“But you don’t propose to go alone?” asked several, anxiously. “It might be dangerous business, if you should happen to encounter him with no help within call.”
“Yes, I think I will go alone,” quietly replied the hunter. “If he can see me before I do him, he will do better than I think he can. And, if I do get my eye on him first, he will stop and yield, or die, as sure as my rifle is true to its old trust; for I should feel it my bounden duty to stop him by bullet, if need be, in case he should attempt to flee, as much as I should to shoot a painter carrying off one of my own children.”
By the approval of the sheriff, and the concurrence of all, the hunter’s plan of operations was immediately adopted. And, accordingly, the designated numbers were told off to man the river, and at once set in motion to perform the duty; while the rest retraced their way to the village, except the hunter, who, seeking a shoal place, waded the river, and was soon out of sight among the thickets of the opposite bank.
On the return of the company to the tavern, every boat to be found on the river, from that place to the lake, was immediately put in requisition, for the service of the night. And by early twilight, eight canoes, each containing two or three well-armed men, led on by the trapper, in a single canoe, were seen emerging from the outlet into the broad lake, and slowly filing off along its western border. Coasting in closely to the shore, so as to keep within the shadow of the woods, they pursued their noiseless way up the lake, to a point where the low, marshy land lying between the lower part of the Umbagog and the Magalloway rises into the gradually-swelling ridge, which, a mile or two farther on, becomes a rocky, precipitous mountain, whose beetling cliffs, overhanging the deep, dark waters beneath, were crowned with their primeval growth of towering pines. Here they paused long enough to station one of their canoes, near a small point, commanding a view across the corresponding coves on either side; and then cautiously proceeded onward, dropping a canoe, in like manner, every five or six hundred yards, till the extremity of the western coast was reached, the line efficiently manned, and the trapper left to cruise alone over the cordon of boats thus stretched along the shore, to carry any needed intelligence, and make independent observations. It was now dark, and, being a moonless night, all within the shade of the mountains, especially, was wrapt in almost impenetrable gloom; so that the ear, rather than the eye, must now be depended on for whatever discoveries were to be made. Nothing as yet, to the disappointment and increasing anxiety of the company, had been seen or heard of the hunter.
“He cannot have been killed, so soon, can he?” whispered the sheriff, in one of the last-stationed canoes, as the trapper glided alongside, to hold communication with the officer.
“No,” was the low-toned reply; “that could not have happened, if there were any fear of such a thing, without one or more rifle-shots, which, in this calm evening, and this favorable locality for conveying sounds to a great distance, we must have heard, even down to the tavern. No, I will risk him. I think he must have got on to the fellow’s trail, and, if near the lake, lies in some spot where he can’t move away without danger of alarming the game. We have nothing to do but wait patiently. Phillips knows we are here in waiting, and he will report himself as soon as he can.”
They did not, however, have to wait long. In a few minutes, a small, shrill, quavering cry, which few could have distinguished from that of a raccoon, rose from a thicket on the shore, a short distance below.
“Ah! that is he,” softly cried the trapper; “I know the thicket he is hailing from. If you will remain just where you are, I will scull my canoe down to the spot, take him in with me, if he has not found a boat,—or at any rate bring him here to make his report.”
Like the gliding of a fish, shrinking away from sight, the light canoe, under the invisible impulse of the dexterously handled oar of the trapper, passed noiselessly away, and disappeared in the darkness. But, long before the expectant officer, who had been vainly listening for some sound, either of the going or the coming of the absent canoe, had thought of its return, it was again at his side, with the anticipated addition to its occupants.
“Here is the man, to speak for himself,” said the trapper, putting out a hand to guard off and prevent the canoes from grazing.