After half an hour he came upon a small creek that flowed from the northwest. With a glance at his compass, he started to follow it. For nearly three hours he plodded along the creek, digging into the banks with a stick and examining every spot where there seemed a chance of finding blue clay; but he found nothing except ordinary sand and gravel. At last, disappointed and disheartened, he turned back toward the Smoke River. After a mile or so he stopped to eat his luncheon, and built a smudge to keep the flies away; then he proceeded onward through the rough, unprofitable country.
But if he did not find diamonds, he came on plenty of game. Ruffed grouse and spruce partridges rose here and there and perched in the trees. He saw many rabbits, and there were signs where deer or moose had browsed on the birch twigs. Once, as he came over a ridge, he caught a glimpse of a black bear digging at a pile of rotten logs in the valley. The animal evidently had not been long out of winter quarters, for it looked starved, and its fur was tattered and rusty. The moment the bear caught sight of him, it vanished like a dark streak.
Fred found no trace that afternoon of blue clay, or, indeed, of any clay, but he happened upon something that caused him some apprehension. It was a steel trap, lying on the open ground, battered and rusted as if it had been there for some time. Scattered round it were some bones that he guessed had belonged to a lynx. Apparently the animal had been caught in the trap, which was of the size generally used for martens, had broken the chain from its fastening, and had traveled until it had either perished from starvation or had been killed by wolves.
Although rusty, the trap was still in working condition, and Fred, somewhat uneasy, took it along with him. Some one had been trapping in that district recently, perhaps during the last winter; was the stranger also looking for diamonds?
With frequent glances at his compass Fred kept zigzagging to and fro, and finally came out on the river again; but he was still a long way from camp, and he did not reach the head of the cataract until nearly sunset.
Horace had already come in, covered with mud and swollen with fly bites.
"What luck?" cried Fred, eagerly.
His brother shook his head. He had encountered the same sort of rough country as Fred; and to add to his troubles, he had got into a morass, from which he had escaped in a very muddy condition.
Then Fred produced the trap and told of his finding it and of his fears. The boys examined it and tested its springs. Horace took a more cheerful view of the matter.
"The Ojibywas always trap through here in the winter," he said. "The owner of that trap is probably down at Moose Factory now. Besides, the lynx might have traveled twenty or thirty miles from the place where it was caught."