The leaders were all but upon him in a very few moments. As the first wolf leaped, Mark threw himself sideways and ran off at a tangent, holding his feet much better than did the brutes. They went scratching along the smooth ice for some yards before they could change their course. The turn, however, put Mark in a serious position. He found the thin ice cracking loudly under his feet. He glanced ahead. There was a streak of open water. He tried to turn again, but this time his spurs slipped. He went down on the ice. The first two wolves were a-top of him and one seized his arm. But luckily it was protected by his thick coat sleeve. Then the wolves darted back from the prone, sliding body of the boy. They saw their peril; Mark could not help himself. With a shriek and splash he was struggling in the deadly cold water of the lake. He plunged beneath the black surface while the yapping pack halted upon the very verge of the broken ice. CHAPTER XXII THE WOLF TRAIL The hole into which Mark fell was not many yards across; but when he came to the surface of the icy water he found that the edge of the strong ice was fringed with open jaws and lolling, blood-red tongues. The wolves had surrounded the open bit of water and were prepared to welcome him with wide jaws wherever he sought to climb out. The lad knew well enough that he was helpless against these foes. To seek to reach the ice would be to give himself up to the savage brutes. Nor could he remain long afloat in this ice-cold water. He was already chilled to his very marrow. Mark was in a perilous position indeed. He could bear up but a few moments. He knew that if he again sank beneath the surface he would never rise again. And so he struggled mightily to keep his head above water. The wolves did not dare leap in to seize him; they did not have to. In their canine minds they probably knew that the boy would have to come to them. But fortunately for Mark the wolves had given tongue when they chased him over the ice. Otherwise the boy's friends might not have been warned of his predicament until too late to be of assistance to him. But the moment the wolves gave tongue Andy Sudds had started with a whoop for the cache of bear meat. Jack and Phineas Roebach followed with their weapons. Coming in sight of the slavering pack, as they whined about the open water-hole in the lake, Andy advised his companions as to the situation and they deployed so as to shoot into the pack of wolves without sending their bullets in the direction of the half-drowned Mark. All using magazine rifles, they were enabled to send such a fusillade into the wolves that the pack was scattered in a few moments. Then they ran on to the edge of the broken ice, finding at least a dozen dead brutes lying about the water-hole.