after all you've been and told me it would be simply impossible! I'll
know where I am every time."

"Oh! yes," laughed Phil; "just like the Indian did, we read about, eh?"

"How was that?" demanded Larry, as he buckled the belt of shells around
his generous waist.

"Why, once upon a time an old Indian actually wandered around several
days without being able to locate his home. That's pretty hard to
believe, but the story runs that way. Then some white men came across
him, hungry and tired. They asked him if he was lost, and the old
fellow got mad right away. Smacking himself on his chest proudly, he
said: 'Injun lost? No, Injun not lost; wigwam lost--Injun here!' And
that's the way it would be with you. Now get along, and be sure you
bring in the game. I changed the buckshot shells for birdshot; but put
these heavy loads in your pocket in case you need them."

So Larry trotted gaily forth. He fancied he looked every inch a Nimrod
in his new corduroy suit, and with the gun under his arm, carried in
the same way he had seen his chum do it many a time. But then Larry
did not know that the hunter who wears an old jacket, with a patch on
the right shoulder where a hole has been worn by constant friction from
carrying a gun, is most apt to inspire respect in the minds of those
who can size the true sportsman up.

Phil was rather sleepy, for he had not secured all the rest he wanted
on the preceding night. So he stretched out on the ground, and dozed.

Every little while he would arouse himself, and consult his little
nickel timepiece. Tony was busy scraping the hide of the wildcat, and
fixing it on a stretcher which he had ingeniously fashioned out of a
heavy strip of bark, straightened out flat, and held so by a couple of
sticks secured to the back.

"Time that greenhorn was back, Tony," Phil finally remarked, as he sat
up. "By the way, did you hear a shot a little while ago, perhaps half
an hour?"

Tony said he had, and he could also tell the exact direction from
whence it had sprung.

"How far away was it, do you think?" continued Phil, seriously.

"'Bout half mile, I reckons," came the reply, without hesitation.

"The air is from that quarter too, I notice; and of course you take
that into consideration when you figure on the distance?"

"Oh! yes, I know," nodded Tony.

"But half a mile--he ought to have been back before now. We'll wait a
little while longer, and then if he don't show up I