"I weren't thinkin' of tracks either," said Andy, disclaiming credit for their discovery. "Whilst you bakes the bread I just goes to look where the window is broke, and when I'm there I sees the strange-lookin' tracks."

"Strange, now! How was they strange?" asked Jamie excitedly, scenting a deepening mystery.

"They was made with boots with nails in the bottom of un," explained Andy. "They was nails all over the bottom of them boots, and they was big boots, them was. They made big tracks—wonderful big tracks."

"'Tis strange, now! Did you trace un, Andy? Did you see what way the tracks goes?" asked David.

"'Twere only under the window where the ground were soft and bare of moss that the tracks showed the nails. I tracks un down though to where they comes in a boat and the boat goes again," Andy explained. "The tracks were a day old, and down by the water the tide's been in and washed un away. Whoever 'twere makes un were beyond findin' whatever. They were goin' away, I'm thinkin', right after they shoots Lem and takes his silver."

"Did you tell Doctor Joe about the tracks?" asked David.

"No, I weren't thinkin' to tell he when we goes in to eat, and he weren't wantin' us in before that fearin' we'd wake Lem. The tracks weren't of much account whatever. The folk that shot Lem were leavin' in a boat and we couldn't track the boat to find out who 'twere."

A drizzling rain began to fall before they made camp that night. It was too wet and dreary under the dripping trees for an open camp fire. The stove was therefore brought into service and set up in the tent, and there they cooked and ate their supper by candle-light.

On a cold and stormy night there is no article in the camp equipment more useful than a little sheet-iron stove. With its magic touch it transforms a wet and dismal tent into the snuggest and cosiest and most comfortable retreat in the whole world. Outside the wind was now dashing the rain in angry gusts against the canvas, and moaning drearily through the tree tops. Within the fire crackled cheerily. The tent was dry and snug and warm. The bed of fragrant balsam and spruce boughs, the smell of the fire and the soft candle-light combined to give it an indescribable atmosphere of luxury.

In the morning the weather had not improved. The wind had risen during the night, and was driving the rain in sheets over the Bay. David went outside to make a survey, and when he returned he reported:

"'Twill be a nasty day abroad."

"Let's bide here till the rain stops," suggested Jamie.

"The wind's fair, and if she keeps up and don't turn too strong we'll make Fort Pelican by evenin' whatever, if we goes," David objected.

"'Twon't be so bad, once we're out and gets used to un," said Andy.

"No, 'twon't be so bad," urged David. "The wind may shift and fall calm, when the rain's over, and if we bides here we'll lose time in gettin' to Fort Pelican. I'm for goin' and makin' the best of un."

"I won't mind un," agreed Jamie, stoutly.

"I got grit to travel in the rain, and we wants to make a fast cruise of un."

It was "nasty" indeed when after breakfast they broke camp and set sail. In a little while they were wet to the skin, and it was miserably cold; but they were used enough to the beat of wind and rain in their faces, and all declared that it was not "so bad" after all. To these hardy lads of The Labrador rain and cold was no great hardship. It was all in a day's work, and scudding along before a good breeze, and looking forward to a good dinner in the kitchen at Fort Pelican, and to a snug bed at night, they quite forgot the cold and rain.

During the morning the wind shifted to the westward, and before noon it drew around to the north-west. With the shift of wind the rain ceased, and the clouds broke. Then Andy lighted a fire in the stove, boiled the kettle and fried a pan of salt pork. Hot tea, with bread dipped in the warm pork grease, warmed them and put them in high spirits.

"'Tis fine we didn't bide in camp," remarked David as he swallowed a third cup of tea. "With this fine breeze we'll make Fort Pelican to-night, whatever."

"I'm fine and warm now," declared Jamie, "but 'twas a bit hard to face the rain when we starts this marnin'."

"'Tis always the thinkin' about un that makes things hard to do," observed David.

"Things we has to do seems wonderful hard before we gets at un, but mostly they're easy enough after we tackles un. The thinkin' beforehand's the hardest part of any hard job."

The sun broke out between black clouds scudding across the sky. The wind was gradually increasing in force. By mid-afternoon half a gale was blowing, a heavy sea; was running, and the old boat, heeling to the gale, was in a smother of white water.

"We're makin' fine time!" shouted David, shaking the spray from his hair.

"We'll sure make Fort Pelican this evenin' early," Andy shouted back.

"We'll not make un!" Jamie protested. "The wind's gettin' too strong! We'll have to go ashore and make camp!"

"The boat'll stand un," laughed David. "She's a sturdy craft in a breeze."

"I'm afeared," said Jamie.

"'A scout is brave,'" quoted Andy.

"'Tisn't meant for a scout to be foolish," Jamie insisted. "I'm afeared of bein' foolish."

"You was braggin' of havin' grit," Andy taunted.

"I has grit and a stout heart," Jamie proudly asserted, "but there's no such need of haste as to tempt a gale. 'Tis time to lie to and camp."

David's answer was lost in the smother of a great roller that chased them, and breaking astern nearly swept him from the tiller. When the lads caught their breath there was a foot of sea in the bottom of the boat.

"Bail her out!" bellowed David, shaking the water from his eyes.

"Jamie's right! 'Tis blowin' too high for comfort!" shouted Andy, as he and Jamie, each with a kettle, bailed. "We'd better not risk goin' on! Find a lee to make a landin', Davy."

"'Tis against reason not to take shelter!" piped Jamie.

"Fort Pelican's only ten miles away!" David shouted back in protest. "We'll soon make un in this fine breeze!"

The boat was riding on her beam ends. White horses breaking over her bow sent showers of foam her whole length. A sudden squall that nearly capsized her roused David suddenly to their danger.

"Reef the mains'l!" he shouted.

"Make for the lee of Comfort Island!" sputtered Andy through the spray, as he and Jamie sprang for the mainsail to reef it.

"Make for un!" echoed Jamie. "'Tis against reason to keep goin'."

The wind shrieked through the rigging. Another great roller all but swamped them. The sudden fury of the wind, the ever higher-piling seas, and the rollers that had so nearly overwhelmed the boat brought to David a full sense of their peril. He had been foolhardy and headstrong in his determination to continue to Fort Pelican. He realized this now even more fully than Andy and Jamie.

David was a good seaman and fearless, with a full measure of faith in his skill. Now that his eyes were open to the peril in which he had placed them, he knew that all the skill he possessed and perhaps more would be required to take them safely into shelter.

Comfort Island with its offer of snug harbour lay a half mile to leeward. David brought the boat before the wind, and headed directly for the island.

Great breakers, pounding the high, rockbound shores of Comfort Island, and booming like cannon, threw their spray a hundred feet in the air, enveloping the island in a cloud of mist.

Stretching away from the island for a mile to the westward was a rocky shoal known as the Devil's Arm. At high tide, in calm weather, it might be crossed, but now it was a great white barrier of roaring breakers rising in mighty geysers above the sea.

To the eastward of the island was a mass of black reefs known as the Devil's Tea Kettle. The Devil's Tea Kettle was always an evil place. Now it was a great boiling cauldron whose waters rose and fell in a seething white mass.

It was quite out of the question to round the Devil's Arm and beat back against the wind to the lee of the island. There was a narrow passage between the Devil's Tea Kettle and the island. If they could make this passage it would be a simple matter to fall in behind the island to shelter and safety.

All of these things David saw at a glance. It was a desperate undertaking, but it was the only chance, and he held straight for the passage. If he could keep the boat to her course, he would make it. If a sudden squall of wind overtook them the leeway would throw them upon the island breakers and they would be swallowed up in an instant and pounded to pieces upon the rocks.

Over and over again David breathed the prayer: "Lord, take us through safe! Lord, take us through safe!" His face was set, but his nerves were iron. Andy and Jamie, tense with the peril and excitement of the adventure, crouched in the bottom of the boat. As they drew near the island, Jamie shouted encouragingly:

"Keep your grit, and a stout heart like a man, Davy!" but the roar of breakers drowned his voice, and David did not hear.

"Is you afraid, Jamie?" Andy yelled in Jamie's ear.

"Aye," answered Jamie, "but I has plenty of grit."

He who knows danger and meets it manfully though he fears it, is brave, and Jamie and all of them were brave.

The boat was in the passage at last. David, every nerve tense, held her down to it. On the right seethed the Devil's Tea Kettle, sending forth a continuous deafening roar. On the left was Comfort Island with a boom! boom! of thundering breakers smashing against its high, sullen bulwarks of black rocks. The boat was so near that spray from the breakers fell over it in a shower.



It was over in a moment. The Devil's Tea Kettle, with all its loud threats, was behind them. The boat shot down along the shore, David swung to port, and they were safe in the quiet waters to the lee of the island.

"Thank the Lord!" said David reverently, as he brought the little craft to and the sail flapped idly.

"'Twere a close shave," breathed Jamie.

"A wonderful close shave," echoed Andy.

"You had grit," said Jamie. "You has plenty o' grit, Davy—and a stout heart, like a man. 'Twere wonderful how you cracked her through! There's nary a man on the coast could have done better'n that!"

"'Twere easy enough," David boasted with a laugh as he wiped the spray from his face, and unshipping the rudder proceeded to scull the boat into a natural berth between the rocks.

Hardly a breath of the gale raging outside reached them in their snug little harbour. The boat was made fast with the painter to a ledge, and the boys climed to the high rocky shore.

An excellent camping place was discovered a hundred yards back in a grove of stunted spruce trees that had rooted themselves in the scant soil that covered the rocks, and held fast, despite the Arctic blasts that swept across the Bay to rake the island during the long winters. Here the tent was pitched, and everything carried up from the boat and stowed within to dry. Fifteen minutes later the tent stove was crackling cheerily and sending forth comfort to the drenched young mariners. "There'll be no hurry in the marnin'," said David when they had eaten supper and lighted a candle. "We'll stay up to-night till we gets the outfit all dried, and if we're late about un we'll sleep a bit later in the marnin', to make up. We'll make Fort Pelican in an hour, or two hours whatever, if we has a civil breeze in the marnin'."

"We'll not be gettin' away from Fort Pelican to-morrow, will we?" asked Andy.

"We'll take the day for visitin' the folk and hearin' the news, and start back the marnin' after," suggested David.

It was near midnight when they crawled into their beds to drop into a ten-knot sleep, and they slept so soundly than none of them awoke until they were aroused by the sun shining upon the tent the next morning.

Breakfast was prepared and eaten leisurely. There was no hurry. The wind had fallen to a moderate stiff breeze, and Fort Pelican, through the narrows connecting Eskimo Bay with the sea outside, was almost in sight.

When the dishes were washed Andy and Jamie took down the tent, while David shouldered a pack and preceded them to the place where they had moored the boat the previous evening. A few minutes later he came running back, and in breathless excitement startled them with the announcement:

"The boat's gone!"

"Gone where?" asked Andy incredulously.

"Gone! I'm not knowin' where!" exclaimed David.

"Has she been took?" asked Jamie, excitedly.

"Took!" said David. "The painter were untied and she were took! There's tracks about of big boots with nails in un!"

Andy and Jamie ran down with David. No trace of the boat was to be found.

In the earth above the shore were plainly to be seen the tracks of two men wearing hobnailed boots.

"They's fresh tracks," declared David.

"Made this marnin'," Andy agreed. "They's the same kind of tracks as the ones I see under Lem's window. Whoever 'twere made these tracks shot Lem and took his silver."

"And now we're left here on the island with no way of gettin' off," said David.

"What'll we be doin'? How'll we ever get away?" asked Jamie in consternation.

But that was a question none of them could answer.



CHAPTER VII

THE MYSTERY OF THE BOAT

The boys looked at each other in consternation. They were marooned on a desolate, rocky, sparsely wooded island. Boats passed only at rare intervals, and a fortnight, or even a month, might elapse before an opportunity for rescue offered. Their provisions would scarcely last a week, and the island was destitute of game.

"Whoever 'twere took the boat," Andy suggested presently, "were on the island when we comes."

"Aye," David agreed, "and makin' for Fort Pelican. They been up as far as Lem's and they's gettin' away with Lem's silver to sell un."

"'Tis strange boots they wears," said Jamie. "Strange boots them is with nails in un."

"'Twere no man of The Labrador made them tracks," David declared.

"I never sees boots with nails in un," said Andy, "except the boots the lumber folks wears over at the new camp at Grampus River."

"Aye," agreed David, "they wears un. When we goes over with Pop last month when the big steamer comes I sees un. Plenty of un wears boots with nails in."

"That's who 'twere took our boat!" said Andy. "'Twere men from the Grampus River lumber camp."

"Let's track un and see where they were camped," suggested David.

The trail was easily followed. Here and there a footprint appeared where soil had drifted in among the rocks above the shore. The trail led them three hundred yards to the eastward, and then down into a sheltered hollow just above the water's edge, where a small boat was drawn up upon the shore.

"Here's a boat!" exclaimed Jamie, who had run ahead.

"A boat!" shouted David. "They left un and took our boat."

"And good reason!" said Jamie, who had reached the skiff. "The bottom's half knocked out of un."

It was evident that the boat had been driven upon the rocks in making a landing, and a jagged hole a foot square appeared in the bottom, rendering it in that condition quite useless. Near by a tent had been pitched, and there was no doubt that the men who had abandoned the boat had been in camp for a day at least in the sheltered hollow.

The boys turned the boat over and examined the break.

"'Tis a bad place to mend," observed David.

"But we can mend un," declared Andy. "We can mend un by noon whatever, and get to Fort Pelican this evenin'."

"I'm doubtin'," David shook his head. "'Twill take a day to mend un whatever, and she'll be none too safe. 'Twill be hard to make un water-tight."

"We can mend un," Andy insisted.

A close examination of the tracks disclosed the fact that there had undoubtedly been two men in the party. They had reached the island before the rain of two days before. This was disclosed by the fact that some of the tracks were partly washed away by the rain, and the earth was caked where the wind and sun had dried it afterwards.

Natives of the coast, as was the case with David and Jamie and Andy, wore home-made sealskin boots in summer and buckskin moccasins in winter. The sealskin boots had moccasin feet with one thickness of skin, and were soft and pliable. None of them ever wore soled boots that would admit of hobnails. It was plain to the boys, therefore, that the men who made the tracks were not natives of the country.

Early in the summer a lumber company had begun the erection of a camp at Grampus River, which lay twenty miles to the southward from The Jug, and on the opposite side of Eskimo Bay. A steamship had brought in men and supplies, and all summer men had been building camps and preparing for lumbering operations during the coming winter.

It was the first steamer to enter the Bay, and its advent had been an occasion of much curiosity on the part of the people. Many of them made excursions to Grampus River to see the strangers at work. Thomas had made such an excursion with David and Andy. Strange, rough, blasphemous men they seemed to the God-fearing folk of the country. These were the men wearing hobnailed boots of which David spoke, and there was small doubt in the mind of the boys that the men who had camped on the island and had stolen the boat were from the Grampus River lumber camp.

It proved a tedious undertaking to repair and make seaworthy the damaged boat. The trees on the island were, for the most part, small gnarled spruce, twisted and stunted by the northern blasts which swept the Bay. After some search, however, they discovered a white spruce tree suitable for their purpose, with a trunk ten inches in diameter. David felled it and cut from its butt a two-foot length. This he proceeded to split into as thin slabs as possible. Then with their jack-knives the boys began the tedious task of whittling the surfaces of the slabs into smooth boards, first trimming them down to an inch and a half in thickness with the axes.

"How'll we make un fast when we gets un done?" asked Jamie. "We has no nails."

"I'm thinkin' of that," said David. "I'm not knowin' yet, but we'll find some way."

"I've got a way," Andy announced. "I been thinkin' and thinkin' and I found a way to make un fast."

"How'll you make un fast now without nails?" David asked expectantly.

"We'll tie un with spruce roots, like the Injuns puts their canoes together," explained Andy. "We'll cut holes in each end of un in the right place to tie un fast to the braces of the boat. We'll have to make holes in the bottom of the boat each side of the braces for the roots to come through so we can make un fast. That'll hold un. Then when we've made un fast we'll caulk un up with spruce gum."

"Why can't we cut strips of sealskin off our sleepin' bags for strings to tie un with?" suggested David. "'Twould be easier than makin' spruce root strings, and quicker too, and the sealskin would be strong and hold un tight."

"Yes, and soon's the sealskin gets wet she'll stretch," Andy objected. "Then the boards would loosen up and let the water in."

"I never thought of the sealskin stretchin', but she sure would. You're fine at thinkin' things out, Andy!" said David admiringly. "The spruce roots won't stretch though. 'Tis a fine way to fix un now, and she'll work. There's no doubtin' she'll work."

"'Twill take all day," Andy calculated, adding with pride, "but once we gets un on they'll hold. I'll get the roots now and put un to soak."

Andy dug around the white spruce tree and in a little while gathered a sufficient quantity of long string-like roots. He scraped them and then split them carefully with his knife. When they were split he filled the big kettle with water from a spring, placed the roots in it and put them over the fire to boil.

They all worked as hard as they could on the boards, and when dinner time came David announced that the boards were smooth enough for their purpose.

"Now all we'll have to do," said he as he sliced pork for dinner, "is to make the holes in un and fasten un on."

"What were that now?" Jamie interrupted as a hoarse blast broke upon the air.

"'Tis the steamer whistle!" David dropped the knife with which he was slicing pork, and with Jamie and Andy at his heels ran to the top of the highest rock on the island, where a wide view of the Bay lay before them.

A mile away the lumber company's big steamer was feeling its way cautiously toward the west, bound inward to the Grampus River camps. The boys waved their caps and shouted at the top of their lungs, but no one on the steamer appeared to see them. It was not until the great strange vessel had become a mere speck in the distance that they turned back to the preparation of dinner.

"They didn't see us," said David in disappointment.

"We're not wantin' to go to Grampus River, whatever," Andy cheered. "We're goin' to Fort Pelican when we has the boat fixed up, and she's 'most done."

After dinner they settled to the task. Two of the narrow boards which they had prepared were required to cover the break, which occurred between two braces. The edges of the boards where they were to join were whittled straight, that the joint might be made as tight as possible. Then David held them in place while Andy marked the position for the holes through which the spruce root thongs were to pass.

Four holes were to be cut in each end of both boards, and holes to match in the bottom of the boat, and in an hour they were neatly reamed out. When Andy removed his thongs from the water they were quite soft and pliable, and proved to be strong and tough.

Andy lashed the boards into place, threading the thongs through the holes and drawing them round the brace several times at each place where provision had been made for them. Thus a dozen thicknesses of fibre bound the boards to the brace at each set of holes.

It was now necessary to collect the spruce gum and prepare it. Gum was plentiful enough, and in half an hour they had collected enough to half fill the frying-pan. To this was added a little lard, and the gum and grease melted over the fire and thoroughly mixed.

"What you puttin' the grease in for?" asked Jamie curiously.

"So when we pours un in the cracks and she hardens she won't be brittle and crack," David explained.

The hot mixture was now poured into the joints between the boards and at all points where the new boards came into contact with the boat, and into the holes where the lashings occurred. In a few minutes it hardened, and the boys surveyed their work with pride and satisfaction.

"Now we'll try un," said David, "and see if she leaks."

"She'll never leak where she's mended," asserted Andy.

They slipped the boat into the water and Andy's prediction proved true. Not a drop of water oozed through the joints, and the boat was as snug and tight and seaworthy as any boat that ever floated.

"'Tis too late to start to-night," said David, "but we'll be away at crack o' dawn in the marnin', whatever. 'Tis fine they left the sail and oars."

And at crack of dawn in the morning the boys were away. The day was misty and disagreeable, but David and Andy knew the way as well as you and I know our city streets. They rounded the Devil's Arm, a friendly tide helped them through the narrows, and in mid-forenoon the low white buildings of Fort Pelican appeared in misty outline through the fog. A few minutes later they swung alongside the Fort Pelican jetty, and there, to their amazement, firmly tied to the jetty, lay their own big boat.

No one about the Post could explain whence the boat had come or how it reached the jetty. The Post servants stated that they had not noticed it until after the departure of the lumber steamer. They had recognized it as Thomas Angus's boat, for in that country men know each other's boats as our country folk know their neighbours' horses.

The lumber ship had arrived on the morning of the gale, and had anchored in the harbour awaiting the arrival of one of the company's officers on the mail boat. The mail boat had arrived the previous morning, and both the mail boat and lumber ship had steamed away shortly after the mail boat's arrival. Many lumbermen had been ashore. If any of them had come in the boat they had mingled among the others and had departed either on the lumber ship, which had gone up the Bay to Grampus River, or on the mail boat to Newfoundland.

"I'm thinkin'," said David, "whoever 'twere took Lem's silver fox and our boat went to Newfoundland to sell the fur."

"There's no doubtin' that," agreed Andy.



CHAPTER VIII

TRAILING THE HALF-BREED

Eli Horn paused in the enclosed porch to shoulder his provision pack, left there upon his arrival home earlier in the evening. He was passing from the porch when Doctor Joe opened the door.

"Eli," said Doctor Joe, closing the door behind him, "may I have a word with you?"

"Aye, sir," and Eli stopped.

"I just wished to speak a word of warning," said Doctor Joe quietly. "Be cautious, Eli, and do nothing you'll regret. Don't be too hasty. We suspect Indian Jake, but none of us knows certainly that he shot your father or took the silver fox skin."

"There's no doubtin' he took un! Pop says he took un, and he knows. I'm goin' to get the silver if I has to kill Injun Jake."

Eli spoke in even, quiet tones, but with the dogged determination of the man trained to pit his powers of endurance against Nature and the wilderness. He gave no suggestion of boastfulness, but rather of the man who has an ordinary duty to perform, and is bent upon doing it to the best of his ability.

"Don't you think you had better wait and start in the morning? It's a nasty night to be out," Doctor Joe suggested. "'Twill be hard to make your way to-night with the wind against you as well as the dark. If you wait until morning it will give us time to talk things over."

"I'll not stop till I gets the silver," Eli stubbornly declared, "and I'll get un or kill Injun Jake."

"See here, Eli," Doctor Joe laid his hand on Eli's arm, "your father says he was not shot until sundown. Indian Jake was at our camp at Flat Point within the hour after sundown. He never could have paddled that distance against a down wind in an hour. The boys and I were four hours coming over here from Flat Point Camp, and I know Indian Jake could not have covered the distance in anything like an hour."

"'Twere some trick of his! He shot un and he took the silver!" Eli insisted. "Good-bye, sir. I've got to be goin' or he'll slip away from me."

"Be careful, Eli," Doctor Joe pleaded. "Don't shoot unless you're forced to do so to protect yourself."

"'Twill be Injun Jake'll have to be careful," returned Eli as he strode away in the darkness, and Doctor Joe knew that Eli had it in his heart to do murder.

The night was pitchy black and a drizzling rain was falling, but Eli had often travelled on as dark nights, and he was determined. He chose a light skiff rigged with a leg-o'-mutton sail. The wind was against him and with the sail reefed and the mast unstepped and stowed in the bottom of the boat, he slipped a pair of oars into the locks and with strong, even strokes pulled away, hugging the shore, that he might take advantage of the lee of the land.

Presently the drizzle became a downpour, but Eli, indifferent to wind and weather, rowed tirelessly on. There was a dangerous turn to be made around Flat Point. Here for a time he lost the friendly shelter of the land, and continuous and tremendous effort was called for in the rough seas; but, guided by the roar of the breakers on the shore, he compassed it and presently fell again under the protection of the land.

With all his effort Eli had not progressed a quarter of the distance toward The Jug when dawn broke. With the first light he made a safe landing, cut a stick of standing dead timber, chopped off the butt, and splitting it that he might get at the dry core, whittled some shavings and lighted a fire. His provision bag was well filled. No Labradorman travels otherwise. A kettle of hot tea sweetened with molasses, a pan of fried fat pork and some hard bread (hardtack) satisfied his hunger.

The wind was rising and the rain was flying in blinding sheets, but the shore still protected him, and the moment his simple breakfast was eaten Eli again set forward. Presently, however, another long point projected out into the Bay to force him into the open. He turned about in his boat and for several minutes studied the white-capped seas beyond the point.

"I'll try un," he muttered, and settled again to his oars.

But try as he would Eli could not force his light craft against the wind, and at length he reluctantly dropped back again under the lee of the land and went ashore.

"There'll be no goin' on to-day," he admitted. "I'll have to make camp whatever."

Under the shelter of the thick spruce forest where he was fended from the gale and drive of the rain, he cut a score of poles. One of them, thicker and stiffer than the others, he lashed between two trees at a height of perhaps four feet. At intervals of three or four inches he rested the remaining poles against the one lashed to the trees, arranging them at an angle of fifty-five degrees and aligning the butts of the poles evenly upon the ground. These he covered with a mass of boughs and marsh grass as a thatching. The roof thatched to his satisfaction, he broke a quantity of boughs and with some care prepared a bed under the lean-to.

His shelter and bed completed, he cut and piled a quantity of dry logs at one end of the lean-to. Then he felled two green trees and cut the trunks into four-foot lengths. Two of these he placed directly in front of the shelter and two feet apart, at right angles to the shelter. Across the ends of the logs farthest from his bed he piled three of the green sticks to serve as a backlog, and in front of these lighted his fire. When it was blazing freely he piled upon it, and in front of the green backlogs, several of the logs of dry wood.

Despite the rain, the fire burned freely, and presently the interior of Eli's lean-to was warm and comfortable. He now removed his rain-soaked jacket and moleskin trousers and suspended them from the ridge-pole, where they would receive the benefit of the heat and gradually dry.

Stripped to his underclothing, Eli crouched before the fire beneath the front of the shelter. At intervals he turned his back and sides and chest toward the heat and in the course of an hour succeeded in drying his underclothing to his satisfaction. His moleskin trousers were still damp, but he donned them, and renewing the fire he stretched himself luxuriously for a long and much needed rest.



CHAPTER IX

ELI SURPRISES INDIAN JAKE

When Eli awoke late in the afternoon the rain had ceased, but the wind was blowing a living gale. There was a roar and boom and thunder of breakers down on the point and echoing far away along the coast. The wind shrieked and moaned through the forest.

Under his shelter beneath the thick spruce trees, however, Eli was well enough protected. He renewed the fire, which had burned to embers, and prepared dinner. The storm that prevented him from travelling would also hold Indian Jake a prisoner. This thought yielded him a degree of satisfaction.

He took no advantage of the leisure to reconsider and weigh the circumstantial evidence against Indian Jake. He had accepted it as conclusive proof of the half-breed's guilt and he had already convicted him of the crime. Once Eli had arrived at a conclusion his mind was closed to any line of reasoning that might tend to controvert that conclusion. He prided himself upon this characteristic as strength of will, while in reality it was a weakness. But Eli was like many another man who has enjoyed greater opportunities in the world than ever fell to Eli's lot.

Once Eli had set himself upon a trail he never turned his back upon the object he sought or weakened in his determination to attain it. His object now was to overtake Indian Jake and have the matter out with the half-breed once and for all. Well directed, this trait of unyielding determination is an excellent one. It is the foundation of success in life if the object sought is a worthy one. But in this instance Eli's objective was not alone the recovery of the silver fox skin, though this was the chief incentive. Coupled with it was a desire for vengeance, prompted by hate, and vengeance is the child of the weakest and meanest of human passions.

When Eli had eaten he shouldered his rifle and strolled back into the forest. Presently he flushed a covey of spruce grouse, which rose from the ground and settled in a tree. Flinging his rifle to his shoulder, he fired and a grouse tumbled to the ground. He fired again, and another fell. The living birds, with a great noise of wings, now abandoned the tree and Eli picked up the two victims. He had clipped their heads off neatly. This he observed with satisfaction. His rifle shot true and his aim was steady. What chance could Indian Jake have against such skill as that?

Eli plucked the birds immediately, while they were warm, for delay would set the feathers, and his game being sufficient for his present needs, he returned to his bivouac on the point.

It was mid-afternoon the following day before the wind and rain had so far subsided as to permit Eli to turn the point and proceed upon his journey. Even then, with all his effort, the progress he made against the north-west breeze was so slow that it was not until the following forenoon that he reached The Jug. Thomas saw him coming and was on the jetty to welcome him.

"How be you, Eli?" Thomas greeted. "I'm wonderful glad to see you. Come right up and have a cup o' tea."

"How be you, Thomas? Is Injun Jake here?"

"He were here," said Thomas, "but he only stops one day to help me get the outfit ready and then he goes on in his canoe to hunt bear up the Nascaupee River whilst he waits there for me to go to the Seal Lake trails. You want to see he?"

"Aye, and I'm goin' to see whatever!"

While Eli had a snack to eat and a cup of tea with Thomas and Margaret he told Thomas of Indian Jake's call upon his father, of the shooting and of the robbery which followed.

"Injun Jake turns back after leavin' and shoots Pop and takes the silver," he concluded, "and I'm goin' to get the silver whatever, even if I has to shoot Injun Jake to get un!"

"Is you sure, now, 'twere Injun Jake does un?" asked Thomas, unwilling to believe his friend and partner capable of such treachery. By disposition Thomas was naturally cautious of passing judgment or of accusing anyone of misdeed without conclusive proof.

"There's no doubtin' that!" insisted Eli. "There was nobody else to do un. 'Twere Injun Jake."

A shift of wind to the southward assisted Eli on his way. Early that evening he reached the Hudson's Bay Company's post, twenty miles west of The Jug. Here he stopped for supper and learned from Zeke Hodge, the Post servant, that Indian Jake had passed up Grand Lake in his canoe two days before. Zeke expressed doubt as to Eli's finding the half-breed at the Nascaupee River. He stated it as his opinion that if Indian Jake were guilty of the crime, as he had no doubt, he was planning an escape and had in all probability immediately plunged into the interior, in which case he was already hopelessly beyond pursuit and had fled the Bay country for good and all. Like Eli, Zeke convicted the half-breed at once.

The Eskimo Bay Post of the Hudson's Bay Company is the last inhabited dwelling as the traveller enters the wilderness; he might go on and on for a thousand miles to Hudson Bay and in the whole vast expanse of distance no other human habitation will he find. His camps will be pitched in the depths of forests or on desolate, naked barrens; and always, in forests or on barrens, he will hear the rush and roar of mighty rivers or the lapping waves of wide, far-reaching lakes. The timber wolf will startle him from sleep in the dead of night with its long, weird howl, rising and falling in dismal cadence, or the silence will be broken perchance by the wild, uncanny laugh of the loon falling upon the darkness as a token of ill omen, but in all the vast land he will hear no human voice and he will find no human companionship.

Indian Jake had told Thomas that he would camp above the mouth of the Nascaupee River, a dozen miles beyond the point where the river enters Grand Lake. It was a journey of sixty miles or more from the Post.

Eli set out at once. Five miles up a short wide river brought him to Grand Lake, which here reached away before him to meet the horizon in the west, and at the foot of the lake he camped to await day, for the lake and the country before him were unfamiliar.

Early in the afternoon of the third day after leaving the Post, Eli's boat turned into the wide mouth of the Nascaupee River, and keeping a sharp look-out, he rowed silently up the river. It was an hour before sundown when his eye caught the white of canvas among the trees a little way from the river.

With much caution Eli drew his boat among the willows that lined the bank and made it fast. Slinging his cartridge bag over his shoulder, and with his rifle resting in the hollow of his arm, ready for instant action, he crept forward toward Indian Jake's camp. Taking advantage of the cover of brush, he moved with extreme caution until he had the tent and surroundings under observation.

There was no movement about the camp and the fire was dead. It was plain Indian Jake had not returned for the evening. Eli crouched and waited, as a cat crouches and waits patiently for its prey.

Presently there was the sound of a breaking twig and a moment later Indian Jake, with his rifle on his arm, appeared out of the forest.

Eli, his rifle levelled at Indian Jake, rose to his feet with the command:

"You stand where you is; drop your gun!"

"Why, how do, Eli? What's up?" Indian Jake greeted. "What's bringin' you to the Nascaupee?"

"You!" Eli's face was hard with hate. "'Tis you brings me here, you thief! I wants the silver you takes when you shoots father, and 'tis well for you Doctor Joe comes and saves he from dyin' or I'd been droppin' a bullet in your heart with nary a warnin'!"

"What you meanin' by that?"

"Be you givin' up the silver?"

"No!"



"I say again, give me that silver fox you stole from father!"

Indian Jake's small hawk eyes were narrowing. He made no answer, but slipped his right hand forward toward the trigger of his rifle, though the barrel of the rifle still rested in the hollow of his left arm.

"Drop un!" Eli commanded, observing the movement. "Drop that gun on the ground!"

Indian Jake stood like a statue, eyeing Eli, but he made no movement.

"I said drop un!" Eli's voice was cold and hard as steel. He was in deadly earnest. "If you tries to raise un or don't drop un before I count ten I'll put a bullet in your heart!"

Indian Jake might have been of chiselled stone. He did not move a muscle or wink an eye-lash but his small eyes were centred on every motion Eli made. He still held his rifle, the barrel resting in the hollow of his left arm, his right hand clutching the stock behind the hammer, his finger an inch from the trigger.

For an instant there was a death-like silence. Then Eli began to count:

"One—two—three—four—"

The words fell like strokes of a hammer upon an anvil. Eli intended to shoot. He was a man of his word. He made no threat that he was not prepared to execute, and Indian Jake knew that Eli would shoot on the count of ten.

"Five—six—seven—eight—"

Still Indian Jake made no move save that the little hawk eyes had narrowed to slits. He did not drop his gun. From all the indications, he did not hear Eli's count.

"Nine—ten!"

True to his threat, Eli's rifle rang out with the last word of his count.



CHAPTER X

THE END OF ELI'S HUNT

Indian Jake, quick as a cat, had thrown himself upon the ground with Eli's last count. Like the loon that dives at the flash of the hunter's gun, he was a fraction of a second quicker than Eli. Now, lying prone, his rifle at his shoulder, he had Eli covered, and the chamber of Eli's rifle was empty.

"Drop that gun!" he commanded.

Eli, believing in the first instant that Indian Jake had fallen as the result of the shot, was taken wholly by surprise. He stood dazed and dumb with the smoking rifle in his hand. He did not at once realize that the half-breed had him covered. His brain did not work as rapidly as Indian Jake's. His immediate sensation as he heard Indian Jake's voice was one of thankfulness that, after all, there was no stain of murder on his soul. Even yet he had no doubt Indian Jake was wounded. He had taken deadly aim, and he could not understand how any escape could have been possible.

"Drop that gun!" Indian Jake repeated. "I won't count. I'll shoot."

Eli's brain at last grasped the situation. Indian Jake was grinning broadly, and it seemed to Eli the most malicious grin he had ever beheld. He did not question Indian Jake's determination to shoot. It was too evident that the half-breed, grinning like a demon, was in a desperate mood. Eli dropped his rifle as though it were red hot and burned his hands.

"Step out here!" Indian Jake, rising to his feet, indicated an open space near the tent.

Eli did as he was told.

"Shake the ca'tridges out of your bag on the ground!"

Eli turned his cartridge bag over, and the cartridges which it contained rattled to the ground.

"Turn your pockets out!"

A turning of the pockets disclosed no further ammunition.

Indian Jake took Eli's rifle from the ground, emptied the magazine, and placed the rifle in the tent.

"Where's your boat?" he asked.

"Just down here."

"You go ahead. Show me."

Eli guided Indian Jake to the boat, and while he remained on the bank under threat of the rifle, the half-breed went through his belongings in the boat in a further search for ammunition. Satisfied that there was none, he replaced the things as he had found them, and was grinning amiably when he rejoined Eli upon the bank.

"Come 'long up to camp," he invited, quite as though Eli were a most welcome guest.

"Give me that silver fox!" Eli's anger had mastered his surprise.

"I won't give un to you, but don't be mad, Eli," Indian Jake grinned in vast enjoyment.

"You stole un!" Eli burst out. "And you were thinkin' to do murder!"

"Did I now?"

"You did!"

Indian Jake did not deign to deny or confess. Eli, at his command, returned to camp. Indian Jake handed him the tea-kettle.

"Fill un at the river," he directed.

While Eli obeyed silently and sullenly, Indian Jake lighted a fire, and when Eli returned put the kettle on. Then he brought forth his frying-pan, filled it with sliced venison, and as he placed it over the fire, remarked:

"Knocked a buck down this mornin'."

Eli said nothing. The odour of frying venison was pleasant. Eli was hungry, and when the venison was fried and tea made, he swallowed his pride and silently accepted Indian Jake's invitation to eat.

When they had finished, Indian Jake cut a large joint of venison, and presented it to Eli with his empty rifle, remarking as he did so:

"The deer's meat's a surprise. I like to surprise folks. Taste good goin' home. I'll keep the ca'tridges. You might hurt somebody if you had un. You'll get quite a piece down before you camp to-night."

"Were you takin' that silver?" asked Eli, changing his accusation to a question.

"Maybe I were and maybe I weren't," Indian Jake grinned. "'Twouldn't do me any good to tell you if I had un, and if I told you I didn't have un you wouldn't believe me. Maybe I've got un. You better be goin'. I'd ask you to stay, Eli, and I'd like to have you, but you don't like me and you'd better go on."

"I don't want the deer's meat," said Eli in sullen resentment.

"You ain't got any ca'tridges, and you can't shoot any fresh meat," insisted Indian Jake, adding with a grin: "She'll go good. Take un along, I got plenty. It's just a little surprise present for you bein' so kind as not to shoot me."

Eli, doubtless deciding that he had better take what he could get, though a bit of venison was small compensation for a silver fox, accepted the meat. Indian Jake accompanied him to the boat, and as he dropped down the river he could see Indian Jake still on the bank watching him until he turned a bend.

Without cartridges for his rifle, Eli felt himself as helpless as a wolf without teeth or a cat without claws. He was subdued and humbled. He had had Indian Jake completely in his power, and through delay in taking prompt advantage of his position, had permitted the half-breed to capture and disarm him.

The thought increased his anger toward Indian Jake. He had no doubt the man had the silver fox in his possession. If there had been any doubt in the first instance that Indian Jake was guilty, and Eli had never admitted that there was doubt, he was now entirely satisfied of the half-breed's guilt. Indian Jake, indeed, had quite boldly stated that he "might" have it, and Eli accepted this as an admission that he did have it.

"There'll be no use getting more ca'tridges and goin' back," Eli mused. "He's had a warnin' and he'll not bide in that camp another day. He'll flee the country."

Then Eli's thoughts turned to his old father and mother.

"The silver's gone, and it leaves Pop and Mother in a bad way," he mused. "They've been fondlin' that skin half the winter. Pop's had un out a hundred times to see how fine and black 'twere, and shook un out to see how thick and deep the fur is. And they been countin' and countin' on the things they'd be gettin' and needs, and can't get now she's gone. And they been countin' on the money they'd have to lay by for their feeble days when they needs un. They'll never get over mournin' the loss of un. 'Twere worth a fortune, and Pop'll never cotch another. He were hopin' and hopin' every year as long as I remembers to cotch a silver, and none ever comes to his traps till this un comes. And now she's gone!"

Perhaps had the silver fox skin been Eli's own, and perhaps had his father and mother not built so many hopes and laid so many plans upon the little fortune it was to have brought them, Eli would never have ventured to the verge of murder to recover it. Even now, with all his regrets, he thanked God from the bottom of his heart that he had not killed Indian Jake and stained his hands with blood.

"'Twere the mercy of God sent the bullet abroad," said he reverently. "Indian Jake's a thief and he deserves to be killed, but if I'd killed he I'd never rested an easy hour again while I lives. But I might o' clipped his trigger hand, whatever," he thought with regret. "I can clip off the head of a pa'tridge every time, and I might have clipped his hand, and got the skin and took he back for Doctor Joe to fix up."

Three days later Eli pulled his boat wearily into The Jug. The boys had returned, and with Thomas they met him on the jetty.

"Did you find Injun Jake?" Thomas asked anxiously.

"Aye," said Eli, "he were there."

Eli volunteered no further details for a moment. Then he added:

"I didn't kill he, thank the Lord, but he's got the silver. He said he had un, and he took my ca'tridges away from me."

"Said he had un? Now, that's strange—wonderful strange. Come in, Eli, supper's ready," Thomas invited, manifestly relieved that Eli had not succeeded in accomplishing his rash purpose. "You'll bide the night with us, and while you eats tell us about un, and the lads'll tell what were happenin' to they."

Margaret was setting the table. She greeted Eli cordially, and arranged a plate for him while he washed at the basin behind the stove.

"Come," invited Thomas, "set in. We've got a wonderful treat."

"What be that, now?" asked Eli as Margaret placed a dish of steaming, mealy boiled potatoes upon the table.

"Potaters," Thomas announced grandly. "Doctor Joe brings un on the mail boat from where he's been, and onions too. Margaret, peel some onions and set un on for Eli. They's fine just as they is without cookin'."

The onions came, and when thanks had been offered Eli tasted his first potato.

"They is fine, now! Wonderful fine eatin'," he declared.

"Try an onion, now. They's fine, too," Thomas urged.

Eli took an onion.

"She has a strange smell," he observed before biting into it.

Eli took a liberal mouthful of the onion. He began to chew it. A strained look spread over his face. Tears filled his eyes. But Eli was brave, and he never flinched.

"'Tis fine, I like un wonderful fine," Eli volunteered presently, adding, "if she didn't burn so bad."

"Take just a bit at a time," advised Thomas, laughing heartily, "and eat un with bread or potaters and you won't notice the burn of un."

Presently Eli told of his experiences with Indian Jake, and Andy told of the tracks he had seen under the window, and all of the boys told of what had happened on the island, the theft of the boat, the tracks of the nailed boots and the discovery of the boat at Fort Pelican.

Then Eli made an announcement that again laid the burden of suspicion more strongly than ever upon Indian Jake.

"I were workin' at the lumber camps a week this summer helpin' they out," said Eli. "Whilst I were there Indian Jake comes and trades a pair of skin boots with one of the lumber men for a pair of their boots, the kind with nails in un. He the same as says he has the fur, and 'twere he took un."

"Injun Jake wears skin boots when he come to our camp on Flat P'int," said David.

"Aye, 'tis likely," admitted Eli. "He'd be wearin' skin boots in the canoe, whatever. The nailed boots would be hard on the canoe. He uses the nailed boots trampin' about, but he'd change un when he travels in his canoe."

The whole question was canvassed pro and con, and due consideration given to the length of time that Indian Jake must have consumed in passing from Horn's Bight to Flat Point. This was alone sufficient in the mind of Thomas and the boys to lift all suspicion from Indian Jake, but Eli still held stubbornly to the opposite view.

Two days later, and on the eve of Thomas's departure for the trails, Doctor Joe returned. Lem had so far recovered that a further stay at Horn's Bight was unnecessary.

Thomas and Doctor Joe quietly discussed the shooting incident. Lem, it appeared, had later decided that he may have been shot much earlier in the afternoon than sundown. What had occurred had fallen into the hazy uncertainty of a dream.

"What kind of a rifle does Indian Jake use?" asked Doctor Joe.

"A thirty-eight fifty-five," said Thomas.

Doctor Joe drew from his pocket the bullet extracted from Lem's wound. Thomas examined it critically.

"There's no doubtin' 'tis a thirty-eight fifty-five," he admitted. "'Tis true Injun Jake gets a pair of nailed boots like the lumber folk wears. But Injun Jake'll tell me whether 'twere he shot Lem. Injun Jake'll be fair about un with me whatever. 'Tis hard for me to believe he did un. If he did, he'll be gone from the Nascaupee when I gets there. If he didn't, I'll find he waitin'!"

"Let us hope he'll be there, and let us hope he's innocent," said Doctor Joe.

Some day and in some way every sin is punished and every criminal is discovered. It is an immutable law of God that he who does wrong must atone for the wrong. We do not always know how the punishment is brought about, but the guilty one knows. And so with the shooting and robbery of Lem Horn. Many months were to pass before the mystery was to be solved, and then the revelation was to come in a startling manner in the course of an adventure amid the deep snows of winter.

Thomas sailed away the following morning. They watched his boat pass down through The Jug and out into the Bay, and then the silence of the wilderness closed upon him, and no word came as to whether or no Indian Jake met him at the Nascaupee River camp.



CHAPTER XI

THE LETTER IN THE CAIRN

In Labrador September is the pleasantest month of the year. It is a period of calm when fogs and mists and cold dreary rains, so frequent during July and the early half of August, are past, and Nature holds her breath before launching upon the world the bitter blasts and blizzards and awful cold of a sub-arctic winter. There are days and days together when the azure of the sky remains unmarred by clouds, and the sun shines uninterruptedly. The air, brilliantly transparent, carries a twang of frost. Evening is bathed in an effulgence of colour. The sky flames in startling reds and yellows blending into opals and turquoise, with the shadowy hills lying in a purple haze in the west.

Then comes night and the aurora. Wavering fingers of light steal up from the northern horizon. Higher and higher they climb until they have reached and crossed the zenith. From the north they spread to the east and to the west until the whole sky is aflame with shimmering fire of marvellous changing colours varying from darkest purple to dazzling white.

The dark green of the spruce and balsam forests is splotched with golden yellow where the magic touch of the frost king has laid his fingers and worked a miracle upon groves of tamaracks. The leaves of the aspen and white birch have fallen, and the flowers have faded.

Spruce grouse chickens, full grown now, rise in coveys with much noise of wing, and perch in trees looking down unafraid upon any who intrude upon their forest home. Ptarmigans, still in their coat of mottled brown and white, gather in flocks upon the naked hills to feed, where upland cranberries cover the ground in red masses; or on the edge of marshes where bake apple berries have changed from brilliant red to delicate salmon pink and offer a sweet and wholesome feast.

The honk and quack of wild geese and ducks, southward bound in great flocks, disturbs the silence of every inlet and cove and bight, where the wild fowl pause for a time to rest and feed upon the grasses.

After Thomas's departure Doctor Joe and the boys tidied and snugged things up for the winter, and many a fine hunt they had, mornings and evenings, in the edge of a near-by marsh through which a brook coursed to join the sea. Hunting geese and ducks was indeed a duty, for they must needs depend upon the hunt for no small share of their living. It was a duty they enjoyed, however. Skill and a steady hand and a quick eye are necessary to success, and they never failed to return with a full bag.

The weather was now cold enough to keep the birds sweet and fresh, and before September closed a full two score of fine fat geese were hanging in the enclosed lean-to shed with a promise of many good dinners in the future.

Between the hunting and the work about home there was no time to be dawdled vainly away. When there was nothing more pressing the wood-pile always stood suggestively near the door inviting attention, and it was necessary to saw and split a vast deal of wood to keep the big box stove supplied, for it had a great maw and would develop a marvellous appetite when the weather grew cold.

No extended travelling was possible for Doctor Joe on his errands of mercy until the sea should freeze and dogs and sledge could be called into service. But during the fine September weather he and the boys made two short trips up the Bay, where there was ailing in some of the families.

In the course of these excursions they took occasion to visit Let-in-Cove, which lay just outside Grampus River, where the new lumber camps were situated, and also Snug Cove and Tuggle Bight, a little farther on. At Let-in-Cove Peter and Lige Sparks, at Snug Cove Obadiah Button and Micah Dunk, and at Tuggle Bight Seth Muggs were enlisted in the scout troop, and a handbook left at each place. These, indeed, with the three Anguses, were the only boys of scout age within a radius of fifty miles of The Jug.

There was great excitement among the lads, and Doctor Joe proudly declared that there would be no finer or more efficient troop of scouts in all the world than his little troop of eight when they had become familiar with their duties.

A new field and a broader vision of life was to open to these Labrador lads, whose life was of necessity circumscribed. They had never been given the opportunity to play as boys play in more favoured lands. They had never known the joys of football or cricket or the hundred other fine, health-giving games that are a part of the life of every English or Canadian boy. They had never seen a circus or a moving picture and they had never been in a schoolroom in their lives.

This opportunity to play and study as other boys play and study in other lands was the thing, perhaps, they longed for above all else. Doctor Joe had inspired them with ambition. They hungered to learn and here was the Handbook with many things in it to study, and through Doctor Joe and the book they were to learn the joy of play.

The new recruits to the troop, however, as well as the Angus boys, had been close students of their native wilderness. Their eyes were sharp and their ears were quick. They knew every tree and flower and plant that grew about them. They knew the birds and their calls and songs. They knew every animal, its cry and its habits of life. They knew the fish of the sea and lake and stream. All this was a part of their training for their future profession of hunters and fishermen.

As hunters they had not learned to look upon the wild things of the woods as friends and associates. To them the animals were only beasts whose valuable pelts could be traded at the Post for necessaries of life or whose flesh was good to eat. Success in life depended upon man's ability to outwit and slay birds or animals, and the lads held for them none of the human sympathy that would have added so much to their own enjoyment.

Now they were to have a new view of life. Doctor Joe was to open to them a wider, happier vista. It was not in the least to breed in them discontent with their circumscribed life, but rather to open to their consciousness the opportunities that lay within their reach, and to make their life richer and broader and vastly more worth while.

Doctor Joe explained to the five recruits the Tenderfoot Scout requirements, much as he had explained them to David and Andy and Jamie. Wilderness dwellers who must take in and fix in the mind at a glance every unusual tree or stump or stone if they would find their trail, have a peculiar and remarkable gift of memory born of long practice and the fact that they must perforce depend upon their ability to retain the things they see and hear. The lads, therefore, required no repetition, and learned their lessons with ease.

Though they had never attended school they could all read, stumbling, to be sure, over the big words, but nevertheless grasping the meaning. Doctor Joe, during his years in the Bay, had taught not only the Angus boys but many of the other young people to read. Doctor Joe now marked the pages that they were to study, and before he and the Angus boys turned back across the Bay to The Jug it was agreed that the new troop should hold a week's camp to study and practise together. Hollow Cove, some five miles from The Jug, was to be the camping ground, and the first week in October was decided upon as the time.

"We'll start to camp on Monday marnin' of that week," suggested David. "Come over to The Jug on Sunday. 'Twill be fine to have us all go to camp together."

"Aye," agreed Micah, "'twill be now, and we'll come, and have a fine time."

"And we'll all study about the scout things whilst we're in camp," piped up Jamie enthusiastically.

"That we will now," David assured.

"Lige, you and Peter bring a tent and stove, and all you need for setting up camp," Doctor Joe directed. "Can you bring one, too, Seth?"

"Aye," said Seth, "I'll bring un, but we have no tent stove. Pop took un to the huntin'."

"Obadiah or Micah may bring a stove. You have one, haven't you?" Doctor Joe asked.

"Aye," said Obadiah, "I has one. I'll bring un along."

"You three fix up an outfit amongst you. There'll be three in a tent," Doctor Joe explained. "Andy can go in with Peter and Lige, and I'll tent with Davy and Jamie."

There was little else than the proposed camping expedition talked about on the return to The Jug, and in the days that followed David, Andy and Jamie devoted every spare moment to the study of first aid and signalling. Doctor Joe, with no end of patience, drilled them so thoroughly in first aid that they were soon really expert in applying bandages. He even instructed them in improvising splints and reducing fractures. In this secluded land, where for three hundred miles up and down the coast there was no other surgeon than Doctor Joe, it was not unlikely that some day they would be called upon to set a leg or an arm.

Doctor Joe was as ignorant, however, of the art of signalling as were the lads, and he must needs take it up from the very beginning and study with them. It was decided that they should learn both the semaphore and Morse codes, and Doctor Joe insisted that neither he nor the lads should consider the Second Class test satisfactorily passed until they had not only learned the codes but could send and receive messages at the rate of speed designated in the handbook as required for the First Class test.

"It wouldn't be fair to the scouts in the big cities," he declared. "They have to learn a great many things that we already know how to do, like building fires, using the axe and knife, and tracking. Those are things we've been doing all our lives and won't have to practise. We must make it just as hard for ourselves to become Second Class Scouts as it is for the city lads. So we'll make the signalling test that much more difficult."

"I'm thinkin' that's fine now," enthused David, "and when we learn un we'll know that much more."

"That's the idea!" said Doctor Joe. "And we'll not only learn the sixteen principal points of the compass, but we'll learn to box the compass to the quarter point as navigators do."

"I can box un now," grinned David.

"So can I box un!" Andy exclaimed. "Dad told me how, same as he told Davy."

"And I can learn to box un easy," promised Jamie.

Margaret joined them one fine day in the forest behind the cabin when they took their Second Class cooking test, and a jolly day they made of it. It was easy enough to roast a spruce grouse on the end of a stick. Even Jamie had done that many times. But Doctor Joe was called upon to solve the problem of cooking potatoes without cooking utensils, and he did it so satisfactorily that the lads practised it every day afterward for a week.

He resorted to a simple and ordinary method. He dug a narrow trench about six inches deep. Upon this he built a fire, which he permitted to burn until there was a good accumulation of ashes. Then he pushed the fire back and raked the ashes out of the trench. The potatoes were now placed in a row at the bottom of the trench and covered with a good layer of hot ashes. The fire was now drawn back over the ashes that covered the potatoes and permitted to burn briskly.

At the end of an hour he brushed the fire back at one end sufficiently to allow a long slender splinter to be pushed down through the ashes and through a potato. The splinter did not penetrate the potato easily and the fire was drawn in again to burn for another quarter of an hour. Then it was raked out and the potatoes removed, to find that, while the skins were not in the least burned or even scorched, the potatoes were done to a turn.

"You couldn't have baked them better in your oven, Margaret," laughed Doctor Joe.

"I never could have baked un half as well," admitted Margaret, adding, "'tis a wonderful way of cookin'."

"Doctor Joe's fine cookin' everything," declared Andy. "I always likes his cookin' wonderful well."

"Thank you, Andy. That's high praise," acknowledged Doctor Joe, "but I could learn a great deal about cooking from Margaret."

"I just does plain cookin'," Margaret deprecated, but flushed with pleasure at the compliment.

On the last day of September, which was a Friday, David and Doctor Joe crossed over to the Hudson's Bay Post and took Margaret with them for a visit to Kate Huddy, the Post servant's daughter, where she was to remain while the Scouts were enjoying their camp at Hollow Cove.

David and Doctor Joe returned to The Jug on Saturday, and when the other members of the troop arrived in a boat on Sunday, had their own tent equipment and food packed and ready for the little expedition on Monday morning.

It was a jolly meeting. The evening was cold, and when supper was eaten they gathered around the big box stove which crackled cheerfully, and Doctor Joe announced that as this was the first meeting of the troop they must organize and elect leaders, just as troops were organized everywhere else in the world.

When he had thoroughly explained the necessary steps he read to them a brief constitution and by-laws which he had previously prepared. These he had them adopt in due form, and then asked some one to nominate a patrol leader.

Every one, with one accord, nominated David, and he was duly, solemnly, and unanimously elected.

"Now," suggested Doctor Joe, "we must have an assistant patrol leader. Who shall it be?"

"Andy," said Seth Muggs. "Andy's been to the trails and he knows more about un than anybody exceptin' Davy."

"'Twouldn't be fair," objected Andy. "Davy's patrol leader. 'Tis but right we put in one of you that comes from across the Bay. I'm saying Peter Sparks, now."

Doctor Joe agreed with Andy, and Peter Sparks was declared elected. Then Seth nominated Andy for scribe.

"Because," Seth explained, "Andy'll be right handy to Doctor Joe all the time and Doctor Joe can help he to do the writin', and he needs help."

When the election was completed Doctor Joe explained the duties of the officers and the necessity of obedience to them in the performance of scout duties.

"Our troop is a team," said Doctor Joe.

"We must pull together. We are like a team of dogs hauling a komatik. If the dogs all follow the leader and pull together the best that ever they can they get somewhere. If they don't follow the leader, and one pulls in one direction and another pulls in a different direction and some don't pull at all, they never get anywhere and aren't of much use. Our troop is going to be the best we can make it, by all pulling together and doing the very best we know how.

"We must always be ready to help other people at all times, as we promise to do in our oath. If we live up to that we'll do a great deal of good, first and last, up and down the Bay. If some one's life is in danger and we can help them even at the risk of our own we must help them. Everybody wants to be happy. There's nothing that will make us so happy as to do some fine thing every day that will make someone else happy.

"We must train our brains and our hands so that we shall always be prepared to do the right thing and do it quickly. We must learn to keep our temper and not get angry. Let us take the hard knocks that come to us with a smile."

The remainder of the evening was spent in playing some rollicking games that the lads had never heard of before, and which Doctor Joe taught them. There was the one-legged chicken fight, and one or two others, as well as hand wrestling, though that they had seen the Indians play and had practised themselves. They all declared that they had never in their lives had so much fun.

An early start the following morning brought them to Hollow Cove at ten o'clock. Hollow Cove was a fine natural harbour. A brook poured down through a gulch to empty into the Bay, and near its mouth was an excellent landing-place. Not far from the brook, and a hundred feet back from the shore, they pitched their tents in the shelter of the spruce forest where the camp would be well protected from winds and storms.

While the others set up the sheet-iron stoves in the three tents and broke spruce boughs and laid the bough beds, David, Micah, and Lige volunteered to cut wood.

"There's some fine dry wood just to the east'ard and close to shore," suggested David, as they picked up their axes. "It's right handy."

A dozen yards from the camp David suddenly stopped and exclaimed:

"What's that now?"

On a great sloping rock close to the shore, but hidden by a jutting point from the place where they had landed, was a recently made cairn of boulders capped by a large flat stone.

"Somebody's been here!" said David as they hurried forward to examine the cairn.

"'Tis wonderful strange to pile stones that way," said Micah. "'Tis new made, too."

"Maybe it's a cache," suggested Lige, "but it's a rare small un. Look and see. 'Tis a strange place for a cache!"

David lifted the flat stone from the top and discovered beneath it a small tin can. In the can was a folded paper. He removed the paper and unfolding it discovered a message written in a cramped, scrawling hand.

"Read un, Davy! Read un out loud! You reads writin' good!" said Lige, and David read:

"i cum and stayed 2 hour, and wood not stay no longer for i hed to go and did not see you comin any were. Then i gos to the rock were We Was the day We was hunting Wen We come here ferst time. Then i done this way. i Pases 20 Pases up To a Hackmatack Tree. it was north. then i Pases 40 Pases west To a round rock, Then i Pases 60 Pases south To a wite berch i use cumpus. Then i climes a spruce Tree and hangs it and it is out of site in the Branches. if You plays me Crookid look out, i wont Stand for no Crooked work and You know what i will do to anybody plays me Crooked. You no Were to put my haf of the Swag. So i can get it Wen i go to get it."

There was no signature.

"That's a strange un—wonderful strange," said David.

"Stranger'n anything I ever sees," declared Lige.

"Whatever is un all about?" asked Micah.

"That's the strangeness of un," said Lige.

"Let's show un to Doctor Joe," suggested David.

But Doctor Joe, when they broke in upon him a moment later, was as mystified as they.

"It looks," said he, "as though something had been cached and here are the directions for finding the cache. There's a threat in the letter, too, and that looks bad. It's a mystery, lads, we'll try to search out. It doesn't look right. Perhaps it's the clue to some crime."

"How can we search un out?" asked David excitedly. "We're not knowin' the rock, and there's plenty of rocks hereabouts."

"That's true," admitted Doctor Joe. "Go and put the paper back as you found it, and we'll see what we can make out of it later."

The whole camp was excited and every one followed David back to the cairn when he returned to restore the letter to its place in the can.

"'Tis something somebody's tryin' to hide," suggested Peter.

"There's no doubtin' that," said David. "I'm thinkin' 'tis not right whatever 'tis."

"We'll get camp in shape and have our dinner and then try to solve the mystery," said Doctor Joe. "It is a real mystery, for no one would make an ordinary cache in this way, and if it was an honest matter there would be no threat."



CHAPTER XII

THE HIDDEN CACHE

When camp was made snug and dinner disposed of, Doctor Joe followed the boys down to the cairn. A careful examination was made of the soil surrounding the rock upon which the cairn was built, and in loose gravel close to the shore were found the imprints of feet. It was evident, however, that rain had fallen since the tracks were made, for they were so nearly washed away that there could be no certainty whether they were made by moccasins or nailed boots.

"'Twere a week ago they were here whatever," observed David, rising upon his feet after a close scrutiny upon hands and knees. "I'm thinkin' we'll see no sign of un now to help us trail un to the rock the writin' tells about."

"The ground was hard froze a week ago just as 'tis now," said Lige. "They'd be leavin' no tracks on froze ground."

"They makes the tracks that shows here whether the ground were froze or not," observed Seth.

"The gravel were loose and dry so 'tweren't froze," explained Lige, "but away from the dry gravel 'twere all froze, and they'd make no tracks to show. Leastways that's how I thinks about un."

"That's good logic," said Doctor Joe. "I'm afraid we'll have to find the rock without the assistance of any tracks to guide us. There will surely be other signs, however, and we'll look for them while we look for the rock."

"Suppose now we scatters and looks up along the brook and along the ridge for the rock the pacin' were done from," suggested Andy. "'Tis like to be a different lookin' rock from most of un around here or they wouldn't have picked un."

"And 'tis like to be a big un too," volunteered Micah. "They'd be pickin' no little rock for that, whatever. I'm thinkin' 'twill be easy to know un if we sees un."

"Yes," agreed Doctor Joe, "the rock is probably larger or in some other way noticeably different from the others. It may be along the brook, or it may not. They were hunting. It may be a rock where they camped, or where they agreed to meet after their hunt, and probably where they boiled their kettle."

"They weren't Bay folk, whatever," asserted David. "The writin' ain't like any of the Bay folkses writin'. None of un here could write so fine."

"None of the Bay folk would be hidin' things that way either," said Andy. "If 'twere anything small enough to hide in a tree they'd been takin' un with un and not leavin' un behind. If 'twere too big to carry, they'd just left un in a cache and come back for un when they gets ready and not do any writin' about un."

"I think you are right, Andy," agreed Doctor Joe. "For the reasons you give and for still other reasons I feel very certain strangers to the Bay left the cache."

"What were they meanin' by 'swag,' Doctor Joe?" asked Andy. "I never hears that word before. 'Tis a wonderful strange word."

"It usually means," explained Doctor Joe, "something that has been stolen. The use of that word is one of the reasons that leads me to conclude that it was not written by any of our people of the Bay. I am quite sure none of them knows what the word means, and like you I doubt if any of them ever heard it. There seems no doubt, indeed, that strangers to these parts wrote it, and as there are no other strangers in the Bay than the lumbermen, we are safe in concluding that the cairn was built and the note written by someone from the lumber camp at Grampus River."

"'Swag' is a wonderful strange soundin' word, now," said David. "I never hears un before."

"I'm thinkin' I knows what 'tis they hid now!" exclaimed Andy suddenly. "'Tis Lem Horn's silver! 'Tis the men hid un that shot Lem and stole the silver! 'Tweren't Indian Jake shot Lem at all! 'Twere men from the lumber camp! What they calls 'swag' is Lem's silver!"

"That's what 'tis, now! 'Tis sure Lem Horn's silver!" David exploded excitedly. "I never would have thought of un bein' that! Andy's wonderful spry thinkin' things out, and he's mostly always right, too!"

"And Indian Jake never stole un! He never stole un!" Jamie burst out joyfully. "I were knowin' all the time he wouldn't steal un! Indian Jake wouldn't go shootin' folk and stealin' from un!"

"It may be," said Doctor Joe. "At any rate it seems extremely probable the 'swag' as they call it is stolen property that has been hidden. That word and the threat together with the other circumstances make it quite certain, indeed, that whatever it is they refer to was stolen. That's a safe conclusion to begin with. We have decided that we may be quite sure, also, that the men that hid the cache so carefully were none of our own Bay people, but men from the lumber camp. We have heard of nothing else than Lem Horn's silver fox having been stolen in the Bay. We have some ground, therefore, to suppose that the 'swag' is Lem Horn's silver fox. It will be a fine piece of work to search out the cache, and if it proves to contain Lem's silver fox, recover it for him. We will be doing a good turn to Lem and at the same time will lift suspicion from Indian Jake. If we find the cache and there is nothing in it that should not be there, we will not interfere with it. Now how shall we go about it to trace it? Let's hear what you chaps think is the best plan."

"We'll separate and look for the rock they tells about," suggested David. "There's like to be some signs so we'll know un when we sees un. If we finds the rock 'twill not be hard to pace off the way they says in the paper."

"And we'll be lookin' out for other signs," added Peter. "'Tis likely they've been cuttin' wood or breakin' twigs or makin' a fire."

"The brook ain't froze, and I'm thinkin' now they been walkin' there and leavin' tracks, if they were going' for water, and 'tis likely they were gettin' water to boil the kettle," reasoned Seth.

"Suppose," suggested Doctor Joe, "two of you follow up the brook, one on each side, and the rest of us will spread out on each side of the two following the brook, and look for the rock and other signs that will guide us."

"We better make a writin' for each of us just like the writin' in the can with what it says about how to find the cache if we finds the rock," suggested Andy. "I for one'll never be rememberin' all of un without a writin' to look at whatever."

"That's true, Andy," agreed Doctor Joe, "and none of us would."

"Andy always thinks of things like that!" exclaimed David admiringly.

"Get the paper from the can and bring it up to camp," directed Doctor Joe. "We'll make several copies of the directions. I have paper and pencil there in the tent."

David lifted the flat stone from the top of the cairn, and removing the paper he and the others followed Doctor Joe to his tent, where Doctor Joe made nine copies of the explicit directions, one for himself and one for each of the lads.

"You had better return this now to the can," said Doctor Joe, handing the paper back to David, "for if it should prove after all that we have been mistaken, and that the cache does not contain Lem's silver fox or other stolen property, it would be wrong, and we would not wish, to interfere with the man for whom this paper was left here finding the cache."

"'Twould be fair wicked to do that," agreed David. "I'll put un back."

When the paper had again been returned to its hiding-place Doctor Joe detailed the boys to their different positions. David and Peter were to follow the brook, David on the left side and Peter on the right side as they ascended. Seth Muggs, Obadiah Button, Andy and Jamie were to spread out at intervals on the left from David, and Lige Sparks, Micah Dunk and Doctor Joe on the right side of the brook from Peter. All were to ascend through the woods at the same time, keeping a sharp look-out to right and to left for any unusual rock or other possible signs that might lead to a clue.

"Now we had better keep close enough together to keep in sight the man nearest us on the side toward the brook," directed Doctor Joe. "If we spread farther apart than that we shall be too far apart to see any rock that may be between us."

"Aye, and we'll keep lookin' both ways," said Andy. "That way we can't miss un."

"It's now," Doctor Joe consulted his watch, "one-thirty o'clock. It's cloudy and it will be dark by half-past four. I'll call to Micah at half-past three and he will pass the word along to the next man and he to the next and so on until all have been notified. Then we will immediately come together and return to camp, that is, of course, if we have not already found the cache. If before that time anyone finds what he thinks may be the rock he will pass the word to his neighbour, and we'll close in and make our search together. If it begins to snow, and the snow is too thick for us to see our next neighbour, we'll close in, for in that case we would miss the rock anyway. Do you all understand?"

Every one understood, as the chorus of "Yes, sir," testified.

"Jamie," said Doctor Joe, "you're the youngest one, and you haven't had much experience tramping through the woods. If you get tired, or find it hard, just come over to the brook and follow it down to camp. If you get there ahead of us you might start a fire in our tent stove and put the kettle over."

"I've got plenty o' grit, sir," Jamie boasted. "I can stand un."

"I think you can," agreed Doctor Joe, "but your legs are short. If you get tired don't keep going. Perhaps you had better take the outside place, and if you do get tired and fall out it won't break the line."

Full of eagerness and excitement, the boys took their positions. On the left bank of the brook was David, next him to the left Obadiah Button, then Andy, beyond him Seth Muggs, and finally Jamie. This placed Jamie on the extreme left flank, in accordance with Doctor Joe's suggestion, and the farthest from David and the brook.

On the right bank of the brook were Peter Sparks, Doctor Joe, Lige Sparks and Micah Dunk in the order named, with Micah on the extreme right flank.

It was a great and thrilling adventure for all the boys, but particularly for Jamie. There was a mystery to be solved, and in the attempt to solve it there was not merely curiosity but a worthy object in view. If the cache proved to contain Lem Horn's silver fox skin Lem and his whole family would be made happy.

Jamie, in his unwavering loyalty, was anxious to lift from Indian Jake all suspicion of the crime. At present every one in the Bay, save only the Angus boys, believed Indian Jake guilty of it. Even Doctor Joe was not satisfied of his innocence, and, indeed, everything pointed to Indian Jake's guilt. Doctor Joe believed that the Angus boys were prejudiced in their loyalty to Indian Jake because of the fact that he had done them kindnesses.

Jamie was sure that if they found this cache there would be proof that he and David and Andy were right and everybody else wrong. Not only did this feature of the adventure appeal to him, but also the fact that he was for the first time in his life trailing in the wilderness and taking part in an undertaking that seemed to him one of vast importance.

Jamie had never slept in a tent. His only acquaintance with the great wilderness had been confined to the woods surrounding The Jug, and always when in company with David or Andy or his father or Doctor Joe. Now he was determined to do as well as any of them, and, no matter how tired he became, to stick to the trail until Doctor Joe gave the signal to return to camp.

As they ascended the slope Jamie kept a sharp look-out to right and left. Now and again Seth Muggs on his right was hidden by a clump of thick spruce trees or would disappear behind a wooded rise, presently to appear again through the trees.

Jamie was happy. He was keeping pace with the others without the least difficulty. Doctor Joe had hinted that his short legs might not permit him to do this. He would prove that he was as able as Seth Muggs or any of them!

Nothing happened for nearly an hour, and Jamie was beginning to think that the search was to end in disappointment, when suddenly his heart gave a leap of joy. Far to the left and just visible through the trees rose the outlines of a great grey rock.

"That's the rock!" exclaimed Jamie. "That's sure he! I'll look at un for signs, and then if there's any signs to be seen about un I'll call Seth!"

Jamie ran through the trees and brush to the rock, which proved, indeed, to be a landmark. It stood alone, and was twice as high as Jamie's head.

Here he was treated to another thrill. On the west side of the rock was the charred wood of a recent camp fire. A tent had been pitched near at hand, as was evidenced by the still unwithered boughs that had formed a bed, and discarded tent pegs, and there were many axe cuttings.

"'Twere white men and not Injuns that camped here," reasoned Jamie. "All the Injun fires I ever heard tell about were made smaller than this un. And these folk were pilin' up stones on the side. No Injuns or Bay folk does that, whatever!"

Jamie continued to investigate.

"'Twere not Bay folk did the axe cuttin' either," he decided. "All the Bay folk and Injuns uses small axes when they travels, and this cuttin' were done with big uns!"

Looking about the rock he found other evidences that the campers had been strangers to the country. There was a piece of a Halifax newspaper, an empty bottle, and a small tin can containing matches. The box of matches he put into his pocket. They had been lost or overlooked, and no hunter of the Bay or Indian would ever have been guilty of such carelessness. Of this Jamie had no question.

"'Tis sure the rock the writin' tells about," he commented.

Jamie looked a little farther, and then suddenly realizing that he should not wait too long before calling, shouted lustily:

"Seth, I finds un! Seth! Seth! I finds the rock!"

He waited a moment for Seth's answering call, but there was no response. A much longer time had elapsed during Jamie's examination of the rock and the surroundings than he realized, and in the meantime Seth and the others had passed on, and Seth was now in a deeply wooded gully where Jamie's shouts failed to reach him.

"Seth! Seth! I finds un! I finds the place!" he shouted again, but still there was no response from Seth.

"I'm thinkin' now Seth has gone too far to hear," said Jamie to himself. "'Twould be fine to find Lem's silver all alone and take un back to camp. I'll just do what the writin' says. I'll pace up the places. I can do un all by myself, and 'twill be a fine surprise to un all to take the silver back to camp."

Jamie had no doubt that the mysterious cache contained the stolen fox pelt. No thought of disappointment in this or of danger to himself entered his head. His whole mind was centred upon one point. He would be the hero of the Bay if, quite alone, he succeeded in recovering Lem's property and at the same time in clearing Indian Jake of suspicion.

Without further delay he drew from his pocket the carefully folded copy of directions that Doctor Joe had given him and sat down to study it.



CHAPTER XIII

SURPRISED AND CAPTURED

"Twenty paces to a hackmatack tree, north," read Jamie. He drew from his pocket the little compass Doctor Joe had given him, and took the direction.

"That's the way she goes, the way the needle points," he said to himself. "I'll pace un off. North is the way she goes first."

But an obstacle presented itself. The northern face of the rock was irregular, and from end to end fully thirty feet in length. From what point of the rock was the northerly line to begin? Where should he begin to pace? Finally he selected a middle point as the most probable.

"'Twill be from here," he decided. "They'd never be startin' the line from anywheres but the middle."

Holding the compass in his hand that he might make no mistake, and trembling with the excitement of one about to make a great discovery, he paced to the northward, stretching his short legs to the longest possible stride, until he counted twenty paces. It brought him not to a hackmatack tree, but to the middle of several spruce trees. He returned to the rock and tried again. This time he was led to a tangle of brush to the left of the spruce trees into which his former effort had taken him. He was vastly puzzled.

"'Tis something I does wrong," he mused. "Doctor Joe were sayin' the compass points right, and she is right. 'Tis wonderful strange though."

He experimented again and discovered that if he did not hold the compass perfectly level the needle did not swing properly. In his excitement he had doubtless tipped the compass, and with the needle thus bound he had been led astray.

He climbed to the top of the rock, and placing his compass in a level position, permitted the needle to swing to a stationary position. He extracted a match from the tin box in his pocket and laid it upon the compass dial exactly parallel with the needle. Lying on his face, he squinted his eye along the match to a distant tree. Rising, he observed the tree that he might make no mistake, and returning to the face of the rock strode twenty of his best paces in the direction of the tree. Again he was disappointed. There was no hackmatack tree at the end of his line.

"Maybe he was a big man that does the pacin' and takes longer paces," he said to himself. "I'll go a bit farther."

He looked directly ahead, but saw no hackmatack within a reasonable extension of his twenty paces to account for the longer strides the original pacer may have taken. Much discouraged, he was about to return again to the rock when suddenly his eye fell upon a small and scarcely noticeable hackmatack six paces to the right of his north line and a little beyond him.

"That must be he, now!" he exclaimed. "'Tis the only hackmatack I sees hereabouts. 'Tis sure he! I'll pace un back to the rock! If the tree's nuth'ard from the rock, the rock'll be south'ard from the tree. I'll try pacin' that way."