Ice Queen (Illustrated Edition). Ernest Ingersoll

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СКАЧАТЬ lad's strength and toughness. The mammas of the village thought him a bad boy, getting their information from the small boys of the public school, whom, in his great fondness for joking, he would sometimes frighten and tease.

      Aleck knew him better, and knew how brave and goodhearted he was. Jim had good cause to be fond of him, for, in behalf of The Youngster, during his first week at school, Tug had soundly thrashed a bullying tyrant; while Kate gratefully remembered various heavy market-baskets he had carried for her, since he lived near by. A closer tie between our little family and their visitor, however, was the fact that, like them, he was an orphan, and, like them, had relatives in Cleveland, whom he had often thought he should like to be with better than staying with his aunt here in Monore.

      When Tug had joined the circle gathered before the big fireplace, and had begun to talk about the brass-works, he was promptly hushed by Aleck.

      "Put that up now, and attend to me. This urchin here, who has become very cheeky since he began to go to school—"

      "And came under my care," Tug interrupted, loftily.

      "Yes, no doubt. Well, The Youngster finds we all want to go to Cleveland, but can't afford the railway fare, and so he coolly proposes that we skate there."

      "Well, why don't you do it? I'll go with you," said Tug, quietly.

      Jim shouted with triumph. Kate laughed, and clapped her hands at the fun of beating her big brother, and Aleck looked as though he thought he was being quizzed.

      "Do you mean it?" he asked.

      "Of course I do. I want to go down as badly as you do. I haven't any stamps, and the walking, I'm told, isn't good. I prefer to skate."

      "Katy says we might drag our luggage on sleds, as they do in the arctic regions; but supposing the ice should break up, or we should come to a big crack?"

      "I have read," Kate remarks again, "that they carry boats on their sledges, and pack their goods in the boats, so that they will float if the ice gives way."

      "Take my boat!" screamed Jim, eagerly.

      "That would call for a big sled."

      "Well, didn't you two fellows build a pair of bobs last winter big enough to carry that boat?"

      "Doubtful," answered Aleck. But when they brought out the plan of the boat, and then measured the bobs, which were stored in the woodshed, they found them plenty wide, and Tug was sure they were sufficiently strong.

      Kate looked at them rather dubiously, and said she had never read of arctic boats mounted on heavy bobs, but that they always seemed in the pictures to have long, light runners under them; but Jim reminded her curtly that "girls didn't know everything," so she kept still, and the planning and talking went on.

      Young people who are under no necessity to ask permission of older persons, and, besides, are pushed by circumstances, decide quickly on a plan which looks forward to adventure. Generally, I fear, they come to grief, and learn some good lessons rather expensively; but sometimes their energy and fearlessness carry them safely through what the caution of old age would have stopped short of trying to perform.

      

DISCUSSING THE PLAN.

      They sat up pretty late discussing the plan, but before Tug went to what he said he "s'posed he must call home," they had determined to try it if the weather held firm.

      This was on Friday. They hoped to get away early in the coming week. Then all three went to bed, Jim jubilant, and looking forward to a long frolic; Kate half doubtful whether it was best, but hopeful; Aleck sure that, for himself, he didn't care, hating to put his sister and brother to any risk, yet seeing no better way of resisting poverty; Tug resolute, and bound to stand by his friends, whatever happened. So they slept, and bright and early next morning the quiet preparations began, Tug declining to answer any questions as to how he arranged the matter of his going with his aunt.

      Chapter III.

       Fitting Out the "Red Erik"

       Table of Contents

      The first thing was to settle upon their preparations.

      "What will you want to take, Tug?"

      "Precious little, I guess. Besides my clothing, which won't make much of a bundle, I don't own much except my shot-gun, and my weasel-trap, and my odds-and-ends chest, and some hooks and lines. I'm going to sell all the rest of my duds."

      "Who'll buy 'em?" asked Jim, doubtfully.

      "Never you mind who, infant. 'This stock must be closed out below cost,' as the old-clo' men say. I can put all my baggage in a nail-keg."

      "Then that's fixed," Aleck remarked. "Now for you, Katy?"

      "I think the little trunk that was mamma's, and my handbag for brush and comb and such things, will hold all that belongs to me—that is, of my own own," she replied, laughing. "Of course, the cooking things, and so on, belong to all of us."

      "Well, Jim, your traps and mine will go into the other little chest, I think—at any rate, they must. Now for the general list."

      The general outfit was then talked over for more than an hour, when, looking at his watch, Aleck said:

      "Now this plan all depends on what luck I have in renting the house. I heard yesterday that Mr. Porter (the owner of the burned factory) would have to leave the hotel, and wanted to find a small furnished house. I am going to see if I can't let ours to him."

      So Aleck went off, and Tug and Jim started down to examine the boat, study how much she would hold, and see what would be the best way of mounting her upon the bobs, which they spoke of as "the sledge." They were not back until afternoon, and found that Aleck had just come in, full of success. Mr. Porter would rent the house, and would allow them a closet in which to store all the small goods they wished to leave behind.

      "Now, what about the boat?" he asked, as he concluded the story.

      "She'll do beautifully. Jim and I think we'd better deck her over from the mast forward, and cover it with painted canvas, so as to make a water-tight place to stow the provisions."

      "That's a good idea."

      "We thought you'd say so, and so we took exact measurements, and can make a deck here, and fasten it on down there."

      "All right; now, how do you think we'd better fasten the boat to the sledge?"

      "That's where we want you to help us decide. I don't believe its weight is great enough to hold it firm."

      "It's the first thing to be arranged," said Aleck, "and after dinner I guess we'll have to go down to the wharf."

      An hour later the three boys were standing beside the boat, gazing first at it and then at the pair of strong bobs they had brought along.

      "We must take that coasting-board off the bobs and put in a heavy reach-pole pretty near as long as the boat, that's certain," said Tug.

      "And," СКАЧАТЬ