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.
well that they had—for they had not passed anything, even at the
tumbledown cabin which looked like good drinking water.
“There is one thing sure,” Scott said; “we have been traveling
pretty steadily westward and must be north of where we want to go.
Then we want to take the south road.”
“Yes,” Merton assented, “and if we get out there five miles or so
before we find that we are wrong we’ll beat it across country to the
northwest till we strike the right road instead of coming back here.
We can’t lose much that way.”
“No,” Scott agreed, “nothing but ourselves.”
“Well,” Merton said, looking apprehensively down the road, “let’s
be going. We don’t want those other fellows to catch up with us
here and think we’re stumped on this fork in the road.”
They scrambled to their feet and set out briskly, for, as Scott
explained, if it was the wrong road they wanted to find it out before
dark, as it would not be very easy to travel across country through
the woods in the night. The road did not get any better or any
worse, nor give any other signs of its ultimate destination. They had
been traveling in this way for two hours when they heard a dog
barking ahead of them, and soon they spied a small shack.
“Now for some Indian talk,” Merton exclaimed disgustedly.
He was not disappointed. In the doorway of the rickety old shack
sat an old man, smoking an old blackened clay pipe, his eyes fixed
on them in watery indifference. He must have been very old, Scott
thought he looked at least a thousand. His face was a mass of deep-
cut wrinkles forming the precipitous cliffs and mountain valleys of a
bold relief map. His palsied head shook violently and his scanty
white locks fluttered nervously against the high cheek bones. No one
but an Indian could have looked so old.
Merton addressed himself to the old man but had little hope of
getting an answer. “Can you tell us whether this is the road to White
Earth?”
The old man’s expression changed not a particle, but he gurgled
almost inaudibly, an incoherent stream of Chippewa. It did not
enlighten them much, but it produced some effect, for a girl
suddenly appeared in the doorway behind him and looked them over
curiously. As Scott looked at her his poetic visions of beautiful Indian
maidens faded away.
“That’s not Minnehaha,” he mumbled; “that’s a cinch.”
She was thin to emaciation, and unspeakably dirty. One eye was
apparently closed with a loathsome disease, giving her face a
sinister, leering expression. She did not look like a promising subject,
but Merton tried her.
“Bojou, bojou,” he used the greeting of the old French coureurs
des bois. “We are trying to get to the Peace Celebration at White
Earth. Can you tell us whether this is the road?”
The old man mumbled some more Chippewa. The girl stared at
them sullenly. Scott took out half a dollar and looked at it
thoughtfully. The girl’s good eye caught the gleam of the silver
instantly. “Frazee camp, ten mile. Straight trail,” she exclaimed,
pointing to a faint track leading on westward from the house, and
thrusting her hand eagerly over the old man’s shoulder for the
money. Scott dropped it into her hand quickly, lest she should touch
him, and with another exchange of “Bojou” they took to the trail
again. Anybody but an Indian living in that unfrequented place could
not have resisted the temptation to watch them on their way, but
the girl turned indifferently into the cabin and the old man did not so
much as turn his eyes to look after them.
“It’s about ten to one that she’s stringing us,” Merton said
cheerfully, “but this is about as near right as we can go now and it
will be great luck if we do strike that camp.”
“It’s only half past eight,” Scott said, “and we ought to make the
camp tonight if it is there. There’s a good moon. Wasn’t that girl a
fright?”
“That’s the way most of them look around here. They nearly all
have trachoma. I have seen some pretty ones, but mighty few. Let’s
hit it up a little. We don’t want to get to that camp too late, or we
can’t get in.”
 The pace became too hot to permit of further conversation, and
Scott amused himself revising his Indian ideas and speculating on
what the Celebration would be like. The spectacle at the cabin had
changed his expectations. The long June twilight made the road
plain before them till ten o’clock and by that time the moon was high
in the heavens. By eleven o’clock they were beginning to think that
the sight of that half dollar had led the “beautiful Indian maiden” to
invent a lumber camp for the occasion, when they heard the snort of
a locomotive at no great distance ahead of them.
“There, by George!” Scott exclaimed. “She was honest, if she was
homelier than sin.”
“The next question,” Merton said, “is that locomotive going or
coming?”
The sound had ceased, and they hurried forward to investigate.
They found that it was only the “swipe” cleaning out the engine.
They could see his figure flitting here and there around the engine in
the dim light of a lantern. He heard them coming and stopped to see
who it was—the camp had been asleep for two hours. When he saw
their packs he took them for lumberjacks looking for a job.
“Nothing doing here,” he growled, without further greeting. “The
camp’s full up, and the boss has a waiting list.”
“He’s lucky,” Merton commented. “We’re not looking for jobs.
We’re trying to get to White Earth. Will there be any train out in that
direction in the morning?”
“Five o’clock,” the man growled, “if I can get this old teakettle
cleaned out by that time. Where did you come from?” In the daytime
he would probably have ignored their existence, but the loneliness of
the night and his curiosity made him sociable.
“Itasca Park,” Merton answered. “How near will the train take us
to White Earth?”
“Some hike,” he said, ignoring the question. “Going to the Peace
Celebration, I suppose?”
“Yes, we just want to see the doings. How near did you say the
train would take us?”
 He seemed loath to answer them. “’Bout eight miles,” he finally
answered. “Reckon you fellows must be tired if you have hiked from
Itasca. You can sleep there in that shack if you want to. I’ll call you
in the morning.”
It seemed to the boys that they had hardly closed their eyes
when they were awakened by the engine and found it broad
daylight. The man had forgotten to call them, and they had just time
to crawl onto the caboose when the train pulled out, lurching along
over the uneven track. The little Shaw engine with its upright
cylinders and geared connections made a noise which would indicate
a tremendous speed, but the train barely crept along and they were
an hour and a half going the fifteen miles to the junction where they
had to walk once more. As they had eaten their breakfast in the
caboose they started out at once on the road the brakeman showed
them, and by nine o’clock they came within sight of the Peace
Celebration.
A small rolling prairie lay before them, completely surrounded by
forest and surrounding a very pretty little lake. The festivities had
not yet started, but it was a lively scene, nevertheless. The tepees
and wigwams of the Indians were scattered over the whole plain in
most picturesque fashion. Indian braves in full regalia strolled
leisurely about or sat smoking contentedly in front of their tepees,
while here and there the booths of the squaws displaying all manner
of Indian baskets, beaded belts and moccasins presented bold
patches of color. Many visitors thronged the camps, bargaining for
souvenirs and asking foolish questions of the Indian chiefs who
never answered them. It was a peaceful scene, and would have
served as a model in point of order for many a white man’s fair. The
Indian policemen did their work well, patrolling the camp
continuously on their moth-eaten little ponies.
“Well, Scotty,” Merton cried. “Here we are, at nine o’clock in the
morning. We sure were lucky. Those other fellows can’t get here
before noon, anyway, and they’ll be all in. That train was the clear
stuff.”
 “Yes,” Scott said, “fifteen miles is a pretty good lift, even on a
train like that. Let’s pick out a place for a camp and fix things up.”
They selected a site on a little knoll on the shore of the lake,
where they soon had their dog-tent up and were sitting as
comfortably in front of it as any chief in the tribes. They commanded
a pretty good view of the whole field and could tell from the
movement of the crowd what was going on.
As they learned from one of the policemen that the program
would not open till the afternoon with pony races, foot races, canoe
races and a big parade, they decided to content themselves with a
general view that morning and wait for the other fellows.
At eleven-thirty they saw them coming straggling in along a road
from the north and hurried to meet them.
“Where have you been all the forenoon?” Scott called tauntingly.
“I suppose you have been here all of five minutes,” Morris
sneered, “or are you on your way home?”
“No,” Merton said, “we’re not quite ready to go home, but we
have been here two hours. We came over from the lumber camp on
the logging train. What time did you leave the camp?”
“We did not see any camp,” Morris answered sullenly. “We have
not seen a soul since we left home.”
They had taken the north fork of the road, which carried them
north of the camp, but had the virtue of being five miles shorter.
They had put up for the night in a deserted log cabin on the edge of
a swamp, where they had been eaten up by the mosquitoes, and
had been walking since five o’clock that morning. It was a rather
peevish crowd, and the luck of the others in getting a lift on the
logging train did not improve their temper. While they talked they
walked over to the camp, put up the rest of the tents and cooked
dinner. An hour’s rest set them all up, and they were ready for
anything the afternoon might bring forth.
The program opened with the grand parade. It was quite an
imposing sight. There were some three hundred Indians of the two
tribes. They formed at opposite ends of the grounds, rode solemnly
forward till the columns met, and joined forces in one big parade.
The two oldest chiefs rode side by side at the head of the
procession, decked in all the extravagance of paint and feathers that
the savage mind could invent. To them it was a solemn occasion—for
they could remember the times when they had opposed each other
in bitter strife—and they sat their ponies in stately dignity. The lesser
chiefs followed, and the young bucks brought up the rear. They
slowly circled the entire grounds amidst the cheers of the onlookers.
The procession finally came to a halt on a little knoll which
commanded a view of the lake on one side and the level race track
on the other. Here the chiefs seated themselves solemnly in a large
circle supported by a larger circle of braves. One of these brought
the ancient peace pipe, lighted it at the fire in the middle of the
circle and handed it to the oldest chief. The old man puffed solemnly
a few times, and handed it on to his neighbor. At last the circuit was
completed and the sacred rite was ended. The far-away look in the
eyes of the older chiefs showed that their thoughts were wandering
back to the bloody scenes of their early days and that they were
counting again the scalps they had taken in those relentless fights.
These rites ended, the young men hurried away to prepare
themselves for the contests to come. As an athletic exhibition it was
really pathetic. The competitors were in miserable physical condition;
the half-starved ponies ran in a listless way, and the foot racers
would have stood very little show in a high school track meet. The
canoe races were slow, for the men who took part in them were so
accustomed to letting their squaws do the paddling that they made a
poor showing.
“It takes all the glamour of romance to throw any interest into
that,” Scott remarked. “We enjoy it because they are real Indians,
but I’ll bet they would not stand a ghost of a show in our Fourth of
July Celebration.”
“We ought to have brought along one of the oxen and entered
him in the horse race,” Steve whispered.
 They had wandered down one of the streets to look over the
baskets and bead work when an unearthly hubbub broke out on the
knoll they had just left.
“Something doing now, fellows,” Merton yelled, as he led the
crowd back in the direction of the sound at full speed.
“Sounds like a cross between a dog fight and a heron rookery,”
Bill muttered, as he slowly overhauled Merton in the race. Their dash
had caused a veritable stampede of all the visitors in the street, and
long before they reached the scene of the disturbance they were
leading a fair-sized mob.
At the edge of the knoll they stopped short and gazed on the
scene in amazement. Everything was peaceful enough, but prancing
around the fire with a weird, halting step were the braves of the
tribe, daubed with war paint and chanting their wild war song. It
was a most monotonous performance which went on unceasingly
without the slightest change, but there was a certain fascination
about it which kept everyone silent for some time. Unconsciously the
onlookers rehearsed in their minds the scenes of Butler’s raid and
imagined these savages lashing themselves in this way into blood-
thirsty fury. Or possibly some of those old chiefs looking on so grimly
were in the force which destroyed Custer’s little troop. The same
people watched and watched and then came back to see it again.
All evening as the boys wandered from booth to booth bargaining
with the squaws for beaded moccasins and belts, or danced in the
pavilion they could hear that monotonous “Ki yi, ki yi, ki yi, ki yi,”
pervading everything. And late in the evening when they went to
bed in their little camp that dull drone which had at one time caused
so many sleepless nights put them to sleep.
In the morning they continued their shopping. It was a good-
natured crowd composed of people from all over the country with
some from the cities, and two troops of boy scouts. The boys found
the squaws shrewd bargainers, with a thorough knowledge of the
value of money and a pretty good idea of the white man’s craze for
Indian trinkets. Nor were they all as ugly as the one Scott and
Merton had seen at the little cabin. Some of them were strikingly
handsome and their richly beaded, bright colored garments added
much to their barbaric beauty. It was a good deal of fun arguing
with them.
Immediately after lunch the boys packed their duffel and started
for home, for Merton had learned that the logging train went east
about three o’clock. Their trip home was uneventful. They spent the
night at the lumber camp and came in sight of the school about
three o’clock in the afternoon.
“Well, boys,” Bill called in a fatherly tone from a comfortable seat
on the front porch, “how did you enjoy the circus?”
Fifteen miles back up the road the opinion might have been
different, but now that they were home they all declared it great,
and as time went on it became “greater.”
 CHAPTER XVI
If any of the boys had come to camp that summer with the idea that
times would be dull there they were beginning to find out how badly
they had been mistaken. As Bill Price said, “there was something
doing every minute and no time to sleep in between.” They had
scarcely recovered from the trip to White Earth when there was
more excitement and it started from an old familiar cause. When
they were working in the nursery one morning about ten o’clock
they heard a wild yell down toward the turn in the Park Rapids road.
It was impossible to determine who it was at that distance, but
someone was swinging jauntily along and commanding them in
stentorian tones and no uncertain terms to get to work. It was
impossible long to mistake that manner and Greenleaf shouted, “It’s
Johnson.” They all trooped down to welcome him, for his sunny
disposition and free comradeship had made him a favorite with
everyone.
“Good,” he called as he saw them approaching. “Coming out to
welcome the president, are you? Where are the keys of the city?”
“Glad to see you, freshie,” Merton said grasping his hand warmly.
“Where did you blow in from? We thought you had given up the idea
of coming up.”
“From the city of Arago. Hello, Greenleaf. Morris, you’re black as a
nigger. Look at the mustache on Steve. All of you look sort of black
and hairy. You are sure a hard-looking bunch. You see I walked out
to the hotel at Arago last night and completed the trip this morning.”
“What are you going to do here?” Merton asked.
“Me? Oh, I’m going to work for the State Forest Service as special
patrolman. Have to report to the ranger at Park Rapids tomorrow.
Thought I’d pay you a visit.”
 They had been walking up the road and now walked onto the
campus by the library. All of them were interested in the news from
the outside.
“Look at that old lake,” Johnson exclaimed eagerly. “Looks good
to me. Good swimming?”
“Fine,” Bill said, “you’ll have plenty of chances to try it. Come on
down and see the boathouse. Scotty has a fine canoe, and there’s a
bunch of good boats.”
They moved down the steps and out onto the long dock. Then it
happened. Without a word being spoken Johnson suddenly found
himself hanging back down with four grinning huskies holding his
hands and feet while another trained a camera on him.
“One,” the crowd shouted as he swung out over the water.
“Two,” the swing was more rapid and he felt that he was
gathering momentum.
“Go as far as you like, fellows,” he shouted irrepressibly.
“Three,” and with arms and legs spread wide he circled gracefully
far out over the water like a huge heron. He landed with a
tremendous splash, disappeared for an instant, and swam laughing
back to the dock amidst shouts of side-splitting laughter. Professor
Mertz was standing on the bank fairly choking.
“What’s the next stunt?” Johnson asked, laughingly shaking hands
all around again. “You put one over on me that time. I suppose you
fellows have been lying awake nights preparing a warm reception for
me. But come to think of it, you did not know that I was coming.”
It was hard for anyone who did not know the complete harmony
existing in the camp to realize that the whole scheme was conceived
on the spur of the moment and carried out perfectly without a word.
But such was the case. It had occurred to the whole crowd as to one
man and they had carried it out spontaneously.
“Well,” Merton said, “you took it like a man, so that is all for the
present. The rest depends on you.”
 As they came up the slope Scott came tearing down across the
campus. When he came out of the cookshack the whole crew had
disappeared from the nursery. While he was wondering what had
become of them he heard the shouting at the dock but had arrived
just too late to see the fun. At the sight of Johnson dripping from
every angle and squirting water from his boots at every step he
stopped short. “What under the—” he started.
“Oh, yes,” Johnson cried in mock sarcasm, “I suppose this is a
great surprise to you. You probably will be asking me next how I got
wet.”
They shook hands heartily. They had not been on intimate terms
since Johnson moved out of his room, but here in the woods
everything seemed different. Everyone was intimate with everyone
else there.
“Well, how did you get wet?” Scott asked.
“You see in me, my friend,” Johnson orated, striking an imposing
attitude, “the victim of mob violence. A peaceful citizen martyred to
the ancient and dishonorable custom of compulsory immersion. I
was duly baptized in my infancy, but your honorable associates here
thought that it did not take and repeated the dose. In plain
language, they threw me in the lake.”
Johnson had the happy faculty of making capital out of everything
that happened to him and he now moved gayly away with the crowd
as solidly a member of the “gang” as though he had been there all
the summer. He inspected the premises with the air of a proprietor
and by evening was familiar with every detail of the camp. He jollied
the cook, made friends with all the children on the place and
arranged a four-day fishing trip with the postmaster a mile up the
lake, because, as he explained to the other fellows, that gentleman
had the only supply of angle worms in that section of the country.
That evening around the campfire he threw the crew into
convulsions with a dramatic account of the conversation he had
heard in Park Rapids between the express agent and an irate
fisherman.
 “I tell you there isn’t anything for you,” said the agent.
“But I tell you there must be,” the fisherman retorted. “They were
shipped from Wadena two days ago.”
“Was it a box?” the agent asked, looking over the waybills once
more.
“Yes,” snapped the fisherman, “and if it has been lost I’ll sue the
company. I’m not going to have a week’s pleasure spoiled for
nothing.”
“Well, there’s nothing here,” the agent answered doggedly.
“I would not have lost them for fifty dollars,” the fisherman raged
angrily. “Nothing is safe with this company any more.”
“What was in it?” asked the agent.
The fisherman almost exploded with excitement. “Seven dozen
angle worms,” he screamed.
“That’s the reason I got next to the postmaster up here,” Johnson
explained, when the laughter had subsided, “the agent said he had
some planted.
“I expected to come up here the first of June,” he continued, “but
some bloated millionaire out at Minnetonka wanted his forest park
trimmed up and I could not resist the temptation to help him out at
five dollars per.”
And so he ran on detailing the news of the cities and bringing the
camp up-to-date on the doings of the rest of the University. He was
perfectly at home. Everyone recognized in Johnson the quick-witted,
steady nerved, natural born leader of men. Scott’s old admiration for
Johnson grew as he listened to him and his conscience hurt him
when he thought that he had never apologized for the boorish
manner in which he had received his friendly advice. He longed to
grasp his hand now and apologize—he knew Johnson would forgive
him with undeserved readiness—but he could not do it before all the
fellows and an appointment with Greenleaf to try the trout stream
kept him from doing it that night.
 But he made a solemn resolution that he would make full
reparation to Johnson, and to make sure that it would not be
overlooked he stored it away in his memory with the determination
to win the ten thousand acres. He felt that the accomplishment of
those two things was essential to his happiness.
Scott and Greenleaf hated to miss the news but had to leave the
campfire early in order to make the camp near the trout stream,
where the firebreak crew was located, before dark. They had
planned to sleep at the camp and fish early in the morning.
The other boys all made fun of them because the trout stream
had the reputation of being the worst mosquito hole in the park. It
was a walk of only two miles and a half, and they soon located the
camp on a little knoll near the beautiful spring which formed the
source of the trout stream.
The men were smoking around the campfire preparatory to going
to bed, for they kept early hours, especially on Friday night, that
they might start an hour earlier Saturday morning to get off an hour
earlier that night. They were delighted to see the boys, for they had
little company, and doubly delighted at the prospect of trout for
lunch.
“You boys did not bring a bear trap along with you, did you?” Dan
asked.
“Have you seen a bear?” Greenleaf asked eagerly.
“No,” Dan said, “we didn’t see him, but he stole a dozen eggs and
two pounds of bacon out of the cook tent last night.”
“Why don’t you lay for him?” Scott asked.
“Can’t touch him here in this park,” Dan answered.
“He’s probably ten miles away by this time,” Greenleaf said
carelessly. He thought it was a scheme cooked up to try to scare
them.
“No,” Pat said confidently, “he has stolen something from us
nearly every night for a week.”
 It never occurred to Scott to doubt the story and he wondered at
Greenleaf’s indifference, but Greenleaf was very cautious and
dreaded being taken in. Dan saw that he did not believe it.
“Do you know a bear track when you see it?” he asked.
“You bet,” Greenleaf answered confidently.
“He left plenty of those visiting cards around here,” Dan said.
Rising he led the way to the cookshack and showed them the
claw marks in the butter tub, and then to the garbage heap where
the soft ground was covered with tracks like those made by a
barefoot man.
“No mistaking those,” Greenleaf exclaimed excitedly. “By George,
let’s catch him tonight.”
“What are you going to do with him when you catch him?” Dan
asked. “You can’t kill him, you know.”
“We’ll cage him and take him down to camp. Where are the
shovels, Dan?”
Dan produced the shovels and sat down to watch the
performance. Greenleaf was all enthusiasm.
“Come on, Scotty,” he cried. “We’ll dig a hole right here beside the
garbage heap. This seems to be where he comes most.”
The boys worked so energetically that the hole grew apace. They
worked in ten-minute shifts and made the dirt fly. It was almost pure
sand with just enough clay to make the sides stand up, the easiest
kind of digging. The men soon caught the spirit of the thing and
volunteered to take their turns at the shovels. In an hour the pit was
completed, five by five and six feet deep, with perpendicular sides.
“There,” Greenleaf said, clambering out on the end of a shovel
Dan extended to him, “if Mr. Bruin tumbles into that he’s our meat.”
“Yes,” Dan laughed, “he’ll be our meat, but the next thing will be
to cure the meat.”
“We’ll shovel this garbage into the pit to lead him on,” Greenleaf
said. “Now where is the brush you cut when you built this camp? He
won’t be as apt to suspect that as he would fresh cutting.”
 “There’s a pile of it up there by the bull pen,” said Pat.
They brought down two or three loads of it and built a weak
cover over the pit, strong around the edges but exceedingly weak in
the center. This was accomplished by placing many small limbs with
the heavy ends resting on one side and the tips on the other, using
enough of them for the butts to make a fairly strong thatch all
around the edge.
“Now,” Greenleaf said, “where is something we can use for bait?”
“I thought you put the garbage in there for bait,” Scott suggested.
“No, that was just to prevent him from making a meal off of it
without getting near the pit at all. Besides, he’s been smelling that
every night for a week. We want something real tempting.”
They canvassed the resources of the cook tent and finally decided
on the lid of a pork barrel with a piece of bacon on it. This Greenleaf
placed carefully in the center of the brush covering.
“There,” he exclaimed, “that ought to get him if anything will.
Now let’s make all those things in the cook tent safe so that he
cannot get a meal in there.”
Everything was made shipshape for the night and they went to
bed—for it was already much later than the men had intended to sit
up.
“Gee,” Greenleaf whispered to Scott as he wriggled into his
blanket, “isn’t this great? It beats fighting fire, and I’ll bet you
tomorrow’s breakfast we have that bear before morning.”
It was not easy to go to sleep with the prospect of catching a
bear any minute, but they finally made it and dreamed of whole
droves of bears eating at the breakfast table with them. The hard
day’s work, the sighing of the breeze in the jack pines and the great
stillness of the woods made them sleep soundly. No unusual noises
disturbed them; the hours slipped by uncounted. It was half past
four when an excited shout from Dan aroused the whole camp.
“By George, fellows, we’ve got him. He’s in there.”
 He did not have to call twice. Greenleaf almost tore a hole in the
side of the tent getting out and the others were close behind him.
Sure enough there in the bottom of the pit was a yearling black bear,
bouncing wildly around and digging furiously at the walls. He made
frequent springs at the edge of the pit and several times succeeded
in clawing the top. He had evidently been very little concerned by his
fall until disturbed by the awakening of the camp—for he had eaten
the bacon and picked the garbage over very thoroughly.
“Ha, ha, my boy,” Greenleaf called to him, “you will steal our
eggs, will you? You’ll make exhibit ‘A’ in our menagerie now for a
little while till we finish with this camp.”
The bear resented the taunts with renewed efforts to escape and
he was clawing down so much dirt from the sides that it was evident
he would soon have enough pulled into the bottom to enable him to
jump out. Every jump he made brought him a little nearer to the
surface.
“You fellows put some poles across the top of this pit,” Greenleaf
directed, “good heavy logs, to keep him from getting out and I’ll go
down to camp to get Sturgis to build a cage for him. Don’t let him
get away, whatever you do. Knock him in the head first if you have
to.”
With that he was gone. It was only half past five when Sturgis
went out to milk, and saw Greenleaf puffing up the road. He thought
the mosquitoes had probably chased him out as they had several
former fishermen, and he rather wondered at it—for he thought him
a better sticker than that.
“Where are the fish?” he called as soon as Greenleaf was within
hailing distance.
“The mischief with the fish,” Greenleaf panted. “We’ve caught a
bear.”
“Caught him,” Sturgis laughed. “Where is he, following you
home?”
“Not this trip. I haven’t got him trained yet.”
 Greenleaf explained the capture, and suggested that they build a
cage to keep him in till the work on the east line was finished. It
seemed the only thing to do, and they set to work immediately to
build a substantial cage of two by fours and a piece of woven wire
hog fence. They loaded the crude cage on a one-horse wagon and
started out for the camp.
“Won’t those fellows be surprised,” Greenleaf chuckled, “when we
bring them in a bear for breakfast instead of a trout?”
They were soon back at the bear pit, where they found things
pretty much as Greenleaf had left them. The bear had dug down
considerably more dirt but had tired himself out and was lying
quietly in the bottom of the pit. They carried the cage over to the
edge of the pit with the open end close to the edge.
“Little fellow, isn’t he?” Sturgis said, peeping down between the
poles. “We oughtn’t to have much trouble with him.”
“If you had seen him bouncing around in there a while ago,” Dan
said, “you wouldn’t be so sure of it.”
“Well,” Sturgis answered, “we’ll try him, anyway. Pat, you get that
light logging chain while we take these poles away.”
The removal of the logs seemed to give the bear renewed hope,
and they soon found that he was only resting, and not nearly so
exhausted as he looked. He sized them up sullenly for an instant,
and then made a vicious lunge at Dan which brought him head and
shoulders above the edge of the pit. He clung desperately to the rim
and only the crumbling of the sides kept him from getting out. He
fell heavily on his back but recovered himself instantly, sprang again
with a vicious snarl, and a furious blow of his paw laid the leg of
Greenleaf’s trousers open for a foot. Once more the crumbling dirt
threw him back.
As Pat came running up with the chain, tying a slip noose in it as
he ran, the bear made another desperate spring and obtained a firm
hold with his front feet, balanced a second and drew up one hind
foot to the solid ground. In another instant he would be free from
the pit, an ugly customer to handle in his infuriated condition.
Greenleaf sprang forward with the intention of pushing him back into
the pit with his hands at the infinite risk of falling in with him, but
Dan was ahead of him and struck the bear a heavy blow on the
head with the flat of an ax. The blow knocked the crazed animal
back into the pit just as he had all four feet on the surface.
“I hate to do it, old man,” Dan said, “but I ain’t crazy to hug you.”
The bear was dazed by the blow and wandered aimlessly around
the pit, snarling horribly. He was not ready to give up yet.
“He pretty near had us that time,” Sturgis said, “but don’t hit him
too hard. Run that noose end of the chain through this far end of
the cage, Pat, out of the open end there and down into the pit. Then
if we can get the noose around his neck we can pull him right into
the cage and hold him there while we nail him up.”
Scott took charge of the noose and attempted to lasso the bear. It
was a difficult trick. Every time he had the noose nearly on the bear
would grab it and bite it savagely. At last he saw his chance. The
bear sat up on his haunches for a better view of his tormentor and
Scott dropped the noose neatly over his head. The noose refused to
tighten and Dan reached down with a shovel to slip it along. The
bear slapped it a blow that tore it out of Dan’s hands and sent it
rattling up against the side of the pit, but his temper proved his
undoing. He pounced savagely on the fallen shovel, the only thing
he could reach, and the lunge tightened the noose.
“Now will you be good?” Scott shouted triumphantly.
“Get on the end of that chain, boys,” Sturgis directed, “and keep it
tight while I dig down this side of the pit so that we can drag him
out.”
The edge of the sandy pit was soon broken down to an easy slope
and the protesting bear was dragged relentlessly into his new home.
The hog wire was quickly fastened across the end of the cage and
the chain loosened. For a few minutes the bear resented its captivity
desperately, tore furiously at the wire, threw itself violently against
the side of the cage, and growled savagely. But it did not last long.
The tremendous exertions in the pit, the heavy blow on the head
and the utter futility of the attacks on the cage had broken his spirit,
and abandoning all hope he lay quietly down in the cage, wholly
indifferent to everything.
“That’s the way, old boy,” Greenleaf said soothingly, “take it easy.
We are going to take you to a nice place where you will get more to
eat than you have ever had before in your life.”
They brought the wagon over to load the cage, but found a new
difficulty. The horse had no idea of hauling a bear. The instant he
scented the brute he became almost unmanageable and it required
the combined efforts of the whole crew to keep him from getting
away. He trembled violently and snorted with fear.
“Take him out,” Dan said, “and I’ll get the oxen. They haven’t
sense enough to be afraid of anything.”
Dan did not like the oxen, but he knew their possibilities. When
the change had been made they set out for the school, Greenleaf
leading the procession on the rebellious horse.
The news of the capture had spread rapidly around the campus.
Two or three of the boys met them a mile down the road, the others
were all assembled near the library, students, professors’ families,
visitors, workmen and all, awaiting the arrival of the mighty hunters.
Some were awaiting the further development of what they
considered a joke; others were prompted by genuine curiosity to see
a real, live, wild bear.
Greenleaf looked a little anxious at the waiting crowd and then at
the cage. “I wish he’d perk up a little,” he said, riding as near the
cage as the horse would consent to go. “Can’t you twist his tail a
little, Scotty? Bill Price will be saying he was dying when we found
him.”
“He hasn’t a great deal of tail to twist, so far as I can make out,”
Scott answered doubtfully, “and nothing seems to arouse him at all.
I wonder if he is going to die after all?”
The crowd cheered loudly as the wagon pulled slowly into the
yard and pushed close around the wagon to inspect the prize.
 “You need not be afraid,” Greenleaf assured the ladies, “Dan had
to knock him on the head with the flat of an ax and it has dazed him
a little. He’ll be all right in a little while.”
“What did he hit him for? To loosen him from the ground?” Bill
Price drawled. “You must have had a hard time dragging him into
the cage, Greeny.”
“Never you mind,” Scott retorted, “if you had seen him trying to
get out of that pit and ripping Greenleaf’s trousers nearly off, you’d
have thought he was a pretty lively corpse.”
“In a pit, was he?” Bill asked quietly. “I supposed he was dead but
why do you suppose they tried to bury him?”
“Never mind, Greeny,” Scott consoled him, “Bill would not have
had the nerve to catch a dead one.”
“Cheer up, fellows,” Greenleaf grinned as he helped carry the
cage over to a shady spot, “we’ve got the first bear ever caught in
the park, if he is a dead one, but if you all live to grow up you may
catch one yourselves some day. Who can tell? Bears are dumb
brutes.”
Scott looked eagerly around for Johnson but he had already left
for Park Rapids, and Scott had to harbor his troubled conscience for
many another month. It was beginning to hurt. He little dreamed
then how splendidly he would some day square the account.