Read Ebook: The Boy Scouts on Sturgeon Island; or Marooned Among the Game-fish Poachers by Carter Herbert Active

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Ebook has 1358 lines and 58943 words, and 28 pages

One look at his really white face told them that at least Davy's fright had been genuine. He may not have seen a truly savage panther up there in the tree, but he firmly believed he did.

"Where was it, Davy?" demanded Giraffe, who had hastened to snatch up the camp hatchet in lieu of any better weapon with which to defend himself.

"Did it try to grab you?" asked Bumpus, with a tremor in his voice that he tried in vain to conceal by a great show of assumed bluster.

"And was there only one up there?" queried Step Hen, anxiously, fingering the double-barreled Marlin shotgun, which was the only firearm they had with them, as this expedition had not been organized with any idea of hunting; and the season for game was not on as yet, either, even in this northern country; though Giraffe, who owned the gun, had fetched it in the hope that they might be forgiven if they knocked over a few wild ducks, should their rations run low.

"I didn't wait to ask," stammered Davy, "fact is, boys, I didn't really see the terrible beast at all, only his big yellow eyes!"

"Oh! is that so, Davy?" exclaimed Thad, turning to give Allan a wink, as much as to let him understand that the truth would soon be coming now.

"But see here," Step Hen wanted to know; "however was you agoin' to see his eyes and not glimpse the panther himself; that's a thing you've got to explain, Davy Jones."

The other bent a look of commiseration on the speaker.

"What's the answer to that?" he went on to say, recovering his voice more and more with each passing second, now that his personal safety seemed assured; "I'll tell you, Step Hen. You see, there's a big yawning gap in the tree up there, as black inside as your hat after night. And when I just happened to look that way what did I see but a pair of round yellow eyes astaring straight at me! Guess I've seen a panther, and I ought to know how his eyes look in the dark--just like you've seen the old cat alooking at you to home, when you went into a dark room. Wow! say, did you notice me acoming down that tree outside like greased lightning? I own up I expected I'd be pounced on any second, and that made me in something like a hurry, fellows!"

One or two of the scouts snickered at this. The sound appeared to annoy Davy, who was plainly very much in earnest.

"Huh! easy to laugh, you fellows," he remark, with deep satire in his voice. "Mebbe, now, you, don't believe what I'm telling you! Mebbe one of you'd like to just climb up there, and see for yourself what it is? I dare you, Bumpus!"

"You'll have to excuse me, Davy; it's too big a job for a boy built like me, you understand, though sure I'd like to accommodate first rate," replied the scout with the red hair and mild blue eyes, shrinking back, and shrugging his shoulders.

"Then how about you, Step Hen," pursued Davy, determined to put it to each of the scoffers in turn until he had shown them up in good style; "I notice that you're looking like you didn't reckon there couldn't abeen such a thing as a genuine panther around this region in the last twenty years and more. Suppose you tumble up there, and take a look-in!"

But the party indicated smiled sweetly, and laid his hand on the region of his stomach, as he went on to say:

"Why, really and truly, Davy, I think I'm going to have one of those nasty cramps just like you used to have so often. There's agripe coming on right now, and you see how unpleasant it would be to find myself doubled-up while I was thirty feet from the ground. I'm afraid I'll have to pass this time."

"Then, there's Giraffe who'll he sure to volunteer," continued the other, bound to take all the scoffers in by turns. "He's of an investigating turn of mind, and if he wants to, I reckon he might take that gun along, so he could have some show, if the thing jumped right out in his face!"

"Well, now," the long-legged scout answered, with a whimsical grin, "I'd like to accommodate you the worst kind, Davy, but you know how it is with me. I ain't worth a cooky before I've had my feed. Feel sorter weak about the knees, to tell you the honest truth; and I never was as keen about climbing to the top of tall trees as you were, Davy. Count me out, please, that's a good fellow."

At that Davy laughed outright.

"I see you've got cold feet in the bargain, Giraffe," he asserted. "Well, then, if anybody's going to climb up there and poke that ugly old beast out of his den it'll have to be either our scout-master, or Allen; for I tell you right now you don't catch me monkeying with a buzz-saw after I've had my fingers zipped."

"I'll go," said Thad, quietly.

"Here, take this, Thad," urged Step Hen, trying to force the shotgun into the hands of the other, as he stepped toward the base of the big tree.

Thad and Allan again exchanged looks.

"Don't think I'll need it, do you, Allan?" the former asked.

"Hardly," came the reply; "and even if you did carry it up, the chances are you couldn't find a way to hold on, and shoot at the same time. Here, let me take that thing, Step Hen; you're that nervous. If anything did happen to fluster you, I honestly believe you'd up and bang away, and perhaps fill our chum with bird-shot in the bargain."

Step Hen disavowed any such weakness, but nevertheless he was apparently glad to hand over the weapon; because he realized that Allan knew much better how to use firearms than he did, and if there was any occasion for shooting, the responsibility would be off his shoulders; for Step Hen never liked to find himself placed where he was in the limelight and had to make good, or be disgraced.

Thad did not appear to be at all worried, as he took a last good look aloft, as though wishing to assure himself that there was no panther in sight among the thick branches above, before he trusted himself up there.

His good common sense told him that the chances were as ten to one that Davy had not seen what he claimed at all; but his fears had worked overtime, and simply magnified some trifling thing.

Of course had Thad really believed there was any chance of meeting such a savage beast as a panther he would never have ventured w make that climb; or if he did he must have surely taken the gun along with him.

The others gathered around near the foot of the tree, and tried to follow the daring climber with their eyes, meanwhile exchanging more or less humorous remarks in connection with his mission.

All of them, saving possibly Allan, seemed to be a little nervous concerning the outcome; because Davy kept on asserting his positive belief that it was a real true panther that lay in the aperture above, and not a make-believe.

"I only hope Thad can dodge right smart if the old thing does come whooping out at him!" was the way Davy put it; at which the eyes of Bumpus grew rounder and rounder, and he began to quietly edge away from under the tree, an inch at a time; for he hoped none of his chums would notice his timidity, because Bumpus was proud of having done certain things in the line of bagging big game, on the occasion of their trip to the Far West.

"There," remarked Step Hen, "he's getting up pretty far now, and I reckon must be close by the place where you saw your old panther, Davy."

"Yes," added Giraffe, "and you notice that Thad's marking time, so to speak, for he's hanging out there, and trying to see what's above him."

"A scout should always use a certain amount of caution," interposed Allan; "there are times when a fellow might take chances, if it's a case of necessity, and quick action is necessary in order to save life; but right now Thad's only carrying out the rule he's always laid down for the rest of us.

"Be prepared, you know, is the slogan of every scout, and that's what he's doing. He wants to be sure of his ground before he jumps."

"Hub!" grunted Davy, "if I'd stopped to count ten before I slid down, I wonder now what would have happened to me. Some fellers act from impulse every time, and you can't change the spots of the leopard, they say. What's dyed in the wool can't be washed out, as took as Bumpus here with his carroty hair."

"You leave my hair alone, Davy Jones, and pay attention to your own business," complained the stout scout, aggressively. "You just know you're a going to get it when Thad makes his report, and you're trying to draw attention somewhere else. Make me think of what I read about the pearl divers when they see an old hungry man-eating shark waiting above 'em; they stir up the sand with the sharp-pointed stick they carry; and when the water gets foggy they swim away without the fish being able to see 'em. And you're atrying right now to befog the real case, which is, did you really see anything, or get scared at your own shadow."

"Hear! Hear!" crowed Giraffe, who always liked to see Bumpus aroused, and when this occurred he often made out to back him up with approval, just as some boys would sick one dog on another, or tempt rival roosters to come to a "scrap."

"You fellow's let up, and watch what Thad's agoin' to do," Step Hen advised them at that juncture; and so for the time being Davy and Bumpus forgot their complaint and riveted their eyes on the boy who was up in the tree.

"I can't hardly see him any more, the branches are so thick," complained Bumpus ducking his head this way and that.

"That's because he's gone on again," argued Giraffe; "seems like he didn't find any signs of a real panther when he took that survey."

"Hold your horses!" was all Davy allowed himself to say, though no doubt he himself had commenced to have serious doubts by now.

Half a minute later and there broke out a series of strange sounds from up above their heads.

"Listen to that, now, would you?" cried Davy, bristling with importance again. "Don't that sound like Thad might a hit up against something big? Hear him talking, will you? Didn't you catch what he said right then--no, you don't grab me, you rascal; I'm afraid I'll have to knock you on the head yet! Say, don't that sound like Thad had found my panther, and was keeping him off with that club he took up with him. Oh! what's that?"

Something came crashing down as Davy uttered this last exclamation. The boys were horrified at, first, because they imagined it might bit Thad and the panther, that, meeting in midair, had lost their grip, and were falling to the ground, fully forty feet below.

"Why, it's only his club," cried Giraffe, quickly.

"Then he must have let it get knocked out of his hand!" ejaculated Bumpus. "Oh! poor Thad. He'll be in a bad fix without a single thing to fight that animal with!"

"That's where you're mistaken, because I can see him now, and he's acoming down the tree right smart!" Step Hen announced; which intelligence allowed Bumpus to breathe freely again, for his face was getting fiery red with the suspense that had gripped him.

"That's so!" echoed Giraffe, "and I'm looking to see if there's any signs of a big cat trailing after him, but so far nothing ain't come in sight."

The five scouts on the ground hastened to close in around the foot of the big tree, so as to welcome their patrol leader when he dropped from the lower limb.

"Seems to me Thad acts kind of clumsy, for him," announced Step Hen; "now, if it'd been Bumpus here I could understand it, because, well I won't say what I was agoing to, because it might make hard feelings between us; and with all his shortcomings Bumpus is a good sort of a chap."

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