e. The trail
led straight from the water to a broad alder belt, beyond which, on the
hillside, I might find the big brute loafing his time away till evening
should come, and watch him to see what he would do with himself.

As I turned shoreward a kingfisher sounded his rattle and came darting
across the mouth of the bay where Hukweem the loon had hidden her two
eggs. I watched him, admiring the rippling sweep of his flight, like the
run of a cat's-paw breeze across a sleeping lake, and the clear blue
of his crest against the deeper blue of summer sky. Under him his
reflection rippled along, like the rush of a gorgeous fish through the
glassy water. Opposite my canoe he checked himself, poised an instant in
mid-air, watching the minnows that my paddle had disturbed, and dropped
bill first--plash! with a silvery tinkle in the sound, as if hidden
bells down among the green water weeds had been set to ringing by this
sprite of the air. A shower of spray caught the rainbow for a brief
instant; the ripples gathered and began to dance over the spot where
Koskomenos had gone down, when they were scattered rudely again as he
burst out among them with his fish. He swept back to the stub whence he
had come, chuckling on the way. There he whacked his fish soundly on
the wood, threw his head back, and through the glass I saw the tail of a
minnow wriggling slowly down the road that has for him no turning. Then
I took up the caribou trail.

I had gone nearly through the alders, following the course of a little
brook and stealing along without a sound, when behind me I heard the
kingfisher coming above the alders, rattling as if possessed, klrrr,
klrrr, klrrr-ik-ik-ik! On the instant there was a heavy plunge and
splash just ahead, and the swift rush of some large animal up the
hillside. Over me poised the kingfisher, looking down first at me, then
ahead at the unknown beast, till the crashing ceased in a faint rustle
far away, when he swept back to his fishing-stub, clacking and chuckling
immoderately.

I pushed cautiously ahead and came presently to a beautiful pool below
a rock, where the hillside shelved gently towards the alders. From the
numerous tracks and the look of the place, I knew instantly that I had
stumbled upon a bear's bathing pool. The water was still troubled and
muddy; huge tracks, all soppy and broken, led up the hillside in big
jumps; the moss was torn, the underbrush spattered with shining water
drops. "No room