A Countess from Canada eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 357 pages of information about A Countess from Canada.

A Countess from Canada eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 357 pages of information about A Countess from Canada.

The dog whined, licking her mitten, but left off struggling, as if it realized the uselessness of such a course.  The other dogs were fastened in like manner, for they had all been trained to hunt wolves, and might bolt at an unexpected moment, wrecking the sledge and scattering the things which were loaded upon it.  Then came ten minutes of hard work clearing away the snow and getting at the packages which Katherine had been obliged to cache a few hours before.  One package had been torn open, and its contents scattered, which showed that the wolf had already started thieving operations; so that even if Oily Dave and his companion had contemplated no raid on the cache, there would not have been much left later which was worth carrying away.

“I don’t like you having to draw that sledge.  Suppose it overruns you, and you get hurt, like Father did this afternoon,” Miles said in a troubled tone, as Katherine prepared to go forward with the hand sledge, while he followed behind with the dogs.

“I don’t intend to let it overrun me, so there is no need to worry.  In fact there is much more danger for you if the dogs hear the wolves and try to bolt.  But let us get along as fast as we can, or Nellie will be in a fine state of anxiety about us,” Katherine replied.  Then, gathering the lines of the sledge round her arms, as her father had taught her, she set out at a good pace, followed by Miles and the dogs.

For a time little was to be heard save the creaking of the babiche lacing of the snowshoes, for the dogs were running silently, and Miles, saving his breath for the work of getting along, was controlling them merely by dumb show, flourishing the whip to hold them back when they took on a spurt, or beckoning them along when they showed signs of lagging.  They were less than a mile from home, and going well, when suddenly a hideous uproar broke out near at hand—­the long-drawn howling of wolves, human shouts and cries, and the crack of a revolver.

CHAPTER IV

A Night of Rough Work

“Phil, where is Katherine?” asked Mrs. Burton, coming out of her father’s room about half an hour after the two had started to bring home the stores.

“She has gone to help Miles to do some work outside, though what it can be I’m sure I don’t know,” grumbled Phil, who was sleepy and wanted to get to bed.  He had washed the supper things after a fashion, had cleared up the kitchen for the night, according to his own ideas of tidiness, and now was sitting in the rocking-chair by the stove, trying very hard to keep his eyes open.

“Oh dear, how unwise of her!” exclaimed Mrs. Burton in a plaintive tone.  “I am always so afraid for her to go outside at night when it is freezing so sharply, for her face would be quite spoiled if she were to get it frostbitten, and she is so pretty.”

“Is she?” Phil’s voice had a drowsy drawl, as if the subject of Katherine’s looks had very little interest for him, as indeed it had.  But an unexpected lurch of the chair, coming at that moment, landed him in a squirming heap on the floor.

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A Countess from Canada from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.