“Oh!” cried Bart, and leaped back several feet. “What was that?”
“An owl,” answered Harry, with a laugh.
“How he scared me.”
They could not see the owl, or Bart might have taken a shot at the creature. The scare made the lad nervous, and he trembled a little as they continued on their journey.
“I don’t know as I should care to walk this road alone at night,” he said. “I am glad we live in the town and not out in the country or in the woods.”
“I fancy it is what one gets used to, Bart. I’ve heard it said a countryman can’t sleep in the city for the noise, and some city folks can’t sleep in the country because it’s too quiet.”
“Yes, I’ve heard that, too. But I think—Oh, my, what was that?”
Both boys halted as some dark object passed across the road a couple of rods in front of them. What the object was they could not discern.
“I guess it was a rabbit or else a fox,” said Harry, as lightly as he could. “Come on.”
“Could it have been a—a bear?”