“Dave Evans!” sneered Lester, as soon as the brothers were out of sight in the cane. “There’s nobody in this settlement but Dave Evans.”
“Twenty dollars apiece,” said Bob, pulling off his hat and dashing it spitefully upon the ground. “That makes forty dollars, which added to a hundred and sixty makes two hundred dollars. Wouldn’t I have a breech-loader if I had that amount of money in my pocket? But I haven’t got a cent, and here’s this miserable fellow rich already. I wish I dared go back there and shoot those cubs. I would if the hounds were not there. I’d shoot the dogs, too, if I thought Don wouldn’t suspect me.”
Meanwhile Don was laying out all his strength on the oars, and the canoe was moving rapidly down the bayou. When it reached the lake, and was passing Godfrey’s cabin, Don and his brother, who had not seen the boy trapper since their return, and consequently knew nothing of his good fortune, looked all around for him, intending, if they saw him, to tell him that he had some valuable property up in the woods which was waiting to be secured. “I don’t see any thing of him,” said Bert, “and we are in too great a hurry to stop and hunt him up.”
“Never mind,” said Don. “He’ll be around as soon as he finds out that we are at home. Now, Bert, if you will make the canoe fast and put our guns in the sail-boat, and get her all ready for the start, I’ll run up to the house and ask father if he will let a couple of the darkies go with us after those bears. We don’t want any lunch, do we?”
No, Bert didn’t want any. There was too much sport in prospect, and he couldn’t eat a mouthful until it was all over.
When the canoe reached the wharf Don sprang out, and Bert was preparing to make her fast at her usual moorings, when they heard a loud shout, and looking toward the road saw David Evans running along the beach. “I’ll wait until I hear how he succeeded with his quails,” said Don.
“And won’t he be surprised when he learns that he will have forty dollars more in his pocket to-night,” said Bert. “David ought to be very happy and contented now, for he is getting on nicely.”
“Well, he doesn’t act to me like a very happy boy this morning,” said Don, in a low tone, as David came nearer. “There’s something the matter with him. He doesn’t usually hang his head that way.”
Bert, having made the canoe fast to the tree, straightened up, and when he had taken a good look at David, told himself that his brother was right. There was something the matter with him. While he was wondering what new misfortune had fallen to the lot of the boy trapper, Don called out:
“We’ve just been talking about you, Dave. How goes the battle?”