Frank Allen at Old Moose Lake;

“What was it?” asked Buster Billings, involuntarily reaching for his rifle.

“Grab the flashlight, Lanky! You fellows get your guns,” commanded Frank instantly, as he leaped from his folds of blanket. “We’ll see what that was!”

In a trice all four of the boys were making their way toward the spot where Lanky and Frank had seen the pair of fiery balls.

“There are the tracks,” ejaculated Lanky Wallace, as he pointed to the snow, where they could see the tracks of an animal very plainly.

They followed the tracks for a short distance, seeing red spots here and there, but nothing of the beast itself.

Back to the camping place they walked when they saw it would be useless to follow further, and here they discussed the matter, deciding that a guard had to be placed for the night.

“How did you know it wasn’t a man?” asked Paul Bird of Frank.

“I didn’t, except that the eyes were so bright. But I believe I would have fired anyhow, because if it were a man he had no business at this hour of the night lurking around a camp when the fire is dying out and we could be plainly seen.”

They drew lots, and Buster Billings lost, but Frank, looking at his watch and seeing that the hour was only eleven, decided that the watches should be short, this decision causing a second drawing, the lot falling to Lanky Wallace.

Paul started the watch by building up the fire with branches from one of the near-by bushes, and Lanky did the same when it came his turn to take the watch, Paul calling him at three o’clock in the morning. The two boys stood whispering awhile before Paul wrapped up for his sleep.

During the early morning the snowstorm abated, and when the first streaks of dawn came Lanky awakened the other boys, after having built the fire into a roaring one. No snow was falling, and there was promise of a bright sun.

Frank’s first thought when he awoke was about the animal. He asked both Paul and Lanky whether there had been any more prowling around.

“Neither of us saw anything,” said Lanky Wallace, speaking for both.

The boys gathered about the roaring fire, and then got out their food packs, making ready for breakfast.

As the sun’s rays fell across the peaks of the mountains, the boys sat and ate their meal, chatting and laughing as carefree as boys could be.

“For a bunch of fellows who are lost in these mountains, we’re taking things mighty easy,” laughed Lanky.

“Yes,” rejoined Frank, “when we know we’re not really lost. We know we can go back the way we came. But we don’t know that we can go where we wish to go.”

Around the old hut they went, peeping in to see what was inside, then made their way the short distance up to the peak where the trail divided.

“There’s smoke!” called Buster, as he reached the top first and looked out over the hills.

“Well, let’s start for the smoke,” said Lanky.

“According to my guess we ought to follow that trail on the left side, then,” said Frank. “The trouble is we don’t know whether it’s a trail, but it surely does look as if one led down that way,” he continued, pointing in the direction he intended.

Away they started, optimistic because of the bright, sunny day, and also because they had plenty of rest and were much refreshed.

“Look at that!” called Paul Bird before they had gone more than half the distance down the declivity to the valley below, pointing off to their right.

There, in plain view, with a little red spot marking its last resting place, lay a medium-sized timber wolf.

All thought of the trail was forgotten as the boys left it and went to where the body lay on top of the Snow.

“You surely hit it fair enough,” remarked Lanky, turning the dead animal over so that the head could be plainly seen.

A dull blotch below the eyes showed where the bullet had plowed its way through.

“Took it a long time to die,” said Frank.

“Well, maybe the bullet hit a bone and glanced in so that the brain wasn’t hurt immediately,” suggested Lanky. “In the papers you read sometimes of a man who is struck by a bullet in what seems a vital spot and yet who lives three or four hours.”

“How far are we right now from that hut?”

“Not more than half a mile,” sad Frank, trying to measure by the difference in angles which they had pursued.

“Well, we did better than we did with the cotton-tail, anyhow,” said Frank as he turned from the wolf and led the party back to the trail.

“I’m going to get a picture of it,” Paul Bird commented, going back to where the animal lay, getting out his small camera. “Just proves what we did, doesn’t it?”

Back on the trail they turned their attention to finding their way out, and, having gone to the valley they saw where they had made the mistake the day previous. They had been balked by the appearance of the valley, it seeming to show no way out, whereas, in reality, a turn past a small bunch of evergreens showed them that a narrow way led between the next two hills in front of them, and when they followed this, they saw it turn sharply to the right and incline upward.

Suddenly there came the whir of bird wings, and all the boys turned quickly to see what they were.

“Partridges! And the hunting season is on yet!” cried Frank.

“Let’s leave the packs here so we can find our way again, and go after them!” suggested Lanky Wallace.

Whereupon packs were thrown to the ground, guns were slung across their arms, and they stole forward in the direction taken by the birds.

The partridges had come to earth in a small thicket of leafless brush about an eighth of a mile off to the left.

But Frank and Lanky were not very well armed for bird hunting. Rifles intend no scattering of shot, but demand that a close bead shall be drawn, for only a single shot will reach the prey.

The boys realized this, but they were intent on the fun of taking the chance. Besides, they wanted to see what Paul and Buster could do.

Creeping more slowly and more stealthily, they were close to the brush when there came a whir, and the covey arose from the ground.

Three quick shots sounded one after the other. Then——

Bang! A single shot followed the other three, and one of the partridges fluttered in the air, seemed to stumble on wing, and then dropped quickly to the ground.

“Fine shot!” called Frank, turning to see who it was. Paul’s lucky shot had brought down the only bird.

Paul ran forward and picked up the only partridge that had been dropped from the covey.

“Shall we follow them around?” asked Frank, noting that the covey had come to ground again in another thicket. The boys were for it at once, and they started to steal forward.

This kept up for an hour, until they had circled the little valley and were almost back to the starting point, three birds having been dropped from a total of about thirty shots.

They decided the birds would make a partial lunch for them when the noon hour came, provided they had not yet reached the Parsons’ camp.

Back again to the arduous task of making the trail, though with enough food for conversation for two long hours.

“There’s a lake!” yelled Paul as they reached the top of a hill in the trail and saw a level, frozen, snow-covered plain. “That can’t be anything else, can it?”

“Must be Old Moose Lake,” decided Frank at once. “We have gone about the right distance. And look! Over there is smoke beyond that hill—there’s a camp there!”

The boys stood looking across the hills to this spot, and seeing the lake stretch away into the distance and lost to view without the opposite bank being seen.

A half-hour more along the trail and they were at the edge of the lake, where they could see two islands—for they stood out of the level plain with trees growing thereon, while no trees or growth were on the plain itself.

Along the edge of the lake they trudged, heading toward the spot where the smoke rose from among some trees.

Ten minutes brought them to a cabin near the lake shore and they hallooed from the outside to attract attention.

The heavy log door opened and a man’s head poked out.

“Is this Old Moose Lake?” Frank asked.

The man answered in the affirmative.

“Will you please tell us where the Parsons’ camp is?” Frank continued.

“Sure, boys! Just follow the trail along the lake until you come to a big camp, a bungalow. Then turn sharp to the right, go up between two hills, and follow that trail for about a mile. It’s plain going one way, but it ain’t so plain coming back, ’cause there’s a fork beyond those hills.”

The man came out of the cabin meanwhile, and was pointing in the direction the boys should take.

“You boys ain’t old man Parsons’ boys, are you?” he asked.

Whereupon Frank vouchsafed the information that they were given permission to camp at the place by Mrs. Parsons, and after thanking the man they continued on their way.

“I guess we followed directions all right,” remarked Lanky Wallace. “Only we didn’t know we were doing quite so well.”

“You’re right, Lanky,” laughed Frank.

The bungalow was a strong, staunch-looking place out here in the wilds, and the boys were attracted to it, wondering whose it was.

Following directions implicitly, they turned and climbed the trail between the hills, then over a small divide, down through a glen, or small valley, and out again to a smooth place along the lake shore.

Once again the lake stretched away before them, and they stood admiring it.

“And we are seeing just what we were told we would see. That bungalow is in the spot where we were told it would be, so the next is our place,” remarked Frank.

Up a slight incline they went, through a clump of hemlocks and firs, with brush abounding, and then they looked again.

In a clear place ahead of them stood a modern house of rather large size, though a single story, one large chimney at the center of it, smoke issuing in volume from that chimney!

“Some one is in the place right now!” exclaimed Frank.

“That’s mighty funny! It seems to me Mrs. Parsons told us no one was up here,” said Paul Bird.

“But some one is there!” exclaimed Frank. “The next thing is this: Does he, or they, belong there? And does this mean trouble?”