Dan could sleep, and he did, too, after he got over his rage, but his night’s rest did not seem to refresh him much, for he was cross and sullen the next morning, and ate his breakfast without saying a word to anybody.  David was as bright as a lark; and after he had assisted his mother in her household duties, he took down his rusty old single-barrel from the pegs over the fireplace, slung on his powder-horn and shot-pouch, and when his mother was ready to go, he accompanied her down the road toward General Gordon’s, leaving Dan sitting on the bench, moody and thoughtful.

“They don’t take no more notice of me nor if I was a yaller dog or a crooked stick,” growled Dan, when he found himself alone.  “I’ll pay ‘em fur it by kickin’ up a wusser row nor pap done ’bout that thar bar’l, an’ I shan’t be long a doin’ of it nuther!”

Mrs. Evans and David separated at the forks of the road, the former directing her course toward the house of the neighbor by whom she was employed, and David hurrying on toward General Gordon’s.  When he reached the head of the lake he heard a loud shout; and looking in the direction from which it came, he saw Don and Bert standing on the wharf beckoning to him.  David ran across the garden to join the brothers, and found that they were all ready to start on the hunt they had planned the day before.  A well-filled basket, which David knew contained a substantial lunch, stood on the wharf, and near it lay the General’s heavy double-barrel gun, which Bert had borrowed for the occasion, knowing that it would throw buck-shot with more force than his light bird gun.  Bert was unfastening the canoe, and Don stood close by, with his trusty rifle in one hand and an axe in the other.  Two other axes lay near the lunch basket, and a couple of Don’s best hounds stood as close to the edge of the wharf as they could get, wagging their tails vigorously and whining with impatience.

These hounds were large and powerful animals, and their courage had been tested in more than one desperate bear fight.  If they had been with their master when he visited the island the day before, something disagreeable might have happened.  Godfrey Evans could not have driven them away by imitating the growl of a wild animal.  They welcomed the newcomer with their bugle-like notes, and were answered by a chorus of angry yelps from the rest of the pack, which had been shut up in the barn and were to be left behind.

“Now, I call this rather a formidable expedition,” said Don, as David came up.  “If that bear is there to-day I wouldn’t take a dollar for my chance of shooting him.  One bullet and three loads of buckshot will be more than he can carry away with him.  Here are the axes to build the trap with, if we don’t find him on the island; there’s a bag of corn for bait, an auger to bore the holes and the pins with which to fasten the logs together.  Bert and I worked in the shop last night until ten o’clock, making those pins.  I think we have everything we wan’t, so we’ll be off.”