h he had fired made a bound and went
off at full speed, leaving the lad with his heart beating and full of
disappointment.

"No, Watty, a miss; I can't shoot straight, and it's of no use trying, I
only waste the cartridges."

"Got him?" came faintly from the distance, and, turning, Steve could see
the doctor a couple of hundred yards away.

"No!" cried Steve gloomily; and then softly, "I can't shoot;" and he
watched the disappearing stag.

"Yes, yes, yes!" yelled Watty. "Hi--yi--yi--yi--ah!"

For just as the deer was going at full speed, and a few more bounds
would have taken it round a point and out of sight, it dropped suddenly,
the impetus at which it had been going sending it right over and over
twice; then it lay motionless, and, re-loading as he went, Steve
exultantly started after his prize.

"I told her sae; I kenned she'd het her by the way the beastie rinned.
Shot recht through the hairt, laddie--recht through the hairt."

"Mind, it may only be wounded, and these things are dangerous."

"Nay, she'll never rin again," panted Watty, whom long inaction on board
had made fat. "It was a bonnie lang shot, and ye ought to be verra
proud."

"But I'm not, Watty; it seems a shame and cowardly to crawl after a
beautiful animal and murder it."

"She isna a peautiful animal," said Watty scornfully. "She's fat, put
she's not so big and bonnie as a Hieland stag, and her horns are puir
scrats o' things. Hey, but ye should see the tines on the het of a
bonnie ret-teer! She's only coot to eat; ant she must kill the
beasties, or else she'd pine to deat."

Watty was right, and they could approach the deer without fear of
attack. As it happened, it proved to be the finest shot that day, and
after it had been gralloched (as the Highlanders term the opening and
cleaning of a stag), by the Norsemen, the light sledge was brought into
requisition, the men harnessed themselves to it, and the reindeer was
dragged to where the game had been left for picking up on their return;
but to the surprise of all it was missing.

"It must have been here that we left it," said the captain, glancing
round at the wilderness of rocks reaching from them to the
mountain-foot.

"Of course; here are the marks," said the doctor.

At that minute, with a quiet smile, Johannes touched Steve's arm and
pointed. The boy followed the direction indicated, and saw something
moving on the mountain-side.

"Yes, I see it!" cried Steve. "Ther