“No,” said Jack, “I don’t know, but I guess likely it’s a bear.”
“Right you are,” said Hugh, “and I reckon we’ll have to bloody up the tent a little to get him out. Take a shot at it and try to kill the beast.”
“All right,” said Jack, as he loaded his rifle, while Joe called out, “White Bull, do you see the cubs in the trees?”
Hugh and Jack both turned, and there, perched high up in the stunted pine trees, were two little cubs, each about as large as a small setter dog, though of course not standing nearly so high.
“Well, I swan,” said Hugh, “if that old bear and her family didn’t come down here to make us grief. Jack, you kill the old one in the tent, and Joe and I will settle these cubs. We’ll have some meat to eat now.”
Jack fired a shot through the tent and a squawl of rage and pain was followed by a series of struggles, but at last the tent lay still, and below the point where Jack’s ball had entered, a little red stain began to appear on the canvas. Hugh and Joe shot the cubs in the trees. The tent was unrolled and the old bear extracted from it. It was evident that she had entered it to investigate its contents and in overhauling things had knocked down the poles. Her struggles had wrapped her so tightly in the canvas that she could not use her legs or paws to tear her way out, and she had lain there firmly bound in the stout duck, until vengeance, in the shape of Jack, descended on her from the hillside above.
The evening and a part of the next morning were spent in skinning the bears, and stretching their hides; and many were the jokes that the hunters made over this curious capture.
CHAPTER XI
THE RETREAT
IT was noon the next day before the various chores about camp were done. The dishes and some small packages of food that had been left in the tent were badly mixed up and a number of packages torn open and their contents ruined. Hugh, fortunately, had put most of the coffee in one of the caches in the trees, but that which had been left in the tent had been scattered and trodden into the ground, so that only two or three cupfuls of the berries could be picked up and used.
“I tell you, Hugh,” said Jack, “it was mighty lucky that you put that food in the trees. If it hadn’t been for that I expect we should have had to go back to the Agency to get more grub.”