t, Helen saw, was at the top of an intersecting canuon. Dale
dismounted, without drawing his rifle from its saddle-sheath, and
approached Roy.

"Buck an' two does," he said, low-voiced. "An' they've winded us, but
don't see us yet.... Girls, ride up closer."

Following the directions indicated by Dale's long arm, Helen looked down
the slope. It was open, with tall pines here and there, and clumps of
silver spruce, and aspens shining like gold in the morning sunlight.
Presently Bo exclaimed: "Oh, look! I see! I see!" Then Helen's roving
glance passed something different from green and gold and brown.
Shifting back to it she saw a magnificent stag, with noble spreading
antlers, standing like a statue, his head up in alert and wild posture.
His color was gray. Beside him grazed two deer of slighter and more
graceful build, without horns.

"It's downhill," whispered Dale. "An' you're goin' to overshoot."

Then Helen saw that Roy had his rifle leveled.

"Oh, don't!" she cried.

Dale's remark evidently nettled Roy. He lowered the rifle.

"Milt, it's me lookin' over this gun. How can you stand there an' tell
me I'm goin' to shoot high? I had a dead bead on him."

"Roy, you didn't allow for downhill... Hurry. He sees us now."

Roy leveled the rifle and, taking aim as before, he fired. The buck
stood perfectly motionless, as if he had indeed been stone. The does,
however, jumped with a start, and gazed in fright in every direction.

"Told you! I seen where your bullet hit thet pine--half a foot over his
shoulder. Try again an' aim at his legs."

Roy now took a quicker aim and pulled trigger. A puff of dust right at
the feet of the buck showed where Roy's lead had struck this time. With
a single bound, wonderful to see, the big deer was out of sight behind
trees and brush. The does leaped after him.

"Doggone the luck!" ejaculated Roy, red in the face, as he worked the
lever of his rifle. "Never could shoot downhill, nohow!"

His rueful apology to the girls for missing brought a merry laugh from
Bo.

"Not for worlds would I have had you kill that beautiful deer!" she
exclaimed.

"We won't have venison steak off him, that's certain," remarked Dale,
dryly. "An' maybe none off any deer, if Roy does the shootin'."

They resumed travel, sheering off to the right and keeping to the edge
of the intersecting canuon. At length they rode down to the bottom,
where a tiny brook babbled through willows, and they followed th