CHAPTER II
A MIGHTY HUNTER.
THE shame and mortification which Bob and Lester experienced after being detected in their attempt to break into the negro cabin, were of short duration. They gradually recovered their courage and began to mingle again with their associates; and although they saw one or two sly winks exchanged the first time they went to the post-office, no one said anything to them about being treed on the top of the cabin, and they hoped the circumstance was not known. But still they felt guilty, and were much more at their ease when they were alone.
They had much to talk about. Lester could never cease grumbling because David had succeeded in his enterprise, in spite of all their efforts to defeat him, and Bob, who was full of dreams and glorious ideas, was continually talking about the fine things he would purchase when he became mail carrier and was earning three hundred and sixty dollars a year. Then he and his friend Lester would see no end of fun. They would have a canoe in the lake and a shooting-box on the shore. They would camp out twice a year, as Don and Bert did, and they would have a crowd of fellows with them of their own choosing. As soon as Bob had earned money enough to purchase his breech-loader, he would invest in a dozen or two of decoys, and they would show that conceited Don Gordon that some boys were just as fine marksmen as he was, and could bag just as many birds in the course of a week’s shooting.
Lester readily fell in with these ideas, and suggested that, as they had no better way of passing the time just then, it might be well to make the canoe at once. Then they could explore the lake from one end to the other, and select a good shooting point whereon to build their house. Bob thought so, too, and with the help of one of his father’s negroes, who was handy with the axe and had shaped more than one dugout, they succeeded, after two days’ work, in producing a very nice little canoe, just about large enough to carry two persons and their camp equipage. Having no iron rowlocks, they made two paddles for it; and when they had given it a coat or two of lead-colored paint, they told each other that it was a much better and handsomer craft than Don Gordon’s. On the same day on which David received his money for the quails, they put the canoe into a wagon, hauled it down to the lake and made it fast to a tree in front of Godfrey Evans’s cabin, promising Dan, who happened to be at home, that they would give him a dime or two occasionally, if he would keep an eye on it and see that no one ran off with it.
When they reached home they found Mr. Owens, who had just returned from the landing. They knew by the expression on his face that he had some news for them. Bob thought it must be something that related to his own prospects, and eagerly inquired:
“Have I got the appointment, father? Am I mail carrier now?”
“O, it isn’t time for that,” was the reply. “I have not even made my bid yet. I don’t know that you ought to have it, Bob. A boy who will let a fellow like Dave Evans carry off a pocketful of money from under his very nose, I don’t think much of.”
“Has he received it?” asked Lester.
“I should say so. I saw Silas Jones pay him over a hundred and sixty dollars.”
Lester pulled off his hat and threw himself on the porch beside Mr. Owens’s chair, while Bob, who was so amazed and angry that he could not speak, stood still and looked at his father.