Part 28 (1/2)

How she came! Kit Carson and Jed Smith were right in her path.

”Look out!” we yelled.

Kit and little Jed leaped to dodge. She struck like a cat as she pa.s.sed, and head over heels went poor little Jed, sprawling in the brush, and she pa.s.sed on, straight to her cubs. They met her, and she smelled them for a moment. She lifted her broad, short head, and snarled.

”Don't do a thing,” ordered Major Henry. ”She'll leave.”

So we stood stock-still. That was all we _could_ do. We knew that poor little Jed was lying perhaps badly wounded, off there in the brush, but it wouldn't help to call the old bear's attention to him again. In the open place Fitzpatrick the Bad Hand stood; he was right in front of the old bear, and he was _taking pictures_!

The old bear saw him, and he and the camera seemed to make her mad.

Maybe she took it for a weapon. She lowered her head, swung it to and fro, her bristles rose still higher, and across the open s.p.a.ce she started.

”Fitz!” we shrieked. And I said to myself, sort of crying: ”Oh, jiminy!”

We all set up a tremendous yell, but that didn't turn her. Major Henry jumped forward, and tugged to pull loose a stone. I looked for a stone to throw. Of course I couldn't find one. Then out of the corner of my eye, while I was watching Fitz, too, I glimpsed Red Fox Scout Van Sant coming running, and shooting with his twenty-two. The bullets spatted into the bear's hide, and stung her.

”Run, Fitz!” called Van Sant. ”I'll stop her.”

But he didn't, yet. Hardly! That Fitz had just been winding his film. He took the camera from between his knees, where he had held it while he used his one hand, and he leveled it like lightning, on the old bear--and took her picture again. That picture won a prize, after we got back to civilization. But the old bear kept coming.

We all were shouting, in vain,--shouting all kinds of things. Red Fox Scout Van Sant sprang to Fitz's side, and again we heard him say: ”Run, Fitz! Over here. Make for the rock. I'll stop her.”

It was the outcrop where Ward had been. Fitz jumped to make for it. He hugged his camera as he ran. We thought that Van Sant would make for it, too. But he let Fitz pa.s.s him, and he stood. The old bear was coming, crazy. She only halted to scratch where a twenty-two pellet had stung her hide. Van Sant waited, steady as a rock. He lifted his little rifle slowly and held on her, and just as she was about to reach him he fired.

”Crack!”

Headfirst she plunged. She kicked and ripped the ground, and didn't get up again. She lay still, amidst a silence, we all watching, breathless.

Beyond, Fitzpatrick had closed his precious camera as he ran, and now at the rock had turned.

”Shoot her again, Van!” begged Scout Ward.

”I can't,” he answered. ”That was my last cartridge. But she's dead. I hit her in the eye.” And he lowered his rifle.

Then we gave a great cheer, and rushed for the spot--except Major Henry; he was the first to think and he rushed to see to little Jed Smith.

Fitzpatrick shook hands hard with Red Fox Scout Van Sant and followed the major.

Yes, the old bear was stone dead. Van Sant had shot her through the eye, into the brain. That was enough. Ward and I shook hands with him, too.

He had shown true Scouts' nerve, to sail in in that way, and to meet the danger and to be steady under fire.

”Oh, well, I was the only one who could do anything,” he explained. ”I knew it was my last cartridge and I had to make it count. That's all.”

Then we hurried down to where the Major and Fitz and Kit Carson were gathered about little Jed. Jed wasn't dead. No; we could see him move.

And Fitz called: ”He's all right. But his shoulder's out and his leg is torn.”

Little Jed was pale but game. His right arm hung dangling and useless, and his right calf was b.l.o.o.d.y. The whole arm hung dangling because the shoulder was hurt; but it was not a fractured collarbone, for when we had laid open Jed's s.h.i.+rt we could feel and see. The shoulder was out of shape, and commencing to swell, and the arm hung lower than the well arm. (Note 58.)

We let the wound of the calf go, for we must get at this dislocation, before the shoulder was too sore and rigid. We knew what to do. Jed was stretched on his back, Red Fox Scout Ward sat at his head, steadying him around the body, and with his stockinged heel under Jed's armpit Major Henry pulled down on the arm and shoved up against it with his heel at the same time. That hurt. Jed turned very white, and let out a big grunt--but we heard a fine snap, and we knew that the head of the arm-bone had chucked back into the shoulder-socket where it belonged.