“I git even! I keel you for zis!” he exclaimed, standing on one leg.
At that moment Alice came hurrying out with the lighted lantern, and the man wheeled and started away at a limping run. Evidently he wished to avoid the light.
“Hold on!” shouted Carl, picking up his gun. “Stop! I want to know who you are. Stop!—or I’ll shoot.”
The thief flung back some savage answer, but kept moving. Carl discharged one barrel of his gun in the air, but it had no effect, for the next moment the man had vanished into the dark woods. Carl did not care. He had only wished to frighten the fellow, and he would not have known what to do with him as a prisoner. The thief surely had had his lesson, and he looked after him with a smile.
“That was your wendigo, Alice,” he said to his sister, who was pale and badly frightened. “Did you notice his feet? He was wearing great stuffed moccasins to imitate a wild beast’s track. I suppose they had nails in the toes for claw-marks. Look here and see the wendigo trail he made.”
Sure enough, here and there on the soft bits of earth they found the same great misshapen trail as before, claw-marks and all. Carl chuckled.
“I’ve heard of the trick before,” he said. “I don’t know why it never occurred to me that it might be a human bear. But I don’t think he’ll try it again.”
“He may do worse, though,” said Alice nervously. “He might set fire to the cabin or the bees—or shoot us.”
But Carl did not think there was any danger of the man attempting any revenge for that night at any rate. He was likely to be too lame and sore, and he had not seemed to carry any weapon; so, after watching for a short time, they went back to bed.
But neither of them slept much in the few hours that remained before daybreak. They were up early and tried to follow the trail of the mock wendigo, but they lost it on the stony road. No hives had been damaged this time; the robber had doubtless been trapped before he had time to rob. And the trap must have bitten hard, for there was blood on the rusty, toothed jaws.