When Ethan called this out the paddler waved at them, and laughed.
"Wait till I push her nose up on that fine sandy beach, and I'll tell you all about it, boys," he answered.
Two minutes later and the prow of the birch bark canoe glided softly up on the shore. Laying his paddle down in the boat X-Ray proceeded to pass along toward the bow, so that he could step out without getting his feet wet. Meanwhile Lub was looking the canoe over, noting that it seemed to be in very good condition, and not at all weather worn, as though it had been lying in the bushes for several winters and summers.
"I ran across her," the finder started in to explain, "while I was pushing along through the scrub, meaning to get to a certain point. I'd picked up some hoppers and crickets, and wanted to give the trout a try, to see if they were hungry. Whoever owned the boat had hid her away; and not so long ago, either, for there was a wet streak on her keel that no rain had made. She was lying bottom-up, of course."
"Have you been fishing in the canoe all this time?" asked Phil, sniffing the air, and then stepping forward to look for himself; upon which X-Ray bent over and lifted out a string of a dozen pretty fair-sized trout.
"How's that for a starter, eh, Ethan?" he demanded joyously. "Think you can beat that for a beginning? Right back of that point there's the boss bay; and say, you couldn't drop in a stone without hitting a trout, they're that thick. I stuck right in the same place all along; no need to move around."
"You got a fine mess, though I believe I could eat that many myself," ventured Lub, eyeing the string hungrily.
"Oh! we can get all we want," he was told; "it's only a question of finding the bait. They're just asking to be taken on. It's hit and come with them as soon as you drop your line in. The bait hardly sinks a foot before it's taken. I never saw anything like it in all my life. And fight, say, they bent my rod double lots of times. I lost more'n I saved."
"But about the canoe," Phil went on to say, "the chances are it must belong to whoever was in our cabin before we came."
"That stands to reason, seems to me," Ethan agreed.