"What breaks the dam?" mumbled Blue Wolf, gruffly.
"I know," screamed Jay; "the Trappers. I saw François knock a hole in one last Winter. That's how he caught your cousins, Umisk, when they rushed to fix the break."
"How do you know when it's damaged, Beaver?" queried Mooswa. "Supposing it was done when you were asleep--you don't make your bed in the water, I suppose."
"No, we have a nice, dry shelf all around on the inside of the lodge, just above--we call it the second-story; but we keep our tails in the water always, so as soon as it commences to lower we feel it, you know."
"That is wise," gravely assented Mooswa. "Have I not said that Umisk is almost as clever as our King?"
"He may be," chirruped Jay; "but François never caught the Black King, and he catches many Beaver. Last winter he took out a Pack of their thick, brown coats, and I heard him say there were fifty pelts in it."
"That's just it," concurred Carcajou. "I admire Umisk as much as anybody. He's an honest, hard-working little chap, and looks after his family and relations better than any of us; but if there was any trouble on we couldn't consult him, for at the first crack of a Firestick, or bark of a Train Dog, he's down under the water, and either hidden away in his lodge, or in one of the many hiding-holes he has dug in the banks for just such emergencies. We must have some one who can get about and warn us all."
"I object to him because he's got Fleas," declared Jay, solemnly.
"Fleas!" a chorus of voices exclaimed in indignant protest.
The Coyote, who had been digging viciously at the back of his ear with a sharp-clawed foot, dropped his leg, got up, and stretched himself, with a yawn, hoping that nobody had observed his petulant scratching.