“Well!  It’s about time we struck something at last,” grumbled Garst.  “Catch me ever coming on a water pilgrimage again!  I’ll let Herb fill his own kettle in future.  Now, I believe that fellow could smell a spring.”

“Just as I smelt this one!” exclaimed Dol triumphantly.  “I told you ’twas on the side of the knoll.  And here it is!”

“Bravo, Chick!  You’ve got good ears, if you are crazy upon one subject.”

And so speaking, Cyrus, with a chuckle of joy, unslung the tin drinking-cup which hung at his belt, filled and refilled it, drinking long, inspiriting draughts before he prepared to fill the camp-kettle.

“The best water I ever tasted, Dol!” he exclaimed, smacking his lips.  “It’s ice-cold.  There’s not much of it, but it has quality, if not quantity.”

The long-sought well was, in truth, a tiny one.  It came bubbling up, clear and pellucid, from the bowels of the earth, and showed its laughing face amid a cluster of bushes—­which all bent close to look at it lovingly—­half-way up the knoll.  A wee stream trickled down from it,—­dribble—­dribble—­a rivulet that had once been twice its present size, judging from the wide margin of spattered clay at each side.

Dol had been following his companion’s example, and drinking joyfully before thinking of aught else.  When the moment came for him to straighten his back, and rise upon his legs, instead of this natural proceeding, he suddenly crouched close to the ground, his breath coming in quick puffs, his eyes dilating, a froth of excitement on his lips.

“What on earth are you staring at?” asked Cyrus.  “You look positively crazy.”

For answer, the English boy shot up from his lowly posture, seized his companion by the arm, making him drop the camp-kettle, which he was just filling, and forced him to scan the soft clay by the rivulet.

“Look there—­and there!” gurgled Dol, his voice sounding as if he was being choked by suppressed hilarity.  “I told you we’d find them, and you didn’t believe me!  Aren’t those moose-tracks?  They’re not deer-tracks, anyhow; they’re too big.  I may be a greenhorn, but I know that much.”

“They are moose-tracks,” Cyrus answered slowly, almost unbelievingly, though the evidence was before him.  “They certainly are moose-tracks,” he repeated, “and very recent ones too.  A moose has been drinking here, perhaps not half an hour ago.  He can’t be far away.”

Garst was now warming into excitement himself.  His bass tones became guttural and almost inarticulate, while he lowered them to prevent their travelling.  On the reddish clay at his feet were foot-marks very like the prints of a large mastiff.  He studied them one by one, even tracing the outline with his forefinger.

“Then I’m going to call,” whispered Dol, his words tremulous and stifled.  “Lie low, Cy!  You promised you’d give me a fair chance; you’ll have to keep your word.”