Hugh smiled and nodded to Ralph.

“You lose this time, Bud,” he said, “because I’m siding with Ralph here.  If we were really hungry and in need of food, of course I’d say we had a right to get fresh meat; but we’re on our way home now, and seems to me it would be a shame to spoil all our splendid sport by being cruel to a poor old bear that doesn’t know any better than to gobble flour and anything else he finds lying around loose.”

Now Bud was a good loser.  Perhaps after all he did not really feel as ferocious as he pretended; and to tell the truth might have been sorry if Hugh had sided with him, so that war was declared upon the hairy invader of the shack.

“How’ll we get him out of there?” he proceeded to ask.  “If he knows a good thing when he tastes it you bet he won’t be in any hurry to leave.”

“How about you going in and telling him his room is better than his company?” asked Hugh.

“You’ll have to excuse me this time, I’m afraid,” Bud quickly announced.  “I pass it up to Ralph here; he knows more about the way of animals in a minute than I do in a year.”

“Can you fix him up, Ralph?” questioned Hugh, turning to the boy who had studied animals so long that he might be looked on as an authority.

Ralph was always willing to oblige.

“To be sure I can, and will, Hugh,” he hastened to say, with one of his rare smiles.  “The rest of you stay back here, and when he once gets clear of the door start to shouting as loud as you can.”

“Which is to add to his alarm, I suppose?” suggested Hugh.

“Just about what it is,” and saying no more, Ralph started for the cabin.

They noticed that he did not approach from the front, and this explained that Ralph had no intention of trying to enter the place while it had a hairy occupant.

He had first gathered up something and made a bundle of it under one of his arms.

Bud, looking closely, believed that he knew what the other scout had collected.

“Dead weeds, as sure as anything!  Bears don’t eat dried weeds, do they?  If he had ’em dripping with wild honey p’raps it might do the business, because they say bears go crazy when they get sniff of honeycomb.”

“All of which is true enough, Bud,” Hugh told him; “but when you think Ralph expects to coax the bear to come out, you’re barking up the wrong tree.  It’s my opinion force would be a much better word, because he means to compel him to vacate.”

“Now you have got me guessing, Hugh; If you know, please take me into the game.  There, Ralph’s climbing up where the roof is lowest.  It wasn’t much of a boost for a fellow as active as he is.  What d’ye think he’ll do next?”

“Make for the chimney, unless I’m away off, which I don’t think I am.  There, you see he’s up already.  What does he seem to be doing now, Bud?”

“Why, I declare if he isn’t crunching all that dry stuff down the old chimney!  Oh! now I’ve got it, Hugh!  He’s going to smoke the bear out!”