"In good truth, shall I, boy? You are a brave promiser! You remember your own adage,—Brag was a good dog, but Holdfast was better."
"In right down earnest, father, you shall. You needn't laugh. Now, you're thinking I have the deer to shoot; there's your mistake. The saddle is this minute lying on the dresser in the kitchen. He was a running buck yesterday; and I could tell where the powder and ball came from (here Henry made the motion of opening a hunting pouch at his side) that put an end to his capers."
"He is a monstrous braggart; is he not, Mildred?" said Lindsay, directing a look of incredulity at his daughter.
"What Henry tells you is true," replied Mildred. "Stephen Foster was here at sunrise with a part of a buck, which he says was shot yesterday."
"Indeed! Then it is to Stephen's rifle we are indebted. You kill your bucks by proxy, master."
"I'll bet," said Henry, "that Stephen Foster hasn't the impudence to charge one penny for that venison. And why? Because, by the laws of chace, one-half belongs to me."
"Oh, I understand," interrupted Lindsay, with affected gravity; "it is a matter of great doubt which of you shot it. You both fired at once; or, perhaps, Stephen first, and you afterwards; and the poor animal dropped the moment you took your aim,—even before your piece went off. You know your aim, Harry, is deadly,—much worse than your bullet."
"There is no doubt who killed him," said Henry; "for Stephen was on that side of the hill, and I was a little below him, and the buck ran right to Stephen, who, of course, gave him the first shot. But there was I, father, just ready, if Stephen had missed, to bring old Velvet-Horns to the ground, before he could have leaped a rod."
"But, unluckily, Stephen's first shot killed him?"
"I don't know that," replied Henry. "Another person's knife might have done the business; for the deer jumped down the bank into the road, and there"—