Kate suggested that they go down to the lumber camp and kindle a fire.
"There's a stove in it that the loggers left three years ago," she said.
"We'll make a fire and thaw our lunch." "We have no matches!" Ellen exclaimed, when they reached the camp.
Inside the old cabin, however, they found three or four matches in a little tin box that was nailed to a log behind the stovepipe.

Hunters had occupied the camp not long before; but they had left scarcely a sliver of anything dry or combustible inside it; they had even whittled and shaved the old bunk beam and plank table in order to get kindlings.
After a glance round, Kate went out to gather dry brush along the brook.
Running on a little way, she picked up dry twigs here and there.

At last, by a clump of white birches, she found a fallen spruce.

As she was breaking off some of the twigs a strange noise caused her to pause suddenly.

It was, indeed, an odd sound--not a snarl or a growl, or yet a bark like that of a dog, but a querulous low "yapping." At the same instant she heard the snow crust break, as if an animal were approaching through the thicket of young firs.
More curious than frightened, Kate listened intently.