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[Illustration: DAVE, THE MAIL CARRIER.]
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BOY TRAPPER SERIES.
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THE
MAIL CARRIER.
BY HARRY CASTLEMON,
AUTHOR OF “THE FRANK NELSON SERIES,” “THE SPORTSMAN’S CLUB SERIES,”
“GUNBOAT SERIES,” &C.
[Illustration: Publisher’s Logo]
PHILADELPHIA:
PORTER & COATES.
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FAMOUS CASTLEMON BOOKS.
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GUNBOAT SERIES. By HARRY CASTLEMON. Illustrated. 6 vols. 16mo. Cloth,
extra, black and gold.
FRANK THE YOUNG NATURALIST. FRANK ON A GUNBOAT. FRANK IN THE
WOODS. FRANK BEFORE VICKSBURG. FRANK ON THE LOWER MISSISSIPPI.
FRANK ON THE PRAIRIE.
ROCKY MOUNTAIN SERIES. By HARRY CASTLEMON. Illustrated. 3 vols. 16mo.
Cloth, extra, black and gold.
FRANK AMONG THE RANCHEROS.
FRANK AT DON CARLOS’ RANCHO.
FRANK IN THE MOUNTAINS.
SPORTSMAN’S CLUB SERIES. By HARRY CASTLEMON. Illustrated. 3 vols.
16mo. Cloth, extra, black and gold.
THE SPORTSMAN’S CLUB IN THE SADDLE.
THE SPORTSMAN’S CLUB AFLOAT.
THE SPORTSMAN’S CLUB AMONG THE TRAPPERS.
GO-AHEAD SERIES. By HARRY CASTLEMON. Illustrated. 3 vols. 16mo. Cloth,
extra, black and gold.
TOM NEWCOMBE. GO-AHEAD. NO MOSS.
FRANK NELSON SERIES. By HARRY CASTLEMON. Illustrated. 3 vols. 16mo.
Cloth, extra, black and gold.
SNOWED UP. FRANK IN THE FORECASTLE. BOY TRADERS.
BOY TRAPPER SERIES. By HARRY CASTLEMON. Illustrated. 3 vols. 16mo.
Cloth, extra, black and gold.
THE BURIED TREASURE; OR, OLD JORDAN’S HAUNT.
THE BOY TRAPPER; OR, HOW DAVE FILLED THE ORDER.
THE MAIL CARRIER.
ROUGHING IT SERIES. By HARRY CASTLEMON. Illustrated. 16mo. Cloth,
extra, black and gold.
GEORGE IN CAMP.
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Other Volumes in Preparation.
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Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1879, by
PORTER & COATES,
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington.
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CONTENTS.
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CHAPTER PAGE
I. “Hark Back!” 5
II. A Mighty Hunter 24
III. Lester shows his courage 42
IV. Don shows his 55
V. Godfrey visits the Cabin 73
VI. Bob is astonished 94
VII. Bob’s Plans 114
VIII. Bob in a quandary 131
IX. The Runaway 147
X. Bob’s first Adventure 165
XI. The Cub Pilot 185
XII. George at the Wheel 207
XIII. The burning of the Sam Kendall 227
XIV. A Specimen Trapper 246
XV. The lost Pocket-book 265
XVI. Dan makes a discovery 286
XVII. Conclusion 303
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THE
MAIL CARRIER.
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CHAPTER I
“HARK BACK!”
“LOOK out thar, Dannie! Don’t run over a feller!”
Dan Evans, who was trudging along the dusty road, with his eyes fastened
thoughtfully on the ground, and his mind so wholly given up to
meditation that he did not know what was going on around him, stopped
suddenly when these words fell upon his ear, and looked up to find
himself confronted by a horseman, who had checked his nag just in time
to prevent the animal from stepping on the boy. He was a small planter
in the neighborhood, and Dan was well acquainted with him.
“You’re gettin’ to be sich rich folks up to your house that you look fur
everybody to get outen your way, I reckon, don’t you?” continued the
planter, with a good-natured smile.
“Rich!” repeated Dan, flushing angrily, as he drew his tattered coat
about him. He did not know what the planter meant, and thought he was
making sport of his poverty. “I can’t help it kase I don’t wear good
clothes like Don and Bert, kin I? I work monstrous hard——”
“And get well paid fur it, too, _I_ tell you,” interrupted the horseman.
“I’d be glad of a chance to ’arn that much money myself. You needn’t
wear sich clothes as them no longer, kase Dave an’ you is pardners, most
likely, an’ he’ll do what’s right by you.”
“Dave!” echoed Dan, who now began to listen more eagerly.
“Yes. He’s a powerful smart boy, Dave is, an’ I’m glad to see him so
lucky. He took home a wad of greenbacks this arternoon as big as that,”
said the planter, pushing back his sleeve and showing his brawny wrist.
Dan fairly gasped for breath. He backed toward a log by the roadside and
seated himself upon it, letting his rifle fall out of his hands in his
excitement.
“Yes,” continued the planter, who seemed to be a little surprised at
Dan’s behavior; “them quails reached that man up North all right, an’
to-day the money come—a hundred an’ ninety-two dollars an’ a half.”
Dan gasped again, and, taking off his hat, drew his coat-sleeve across
his forehead.
“Yes. Silas Jones, he done took twenty-eight dollars outen it fur
freight an’ give Dave the balance—a trifle over a hundred an’ sixty-four
dollars. I was in the store at the time, an’ it done me good to see Dave
take them thar greenbacks an’ walk out.”
“Whar—whar’s the money now?” Dan managed to ask at last.
“Why, he took it home with him, I reckon. What else should he do with
it? Now, Dannie, don’t you get on a high hoss an’ say that you won’t
look at us common folks any more.”
With this parting advice the planter rode off, leaving Dan sitting on
his log, lost in wonder. It was a long time before he recovered himself,
and when he did, he jumped to his feet as if he had just thought of
something that ought to have been attended to long ago, caught up his
rifle and disappeared in the woods.
This incident happened on the same day on which Silas Jones paid David
for the quails he had shipped by the steamer Emma Deane. At the close of
the second volume of this series, we saw that as soon as David had
received the reward of his labors he made all haste to reach home. He
found his mother there, but before he said a word to her about his good
fortune he walked around the cabin two or three times and looked sharply
in every direction, to make sure that his brother Dan was nowhere in the
vicinity; and having satisfied himself on this point, he went in and
laid the roll of greenbacks in his mother’s lap.
David had reason to feel proud, for he had earned the money in spite of
many obstacles. In the first place, there was Dan, who, when he learned
that his brother was in a fair way to earn a handsome sum of money by
trapping quails and shipping them to a man in the North, who had
advertised for them, determined to share in the proceeds of his work,
and offered to go into partnership with him; but David would not
consent, and this made Dan his enemy. Dan declared that not a quail
should be caught in those fields. He would make it his business to hunt
up his brother’s traps, and if there were any birds in them he would
either liberate them or wring their necks, and then he would smash the
traps. But, as it happened, Dan did not carry this threat into
execution. An older and wiser person than himself, with whom he held
frequent consultations, had another plan to propose, and Dan readily
fell in with it.
Godfrey Evans, Dan’s father and David’s, was in deep disgrace. He had
robbed Clarence Gordon of twenty dollars on the highway, and for fear
that he would be arrested and punished for it, he took to the woods and
stayed there. He lived on a little island in the bayou, about two miles
from the settlement, which had been his hiding-place during the war,
when the Union forces were raiding that part of Mississippi. Here he
lived in a miserable brush lean-to, with no companion but his rifle,
until his hiding-place was accidentally discovered by Dan, during one of
his rambles in the woods.
Of course Godfrey was anxious to know what had been going on in the
settlement since he left, and among other things Dan told him that David
was going to make himself rich by catching quails, but that he (Dan) had
resolved to put a stop to it by breaking his traps. After hearing a
statement of the case, Godfrey told his hopeful son that if he wished to
be revenged upon David for his refusal to go into partnership with him,
there was a better way than that. It was not to their interest to
interfere with the _Boy Trapper_ in any manner. Let him go on and catch
the birds, and when his work was done and he had received the money for
it, _then_ it would be time for them to act. They would take the money
themselves and divide it equally between them. Godfrey did not say what
he intended to do with his share when he got it, but he drew the most
glowing pictures of the comforts and luxuries with which Dan could
provide himself when he received the money that would fall to his lot.
Dan wanted to live just as Don and Bert Gordon lived. He wanted a
spotted pony, a breech-loading shot-gun, a jointed fish-pole and a
sail-boat; and in order to insure his earnest assistance in the scheme
he proposed, Godfrey held out the idea that for seventy-five dollars
(they expected that David would receive one hundred and fifty dollars
for his birds, and that would give them just seventy-five dollars
apiece, if the money were equally divided) all these nice things could
be purchased, and besides something would be left to be invested in good
clothes.
Dan was delighted with his father’s plans, and from that hour was as
much interested in David’s success as David was himself. It chanced,
too, that he was able to defeat a plot which, if carried into execution,
would have worked much injury to the boy trapper. It turned out that
there were two other persons in the settlement whom David had reason to
fear. They were Lester Brigham and Bob Owens; and as they did not expect
to share in the money after David earned it, they were determined that
he should not earn any at all. They were disappointed applicants for the
very contract that had been given to David. When they read the
advertisement in the _Rod and Gun_, calling for fifty dozen live quails,
they lost no time in replying to it; but they were just three days too
late, the wide-awake Don Gordon having already secured the order for
David Evans.
When Bob and Lester found this out they were very angry. Bob wanted a
breech-loader as much as Dan did. Almost every boy in the settlement
with whom he associated owned one, and seventy-five dollars would put
him in possession of one, too. He had long been on the lookout for a
chance to earn that amount of money, and when it was almost within his
grasp it was snatched from him by that meddlesome Don Gordon and handed
over to that ragamuffin Dave Evans. This was the way Bob and his friend
looked at the matter, and after they had talked it over they came to the
conclusion that David had no business with so much money, and that he
should not have it. They wrote to the man who had advertised for the
quails, telling him that the person to whom he had given the order was
not reliable and could not furnish him with the required number of
birds; and then they set to work to make their words good.
The first thing they did was to try to frighten David by threatening him
with the terrors of a law which did not exist. Lester told him that if
he trapped quails and sent them out of the state he would render himself
liable to fine and imprisonment; but David knew better, and positively
refused to give up his chances of earning an honest dollar, although
Lester threatened to beat him with his riding-whip if he did not. Being
defeated at this point, the conspirators tried another plan. They drew
up a constitution and by-laws for the government of a Sportsman’s Club,
and Lester started out to obtain signers to it. He first called upon Don
and Bert Gordon, for he knew that if he could secure their names, he
could secure Fred and Joe Packard’s, too, and, through the influence of
these four, every young sportsman in the settlement could be brought
into the club. But Don and Bert did not like Lester, and neither did
they like the object for which the club was to be organized. They saw
plainly that Bob and Lester were trying to form a combination against
David Evans, and as they could not assist in any such business as that,
they declined to put down their names.
Highly enraged over their second failure, Bob and Lester prepared to
take vengeance on the brothers, which they did that very night by
setting fire to their shooting-box, which was located on the shore of
the lake. Then, being determined that they would not give up until David
had been driven from the field, they decided upon another plan, which
was to set their own traps, which they had made in expectation of
receiving the order, capture as many birds as they could, and at the
same time watch David’s traps and steal every quail they found in them.
But this plan failed also. The quails would not get into their traps and
they could not find any of David’s. The reason was because they looked
on Godfrey’s plantation for them, and David’s traps were all set in
General Gordon’s fields.
The conspirators did not know that Don and Bert were assisting David in
his work, but they found it out one morning by accident. They saw the
three boys in the act of transferring their captured quails from a trap
to a large coop they had placed in a wagon, and following the wagon as
it left the field, they saw that when the captives were removed from the
coop they were put into one of the general’s unoccupied negro cabins.
After comparing notes they made up their minds that the cabin was almost
full of birds, and that if they could only force an entrance into it,
they would be well repaid for their trouble. They could steal some of
them, and those they could not carry away they could liberate. They made
the attempt that same night, and were sorry enough for it afterward. Dan
Evans was on the watch, and he defeated their designs very neatly by
directing the attention of Don’s hounds to them. The fierce animals
forced the young robbers to take refuge on the top of the cabin, and
there they remained until the general came down and released them in the
morning.
While these incidents, which we have so hurriedly described, were taking
place in the settlement, some others that have a connection with our
story were transpiring a little way out of it. The most important of
these was the discovery of Godfrey’s hiding-place by Don and his
brother, who went up the bayou duck-hunting. It happened on the same day
that Dan discovered it, and led to a good many incidents, some of which
we have yet to describe. The most amusing, perhaps, was the stratagem to
which Godfrey resorted to drive Don and Bert away from the island.
The brothers landed to take a few minutes’ rest after their long pull,
and the first thing Don discovered was his canoe, which he valued
highly, and which had been stolen from him a few days before. The thief
was Godfrey Evans, who made use of the canoe in passing from the main
land to his hiding-place on the island. The fresh footprints which were
plainly visible in the soft mud showed that there was somebody besides
themselves on the island, and they resolved to find out who he was.
While they were advancing along a narrow path leading toward the
interior, Godfrey, who with Dan was concealed in the cane at the other
end of the path, imitated the growl of some wild animal so perfectly
that Don and Bert, who were armed only with their light breech-loaders,
made all haste to reach their boat and push off into the stream. Perhaps
the remembrance of the scenes that had once been enacted in that same
cane brake added to their terror. The place was known as Bruin’s Island,
from the fact that a savage old bear had once made his den there, and
had been killed only after a severe fight, during which he had wounded
two men and destroyed a number of dogs.
Don and Bert really believed that another bear had taken possession of
the island, and they resolved to dislodge him; so they secured the
services of David Evans and his rusty single-barrel shot-gun, and the
next morning returned to the island, accompanied by two good dogs and
armed with weapons better adapted to hunting such large game than their
little fowling-pieces were, Don being armed with his trusty rifle and
Bert with his father’s heavy duck gun. They wanted to shoot the bear if
they could, and if they failed in that, they came provided with tools
and bait with which to set a trap that would catch him alive.
It is proper to state that there _was_ a bear, which divided his time
about equally between the island and the main shore, and the boys
thought they would certainly have an opportunity to try their skill upon
him on this particular morning, for the hounds scented something that
drove them almost wild with excitement. But it was not a bear they
scented; it was Godfrey Evans, who waited until both dogs and hunters
were hidden from view by the cane, and then stepped into the bayou and
struck out for the main land. The boys, however, firmly believed that
the dogs had routed a bear, and they spent the day in building a trap
for him, hoping that the next time they visited the island they would
find the animal in it.
Now Godfrey had found it necessary to spend some of the money of which
he had robbed Clarence Gordon, but he still had fourteen dollars of it
left. As his pockets could not be depended upon to hold it, being full
of holes, he hid the money in a hollow log, where he thought it would be
safe. The sudden appearance of the young hunters and their dogs so
greatly excited and alarmed him that he never thought of his treasure
when he left the island, nor did he ever think of it again until Dan
happened to mention it to him a day or two afterward. Then Godfrey swam
back to his old hiding-place, but the money could not be found. Don and
his companions had changed the appearance of things considerably while
they were building the trap. Thickets had been cut down, logs rolled out
of the way, and Godfrey could not find the place where he had hidden his
ill-gotten gains. Of course he was almost beside himself with fury, and
for want of a better way of being revenged on the young hunters, he
sprung their trap and carried off the lever, rope and bait. He would
have been glad to tear the trap in pieces, but it had been built to
resist the strength of a full-grown bear, and Godfrey could not move any
of the logs. When Don and Bert came up in their boat, to see if the bear
had been caught, they found their trap in the condition we have
described. They set it again, and how their efforts were rewarded this
time we have yet to tell.
Meanwhile the work of trapping the quails went bravely on. Assisted by
Don and Bert, who devoted as many hours to the business as David did
himself, the boy trapper saw money coming in every day in the shape of
scores of little brown birds, and he would have been as happy as any
fellow could well be, had it not been for two unpleasant incidents that
happened a short time before the attempt was made to rob the cabin, and
which we neglected to notice in their proper place. One of these
incidents was brought to his notice by his wide-awake enemies, Bob and
Lester.
While these two worthies were discussing their prospects one night,
shortly after dark, they detected somebody in the act of robbing Mr.
Owens’s smoke-house. They succeeded in getting near enough to the thief
to see that it was Godfrey Evans, and this suggested to them another
plan for compelling David to leave off trapping the quails. Instead of
reporting the matter to Mr. Owens, as they ought to have done, they
sought an interview with David, and threatened that in case he did not
leave them a clear field, they would have his father arrested for
burglary. Of course David had no peace of mind after that; and, as if to
add to his troubles, his brother Dan, who had already been the means of
swindling Don Gordon out of ten dollars, made an effort to extort ten
dollars more from him by stealing his fine young pointer, _Dandy_. But
David was able to defeat this scheme, though at serious loss to himself.
He visited his father’s new hiding-place in the woods, and, finding the
pointer there, he succeeded in liberating him and starting him toward
home; but in his desperate efforts to escape the punishment with which
his angry parent threatened him he was obliged to swim the bayou, and in
so doing lost his gun. He brought the pointer home, however, and saved
Don’s ten dollars.
But if David had more than his share of trouble, he also had about as
much good luck as generally falls to the lot of mortals. The quails got
into his traps almost as fast as he wanted to take them out; and
furthermore, General Gordon, who had long had his eye on the boy, was
using his influence to secure for him the responsible position of MAIL
CARRIER; but in so doing the general excited the jealousy of one of his
neighbors, who envied him his popularity in the settlement, and would
have been glad to injure him by any means in his power. This jealous
neighbor was Mr. Owens, Bob’s father.
At first Mr. Owens did not care who took the old mail carrier’s place,
so long as it was not some one who was recommended by General Gordon;
but after he had talked with Bob about it, it occurred to him that it
would be a fine thing if his own son could have the position instead of
that low fellow, Dave Evans. Bob thought so, too, and suddenly made up
his mind that nothing could suit him better. More than that, he looked
upon the matter as settled already. His father promised that he would do
the best he could for him; Lester said that _his_ father would furnish
the required bonds, if he (Lester) asked him to do so, and Bob thought
he needed nothing more. In his estimation, three hundred and sixty
dollars a year (that was what the old carrier received) was a sum of
money that he would find it hard work to spend, and the belief that he
would soon be in a fair way to earn it was all he had to comfort him
when he saw David Evans walking up and down the river bank, with his
hands in his pockets, surveying with great satisfaction the long line of
coops which contained the captured quails, and which were piled there
awaiting the arrival of the Emma Deane.
“Just look at him,” said Bob, in great disgust. “One would think, by the
airs he puts on, that he was worth a million dollars.”
“Let’s come down here after dark and pitch every coop into the river,”
said Lester.
“Why, he will stay here to watch them, won’t he?”
“What of that? If he says a word, we’ll tumble him into the river, too!”
Bob said nothing would please him more. He and his crony rode down to
the landing that night, about nine o’clock, fully determined to carry
out Lester’s suggestion; but, to their great surprise and
disappointment, they found David and his property well guarded. A fire
was burning brightly on the bank, and just in front of it was pitched a
little lawn tent, which sheltered a merry party, consisting of Don and
Bert Gordon and Fred and Joe Packard, who were singing songs and telling
stories, while waiting for the lunch and pot of coffee which David was
preparing for them. David looked up when he heard the sound of their
horses’ feet, and a large, tawny animal arose from his bed on the other
side of the fire and growled savagely. Bob and his companion waited to
see and hear no more. They had no desire to trouble such fellows as Don
Gordon and Fred Packard, either of whom could have whipped them both,
and they stood in wholesome fear of that tawny animal behind the fire.
It was the hound that had so nearly captured one of them on the night
they attempted to break into the cabin in which the quails were
confined. Without a word they turned their horses and rode homeward, and
David and his property were allowed to rest in peace.
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