something; that's plain."

Indeed, the young Aleut, not much farther on, began now to stoop and
examine the trail closely. At length he pointed his brown finger at a
certain spot near the trail. The others bent over the place.

"Something's been here," said Jesse. The moss had been dug out and put
back again.

Skookie smiled and walked on a little farther and showed them several
other such places a few yards apart. He held up the fingers of one hand.

"Five _klipsie_," he said, and then swept an arm around toward the face
of the mountains, remarking: "My peoples come here."

"Oh," said Rob; "he means that here is where his family come to set
their _klipsie_ traps for foxes. I suppose these places are where the
same _klipsies_ were set five different times. I have heard that when
they catch a fox in one place they always take up their trap and move it
on a little way so that the other foxes may not be frightened away by
the smell of the dead fox or the trap."

"I wonder," said Jesse, "if any fox would have good fur this late in the
spring."

"He might," said Rob, "if he had been living all the time up in the
mountains near the snow; but as the natives trap a good deal along the
beach, I suppose they took up their traps some time ago. They never like
to take fur unless it is good, of course."

"Anyhow," said Jesse, "I shouldn't mind trying once for a fox. We might
get a good one. I've heard they catch foxes sometimes--silver-grays or
blacks, you know--that are worth three or four hundred dollars."

"Or even more," added Rob; "but that is when they're very prime, and
when they bring the top of the market."

Skookie looked from one to the other, but finally made up his own mind.
He led out on the way toward the barabbara, where very methodically he
set to work carrying out his purpose. He rummaged among the _klipsie_
butts in the back part of the hut until he got one to suit him, and then
without any hesitation led the way a few hundred yards distant from the
hut where, parting the grass, he disclosed the cache or hiding-place
where the owners of the _klipsies_ had secreted the traps; they, in
their cunning, not wishing to leave the entire trap in the possession of
any stranger who might come to the house.

Fumbling in this heap of narrow sticks, each of which was about as long
as a boy's arm, Skookie at last picked out one which suited him. They
discovered that the end of it was armed with four or five spikes