The top of the ridge was thickly covered with bushes, and it was something Oscar imagined he saw behind those bushes that caused his eyes to open, and set his hands to trembling violently. Arising above the top of the thicket was an object that looked for all the world like a pair of wide-spreading antlers; and on the ground could be dimly seen another object, that greatly resembled a doe lying down.
A person whose eyes were less keen than Oscar’s might have looked toward the top of the ridge a score of times without seeing anything but bushes there; but the young hunter was positive that the deer he had been following were stationed within easy range of him, closely watching all his movements.
Why did he not bolt at once and shoot at 245them? For the reason that he knew that so long as he kept moving, and the animals fancied themselves unobserved, they would remain motionless in their place of concealment; but the instant he came to a stand-still, they would take the alarm and show him their heels. Besides, he wanted to obtain a better view of them, if he could, to gain a favorable position for a shot, and to make sure that they were really live deer, and not creatures of his imagination.
With these thoughts in his mind, Oscar walked slowly along the trail, keeping his eyes fixed upon the shrubbery.
In a few seconds another cluster of bushes shut the doe out of his sight. This seemed to cause her some uneasiness, for she promptly arose to her feet and moved nearer to the buck, so that she could look through the tops of the bushes at the hunter. It was plain that she thought it best to keep her eyes on him.
The buck, at the same time, shifted his own position very slightly, and thus brought himself in front of an opening in the thicket, 246through which Oscar saw that he could obtain a fatal, or at least a disabling shot.
These movements on the part of the game removed all doubts from the mind of the young hunter.
He was looking at live deer, and nothing else.
Still keeping his gaze fixed upon the animals, he moved along the trail about ten yards further; and, when he had taken an extra cartridge from his belt, he faced about and walked back, at the same time drawing the rifle to his face.
He kept the weapon directed toward the top of the ridge; and, when the muzzle of it came within range of that clear space in the bushes, he pressed the trigger.
An instant afterward there was a great commotion behind the thicket. A cloud of snow and deep leaves flew into the air, raised by the doe as she bounded high in her tracks and sought safety in flight, and by the hind feet of the buck, which, giving one convulsive spring, came crashing through the tops of the bushes, and rolled down the bluff, landing in a heap 247almost at the feet of the hunter, who jumped quickly to one side to avoid the blows from the sharp little hoofs that were flourished so spitefully in the air.
But his struggles did not long continue. He was hard hit; and, by the time Oscar had thrown the empty shell out of his rifle and put in the cartridge he held in his hand, the buck was stone dead.
The report of his gun awoke a thousand echoes, which reverberated among the rocks and gorges until it seemed as if a dozen answering shots were coming from as many different points of the compass, and fell upon the ears of a man who, carrying his rifle at a trail, moving with long, swinging strides, and keeping his eyes fastened upon the tracks in the snow, was making his way through a dense thicket a quarter of a mile distant.
He stopped suddenly when he heard it; and, having made sure of the direction from which the report came, he uttered an exclamation indicative of astonishment and anger; and, turning short off from the trail, ran at the top of his speed toward the valley.
248Arriving at the edge of the timber, he peeped cautiously through the bushes, and saw Oscar standing below him, leaning on his rifle and looking at the prize he had secured.
The hunter either recognized in him somebody against whom he held a grudge, or else he was enraged over the loss of the game he had so long and perseveringly followed; for he raised his rifle to his face and pointed it at the boy as if he had half a mind to drop him as Oscar had dropped the mule-deer.
It was probable, however, that he had no such intention, for he did not cock his gun. He was only acting out in pantomime what he would have been glad to do in reality, if he had not been afraid of the consequences.
Just then Oscar raised his head and set up a shout that once more put the echoes at work among the hills. The sound seemed to startle the concealed hunter, for he straightened up quickly and cast suspicious glances behind and on both sides of him, at the same time straining his ears to catch the reply, if any were given.
After looking and listening for two or three 249moments he again brought his rifle to a trail, glided away as noiselessly as a spirit, making use of every tree and rock to conceal his progress, and presently he was lost to sight in the depths of the woods.
“Who—whoop!” yelled Oscar again, when he thought he had waited long enough for a reply. “Where is Thompson, I wonder? If he can’t hear the call he ought certainly to have heard the report of the gun, and I don’t see why he doesn’t answer it. That was the agreement between us. If we were hunting out of sight of each other he was to reply to my shot, and come to me at once. I’ll try him again.”
Oscar looked around for some mark upon which to exercise his skill, and discovering a white spot on a tree fifty yards away, took a quick aim at it, and had the satisfaction of seeing the centre of the spot disappear.
The echoes answered as before, but the boy heard nothing that sounded like the sharp, whip-like report of Big Thompson’s muzzleloader.
He shouted until he was hoarse, but no 250reply came back to him save the sound of his own voice thrown back from the cliffs.
“I think I’d better not waste any more time,” said Oscar, after he had waited nearly half an hour for the guide to make his appearance. “If he comes back this way he will, of course, strike my trail, and he is such a runner that it will not take him long to come up with m............