CHAPTER III. WHEN THE FOXES TOOK TO THE TREES.
"Bang!"
"Hold on there, Bumpus, you're crazy!" shouted Thad.
"Bang!" went the other barrel of the new ten-bore gun, with which the fatscout was determined he would sooner or later get a bear.
"Oh! he knocked him over!" shrieked Step Hen, who had managed in somemysterious way to get possession of his own gun, and was visiblydisappointed because it began to look as though he could not make use ofit.
"Bumpus has killed a grizzly!" shouted Giraffe; and then, quick on theheels of this exultant cry he added: "no he ain't, either! Look at himgettin' up on all fours again! Now he's sighted us, fellers! Here hecomes, licketty-split! A tree for mine! They told us grizzlies couldn'tclimb trees, you know."
Giraffe was as good as his word. He seemed to fairly fly over to thenearest tree, and the way those supple long legs wrapped around theslender trunk was a sight worth seeing.
A panic broke out among the rest, especially when Thad shouted:
"Get up a tree, everybody! Quick, now, he's coming right along!"
Now, Step Hen had his rifle, and knew that it could be depended on to doits work, provided the marksman himself was there with the good aim. StepHen did not have full confidence in his ability to plant a bullet whereit would do the most execution. Besides, the sight of that savage monsterlumbering along, and looking so very fierce, gave poor Step Hen an attackof the "rattles."
When he heard the scoutmaster call out for every one to hunt a tree, StepHen felt that he must be included in that order. If all the othersclimbed to safety, it would be the height of folly for him to remainbelow.
And not wanting to play the part of Casibianca, the boy who "stood on theburning deck, whence all but him had fled," Step Hen, dropping his gun ashe ran, made for a tree that seemed to offer all the advantages of home.
Just ahead of him was Bumpus, gripping a limb with a desperation born ofdespair, and struggling furiously to get one of his fat legs entwinedabove, when he might hope to pull himself up.
Step Hen had no trouble in mounting on his side of the tree.
"Give Bumpus a hand, Step Hen!" shouted the scoutmaster, already settledin a nest of his choosing.
As one scout is expected to help another whenever the chance arises,doubtless Step Hen would have rendered this "first aid to the clumsy"even though Thad had not seen fit to call out.
There was really need of haste. The wounded bear was perilously near, andseemed to be heading straight for the tree where Bumpus was, unable, inhis excitement and fright to draw his body up on the limb to which heclung.
His fat face was white, and his eyes seemed almost ready to pop out ofhis head, as Step Hen, bending down, caught hold of his coat collar. Itlooked as though the angry bear just knew which of these campers hadinflicted this pain upon him, and was bent upon revenge.
But Step Hen was strong, moreover, the necessity of moving the unwieldybody of Bumpus was great. Exerting himself as the fat scout commenced tostrain again, Step Hen managed to get Bumpus up alongside him.
Even then there was more or less danger that the grizzly might standerect on his hind legs, and be able to claw them, so the boys hastened toput more distance between their precious bodies and the furious beast.
When the bear found that he could not reach any of the scouts, he spentsome little time rolling from one tree to another, and looking up at theboys in the branches and sending forth loud growls.
"Scat! get out!" shouted Giraffe. "Say, he's a goin' to try and climb upmy thin tree. Here, quit that, you old scamp! Look what he's doin', Thad!Wow! he wants to shake me down like a big persimmon."
The bear did actually shake the slender tree to and fro, by exerting histremendous strength. Giraffe had a few anxious minutes. He had to hold onwith all his might to keep from being dislodged. And then again, therewas always a chance that the furious grizzly might actually snap the treeoff.
After a short time the animal seemed to tire of this sport. Greatly tothe relief of Giraffe he ambled away.
"Good-bye, old feller! Come again when you can't stay so long!" criedGiraffe, whose courage returned when he realized that his safety wasassured.
But the bear did not have the remotest idea of abandoning his game.
"He smells our grub, that's what!" called out Bumpus. "See him sniffing,would you? And there he goes, right at our stock of things. Oh! what ifhe gobbles it all up, whatever will we do, stranded away up here?"
"We've got to do something, boys, to chase him off," declared Allan.
"If I had some powder up here, I'd show him," declared Giraffe.
"What would you do?" demanded Smithy, who for once had not waited to pickout a clean tree, when he started to "elevate."
"Why, I'd wet some powder, and make those sputtering 'devils' youremember I used to carry around with me. Then I'd get the old bear rightunder, put a match to a bunch of the powder, and when it took to sendingout sparks to beat the band, I'd drop it on his back. Wow! but take myword for it, boys, he'd make tracks out of this in a cloud of smoke."
"Well, suh, why don't you do that, and help us out of a bad scrape?"demanded Bob White, whose hot Southern blood fairly boiled at theridiculous idea of eight wide-awake scouts being made prisoners, by justone old bear.
"For several reasons," replied Giraffe, calmly. "In the first place Idon't happen to possess a single match, even if I had the powder, whichis not the case. And then again, I want to see how our sagacious andresourceful scoutmaster works his little game."
This caused all the others to turn their attention toward Thad. For thefirst time they discovered that he was lowering a long piece of cord,with an open loop a few inches in diameter at the end.
"Oh! I know what he's hoping to do," sang out Bumpus. "He wants to fishup Step Hen's gun, that lies just below him, where Step Hen dropped it."
"That's the stuff!" declared Davy Jones, excitedly, as he watched theoperation.
"But look at the bear, fellers!" cried Giraffe. "He's right at it now,chawin' up our grub as if he could store away the lot of it. Guess he'sforgot all about us."
"Don't you believe it," declared Allan. "Watch me prove it."
With that he made as if to descend his tree. No sooner had his swinginglegs attracted the attention of the bear, than uttering savage growls heabandoned his feast, and came hurriedly over, to look up at Allan withthose cruel little eyes, as if inviting him to just try it.
So Thad had to suspend operations until Bruin, overtaken by a desire toonce more revel in the camp-stores, shuffled back again to theneighborhood of the twin tents.
"Don't coax him over here again, please, Allan," remarked thescoutmaster, who was now busily engaged "fishing" with that looped cord,trying to drop the noose over the end of the little rifle, which, by arare chance, was raised a few inches from the ground.
The other scouts were all watching his labor, being deeply interested inthe result.
"Now you've got a bite, Thad!" called out Giraffe.
"Give it to him, Thad!" advised Step Hen.
But the fisherman was too cautious to risk so much. He wanted to slip thenoose a little further along, before he made a final jerk, in order totry and tighten it.
"He's got his eye on you, Thad!" warned Smithy, whose tree happened to bebetter located for observation than any of the other ones appropriated byhis comrades.
"Yes, and there he's coming over to see what you mean by that stringhanging down," asserted Giraffe.
"Somebody draw his attention!" called out Thad. "Make him think you'remeaning to drop down. It will give me the chance I need to finish myjob."
"Yes, throw Bumpus down, Step Hen!" called out Giraffe. "He was the causeof all this trouble and he ought to sacrifice himself now, in order tocreate a diversion."
"Keep away from me! Don't you dare touch me, Step Hen! I'll pull you downalong with me, if you try to do that," cried Bumpus, really alarmed.
But Allan caught the idea Thad advanced. Besides, it just happened thathe was well situated for carrying it out. By going through someextravagant motions, as though about to descend, he caught the attentionof the bear, which immediately shuffled over to his tree, and looked upexpectantly.
Meanwhile Thad was not idle.
He saw what he had to do in order to make a sure thing of his work.Moving to one side a little, as the nature of his hold in the branches ofthe tree permitted, he jerked at his line until the loop actually closedtightly on the barrel of Step Hen's rifle. After that it should not be adifficult task to pull the weapon up.
"Quick! Thad, he's coming!" shouted the excited Giraffe.
In spite of all Allan's cutting-up the bear seemed to think that he hadbetter be paying more attention to what was going on elsewhere.
Thad had raised the gun from the ground. It was slowly ascending throughspace, and turning around as it came.
The grizzly hurried underneath, while Thad hastened to pass the cordthrough his fingers and when the wise old bear, seeming to understand thecase, reared up to strike at the dangling rifle, he just managed to giveit a tap that started it to spinning around at a lively clip.
"Oh!" gasped Giraffe, under the belief that all was lost.
But Thad had made one last drag, and even as the other uttered thatexclamation the scoutmaster snatched the gun out of the air; for withthat very last pull, the noose seemed to have slipped.
"Hurrah! Thad wins!" burst out from Step Hen.
"Good-bye, old Charlie!" mocked Bumpus. "Better skip out while there istime, if you know what's good for you."
But the bear did not seem to be that wise. He remained there, winkingthose wicked little eyes up at Thad, as if daring him to do his worst.
"Give it to him, Thad!" begged Giraffe, so impatient that he could hardlyunderstand why the more careful boy should wait.
But although Thad had never up to now encountered a wild grizzly, he hadheard and read a great deal about them. And thus he knew that at timessuch an animal can be shot full of bullets, so to speak, without killinghim, so tenacious of life is the grizzly bear of the Rocky Mountains.
On this account, therefore, Thad wished to make all the capital possibleout of the six bullets that were contained in Step Hen's gun.
Waiting until a good opportunity presented itself, he took a quick aim,and then pulled the trigger. With the report there came a tremendousroar, so savage, so full of pent-up animal rage, that Bumpus immediatelyproceeded to climb up to a still higher limb of the tree in which he hadfound shelter.
"He's down! No, he's up again! Give him another, Thad! Oh! don't I wish Ihad my Old Reliable here, though," cried Giraffe.
Thad was awake to the necessity for prompt action. The bear, even thoughdesperately wounded, was still full of fight. And there could be notelling what the maddened animal might not attempt, if given time.
Thad taking careful aim fired again.
He really felt an admiration for the hard-fighting grizzly, such as allhunters worthy of the name experience toward the four-footed enemy thatputs up a game battle for its life.
There were four more bullets in the repeating rifle, and Thad had to makeuse of them all before he could really feel he had caused the last vitalspark to flee from its abiding-place in the body of the shaggy monster.
But after the sixth and last shot had been fired, there was silence onthe part of the terror of the mountain gulches. The grizzly's lastconvulsive movement had taken place. No longer would his savage roar,echoing from cliff to cliff, cause all other wild animals to flee.
"Hurrah!" shouted Giraffe, as he dropped to the ground.
"Is he surely dead?" asked Smithy, from his perch aloft.
For answer the reckless Giraffe ran up, and placed a foot on themotionless body of the bear.