Part 37 (1/2)
”You should have kept him bound, Dave,” said Laura
”That's it, Dave,” added Belle ”In the West they would tie a rascal like Link fast to a tree with a lariat If you secured him properly he would stay there until you freed hi over spilt milk,” reo to bed again” And on this the others agreed
Several days, including Sunday, passed, and nothingthat ti folks went out on the lake several ti wascolder rapidly, only Dave and Phil went in for a plunge One day they planned to visit the o
”It will soon be tiet a chance to bring down soo back”
”Well, I'd like to have a crack at a deer, otten the sport he had had on Squirrel Island and at other places in the vicinity of Oak Hall
”What's theshaggy fellow that would weigh eight hundred or a thousand pounds”
”Say, Phil, you don't want much in life!” cried Ben ”Why don't you make it a two-thousand-pound bear while you are at it?”
”Say, speaking about heavy bears puts me in hting up for the first time since the escape of Link Merwell ”This yarn was told by an old western hunter and trapper, and he said it was strictly true He said he was out on the ranges one day when he found himself suddenly pursued by three Modoc Indians He shot at the anybody, and then, to his consternation, he found that his aed it up ato beat the band Just as they were following hi out from a thicket near by
He was so upset that he hardly knehat to do, but he grabbed up a big rock and sent it at the bear It struck the monstrous animal on the head and keeled him over, and the bear rolled down the steep mountain-side, and knocked over the three Modoc Indians, s every one of them”
”Wow! That's some bear story!” exclaimed Luke
”Shado could you bear to tell such a story?” asked Dave, reproachfully
”That knocks out all the dime novels ever written,” said Ben
”Why, Ben! do you mean to say you have read them all?” cried our hero, in pretended surprise
”All? I don't read any of theest whopper I ever heard”
”Well, I' for the story,” interposed Shadow, dryly, ”I' about being frightened by a bear putser
”We don't want to see or hear anything h”
”It's queer that the Pooles don't send some one up here to look for him,” remarked Jessie ”If he werearound in the woods that way”
”If he is just roaes to live,” said Dave ”And where does he get all that outlandish outfit?”
”He must have some sort of a habitation here,” returned Phil ”Maybe he has taken possession of soalow or cabin that was locked up If he has, won't the owners of the place betheir things!”
”I wonder if we couldn't go up to that cliff and track him in some way from there?” said Phil ”He may have left some sort of trail behind hih the woods he would be apt to get lost, just like anybody else”