oxes for a moment in his
anxiety to hear the result of Horace's trip.

"None," said Horace curtly. He looked tired, dirty, and discouraged.
"I went clear to the Whitefish--nothing doing. But what are you
fellows grinning about? What did you find at the head of the river?
You haven't--it isn't possible that you've hit it!"

"No, not diamonds," said Mac. "But we 've found something valuable."
And he told of their discovery of the black foxes. "But the problem is
how to get them," he finished. "The only way I can see is to shoot
them at long range."

"Shoot them! Are you crazy?" exclaimed Horace, who was even more
stirred by the news than they had expected. "Never! Catch 'em alive!
They're worth their weight in gold."

"Alive! I never thought of that!" exclaimed Fred.

"Why, their fur is no good now. Besides, suppose you did get a
wretched thousand dollars or so for the pelts--what's that? Why, down
in Prince Edward Island a pair of live black foxes for breeding was
sold for $45,000."

"Gracious!" gasped Fred.

"Down there every one is wild about breeding fur. A big syndicate has
a ranch that's guarded with watchmen and burglar alarms like a bank.
Their great trouble is to get the breeding stock, and they'll pay
almost any price for live, uninjured black foxes. If we could manage
to catch this pair of old ones and the four cubs without hurting them,
they ought to bring--I'd be afraid to guess how much! Maybe a hundred
thousand dollars! Kill them? Why, you'd kill a goose that laid golden
eggs!"

"That's right! I've heard of those fox ranches, of course," said Mac,
"but I didn't think of them at the moment. A hundred thousand dollars!
But how on earth can we catch them? We might dig the cubs out of their
den, but we couldn't get the old ones that way. If we only had a few
traps!"

"Why, there's that trap I found in the woods!" exclaimed Fred suddenly.

They had all forgotten it; they had dropped the trap into the dunnage,
and had not seen or thought of it since. Now, however, they eagerly
rummaged it out, and examined it critically.

It was badly rusted, but not broken. Mac knocked off the dirt and rust
scales, rubbed it thoroughly with grease, and set it. When he touched
the pan with a stick the jaws snapped. The springs were a little
stiff, but after they had been worked several times and well greased,
the trap seemed to be almost as good as new.

"We should have three or four of th