CHAPTER XXI
"HELP! HELP!"
"Take your stations," added Bob Budd, excitedly; "we're going to havethe tallest kind of fun; I'll stay here, and you--"
But his friends did not wait for further directions. Tom Wagstaffsprang up, gun in hand, and went threshing among the trees and throughthe undergrowth toward the path on the left (as they faced themountain ridge), while Jim McGovern was equally prompt in hurrying tothe trail on the right.
Within a few seconds after the first baying of the hound fell upontheir ears Bob Budd found himself alone.
"They're such lunkheads," he said to himself, "that the two togetherdon't know enough to hit the side of a barn ten feet off. I hope thedeer will take the middle path so that I can show them how the thingis done, which reminds me that it is time to take another drink."
Meanwhile the dog Hero was getting in his work in brilliant style.
The first sounds of the hound showed that he was over the mountaincrest, and within the following minute it was apparent to all that hewas approaching, his baying rapidly growing more distinct.
This confirmed what his owner had said: he had held his peace untilbeyond the wild animal, so that the latter, when he awoke to thealarming fact that the hound was after him, naturally turned in theopposite direction, and was, therefore, coming toward the threehunters, though, of course, it must remain undecided for a time whichtrail he would take.
The baying of Hero continued at brief intervals, and drew near so fastthat each of the three hunters knew the game was sure to pass nearhim, and one of them was to be favored with a shot before he was aquarter of an hour older.
Which would it be?
"I think I'm to be the lucky chap," reflected the delighted Tom, overon the left, "and I'll show Bob, who thinks he knows so much, thatsome things can be done as well as others. What the mischief is thematter with me?"
This impatient inquiry was caused by Tom's discovery that a singularnervousness had taken possession of him and was rapidly increasing.The belief that a wild animal was bearing down upon him and would soonbreak cover affected him as he had never been affected before.
He found himself trembling in every limb, while his teeth rattled asthough he were shaking with the ague. Angered at his weakness, hestrove desperately to overcome it, but, as is the rule at such times,though he was able to check himself for an instant, he was powerlessto master his strange weakness.
I suppose I hardly need tell you that Tom was suffering from thatpeculiar nervousness known as "buck fever."
Experienced hunters laugh at amateurs when they see them overtaken bythe exasperating disease (if it be proper to call it that), whichnever attacks them.
"Confound it!" muttered Tom, "I wonder whether Bob or Jim is affectedthis way; if I don't get better, I hope the deer won't come in sightof me."
Nevertheless, it quickly became apparent that the animal had taken thepath on the left, and was approaching the impatient hunter, who hadstationed himself behind the trunk of a large oak, with his gun atfull cock, ready to let fly with both barrels the instant he saw thechance.
Each of the trails to which I have alluded were traversed so rarelythat they showed only dimly, and were overhung by the luxuriantundergrowth and branches growing beside them. This prevented Tomseeing very far along the path, so that his ear gave him knowledge ofthe whereabouts of the animal before the eye located him.
The youth was still striving desperately to get the mastery of thebuck fever, when he heard the crashing tread of the game, which wasadvancing along the trail, and unless he wheeled aside would passwithin twenty feet of where he stood.
Suddenly a commotion was discernible among the vegetation, and thenext instant Tom caught sight of the antlers of a noble buck, who wassailing along with such speed that the next second his shoulders andbody burst into sight.
He was running fast with that peculiar lope natural to the animal, andno doubt was panic-stricken by the baying of the hound, not far behindand gaining fast.
The sight of the royal game intensified Tom's nervousness. Hecompressed his lips and held his breath, with the resolve to calm hisagitation or die in the attempt.
But finding it utterly beyond his power, he deliberately stepped frombehind the tree, and when the buck was no more than fifty feet away,and coming head on, he let fly with both barrels.
Had the animal been perched in the topmost branches of the beech-treeon the left he would have received a mortal hurt, but as it was, hewas not touched by a single pellet of the numberless shot that weresent hurtling and rattling among the leaves.
"Confound you!" muttered Tom, aware of his absurd failure; "I'll clubyou to death."
And swinging the butt of his weapon over his shoulder he rushedsavagely at the beast.
In doing so, he ran into a peril of which he did not dream, fornothing is truer than that "a deer at bay is a dangerous foe," and hewould have been practically helpless against an assault of the animal.
Had the latter been wounded there is little doubt that he would havelowered those beautiful antlers and charged directly at the ardenthunter, who would have been caught in a most unpleasant dilemma; butthe fact that he was unharmed, added to the terrible baying comingcloser every minute, drove all idea of fight from the buck, whichwheeled sharply to one side and went crashing through the undergrowthtoward the path where Bob Budd was waiting for him.
Tom Wagstaff was carried away by the excitement of the moment, andwith his gun clubbed started in frantic pursuit of the fleeing game,resolved to help bring it down, even if he could not shoot it.
He doubtless would have chased the animal a considerable distance hadthe route been favorable, but beside the rocks and boulders there wasno end to the wiry, running vines, one of which wrapped itself abouthis ankle in a fashion peculiar to its species, and Tom sprawledheadlong on his face, his gun flying a half-dozen feet from his hands.
Still determined to keep up the pursuit, he hastily scrambled to hisfeet, and catching up the weapon, tore ahead with the same frantichaste as before.
Unfortunately for him, however, when he fell he was partly turnedaround, and his ideas were so confused that he started back over hisown trail without a suspicion of the fact, not awaking to his blunderuntil too late to correct it.
In the meantime the buck was making matters lively not only forhimself, but for the other parties.
The report of Tom's gun readied the ears of Bob and Jim as a matter ofcourse, since they were quite near, but Bob knew that the shot hadfailed to bring down the game, since he was heard plunging through thewood toward the path beside which Bob Budd was excitedly awaiting hisapproach.
It would have been strange if Bob had not felt something of thenervousness that had played the mischief with Tom, but it was to amuch less extent, so that he did not doubt his ability to fire ascoolly and effectively as when practicing at a target.
It is a thrilling experience even for the veteran hunter when a noblebuck breaks cover within easy gunshot, and the sight of the animal, ashis leathery sides, proud head, and spreading antlers burst upon hisvision, stirred the pulses of Bob Budd as they had not been stirredsince his encounter with the Widow Finnegan, a couple of nightsbefore.
"You're my game!" he exclaimed, aiming at the animal and dischargingthe two barrels in quick succession.
He did better than Tom Wagstaff, though he failed to drop the buck inhis tracks, as he expected to do.
In fact, it seems to be one of the impossibilities to kill any of the_cervus_ species instantly--that is, so as to cause him to fall atonce, like many other animals when mortally hurt.
I once sent a bullet straight through the heart of a deer that wasrunning broadside past me. He kept straight on with unabated speed fora dozen yards, when he crashed directly against the trunk of a treeand fell all in a heap. But for the tree in his way he would have runconsiderably further.
Bob lost his head very much as Tom had done a minute before, forobserving that the buck did not fall
, he clubbed his gun and rushedforward with the intention of braining him.
But from this point forward there was no parallelism in the flow ofincidents.
The buck had been slightly wounded, just enough to rouse his anger. Itis not impossible, also, that the sight of a second hunter and thesound of the baying hound near at hand convinced him that he wascaught in close quarters and must make a fight for it.
So when Bob rushed to meet him, instead of fleeing, the buck loweredhis antlers and rushed to meet Bob.
"Jewhilakens!" exclaimed the terrified youth, "I didn't think of_that_!"
And wheeling about, he fled for his life.
Where to go or precisely what to do except to run was more than thefugitive could tell.
Accordingly he sped with all the haste at his command, running, it maybe said, as never before. His terror was irrestrainable when he cast asingle glance over his shoulder and saw that the buck was in savagepursuit.
"Fire! murder! Tom and Jim! where are you? Come to my help, quick, orI'm a goner!" shouted Bob, dodging to the right and left like a DiggerIndian, seeking to avoid the rifle shots of a pursuing enemy; "whydon't you help me? The buck has got me and is going to chaw me all topieces!"
The Campers Out; Or, The Right Path and the Wrong Page 21