Storm-Bound: or, A Vacation Among the Snow Drifts

"Point out to me just where the deer was when you fired, Lil Artha."

"Oh! now even you suspect that I just imagined I saw one, Elmer," sighed the other scout, "but d'ye notice that log lying across the other, something like a letter X? Well, he jumped clean over that when I gave him the second shot. Oh! he was as big as a barn to me, I tell you, and how I could ever miss him with the barrel that had the buckshot shell in it beats my time. I ought never to go out in the forest alone; I'm a fine duck of a hunter, ain't I? If it depended on Lil Artha to keep the camp in game we'd all turn into living skeletons, like the one in the sideshow of the circus last summer. Oh, rats – but not muskrats – I'm feeling pretty sick."

Elmer had not waited to listen to all this lament on the part of the disappointed marksman. Pushing forward he was now at the crossed logs. Immediately he called out in a loud voice that seemed to have an air of excitement about it:

"Hi! there, Lil Artha, come here, and hurry, too!"

Upon that the tall scout jammed the breech of his gun shut, having succeeded in reloading the same, and he lost no time in hastening to join his chum.

"W-what is it, Elmer?" he asked, breathlessly.

The other pointed to his feet.

"What do you call that, and that, and that?" he asked, impressively.

Lil Artha stared, and over his thin face there crept a look, almost of rapture, as he ejaculated:

"Blood spots on the snow, as sure as anything, Elmer! Oh! then I must have hit that deer after all! I'm glad, and then again I'm sorry. If he had to get away from us, I'd much rather not a single piece of lead had found him. Now he'll only suffer, and it'll do us no good at all."

"Hold on, don't be too sure about that," remarked Elmer, as he started to step across the logs, and follow the plainly marked red trail over the otherwise spotless field of pure snow; "that chap has been struck hard, and I don't believe he can go very far before he drops!"

At hearing this Lil Artha became greatly excited.

"Then let's chase after him right away!" he exclaimed. "Goodness knows we need fresh meat about as much as anybody could, because we're almost half starved, and haven't a ghost of a show at anything else. And if the poor thing does drop think how mean it'd be to have the foxes and other varmints gnaw at our deer all night long, while we sucked our thumbs in camp, and went hungry."

All this while Elmer was following the trail. It was an easy task, and even the tenderfoot scout of the troop might have accomplished such a proposition without being coached.

"Don't you see that it seems to be getting stronger all the while," he explained to Lil Artha, who was close at his heels, holding his breath with eagerness as he tried to look ahead so as to glimpse the welcome sight of the deer fallen at last through sheer exhaustion, "and take my word for it, we're pretty sure to get your game before we go back to camp."

"Well, that would tickle me more'n I could tell you, Elmer," the other assured him, with visions of glorious feasts rising up before his mind.

"And there he is!" added the other, quickly, "just at the foot of that fir tree!"

They made a spurt, and were soon bending over the deer, which they found quite dead, though life had evidently just departed. Lil Artha could hardly contain himself. He insisted on shaking hands several times with Elmer, and then did the same thing with himself, bubbling over with delight.

"Oh! tell me I'm not dreaming, Elmer, and that I have really and truly shot a fine deer, just when we needed it the worst kind?"

"There's no mistake about it, old fellow, because here's your deer as plain as anything," Elmer assured him, not a little pleased himself at the great success that had accompanied their hunt.

"Think how the other fellows will yell when they see it!" Lil Artha continued, "and Toby needn't be afraid he's going to starve yet a while, need he?"

"I should think not," the scout master admitted; "when there's all this fresh venison to be cooked. The country is saved, Lil Artha, and you're the lucky one to be our George Washington. The boys will be wanting to kneel down and kiss the back of your hand."

"If they try any of that softy business they'll take a back seat in a hurry, let me tell you," was what the matter-of-fact scout remarked. "But, Elmer, ain't it queer that somehow the snow woods don't look quite so dreary to me now? Fact is, I kind of think this is as pretty a sight as I've seen for a long time."

Elmer laughed at hearing that.

"They always say circumstances alter cases, Lil Artha, and when I hear you talking that way I know it's true. When a man's as hungry as he can be and yet live, the world looks different to him from what it does an hour later after some kind friend has filled him up. This deer gives you the magic spectacles through which you view things in an altogether different light."

"I guess you're right, Elmer," admitted the other; "I was feeling blue, and so I looked at everything through blue glasses. Now I'm seeing rosy. But say, however will we manage?"

"You mean about getting the game back to camp, I reckon, Lil Artha?"

"That's what I'm striking at, Elmer. We must be some distance off, and I should think the deer would weigh between a hundred-and-fifty and two hundred pounds; a pretty hefty load for two boys, with all this snow around. And yet to have to stop so as to cut the deer up would delay us like fun."

"Wait, and let's look around for a strong pole," suggested Elmer, who had seen heavier game than this carried for miles by two husky cow punchers or hunters. "I have some good stout cord along, which we'll use to tie his forelegs together, and then the hind ones ditto. The pole will pass through, and is carried on a shoulder of each. That's the way hunters always get their shoot to camp, if there are a pair of them."

The necessary pole was soon discovered, and they managed by means of jumping on the same to reduce it to the required length. Then the scout master made good use of his cord in order to secure the legs of the deer in such a way as to afford a hold when the pole was shoved through. Nothing now remained but to lift the game, and start over the back trail.

As long as the light held they would find no difficulty whatever in keeping on the track; and should twilight rapidly change into darkness Elmer had his bearings so that he could lead aright.

Lil Artha had considered that he was "dog-tired" up to the time he started that deer from where it had been lying in some brush; but this was forgotten in the excitement of the hour. When glorious success rewards the efforts of the hunter he seems to have been granted a new lease of life; and weariness is forgotten.

All the same the load was no light one, and the going very bad. Many times they staggered, and once both of them fell down. But the snow prevented any injury, and they were in too satisfied a frame of mind to complain.

"We'll have our revenge all right later on, Lil Artha!" the scout master told his comrade as they got up and dug the snow out of their ears, as well as shook another accumulation free from their collars.

"That's right, we will," assented the other, "and for every tumble like that I promise myself an additional chunk of deer meat for supper. Another thing, Elmer, we ought to remember; the heavier the game the more grub we'll have."

"You know how to see the bright side of things, Lil Artha," Elmer told him.

"Oh! anybody can when success comes along. It takes fellows like you to keep smiling when things are going wrong all around. But I've learned a lesson, Elmer, and after this I won't despair, no matter how dark the clouds look."

"If one deer can reform a scout, what would big game like an elephant do?" asked Elmer, "but then again I'm a little sorry too, Lil Artha."

"What for?" demanded the panting hunter who held up the other end of the pole that bent under the weight of the suspended game.

"We won't have that chance to settle whether the Indians knew a good thing when they said musquash was better than 'coon or 'possum, or even rabbit stew!"

"Gosh! don't waste a tear over that, Elmer. Besides, while we're up here with Uncle Caleb, like as not we'll have plenty of chances to give that dish a try. But honest to goodness, it doesn't seem to strike me just as much as it did before I cracked over this bully young buck for you said it was a fairly young one, and ought to eat tender enough."

"I guess that's only natural," the scout master told him. "While we were facing starvation, why stewed musquash sounded right good to us; but with a whole carcass of venison on our hands it's plain muskrat again; and there you are, Lil Artha."

"How d'ye think we're getting along by now?" asked the tall scout with a little vein of entreaty in his voice.

"Oh! perhaps half-way there, more or less," came the reply.

"Whew! think we can make the riffle with this mountain of a deer, Elmer?"

"Seems to weigh about three hundred now, don't it? That's because we're getting more tired all the time. But since we've started it would be a shame to stop. And think of the joy we'll be bringing Toby, and poor hungry George."

"That does seem to help out some," admitted Lil Artha, taking occasion to change his end of the pole from the right shoulder to the left.

"Keep in step with me as much as you can," advised the leader; "that does more than you'd think to make the going easier. It's a point everybody learns who has to carry heavy burdens this way. Coolies over in China know it. Horses running together pull easier if they happen to go in step. You've watched a pair trying to start, with a stalled wagonload of freight. When first one bucks hard, and then the other, there's nothing doing; but once get them to combine, and away she goes on the jump."

There was little that escaped the observation of Elmer Chenowith; and he never failed to try and impart some of the information he picked up to those of his chums who did not happen to be so keen-eyed.

"It's getting dark; and I can hardly see our old tracks now!" announced the tall scout, presently.