Page:A Wild-Goose Chase - Balmer - 1915.djvu/153

Rh "Damn! You mean the freeze-up?"

"The winter freeze-up."

"Then get us out of here," Latham ordered; "and get us out of here quick."

McNeal, stung at the tone, spun upon him belligerently. "Get us out of here?" he returned. "How—by tramcar? You think this is Chicago, with the first cold snap at Christmas just in time for Santa Claus?"

"You're insolent!" Latham returned.

"Insolent?" cried McNeal. Koehler caught him by the shoulder to check him. At that moment Margaret appeared from below, and McNeal's words, which just had begun to flow, were stopped.

Latham turned to her. "McNeal was just saying the freeze-up is coming, so I ordered him to get us as far south as he can before it."

This was not the way, Margaret knew, in which Price had meant to claim her. But as she faced him she was aware that since the matter had come up he was going to put it through. The others—McNeal and the doctor, even Brunton and Michaelis—understood vaguely that the abandoning of further search