“Goodness, what was that?” asked Uncle Teddy, running forward in the direction of the noise, followed by the others.
They soon saw. On the ground at the upper end of the ravine lay the great bull moose they had seen that afternoon when he had come, in the pride of his strength, to answer the call of the birchbark trumpet. Now he lay in a heap, his sides heaving convulsively, beside a good-sized rock he had either carried over the edge of the precipice in his fall from above, or which had carried him. At the top of the ravine there was a deep hole in the soil where the ground had given away and hurled him over the edge. But the fall was not the worst of it. Down in the ravine there stood a broken sapling about two feet high, its sharp point standing up like a bayonet. Straight onto this the moose had plunged in his fall, ripping his chest open in a great jagged gash from which the blood flowed in a stream.
61Hinpoha turned away and covered her eyes with her hands at the dreadful sight.
“Kill him, kill him,” said Aunt Clara, catching hold of her husband’s arm in distress, “I can’t bear to see him suffer so.”
“I have nothing to kill him with,” said Uncle Teddy, in equal distress.
But the moose was beyond the need of a friendly bullet to end his sufferings, for after a few more convulsive heaves he stiffened out and lay still.
“Is he dead?” asked Hinpoha.
“Yes,” answered Uncle Teddy.
“I’m so glad,” said Hinpoha, still keeping her eyes averted. “The poor, poor thing. Are you going to bury him?”
“Bury him!” shouted the Captain in amazement. “Bury that moose? Not for a hundred dollars! Bury those antlers, and that hide? What are you thinking of?”