“Me, too,” returned Jerry; “but that’s the way it happens sometimes. I only hope they find out they haven’t got a single match among ’em. Perhaps, then, if it keeps on getting colder, and the storm blows heavier and heavier, they’ll wish they hadn’t made us clear out.”

“Why, what are you talking about, Jerry?”

“Didn’t you hear what they started to say while we were backing away?” demanded the other. “Whalen asked the other man for a match, so they could start up a fire and get warm. Then I heard the second fellow say he didn’t know where he’d dropped the box, but it didn’t seem to be in his pockets. They turned to Nackerson, and I reckon asked him for a light, because I heard him growl that he’d used his last match when he smoked a cigar.”

“Oh, well, they’ll find some stray ones stowed away in a pocket, like as not!” Bluff remarked, and in that fashion allowed the incident to pass from his mind.

“But tell me what you’re aiming to do next, Bluff?” asked Jerry. “I’d also like to know which way you mean to play the game so’s to get back the horns of our big moose?”

Bluff chuckled on hearing that.

“Oh, I only said that to impress Bill, that’s all!” he observed carelessly. “I had to be true to my name, you know. I only wish I could see some way to beat that crowd out in the end. I’d sure go to a heap of trouble to get there.”

“Are we heading right to get back home?” asked Jerry, a few minutes later.

“My stars! I hope you don’t think I’m silly enough to want to try and cover all the miles between here and the cabin, and with this storm starting in, too.”

“Well, I’ll do whatever you say, Bluff, because I always did own up you knew more about the woods in a day than I could in a week; but all the same I’d be right glad to hear you mean to make a camp, and spend the night resting up.”

“I’m afraid it isn’t going to be much of a camp, though; you don’t want to expect too much.”

“Some sort of brush shelter ought to help out, I should think,” the other returned, as he bent his head lower in order to fight against the driving wind.

Night was coming on unusually early, on account of the clouds above and the falling snow. Any one who knew what these signs foretold could understand that there was a wild time ahead for those caught away from shelter and exposed to the fury of a growing blizzard.

“We might be able to do some better than that,” Bluff went on to say, as he kept turning his head from side to side, as though constantly on the lookout for something he had in mind.

Five, ten minutes passed, until they must have gone nearly half a mile away from the scene of their meeting with Nackerson and his cronies.

“Whew! Let me tell you this is going to be a screecher!” Jerry declared, while he rubbed his ears to make them burn, for the cold wind nipped them.

“You’re wondering why I don’t call a halt, Jerry, so I’ll explain,” Bluff told him. “I remembered seeing a place when we were moving along the trail of the moose where some trees had been uprooted in a storm years ago.”

“Yes, I noticed it, Bluff!” cried the other eagerly. “Is it on account of the firewood you want to get to those fallen trees?”

“Partly that,” admitted the other; “but p’raps you didn’t notice that one of the trees had been a regular whopper, for when it went down in the cyclone it yanked up a heap of earth nearly as big as a cabin.”

“Oh, now I see what you mean, Bluff: the hole in the ground where the roots came out of might make us a first-rate camp!”

“For a good many reasons,” pursued Bluff, who managed to speak after a fashion in spite of the wind whistling into his teeth and at times almost taking his breath away. “First of all, the roots stand up in the right way to protect us from the worst of this northwest storm.”

“Couldn’t be better, for a fact,” said Jerry, feeling his courage returning as the plan unfolded.

“Then, as you say, we’d have plenty of firewood handy for that little camp hatchet to get busy on. And unless I miss my guess we ought to be able to cover the gap more or less with stuff, so as to form a rough roof.”

“Then all I hope is,” Jerry told him rather plaintively, “that we don’t get off our base, and miss connections with that windrow of fallen trees.”

“I’ve kept my bearings right along,” Bluff returned, “and if you look sharp over there on the left I reckon you’ll see the open place where the trees are down.”

“Bluff, you did take us straight there, for a fact. I don’t think Frank or anybody else could have done better!” was Jerry’s exultant outbreak, after he discovered that they had arrived at their goal.

A minute afterward the two chums were looking down into the hole that had once contained the roots of the big tree, now lying where the violence of the hurricane had thrown it.

“Just the thing for us!” Jerry exclaimed, as he jumped into the cavity and mentally pictured it roofed over so that the snow might be almost wholly kept out.

“Then the first thing we want to do is to get a fire started,” Bluff advised him. “Before we know where we’re at, we’ll be in the dark; so let’s drag a bunch of this wood where we’ll need it before we do anything else.”

They laid their guns aside, leaning them against a tree that had weathered the gale so fatal to the giant of the woods. For some little time both boys labored steadily, until a heaping pile of fairly good wood had been brought close to the hole.

“Where’d we better start the fire?” asked Jerry, for he knew that a number of things must be considered when settling this question.

There was the direction of the wind to be remembered, for it would be very disagreeable to have the pungent wood smoke blown constantly in their faces, making their eyes smart. As the upturned roots stood between them and the storm, this compelled them to start the blaze on the opposite side of the excavation.

Once Jerry had the site pointed out to him, he busied himself in getting a blaze going. Things began to take on a more cheerful air as soon as the fire started crackling and throwing out both light and heat.

This was only a beginning. The boys knew that in order to shelter themselves from the blizzard they must get some sort of roof above their heads. This would keep off the falling snow that might otherwise almost fill the hole before morning came.

The hatchet proved to be worth its weight in silver, as Jerry declared.

“What would we have done without it?” he remarked several times, as he continued to hack away, handing the brush over to Bluff, who was engaged in trying to weave it after a certain fashion, securing it to the poles they had laid across the top of the hole.

“Don’t ask me,” Bluff told him; “thank Frank for telling us to bring it along, when like as not neither of us would have thought it worth while.”

“No,” continued Jerry, “because a fellow as a rule doesn’t expect to use a hatchet when he’s tracking a moose or a deer. All the same, I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s best to have such a tool along whenever you even take a walk up here in these Maine woods. You never know when you may need it.”

“The roof’s half done,” announced Bluff. “Take a look, and tell me how you like it.”

“Seems like a good job, so far as I know,” the other commented. “I should say you’ve made a brush shelter that way more’n a few times before now.”

“Maybe I have,” was the reply, as Bluff once more set to work to finish the roof, leaving untouched the end through which they could pass in and out and receive the benefit of their fire.

“And when we’ve got all through building our house,” remarked Jerry, “it’ll be time to think of having a bite.”

“Huh! That’s another thing we’ve got to thank Frank for,” was the rejoinder. “It looks as though he might have seen what trouble we had in store for us, and fixed things to meet the need.”

“That’s Frank’s way,” commented Jerry, feeling very grateful to know that even though compelled to spend the night in such a crude camp he and Bluff need not lie and shiver for want of warmth or go hungry because of lack of food.

“It strikes me the storm keeps getting worse right along,” Bluff announced, as he was forced to push up to the fire in order to warm his stiff fingers.

“It’s a corker, all right,” admitted the other, whose exertions with the hatchet helped to keep his blood circulating, so that he did not feel the freezing temperature quite so much as Bluff seemed to.

In due time the roof was finished, as far as the builder intended it should be laid. No matter what depth of snow fell, very little of it was likely to find its way inside the shelter back of the upturned tree.

“Now, don’t we deserve a little refreshment?” asked Jerry.

“We might as well, for a change,” Bluff told him. “After that, we must fetch more wood. The wind makes the fire burn savagely, you notice, and it’s sure a caution how it eats up the stuff. Besides, remember it’s going to be something like twelve hours before morning comes.”

“Wow! Will we manage to get any sleep, do you think?”

“Give it up; but let’s hope so.”

“And when we intended to start out light, I can remember Frank saying we might wish we had lugged our blankets along with us. ’Course we, couldn’t do that, and chase after the moose; but I’d like to feel that same blanket up around my shoulders.”

“Oh, we’re doing pretty well, as it is,” Bluff returned, determined to make the best of a bad bargain, which was a pretty wise thing for him to do under the circumstances.

Sitting there, with the fire crackling close by, and its heat feeling very comfortable, the two chums opened the packages of food which Frank had rammed into the pockets of their coats before they started.

Their supper consisted of only crackers and cheese, with some strips of left-over venison to munch on. Still, since their appetites were good and there was an abundance of the fare, it tasted as fine as anything they could remember.

“Had enough?” asked Bluff, when he saw that his comrade had cleaned up every scrap of his portion.

“Plenty,” replied Jerry, with a sigh of satisfaction; “couldn’t eat another bite if I tried. And don’t let’s bother thinking where our breakfast’s going’ to come from. We’ll run across some game, or else be able to find the cabin again before we’ve quite starved to death.”

“That’s right. I was just thinking if those men should turn out to be without a single match among them, wouldn’t they have a rough time of it all night out in this storm?”

“Yes; and I’m sorry now I didn’t offer to hand them over some of our supply of matches,” Jerry said softly, which remark spoke well for his forgiving nature. “They treated us mean, of course, but then it doesn’t pay to hold a grudge when you’re in the woods.”

“Oh, I reckon they found the match, all right,” Bluff remarked carelessly, “and as they’re old sportsmen they must know all the tricks woodsmen make use of to keep warm and cozy in a blow like this.”

“I hope so, Bluff.”

Later on they decided to get busy with the wood supply, for the snow continued to come down as furiously as ever. It was a fine kind of powdery snow, which, blown on the gale, caused their cheeks to smart when it struck.

Every little while they would get close to the fire to warm themselves. Jerry shuddered as he contemplated the long vigil of that never-to-be-forgotten night following their moose hunt. He did not anticipate that sleep would visit either of them, so uncomfortable would be their position. The wind managed to find cracks and crannies through which to whistle, and with the storm raging through the forest all sorts of strange noises came to their ears.

At times it even seemed to Jerry as though people in distress were calling for help. Twice he went outside the shelter to listen, though Bluff told him it was all imagination.

“It wouldn’t surprise me, though,” the other remarked, when Jerry came back the second time, “if we heard that wolf pack whooping things up through the timber before morning comes. A wild night like this is what starts them on the rampage, I reckon.”

“Do you think they would attack us here?” asked Jerry, drawing his gun a little closer to his hand.

“Well, hardly, with this jolly blaze going,” Bluff continued reflectively. “You know, they are afraid of fire. But they may make a meal from that big moose we shot, if the men don’t stay there to keep them away.”

“So long as they left us the horns I wouldn’t care, Bluff. But if the men didn’t find a single match among them, and the wolves came along, like as not they’d have to pass the night perched in a tree, and freezing. Oh, I’m glad we’ve got our fire!”

CHAPTER XXII – THE GRAY-COATED PIRATE FROM CANADA

“Well,” observed Bluff contentedly, “believe me, a fire is a bully thing to hug up to on a night like this. I always did have a sneaking fancy for a crackling blaze, and now I’m more in love with this one of ours than I could tell you.”

“Hark to that, would you!” exclaimed Jerry, suddenly sitting up straight and turning his head to one side, as though straining his hearing to catch a repetition of the sound.

“Now, what do you think you heard?” asked Bluff, more or less interested, but still showing no signs of alarm.

“That’s what I’d like to know. Seemed like a howl of some kind.”

“I thought that wolf business would get on your nerves before long,” chuckled the other boy.

“But you said yourself that on a stormy night like this beasts of prey are apt to be unusually fierce,” protested Jerry.

“That’s right,” he was told; “but even then it doesn’t mean every whoop of the wind through the trees is a wolf giving tongue. Of course, I don’t say you didn’t hear one, but chances are ten to one against it.”

“Well, it hasn’t come again, so far, and I hope it won’t, that’s all,” said the still unconvinced Jerry.

Every once in a while he would go to the opening in front and look out. Of course, the fire needed more or less attention, as Bluff well knew; nevertheless, he felt pretty certain that Jerry was influenced by his fears of an invasion rather than any desire to throw on the additional fuel.

The time dragged along. So far as they could tell, there did not appear to be any let-up to the fury of the storm. There were many open chinks in their barricade, as might be expected, since it was composed of branches and such stuff as lay around at the time they made their roof and the sides to the cover.

Driven by the fierce wind, the fine powdery snow managed to penetrate more or less, so that they could feel it against their faces. Unpleasant as this might appear, it was not to be complained of when they realized the discomfort and danger that would have been their lot if compelled to remain out in the open.

After a long time they found their eyes getting heavy. While it was next to impossible to get any sound sleep, they might take what Bluff called “cat-naps,” rousing themselves every little while so as to change their cramped position and perhaps cast more wood on the fire.

Jerry remembered that it was immediately after he had taken the longest doze of any that he heard something that thrilled him.

He raised his head to listen, and then kicked his companion in the calf of the leg. Bluff only grunted, possibly believing, if he thought anything at all, it might be only an accident.

“Bluff – oh, Bluff!”

Now he caught the sound of Jerry’s voice close to his ear, and it was accompanied by yet another prod with his toe, this time of a more vigorous nature than before.

“Hey! What ails you, Jerry? If you can’t sleep, what’s the need of punching me that way?” grumbled Bluff.

“But I tell you there is something trying to get in here!!” argued the other.

At that, Bluff condescended to slightly raise his head. He was more awake by now, for he realized that Jerry was in earnest.

“I don’t see anything but that our fire is going down some. Now I’m roused up, I guess I’d better put on more stuff,” he remarked sleepily, as he started to sit up.

“Watch back there and you’ll see, I tell you!” And Jerry pointed toward the side of their weak barricade, where it joined the upturned roots and frozen soil.

Having his attention pivoted upon the one particular spot, Bluff was not long in making a surprising discovery.

“By Jinks, it does seem to be moving!” he admitted. “Wonder now if that could be only the wind?”

“But, don’t you see, the wind has died out. And, say, that noise sounds for all the world like a dog trying to dig his way through. I tell you, Bluff, they’re coming in after us – the wolves, I mean!”

This time Bluff did not laugh. Instead, he put out a hand and commenced to fumble around him. Jerry knew he was searching for his rifle, and he hastened to take a firmer grip on his own weapon, which he was holding at the time.

The scratching noise continued, with but slight intermissions. They could also see even in that uncertain light that the animal was by degrees demolishing the flimsy shelter at the place where he had attacked it.

Then something that glowed like two coals of yellow fire appeared. Jerry caught his breath, and stared as though fascinated. He knew that those strange objects were the flaming eyes of the bold wolf that thought to steal this march upon them.

The animal had been afraid to enter the shelter on the side where the fire smoldered. Urged on by hunger, he had thought to tear a hole in the wall and attack those within.

Had either of the boys been better versed in the nature and habits of wolves, they must have known that only when half famished would these skulkers of the Canadian forests make bold enough to attack human beings.

Neither of the boys bothered about anything just then save the fact that they were threatened by a savage enemy and had better take immediate measures looking to self-protection.

Jerry felt rather than saw his companion start to raise his gun.

“Oh, Bluff, please don’t!” he cried hurriedly.

“Why, what’s the matter?” replied the other. “The sooner we let Mr. Wolf know we’re at home and ready to give him and his kind a warm reception, the better for us. Let go my arm, can’t you? I want to send a bullet between those two eyes.”

“But, Bluff, it isn’t fair!” protested the other boy, while the wolf, if it was one, had fallen to scratching again, apparently not intimidated by the muttering of voices within.

“Hey, tell me what you mean, can’t you?” Bluff demanded indignantly, wondering at the same time whether his chum could have gone out of his mind because of the sudden awakening and the threatening peril.

“It’s my wolf, Bluff; didn’t I discover him first?” Jerry continued, still holding tenaciously on to the arm of the other, as though to add force to his argument.

At that Bluff laughed softly.

“Oh, that’s what’s ailing you, is it?” he ventured to say. “Like as not you feel as if you ought to be the one to knock him over, eh? Well, get your gun!”

“I have, already. Tell me when it’s time for me to let go!” And, having received the commission to act, Jerry no longer kept an eager grip on the sleeve of his comrade’s coat.

“I might give a whoop, which is apt to make the beast look in on us again,” was Bluff’s reply. “Keep your gun leveled, so as to let drive as soon as you glimpse his eyes. Right between them, remember.”

“I will, and thank you for giving me first chance. But hark to what’s going on out there now. Whew! Sounds as if there might be more’n one wolf waiting to jump in here on us.”

“It’s snarling and scrapping, as sure as you’re born,” admitted the second boy, as he managed to hold his gun in readiness. “Tell you what I’ll do, Jerry.”

“Yes, go on then,” said the other eagerly.

“Just as soon as you blaze away, I’ll be ready to jump outside, gun in hand.”

“What for?”

“So as to try to get another crack at some of the other critters. They’ll turn tail, and run a little way off after the crash of the gun inside here and seeing their mate keel over. But it may be light enough for me to see to bowl over one on my own account.”

“I understand now. Do whatever you think best. And just as soon as I’ve pulled the trigger I think I’ll climb out after you.”

“Not a bad idea,” admitted the other; “but now get ready, for I’m going to let out a yell to see what happens.”

Bluff had managed to scramble into a position that gave him a better opportunity to gain his feet in a hurry. He knew there would be considerable need of haste in making his exit, if he hoped to glimpse any of the vanishing wolves after they had been alarmed by the gunshot within the pit.

“Go on!” urged the nervous Jerry, with raised gun, and his eyes fixed on the particular spot where the intruder was again busily at work.

The shout Bluff gave was indeed enough to attract attention. They could hear a movement outside the shelter, as though the invaders had started to retreat, only to come back again, as determined as ever.

Jerry was waiting. All he wanted was just a glimpse of the twin balls of fire not six feet away, when he stood ready to do the duty he had begged Bluff to give into his hands.

It speedily came to him. First he saw a movement about the small gap that had already been made in the wall of branches. Then a nose was rudely thrust into the aperture, as the daring wolf feasted his eyes on the figures of the two lads.

Bang! went Jerry’s rifle, fired point-blank. Instantly the other boy was in motion, and scrambling to get up out of the hole on the side of the opening and the dwindling fire.

As he passed this bed of red embers, he gave a kick that sent some small bits of fuel into the mass. The object of this, of course, was to try and coax a slight uplift in the way of a blaze that might be of assistance to him in sighting the fleeing wolves.

Jerry, almost stunned by the violence of the report in such confined quarters, did his best to follow at the heels of his chum. His heart was beating three times as fast as ordinary. Perhaps he anticipated finding his bold comrade battling for his life with a horde of hungry gray-coated animals and in need of such help as he might render.

Jerry heard a gun sound even as he was climbing up the little incline that marked the border of their depressed camp. Bluff gave a series of shouts at the same time; somehow these did not impress Jerry as cries for aid, but rather given in derision, and to add to the speed of the wolves’ retreat.

Yes, there was Bluff standing staring into the white bank of falling snow, while holding his gun in readiness to repeat his shot, if necessary.

“Did you get one?” cried Jerry eagerly.

“I hardly think so,” the other replied dejectedly. “You see, they were a little too fast for me. When I got on my feet out here I could just see something darker than the snow on the point of disappearing. I pulled on it as quick as I could; but the chances are I didn’t more than wound him, even if I managed that.”

“But they’re gone away, Bluff!”

“Seems like it,” returned Bluff.

“I only hope they’ve had enough of it, and will fight shy of our camp the rest of the night,” ventured Jerry.

“Guess you got your fellow, all right,” observed the other boy.

That caused Jerry to turn toward the snow-covered shelter. The fire was now burning briskly for the time being, and it was possible to see without much difficulty.

“Oh, do you think I did?” exclaimed the marksman. “Let’s find out. And, say, if I turned him over, I’d like first rate to save his hide for a mat. A wolfskin makes the finest kind of a footmat, you know; and it’d be great to know every time you stood on it that you had won it fair and square.”

They were by this time standing over the fallen animal. It lay stretched out on the snow, and was apparently dead.

“Looks like a pretty big wolf to me,” ventured Jerry, feeling the thrill of satisfaction that comes to every hunter when he has by good luck or superior marksmanship managed to bring down his quarry.

“He is a buster, sure enough,” said Bluff; “in fact, I never saw a bigger one, either in captivity or running wild. I’d hate to tackle such a beast hand to hand. See his white teeth, will you! Don’t they look ferocious, though? Here, give me your gun, if so be you mean to lug him into the shelter with us.”

“I only want to do that to save the skin, you see,” explained Jerry, as he started to comply.

“Well, I reckon you’re wise,” Bluff remarked, “because if his mates are as hungry as he seemed to be, chances are they’ll sneak back and carry the body away, so’s to make a meal off it.”

While it was not as pleasant as it might be, having that four-footed wood pirate inside with them, Bluff made no remonstrance. He saw that it pleased Jerry to anticipate getting the skin of the wolf to keep as a memento of the strange adventure; and Bluff could be one of the most accommodating fellows ever known when he felt so disposed.

So once more the boys made themselves fairly comfortable, after the fire had been renewed, and between listening and dozing the long hours passed away.