Page:A Wild-Goose Chase - Balmer - 1915.djvu/243



HE news that Hedon brought struck the party with a shock. Margaret alone was unaffected by it; indeed, it was doubtful if she heard it at all. Geoff would have said that his thought also had been entirely occupied with Eric and the fact that he had been found. But now he realised that concurrently he had been thinking of more than that. His thoughts had been running thus:

Eric must have been living on the country for at least a year. He spoke of the Eskimos and mentioned that they had seen the party; therefore the Eskimos could not be far away, and must have food and fuel.

So the finding of Hedon seemed to mean at least the putting off of starvation. But his news, as he gave it in greater detail, was most serious. In the fall and winter of the year previous, when Eric alone came down the coast, 229