“I do, and will bid you good-night.”

They exchanged pleasant greetings, and separated, each to pursue his own way.

Herbert was anxious to join his friends; for the fact that he had fired into a stump, under the belief that it was a bear, was no proof that the dreaded quadruped was not somewhere in the neighborhood.

As the path, which he was able to keep without difficulty, led by the rock where the three lads were to meet, he had not gone far when he caught the starlike twinkle of a point of light, which told him he was not far from camp.

“Hallo, Sam, are you there?” called out Herbert, while yet a considerable distance off.

“Yes.  What makes you so late?” was the impatient response and question.

Without pausing to reply, Herbert hurried forward and a few minutes later joined Sam Harper, who had a large fire going, and had broiled a squirrel and a rabbit, both of which were in fine condition.

“Where’s Nick?” asked Sam, as soon as he saw the youth was alone.

“How should I know anything about him?  I haven’t seen him since we parted.”

“It’s mighty queer, any way you may look at it; Nick is always the most prompt to keep any bargain he made, and I haven’t seen anything of him for hours.  He ought to have been here the very first.”

“Have you signaled to him?”

“I have fired off my gun, and shouted and whistled till my cheeks ache, and I haven’t had the first show of an answer.”

The manner in which these disheartening words were uttered showed that Sam Harper was ill at ease, not so much over the continued absence of Nick, as from his utter silence.  It was fully understood by all, that, if anything happened to either one, he was to signal immediately to the others.

Neither Herbert nor Sam had heard Nick’s rifle, though it might have been discharged without recognition by them.

Herbert had been asleep so long that he could have missed the report very readily, while Sam was so far from Nick that the sound of his gun could have been mistaken for that fired by some wandering hunter, unknown to either.

Every few minutes, Sam halloed or whistled, after Nick’s favorite manner of signaling, and then the two bent their heads and listened for the answer, which came not.

The broiled game remained untasted, for Sam’s appetite was suspended, and Herbert refused to eat while his companion was in such mental trouble.

“There’s no use of talking,” finally exclaimed Sam, unable to repress his uneasiness, “something has gone wrong with Nick, and I’m bound to find out what it is.”

CHAPTER XXIII.

HUNTING A BUCK.

It will be remembered that when Nick Ribsam left his companions, early in the afternoon, it was with the resolution to find out whether the showy shot made by Herbert Watrous at the buck, had done the execution he claimed for it.