“I declare! it looks as though we were in a mess, with all this snow,” complained Tom Cameron.

“And with all these girls,” growled Ralph Tingley.  “Wish we’d started an hour ago.”

“I don’t know about starting at all,” observed Bobbins.  “Don’t you see that the girls will give out before we’re half-way there?  We can’t use snowshoes with the snow coming down like this.  They clog too fast.”

“Oh, they’ll have to wade the same as we do,” said Isadore.

“Yah!  Wade!  And us pulling this sled, too?  I wish Preston had stayed with us.  Don’t you, Ralph?” asked his brother.

“Hush! don’t let the girls hear you,” was the whispered reply.

Already the girls were comparing notes in a group around the fire.  Now Madge turned and shouted for them: 

“Come here, boys!  Don’t be mumbling together there.  We have an idea.”

“If it’s any good, let’s have it,” answered Tom, cheerfully.

“It is good.  It was born of experience.  Some of us got all the tramping in a blinding snowstorm that we wanted a year ago.  Never again!  Eh, girls?”

“Quite right, Madge,” said Ralph.  “It is foolish to run into danger.  We are all right here——­”

“Why, the snow will drown out your fire in half an hour,” scoffed Isadore.  “And there isn’t so much dry fuel.”

“I know where there is plenty of wood—­and shelter, too!” cried Ruth, suddenly.

“So do I. At the lodge,” scoffed Belle.

“No.  Nearby.  Tom and I were just talking about it.  Up that ravine yonder is the place where I fell over the cliff.  And Jerry’s cave is right there—­one end of it.”

“A cave!” ejaculated Helen.  “That would be bully.”

“If only we could have a good fire and get dry and warm again,” quoth Lluella, her teeth already chattering.

“I believe that would be best,” admitted Madge Steele.  “We never could get back to the lodge through this snow.  The shore is so rough.”

“We can travel on the ice,” ventured Ann Hicks, doubtfully.

“And get turned around,” put in Tom.  “Easiest thing in the world to get lost out there on that ice without a compass and in such a whirlwind of snow.  Ruth’s right.  Let’s try to find the cave.”

“I’m game!” exclaimed Heavy.  “Why, with all this fish we could live a week in a cave.  It would be bully.”

“‘Charming’ is the better word, Miss Stone,” suggested The Fox.

“Don’t correct me when I’m on a vacation,” exclaimed the plump girl.  “I won’t stand for it——­”

Just then she slipped and sat down hard and they all laughed.

“Lucky you weren’t on the ice.  You’d gone right through that time, Jennie,” declared The Fox.  “Now, let’s come on to the cave if we’re all agreed.  I guess Ruth has the right idea.”

“We’ll drag the sled and break a path for you girls,” announced Tom.  “All ready, now!  Bring your snowshoes.  If it stops snowing, we can get home on them to-night.”