an't tell it good. But 'twas real _scarey_ and interesting.
Something about a cow. The panther killed my grandfather's father's cow,
I believe. The men were all away. It was in the winter time; and those
two boys followed the panther's track away up into the great woods here
somewheres and shot it. It's a real interesting story. You get the old
gentleman to tell it to you some evening."

"We will," said Theodora. "I'll ask him the first night after we go
home."

"My! Did you hear what an awful noise _that_ was, just now?" exclaimed
Kate.

We had all heard it--a singular yell, not wholly unlike the human voice,
yet of ugly, wild intonation. Addison and Thomas exchanged glances.

"Queer what a noise a screech owl will make," the former remarked, after
a moment's silence.

"Dear me, was that a screech owl?" said Theodora.

"Oh, I guess so," replied Addison carelessly. "They make an awful outcry
sometimes."

Tom did not say anything, but he told me next day that it was a bear
which had made that cry, only a little ways from the camp; and that he
had winked to Addison not to tell the girls, for they were looking
nervously about them, after hearing the "screamer" story.

It was not a cold night, for October; yet as the evening advanced the
fire felt very comfortable.

As we sat talking, several striped squirrels came out in sight into the
firelight. There were hundreds of these little fellows there in the
clearing, gathering the hazel nuts for their winter store. The hazel
nuts were very large, nearly the size of those sold as filberts. The
squirrels made their winter burrows in the ground about the old stumps.
Kate had gathered a pint dipper full of the nuts before dark; and as we
sat talking, we cracked them with round stones from the stream. Once we
heard a great rushing and running, as of large animals through the
bushes, at no great distance away.

"Hear the deer go!" Willis exclaimed.

Tom laughed. "We will pop over some of them to-morrow," said he. But he
whispered to me a few minutes later, that he expected two bears were
having a squabble over there in the brush. By and by we heard them
running again; and this time they passed around to the south of our
camping place, and we heard them go, splashing, through the stream and
away into the woods on the other side. Willis jumped up and gave a loud
_so-ho!_ which resounded far across the darkened wilderness; and then
for a time all the wild denizens of the f