WHAT WOODCRAFT MEANT.
"Wolves! Oh, my gracious! You don't say!" cried Bandy-legs, making a dive
for the two sleeping bunks that Steve had built along one side of the
inside wall of the cabin.
Of course there was an immediate scurrying around. All the other boys
were on their feet instantly, even tired Toby with the rest.
Max instinctively threw a glance toward the corner where his faithful gun
stood. He did not jump to secure it, however, because something caused
him to first of all steal a quick look at Trapper Jim. When he discovered
that worthy with a broad smile upon his face, Max decided that after all
the danger could hardly be as severe as indications pointed.
Meanwhile Steve had managed to slam the door shut, and was holding it so
with his whole weight while he tried to adjust the bar properly in its
twin sockets.
Steve was trembling all over with excitement. A thing like this was apt
to stir him up tremendously.
"Why don't some of you lend a hand here?" he kept calling out. "Plague
take that clumsy old bar, won't it ever take hold? Get my gun for me,
can't you, Bandy-legs? Listen to the varmints a-tryin' to break in, would
you. Wow! Ain't they mad I fooled them, though? Say, I wonder now if
they'd think to get on the roof and come down the chimbly. Hand me my
gun, Bandy-legs! Get a move on you!"
By this time Jim was doubled up with laughter.
"Hold on you cannon-ball express boy," he remarked, as he stepped over
and began to take away the bar which Steve had managed to get in place
with so much trouble; "I guess we'll have to let these critters come in.
They look on Uncle Jim's cabin as their home."
"What, wolves!" gasped Steve.
"Well, hardly, but my two dogs, Ajax and Don," replied the trapper. "You
see, I didn't want them along when I borrowed that buckboard and team to
fetch you all here. So I left 'em with a neighbor three miles off, and
told him to set 'em loose to-night. So you thought they were wolves, did
you, Steve? Well, I guess they look somethin' that way, and the moonlight
was a little deceivin', too."
With that he threw open the door.
Immediately a couple of shaggy dogs bounded in and began barking
furiously as they jumped up at their master, showing all the symptoms of
great joy.
"Sho, one'd think they hadn't seen me for a whole month, instead of only
a few hours," laughed Trapper Jim, as he fondled the dogs.
Then the five boys in turn were introduced, as gravely as though Ajax and
Don might be human beings.
"They're quick to catch on," remarked Trapper Jim. "They know now you're
all friends of mine, and you can depend on 'em to stand by you through
thick and thin."
"What are they good for?" asked Bandy-legs.
"This smaller one is reckoned the best 'coon dog in the woods," replied
the other, patting the head of Don. "If there's a striped-tail in the
district and I set him to working, he'll get him up a tree sooner or
later. And when the animal is knocked to the ground Don knows just how to
get the right grip on his throat."
"But his ears are all slit, and his head looks like it had been scratched
and gouged a whole lot," remarked Steve.
"Well, old 'coons, they've got pretty sharp claws sometimes, ain't they,
Don?" continued the old trapper. "And in the excitement a dog can't
always just defend himself, eh, old fellow! They will get a dig in once
in a while, spite of us."
Don barked three times, just as if he understood every single word his
master was saying.
"And how about Ajax?" Bandy-legs continued.
"He's a general all-around dog, and ain't afraid of anything that walks.
Why, boys, I've known him to tackle and kill the biggest lynx ever seen
in these parts, and that's something few dogs could do."
"What's a lynx?" asked Bandy-legs.
"A species of wildcat that sometimes strays down this way across the
Canada border," replied the trapper. "Generally speaking, he's bigger'n
the other and fierce as all get out. Fact is, I believe I'd sooner have a
panther tackle me than a full-grown, ugly tempered lynx. Some people call
it the 'woods devil,' and they hit it pretty near right, too."
"Hasn't a lynx got some sort of mark about him that makes him look
different from the ordinary bobcat?" asked Owen.
"Why, yes," replied Trapper Jim, "there's some difference in the beasts;
but I reckon the little tassels that kinder adorn the ears of the lynx
mark him most of all."
"Looks like a full house, now," remarked Max, who had not hesitated to
make up with both the dogs, being very fond of their kind.
"Oh, while I have company Ajax and Don'll have to sleep in the shed or
lean-to outside," remarked the master of the dogs. "Of course, when I'm
here all by myself they stay indoors with me. And I tell you, lads, they
make a fellow feel less lonely in the long winter days and nights. Dogs
are men's best friends--that is, the right kind of dogs. They become
greatly attached to you, too."
Toby just then seemed to become greatly excited. Finding it difficult to
express himself as he wanted, he pointed straight at Steve, and was heard
to say:
"A-a-attached to you! S-s-sure they do; S-s-steve knows! Saw one attached
to h-h-him once. Wouldn't h-h-hardly let go."
At that there were loud shouts, and even Steve himself could hardly keep
from grinning at the recollection of the picture Toby's words recalled.
"'Spose you fellers never _will_ get over that affair," he remarked, as
he put his hand behind him, just as if after all these months he still
felt a pain where the dog had bitten him. "Cost me a good pair of
trousers, too, in the bargain. It was a bulldog," he added, turning
toward Trapper Jim, "and he was so much attached to me that he followed
me halfway 'over a seven-foot fence. Would have gone the whole thing only
the cloth gave way and he lost his grip."
"Well, that showed a warm, generous nature," remarked Trapper Jim; "some
dogs are marked that way."
"This one was," declared Steve. "But I got even with the critter."
"How was that?" asked the other, looking a little serious; for, himself a
lover of dogs, he never liked to hear of one being abused.
"I got me one of those little liquid pistols, you know, and laid for my
old enemy," Steve continued; "he saw me passing by and came bouncing out
to try my other leg. But he changed his mind in a big hurry. And, say,
you just ought to 'a' heard him yelp when he turned around and faced the
other way."
"You didn't blind the poor beast, I hope?" remarked Jim.
"Oh, nothin' to speak of," said Steve, gayly. "He was all right the next
day. Ammonia smarts like fun for awhile, but it goes off. But, listen,
whenever I passed that house, if old Beauty was sitting on the steps like
he used to do, as soon as he glimpsed me, would you believe it, he'd turn
tail and run quick for the back yard and watch me around the comer of the
house."
"You had him tamed, all right," said Max.
"We called it an even break, and let it go at that," said Steve.
When the boys began to yawn, and betrayed unmistakable evidences of being
sleepy, their host showed them how he had arranged it so that they could
all sleep comfortably.
There were only two wooden bunks, one above the other. Trapper Jim was to
occupy the lower one, and turn about, the five boys were to have the
other.
This necessitated four of them sleeping on the floor each night. But as
there were plenty of soft furs handy, and the boys announced that they
always enjoyed being able to stretch out on the ground, Jim knew he would
have no trouble on this score.
So the first night passed.
Perhaps none of them slept as well as usual. This nearly always turns out
to be the case with those who go into the wilderness for a spell. The
change from home comforts and soft beds to the hardships that attend
roughing it can be set down as the principal cause.
However, nothing serious occurred during the night calculated to disturb
them. It is true Toby did fall out of the upper berth once, landing on a
couple of the others with a thump, but then such a little matter was
hardly worth mentioning between friends.
And they could understand how Toby must be dreaming of his recent
trouble, as he hung over that terrible abyss by his hold on a single
root.
Perhaps the root gave way in his dreams, and Toby made a frantic effort
to save himself.
Morning came at last.
Breakfast was cooked and eaten with considerable eagerness, for
immediately it was over the boys expected to accompany their host while
he made his first tour of the season, intending to set a few traps in
places that had been marked as favorable to the carrying out of his
business.
They could hardly wait for Trapper Jim to get through his chores.
Presently Jim went over several lots of hanging traps and selected those
he wished to use on the first day.
How he seemed to handle certain ones fondly, as though they carried with
them memories of stirring events in the dim past.
They all looked pretty much alike to the boys, but Jim undoubtedly had
certain little familiar marks by means of which he recognized each
individual trap. He mentioned some of their peculiar histories as he
picked out his "lucky" traps.
"This one held two mink at a pop twice now, something I never knew to
happen before," he remarked.
"And this old rusty one was lost a whole season. When I happened to find
it, there was a piece of bone and some fur between the jaws, showing that
the poor little critter had gnawed off its own foot rather than die of
starvation. Made me fell bad, that did. A good trapper seldom allows such
a thing to happen."
"Do mink really set themselves free that way?" asked Owen.
"They will, if given half a chance," was Jim's reply. "That's one reason
we always try to fix it so that mink, otter, muskrats, fisher, and all
animals that are trapped along the edge of streams manage to drown
themselves soon after they are caught. It saves the pelt from being
injured, too, by their crazy efforts to break away."
"And what of that trap over there? You seem to be taking mighty good care
of it," said Max, who was deeply interested in everything the trapper was
doing.
"Well, I hadn't ought to complain about that trap," came the answer.
"Year before last it caught me a silver fox, as the black fox is called.
And perhaps you know that a prime black fox pelt is worth as high as
several thousand dollars."
"Hear that, will you!" exclaimed Steve.
"H-h-how much d-d-did you g-g-get for it?" asked Toby.
"Well," Jim went on to say, "it wasn't a Number One, but they allowed I
ought to get eight-fifty for it; which check was enclosed in the letter
I'll show you some day. I keep it to prove the truth of my story."
"A bully good day's work, eh?" remarked Steve.
"Best that ever came my way," admitted the other.
"Gee, wonder now if we'd be lucky enough to set eyes on a silver fox
worth a cool thousand or more?" ventured Bandy-legs.
"It is barely possible you may, boys," remarked the trapper; "because I
saw a beauty two or three times during the summer. And I'm kind of hoping
there may be some sort of magic about this same trap to coax him to put
his foot in it."
"A single fox skin fetching thousands of dollars!" remarked Steve, as if
hardly able to grasp it as the truth. "Whew, that beats finding pearls in
the shells of mussels all hollow!"
"Yes," Owen broke in, "and even Ted Shafter and his crowd hunting wild
ginseng roots and selling it to the wholesale drug house at big money
doesn't cut so much of a figure after all, does it?"
"One thing I want to ask you, boys, right in the start," the trapper took
occasion to say; "while you're up with me you must promise never to shoot
at a fox, a mink, a marten, an otter, or in fact any small fur-bearing
animal."
"We give you our word, all right, Uncle Jim," said Steve, readily.
"Of course," continued the old trapper, "my one reason for asking this is
to keep you from ruining good pelts. It would be pretty tough now if
after I caught that black fox I found that his skin had been so badly
torn by birdshot that it wasn't worth handling."
"That's right, it would," admitted Owen.
"You can depend on us to hold back," Max added, sincerely.
"Well, this is about all the traps I care to put out to-day," and as he
spoke Jim made them up in two bundles, one of which he gave to Toby and
the other to Bandy-legs.
He saw that, ordinarily, these two were the least important members of
the club. And in the kindness of his heart he wished to make them feel
that he needed their especial help.
So Toby and the other chum slung the traps over their shoulders with
ill-concealed pleasure in that they had been singled out for such
attention by the old trapper.
"Then you don't mean to set Old Tom to-day," asked Owen, pointing to a
big trap, whose weight and grim-looking jaws announced that it was
intended for large game.
Old Jim smiled and shook his head, as he replied:
"Hardly any use, unless we run across bear tracks. Such a thing might
happen, you know; because it did snow last night, and there's a good inch
on the ground right now."
"But, hold on," said Owen, "I understood that bears always went to sleep
in the fall and stayed in some cave or a hollow tree till spring came."
"They do," answered the trapper, "but generally hang around till the
first real hard blizzard comes along. This little snow don't count, and
every day a bear is able to be around hunting roots and such things, why,
the less he has to live on his own fat, you know, But we're all ready
now, so come along, boys."
The dogs were left at the cabin, which Jim did not even shut up. He knew
Ajax and Don would stay close at home; for the sight of the strings of
traps told the intelligent dogs they could not be allowed to accompany
their master on this expedition.
An hour later, and Jim was showing the eager and curious boys who
remained at a little distance, so that their scent might not cause the
cautious mink to abandon his usual trail, just how he set a trap in order
to catch the cunning little animal, and make him drown himself with the
weight of the trap.
The snare was set at the mouth of a hole in the bank of a creek, and
which, Jim informed them, was one of many visited by the male mink each
night as they wandered up and down the stream.
He used some animal "scent" contained in a small bottle to help attract
his prey. Then, after destroying all evidences of his having been there
as much as he possibly could, Trapper Jim rejoined the boys.
"Now we'll head for the marsh where I put several traps day before
yesterday and mean to add a few more to-day," he remarked. "As we go,
I'll try to explain just why a man has to be so very careful whenever he
matches his wits against those of a wily and timid little beast."
They hung upon every word Jim uttered, for these secrets of the woods
were things all of them had long wanted to know. What could musty old
school books teach them that could equal the knowledge they imbibed
straight out of the fountain of experience.
It was while Jim was holding forth in his most effective manner, so as to
thrill every one of his boy friends, that they saw him come to a sudden
stop.
His eyes were fastened upon the white ground just in front of them, and
as he pointed with his gun he electrified the boys by saying:
"Mebbe after all we might have use of Old Tom to-morrow, for there's the
tracks of a big bear."