THE HUNT
“Oh! Come here, quick!” yelled Ranny, in tones that made the others
respond promptly.
“What is it?” demanded Tom.
“A wild animal!” shouted back Ranny.
“Whereabouts?” asked Jerry, the fearless.
“He’s—he’s behind that—rock!” panted Ranny, pointing to a huge boulder
that in size almost matched the county landmark.
“Got—got anything—to get—him with?” gasped Arthur Williams, creeping up
toward the path-finder Ranny, but managing to keep pretty well behind
him.
“Don’t make any noise,” cautioned Ranny. “I saw him first near the
spring, and when I whistled—! Sh-s-s-h!” came the sibilant warning. “I
saw—him—move!”
Two or three steps over the crunching brush and the boys made a sudden
plunge to get under cover—of anything. An object had moved! It sounded
like a small animal and it moved in bounds and leaps. By this time the
remainder of the hiking party realized something new was in prospect.
Mr. Doane was with the girls, who had insisted upon obtaining some
perilously perched wild columbine, while the remainder of the boys were
scattered about near Moon Rock. But now there was a sudden change of
base, and the squad presented battle formation at the trunk of the
biggest and roundest tree.
There was no need for explanation. The secret signal that shouts danger,
was bristling from the red hair of Tommy, and from the black curls of
Neddie, and every little gasp of the others fairly echoed to the four
ends of the earth, in the silent language of hikers.
“There he goes!” breathed Tom, as something went from the oak to the
button-ball tree. But it did not fully come out into view, there was
merely a flash of soft color seen to dart among the green.
“Yep! It’s a deer!” confirmed Ralph Dana, although he could not possibly
have seen even the flash from his hiding place.
“Don’t make any noise! They’re awfully scared,” said Jerry, while his
own cautious movements seemed to make more noise than the combined
shifting of all the others.
“Let’s get sticks,” suggested George Alton.
“What for?” demanded the path-finder Ranny.
“To beat the brush down—”
“Think a deer would hide under brush?” came the derisive query of Tom.
“Naw, o’ course he wouldn’t,” scoffed Jerry. “They run like anything if
you only—only shake a stick at them.”
“Sure. They’re the scariest animals they is,” said little Neddie, glad
to be in the deer hunt in lieu of the snake chase.
“There he goes again!” called out Arthur Williams, now openly defying
orders to keep quiet.
Something very nimble, indeed, leaped over a few more stones; but as
before succeeded in hiding its real identity.
The boys stood breathless. This creature was surely a rare animal, and
it came to the mind of more than one boy that it would be greatly to
their credit if they could capture it single handed, without the aid of
Mr. Doane.
“Who’s got the rope?” demanded Jerry, sending a scathing look over those
companions within his range.
Hands went down into incompetent pockets, and into blouse depths but
none fetched up a coil of rope suitable for lassoing.
“Of course, we didn’t bring any,” again growled Jerry.
“Of course not,” echoed Arthur Williams.
“I could lasso him just as easy—”
“Sure we could,” confirmed Tom.
“Sure!” went down the line till Neddie swallowed it.
“Well, we got to do something! Look! There he goes! The son-of-a-gun!”
groaned Arthur.
“Into the cave!” gasped Ralph.
“Gone!” sighed Tom, except that the sigh was somewhat like a gasp.
Their concentration had attracted the attention of the columbine
hunters, and now the girls, with Mr. Doane, came as quickly through the
wood as the deep underbrush would allow.
Signs and wig-wags warned them not to speak, but of course Millie had to
giggle. A “Sh-s-s-h!” from Tom brought Gloria up so suddenly that she
all but fell headlong into a nest of briars.
“What—is it?” whispered Grace Ayres.
“Somethin’,” admitted Neddie, rebelling against the tight squeeze Ranny
was holding him in with.
Mr. Doane somehow took in the situation without any explanation. Perhaps
that was because he had been a boy not so very long before, and he could
easily guess what hunters are apt to come upon in Turtle Cove Woods.
“He’s in there,” ventured Ranny, pointing to the hole in the rocks which
had swallowed up the prize.
“Big?” asked Mr. Doane.
“You bet!” replied Tom. “He looks like a deer.”
“We’ll get him,” boasted the man with such a look of courage and
determination that every boy was at once his slave with renewed, if
unspoken, allegiance.
“A rope,” suggested Jerry crisply.
“You bet, old man,” agreed Mr. Doane. “We have one in the boat—”
“I’ll get it,” offered Arthur, but perhaps Tom thought of the lunch box,
for he turned and ran along with the first messenger.
They had not yet reached the launch when a hail from Jerry brought them
both to a standstill.
“Hey, wait!” he yelled, but they paid no heed to the order, for at any
moment that animal might dash out of the cave and get away.
Tom climbed into the boat and Arthur followed.
“I saw the rope here—” began Tom, but Jerry was now climbing in and
still saying something.
“A sandwich!” he finally managed to exclaim. “They want a sandwich.”
“I guess you won’t have any sandwich,” declared Tom, not in the most
amiable tones.
“They want it!”
“What for?” demanded Arthur.
“For the deer,” replied the impatient Jerry.
“A sandwich—for—a deer!” gasped Tom, pausing with a cushion in one hand
and a life preserver in the other.
“Sure,” snarled Jerry. “Did you think I wanted it for myself?”
“We didn’t know,” said Tom, “but no one gets anything out of that box—”
“Oh, hey!” snarled Jerry. “Can’t you see anything? Mr. Doane wants to
bait the deer with it.” His tone was scornful enough to poison the very
atmosphere.
“Well, I’ll get one,” finally condescended Tom. “Glo told me to get it,”
insisted the annoyed Jerry, climbing over his two companions and making
his way up to the big blanket that covered the bread box.
Both boys stopped in the rope hunt to watch him.
“Be careful,” ordered Tom. “They’re each wrapped in wax paper.”
“I know,” retorted Jerry, who now actually had hold of one of the
precious sandwiches and was shutting the box.
“One’s enough,” said Arthur, foolishly.
“You don’t need to think I’m cribbin’.”
“Oh, come along,” called Tom, who had procured the rope and was
scrambling out with it. “Think a wild deer is going to wait all day?”
They didn’t, evidently, for Jerry held the sandwich in both hands and
followed his companions up the hill, there to find the others still
waiting anxiously, lined up like a guard of honor on each side of the
cave.
More signs and wig-wagging, but few words were used in giving the
directions necessary to lay the trap and bait it with one of Jane’s best
corn beef sandwiches—it was in the lightest brown paper outside the
inside wax paper, so that was sure to be corn beef.
Tom laid the rope in a ring just at the opening of the rocks as Mr.
Doane directed, then Jerry very carefully placed the unwrapped sandwich
right in the very center, and the two most important actors stepped back
in line with the others.
They waited.
Mildred giggled.
Gloria almost choked.
“Your red sweater!” hissed Ranny. “They’re afraid of red.”
Mr. Doane agreed without saying so, but he looked so intelligently at
Gloria that she crept back of him to hide her sweater and—her laugh.
“I see—him! Here he comes!” gasped little Neddie, and before any one
could even say “So he does!” something sprang out from the rocks!
“Mrs. Higgins’ Nanny!”
This was announced by so many that it doesn’t really matter who is
credited with the identification, for the pretty deer-like, faun-colored
goat deliberately gulped down the corn beef sandwich, while Ranny pulled
the rope and captured the “wild animal.”
“Poor Mrs. Higgins has been looking for Nanny for two whole days—” said
Gloria ruefully.
“She’ll have her tonight,” replied Mr. Doane. “But go easy with the
rope, Ranny, and let the poor creature finish up the paper.”
“They love it,” added Blanche without a trace of disappointment in her
voice. What’s a deer or a goat to animal hunters? Besides, Mrs. Higgins
sold the goat’s milk to a delicate old lady who believed it had health
value—every one knew that.
“We’ll tie her to a tree and eat our lunch,” suggested Mr. Doane, and
the way that order was carried out left no suspicion of poor health
demanding goat’s milk among any of those present.
But Nanny wasn’t home yet, and it was quite a sail over the tranquil
waters, back to Barbend.