, from a near-by pool he dipped water to pour over
his carpet and flowers.

Then he took out the bird book, settled comfortably on a bench, and
with a deep sigh of satisfaction turned to the section headed. "V." Past
"veery" and "vireo" he went, down the line until his finger, trembling
with eagerness, stopped at "vulture."

"'Great black California vulture,'" he read.

"Humph! This side the Rockies will do for us."

"'Common turkey-buzzard.'"

"Well, we ain't hunting common turkeys. McLean said chickens, and what
he says goes."

"'Black vulture of the South.'"

"Here we are arrived at once."

Freckles' finger followed the line, and he read scraps aloud.

"'Common in the South. Sometimes called Jim Crow. Nearest equivalent to
C-a-t-h-a-r-t-e-s A-t-r-a-t-a.'"

"How the divil am I ever to learn them corkin' big words by mesel'?"

"'--the Pharaoh's Chickens of European species. Sometimes stray north as
far as Virginia and Kentucky----'"

"And sometimes farther," interpolated Freckles, "'cos I got them right
here in Indiana so like these pictures I can just see me big chicken
bobbing up to get his ears boxed. Hey?"

"'Light-blue eggs'----"

"Golly! I got to be seeing them!"

"'--big as a common turkey's, but shaped like a hen's, heavily splotched
with chocolate----'"

"Caramels, I suppose. And----"

"'--in hollow logs or stumps.'"

"Oh, hagginy! Wasn't I barking up the wrong tree, though? Ought to been
looking close the ground all this time. Now it's all to do over, and I
suspect the sooner I start the sooner I'll be likely to find them."

Freckles put away his book, dampened the smudge-fire, without which the
mosquitoes made the swamp almost unbearable, took his cudgel and lunch,
and went to the line. He sat on a log, ate at dinner-time and drank his
last drop of water. The heat of June was growing intense. Even on the
west of the swamp, where one had full benefit of the breeze from the
upland, it was beginning to be unpleasant in the middle of the day.

He brushed the crumbs from his knees and sat resting awhile and watching
the sky to see if his big chicken were hanging up there. But he came to
the earth abruptly, for there were steps coming down the trail that
were neither McLean's nor Duncan's--and there never had been others.
Freckles' heart leaped hotly. He ran a quick hand over his belt to feel
if his revolver and hatchet were there, caught up his cudgel and laid
it across his knees--then s