Harry Castlemon

“ Why was it that the hounds followed his trail as they would have followed that of a bear or deer? Simply because they scented him before they reached the island, and because Godfrey took so much pains to keep out of their way. Had he stood out in plain view while the boat was approaching, the hounds would have paid no attention to him.
“Well, he's gone,” said Bert, and the deep sigh that escaped his lips as he uttered the words would have led one to believe that he was glad of it, “and now comes the hard work. It's an all-day's job to build that trap.” ”

“ No sooner had the General released David's hand than it was seized by the grocer, who appeared to be as glad to see him as though he knew that the boy had come there to buy a bill of goods worth hundreds of dollars.
“It never does any good to give away to our gloomy feelings,” said the General. “There are many times when things don't go just as we would like to have them, but the day always follows the night, and a little perseverance sometimes works wonders.” ”

“ After running through the bushes for a short distance, David came within sight of a little cloud of smoke, which ascended from a hollow just in advance of him. A few steps more brought him within sight of the camp, and the first object his eyes rested upon was Don Gordon's pointer, which was tied to a sapling near a little bark lean-to, something like the one Godfrey occupied while he was living on the island. The animal, hearing his approach, advanced to meet him as far as the length of his rope would allow, and stood wagging his tail with every demonstration of joy. ”

“ It looks gloomy in the cane, doesn't it? What would we do if we should find a bear in there?”
“I don't know,” answered Don, with a laugh. “Our guns are loaded with small shot, and they would hardly penetrate a bear's thick skin. If he should come at us, I'd be a goner, sure, for I am so stiff I couldn't run to save my life. But I don't think we'll find——Halloo! Bert, just look here!”
A chorus of exclamations followed, and Godfrey and Dan looked at each other and scowled fiercely.
“That's my canoe,” said Don, and they heard the oars rattle as he stepped into it. ”

“ When they reached the barn Don was willing to confess that he was very tired. Riding on horseback is hard work for one who is stiff in every joint and lame all over; but Don could not think of going into the house and taking a rest. He had been a close prisoner there for a whole week, and now that he had taken a breath of fresh air and stirred his sluggish blood with a little exhilarating exercise, he could not bear to go back to his sofa again. He proposed that they should leave their ponies at the barn and go up to David's in the canoe. ”

“ Bert was one of the few boys we have met, who did not believe in telling everything he knew. Do you know such a boy among your companions? If you do, you know one whom nobody is afraid to trust. Bert wanted to live in peace, and thought it a good plan to quell disturbances, instead of helping them along. He knew that if he told his brother what had happened in the post-office, there would be a fight, the very first time Don and Bob met, and Bert didn't believe in fighting. But even if Don had known all about it, he would not have said anything to Lester. ”

“ Don at once began making inquiries concerning his pointer, but no one had seen him, and his loud and continued whistling brought only the hounds, which snuffed at the guns and yelped and jumped about as if trying to make their master understand that they were there, and ready for anything he might want them to do.
“Never mind,” said Don, who did not seem to feel half as bad as David did; “dogs of his breed never stray far away, and he'll be at your house or ours before morning, you may depend upon it. Good-by now, and don't forget to be on hand at an early hour. ”

“ He had money now, and that grocery bill should not trouble him any longer.
“If there ever was a lucky boy in the world I am the one,” thought David, whose spirits were elevated in the same ratio in which they had before been depressed. “I'll earn my hundred and fifty dollars now, and mother shall have her nice things in spite of Dan and Lester. It isn't every fellow who has such friends as Don and Bert Gordon. But I shall have a hard time of it, anyhow. Dan will be so mad when he finds out that he can't ruin me, that he will do something desperate.” ”

“ It was an easy matter to cheat confiding fellows like Don and Bert, who were much more familiar with Greek than they were with the way business was conducted, but it was not so easy to deceive a man like Silas Jones. Dan was surprised and disappointed, and of course as angry as he could be. He walked rapidly along the road with his bundles, under his arm and his rifle on his shoulder, and it was not until he reached home and had sunned himself for a few minutes on the bench in front of the door, that he cooled down so that he could think the matter over. ”

“ I am going to get up a Sportsman's Club among the fellows, and then we'll keep such poachers and pot-hunters as you where you belong. No one objects to your shooting the birds over a dog—that's the way to shoot them; but you shan't trap them and send them out of the country. Will you promise that you will give up the idea?”
“No, I won't,” answered David.
“Then you'll find yourself in the hands of the law, the first thing you know,” exclaimed Lester, angrily. “We won't stand any such work. Don Gordon ought to be ashamed of himself for what he has done. ”

“ While Lester and Bob were looking at them, a small, dark object suddenly arose from the box and came toward them, passing swiftly over their heads and disappearing in the woods.
“That's a quail!” exclaimed Bob. “It escaped from Don's hands.”
“Yes, sir, and we have made a discovery,” said Lester. “Dave Evans hasn't given up trapping the quails after all. He's catching them every day, and Don and Bert are helping him.”
“It's just like them,” replied Bob, in great disgust. “They're always poking their noses into other people's business. ”

“ Godfrey Evans could not have driven them away by imitating the growl of a wild animal. They welcomed the newcomer with their bugle-like notes, and were answered by a chorus of angry yelps from the rest of the pack, which had been shut up in the barn and were to be left behind.
“Now, I call this rather a formidable expedition,” said Don, as David came up. “If that bear is there to-day I wouldn't take a dollar for my chance of shooting him. One bullet and three loads of buckshot will be more than he can carry away with him. ”

“ After running his eyes all along the shore, to satisfy himself that he had made no mistake as to the locality, Don picked up the oars again, and with a few more strokes brought the canoe to the bank. All there was left of the shooting-box they could have carried away in their arms. Even the stove had not escaped destruction. The chimney had fallen upon it and it was completely ruined.
“Godfrey means to put a stop to all our fun if he can, doesn't he?” said Bert, who thought that a man who would steal a canoe and spring a trap, would be guilty of any meanness. ”

“ Godfrey disliked this aimless, joyless existence as much as he disliked work, and even Dan at times longed for something better. They both wanted to be rich. Godfrey wanted to see his fine plantation, which was now abandoned to briers and cane, cultivated as it used to be; while it was Dan's ambition to have two or three painted boats in the lake, to have a pointer following at his heels, and to do his shooting with a double-barrel gun that “broke in two in the middle.” He wanted to take his morning's exercise on a spotted pony—a circus horse, he called it ”

“ They take along a nigger to cook for them, and have a high old time shooting over their decoys; but the first thing they know they'll find that shanty missing some fine morning. I'll set fire to it.”
“Don't say that out loud,” said Lester, quickly, at the same time extending his hand to his companion, as if to show that what he had said met his own views exactly. “Don't so much as hint it to a living person. We'll give them a chance to make friends with us if they want to, and if they don't, let them take the consequences. ”

“ The wagon having passed on out of hearing, Dan shouldered his rifle and started toward the landing. While he was skulking through the woods at the lower end of the field, he stopped in a fence corner long enough to see David and his two friends transfer another good-sized catch from one of the traps to the coop in the wagon. The sight encouraged him greatly. If David's good luck would only continue for just one week, the fifty dozen birds would certainly be captured, and Dan would stand a chance of making a small fortune. ”

“ Mother says that if folks don't grow better every day, they grow worse, and I can see that it is true in your case and father's. You are both going down hill, and the first thing you know you'll do something that will get you in the calaboose. Three months ago neither one of you would have been guilty of stealing.”
“Whoop!” yelled Dan, jumping up and knocking his heels together.
“I don't want to go back on either one of you,” continued David, “and neither do I want to tell mother how bad you are; but I'll do it sooner than let you swindle Don Gordon or anybody else. Why don't you go to work?” ”

“ If I can't get work to do, I can hunt and trap small game, you know; and if I only had a rifle, I am sure I could kill at least one deer every week. That, reckoning venison worth six cents a pound, would bring us in about thirty dollars a month. Who says we couldn't live and save money on that?”
“But you don't own a rifle,” said his mother, smiling at the boy's enthusiasm.
“Well, that's so,” said David, sadly. “But,” he added, his face brightening, “I shall have ten dollars coming to me as soon as Don Gordon's pointer is field-broken, and you shall have every cent of it. ”

“ Lester and Bob were jealous of Don and Bert, that was the secret of the matter; and more than that, they were disappointed applicants for the very contract which Don had secured for David.
Bob regularly borrowed and read the “Rod and Gun,” and when his eye fell upon the advertisement calling for fifty dozen live quails, he thought he saw a chance to make a goodly sum of pocket money, and hurried off to lay the matter before his friend Lester, proposing that they should go into partnership and divide the profits. Of course Lester entered heartily into the scheme. ”

“ The negro was commanded to point out the spot where the treasure was hidden, but nothing could be learned from the old fellow. He would not speak at all, until Godfrey threatened to punch him in the ribs with his shovel, and then he denied all knowledge of the barrel. Upon hearing this, Clarence and his companion seized him by the arms, dragged him across the field, over the fence and down the road to Godfrey's potato-cellar, where he was tied to a stanchion with a plough-line and left with the assurance that he should never see daylight again until he told where the fortune was to be found. ”

“ When he arrived within sight of the field where the traps were set, he saw his brother and David coming in with another wagon load of birds.
“How many this morning?” asked Don.
“We have enough now to make fifty-five dozen altogether,” replied Bert.
“Hurrah for our side!” cried Don. “We'll ship them all. Some may die on the way, you know, and that man must have the number he advertised for. Captain Morgan will stop and get the birds when he comes back. He will see them shipped on the railroad at Cairo, and all we have to do is to be sure that the game is at the landing in time.” ”

“ Bert will take father's heavy gun; and we'd like to have you take your single-barrel. If he gets a bullet and three loads of buckshot in his head, he'll not growl at us any more. If we don't get a chance to shoot him, we'll build a trap and catch him alive the next time he comes to the island. Will you go?”
Of course David would go. He would have gone anywhere that Don told him to go. He promised to be at the barn at an early hour the next morning, and then showed a desire to leave the shop; so Don unlocked the door, and David hurried out and turned his face toward the landing. ”

“ He was downright insolent.”
“These white trash are as impudent as the niggers,” said Bob, “and no one who has the least respect for himself will have anything to do with them. I used to think that Don Gordon was something of an aristocrat, but now I know better.”
“I wish I had given him a good cowhiding,” continued Lester, who did not think it worth while to state that he had been on the point of attempting that very thing, but had thought better of it when he saw how resolutely David stood his ground. “But never mind. We'll get even with him. ”

“ I don't suppose the ignoramus ever knew before——”
“Well, who cares whether he did or not?” exclaimed Bob, impatiently. “That's a matter that doesn't interest me. Is Dave Evans going to make that hundred and fifty dollars and cheat me out of a new shot-gun? That's what I want to know!”
“Of course he isn't,” replied Lester. “We can't stop him by the aid of the Sportsman's Club, and so we will stop him ourselves without the aid of anybody. Let him go to work and set his traps, and we'll see how many birds he will take out of them. We'll rob every one we can find and keep the quail ourselves. ”

“ We don't care for that, however. He'll be sure to come back, and when he does he'll find a trap waiting for him. We'll see as much sport in catching him alive as we would in shooting him. Hunt 'em up, there!” he added, waving his hand along the path.
The hounds, baying fierce and loud at every jump, went tearing through the cane, followed by the boys, who moved in single file, Don leading the way. A very few minutes sufficed to bring them to the cleared spot in which Godfrey's camp was located, and there they found the hounds running about showing every sign of anger and excitement. ”