The Boy Hunters of Kentucky

by Edward Sylvester Ellis

"No," was the kind but decisive reply of the father; "there is enough work to keep them busy until dark."

The boys knew better than to plead with their father after he had once given his decision, so, like the manly fellow that he was, Jack leaned his rifle against a tree, and fell to work with the boys to help in the task.

The work was finished just as the sun was setting, and Jack, declining to stay to supper, once more slung his gun over his shoulder and set out for home, promising his young friends that he would be ready at daylight the next morning to join them in a big hunt.

"It's a pity I didn't get a chance to use her to-day," thought Jack, as he turned his face homeward, little dreaming how soon he would be forced to call upon the weapon to help him out of a peril that threatened his very life.

It was the season of the year when the days were quite short, and Jack knew that the night would be fully come before he could reach his home. He cared nothing, however, for that. He had gone over the trail (or path) many a time when the hour was much later, and it may be said that he knew it so well that he could have walked the entire length with his eyes shut.

The youth had advanced only a little way when he noticed that the darkness had closed in, and, though the moon was shining above the thick branches, the gloom was so deep in most portions of the forest that he could see only a short distance along the path, even when it took a straight course: which was not often the case.

You must not think that our young friend had any such emotion as fear. Most boys who have spent their lives in the city would shrink from such a journey after nightfall, for it was a fact that Jack Gedney was walking through a stretch of woods in which not only wild animals abounded, but through which the fierce red men hunted, and he was liable to meet both the former and the latter; but he had no more hesitation than he would have felt in climbing from the lower floor of his cabin home to the loft where he slept every night.

You must not forget, too, that he carried his new rifle, and that made him feel secure.

A youngster in the situation of Jack may do a good deal of thinking as he walks briskly along, but, if he has been rightly trained he always keeps his wits about him. So it was that his eyes and ears were always open. He stepped as lightly as an Indian, peering as far ahead as he could in the gloom, glancing from side to side and behind him, and now and then halting for a moment to catch any sound that might fall on his ear.

In this manner he had gone a third of the distance when he became sure that something was following him. He stopped several times and looked back, but could see nothing. His quick ear, however, had caught the soft footfall in the trail, which left no doubt that either a man or an animal was dogging his footsteps.