“We are getting close to the spot where we glimpsed that deer feeding on the green grass, so let us stop talking, and be on the watch,” Dick suggested, thinking the animal might have moved from its place.
Three minutes afterwards Roger gave a low “hist.”
“I can see him right now,” he whispered, and, following the direction of the extended finger, Dick also caught sight of the dun-colored figure.
Really it must have been a very hungry deer. As a rule such an animal, when feeding, is so nervous and suspicious that every minute or so its tail will whisk, and the hunters know from this that the deer will immediately raise its head to take a look around. But although the boys as they advanced kept their eyes fastened closely on their intended quarry, they could not see even the slightest movement.
Roger had begged the privilege of having first shot, and, when they had crept as close as seemed wise, his gun-stock came up against his cheek, his eye ran along the sights, and then his finger pressed the hair trigger of the long-barreled rifle.
Strange to say, the deer never moved even then. Roger was more than amazed.
“Give him a shot, Dick!” he cried, “or he may get away from us yet, thanks to my poor aim!”
Dick was about to comply, when suddenly the deer toppled over. There was something decidedly suspicious in the way the animal collapsed, and Dick had a flash of intelligence sweep over him. He believed the deer was being used for a stalking animal, and had been dead all the while, its body propped up to deceive them. And even as this dreadful truth struck him, he heard loud Indian whoops ring out.