Free The Curse of the Viking Grave by Farley Mowat

it was completely overcast. Anxious to make as much distance as possible before the storm broke, they did not stop for lunch but pushed on, munching pieces of cold bannockas they trotted beside their sleds. Reaching the foot of the bay they turned east to skirt its hills and this brought the wind dead in their teeth. Suddenly the black clouds overhead began to disgorge not snow, as they had expected, but a bitter, driving rain.

    They raced toward the nearby shore, but there was little shelter there. Gone were the thick spruce and jackpine forests of the Putahow country, leaving a scattering of small and wind-distorted trees. The only protection they could find was behind a cluster of frost-shattered boulders. By the time they had the tent up everything was soaking wet.

    It was almost dark before the boys could gather enough twigs and brush for a fire, and when they eventually got it lit the wind and rain put it out again before they could even boil the tea billy. They gave up and crawled into the tent where Angeline had been doing what she could to arrange the drier robes for them to sleep under.
    They spent a miserable night, but cold and uncomfortable as they were they were not unhappy. As the tent flapped and snapped under the assault of wind and rain, they sat huddled together with robes pulled over their shoulders and sang to keep up their spirits. Angeline had a particularly sweet, clear voice, and at her brother’s urgingshe sang some songs she had learned at the mission school.
    Only Peetyuk, that usually amiable and jovial youth, seemed subdued. When Jamie teased him a little, calling him a “gloomy-gus,” he mustered a smile.
    â€œForest country—that your country,” he explained. “ You know that country and so I not worry there. Now we come my country. You not know so much. Now I worry for all. Soon rivers melting. After that ice go bad on small lakes. After that go bad on big lakes. If we not get to Innuit camps soon, we stuck. This rain no good. Much water come in rivers.”
    â€œThat’s true,” Jamie agreed. “But I guess we’ll be all right on Nuelthin. It won’t thaw for a long time yet. How far do we go on it, Peetyuk?”
    â€œMaybe two-three days. After that must go on little rivers and lakes and over country.”
    â€œThe rain is not so strong now,” Awasin said. “Perhaps it will stop soon. We should try and sleep a little.”
    â€œOnly a fish could sleep in this tent,” Jamie grumbled. Nevertheless, it was not long before they were all dozing.
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    The morning broke dry and warm with a south wind blowing and clear skies overhead. Cold, stiff and tired, the four crawled out at dawn. Peetyuk got a fire going, and after a hasty mug of tea and some fried deermeat the travelers hitched up the willing dogs and moved off.
    The rain had made shallow melt pools on top of the ice and had turned the overlying snow into thin slush. Nevertheless, it was good going for the sled and carioles, and the dogs seemed to share the impatience of their masters toget north. All that day they drove steadily on, stopping only twice to brew tea on willow fires at the shore and to have a bite to eat. Before noon they passed through a narrows into the northern part of Nuelthin-tua, and here they said good-by to the last trees. Ahead of them stretched the gigantic sweep of the Barrenlands, where the only wood they would find would be tiny clumps of willows huddled in the bottom of a few protected valleys.
    When they pitched camp that night they had covered twenty miles, which, considering that none of them had been able to ride on the overloaded sleds, was a good day’s run. And “run” was the right word, for the boys and Angeline literally ran much of the way.
    The following day—their sixth since leaving Kasmere House—they made equally good progress. There was frost at night, but in the daytime the temperature rose well above