The Mail Carrier E-Book

Harry Castlemon

• Herausgeber: Publisher s11838
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018

Beschreibung

The Mail Carrier by American writer Harry Castlemon. This book is one of many works of him. Published in 1879. And now republish in ebook format. We believe this work is culturally important in its original archival form. While we strive to adequately clean and digitally enhance the original work, there are occasionally instances where imperfections such as blurred or missing pages, poor pictures or errant marks may have been introduced due to either the quality of the original work. Despite these occasional imperfections, we have brought it back into print as part of our ongoing global book preservation commitment, providing customers with access to the best possible historical reprints. We appreciate your understanding of these occasional imperfections, and sincerely hope you enjoy reading this book.

Leseprobe

The Mail Carrier

By

Harry Castlemon

Table of Contents

CHAPTER I.    “HARK BACK!” 

CHAPTER II.    A MIGHTY HUNTER. 

CHAPTER III.    LESTER SHOWS HIS COURAGE. 

CHAPTER IV.    DON SHOWS HIS. 

CHAPTER V.    GODFREY VISITS THE CABIN. 

CHAPTER VI.    BOB IS ASTONISHED. 

CHAPTER VII.    BOB’S PLANS. 

CHAPTER VIII.    BOB IN A QUANDARY. 

CHAPTER IX.    THE RUNAWAY. 

CHAPTER X.    BOB’S FIRST ADVENTURE. 

CHAPTER XI.    THE CUB PILOT. 

CHAPTER XII.    GEORGE AT THE WHEEL. 

CHAPTER XIII.    THE BURNING OF THE SAM KENDALL. 

CHAPTER XIV.    A SPECIMEN TRAPPER. 

CHAPTER XV.    THE LOST POCKET-BOOK. 

CHAPTER XVI.    DAN MAKES A DISCOVERY. 

CHAPTER XVII.    CONCLUSION. 

 

Dave, the Mail Carrier. 

CHAPTER I.   “HARK BACK!”

“LOOK out thar, Dannie! Don’t run over a feller!”

Dan Evans, who was trudging along the dusty road, with his eyes fastened thoughtfully on the ground, and his mind so wholly given up to meditation that he did not know what was going on around him, stopped suddenly when these words fell upon his ear, and looked up to find himself confronted by a horseman, who had checked his nag just in time to prevent the animal from stepping on the boy. He was a small planter in the neighborhood, and Dan was well acquainted with him.

“You’re gettin’ to be sich rich folks up to your house that you look fur everybody to get outen your way, I reckon, don’t you?” continued the planter, with a good-natured smile.

“Rich!” repeated Dan, flushing angrily, as he drew his tattered coat about him. He did not know what the planter meant, and thought he was making sport of his poverty. “I can’t help it kase I don’t wear good clothes like Don and Bert, kin I? I work monstrous hard——”

“And get well paid fur it, too, I tell you,” interrupted the horseman. “I’d be glad of a chance to ’arn that much money myself. You needn’t wear sich clothes as them no longer, kase Dave an’ you is pardners, most likely, an’ he’ll do what’s right by you.”

“Dave!” echoed Dan, who now began to listen more eagerly.

“Yes. He’s a powerful smart boy, Dave is, an’ I’m glad to see him so lucky. He took home a wad of greenbacks this arternoon as big as that,” said the planter, pushing back his sleeve and showing his brawny wrist.

Dan fairly gasped for breath. He backed toward a log by the roadside and seated himself upon it, letting his rifle fall out of his hands in his excitement.

“Yes,” continued the planter, who seemed to be a little surprised at Dan’s behavior; “them quails reached that man up North all right, an’ to-day the money come—a hundred an’ ninety-two dollars an’ a half.”

Dan gasped again, and, taking off his hat, drew his coat-sleeve across his forehead.

“Yes. Silas Jones, he done took twenty-eight dollars outen it fur freight an’ give Dave the balance—a trifle over a hundred an’ sixty-four dollars. I was in the store at the time, an’ it done me good to see Dave take them thar greenbacks an’ walk out.”

“Whar—whar’s the money now?” Dan managed to ask at last.

“Why, he took it home with him, I reckon. What else should he do with it? Now, Dannie, don’t you get on a high hoss an’ say that you won’t look at us common folks any more.”

With this parting advice the planter rode off, leaving Dan sitting on his log, lost in wonder. It was a long time before he recovered himself, and when he did, he jumped to his feet as if he had just thought of something that ought to have been attended to long ago, caught up his rifle and disappeared in the woods.

This incident happened on the same day on which Silas Jones paid David for the quails he had shipped by the steamer Emma Deane. At the close of the second volume of this series, we saw that as soon as David had received the reward of his labors he made all haste to reach home. He found his mother there, but before he said a word to her about his good fortune he walked around the cabin two or three times and looked sharply in every direction, to make sure that his brother Dan was nowhere in the vicinity; and having satisfied himself on this point, he went in and laid the roll of greenbacks in his mother’s lap.

David had reason to feel proud, for he had earned the money in spite of many obstacles. In the first place, there was Dan, who, when he learned that his brother was in a fair way to earn a handsome sum of money by trapping quails and shipping them to a man in the North, who had advertised for them, determined to share in the proceeds of his work, and offered to go into partnership with him; but David would not consent, and this made Dan his enemy. Dan declared that not a quail should be caught in those fields. He would make it his business to hunt up his brother’s traps, and if there were any birds in them he would either liberate them or wring their necks, and then he would smash the traps. But, as it happened, Dan did not carry this threat into execution. An older and wiser person than himself, with whom he held frequent consultations, had another plan to propose, and Dan readily fell in with it.

Godfrey Evans, Dan’s father and David’s, was in deep disgrace. He had robbed Clarence Gordon of twenty dollars on the highway, and for fear that he would be arrested and punished for it, he took to the woods and stayed there. He lived on a little island in the bayou, about two miles from the settlement, which had been his hiding-place during the war, when the Union forces were raiding that part of Mississippi. Here he lived in a miserable brush lean-to, with no companion but his rifle, until his hiding-place was accidentally discovered by Dan, during one of his rambles in the woods.

Of course Godfrey was anxious to know what had been going on in the settlement since he left, and among other things Dan told him that David was going to make himself rich by catching quails, but that he (Dan) had resolved to put a stop to it by breaking his traps. After hearing a statement of the case, Godfrey told his hopeful son that if he wished to be revenged upon David for his refusal to go into partnership with him, there was a better way than that. It was not to their interest to interfere with the Boy Trapper in any manner. Let him go on and catch the birds, and when his work was done and he had received the money for it, then it would be time for them to act. They would take the money themselves and divide it equally between them. Godfrey did not say what he intended to do with his share when he got it, but he drew the most glowing pictures of the comforts and luxuries with which Dan could provide himself when he received the money that would fall to his lot. Dan wanted to live just as Don and Bert Gordon lived. He wanted a spotted pony, a breech-loading shot-gun, a jointed fish-pole and a sail-boat; and in order to insure his earnest assistance in the scheme he proposed, Godfrey held out the idea that for seventy-five dollars (they expected that David would receive one hundred and fifty dollars for his birds, and that would give them just seventy-five dollars apiece, if the money were equally divided) all these nice things could be purchased, and besides something would be left to be invested in good clothes.

Dan was delighted with his father’s plans, and from that hour was as much interested in David’s success as David was himself. It chanced, too, that he was able to defeat a plot which, if carried into execution, would have worked much injury to the boy trapper. It turned out that there were two other persons in the settlement whom David had reason to fear. They were Lester Brigham and Bob Owens; and as they did not expect to share in the money after David earned it, they were determined that he should not earn any at all. They were disappointed applicants for the very contract that had been given to David. When they read the advertisement in the Rod and Gun, calling for fifty dozen live quails, they lost no time in replying to it; but they were just three days too late, the wide-awake Don Gordon having already secured the order for David Evans.

When Bob and Lester found this out they were very angry. Bob wanted a breech-loader as much as Dan did. Almost every boy in the settlement with whom he associated owned one, and seventy-five dollars would put him in possession of one, too. He had long been on the lookout for a chance to earn that amount of money, and when it was almost within his grasp it was snatched from him by that meddlesome Don Gordon and handed over to that ragamuffin Dave Evans. This was the way Bob and his friend looked at the matter, and after they had talked it over they came to the conclusion that David had no business with so much money, and that he should not have it. They wrote to the man who had advertised for the quails, telling him that the person to whom he had given the order was not reliable and could not furnish him with the required number of birds; and then they set to work to make their words good.

The first thing they did was to try to frighten David by threatening him with the terrors of a law which did not exist. Lester told him that if he trapped quails and sent them out of the state he would render himself liable to fine and imprisonment; but David knew better, and positively refused to give up his chances of earning an honest dollar, although Lester threatened to beat him with his riding-whip if he did not. Being defeated at this point, the conspirators tried another plan. They drew up a constitution and by-laws for the government of a Sportsman’s Club, and Lester started out to obtain signers to it. He first called upon Don and Bert Gordon, for he knew that if he could secure their names, he could secure Fred and Joe Packard’s, too, and, through the influence of these four, every young sportsman in the settlement could be brought into the club. But Don and Bert did not like Lester, and neither did they like the object for which the club was to be organized. They saw plainly that Bob and Lester were trying to form a combination against David Evans, and as they could not assist in any such business as that, they declined to put down their names.

Highly enraged over their second failure, Bob and Lester prepared to take vengeance on the brothers, which they did that very night by setting fire to their shooting-box, which was located on the shore of the lake. Then, being determined that they would not give up until David had been driven from the field, they decided upon another plan, which was to set their own traps, which they had made in expectation of receiving the order, capture as many birds as they could, and at the same time watch David’s traps and steal every quail they found in them. But this plan failed also. The quails would not get into their traps and they could not find any of David’s. The reason was because they looked on Godfrey’s plantation for them, and David’s traps were all set in General Gordon’s fields.

The conspirators did not know that Don and Bert were assisting David in his work, but they found it out one morning by accident. They saw the three boys in the act of transferring their captured quails from a trap to a large coop they had placed in a wagon, and following the wagon as it left the field, they saw that when the captives were removed from the coop they were put into one of the general’s unoccupied negro cabins. After comparing notes they made up their minds that the cabin was almost full of birds, and that if they could only force an entrance into it, they would be well repaid for their trouble. They could steal some of them, and those they could not carry away they could liberate. They made the attempt that same night, and were sorry enough for it afterward. Dan Evans was on the watch, and he defeated their designs very neatly by directing the attention of Don’s hounds to them. The fierce animals forced the young robbers to take refuge on the top of the cabin, and there they remained until the general came down and released them in the morning.

While these incidents, which we have so hurriedly described, were taking place in the settlement, some others that have a connection with our story were transpiring a little way out of it. The most important of these was the discovery of Godfrey’s hiding-place by Don and his brother, who went up the bayou duck-hunting. It happened on the same day that Dan discovered it, and led to a good many incidents, some of which we have yet to describe. The most amusing, perhaps, was the stratagem to which Godfrey resorted to drive Don and Bert away from the island.

The brothers landed to take a few minutes’ rest after their long pull, and the first thing Don discovered was his canoe, which he valued highly, and which had been stolen from him a few days before. The thief was Godfrey Evans, who made use of the canoe in passing from the main land to his hiding-place on the island. The fresh footprints which were plainly visible in the soft mud showed that there was somebody besides themselves on the island, and they resolved to find out who he was. While they were advancing along a narrow path leading toward the interior, Godfrey, who with Dan was concealed in the cane at the other end of the path, imitated the growl of some wild animal so perfectly that Don and Bert, who were armed only with their light breech-loaders, made all haste to reach their boat and push off into the stream. Perhaps the remembrance of the scenes that had once been enacted in that same cane brake added to their terror. The place was known as Bruin’s Island, from the fact that a savage old bear had once made his den there, and had been killed only after a severe fight, during which he had wounded two men and destroyed a number of dogs.

Don and Bert really believed that another bear had taken possession of the island, and they resolved to dislodge him; so they secured the services of David Evans and his rusty single-barrel shot-gun, and the next morning returned to the island, accompanied by two good dogs and armed with weapons better adapted to hunting such large game than their little fowling-pieces were, Don being armed with his trusty rifle and Bert with his father’s heavy duck gun. They wanted to shoot the bear if they could, and if they failed in that, they came provided with tools and bait with which to set a trap that would catch him alive.

It is proper to state that there was a bear, which divided his time about equally between the island and the main shore, and the boys thought they would certainly have an opportunity to try their skill upon him on this particular morning, for the hounds scented something that drove them almost wild with excitement. But it was not a bear they scented; it was Godfrey Evans, who waited until both dogs and hunters were hidden from view by the cane, and then stepped into the bayou and struck out for the main land. The boys, however, firmly believed that the dogs had routed a bear, and they spent the day in building a trap for him, hoping that the next time they visited the island they would find the animal in it.

Now Godfrey had found it necessary to spend some of the money of which he had robbed Clarence Gordon, but he still had fourteen dollars of it left. As his pockets could not be depended upon to hold it, being full of holes, he hid the money in a hollow log, where he thought it would be safe. The sudden appearance of the young hunters and their dogs so greatly excited and alarmed him that he never thought of his treasure when he left the island, nor did he ever think of it again until Dan happened to mention it to him a day or two afterward. Then Godfrey swam back to his old hiding-place, but the money could not be found. Don and his companions had changed the appearance of things considerably while they were building the trap. Thickets had been cut down, logs rolled out of the way, and Godfrey could not find the place where he had hidden his ill-gotten gains. Of course he was almost beside himself with fury, and for want of a better way of being revenged on the young hunters, he sprung their trap and carried off the lever, rope and bait. He would have been glad to tear the trap in pieces, but it had been built to resist the strength of a full-grown bear, and Godfrey could not move any of the logs. When Don and Bert came up in their boat, to see if the bear had been caught, they found their trap in the condition we have described. They set it again, and how their efforts were rewarded this time we have yet to tell.

Meanwhile the work of trapping the quails went bravely on. Assisted by Don and Bert, who devoted as many hours to the business as David did himself, the boy trapper saw money coming in every day in the shape of scores of little brown birds, and he would have been as happy as any fellow could well be, had it not been for two unpleasant incidents that happened a short time before the attempt was made to rob the cabin, and which we neglected to notice in their proper place. One of these incidents was brought to his notice by his wide-awake enemies, Bob and Lester.

While these two worthies were discussing their prospects one night, shortly after dark, they detected somebody in the act of robbing Mr. Owens’s smoke-house. They succeeded in getting near enough to the thief to see that it was Godfrey Evans, and this suggested to them another plan for compelling David to leave off trapping the quails. Instead of reporting the matter to Mr. Owens, as they ought to have done, they sought an interview with David, and threatened that in case he did not leave them a clear field, they would have his father arrested for burglary. Of course David had no peace of mind after that; and, as if to add to his troubles, his brother Dan, who had already been the means of swindling Don Gordon out of ten dollars, made an effort to extort ten dollars more from him by stealing his fine young pointer, Dandy. But David was able to defeat this scheme, though at serious loss to himself. He visited his father’s new hiding-place in the woods, and, finding the pointer there, he succeeded in liberating him and starting him toward home; but in his desperate efforts to escape the punishment with which his angry parent threatened him he was obliged to swim the bayou, and in so doing lost his gun. He brought the pointer home, however, and saved Don’s ten dollars.

But if David had more than his share of trouble, he also had about as much good luck as generally falls to the lot of mortals. The quails got into his traps almost as fast as he wanted to take them out; and furthermore, General Gordon, who had long had his eye on the boy, was using his influence to secure for him the responsible position of Mail Carrier; but in so doing the general excited the jealousy of one of his neighbors, who envied him his popularity in the settlement, and would have been glad to injure him by any means in his power. This jealous neighbor was Mr. Owens, Bob’s father.

At first Mr. Owens did not care who took the old mail carrier’s place, so long as it was not some one who was recommended by General Gordon; but after he had talked with Bob about it, it occurred to him that it would be a fine thing if his own son could have the position instead of that low fellow, Dave Evans. Bob thought so, too, and suddenly made up his mind that nothing could suit him better. More than that, he looked upon the matter as settled already. His father promised that he would do the best he could for him; Lester said that his father would furnish the required bonds, if he (Lester) asked him to do so, and Bob thought he needed nothing more. In his estimation, three hundred and sixty dollars a year (that was what the old carrier received) was a sum of money that he would find it hard work to spend, and the belief that he would soon be in a fair way to earn it was all he had to comfort him when he saw David Evans walking up and down the river bank, with his hands in his pockets, surveying with great satisfaction the long line of coops which contained the captured quails, and which were piled there awaiting the arrival of the Emma Deane.

“Just look at him,” said Bob, in great disgust. “One would think, by the airs he puts on, that he was worth a million dollars.”

“Let’s come down here after dark and pitch every coop into the river,” said Lester.

“Why, he will stay here to watch them, won’t he?”

“What of that? If he says a word, we’ll tumble him into the river, too!”

Bob said nothing would please him more. He and his crony rode down to the landing that night, about nine o’clock, fully determined to carry out Lester’s suggestion; but, to their great surprise and disappointment, they found David and his property well guarded. A fire was burning brightly on the bank, and just in front of it was pitched a little lawn tent, which sheltered a merry party, consisting of Don and Bert Gordon and Fred and Joe Packard, who were singing songs and telling stories, while waiting for the lunch and pot of coffee which David was preparing for them. David looked up when he heard the sound of their horses’ feet, and a large, tawny animal arose from his bed on the other side of the fire and growled savagely. Bob and his companion waited to see and hear no more. They had no desire to trouble such fellows as Don Gordon and Fred Packard, either of whom could have whipped them both, and they stood in wholesome fear of that tawny animal behind the fire. It was the hound that had so nearly captured one of them on the night they attempted to break into the cabin in which the quails were confined. Without a word they turned their horses and rode homeward, and David and his property were allowed to rest in peace.

CHAPTER II.   A MIGHTY HUNTER.

THE shame and mortification which Bob and Lester experienced after being detected in their attempt to break into the negro cabin, were of short duration. They gradually recovered their courage and began to mingle again with their associates; and although they saw one or two sly winks exchanged the first time they went to the post-office, no one said anything to them about being treed on the top of the cabin, and they hoped the circumstance was not known. But still they felt guilty, and were much more at their ease when they were alone.

They had much to talk about. Lester could never cease grumbling because David had succeeded in his enterprise, in spite of all their efforts to defeat him, and Bob, who was full of dreams and glorious ideas, was continually talking about the fine things he would purchase when he became mail carrier and was earning three hundred and sixty dollars a year. Then he and his friend Lester would see no end of fun. They would have a canoe in the lake and a shooting-box on the shore. They would camp out twice a year, as Don and Bert did, and they would have a crowd of fellows with them of their own choosing. As soon as Bob had earned money enough to purchase his breech-loader, he would invest in a dozen or two of decoys, and they would show that conceited Don Gordon that some boys were just as fine marksmen as he was, and could bag just as many birds in the course of a week’s shooting.

Lester readily fell in with these ideas, and suggested that, as they had no better way of passing the time just then, it might be well to make the canoe at once. Then they could explore the lake from one end to the other, and select a good shooting point whereon to build their house. Bob thought so, too, and with the help of one of his father’s negroes, who was handy with the axe and had shaped more than one dugout, they succeeded, after two days’ work, in producing a very nice little canoe, just about large enough to carry two persons and their camp equipage. Having no iron rowlocks, they made two paddles for it; and when they had given it a coat or two of lead-colored paint, they told each other that it was a much better and handsomer craft than Don Gordon’s. On the same day on which David received his money for the quails, they put the canoe into a wagon, hauled it down to the lake and made it fast to a tree in front of Godfrey Evans’s cabin, promising Dan, who happened to be at home, that they would give him a dime or two occasionally, if he would keep an eye on it and see that no one ran off with it.

When they reached home they found Mr. Owens, who had just returned from the landing. They knew by the expression on his face that he had some news for them. Bob thought it must be something that related to his own prospects, and eagerly inquired:

“Have I got the appointment, father? Am I mail carrier now?”

“O, it isn’t time for that,” was the reply. “I have not even made my bid yet. I don’t know that you ought to have it, Bob. A boy who will let a fellow like Dave Evans carry off a pocketful of money from under his very nose, I don’t think much of.”

“Has he received it?” asked Lester.

“I should say so. I saw Silas Jones pay him over a hundred and sixty dollars.”

Lester pulled off his hat and threw himself on the porch beside Mr. Owens’s chair, while Bob, who was so amazed and angry that he could not speak, stood still and looked at his father.

“See what you boys have lost by not having a little more ‘get up’ about you—eighty dollars apiece,” continued Mr. Owens. “Where’s your breech-loader now, Bob?”

“I could have bought one for that amount of money and a nice jointed fish-pole besides,” said the boy, regretfully. “I hope Dave will lose every cent of it.”

“He’ll look out for that,” answered Mr. Owens, with a laugh. “He has worked so hard for it that he’ll not let it slip through his fingers very easily.”

“He never would have got it if it hadn’t been for Don and Bert,” said Bob, spitefully. “But I don’t care—I’ll beat them all yet. Just wait till I get to be mail carrier, and I’ll show them a thing or two. Don’t you think I am sure to get it, father?”

“I think your chances are as good as anybody’s. I haven’t had an opportunity to speak to any one about it yet, but I must be up and doing to-morrow, for the general is busy all the time. He intends to get the contract himself and hire Dave to do the work, and that is the way I shall have to do with you, if I get it. The general was talking about it to-day in the store. He didn’t say a word to me—I suppose he thought I could neither help nor hinder him—but I walked up in front of him and told him very plainly that David was the son of a thief, and not fit to be trusted with such a valuable thing as the mail. You ought to have seen the general open his eyes. When I told him that Godfrey had robbed my smoke-house, he said David wasn’t to blame for that. He couldn’t help what his father did. I made no reply, for I didn’t want to let him know that I am working against him. If I can get the bonds, I think the rest will be easy enough.”

“I’ll speak to my father about it to-morrow night,” said Lester. “Bob and I are going up the lake in the morning, and as soon as we get back I’ll go home and fix the bond business.”

Bob passed a sleepless night. He grew angry every time he thought of David’s success, and jubilant and cheerful when he recalled his father’s encouraging words. The air-castles he built were as numerous and gorgeous as those Godfrey Evans erected when he told his family about the treasure that was buried in the general’s potato-field.

The two boys arose the next morning at an early hour, and as soon as they had eaten breakfast and Mrs. Owens had put up a substantial lunch for them, they shouldered their guns and set out for the lake. Bob carried his father’s muzzle-loading rifle, while Lester was armed with the heavy deer-gun with which he had bowled over so many bears and panthers in the wilds of northern Michigan. Lester delighted to talk of the wonderful exploits he had performed with that same rifle, and as he had a good memory and generally managed to tell the same story twice alike, Bob finally came to believe that he told nothing but the truth; but at the same time he thought it very strange that his friend could never be prevailed upon to give an exhibition of his skill.

They found Godfrey’s cabin deserted by the family (if they had known what had happened there the night before, their delight would have been unbounded), but the canoe was where they left it, and they knew where to look to find the paddles. While Bob went in search of them, Lester unlocked the chain with which the canoe was secured, put in the lunch basket and weapons, and, when all was ready, they pushed out into the lake.

“Yes, sir, this rifle holds a high place in my estimation,” said Lester, continuing the conversation in which he and Bob had been engaged, as they came along the road. “It has saved my life more than once, as you know. The last bear I shot charged within five feet of me before I dropped him. I put four bullets into him in as many seconds. Where would your muzzle-loader be in such close quarters?”

“Nowhere,” replied Bob. “That’s what makes me so mad every time I think of Dave Evans. I might have ordered a nice gun and had it in my hands in a few days more, if it had not been for him. But I’ll make it up when I get to be mail carrier.”

“I’ll tell you what else I’ve done with this rifle,” continued Lester, who found as much pleasure in dwelling upon his imaginary exploits as Bob did in talking about his future prospects. “Once when I was walking through the woods I shot a gray squirrel out of the very top of the tallest shell-bark hickory I ever saw. It fell about four feet and lodged on a little branch, which, from the ground, looked no larger than a knitting-needle. I wanted that squirrel, as it was the only one I had seen that day, but I didn’t want to climb the tree to get it; so I hauled up off-hand and at the first shot I cut off that limb and brought down the squirrel. What do you think of that?”

“I think you are a splendid marksman,” replied Bob. “Why don’t you go to some of the shooting-matches about here? You would be certain to carry off some of the prizes. Let’s see you take the head off that fellow,” he added, pointing toward the shore.

Lester looked in the direction indicated by his friend’s finger, and saw a quail sitting on a fallen log, close by the water’s edge, evidently keeping watch over the rest of the flock, which were disporting themselves in the dusty road. As Bob spoke, the bird uttered a note of warning, and the flock hurried away into the bushes, but the sentinel kept his place on the log.

“Knock him over,” said Bob. “He’ll make a capital good dinner for us, if we don’t find any ducks.”

“I—I am all out of practice,” replied Lester. “I’ve seen the day that I could do it with my eyes shut.”

“I can do it with my eyes open,” said Bob.

He drew in his paddle as he spoke, picked up his father’s rifle, and, resting his elbow on his knee, drew a bead on the bird’s head and pulled the trigger. Bob was really a fine marksman, and the effect of his shot made Lester open his eyes in astonishment. The bird looked so small that it seemed useless to shoot at its head, but Bob made a centre shot. Lester had never seen anything like it. Bob had never before fired a rifle in his presence (he always used a shot-gun), and the reason was because Lester boasted so loudly of his own skill that Bob was afraid of being beaten.

They paddled ashore after the bird, and when they pushed out into the lake again, Lester had nothing more to say about hunting and shooting. He even showed a desire to abandon the trip up the lake and go home.

“I don’t feel very well this morning,” said he, “and I think we had better go back.”

“O, no,” replied Bob. “You can lie down in the bow of the canoe and I’ll do the paddling. Does your head ache?”

“Dreadfully, and I thought perhaps it would be well to speak to father about those bonds of yours. We don’t want to be beaten again, you know.”

“Of course not, but if you speak to him to-night it will answer every purpose. If my father had been in any hurry he would have told you so. I have a plan to propose that will wake you up and put life into you. You remember that when you went over to get Don to join our Sportsman’s Club, he told you that he and Bert had been frightened off Bruin’s Island by a bear, don’t you? And you told him that perhaps you would go up there some day and shoot him?”

“Ah! Yes, I think I remember some such conversation. But I don’t feel like it to-day. Some other time I’ll go up there with you, and if we find any bears there, I’ll show you how to hunt them.” 

It was not at all probable that Lester or any other boy in the settlement could have taught Bob anything about bear-hunting. He had ridden to the hounds almost ever since he was large enough to sit on horseback. Nearly every planter in the neighborhood owned a pack of dogs, Mr. Owens among the number, and hunting with them was as much of a pastime as base ball is in the North, and during the proper season was as regularly practised. Many an old bear had Bob seen “stretched” by the dogs, and the rifle he then carried had been the death of more of them than Lester could have counted on the fingers of both hands.

“It is strange that you never come out to any of our hunts,” said Bob. “You have often been invited.”

“I know it, but I can’t see any fun in it,” answered Lester, who knew that if he ever appeared among the hunters they would soon find out that he was a very poor horseman. “It is easy enough to kill a bear when you have a score or two of dogs to hold him for you; but I’d like to see one of you fellows walk into the woods and meet one alone, as I have. There’s where the fun comes in.”

“I should think so,” answered Bob, as, with one sweep of his paddle, he brought the canoe to a stand-still in the mouth of the bayou that led to Bruin’s Island. “What do you say? Shall we go up?”

“Not to-day; my head aches too badly.”

“I was all over that island this last summer,” continued Bob; “you know one can wade out to it when the bayou is low; and I didn’t see any bear sign. More than that, I know there hasn’t been a bear near the island for years; but if we should go up there and find one, and you should shoot him, I don’t know of anything that would make Don Gordon feel more ashamed of himself.”