet that was Mr. Salper," Bob said. "Don't you remember last night that he said he must get a message through to his broker first thing in the morning?"

"By Jove, the storm knocked it clear out of my head!" exclaimed Joe.

"Say, I feel sorry for him, all right."

"Wish we could help him some way," said Herb anxiously. "It would never do to let that fellow Mohun and his pals get off with the filthy lucre just when we thought we'd double-crossed them so nicely."

"I guess that's where Mr. Salper would agree with you," said Jimmy, with a grin. "Especially since the filthy lucre belongs to him."

They walked on in silence for a few moments, chagrined at the thought that the storm had played so into the hands of Mr. Salper's enemies.

They had learned from Mr. Salper the night before that Mohun of the protruding teeth was not the kind of man to let a golden opportunity pa.s.s. He would rush the "deal" through while Salper was out of town, and, from the latter's impatience, they had gathered that the next few hours would, in all probability, be the crucial time.

"Burr-r-r!" cried Jimmy suddenly, wrapping his arms as far as they would go about his chubby body and shivering with the cold. "This weather sure does make a fellow wish for a fur overcoat. The thermometer must have gone down twenty degrees over night."

"Hear who's talking!" scoffed Herb. "With all that fat on your bones, Doughnuts, you haven't a chance in the world of feeling cold."

"I suppose you know more than I do about it--not being me," retorted Jimmy, scathingly. "I'd just like you to feel the way I do; that's all."

"Well, it isn't what you might call unpleasantly hot," observed Bob.

"I must say I'm not sweltering, myself."

"Guess it isn't much colder than this up at the North Pole," agreed Joe, as he turned his sweater collar up higher about his ears. "Might as well rig up as an Eskimo and be done with it."

"Reminds me of that Norwegian, Amundsen," said Bob. "He sure intends to discover the North Pole with all the fancy tr.i.m.m.i.n.gs, this time."

"What do you mean?" asked Herb, with interest.

"Do you mean to say you haven't read about it?" demanded Jimmy, indulgently. "Why, he's the fellow who is going to have his ship all dressed up with wireless so that when he smashes his ship against the North Pole he can let everybody know about it."

"It's a great idea, I call it," said Joe, enthusiastically. "Up to this time, explorers haven't had any way of communicating with the outside world, and so if they got in trouble they just had to get out of it the best way they could or die in the attempt."

"While now," Bob took him up eagerly, "his wireless messages will be picked up by hundreds of stations all over the world and in case of need ships and teams of huskies and even aeroplanes can be rushed to his rescue."

"Exploring de luxe," murmured Herb, with a comical look. "Pretty soon there won't be any such thing as adventure because there won't be any danger. We'll have radio to watch over us and keep us from all harm."

"It's all right for you to talk that way," said Jimmy. "But I bet if you were one of these explorer chaps you'd be mighty glad to have something watch over you and help you out of a tight fix."

"Yes, I guess those fellows need all the help they can get," agreed Bob, soberly. "It isn't any joke to be away out there with hundreds of miles of ice and water between them and civilization."

"They say even the sledges are to be equipped with radio," Joe broke in. "So that they can keep in touch with the ship all the time and through the medium of the powerful sending set aboard the boat the ship itself can be kept in constant touch with the outside world."

"There are planes too, equipped with radio," added Bob. "And they say each plane is outfitted with skids so that it can land safely on the ice."

"I should think there would be danger in that," remarked Jimmy, rubbing his hands vigorously to set the blood circulating again. "They say the ice is awfully rough and b.u.mpy and spattered with small hills of ice. I should think a pilot would have a jolly time trying to make a landing under those conditions."

"They intend to cut out the ice about the ship so as to make landing possible," explained Bob. "And in the other places the skids help them to make a sure landing. Say, wouldn't I like to make one of that expedition!" he added, with enthusiasm.

"I wonder how long they expect this expedition to take," said Herb.

The idea of exploring the arctic with radio as a companion was a fascinating one to him and at that moment he would have made one of Amundsen's hardy crew, if such a thing were possible, with the greatest joy.

"They expect it will take them five years, maybe six." It was Bob who answered the question. "Their idea is to travel as far as possible north before the ice gets thick. Then when the floes close in about them they will drift with the ice over the pole--or, at least, that's what they hope to do."

"What gets me," said Jimmy plaintively, "is how they are going to know when they get to the pole anyway."

Herb made a pa.s.s at him which the fat boy nimbly avoided.

"Why, you poor fish," said the former witheringly, "you sure will be a full-sized nut if you ever live to grow up. I suppose if you got to the North Pole you'd expect to see a clothes pole with the clothes line wrapped around it, ready for use."

CHAPTER XXI

A SUDDEN INSPIRATION

Unconsciously their feet had carried the radio boys in the direction of the radio station and now they were surprised to find themselves confronted by the building itself.

"We've come some way," Herb began with a chuckle, but Bob cut him short excitedly.