Presently the Indians passed quite near them, and one, speaking so softly that the children thought his voice could never have sounded the terrible war-whoop, accosted them:
“How do? You Beenum boy?”
“Yes,” Nathan answered; and then, obeying the Yankee instinct of inquiry, asked: “Be you gettin’ many mushrat?”
“No ketch um plenty,” the Indian replied. “Ol’ Capenteese ketch um mos’ all moosquas,” and Nathan understood that he attributed the scarcity of muskrats to Job, whose fame as a hunter and trapper was known to every Waubanakee who visited this part of the lake.
“Me come back pooty soon,” the Indian said, pointing up the creek with his paddle. “Den go house, see um Beenum. Buy um some pig eese.[1] S’pose he sell um lee’l bit?”
| [1] | Pork |
Nathan nodded a doubtful assent, and then, reminded of dinner-getting by the mention of pork, caught Martha’s hand and hurried homeward, while the Indians resumed their way upstream.
When the children entered the open door, they were for a moment dumb with amazement at the confusion that had in so short a time usurped the tidiness whereof they had left the room possessed. The coverlets and blankets of one bed were dragged from their place, two or three chairs were overturned, and the meal barrel was upset and half its contents strewn across the floor.
“What in tunket,” cried Nathan, when speech came to his gaping mouth. “Has that old sow got outen the pen?” Then he saw in the scattered meal some broad tracks that a former adventure had made him familiar with, and he heard a sound of something moving about in the cellar.
“It’s a bear,” he cried, “and he’s down cellar.”