Ethan had lately become quite an adept with bow and arrows, which suggested to him the bright idea of going into the merry greenwood with the romantic equipment of a Robin Hood or a Hiawatha. He rather looked for the admiration of the girls, and especially of Yellow Star, and had even gone so far as to picture himself triumphantly bringing in the deer on his shoulders, and gallantly throwing it down at Mrs. Waring’s kitchen door. Rather to the boy’s resentment, however, she proved most unsympathetic.
“How can you think of such a thing?” she protested, “and after we have all watched the darling things drinking out of Uncle’s spring! I don’t call it hunting to go out and kill them when they are so tame, almost like pets.”
“I hope you don’t think I propose to shoot on posted land,” remarked Ethan With some dignity. “I know just where I shall go; on the south side of the mountain there’s a regular deer path; and it isn’t like gunning, let me tell you, with the buckshot scattering every which way; and beside, the farmers down that way are glad enough to have the deer killed—they do no end of damage to the young fruit trees.”
“I should say so; why, those very deer that Uncle Si thinks so much of got into the garden one night, and ruined all his early peas,” chimed in sensible Doris. “If it had been his next-door neighbor’s calves, wouldn’t there have been a row, or even a lawsuit, may be.”
“Well, rather,” observed Ethan, glad of a champion. “That’s just why the law was passed providing for one week’s open season; the deer are getting to be regular nuisances all over this part of the state. Pretty soon the farmers will have to build high fences to keep them off the growing crops.”
“It’s letting them think no one is going to hunt them, till they forget to be afraid, and then turning an army of men and boys loose on the poor things all of a sudden, that I don’t like,” broke in Cynthia impulsively. “It’s all very well talking about the law, but what do the deer know about your old law? It isn’t fair, and I hate anything that’s not fair.”
“And it has seemed so like home, ever since I knew for certain there were Wild deer in these woods,” breathed Stella. “Girls, I keep fancying we’ll come upon some wigwams, some time, of those old Indians who lived here two hundred years ago. I suppose there aren’t any bounties offered for their scalps nowadays; and just suppose they should come back, like the deer!”
The young folks were picnicking, as usual, in the edge of that bit of first-growth pine that Uncle was so proud of, and at Stella’s words all glanced furtively about, as if half expecting to glimpse a ragged birch-bark dwelling, or even one of the soft-footed braves revisiting his native haunts in these venerable woods. After all, it was they who were the intruders. Ethan looked decidedly shaken, but matter-of-fact Doris remarked bluntly:
“If they did come back, they wouldn’t kill the deer for one week, but every day in the year. I thought Indians were always hunting, when they weren’t on the war-path killing people; and you needn’t say anything, Stella Waring, so there!”