Crippled as he was, Jim could not climb the steep face of the knoll, but his master helped him up. The instant he entered the cave he growled savagely, and once more the stiff hair rose along his back. Blackstock watched in silence for a moment. He had never before noticed, on Jim’s part, any special hostility toward bears, whom he was quite accustomed to trailing. He glanced up at the big branch that overhung the entrance, and conviction settled on his face. Then he whispered, sharply, “Seek him, Jim.” And Jim set off at once, as fast as he could limp, along the trail of the bear.
“Come on, boys,” called Blackstock to his posse. “Ef we can’t find Black Dan we may as well hev a little bear-hunt to fill in the time. Jim appears to hev a partic’lar grudge agin that bear.”
The men closed up eagerly, expecting to find that Blackstock, with Jim’s help, had at last discovered some real signs of Black Dan. When they saw that there was still nothing more than that old bear’s trail, which they had already examined, Long Jackson began to grumble.
“We kin hunt bear any day,” he growled.
“I guess Tug ain’t no keener after bear this day than you be,” commented MacDonald. “He’s got somethin’ up his sleeve, you see!”
“Mebbe it’s a tame b’ar, a trained b’ar, an’ Black Dan’s a-ridin’ him horseback,” suggested Big Andy.
Blackstock, who was close at Jim’s heels, a few paces ahead of the rest, turned with one of his rare, ruminative laughs.
“That’s quite an idea of yours, Andy,” he remarked, stooping to examine one of those great clawed footprints in a patch of soft soil.
“But even trained b’ar hain’t got wings,” commented MacDonald again. “An’ there’s a good three hundred yards atween the spot where Black Dan’s trail peters out an’ the nearest b’ar track. I guess yer interestin’ hipotheesis don’t quite fill the bill—eh, Andy?”
“Anyways,” protested the big Oromocto man, “ye’ll all notice one thing queer about this here b’ar track. It goes straight. Mostly a b’ar will go wanderin’ off this way an’ that, to nose at an old root, er grub up a bed o’ toad-stools. But this b’ar keeps right on, as ef he had important business somewhere straight ahead. That’s just the way he’d go ef some one was a-ridin’ him horseback.”