“The racket has died out now,” remarked X-Ray, partly to change the subject, and hide the little confusion he felt at displaying his ignorance in his little dispute with Lub.
“And I guess the dog has been killed,” Ethan went on to remark; “but it took a whole lot of gunning to do the job, seemed like. They must have been pretty badly rattled, those New York City sportsmen who are up here to run the country about as they see fit.”
“I’d like to have seen the affair,” observed X-Ray Tyson, meditatively, as if he might be trying to draw a mental picture of what must have been an exciting episode; for a mad dog in camp is likely to create considerable of a wild stampede.
“Excuse me from that sort of fun,” Lub protested; “I’m too fond of dogs to want to watch one running around, frothing at the mouth, and having to be executed.”
“Shot down like a dog, you mean,” interposed Ethan; “and I wouldn’t be much surprised if that old saying originated in a mad dog scare.”
All seemed quiet and serene once more over in the direction of the other camp. Whatever the cause of all that shooting and shouting may have been, it had become a thing of the past, apparently.
“Well, it isn’t any of our funeral,” X-Ray remarked, with a queer shrug of his shoulders; “and so I guess we’d better forget all about it.”
Lub noticed that Phil did not seem to agree with the last speaker. He had a serious expression on his face that told of some idea forming in his brain.
“Perhaps it wasn’t a mad dog scare after all,” Phil suggested.
“But what else could it have been?” asked Ethan.