From out in the
middle of the Big River sounded a low "quack"; Dusky and his flock were
swimming in this time. Presently the hunter could see a silver line on
the water, and then he made out nine black spots. In a few minutes those
Ducks would be where he could shoot them. "Bang, bang" went that gun
below him again. With a roar of wings, Dusky and his flock were in the
air and away. That hunter stood up and said things, and they were not
nice things. He knew that those Ducks would not come back again that
night, and that once more he must go home empty-handed. But first he
would find out who that other hunter was and what luck he had had, so he
tramped down the shore to where that gun had seemed to be. He found the
blind of Farmer Brown's boy, but there was no one there. You see, as
soon as he had fired his gun the last time, Farmer Brown's boy had
slipped out and away. And as he tramped across the Green Meadows toward
home with his gun, he chuckled. "He didn't get those Ducks this time,"
said Farmer Brown's boy.

CHAPTER XXVII: The Hunter Gives Up

Blacky The Crow didn't know what to think. He couldn't make himself
believe that Farmer Brown's boy had really turned hunter, yet what else
could he believe? Hadn't he with his own eyes seen Farmer Brown's boy
with a terrible gun hide in rushes along the Big River and wait for
Dusky the Black Duck and his flock to come in? And hadn't he with his
own ears heard the "bang, bang" of that very gun?

The very first thing the next morning Blacky had hastened over to the
place where Farmer Brown's boy had hidden in the rushes. With sharp eyes
he looked for feathers, that would tell the tale of a Duck killed. But
there were no feathers. There wasn't a thing to show that anything so
dreadful had happened. Perhaps Farmer Brown's boy had missed when he
shot at those Ducks. Blacky shook his head and decided to say nothing to
anybody about Farmer Brown's boy and that terrible gun.

You may be sure that early in the afternoon he was perched in the top of
his favorite tree over by the Big River. His heart sank, just as on the
afternoon before, when he saw Farmer Brown's boy with his terrible gun
trudging across the Green Meadows to the Big River. Instead of going to
the same hiding place he made a new one farther down.

Then came the hunter a little earlier than usual. Instead of stopping at
his blind, he walked straight to the blind Farmer Brown's boy had first
made. Of course,