"That is true, Shep," answered Snap. "What I am thinking of is, what
are we to do to-night? We can't stay out in the open air. It is
growing colder every minute."

"Well, I am not going home," came quickly from Giant. "I'd rather
freeze!"

"Who said anything about going home?" demanded Whopper. "Why, I
wouldn't go home in a thousand years, cabin or no cabin. We can rig up
some sort of shelter of pine boughs and then build another cabin."

"I know a dandy spot for another cabin," said Snap. "Don't you
remember I mentioned it to you, Shep, last summer? The spot where the
young trees stood so close together in a circle?"

"Just the place," answered the doctor's son.

Standing around was cold work and the young hunters lost no time in
cutting some dry brushwood and building a fire, on which they placed
several of the half-burnt logs. It was now the middle of the afternoon
and they knew they must work vigorously if they wanted any sort of a
suitable shelter against the cold before nightfall.

The spot Snap had mentioned was less than two hundred feet up the lake
front. Here, behind some bushes which would keep off considerable
wind, was an almost perfect circle of trees, the diameter inside being
about fifteen feet. The trees were mostly young and not very tall and
the lower branches were not over ten feet from the ground on an
average.