The Outdoor Chums After Big Game Or, Perilous Adventures in the Wilderness

CHAPTER I

GLO­RI­OUS NEWS

“Hel­lo, there, _Red Rover_! Come along­side!”

“What's the row, fel­lows? This dandy breeze is too good to be wast­ed loaf­ing.”

“Frank's com­ing in the _Jupiter_, and com­ing like a streak!”

“Yes, and more than that, Bluff, he waves his hat as though he had great news!”

Will Mil­ton and Jer­ry Walling­ton sat in the dou­ble ca­noe, that with flap­ping sails point­ed its stem in­to the wind; while their chum, Richard Mas­ters, known among all his school­mates as Bluff, ma­nip­ulat­ed the dain­ty fif­teen-​foot cedar craft in which he had been speed­ing over the sur­face of Ca­malot Lake.

An­oth­er midget boat, con­struct­ed on the same lines as that in which Bluff was seat­ed, came fly­ing down be­fore the wind, and present­ly brought up along­side the oth­er craft.

It con­tained a sin­gle young fel­low, up­on whose frank and open face rest­ed a broad smile that seemed to proph­esy pleas­ing news.

“What makes you look so hap­py, Frank? Ev­ident­ly you've heard that your ex­am­ina­tion pa­pers were up to the stan­dard, and it's col­lege next year for yours,” re­marked Bluff with ea­ger­ness, and, it must be con­fessed, a tinge of en­vy in his quiv­er­ing voice.

“Right for you! But that is on­ly the be­gin­ning of my news!” cried Frank Lang­don as he reached out and caught Jer­ry by the arm.

“Am I in it?” de­mand­ed that wor­thy, seem­ing to catch his breath.

“Well, I should say you were, and with even bet­ter hon­ors than poor me. Now, the rest of you fel­lows, don't look that way. It's all right, I tell you,” went on the bear­er of news, try­ing to con­trol his own voice, but suc­ceed­ing on­ly a lit­tle bet­ter than Jer­ry.

“Say! do you mean it? Did Bluff and I get through, af­ter all?” ex­claimed Will.

Frank nod­ded his head en­thu­si­as­ti­cal­ly.

“Care­ful, now, you wild In­di­ans! Just re­mem­ber that you're in ca­noes that can be up­set eas­ily, and un­less you want a duck­ing out in the mid­dle of the lake, re­strain your en­thu­si­asm a bit, please. It isn't the eas­iest thing in the world, climb­ing over the stern of a ca­noe with all your clothes on,” he warned them.

“But is it re­al­ly true?” plead­ed Will. “Have I crawled through de­cent­ly? Well, I'm glad; not on­ly be­cause it will keep four chums to­geth­er a while longer, in col­lege, but my moth­er has set her heart on this thing. Yes, I'm mighty well pleased.”

Will's moth­er was a rich wid­ow, and as he had on­ly a twin sis­ter, Vi­olet, for whom Frank en­ter­tained a pro­nounced lik­ing, the two were more than or­di­nar­ily dear to Mrs. Mil­ton.

“Well, fel­lows, let's give one mighty cheer be­cause of our good for­tune,” said Jer­ry, his face beam­ing with de­light; for the chums were very fond of each oth­er, and had a sin­gle one been left be­hind on the fol­low­ing year, when the col­lege term opened, there would have been many a keen re­gret.

“Hip, hip, hur­rah! Hur­rah! hur­rah! Tiger!”

No doubt, many per­sons ashore, who heard that lusty shout come ring­ing over the clear wa­ter of the beau­ti­ful lit­tle lake on which the town of Cen­ter­ville was lo­cat­ed, won­dered what the burst of en­thu­si­asm meant.

But then they knew these four boys were built along the right lines, and that while they loved the whole out­doors, with its at­ten­dant ex­cit­ing times, nev­er had they been known to in­dulge in mean pranks.

Af­ter the cheer had died away there was a shak­ing of hands all around.

“Fel­lows, it be­gins to look as though our great trip to the Gulf of Mex­ico last win­ter might not be our last grand out­ing, af­ter all. You know what our par­ents promised us if we went through all right?”

“Hear! hear! Frank has the floor!” cried Jer­ry.

“We were to have our choice of an ex­tend­ed tour through Yel­low­stone Park to Cal­ifor­nia, and re­turn by way of the Cana­di­an Rock­ies; or a grand hunt in the wilder­ness, wher­ev­er we chose to take it. That was the idea, wasn't it?” went on the hap­py oc­cu­pant of the _Jupiter_.

“Talk to me about your per­son­al­ly con­duct­ed tours all you please, noth­ing ap­peals to me like a re­al old hunt in the Great West,” said Jer­ry ec­stat­ical­ly. “Haven't I just longed for a chance to look at a big elk in his na­tive wilds, for years? And the thought of a griz­zly bear sends a thrill of plea­sure through me.”

“And as for me, haven't I lain awake nights with­out num­ber think­ing about what bliss it would be to ac­tu­al­ly snap off a few pic­tures of those same an­imals right where they live? How tame to go to a menagerie and get a pho­to of a poor old bear be­hind the bars, when a fel­low has a chance to take him in the open!”

Of course it was Will who made this re­mark. He was the of­fi­cial pho­tog­ra­pher of the Rod, Gun and Cam­era Club, as our four boy friends called them­selves, and his am­bi­tion to se­cure strik­ing scenes, with wild game in the cen­ter of the stage, had al­ready led him in­to quite a few scrapes, just as it would again when the op­por­tu­ni­ty pre­sent­ed it­self.

“But what I have told you isn't quite all,” re­marked Frank present­ly, when the chat­ter of voic­es al­lowed him a chance to get in a few words edge­wise.

“What else have you got up your sleeve?” de­mand­ed Bluff.

“Yes, con­fess ev­ery­thing, and per­haps we'll for­give you,” came from Will.

“Well, I've had a let­ter.” And Frank held some­thing up.

“From that old side part­ner of Jesse Wilcox, the trap­per whose camp we used to vis­it dur­ing our fall hunt?” cried Jer­ry.

Frank nod­ded his head.

“And what does he say? Hur­ry up, and tell. Can't you see that Bluff, here, will be over­board? He's lean­ing so far over the side that the wa­ter is ready to pour in over the gun­wale. Will Mar­tin Ma­bie take us out?” asked Jer­ry.

“He says he will be glad to do so, for old friend­ship's sake. I'm to wire when to ex­pect us, and leave the rest to him,” Frank ex­plained.

“I hope he has told you what we are to fetch along. We've done some hunt­ing, fel­lows, in our time, but that sort of thing, with big game in prospect, calls for heav­ier gear. None of your re­peat­ing shot­guns need ap­ply this trip, Bluff, you un­der­stand?”

Jer­ry could nev­er be­come whol­ly rec­on­ciled to the mod­ern gun Bluff owned. He pro­fessed to be such a clean sports­man that he al­ways be­lieved in giv­ing the game a chance, and de­clared it to be next door to mur­der to have six shots in hand when hunt­ing birds. With big game, it was all right, be­cause then a fel­low's life might of­ten be in dan­ger.

“Oh, Mar­tin Ma­bie has writ­ten quite a long let­ter. He seems to be an ed­ucat­ed man, and not at all the brand we fig­ured out from hear­ing Jesse talk about him. Boys, we can now lay our plans, and make a start in­side of a week,” de­clared Frank.

“Isn't it just great? Did ev­er a set of grads get such a chance for fun as this?”

“I don't be­lieve they ev­er did, or ev­er will, Bluff. And our folks have been mighty good to give us this glo­ri­ous op­por­tu­ni­ty to en­joy an out­ing such as we've han­kered af­ter for a year, re­mem­ber that, fel­lows,” re­marked Frank se­ri­ous­ly.

“You can just wa­ger that I make it a point to let the pa­ter know my sen­ti­ments. He's the best dad go­ing, and I mean to make him proud of me some day. But tell us more about it, Frank. Where is Mar­tin Ma­bie to meet us, and what does he tell us to fetch along?”

“I'm not go­ing to say an­oth­er word, Jer­ry, un­til we get to the club­house, when ev­ery one of you can have a chance to read his let­ter,” re­marked Frank as he pre­pared to cast off and throw his sails to the breeze again.

“A week, did you say? Oh! what a long time to wait!” groaned Bluff.

“Still, there are lots of things to be done. I think it may be nec­es­sary for one of us to run down to the city to lay in some things in the way of am­mu­ni­tion, and a few ar­ti­cles of cloth­ing for moun­tain wear.”

“Then we'll ap­point you as a com­mit­tee of one to see to such traps, Frank,” called Jer­ry as the oth­er shot away with the wind, his ca­noe glid­ing over the lit­tle wavelets like a phan­tom craft.

Frank smiled. It was cer­tain­ly nice to know that his chums felt such sin­cere con­fi­dence in him at all times. There was noth­ing he would not do to give them plea­sure.

So the three cedar boats were soon head­ing for the club­house, and while they are thus em­ployed it might be well for us to un­der­stand just who these chums were, and what they had been do­ing in the past to make them such firm friends.

Frank was from Maine, but his fa­ther, a banker, had come to Cen­ter­ville a few years back; and among all the boys at­tend­ing the Acade­my Frank had soon picked out as his es­pe­cial friends these three, Will Mil­ton, Jer­ry Walling­ford and Bluff Mas­ters.

Af­ter the Rod, Gun and Cam­era Club had been formed they had tak­en their first out­ing, us­ing their mo­tor­cy­cles to reach the woods be­yond the head of the lake. What be­fell them on this oc­ca­sion has been told in the first vol­ume of this se­ries, called “The Out­door Chums; or, The First Tour of the Rod, Gun and Cam­era Club.”

Lat­er on, a storm hav­ing done con­sid­er­able dam­age at the school, they were giv­en an un­ex­pect­ed fall va­ca­tion, and the chums de­cid­ed to spend it on Wild­cat Is­land, sit­uat­ed at the foot of the lake. There were sev­er­al strange things con­nect­ed with this is­land, such as a mys­te­ri­ous wild man who had been seen there; and be­sides, it was shunned be­cause of the fierce bob­cats that had pos­ses­sion. How our boys camped on this is­land, and what won­der­ful ad­ven­tures they met with there, can be learned by read­ing the sec­ond vol­ume, en­ti­tled “The Out­door Chums on the Lake; or, Live­ly Ad­ven­tures on Wild­cat Is­land.”

When the East­er hol­idays came around they had laid out an­oth­er charm­ing cam­paign. This was noth­ing more nor less than an ex­pe­di­tion to Oak Ridge, that lay some ten miles back from the lake, amid the Sun­set Moun­tains. Re­port had it that there was a re­al ghost to be seen there, and the boys were bent on dis­cov­er­ing the truth of this weird sto­ry. It can be eas­ily un­der­stood that they must have had a glo­ri­ous time on that trip, viewed from the stand­point of an ea­ger, ad­ven­ture-​lov­ing boy. But the sto­ry is set down in full in the third vol­ume, and you can read it for your­selves in “The Out­door Chums in the For­est; or, Lay­ing the Ghost of Oak Ridge.”

No fur­ther long jaunts came the way of the quar­tet dur­ing the school term, up to the Christ­mas hol­idays, when they re­ceived per­mis­sion to un­der­take a trip to the Sun­ny South. Just how this came about, and what won­ders they saw and ex­pe­ri­enced on a Flori­da riv­er, as well as up­on the great Mex­ican Gulf, have been told in the fourth book of the se­ries, called “The Out­door Chums on the Gulf; or, Res­cu­ing the Lost Bal­loon­ists.”

And now it seemed as though, less than six months lat­er, they were ready to em­bark on what promised to be the most ex­cit­ing trip of all, a vis­it to the wilder­ness of the great North­west, in search of big game.

Reach­ing the club­house, they quick­ly stowed their boats away. From this time on there would prob­ably be scant time for aquat­ic sports. The tremen­dous un­der­tak­ing they had in view would, very like­ly, oc­cu­py all their spare mo­ments.

“Now let's have that let­ter, Frank. We want to con it so that ev­ery word will be pho­tographed on our brains from this time on. Didn't old Jesse say that Mar­tin Ma­bie was a big stock­man now, and had re­al­ly quit be­ing a guide and hunter? Then it's mighty kind of him to un­der­take to con­voy a raft of ten­der­feet in­to the wilder­ness. Mon­ey didn't en­ter in­to it, that's sure,” said Bluff.

“He men­tions hav­ing had a long let­ter from Jesse,” re­marked Frank.

“That set­tles it, then. Our good old friend has been telling him ev­ery­thing we ev­er did, and got him in­ter­est­ed. We must make it a point to run up and see Jesse be­fore we go, and thank him.”

“You're right about that, Jer­ry,” said Frank warm­ly. “I was think­ing the same, my­self. But here's the let­ter. Read it for your­selves.”

Var­ious were the com­ments af­ter this had been done.

“Talk to me about your good fel­lows! That Mar­tin Ma­bie stands in a class of his own,” ob­served Jer­ry. “Think of him of­fer­ing to take us in­to the moun­tains for weeks, and see that we have the time of our lives! And he warns us not to men­tion the word mon­ey to him un­less we want to break up the game. I sure am anx­ious to shake hands with that same friend of old Jesse.”

“I move we start up there right now and see Jesse. The day is fine, and when can we spare the time bet­ter?” sug­gest­ed Will, who se­cret­ly want­ed just an­oth­er chance to try a snap­shot of the queer cab­in which the trap­per oc­cu­pied.

“Sec­ond the mo­tion!” cried Bluff ea­ger­ly.

“I'm some cramped, my­self, from sit­ting so long in that ca­noe. Per­haps a run on our mo­tor­cy­cles might give me re­lief. So I say go,” came from Jer­ry.

Frank him­self be­lieved it would be a good idea. He knew that once they start­ed mak­ing prepa­ra­tions for their West­ern trip noth­ing was apt to tear them away.

“All right, boys. It's go­ing to be a full moon to-​night. Sup­pose we stop over and have a part­ing sup­per with Jesse? He'd be dread­ful­ly tick­led at the no­tion. Tell your folks at home, and meet me at the Forks in not more than half an hour.”

Frank hus­tled the oth­ers out of the boathouse, locked the door, and then the four chums has­tened to their var­ious homes.

Ere the half hour was up they came to­geth­er at the forks of the road, just out of Cen­ter­ville. Frank was first on hand, as usu­al, but even lag­gard Will showed up on time, cam­era and all.

In sin­gle file, and with a lit­tle space sep­arat­ing them, they start­ed off, the mo­tors soon pop­ping mer­ri­ly as the boys en­tered in­to the spir­it of the oc­ca­sion.

The air was fresh as they sped along the dusty road. The lead­er was ev­er ready to sig­nal a slow-​down in case they met a farmer with a load of hay, go­ing to mar­ket, or any oth­er ve­hi­cle. This was ren­dered nec­es­sary be­cause the cloud of dust might blind the eyes of those who came af­ter, and a col­li­sion be the re­sult.

In this fash­ion they ar­rived at the lum­ber camp, which was de­sert­ed at this time of year. From there on the pace had to be slowed down, for the road was on­ly used by log­ging teams, and hard­ly suit­able for mo­tor­cy­cles.

They were plug­ging along, each keep­ing his eyes open for ob­sta­cles apt to present them­selves, such as roots crop­ping up above the sur­face, when the lead­er gave a sud­den toot up­on the lit­tle horn at­tached to his ma­chine that warned the oth­ers a stop was im­per­ative.