JACK AND THE STRANGE YOUTH.
The deer were still in sight, stopping occasionally to feed, and then, with heads in air, moving a few paces along the slope. Jack waited with breathless anxiety to see his horseman emerge from among the hills beyond. Several minutes elapsed; then, though no horseman appeared, the old deer, startled by sound or scent of the enemy, threw high her head, and began to leap, with graceful, undulating movements, along the hillside.
The fawn darted after her, and for a minute they were hidden from view in a hollow. The stratagem had so far succeeded. They had started toward the woods.
Jack, in an ague of agitation, waited for the game to show itself again, and, by its movements, guide his own. At length the fawn appeared on the summit of a low hill, and stopped. The doe came up and stopped too, with elevated nostrils, snuffing. For a rifle, in approved hands, there would have been a chance for a shot. But the game was far beyond the range of Jack's gun.
To try his nerve, however, he took aim, or, rather, attempted to take aim. His hands—if the truth must be confessed—shook so that he could not keep his piece steady for an instant. Cool fellow enough on ordinary occasions, he now had a violent attack of what is called the "buck fever."
Fortunately, the deer had not seen the horseman; and, while they were recovering from their first alarm, they gave the young hunter time to subdue, with resolute good sense, his terrible nervous agitation.
They did not stop to feed any more, but moved on, with occasional pauses, toward the woods; following the line of the hollows, as Jack had foreseen.
All this time the dog lay whining at his young master's heels. He knew instinctively that there was sport on foot, and could hardly be kept quiet.
The deer took another and final start, and came bounding along toward the spot where the wagon had stood. But for the excitement of the moment, Jack must have felt a touch of pity at sight of those two slender, beautiful creatures, so full of life, making for their covert in the cool woods. But the hunter's spirit was uppermost. He took aim at the doe, followed her movements a moment with the moving gun, then fired. She plunged forward, and dropped dead.
The fawn, confused by the report and by the doe's sudden fall, stood for an instant quite still, then made a few bounds up toward the very spot where the young hunter was concealed. It stopped again, within twenty paces of the levelled gun. There it stood, its pretty spotted side turned toward him, so fair a mark, and so charming a picture, that for a moment, excited though he was, he could not have the heart to shoot. Ah! what is this spirit of destruction, which has come down to us from our barbarous forefathers, and which gives even good-hearted boys like Jack a wild joy in taking life?
The dog, rendered ungovernable by the firing of the gun, made a noise in the thicket. The fawn heard, and started to run away. The provocation was too great for our young hunter, and he sent a charge of buck-shot after it. The fawn did not fall.
"Take 'em, Lion!" shouted Jack; and out rushed the dog.
The poor thing had been wounded, and the dog soon brought it down. Jack ran after, to prevent a tearing of the hide and flesh. Then he set up a wild yell, which might have been heard a mile away on the prairie,—a call for his horseman, who had not yet reappeared.
Jack dragged the fawn and placed it beside its dam. There lay the two pretty creatures, slaughtered by his hand.
"It can't be helped," thought he. "If it is right to hunt game, it is right to kill it. If we eat flesh, we must take life."
So he tried to feel nothing but pure triumph at the sight. Yet I have heard him say, in relating the adventure, that he could never afterwards think of the dead doe and pretty fawn, lying there side by side, without a pang.
He now backed his buggy out of the woods, set the seat forward in order to make room for the deer behind, and waited for his horse.
"Where can that fellow have gone?" he muttered, with growing anxiety.
He went to a hill-top, to get a good view, and strained his vision, gazing over the prairie. The sun was almost set, and all the hills were darkening, save now and then one of the highest summits.
Over one of these Jack suddenly descried a distant object moving. It was no deer this time, but a horse and rider far away, and going at a gallop—in the wrong direction.
He gazed until they disappeared over the crest, and the faint sundown glory faded from it, and he felt the lonesome night shutting down over the limitless expanse. Then he smote his hands together with fury and despair.
He knew that the horse was his own, and the rider the strange youth in whose hands he had so rashly intrusted him. And here he was, five miles from home, with the darkening forest on one side, and the vast prairie on the other; the dead doe and fawn lying down there on the dewy grass, the empty buggy and harness beside them; and only his dog to keep him company.