“Never mind,” said Don, when his brother told him of the loss.  “He’ll go off and join some other flock, so we are bound to catch him anyhow.  I call this a good beginning, don’t you, Dave?  It looks now as though you were going to earn your money in spite of Lester and Dan.”

After re-setting the trap the boys got into the wagon and drove on.  They found some of their traps just as they had left them; a few had been thrown by ground squirrels or red-birds; and from the others they took enough quails to make their day’s catch amount to a little over four dozen.  These were all safely transferred to the cabin, the mule was unharnessed and the young trappers, greatly encouraged by their success, replenished the fire in the shop, for the day was raw and chilly, and went to work to build more traps.

CHAPTER XII.

WHERE THE POINTER WAS.

“Yes, sar, I’m goin’ to raise a furse here now, an’ I won’t be long about it, nuther.  They think I don’t amount to nothin’ in this yere house, but I’ll show ’em that I do.  Pap bein’ away, I had oughter be the man of the family, an’ that leetle Dave shan’t crowd me outen the place, nuther.  When he comes back to-night his eyes’ll stick out so’t a feller could hang his hat onto ’em.  You hear me?”

This was the way Dan Evans talked to himself, as he sat on the bench in front of the door, gazing after his mother and David, as they walked down the road toward General Gordon’s.  He was greatly enraged over his failure to steal his brother’s ten dollars, and really thought David had been guilty of a mean piece of business in putting his money where it would be safe.

“He hain’t went off with that thar shootin’-iron on his shoulder fur nothin’,” thought Dan.  “He’s goin’ huntin’ with them Gordon fellers, and he’ll have a nice time an’ get somethin’ good to eat, while I must go without my dinner, dog-gone it, kase thar hain’t nobody here to cook it fur me.  They don’t take half so much notice of me as they would if I was a pinter dog!”

Dan sat on the bench for half an hour or more, now and then looking down the road as if he were waiting for something, and all the while his mind was occupied with such thoughts as these.  At last the sight of Don Gordon’s canoe, which suddenly appeared in the lake, brought him to his feet and sent him behind the cabin in great haste.  It did more.  It recalled to him the fact that his father had told him to steal that same canoe and bring it to Bruin’s Island, together with several necessary articles that were to be purchased at Silas Jones’s store.  Dan had not once thought of this since he saw David at the landing with ten dollars in his hand, and heard the grocer tell him that his credit was good for six months; but he thought of it the moment he saw the canoe with the hounds curled up in the bow.  His eyes were sharp enough to see that Don carried his rifle in his hands, and that a heavy shot-gun, which