But, instead of taking the trail to the tunnel, Ross struck across the mounds and hillocks and drifts of snow that blocked the trail leading to Miners' Camp. Through the tangle of pines and hemlocks he led the way until he stopped at the foot of the snow-heaped dump and looked up at the tool house, one side of which rested on the dump, while the opposite side was fastened to sturdy hemlocks whose trunks arose from the debris heaped about them from the tunnel. The tool house was now a shapeless white form, while the dump was buried beneath tons of snow. "It was here," Ross explained breathlessly, "that Sandy stood. I was looking out at the McKenzies from a crack up in the house. He came back and looked up under the house and then grinned and went back to the others. They had started to leave, you know. Now why did he want to look under that house?" "That's it!" cried Leslie with excited conviction. "They had cached the stuff under the house and he wanted to make sure that their trail could not be seen. Ross, the sticks are up under there, high and dry." "You bet!" shouted Ross turning in his tracks. "We'll get shovels and dig for it. And, Less, if we find the cache, we'll let off one blast around here outside of the tunnel that 'ill show them, if they're still over in Camp, that we ain't dead yet." "Nor dumb and stupid, either!" cried Leslie delightedly as he legged it rapidly over the snow. In the door of the shack they found Weimer still standing, shielding his eyes with one hand and calling questions into space. The boys, appearing, stopped to answer, not only satisfying the old man but receiving a valuable suggestion. "Vat for you dig mit all dot vork? It vill dake you poys a day und a half to git up unter dot shack. Vy not go in und raise dot floor und find dem sticks unter?" Leslie tossed up his cap. "Three cheers for Uncle Jake!" he shouted. "That's the very thing to do. We'll get around to that signal blast sooner. Come on, Ross!" It was Leslie who led this time, axe in hand, while Ross followed with hammer and shovel. The trail to the tunnel had been unused for days and was so deeply drifted that the boys had difficulty in getting up to the dump even with the aid of the shovel. Once on top they were obliged to shovel their way slowly into the tool house. "Now," exclaimed Ross when they were fairly in, "now for work with these floor boards!" Leslie, with many grunts, fell to clearing away the snow from the floor, while Ross pulled the big box in which the dynamite had been stored from the center of the shack into one corner. "See here, Ross," cried Leslie excitedly as he bent to the last shovelful of snow. "We don't need axe nor hammer. The McKenzies have done the work for us. The floor has been taken up and just laid back again without being spiked down. That box held the planks down pretty firmly, you see."