“You’re right, he wa’n’t. We all larnt to keep our heads shut when we was a-scoutin’ an’ a loud word might cost a man his’n an’ many another life.” Seth wondered how long since the hunter had forgotten the lesson, yet he noticed the voice of the other was never high pitched and he never made a sudden, abrupt movement. “An’ so these is your wife an’ childern, be they?” said Job, passing toward the sled, whose occupants were so muffled in bed-quilts and blankets that nothing of their forms, and but little of their features, were visible. “How dedo, marm. How dedo, little uns. Tol’able comf’table, I hope?” Ruth Beeman answered his kind salutation as audibly as she could out of her mufflings, and the children, a boy of twelve and a girl of three years younger, stared at him with round, wondering eyes. “It’s a hard life that lies afore women an’ children in this wilderness,” he said to himself, and then, in a louder tone: “Wal, I’m glad you’re goin’ to be nigh the Fort. There’s always a doctor there, an’ it’s sort o’ protection, if the garrison be reg’lars. Now, Seth, start up your team, an’ I’ll boost on the sled till it’s square on the road again.” So saying, he set his shoulder to one of the sled stakes, while Seth carefully started the oxen forward. With a heaving lurch and prolonged creak, the sled settled upon evener ground without disturbance of its passengers or its burden of house gear and provisions, which, till now, had hidden from view of the hunter a gentle little cow in lead close behind it. “How far be we from the Fort?” Seth asked. “Nigh onto five mile,” the hunter answered, after considering their whereabouts a moment. “After a spell you’ll come to a better road on the ice of the crik, if you take the first blazed path beyend here, to your left. It’ll fetch you to my cabin, where you’d better stop till morning, for you can’t no ways git to your pitch till long arter nightfall. I know where it is, for I come across it, last fall, when I was trappin’ mushrat up the crik. My shanty’s the first thing in the shape of a dwelling that you’ll come to, an’ can’t miss it if you foller the back track of my snowshoes. It hain’t so great, but it’s better’n no shelter, an’ you’re more’n welcome to it. Rake open the fire an’ build you a rouster, an’ make yourselves to home. I’ve got some traps to tend to, but I’ll be back afore dark,” and, almost before they could thank him, he disappeared among the trees.