than a dead quiet."

This dialogue was exchanged in low but excited voices between a young
man of about one and twenty, and a lad who was apparently five years his
junior, while they waded knee-deep in water among the long, rank grasses
and circular pads of water-lilies which border the banks of Squaw Pond,
a small lake in the forest region of northern Maine.

The hour was somewhere about eleven o'clock. The night was intensely
still, without a zephyr stirring among the trees, and of that wavering
darkness caused by a half-clouded moon. On the black and green water
close to the bank rocked a light birch-bark canoe, a ticklish craft,
which a puff might overturn. The young man who had urged the necessity
for silence was groping round it, fumbling with the sharp bow, in which
he fixed a short pole or "jack-staff," with some object--at present no
one could discern what--on top.

"There, I've got the jack rigged up!" he whispered presently. "Step in
now, Neal, and I'll open it. Have you got your rifle at half-cock?
That's right. Be careful. A fellow would need to have his hair parted in
the middle in a birch box like this. Remember, mum's the word!"

The lad obeyed, seating himself as noiselessly as he could in the bow of
the canoe, and threw his rifle on his shoulder in a convenient position
for shooting, with a freedom which showed he was accustomed to firearms.

At the same time his companion stepped into the canoe, having first
touched the dark object on the pole just over Neal's head. Instantly it
changed into a brilliant, scintillating, silvery eye, which flashed
forward a stream of white light on a line with the pointed gun, cutting
the black face of the pond in twain as with a silver blade, and making
the leaves on shore glisten like oxidized coins.

The effect of this sudden illumination was so sudden and beautiful that
the boy for a minute or two held his rifle in unsteady hands while the
canoe glided out from the bank. An exclamation began in his throat which
ended in an indistinct gurgle. Remembering that he was pledged to
silence, he settled himself to be as wordless and motionless as if his
living body had become a statue.

From his position no revealing radiance fell on him. He sat in shadow
beside that glinting eye, which was really a good-sized lantern, fitted
at the back with a powerful silvered reflector, and in front with a
glass lens, the light being thrown directly ahead. It was provided also
wi