beast seemed to be overcome with disgust for the two
youngsters. He whisked squarely about and trotted away, showing a bushy
fox-like tail that almost swept the ground.

"I call that an insoolt!" exclaimed Terence Clark, bringing his gun to
his shoulder, taking quick aim and letting fly, before his companion
could object. He insisted that he had hit the animal, but it is likely
he was mistaken, for it gave no sign of being touched, trotting with the
same even step until it passed from sight around a bend in the path.

"I hit him hard," insisted Terry, who proceeded to reload his piece;
"there's no doubt of the same."

"If you had done so, he would have given some evidence of it, but there
was not the slightest."

"Ye know that such creatures are tough," coolly remarked Terry; "and the
bullet has glanced off his side as from a rock."

"If I could believe that," said the other, "I would hide somewhere until
he went away, for it would be only a waste of powder and ball to shoot
at him."

"Hasn't he gone off? What are ye talking about?"

"Gone away? Yes; for awhile, but we are not done with that beast yet; we
shall have trouble with him."

"If we keep our guns loaded and our powder dry, we'll open on him, and
if we can't kill him we'll fill him with so much lead that he won't be
able to travel fast, and we'll bid him good-by and walk from him."

The boys waited a few minutes, thinking possibly that the strange
creature would show himself again, but he did not appear, and they
turned about and resumed their journey.

They were now on one of the best stretches of the trail. The ground was
even, there were no bowlders or rocks in the path to make walking
difficult, and the undergrowth, which in some places was quite an
obstruction, did not interfere. By the middle of the afternoon, Fred was
confident they were twenty miles at least on the road, and he said that
if they came upon an inviting place, they would go into camp for the
night. The package which each carried on his back was wrapped in a
blanket that could be used to lie upon by the fire, or in severe
weather, though they would have cared little had they owned nothing of
the kind.

Their good spirits continued, and they were walking at a leisurely pace,
when a rustling in the bushes on the left caused them to look in that
direction. There stood the strange beast, not fifty feet away, head
erect, and staring at them with the same inquiring look that he showe