Connie sat motionless upon his branch until the sounds of the retreating men were lost in the darkness. What did it all mean? "Swipe Frenchy's lantern." "Plug the lock." "Soak the straw." "Terrorize business." The words of the man repeated themselves over and over in Connie's brain. What was this thing these men were planning to do "at eleven o'clock the first night the wind blows stiff from the west?" He wriggled to the ground and crept toward the thing the men had cached in the windfall. It was a five-gallon can of coal-oil! "That's Steve's part of the scheme, whatever it is," he muttered. "He's got a key to the storehouse." Leaving the can undisturbed, he struck out for camp, splashing through the waters of a small creek without noticing it, so busy was his brain trying to fathom the plan of the gang. "I've got all day tomorrow, at least," he said, "and that'll give me time to think. I won't tell even Saginaw 'til I've got it doped out. I bet when they try to start something they'll find out who's going to be terrorized!" A few minutes later he entered the office and was greeted vociferously by Saginaw Ed:
"Hello there, son, by jiminetty, I thought you'd took me serious when I told you you'd better make a long stay of it. What ye got there? Well, dog my cats, if you didn't up an' git you a deer! Slip over to the cook's camp an' wade into some grub. I told him to shove yer supper onto the back of the range, again' you got back. While yer gone I'll jest run a couple rags through yer rifle."
When Connie returned from the cook's camp Saginaw was squinting down the barrel of the gun. "Shines like a streak of silver," he announced; "Hurley's mighty pernickety about his rifle, an' believe me, it ain't everyone he'd borrow it to. Tell me 'bout yer hunt," urged the man, and Connie saw a gleam of laughter in his eye. "Killed yer deer dead centre at seven hundred yards, runnin' like greased lightnin', an' the underbrush so thick you couldn't hardly see yer sights, I 'pose."
The boy laughed: "I got him dead centre, all right, but it was a standing shot at about twenty yards, and I had a rest. He's only a four-prong—I let a five-prong get away because I was clumsy."
Saginaw Ed eyed the boy quizzically: "Say, kid," he drawled. "Do you know where folks goes that tells the truth about huntin'?"
"No," grinned Connie.
"Well, I don't neither," replied Saginaw, solemnly. "I guess there ain't no place be'n pervided, but if they has, I bet it's gosh-awful lonesome there."
Despite the volubility of his companion, Connie was unusually silent during the short interval that elapsed before they turned in. Over and over in his mind ran the words of the four men out there in the dark, as he tried to figure out their scheme from the fragmentary bits of conversation that had reached his ears.
"Don't mope 'cause you let one buck git away, kid. Gosh sakes, the last buck I kilt, I got so plumb rattled when I come onto him, I missed him eight foot!"