Just as he was about to try once again, he was rewarded with a faint, almost unintelligible answer....
CHAPTER XXVIII—BETWEEN TWO FIRES
Everything was silent again, and Westy waited, all the while listening intently. Then he tried it once more. This time the answer came not so clear, but louder. He recognized the voice immediately as Uncle Jeb’s and it did not sound far away either.
“Where—are—you?” he called ever so slowly.
“Up—at—the—elm,” came the answer, faint again.
“M’gosh!” exclaimed Westy. “The elm? The elm?” he repeated, trying to figure out where it was and what had happened. There was only one distinctive elm tree that he had heard Uncle Jeb mention, and that was a little distance above the cabin, overhanging the gulley. That must be the place, he assured himself.
That he didn’t meet with disaster was nothing short of good luck, for he didn’t walk or run—he fairly slid down that precipitous slope.
The elm wasn’t far and, by keeping in the gulley, Westy soon reached it, not much the worse for wear. There he found Uncle Jeb lying helpless and bleeding quite profusely from a hole in his head. His foot was securely caught in an old rusty bear trap. He was not unconscious, but quite exhausted from the pain in his foot that the trap with its terrible pressure was causing. Also, Westy detected at once, he was extremely weak from loss of blood. He bandaged his head with strips of his own and Uncle Jeb’s handkerchief. Then with the aid of some old sticks lying around in the gulley he finally succeeded in dislodging the old scout’s foot.
In spite of his age, Uncle Jeb was no weakling and though his foot and head were throbbing with intense pain, he managed to raise himself with Westy’s aid.
“Wa-al, son, so fur, so good,” he said weakly. “Can’t expect a young fella like yuh to act as a crutch fer me though. Yuh better get Artie!”