After Balser had killed the wolf, clouds obscured the moon before he could make another shot. He feared to fire in the dark lest he might kill his father, so he waited impatiently for the light which did not come.
Meanwhile, the dead wolf having been devoured, the pack again turned upon Mr. Brent, and Balser could hear his father’s voice and the clanking of the iron upon the singletree as he struck at the wolves to ward them off.
It seemed to Balser that the moon had gone under the clouds never to appear again. Mr. Brent continually called loudly to the wolves, for the human voice is an awesome sound even to the fiercest animals. To Balser the tone of his father’s voice, mingled with the howling of wolves, was a note of desperation that almost drove him frantic. The wind increased in fury every moment, and Balser felt the cold piercing to the marrow of his bones. He had waited it seemed to him hours for the light of the moon again to shine, but the clouds appeared to grow deeper and the darkness more dense.
While Balser was vainly endeavouring to watch the conflict at the wagon, he heard a noise at the root of the tree in which he had taken refuge, and, looking down, he discovered a black monster standing quietly beneath him. It was a bear that had been attracted to the scene of battle by the noise. Balser at once thought, “Could I kill this huge bear, his great carcass certainly would satisfy the hunger of the wolves that surround my father.” Accordingly he lowered the point of his gun, and, taking as good aim as the darkness would permit, he fired upon the bear. The bear gave forth a frightful growl of rage and pain, and as it did so its companion, a beast of enormous size, came running up, apparently for the purpose of rendering assistance.
“... IMAGINE HIS CONSTERNATION WHEN HE RECOGNIZED THE FORMS OF LINEY FOX AND HER BROTHER TOM.”
Balser hastily reloaded his gun and prepared to shoot the other bear. This he soon did, and while the wolves howled about his father the two wounded bears at the foot of the tree made night hideous with their ravings.
Such a frightful bedlam of noises had never before been heard.
Balser was again loading his gun, hoping to finish the bears, when he saw two lighted torches approaching along the path over which he had just come, and as they came into view imagine his consternation when he recognized the forms of Liney Fox and her brother Tom. Tom carried his father’s gun, for Mr. Fox had gone to Brookville, and Liney, in addition to her torch, carried Tom’s hatchet. Liney and Tom were approaching rapidly, and Balser called out to them to stop. They did not hear him, or did not heed him, but continued to go forward to their death. The bears at the foot of the tree were wounded, and would be more dangerous than even the pack of wolves howling at the wagon.
“Go back! Go back!” cried Balser desperately, “or you’ll be killed. Two wounded bears are at the root of the tree I’m in, and a hundred wolves are howling in the hollow just below me. Run for your lives! Run! You’ll be torn in pieces if you come here.”