"Owen, Owen, wake up!"
When Bandy-legs dug his elbow into the side of his sleeping chum, and whispered these words in his ear, naturally enough the said Owen could not help but awaken.
"What ails you?" he asked sleepily; and even Steve stirred as though the sound of their voices had aroused him.
"My trap's sprung!" was the rather surprising information Bandy-legs vouchsafed in return.
"The dickens you say!" exclaimed Owen, suddenly sitting up in the darkness. "Now, how d'ye know that fact? Did anything give a yelp?"
"No," continued the other, eagerly; "but you see, Owen, before I went to sleep I had Max tie a string to my leg and the other end to that loop. It was fixed under the root of a tree; and if the trap went off, why, don't you see, the string'd give me just a sweet little yank, like it wanted to tell me to come around and take my game out."
"And did you feel that same yank?" demanded Steve, sitting up suddenly.
"Right now, before I woke Owen up. Oh, it was a sure enough jerk, all right! What'll we do about it?" demanded Bandy-legs.
"Let's crawl out and see what happened," remarked Owen, setting his actions to correspond with his words, and being followed by his two companions.
"What is it?"
That was Max speaking, and they could see his head poked out from the partly open flap of the smaller tent. Evidently he must have been awake at the time, or else the sound of murmuring voices aroused him; for Max always declared that he was a very light sleeper.
"Bandy-legs here says his trap is sprung," remarked Owen. "He tells us you fixed a string to his leg and the other end to the loop. Well, that just gave him word something had happened."
"We'll soon find out," was all Max remarked, as he proceeded to crawl all the way out of his tent.
Stepping over he picked up the lantern, and a match that had been left handily near by. And so it took but a fraction of a minute for them to possess a light that would answer all purposes.
The four of them then approached the place where Bandy-legs had set his wonderful snare, which he had tested so well himself to start with.
"Huh! I don't see anybody swinging around here!" remarked the always skeptical Steve.
"Neither do I," added Owen, in a tone of disappointment.
"But see, fellers, the old trap, she's gone off!" exclaimed Bandy-legs, in a thrilling tone. "Didn't I tell you I felt a pull that woke me up? It worked, just you bet it did, now."
The hickory sapling was indeed standing up almost straight, with the loop dangling part way down; but the snare was devoid of any victim.
Max looked around as best he could with such a poor light.
"I don't see the first sign of any tracks here," he remarked.
"Shucks, the chances are Bandy-legs might have kicked in the night, and that was enough to set the loop free!" Steve declared.
"He couldn't do that," answered Max; "I fixed that string in such a way there was no danger of it happening. But I rather think some fox in hunting around set the thing off, but didn't get caught in the spread loop. It was set for bigger game, you remember, boys."
"Well, I'm going back to my blanket again," said Owen. "It feels chilly out here, and there's no use staying."
Even Bandy-legs seemed to have lost all faith in his wonderful snare; for he declined to stay long enough to put it in working order again. Twice now it had gone off, and there could be no telling what the third result might be if he ventured to try it again, which he would not.
There was no further alarm, and at dawn the boys came piling out of their tents. The weather seemed to have grown a bit sultry, so Max remarked that perhaps a dip in the water of the Big Sunflower might not feel out of the way.
So they had a happy little time of it, splashing each other, and carrying on as any five carefree lads might be expected to; until all of them decided they had had enough, when dressing was the next thing on the programme.
Bandy-legs was the first to finish. The fire was burning briskly, and a nice red bed of embers between the side stones invited the attention of the cook of the morning, namely himself.
"Say, where'd you hang that half of a ham, Owen?" he asked, after what seemed a vain search.
"Just where we always kept it," was the reply; "suspended from that limb of the oak over—well, did anybody change it around or take it inside the tent?" and Owen looked his surprise, when the others all shook their heads in the negative.
"It's gone!" cried Bandy-legs, looking very unhappy; "our nice ham's been hooked!"
A rush was made for the oak tree in question.
"There's the twine I hung it up by, dangling from the limb right now," declared Owen, pointing.
"But show me the ham, will you?" asked Bandy-legs. "We can't make a decent breakfast off string that's only got a ham flavor, can we?"
"Why, it must have been full six feet up from the ground," remarked Steve, for the benefit of Bandy-legs; "I never thought before a panther could leapthathigh!"
"Oh, gracious!" began Bandy-legs; and then, seeing the look on Steve's face, he understood that the other was only baiting him for a fall: whereupon he shut his jaws hard together, and determined not to be taken in.
Max, of course, was already looking for signs. It was his opinion that few things could happen without there being evident traces left behind, if only one knew how to find them.
"Here's a track, fellows; and it looks like the same we saw before!" he called out, presently, as he bent over eagerly.
"It sure does," admitted Owen.
"Right under where our lovely ham hung, too," wailed Bandy-legs.
"All he had to do was to reach up and grab it," commented Owen.
Toby did not say anything, but went through a pantomime movement as of a man taking possession of some object dangling there from the limb.
"I wish now we'd taken it in our tent, when Max complained that the ham smell made it unpleasant in his own," Bandy-legs went on.
"There was a man once who actually locked the door of his stable after his horse was took," Steve ventured; at which Max laughed.
"Well, it does look like we'd have to go without ham for a while, boys; but after all, it was only a half. Think how bad we'd feel if it was a whole one. And whoever took it must have been pretty hungry in the bargain. He's been living on partridges right along, when he could find any in his snares. The rest of the time he went without a bite, seems like."
"But, Max, who is he?" asked Steve; at which the other shrugged his shoulders.
"Ask me something easy, boys," he replied. "I've never seen him even once, like Herb and his chums did, when they tried to sleep in that queer old cabin. But you see, we've got his footprints right here in the dirt. They ought to tell us something, perhaps."
"But, Max, footprints can't talk, can they?" demanded Bandy-legs,
"Always, in their own language," was the ready reply. "You have to study that a while though, before you can understand what they say."
"Oh, yes, I'm on to you now, Max," cried the other, triumphantly; "you mean that you can tell it was a man by the size of the prints; ain't that it?"
"One of many things," answered Max. "Now, this seems to have been a pretty hefty sort of fellow, because the marks are big. It is a common shoe, too, just like the men make and wear in the prisons and public institutions."
Bandy-legs fairly gasped for breath at hearing this remark. To his mind it seemed to imply that the mysterious dweller of the strange cabin on Catamount Island must be an escaped convict, a desperate ruffian, who might take a notion to murder them all in their sleep.
"And we've still got five more nights to stay here!" he groaned, as though with that new intelligence the very last hope he was cherishing of ever being able to see his folks again vanished like a puff of smoke in the wind.
"Say, that makes me think of something," Steve broke out just then.
"About what?" asked Max, turning from his examination of the plain footprint at the place where the unknown visitor had stood when reaching up for the tempting half of a smoked ham.
"Those two men," the other went on to say.
"What about 'em?" asked Owen.
"I said they wore gray homespun clothes, didn't I, just like the farmers, plenty of 'em, have around these diggings? Well, I've changed my mind, boys. It just broke in on me that I saw somethin' flash every time they moved this way and that. No, it wasn't the field glasses either; but somethin' about their clothes. Brass buttons, I reckon, boys! Them men might 'a' been wardens from the penitentiary, lookin' for a prisoner that escaped some time ago!"
Steve drew himself up proudly, as though conscious of the fact that he had hit upon a very plausible explanation of the mystery. Max was evidently thinking it over, for his face seemed serious enough, to be sure.
"That doesn't sound so much out of the way, Steve," he admitted. "Fact is, it may be the very thing. Some of these guards have gray uniforms, I believe; and they put brass buttons on the same, just to make them look official-like. Yes, they wanted to get over here, and didn't have a boat. Perhaps they've gone up river to get one, and cross to the island. They might try it to-day; and then again perhaps they'd wait for another night, for fear of frightening him away, and losing him somehow if he jumped into the river."
"What a peck of trouble we've sure struck since we took on that dare," Owen remarked, just then.
"Yes," added Bandy-legs, with a sad look, "and the end ain't come along yet, by a big sight."
Of course they had plenty of other things to supply the lack of ham for breakfast. Max even went to the trouble of making some flapjacks, just to take away the bitter disappointment Bandy-legs seemed to feel over the disappearance of the joint. And all of them united in declaring that they did not care how soon he had the same notion again, the cakes were so fine.
The day was very warm, and having been reminded that the Big Sunflower River was capable of assuming the dimensions of a flood upon certain occasions, nervous Bandy-legs turned one eye upward from time to time, as though trying to figure out whether they might expect a cloudburst of some sort, should a storm drop in upon them.
Steve joked him more than a little about his new fears.
"Got your tree all picked out, have you, Bandy-legs?" he would remark in his bantering way. "Be sure and tie your canoe to the lower limb, so it'll stay by you. And feel a little pity, won't you, please, for the other poor fellers who go ridin' down the raging flood, hangin' on to the bottom of their boats? Oh, it's a wise guy you show yourself, old boy. They don't ketch you asleep, do they? Weasels ain't in it with Bandy-legs, boys. You see from the way he looks at that oak yonder, that's his choice, when she comes bowling along here."
Max had some little scheme of his own on his mind. He did not even take his cousin into his confidence; but along after lunch he picked up the gun, and, remarking that he might go for a little walk along the shore, left them wondering.
They knew Max well enough to feel pretty certain he must have something "hatching," as Steve put it; and all sorts of guesses were indulged in during his absence.
Although the four boys left in camp amused themselves in a variety of ways, even fishing with fair success, as Steve had done on the preceding day, time hung heavy on their hands that afternoon. It seemed as though the sun would never draw near the line of far-away hills that marked the western horizon.
More than a few times Owen would look up, as some slight sound caught his ear. He was listening for the report of the gun Max carried; but as the minutes turned into hours, and nothing was heard, Owen began to grow anxious.
He had almost reached the point of proposing that they give a halloo, and if no reply came, start out to look for the absent chum, when a moving figure up the shore caught his attention, and presently it developed into Max.
"See anything of the convict?" asked Steve, upon whom that idea seemed to have taken a decided hold.
Max shook his head in the negative.
"Have you been up to that cabin again?" asked Owen, suspiciously.
"I suppose I might as well tell you that I've laid a little plan that, if it only turns out well, may bag the unknown visitor we had last night," Max confessed. "You see, when we were up there the other day, I noticed that old as it was, the cabin was as strong as anything. If a fellow could only slip up, and shoot a bar across the door in any way aftersome onewent inside, it'd be dollars to doughnuts he'd find the chap there in the morning."
"And when would you do all this fine slipping-up business?" asked Steve.
"I'm going there again to-night," Max continued, positively; "and lie around to see what happens. And none of you need say a single word, because you don't come along with me. When I've managed to secure that door as I've arranged for, it'll be time enough to let you know about it. Forget it now, boys; and let's talk about supper."
Bandy-legs stared hard at Max, as though he could not believe his ears. That anyone would dare venture all the way up to that strange cabin in the darkness of the night, and even try and capture the desperate ruffian whom they now believed to be an escaped convict, amazed him.
Sure enough, that night, about the time the boys under ordinary conditions would be thinking of seeking their blankets, Max quietly took his gun and vanished from the sight of his chums.
He had taken particular note of every step of the route along the bank with this night journey in view. And he felt now that he could silently make his way along without anything bordering upon an accident. Had any of the others been with him a clumsy mis-step was apt to create trouble; and Bandy-legs in particular was always getting into a mess.
Max had reached a point about halfway up the shore of Catamount Island when he suddenly stopped short and crouched low. Surely that was the low sound of voices coming to his ear. And he immediately recognized the fact that the murmur must be carried across the water, which is such a splendid conveyer of sounds.
Then some persons must be coming off from the shore in a boat! His mind went back to what Steve had seen of the two men in gray uniforms. Were they about to land on the island now, bent upon recapturing the desperate man who was hiding there.
Max had just about come to this decision when he had occasion to alter his views of the matter. He heard a peculiar little cough, which struck him as mighty familiar. Their old enemy, Ted Shafter, had an odd way of making such a sound; and there were those who said it was caused by smoking so many cigarettes. Did this cigarette cough mean that Ted and his two cronies were coming to play a practical joke on the campers of Catamount Island?
"Hold on, fellers! Let's get a line on what this rotten old shore looks like," Max plainly heard Ted Shafter say, in a low tone.
The oars continued to dip in the water, for unless this were done continually the swift current would carry the boat downstream rapidly enough.
Looking closely at the point from whence the sound proceeded Max believed he could make out an object that seemed darker than the surroundings. This then must be the boat in which the three boys had pulled all the way up from Carson; a job not to be sneered at, considering the weight of the craft, and the strength of the current.
"Hang the luck, Ted, I can't see anything but just a solid blur," remarked another of the occupants of the boat; and Max knew that it was Shack Beggs, whose father was an engineer in one of the works at Carson, who made this disgusted remark.
"I can see trees, and I think some rocks," said a third one, undoubtedly Amiel Toots; for he had a soft oily voice, just as Amiel was a soft oily boy, treacherous by nature, and only faithful to Ted because he really feared the big bully.
"That accounts for the whole bunch of them," Max was saying to himself, and at the same time endeavoring to figure out how he could give the three rowdies a scare that would send them flying down the river, not to come back again.
Max thought he saw a way of accomplishing this much-to-be-desired end. He had in his pocket several flashlight powders that he had intended using in the line of photography, if the occasion ever arose for trying to take a picture during the period of darkness. With them he also carried a clever little arrangement fashioned after the style of a pistol, whereby with a pressure of one finger the flash could be brought about.
There, they were talking again, after all of them had been trying their hardest to make out the conformation of the shore near which they were at the time.
"Reckon yuh must move in a little closer, Ted, if so be yuh 'spect us tuh see just where tuh land," Shack remarked.
"Don't you think we ought to go a little slow about landing?" remarked Amiel, who evidently had certain fears of his own, which same caused his soft oily voice to quiver painfully.
"Aw! what's the matter with you?" grated Ted, savagely. "Just acause them fellers go to talkin' 'bout ghosts and all that stuff, you're afraid, that's what! Sho! didn't we see Max Hastings and his crowd there on the foot of the plagued island? If they could stay here two nights a'ready, what's a-goin' to hurt us inside of only one hour, tell me that, hey?"
When Max heard this he came near chuckling. It seemed to answer the question he had been asking himself; for he wondered whether these fellows could have heard about the scare Herb and his friends received some little time ago, when they tried to stop on the island over night.
Apparently, then, they had, and the fact had even made a strong impression on the weakest one of the lot, Amiel Toots. And Max was not so sure about the others being very far removed from fear in connection with that same subject, much as they made out to show courage.
"It's going to work all right, see if it don't," Max whispered to himself, as he began to make ready to start things moving.
First of all he wanted to screen his own body completely from sight; for when the sudden vivid flash came it would disclose every little object around for a radius of many feet. This was easily accomplished. A convenient tree trunk offered a friendly asylum; and back of this he might hide, so that no one could see him, from the river side at least.
First of all he gave a very dismal groan. Max was not up in matters pertaining to ghosts in general, and could only make a guess at emitting the proper kind of sound; but really it did seem quite "shivery," even to the boy responsible for making it.
"Glory be! What was that?" he heard Amiel ask, instantly.
Utter silence followed, and apparently everyone in the boat was listening with might and main for a repetition of the groan. Max thought it would be a pity to disappoint those fellows. They had come soveryfar just to have some fun; and if they were now compelled to go all the way back to Carson without ever having the least amusement, think of the trouble they had taken for nothing! And after all, it was so easy to give them good measure, brimming full, and running over. So he groaned three times in rapid succession, just as if the troubled spirit might be getting impatient.
He heard exclamations of renewed alarm from the pitch darkness; for clouds shut out what little light might have come from the heavens above.
"Let's get out of this, boys!" Ted was heard to say.
"Hurry, hurry! I thought I saw something moving right then! Be quick, fellows!" Amiel Toots exclaimed, in thick accents, as though his fright had become such as to seriously interfere with the working of his vocal cords.
Max waited no longer. He knew that the boat, drifting down with the current, was now exactly opposite to him. He heard the splash of the oars striking the water; although in their haste and clumsiness the three Carson boys were in danger of upsetting their craft while trying to turn so quickly.
Max pressed the trigger of his little flashlight pistol. Instantly a dazzling light sprang forth, blinding the eyes of the three in the boat just as if they had met with a bolt of descending lightning.
Then it was gone, as quick as that, leaving the darkness of the night more noticeable than before. Max was satisfied with his work. He heard cries of horror break forth from Ted Shafter and his two cronies. Amiel Toots even started to crying like a big baby, he was so badly frightened; while the others tugged at the oars desperately, in the endeavor to turn the boat, so as to head downstream.
And when they did finally get started, the way they tugged at those ashen blades was enough to win almost any race.
"Good-by, Ted and Company!" said Max, not out loud, but to himself in a low tone; for he did not want to lessen the fear that had gripped those three fellows.
He could hear the sound of the oars working furiously in the rowlocks long after the fugitives must have passed the lower end of the island. Of course the rest of the campers would catch the sounds that had welled forth, and feel curious about them; but between the four they ought to be able to figure out what it meant. And as the fact of his possessing the flashlight powders was known, they must realize that he, Max, was at the bottom of the whole affair.
As Max continued his forward progress he was trying to understand what Ted and his friends had meant to do. They knew, of course, how the campers expected to stay there on Catamount Island for a whole week; and the temptation to try and play a mean trick on Max and his chums had finally moved them to get a boat, and row all the way up here.
No doubt they had arrived in the vicinity of the island at some time during the afternoon; but unwilling to show themselves, lest their intentions be thwarted, they had waited down around the next bend until darkness came along to conceal their movements.
Just what they expected to do no one ever knew; but such mean tricks were always cropping up in the minds of the trio, that even the setting adrift of all the canoes, thus compelling the campers to swim ashore, and foot it all the way back to Carson, would not be anything unusual for them.
However, there need be little fear that those three frightened boys would ever make a second attempt to land on Catamount Island, especially during the night time. So far as they were concerned, the campers might now rest easy; and even Bandy-legs, when he heard the facts, could draw a relieved breath.
Max now tried to forget all about the recent little adventure, and fix his whole mind on what lay ahead of him. He had started out on what seemed rather a risky errand, if, as they suspected, the occupant of the strange cabin was really a desperate escaped convict. Still, Max was a brave lad; and having once conceived this little plan of campaign, he could not force himself to give it up, just because it carried a spice of danger.
He knew that at a certain point, which he had marked, he must leave the shore of the island, and turn aside. Through dense shrubbery then his course lay; but he had marked it well in his mind, so that he could follow it faithfully, even in pitch darkness. And it was only a little way, after all, before he would come upon the strange cabin with the green roof and lichen-covered side logs.
Several times he stopped to listen, but heard no suspicious sound. Once a small animal of some sort started off nearly under his feet, and gave the boy a shock; but nevertheless he did not turn back. Having made his mind up on a certain matter, it would have to be something more than that to make him change his plans.
Before quitting camp he had asked his chums to leave something in the line of food, where it could be easily found by a roving man, while out of the reach of foxes, 'coons, and 'possums. This he meant to be in the shape of a bait. If the half-starved marooned convict once got it in his clutch he would undoubtedly make straight for the cabin retreat, there to devour his prize. And it was while the unknown party was engaged in this delightful task that Max expected to slip up and fasten the door by means of the arrangement he had fixed that afternoon, a very simple affair, too, as it turned out.
Now he could just distinguish the dark blur ahead of him, which he knew must be made by the cabin itself. As the trees were not quite so dense overhead in this spot, for once upon a time, many years ago, poor Wesley Coombs had started to clear around his then newly made log cabin, Max was soon able to make out the partly open door, just as he had found, and also left it, so as not to excite the suspicions of his intended victim.
Then he settled down to watch, hoping that if the man were waiting for a chance to steal more food, he would soon find an opportunity, and come hurrying back to dispose of it as before. For Max had found the bone of their ham, picked clean, in the shack that afternoon when he visited it; though there had been no sign of any human being around at the time, the man evidently only sleeping under that old but stout roof.
Once Max had crept softly up to the side of the cabin and listened, with all his senses on the alert. If the unknown were asleep within, he surely must have betrayed the fact by his labored breathing.
No sound, however slight, came to the alert ears of the boy from inside the strange cabin; and from this fact he felt pretty positive that it must be entirely empty at the time.
After that he moved back again and took up his old station, where the undergrowth would shelter him. He had picked out the place in the daylight, and made sure it was not in the path one would naturally take when coming from the lower end of the island. When settling this matter Max had in mind the unpleasant nature of the meeting should the other stumble upon him as he hid there waiting.
How slowly the minutes passed! To kill the time he began counting, as though in imagination he could see the great pendulum of the grandfather clock that stood in the hall at home, why even a minute seemed enormously long, and five of them an eternity.
Then he allowed his mind to roam back again to the camp, where his four chums were at that minute. He was trying to picture the coming of the escaped convict in his striped suit, creeping up like a stealthy tiger, and quickly discovering the food that had been left there as a bait.
How eagerly would he pounce upon it, and then head back to the vicinity of the lonely cabin, around which clung such sad memories of that tragedy of the long ago, when the waters came up in the night, and took the whole Coombs family off to their death.
Once Max felt his nerves thrill with expectancy, as he caught a movement close by. His hands involuntarily tightened on the stock of the gun he carried, not to use upon the convict, but as a measure of precaution.
Listening intently, he felt sure that he could detect a slight creeping sound, as if some one, or something, were stealthily approaching the spot where he crouched, and held his very breath with suspense.
Surely this could not be a man making his way along. Such a burly figure must make more noise than now reached him. Only a sleek animal could pass from log to log with but a faint pat of feet; or it might be the brushing of the bushes in its progress toward him.
But it was no small raccoon or mink that was slowly approaching, as though bent upon finding out what manner of intruder lay in concealment there.
Facing the slight sounds Max waited, and watched, and listened. If his pulses were bounding much faster than their wont it was not surprising, for as yet he had not the slightest idea as to what might happen.
Should this, for instance, be one of the ferocious wild-cats for which the island had been famous long before Wesley Coombs ever dreamed of settling there, Max felt that he would hardly find himself in an enviable position; since the gloom under the trees must prevent him from seeing how to aim with certainty.
Given daylight, and that faithful little gun, the boy would not have thought it anything terrible to face at close quarters the biggest and most savage wild-cat ever known; for his charge of birdshot might be counted on to serve the purpose of a large bullet, and tear a hole in the side of the beast.
It was far different at dead of night, and such a dark night at that. And Max, while he could hardly be said to have had very much experience in that line, knew from hearing old Trapper Jim up in the North Woods tell stories that a wounded bobcat was one of the meanest things to run up against known to hunters.
The sounds kept on, and even became slightly plainer. This would surely indicate that the animal must be drawing nearer in his cautious way. Perhaps it was only curiosity that urged him on. Max hoped so from the bottom of his boyish heart. He did not have any desire to find a savage denizen of the wilds fastened on his back, clawing and tearing with the fury of a demon, while he himself would be almost helpless to get at his enemy.
Max was determined on one thing. No matter about the escaped convict and their desire to capture him, self-preservation must stand first on the calendar; and if he really found himself in a position where he anticipated an attack from the big cat, he meant to pour in the contents of both barrels, and then take chances.
As he continued to watch, always in the one quarter, where the slight noise indicated the presence of the creeping beast, Max saw something that riveted his attention immediately. At first he thought it was a glowworm, or possibly a firefly that had not yet arisen from the lush grass in which it lay concealed during the daytime.
Then, with a sudden shock, he realized what it was, for now there were two of the glowing spots, and close together. The cat had turned its head slightly, exposing both eyes. Like the orbs of all creatures of the feline species its eyes in the darkness glowed as though they were made of phosphorus.
It was far from a pleasant sight. Small wonder that the boy's hands trembled a little as he raised his gun, so as to cover those twin spots of yellow fire. He did not want to shoot, and only meant to do so as a very last resort; but since there was no telling what the treacherous brute might attempt to do, Max felt that he must keep himself in readiness every second of the time.
One thing brought him a little reassurance; so far as he could ascertain now, the bobcat was no longer advancing. Doubtless it lay there, stretched out upon a convenient log, and intently watching the crouching figure among the bushes, which it undoubtedly recognized as belonging to the hated, and also feared, human family.
Max stared as hard as he could straight back. He wanted it to understand that he was not in the least afraid, for that was what would count most when facing a wild beast.
A woman had been known to set a tiger in flight by opening her red parasol and rushing straight at him; while a bugler, about to be devoured by a lion, frightened the animal away by waving his arms and blowing all sorts of weird notes on his instrument.
Another man Max had heard of, upon finding himself at the mercy of a tiger, being utterly unarmed, was inspired to throw himself over, so that he stood upon his hands, waving both feet in the air, and in this posture advancing, finally dropping upon all fours, and still running toward the beast. Unable to understand what manner of creature this was the tiger slunk away.
For a space of perhaps five minutes, which to Max were like so many hours, the curious bobcat remained there, watching him as a cat might a mouse at play. Then the boy plainly heard the animal give a snarl as of utter disgust, and the glowing orbs vanished; while he could hear the pat of velvet-shod feet as they landed on another log.
At any rate, the beast had withdrawn, much to the relief of the lad. And again he was free to take up his own business of watching for the return of the occupant of the strange cabin on Catamount Island.
Another period of waiting, and Max again caught a slight sound. At first he feared that his former visitor, the bobcat, had returned with the intention of making a closer investigation; but, after listening, he became convinced that this was not the case.
Now it was a peculiar rustling among the dead leaves that lay under the trees, no fire having ever swept across the island, at least for many years. The sound was really continuous, and could hardly be made by the passage of any animal—mink, skunk, weasel, 'coon, 'possum or even muskrat.
Then it must be some sort of snake that was gliding along close by him. Again did the boy feel a sense of repulsion. He knew that it had long been said the island up the Big Sunflower was a nest of rattlesnakes, though so far none of them had seen even one of the scaly reptiles. What if this were one of the deadly species that was being attracted toward his crouching form?
He could not refrain from making some movement, with the intention of frightening it away; and was immediately gratified by hearing the slight rustling pass off to one side, as though his ruse had been successful.
This was really getting monotonous, and he found himself wondering when it might come to an end. What could be delaying the man? Had he, Max, miscalculated, so that the unknown party would not be apt to try to enter the camp until away toward morning? Or could it be that the boys were sitting up unusually late?
Max hardly believed this latter was the case, since he had asked them to retire shortly after he left; and supposed that they would heed his wishes in the matter, knowing how important it was to start things going.
So he finally concluded that the man himself was unduly cautious. Well, he had reason to be, if, as they now believed, he chanced to be an escaped prisoner, who had broken out from the penitentiary, and was trying to elude recapture by hiding in this remote and unusual haunt.
But surely it could not be much longer. Why, it seemed to Max that hours must have elapsed since he parted from his chums, and started on this little private enterprise of his own. Much had happened to him in that time, and he marveled to think how events could crowd upon each other's heels, once they started.
There was that little adventure with Ted Shafter and his followers, whereby he had, by a clever ruse, sent the fellows hurrying back down the river, and given them such a good scare that they would never again bother the campers on Catamount Island.
Then came the affair with the prowling bobcat; and Max would certainly not soon forget the chilly sensation that held possession of him all the time he could see those twin glowing yellow orbs fastened upon him.
And last, though far from least, had been that fear when he found reason to believe a passing rattler was within half a dozen feet of him.
Could there be any further danger to be met? He knew of none, and hoped nothing might occur to give him another thrill such as those that had passed. For while Max Hastings might be said to be a resolute lad, about as fearless as the ordinary boy of his years, perhaps more so, still he did not yearn for excitement.
There was Steve now, who was quite another proposition; he just dearly loved a racket, and was never so happy as when he felt that there was a fight of some sort in prospect, he cared very little what its nature.
How much longer could he stand it? And was midnight far past? Max would have given something for a chance to glance at the little nickel watch he carried; but the flash of a lighted match might come just at a time to ruin his carefully laid plans, and he declined to take the risk.
There was no striking clock in a church tower to tell him of the night, such as he was accustomed to at home; and Max was hardly woodsman enough to be able to read the stars and know by that means.
The thought came to him with great force, however, as he lay there looking up at the few stars he could see through the leafy canopy overhead; and Max determined that henceforth he would place himself in position to know just when certain bright stars might be expected to rise above the eastern horizon each succeeding night or others set in the west.
His long vigil was fated to come to an end at last, however. When the boy was almost ready to give up, and confess that sleep was mastering his desire to accomplish things, he heard a sound again.
Ah, this time it could be neither the rustle of a cat's body through the foliage nor the sinuous movements of a gliding snake along the ground. Closer it drew, and again did Max hold his breath with suspense; for now he knew beyond a doubt that a human being was approaching with hurried steps, and that the unknown headed toward the cabin, coming from down the island, too!
Once Max allowed himself to suspect that it might be one of his chums trying to find his place of concealment, and that something dreadful might have happened in camp that required his immediate presence. This thought, however, he immediately put aside as nonsense. It must be the inmate of the strange cabin who, having stolen the provisions, just as Max had expected he would, was now making a bee line for his retreat with the intention of devouring the same!
Closer came the rushing sound, as of the passage of some large form. Max had, it seemed, been wise to choose his hiding place in a thicket, where no one would think of going, for in this way he avoided contact with the stranger.
Directly past him Max saw a moving bulk go, and all he could make out was that the other was a man of unusual proportions, a giant in fact.
Then he heard him come up against the wall of the cabin, give a grunt, grope around for the door, and pass within.
After which the sound of the door closing came agreeably to the ears of the boy.