The four of them had no trouble in finishing the portage of the Jaybird and her cargo from the wagon to navigable water, and finally they set off, paddling for the marshes which made off toward the main lake.
They had traveled perhaps three or four miles when Alex concluded to yield to the importunities of the boys to get ashore. They were eager to do this, because continually now they saw great bands and streams of wild fowl coming in from every direction to alight in the marshes—more ducks, as Alex had said, than they had thought there were in all the world. Most of them were mallards, and from many places in the marsh they could hear the quacking and squawking of yet other ducks hidden in the high grass.
“We haven’t any waders,” said Alex, “and I think you’ll find the water pretty cold, but you’ll soon get used it to. Come ahead, then.”
They pushed their canoe into the cover of the reeds and grasses, and disembarking, waded on out toward the outer edge of the marsh, where the water was not quite so deep, yet where they could get cover in rushes and clumps of grass. Alex posted them in a line across a narrow quarter of the marsh, so that each gun would be perhaps a hundred yards from his neighbor, Jesse, the shortest of the party, taking the shallowest water nearest to the road beyond the marsh.
They had not long to wait, for the air seemed to them quite full of hurrying bands of fowl, so close that they could see their eyes dart glances from side to side, their long necks stretched out, their red feet hugged tight up to their feathers.
It is not to be supposed that any one of our young hunters was an expert wild-fowl shot, for skill in that art comes only with a considerable experience. Moreover, they were not provided with the best of guns and ammunition, but only such as the Post was accustomed to sell to the half-breeds of that country. In spite of all handicaps, however, the sport was keen enough to please them, and successful enough as well, for once in a while one of them would succeed in knocking out of a passing flock one or more of the great birds, which splashed famously in the water of the marsh. Sometimes they were unable to find their birds after they had fallen, but they learned to hurry at once to a crippled bird and secure it before it could escape and hide in the grasses. Presently they had at their feet almost a dozen fine mallards. In that country, where the ducks abound, there had as yet been no shooting done at them, so that they were not really as wild as they are when they reach the southern latitudes. Neither were their feathers so thick as they are later in the season, when their flight is stronger. The shooting was not so difficult as not to afford plenty of excitement for our young hunters, who called out in glee from one to the other, commenting on this, the last of their many sporting experiences in the north.
They found that Alex, although he had never boasted of his skill, was a very wonderful shot on wild fowl; in fact, he rarely fired at all unless certain he was going to kill his bird, and when he dropped the bird it nearly always was stone-dead.
After a time Rob, hearing what he supposed to be the quacking of a duck in the grass behind him, started back to find what he fancied was the hidden mallard. He saw Alex looking at him curiously, and once more heard the quacking.
“Why, it’s you who’ve been doing that all the time, Alex!” exclaimed Rob. “I see now why those ducks would come closer to you than to me—you were calling them!”
Alex tried to show Rob how to quack like a duck without using any artificial means, but Rob did not quite get the knack of it that evening. For a time, however, after the other boys had come over also, they all squatted in the grass near to Alex, and found much pleasure in seeing him decoy the ducks, and do good, clean shooting when they were well within reach.