Phil. "A great
big shaggy fellow that would weigh eight hundred or a thousand pounds."

"Say, Phil, you don't want much in life!" cried Ben. "Why don't you make
it a two-thousand-pound bear while you are at it?"

"Say, speaking about heavy bears puts me in mind of a story I heard!"
cried Shadow, his face lighting up for the first time since the escape
of Link Merwell. "This yarn was told by an old western hunter and
trapper, and he said it was strictly true. He said he was out on the
ranges one day when he found himself suddenly pursued by three Modoc
Indians. He shot at them several times without hitting anybody, and
then, to his consternation, he found that his ammunition had given out.
He legged it up a mountain-side, and the three Modocs came after him,
yelling to beat the band. Just as they were following him up the steep
trail, he saw a monstrous bear come plunging out from a thicket near by.
He was so upset that he hardly knew what to do, but he grabbed up a big
rock and sent it at the bear. It struck the monstrous animal on the head
and keeled him over, and the bear rolled down the steep mountain-side,
and knocked over the three Modoc Indians, smashing every one of them."

"Wow! That's some bear story!" exclaimed Luke.

"Shadow, how could you bear to tell such a story?" asked Dave,
reproachfully.

"That knocks out all the dime novels ever written," said Ben.

"Why, Ben! do you mean to say you have read them all?" cried our hero,
in pretended surprise.

"All? I don't read any of them!" snorted Ben. "Just the same, that's the
biggest whopper I ever heard."

"Well, I'm not vouching for the story," interposed Shadow, dryly, "I'm
just telling it as it was told to me."

"Speaking about being frightened by a bear puts me in mind that it's
queer we haven't seen or heard anything more of that wild man," remarked
Roger.

"We don't want to see or hear anything more of him!" burst out Laura.
"One scare was enough."

"It's queer that the Pooles don't send some one up here to look for
him," remarked Jessie. "If he were my uncle I certainly wouldn't want
him to be roaming around in the woods that way."

"If he is just roaming around I wonder how he manages to live," said
Dave. "And where does he get all that outlandish outfit?"

"He must have some sort of a habitation here," returned Phil. "Maybe he
has taken possession of some bungalow or cabin that was locked up. If he
has, won't the owners of the place be m