Jack Ranger's Gun Club: or, From Schoolroom to Camp and Trail

The horses were sheltered in a shack that had been built of saplings, with leaves and earth banked around it and on the roof, and the animals, huddled closely together, were warm and comfortable.

Inside the big tent, where the members of the gun club stayed, it was not cold, for Long Gun and Budge kept the fire going in the stone stove, and as the tent was well banked around the bottom, but little of the biting wind entered.

Nothing could be done, as it was not safe to venture out, so the boys put in the day cleaning their guns, polishing some of the horn trophies they had secured, and talking of what had happened so far on their camping trip.

Toward evening Long Gun went out to the supply tent to get some meat to cook. He came back in a hurry, his face showing much surprise.

“What’s the matter?” asked Jack quickly.

“Meat gone!” exclaimed the Indian. “Something take him from tent.”

The boys rushed out into the storm toward the smaller canvas shelter where their food and supplies were kept. One side had been torn down, and within there was a scene of confusion.

In the fierceness of the storm, while the campers had been in the big tent, some wild beast, or, perhaps, several of them, had stolen up and carried away most of the food on which Jack and his chums depended. Nor could it be said what beasts had robbed them, for their tracks were obliterated by the snow that had fallen since.

“Well, this is tough luck!” exclaimed Jack. “What are we going to do now?”

“There’s some bacon left from breakfast,” said Budge. “Have to eat that, I guess.”

“Yes; and, thank goodness, the thieves didn’t care for coffee,” added Nat. “We sha’n’t starve, at least, to-night.”

“There’s some canned stuff left, too,” went on Will.

“But it won’t last long, if this storm keeps up,” spoke Jack seriously. “I guess we’re going to be up against it, fellows.”

“Like fish?” asked Long Gun suddenly.

“What have fish got to do with it?” inquired Bony.

“Catch fish through ice soon. Storm stop,” replied the Indian. “River plenty full fish.”

“That’s a good idea,” commented Jack. “But when will the blizzard stop?”

It kept up all that night and part of the next day. The campers were on short rations, as regards meat, though there was plenty of canned baked beans, and enough hardtack for some time yet, while there was flour that could be made into biscuits. But they needed meat, or something like it, in that cold climate.

It was late the next afternoon when Jack, looking from the tent, announced:

“Hurrah, fellows! It’s stopped snowing, and the wind has gone down. Now for some fish through the ice. Long Gun, come on and show us how.”

The Indian got some lines and hooks ready, using salt pork for bait. Then the whole party went down to the river, traveling on snowshoes, for there was a great depth to the snow, and it was quite soft.

It was no easy task to scrape away the white blanket and get down to the ice that covered the river, but they managed it. Holes were chopped in the frozen surface of the stream, and then they all began to fish. They had good luck, and soon had caught enough of the finny residents of the Shoshone to make a good meal.

“Um-um!” exclaimed Bony, as they sat down to supper a little later. “Maybe this doesn’t taste fine!” and he extended his plate for some more of the fish, fried brown in corn meal, with bacon as a flavoring.

The next day Jack, Nat and Sam went out and killed some jack-rabbits, and this served them until two days later, when Jack killed a fat ram and Will a small deer.

All danger of a short food supply was thus obviated, and, the damaged tent having been repaired, the boys prepared to resume their hunt.

“We’ve only about three weeks more,” announced Jack one night. “If we stay much longer we may get snowed in and have to stay until spring.”

“Well, that wouldn’t be so bad,” spoke Bony.

“I know why Jack wants to start back,” spoke Sam. “He is going to stop at Pryor’s Gap and see a certain party with brown eyes, who – ”

Then Sam dodged to avoid the snowshoe which his chum threw across the tent at him.

“When are we going to make another try to discover the secret of the strange camp?” asked Nat when quiet was restored.

“That’s so. When?” asked Will. “We haven’t heard that queer noise lately.”

“We’ll see what we can do to-morrow,” answered Jack.

That night the lads were startled by again hearing that strange sound in the air over their camp. But this time it seemed farther away, and only lasted a short time, while Jack, who rushed out the moment he heard it, could discover nothing.

Jack, Nat, Sam, Bony and Will started off early the next morning on snowshoes for the top of the mountain, in accordance with a plan Jack had formed of trying to reach the camp of the men from a point directly back of the place whence they had been ordered away.

They reached the summit of the mountain and found, as Long Gun had said they would, a trail leading directly down. But it was so steep and so covered with snow that it seemed risky to attempt it.

“We can never get down there,” said Nat.

“Sure we can,” declared Jack.

“We might if we had some of those long, wooden snowshoes, like barrel-staves, which the Norwegians use,” spoke Sam. “Otherwise I don’t see how we’re going to do it.”

Jack did not reply. Instead he was walking slowly along what seemed to be an abandoned trail. Suddenly he uttered an exclamation.

“The very thing!” he cried.

“What?” asked Bony.

“That old sled,” answered Jack, pointing to a sort of bobsled, that had evidently been made by lumbermen. It consisted of a platform of slabs, on long, broad, wooden runners, and stood near an abandoned camp.

“How can we use that?” asked Nat.

“Get on it and slide down the mountain,” daringly proposed Jack. “There’s plenty of snow. The old sled will hold us all, and maybe we can ride right into their camp lickity-split. Then they can’t put us out until we’ve seen what’s going on. Will you go?”

The boys hesitated a moment. It was a hazardous plan, one fraught with danger, but they were not the lads to draw back for that. It seemed the only feasible way of getting down the mountain.

CHAPTER XXXI

A PERILOUS RIDE

“Well,” asked Jack again, “will you go, or do I have to take the trip alone?”

“I’ll go!” cried Nat suddenly.

“And I!” “And I!” “And I!” added Bony, Sam and Will.