"Well, what are we going to do?" demanded Nora. "If we leave this charming abode of Jean's, we shall be eaten alive, and if we stay in it we shall starve." "You won't starve for a while yet, child. You have only just eaten. You remind me of the story of the people who were locked up in a vault in a cemetery. They divided the candle into notches and decided to eat a notch apiece every day. They had just finished the last notch, and were expecting to die at any moment of starvation, when somebody unlocked the door, and how long do you suppose they had been shut up!" "Several days, I suppose," answered Nora, "since they appeared to have eaten several notches." "Not at all," replied David. "Only three hours." "I'd rather be in a vault, with the dead, than out here," observed Hippy. "Are we such poor company as all that, Fatty!" laughed Reddy. "I've made a great find," announced Tom Gray in the midst of their chatter. He was standing on a bench examining something on a shelf suspended from the ceiling. "What?" demanded the others in great excitement. "A pair of snowshoes," he answered. There was a disappointed silence. "Well, don't all speak at once," said Tom at last. "Don't you agree with me that it's a great find?" "We are sorry we can't enthuse," answered David, "but we fail to see how snow shoes can help us out of our present predicament." "Nobody here knows how to use them," continued Reddy, "and even if he did, he couldn't out-run a pack of wolves." "I know how to use them," exclaimed Tom. "I learned it in Canada a few winters ago, but I will admit I couldn't beat the wolves in a race. However, the shoes may come in handy yet." Just then one of the wolves threw his body against the door and the small cabin shook with the force of the blow. "By Jove!" exclaimed David, "I thought they had us then. Another blow like that and the old latch might give way." They looked about them for something to place against the door, but there was not a stick of furniture in the room. Even the bed, in one corner, was made of pine boughs and skins. "I wonder how there happens to be only five wolves," said Anne. "I thought they went about in large packs." "They are probably mama and papa and the whole family," replied Hippy. "The smallest, friskiest ones, I think, are young ladies, by the way they switched along behind the others and hung back kind of shy-like." "Now, Hippy Wingate, don't tell us such a romance as that," warned Grace, "when you were so winded you could hardly look in front of you, much less behind you." At that moment there was another crash against the door while two gray paws and the tip of a pointed muzzle could be seen on one of the window sills. "It's almost three o'clock," said Tom Gray, looking at his watch. "I think we'll have to do something, or we shall be penned here all night. Now, what shall it be? Suppose we have a friendly council and consider."