Part 49 (1/2)

One morning Sam approached the game from one point, Guy and Yan from another some yards away. ”No Woodchuck!” was the first opinion, but suddenly Guy called ”I see him.” There in a little hollow fully sixty yards from his den, and nearly a hundred from the boys, concealed in a bunch of clover, Guy saw a patch of gray fur hardly two inches square.

”That's him, sure.”

Yan could not see it at all. Sam saw but doubted. An instant later the Woodchuck (for it was he) stood up on his hind legs, raised his chestnut breast above the clover, and settled all doubt.

”By George!” exclaimed Yan in admiration. ”_That is great_. You have the most wonderful eyes I ever did see. Your name ought to be 'Hawkeye'--that should be your name.”

”All right,” shrilled out Guy enthusiastically. ”Will you--will you, Sam, will you call me Hawkeye? I think you ought to,” he added pleadingly.

”I think so, Sam,” said the Second Chief. ”He's turned out great stuff, an' it's regular Injun.”

”We'll have to call a Council and settle that. Now let's to business.”

”Say, Sapwood, you're so smart, couldn't you go round through the woods to your side and crawl through the clover so as get between the old Grizzly and his den?” suggested the Head Chief.

”I bet I can, an' I'll bet a dollar--”

”Here, now,” said Yan, ”Injuns don't have dollars.”

”Well, I'll bet my scalp--my black scalp, I mean--against Sam's that I kill the old Grizzly first.”

”Oh, let me do it first--you do it second,” said Sam imploringly.

”Errr--yer scared of yer scalp.”

”I'll go you,” said Sam.

Each of the boys had a piece of black horsehair that he called his scalp. It was tied with a string to the top of his head--and this was what Guy wished to wager.

Yan now interfered: ”Quit your squabbling, you Great War Chiefs, an'

'tend to business. If Woodp.e.c.k.e.r kills old Grizzly he takes Sapwood's scalp; if Sappy kills him he takes the Woodp.e.c.k.e.r's scalp, an' the winner gets a grand feather, too.”

Sam and Yan waited impatiently in the woods while Guy sneaked around.

The Woodchuck seemed unusually bold this day. He wandered far from his den and got out of sight in hollows at times. The boys saw Guy crawl through the fence, though the Woodchuck did not. The fact was, that he had always had the enemy approach him from the other side, and was not watching eastward.

Guy, flat on his breast, worked his way through the clover. He crawled about thirty yards and now was between the Woodchuck and his den.

Still old Grizzly kept on stuffing himself with clover and watching toward the Raften woods. The boys became intensely excited. Guy could see them, but not the Woodchuck. They pointed and gesticulated. Guy thought that meant ”Now shoot.” He got up cautiously. The Woodchuck saw him and bounded straight for its den--that is, toward Guy. Guy fired wildly. The arrow went ten feet over the Grizzly's head, and, that ”huge, shaking ma.s.s of fur” bounding straight at him, struck terror to his soul. He backed up hastily, not knowing where to run. He was close to the den.

The Woodchuck chattered his teeth and plunged to get by the boy, each as scared as could be. Guy gave a leap of terror and fell heavily just as the Woodchuck would have pa.s.sed under him and home. But the boy weighed nearly 100 pounds, and all that weight came with crus.h.i.+ng force on old Grizzly, knocking the breath out of his body. Guy scrambled to his feet to run for his life, but he saw the Woodchuck lying squirming, and plucked up courage enough to give him a couple of kicks on the nose that settled him. A loud yell from the other two boys was the first thing that a.s.sured Guy of his victory. They came running over and found him standing like the hunter in an amateur photograph, holding his bow in one hand and the big Woodchuck by the tail in the other.

[Ill.u.s.tration: The hunter]

”Now, I guess you fellers will come to me to larn you how to kill Woodchucks. Ain't he an old socker? I bet he weighs fifty pounds--yes, near sixty.” (It weighed about ten pounds.)

”Good boy! Bully boy! Hooray for the Third War Chief! Hooray for Chief Sapwood!” and Guy had no cause to complain of lack of appreciation on the part of the others.

He swelled out his chest and looked proud and haughty. ”Wished I knew where there was some more Woodchucks,” he said. ”_I_ know how to get them, if the rest don't.”

”Well, that should count for a _grand coup_, Sappy.”

[Ill.u.s.tration: ”Guy gave a leap of terror and fell.”]