"Well," said Hugh, "that little cuss rather played it on us, didn't he? One of us ought to have gone down there and killed him—that is, if we wanted him—of course, his hide wouldn't be of any special use; it's only that it sounds more like something to kill three bears than it does to kill two."
"Then you got the other cub, did you, Hugh?" asked Jack.
"Yes," said Hugh, "he sort o' stopped to look when his mother began to run, and I killed him."
"Well," said Jack, "we've got quite a job on our hands now with two bears to skin and our traps to take up."
"Right you are," agreed Hugh, "we've got a full day's work. Now, what do you think? I believe the best thing for us to do is to take up these traps, skin these bears and whatever beaver we get, and then to move along?"
"Yes," said Jack, "I guess that's the best thing to do. As you said the other night, we didn't come out here to do hard work all summer, and it's certainly better fun to be traveling around than it is to be skinning beaver all day. We ought to get some more beaver on other creeks, I should think, but even if we don't, we've got enough to make a half dozen beaver robes."
"Well," said Hugh, "we don't want to be wasting any more time than we have to. Now, shall I sit here and skin this bear, and leave you to go and pick up the traps, or will you skin the bear and let me go for the traps?"
"Which do you think would be better, Hugh?" asked Jack.
"Well, there's hard work enough in either job," said Hugh, "but I think if I were you I'd sit here and do the skinning, and let me go for the traps. If we get any beaver, there'll be quite a lot of pulling and hauling and carrying to do, getting the beaver and the traps both out and loading them onto the horses."
"All right," said Jack, "I'll go at this old lady at once, then, and when you go back for the horses, bring Pawnee along and leave him here with me."