It seemed to the anxious boys that noon would never come. They walked about the little village and spent some time on the jam of logs. It was warm in the sun and the snow was melting rapidly, making heavy going for a team. “I don’t suppose it makes much difference, after all, if he is late,” Bob said, as they were slowly making their way back to the hotel. “We won’t get up to Jackman in time to make a start from there till morning anyway, but the time sure does drag.” Dinner was ready by the time they got to the house, and they lost no time in sitting down at the table. As soon as they had finished they got their belongings together on the porch, for they knew that the stage might show up at any moment. But the moments lengthened into hours, and it was almost three o’clock before they heard the sound of sleigh bells. “I guess he’s coming at last,” Bob declared, as he jumped up and ran out to the road. He was right, for, as he reached the road, the stage whirled around a curve, and a moment later the steaming horses were brought to a stop close to the porch. “Sure and of all the soft slushy goin’ I ever seed this is the worse,” the driver declared, as he jumped from the stage, or rather sled, for that is what it was. A long sled, fitted with a body having sides about a foot high, which boasted of three seats capable of accommodating three passengers each, it is much used in northern Maine in the winter. The natives call it a pung. While Sandy was snatching a hasty bite in the dining room, a fresh span of horses was substituted for the tired beasts which had drawn the pung for nearly forty miles since morning. It happened that Sandy had no passengers and the pung was empty save for a couple of mail bags and a few packages. “Jim tells me thot you boys is a wantin’ to go up ter Jackman,” Sandy greeted them as he came out picking his teeth. “That’s right,” Bob assured him. “Foine, an’ it’s meself thot’ll be glad ter have company, but I dunno when we’ll be after gittin’ thar, what wid all the slush an’ mud. But throw yer traps in an’ we’ll be after startin’,” and the sandy-haired Irishman jumped to the driver’s seat and gathered the reins in his hand. They found the driver very much inclined to talk and very inquisitive as to the object of their journey; but Bob, thinking it best not to be too candid, made evasive answers to his rather pointed questions. The road was, as Sandy had declared, in bad shape. In places the snow had entirely disappeared, and where it still lay it was so soft that the horses sank nearly to their knees in many places. Several times the pung nearly overturned as it slued into a washout. At the end of an hour they had covered about three miles and Sandy declared, with a shake of his head, that they would be lucky if they reached the end of their journey by midnight. But along about five o’clock it began to grow colder, and soon the temperature was falling rapidly.