Anvik gave him a glance of inquiry.
“Where are you going?” demanded the Professor.
“I’m going to ‘mush’ a little way up the pass to see if I can’t get something worth while for our breakfast.”
“You will get lost.”
“No, that will not be possible. So long as I keep in the pass I shall be all right. Don’t worry; I’ll keep in the pass all right.”
The boy plunged into the thick undergrowth, and no sooner had he done so than the giant mosquitoes and black gnats attacked him in force. Tad fought them until he grew tired of it, then he trudged on grimly, permitting them to do their worst. After a time he decided that he would get no game if he remained down in the pass, so, after carefully taking his bearings, Tad climbed the mountain until he was able to look over the tops of the trees. It was like a level green sea. He sat down in the sunlight, gazing out over the wonderful landscape.
142“A world of silence,” he murmured. “If Chunky were here he would say I was getting softening of the brain. Hello!” Tad froze himself. There was scarcely a perceptible flicker of the eyelids as his gaze became fixed on a point of rock just across the pass. There, poised with one foot in the air, stood an antelope. It was a young doe, as Tad surmised it to be. His position was not a favorable one for shooting because he was in plain sight, and the least move on his part no doubt would be discovered by the antelope.
“She must have scented me or else she has got a whiff from the camp. If I don’t make any false moves she will be over in that camp within the next hour.”
Tad raised his rifle slowly. Yet slow and cautious as he was, the antelope’s head went up sharply. So did Butler’s rifle. He took quick aim and pulled the trigger. The report of his shot went crashing from wall to wall, like a series of heavy shots.
The freckle-faced boy leaped to his feet, and to one side, with rifle ready for another shot in case he had missed. But he had not. The antelope had leaped into the air, turned a complete somersault, and went crashing down into the gulch out of sight.