Guns and Snowshoes; Or, the Winter Outing of the Young Hunters Part 8

She told her husband what chickens to catch and kill, and helped pull the feathers. Then she brought forth the still steaming mince pie, leaving it in the stone dish in which it had been baked.

"You can leave the dish when you come back--if you think o' it," she said, "and if ye don't, 'twon't matter much."

A little later saw the four boy hunters on their way again, the precious mince pie resting on the top of one of the sled loads and the apples and chickens on the other. Mrs. Lundy waved them a cheery adieu and Simon smiled somewhat grimly.

"It nearly broke old Pop Lundy's heart to give the things away," was Giant's comment.

"It wasn't any more than fair, after what we did for him," answered Shep. "Say, boys, camping out with chicken and mince pie won't be bad, will it?"

"Yum! yum!" was the only answer the others gave.

By noon they found themselves on Lake Cameron. On one sh.o.r.e were the grim evidences of that terrible forest fire which had nearly cost the saw mill robber and the Felps' crowd their lives. A few spots on the lake were clear, but at other points the snow lay from a few inches to a foot and a half deep.

They skated to the opposite sh.o.r.e and stopped near the shelter of some pines and hemlocks. All were willing to rest, and a small campfire was built, over which they made a pot of coffee. They had brought with them some sandwiches and some cake, and these made up the brief noonday meal.

"Here goes for a first shot!" cried Snap, leaping to his feet with a part of a sandwich still in his mouth. He had discovered several rabbits near some bushes up the lake sh.o.r.e. Catching up his shotgun he took careful aim and blazed away.

"Two of them!" exclaimed Shep. "Good for you, Snap!"

Snap ran forward and picked up the game. They were plump and heavy and he held them up with pride.

"We shan't starve just yet," remarked Giant. "We are sure to get rabbits, and partridge and wild turkeys, and there must be plenty of fish under this ice."

All of the party were anxious to reach the former camp, to see what it looked like, so the noonday rest did not last long. Skirting one sh.o.r.e of Lake Cameron, they came to the narrow waterway that connected it with Firefly Lake. Here the water, which usually flowed swiftly between the rocks, was frozen up in a lumpy fas.h.i.+on that made skating impossible.

"We'll have to walk the rest of the distance," announced Whopper. "We couldn't skate on this in a million years."

"I wish we could try the snowshoes," said Giant. He knew very little about using the articles.

"Can't do it," answered Snap. "But just you wait, we'll have more snow before long and then the snowshoes will come in mighty handy."

They took off their skates, put them on the sleds, and started up the rocky and frozen watercourse. The walking was treacherous and soon Whopper went down, with Shep on top of him. The bag of apples came over both.

"Hi! get off of me!" roared Whopper. "Do you want to crush me into a pancake? Who threw that bag of apples?"

"You want to be careful of the loads," admonished Snap. "Don't throw off the mince pie as you did the apples."

"Look!" yelled Giant, who had been gazing to the north of the watercourse. "Am I mistaken, or is that a deer?"

"A deer! A deer!" cried Shep, and on the instant all of the boys forgot about the tumble and each caught up his shotgun. It was indeed a deer, standing among some young trees about two hundred yards distance.

"Oh, if we can only bring it down!" said Whopper, in a whisper.

"We must bring it down," answered Shep, in an equally low voice.

"Get out of sight," warned Snap. "If he sees us he'll be of in a jiffy."

They dropped behind some convenient bushes and then moved forward with great caution, each with his shotgun ready to blaze away instantly.

The forward movement lasted for fully five minutes and then all raised up cautiously and looked for the deer.

The game had disappeared!

"Where is he?" whispered Giant, gazing around in bewilderment.

"Bless me if I know," answered Snap.

The young hunters gazed in all directions and then came out into the open.

"He is surely gone," said Shep.

"There he goes!" sang out Giant, and pointed up the lake to a clearing an eighth of a mile away.

"And streaking it like greased lightning," added Whopper. "He'll reach the Canadian line before he stops."

"Too bad!" growled Shep, in disgust. "I fancied we'd get him sure."

"This puts me in mind of what Jed Sanborn says," said Snap, with a sickly grin. "'Be sure of only what is in your game bag.'"

The young hunters looked around for more deer but none were in that vicinity and so they returned to where they had left the sleds.

"If it hadn't been that we want to get to camp we might have followed up that deer," was Giant's comment.

"Not much use of that," answered Snap. "By the way he was running he must have been pretty well woke up, and when that happens you know a deer will run for miles without stopping."

All were glad when they came in sight of Fire-fly Lake. About one half of the surface was a smooth glare of ice, the other half being covered with ridges of snow.

To reach their old camp they had to go up the sh.o.r.e and around a bend where the bushes and trees were thick. Once more they donned their skates and went forward rapidly.

"Let us have a race!" cried Whopper, and he and Giant set off with one sled, while Snap and Shep set off with the other.

"An extra piece of mince pie to the winning team!" cried the doctor's son merrily as he put on an extra spurt.

Soon the turn of the sh.o.r.e was gained, with the sleds side by side.

Then all of the young hunters gazed ahead.

"Well, I never!"

"If this isn't too bad for anything!"

Such were the exclamations uttered. And there was good cause for their consternation and dismay. Instead of the tidy cabin they had expected to see, nothing but a heap of blackened logs confronted them.

The log cabin had been burnt to the ground.

CHAPTER VII