“Do you think a bear did it?” Alice asked, when they had finished.
“It seems more like a bear’s work than anything else,” answered Carl. “Let’s see if we can find any trail.”
Most of the ground in the bee-yard was too hard and stony to show tracks. Carl began to circle the edge of the clearing to see if he could make out where the animal had entered the apiary.
“Look here, Carl,” Alice suddenly called to him from a distance. “What in the world do you make of this?”
Carl hastened up, and found her bending over a monstrous footprint, the like of which neither of them had ever seen before.
CHAPTER III
STRANGE PERILS
The strange oval footprint was at least ten inches long. The creature that had made it was surely heavy, for it had sunk deep into the ground; and there were four claw-marks.
“Surely that’s not a bear-track,” said Alice.
“More like the track of a young elephant, I should think,” Carl returned. “That is, if elephants had claws and ever robbed beehives.”
It was not easy to follow the trail over the hard ground. Here and there in soft spots they found the huge foot-marks. Apparently the beast had rambled all over the apiary, coming close to the trap several times, but always avoiding it. They followed it across the road, and there it gave out completely.