Tom slept the sleep of the exhausted that night, and at seven o’clock the next morning shoved his canoe away from the beach and pulled toward the hatchery.
CHAPTER XI.
SAM ON THE TRAIL.
“There, now,” soliloquized Jake Coyle, as he wended his way through the gloomy woods after concealing the canvas canoe and the two valises he had fished up from the bottom of the lake. “I’m a rich man, an’ nobody but me knows the first thing about it. As soon as it gets daylight, I’ll come back an’ hide the guns an’ the money an’ the canoe all together, in a better place, so’t if pap gets a hint of what is goin’ on, an’ I have to dig out from home in the middle of the night, I shall know right where to find ’em without runnin’ through the woods to hunt ’em up. Now, as soon as I can get Rube to buy me some shoes an’ clothes an’ powder an’ lead, I’ll go back to some of them swamps that I’ve heared pap tell about, an’ trap on my own hook. I’ll sell my skins in New London, ’cause nobody don’t know me there. I’ll be ’rested if I stay around where pap is.”
In blissful ignorance of the fact that his father, following close behind him, had seen almost every move he made that night, Jake lumbered on through the darkness, and at last found himself on the “carry” that ran close by the door of Rube Royall’s humble abode. Cautiously approaching the door, Jake pushed it open and looked in. He could see nothing, for the fire on the hearth had gone out, and the interior of the cabin was pitch dark. But he heard the heavy breathing of the sleepers, and, believing that his father was among them, he entered on tiptoe, stretched himself out on one of the beds beside his slumbering brother, and drew a long breath of relief. The night had been full of excitement, and the day was destined to bring more.
About eight o’clock the next morning, after breakfast had been eaten and Rube had gone to sleep, the old woman and her boys gathered in the wood yard in front of the house, and talked and wondered at the prolonged absence of the head of the family. Jake appeared to be very much concerned about him.
“Say, mam, when did you see him last?” he anxiously inquired.
“Not sence you left hum last night,” was the reply. “I didn’t think nothin’ of your bein’ gone, ’cause I thought mebbe you had went after more grab; but I don’t see what took the ole man away so permiscus. I couldn’t make head or tail of the way he went snoopin’ around yisterday, first in the house, then in the woods, an’ the next thing you knowed you didn’t know where he was. ’Taint like him to be gone all night in this way. Why, Jakey, what makes your face so white?”
“Dunno; less’n it’s ’cause I’m afeared the constables have got a hold of him,” answered the boy.
“Oh, shucks!” exclaimed the old woman. “You needn’t——”
She was going to say something else but didn’t have time. Just then hasty steps sounded on the hard path, and the three looked up to see the missing man approaching at a rapid run. He was angry about something, Jake could see that with half an eye, and frightened as well.