“What’s that?” demanded his chum, stopping short.
“Why, I never stuck a blessed cartridge in my pocket, you see. Thought the six I had in the magazine of the gun would be good and plenty for all the needs I’d run up against. Now I wish I had the whole hundred along. Just my luck. I’m always losing things, and if it ain’t anything else, it must be chances. Think of a hundred dead wolves, and all killed with this great little gun while I sat perched up in the crotch of a nice tree! It makes me sick to think of it, that’s what, Thad.”
“Are you sure you did put six cartridges in the magazine before we left?” asked the other.
“Well, that’s what I meant to do, and I reckon I did, all right; though Giraffe was joking me at the time, and he might have upset my calculations,” Step Hen admitted.
“Well, then, suppose you drop your bundle of meat, and take a look,” advised Thad. “If it gets to warm quarters it’s just as well that you know how many wolves you can account for. Throw them out in one, two, three order, now.”
So Step Hen began working the mechanism of his little gun. Not being excited, he was able to do this excellently. With the first cast a cartridge flew out of the rejecting opening; but when he tried to repeat, nothing happened. He looked at the gun blankly, and tried twice more; but with the same result.
“No use,” remarked Thad, grimly; “nothing doing, it seems. When you thought you put six cartridges in the magazine, you stopped at three. And just such little mistakes have cost many a hunter his life before now, let me tell you, Step Hen.”
“Oh! mercy, what do you mean, Thad?” asked the other, alarmed.
“Why, suppose now, several wolves were rushing at you with open mouths; and when you stood there, feeling able to take care of them all, your gun missed fire, not because it went back on you, but through your silly fault in not making sure it was fed to the limit when you started; things would look kind of gloomy just then, wouldn’t they?”
“I’ll never go out without being dead sure my magazine is plumb full; and a handful in my pocket besides, catch me again,” said Step Hen, solemnly.