Twilight was deepening, the supper was almost ready, and Paul went forth to see if Henry and Tom were yet in sight.  Presently he saw them coming—­two black figures against the setting sun, with the body of a deer that they had killed and dressed.  He hastened to meet them and give them a helping hand, and together they approached the house.

First they swung the body of the deer from a bough, and then they opened the door.  Deep silence reigned within.  No friendly voice greeted them.  The heads of Jim Hart and Shif’less Sol almost touched over a square of deerskin, at which both were looking intently.  With the supper ready, and nothing else to do, they had got out the chessmen, and were playing the rubber.  So absorbed were they that they neither heard nor saw.

“Now what under the sun is this?” exclaimed Tom Ross.

“It’s a game I taught ’em while you and Henry were gone,” explained Paul.  “It’s called chess.”

Shif’less Sol and Jim sprang up, but Sol quickly recovered his presence of mind.

“I jest about had him cornered, an’ your comin’ saved him,” he said.

“Cornered!” said Jim Hart.  “He ain’t even seed the day when he kin beat me!”

The chessmen were put aside for the time, and five hungry beings ate as only borderers could eat.  Then Tom Ross demanded a look at the game.  After the look he asked for instruction.

“I saw a set uv them fellers once when I wuz at Fort Pitt,” he said, “but I never thought the time would come when I’d play with ’em.  Push up the fire thar a little, will you, Jim, so I kin see better.”

Paul and Henry looked at each other and smiled.  Soon Tom himself, the senior of the party, was absorbed in the new game, and it was a happy thought of Paul’s to introduce it, even with the rude figures which were the best that they could make.

Paul brought up again the next morning the subject of their weather prospects, and Tom and Henry agreed with the others in predicting a great deal of snow and cold.

“All signs show it,” said Henry.  “The rabbits are burrowing deeper than usual under the bushes, and I notice that the birds have built their nests uncommonly thick.  I don’t understand how they know what’s coming, but they do.”

“Instinct,” said Paul.

“We know that a hound kin follow by smell the track of a man who has passed hours before,” said Shif’less Sol, “when no man in the world kin smell anything at all o’ that track.  So it ain’t any more strange that birds an’ beasts kin feel in their bones what’s comin’ when we can’t.”

“Ef you’ll imitate them squirrels an’ rabbits an’ birds an’ things,” said Jim Hart, “an’ lay up lots uv things good to eat fur the winter, it’ll give me pleasure to cook it ez it’s needed.”

“I’ve noticed something besides the forethought of the animals,” added Henry.  “The moss on the north side of the trees seems to me to be thicker than usual.  I suppose that nature, too, is getting ready for a long, hard winter.”