downward-branching tree trunk.]

[Illustration: GETTING EVEN IN THE DARK.]

Here his journey seemed to be effectually interrupted, and he thrust
the boots, as he supposed, into a hole, driving them with some little
force through a tangled net work of small roots. What he really did
do, however, was to drive them through a net work of small roots,
between two great ones, into the outer air, at the very spot from
which he had taken them. When he quitted his hold of them, leaving
them, as he supposed, buried in the centre of a great drift pile, they
lay in fact by Sam's coat and hat, right where they had lain when Sam
went to sleep.

Sam had silently observed him as he entered the drift pile, and
running quickly to the entrance he seized a stick of timber and drew
it toward him with all his force. Sam Hardwicke had an excellent habit
of remembering not only things that were certainly useful to know, but
things also which might be useful. When Jake entered the drift pile,
Sam remembered that during his own stay there a year before, he had
carefully examined the great log which formed the archway of the
entrance, and that it was kept in its place only by this single stick
of timber acting as a wedge. Pulling this out, therefore, he let the
farther end of the great tree trunk fall, and completely blocked the
passage way.




CHAPTER III.