"We must make a ring right around the woods, and hem him in—that's the way," said the Squire, quickly.
Tom, standing back behind his brothers, was seen to nod approvingly, whereupon the other boys did the same. Indeed, the proposition seemed to commend itself to the entire company, and they started toward the woods, those who had not brought guns hurrying off to get some.
"I could do it jest as well alone," muttered Uncle Zed. "They hain't ben no wolves around here for several years now, but I hain't forgot how to ketch 'em. I guess I hain't."
The men were disposed, and then everything was profoundly quiet, excepting for the sound of the beating of the bushes, or of a stray shot, when some overconfident hunter was "sure he had him."
At last Uncle Zed heard a low growl in a thicket, and he had hardly time to raise his gun when out sprang an enormous wolf, and came directly toward him. The old man, almost paralyzed with fright, pulled the trigger, but his hand trembled so that his shot went a yard above the wolf's head, and the animal bounded past him unhurt. Uncle Zed shrieked, "Wolf! wolf!" and a half-dozen men were soon in hot pursuit of the discovered game.
Tom Miller, feeling very disconsolate because he hadn't any gun, had not accompanied the rest; but his mother, who felt no fear for Tom, and sympathized deeply with the courageous little fellow, had advised him to go to a certain neighbor's and see if he couldn't borrow one. It was necessary to go quite a distance, but Tom had made it on old Sorrel, the mare. He had come back in a wonderfully short time, bringing a trusty little shot-gun with him, and was making his way up the hill just as the wolf dashed out of the woods, heading in his direction.
Tom's heart came up in his throat, but he ran for a clump of bushes close by that he thought would afford a good position for a shot, stationed himself among them, and waited.
The cries of the men in pursuit came nearer. Then the gallop into which the wolf had broken from its quick trot when it left the woods seemed to shake the very ground under him. Spring—spring—spring, came the terrified brute. He was in sight. Tom steadied his gun and fired. The wolf uttered a cry, half bark, half screech, and giving a few lame and wounded leaps, lay bleeding on the ground. Then shot after shot from the men behind was poured in upon the poor creature, until he lay thoroughly dead. Tom Miller was quite the hero of the day, and it was voted unanimously that the wolf-skin belonged to him.
"Well, Uncle Zed, why didn't you 'ketch him,' as you said you were going to?" inquired Squire Taylor, jokingly, as the men were separating to go to a late dinner.
"Don' know what in thunder ailed my gun," complained Uncle Zed, rapping that unfortunate weapon crossly; "but, after all"—straightening up proudly—"you'd never have ketched that wolf if it hadn't 'a ben for me."