When they awoke next morning their vitality was very low. The frightful cold had penetrated even their heavy coverings and immediately they crawled out from beneath the rugs frost from their breath rimed their eyebrows. Their sleep had not refreshed them for they felt drowsy and their extremities were numb. While they tried to warm themselves by violent exercise they wondered miserably if after another night like the last they would fail to wake in the morning and remain frozen in their sleigh, with the snow for a canopy, until someone found them in the spring. Angela, forgetting that it was dangerous to touch metal when the thermometer was so many degrees below zero, burnt her fingers through removing her glove to open a tin; Erika was crying from the cold and her tears froze as they ran down her blue cheeks.
Snow was falling gently but, urged by an instinctive effort of self preservation, they managed to get another fire going and cook themselves some breakfast. After they had eaten they felt a little restored. The hardy Arctic ponies had taken less harm from the cruel night than the humans and, having harnessed them to the sleigh, the party set off once more.
All through the short day they continued their tourney, often having to turn south but sooner or later always finding an opening that led them further to the west. The girls were dumb from the agony they felt and Freddie, who loved winter sports and exercise, had been reduced to a state of despondency in which he was too dejected even to blaspheme each time they had to dig the sleigh out of deep snow. It was the indomitable spirit in Gregory's lean body that kept them all going as he mocked or cussed them into making a fresh effort whenever they got stuck and encouraged them with the belief that they must sight a village in another mile or two. He was feeling the cold as acutely as any of them but he would not show it and it seemed as if he was made of steel.
The days were lengthening slightly but dusk still fell before four o'clock, an d when it came they halted once more, to eat again and rest before making the second daily stage of their journey, by moonlight.
It was about eleven o'clock and their last camp was an hour behind them when Erika caught the first distant howl of a wolf. A moment later it came again and the others heard it. Gregory was driving and he cast an uneasy glance over his shoulder. A lone wolf was nothing to be frightened of as it would never dare to attack them; but even he was not proof against a spasm of fear at the thought that they might be hunted by a pack.
The howling came again, this time from a slightly different direction another wolf had taken it up. Within five minutes the forest, from being dead with an unearthly silence, was filled with a horrid baying in their rear.
The horses had heard the threatening note before the humans. Gregory had no need to urge them on. They were straining at the harness. For ten minutes the sleigh was carried across the snow at a faster pace than any they had made since leaving the trapper's house.
Suddenly another barrier of trees loomed up before them in the moonlight and Gregory had to swerve south along it. Churning up the snow, which glistened in the moonlight like two sheets of spray as it flew out on either side of them, the sleigh sped on for another five minutes. But the howling of the wolves was nearer now much nearer. They had decreased their distance by cutting across the corner formed by the sleigh's track.
Freddie and the girls had crawled out from underneath the rugs and were straining their eyes through the semi darkness in their wake. Another moment and they could just make out a black shadow that seemed to dance upon the snow in the distance. It was the pack that now had them in sight and was in full cry after them.
Another gap opened in the woods. Straining at the reins Gregory cornered it at such speed that the sleigh nearly overturned. A breathless second and they had straightened out again to continue their wild career.
Not one of them had spoken, but a ghastly fear filled all their hearts. They were miles from any form of help or shelter. If they struck another snow drift, or the wolves once caught up with them, the horses would be torn to pieces and they, in turn, would suffer a frightful death as they fell fighting under the tearing fangs of the ravenous pack.
Chapter XXVI
Hunted By Wolves
GREGORY dared not look behind again; it was all he could do to control the sweating, terror maddened horses. The troika was flying over the ground at such speed that in spite of his fears he felt all the exhilaration which he would have got out of driving a Roman racing chariot; but it needed iron muscles to guide the three stampeded beasts and an unswerving eye for the ground ahead. Any hummock in the snow might conceal a tree stump and overturn the whole outfit, leaving them a defenceless prey to the famished beasts which were hunting them so relentlessly.
The others had got out the arms they had brought and Freddie was lying with a rifle over the back of the sleigh. The wolves were now less than two hundred yards behind; a dark, undulating patch that seemed to streak along the white carpet of snow. It was impossible to count them but he reckoned that there were anything from seventy to a hundred. Another few minutes and he could distinguish the leaders; see their fiery eyes gleaming in the moonlight.
Still no one spoke. Driver and passengers were all frantically racking their wits for some way to escape the terrible death that menaced them. It was useless to drive in among the scattered trees on the fringe of the forest in the hope of throwing the pack off. Wherever the sleigh could go the wolves would follow. For a second the idea came to Gregory that they might pull up and climb a tree. But even if in their mad flight he could have selected a tree which it would have been easy for them to climb they had not sufficient lead to do so now before the wolves would be upon them; and if they could have fought them off long enough to scramble up to safety it would have meant
sacrificing the horses.
That thought gave him an idea which he was horribly reluctant to carry out; but their lives were at stake and it might mean a temporary respite during which he could perform the seemingly impossible and think of some other plan to save them. Now that he had his full mental capabilities back, to think was, once again, to act.
Rolling the reins round his left hand, with his right he drew the trapper's sharp hunting knife from his belt and, stooping, swiftly severed the leather thongs by which the breast harness of the off side horse was attached to the sleigh. Directly it felt itself free of the weight it was dragging it bounded forward with a new spurt of energy nearly jerking Gregory out of the sleigh by the single rein which was all that now held it. But he had been expecting such a movement and had thrown himself backwards at the same instant, partially counteracting the pull. The other horses reared and the sleigh was almost brought to a standstill. Sheathing his knife lie eased the reins and, as the sleigh started forward again, released the rein of the off horse altogether. As it broke away, outdistancing the others, he pulled his gun. For a moment the horse streaked ahead of them, its harness flapping wildly. Gregory swerved the sleigh a little to the left and did the horrible thing he had to do. Aiming his pistol at the horse he had freed he put three rounds into its buttocks.