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The air was crisp and keen, the jingle of the sled-bells merry, and Baldy even forgot, in the very joy of living, and in the nearness of Ben, that Jemima was his team-mate. They could faintly hear Pete's voice giving strange directions to his dogs; for Pete was Captain of a coasting schooner in summer, and freighted with a dog team in winter, and used the same terms in both occupations.
The sled-bells jangled; the steel runners crunched and sang frostily; and the cheerful camp, the only centre of human life within a radius of more than twenty miles, sank back behind the voyagers. There was the sound of a door slamming, and the bright streak across the snow was blotted out. The travellers were alone on the trail, with the solemn ranks of trees and the icy-pointed stars.
But in a few minutes the four wolves, though keeping a distance of a couple of hundred yards, were running abreast of them. The animals were evidently unacquainted with horses or men, and shy about a close investigation. The sled-bells, too, were to them a very suspicious phenomenon.
The travellers knew that there were plenty of wood-mice astir, that if there had been light enough they would have seen their delicate trails wandering everywhere among the trees. But the jangling of the sled-bells was enough to keep all shy beasts at a distance. Only the porcupine was quite undaunted by the strange sounds.