Page:Hendryx--Connie Morgan with the Mounted.djvu/98

80 peering through the underbrush, he made out the outlines of a cabin, from whose uncurtained window shone a bright square of candlelight. Slowly and cautiously, he edged forward: "If they've got dogs I'm up against it," he muttered, and tightened his grip on his axe. A small clearing surrounded the cabin—so small that although Connie lay concealed by the underbrush, the window was only twenty-five feet distant. "If there are dogs, so much the worse for the dogs," he gritted, and crawling into the open, wriggled swiftly to the wall of the cabin. From within came the voices of men, but strain his ears as he would, he could not catch their words, and dared not risk showing his face at the window. Cautiously he explored the wall with his fingers. The rough logs were chinked with moss, and Connie drew the sheath knife from his belt. Carefully he picked and prodded at the moss chinking, removing it shred by shred from between the logs. Being ignorant of the positions of the men, he did not dare punch the moss inward. As the chinking thinned, the voices became more distinct, and at length the boy placed his eye to a tiny hole through which filtered a single ray of candlelight.