“No, they are the despised buzzard, that everybody shuns, yet no one kills, for he’d be far worse to eat than crow,” said Thad.
“And yet a ten times more useful bird than the eagle, which lives upon its ill-gotten reputation, and as I said before, the labor of the osprey, or fish hawk,” Allan went on to remark.
“But see ’em circle around, would you, Thad,” Step Hen kept on. “They generally do that, don’t they, when they’ve discovered something worth while?”
Step Hen did not wholly voice the terrible fear that had suddenly gripped his heart in a sickening clutch. There was no need, for every one of the other scouts had a spasm along the same lines.
They looked at each other rather guiltily. An undefined fear was written large upon each paling countenance. Thad, however, was the first to recover.
“You gave me an uneasy minute with the suggestion your words conjured up, Step Hen,” he said, firmly; “but I just can’t force myself to believe there’s anything to it.”
“But, Thad——”
“Just hold on, Step Hen,” the patrol leader went on to remark, “I understand what you mean, and of course we’ll head that way, to make sure it’s a deer, or something like that.”
None of them cared to pursue the matter any further, as they walked along, keeping one eye aloft to note the position of the buzzards that sailed around and around, constantly dropping lower, and with the other taking stock of their surroundings.
Thad smiled after a while, but he did not take the trouble to communicate what was in his mind to the others.