But in spite of their success the boys' faces were grave and depressed.
The captain glanced shrewdly from one to the other. "I reckon you-alls are thinkin' now of just what I've been studyin' on. You're thinkin' of all them poor innocent birds we've killed to get them feathers. You're thinkin' of them and of the dozens you only wounded which are bound to die a lingerin', sufferin' death, poor things."
Charley shuddered, "I killed one and it didn't fall," he explained, "I climbed up and looked, and it was resting on a nest containing five, cute, little fluffy ones."
"We can't go on with it," declared Walter with deep feeling. "It's fit work for brutes like those convicts but not for us."
"Pulling out the plumes won't kill 'em, an' I don't think it hurts 'em much," said the captain, thoughtfully. "Maybe we can rig up some sort of trap that will do the work without killin' 'em. It's time for bed, now, lads, but think it over and, perhaps, we can hit on some scheme. Had we better take turns at keeping watch, Charley?"
"I don't think we'll be bothered for a while yet, at any rate," said Charley, thoughtfully, as he stretched out on his couch and pulled his blanket over him. "Good-night, all; here goes for the land of dreams."
Although he closed his eyes and endeavored to sleep, it was a long time before it visited his excited brain. He was only a boy in years and the responsibility for the safety of the little party now trustfully thrust upon him bore heavily upon his young shoulders. It would not have been so bad were it not for the close proximity of that band of twelve, armed, desperate, escaped murderers. Their attitude towards the hunters, together with scraps of conversation they had uttered, had bred in Charley's active mind a theory for their actions and object, a theory involving a crime so vile and atrocious as to stagger belief.
"I'll be getting flighty if I keep brooding on this thing by myself much longer," Charley mused. "I am beginning to fear my own judgment is wrong. I'll confide it all to someone else to-morrow and see if their opinion agrees with mine." With little reflection, he decided on Walter as the fittest one to tell. This resolve lifted a burden from his mind and he soon drifted off into healthy slumber.
"I've got something I want to talk over with you, Walt," he found a chance to whisper while breakfast was cooking next morning. "Let's get away somewhere where the captain and Chris will not hear us," he cautioned.
Their chance came soon after breakfast while Chris was cleaning up the things and the captain was engaged in sorting out and packing away the plumes in the tin boxes they had brought with them.