e slope, some of them of large size, which is pretty
fair evidence that there has been no slide for a long time--not for a
hundred years probably. For as you see, there and there"--pointing to
two long, bare tracks on the mountain-side--"when the slides do come
down they clean off every tree in their course. No, I have no fear of
snowslides.

"By the way," he continued, "there is one thing you might tell Tom
Connor when you see him, and that is that Big Reuben's creek heads in a
shallow draw on the mountain above my house. If you follow with your eye
from the summit of the cliff upward, you will notice a stretch of bare
rock, and above it a strip of trees extending downward from left to
right. It is among those trees that the creek heads.

"You might mention that to Connor," he went on, "in case he should
prefer to begin his prospecting downward from the head of the creek
instead of upward from Big Reuben's gorge. And tell him, too, that if he
will come to me, I shall be glad to take him up there at any time."

"Very well," said I, "we'll do so."

"Yes, we'll certainly tell him," said Joe. "It might very well happen
that Tom would prefer to begin at the top, especially if he should find
that Long John had got ahead of him and was already working up from
below."

"Exactly. That is what I was thinking of. Well, I must be off. I have a
longish tramp before me, and the sunset comes pretty early under my
cliff."

"Won't you come home with us to-night?" I asked. "We have only two miles
to go. My father told me to ask you the next time we met, and this is
such a fine opportunity. I wish you would."

"Yes; do," Joe chimed in.

But the hermit shook his head. "You are very kind to suggest it," said
he, "and I am really greatly obliged to you, and to Mr. Crawford also,
but I think not. Thank you, all the same; but I'll go back home. So,
good-bye."

"Some other time, perhaps," suggested Joe.

"Perhaps--we'll see. By the way, there was one other thing I intended to
say, and that is:--look out for Long John! He is a dangerous man if he
is a coward; in fact, all the more dangerous _because_ he is a coward.
So now, good-bye; and remember"--holding up a warning finger--"look out
for Long John!"

With that, he slipped his feet into his skis and away he went; while Joe
and I turned our own faces homeward.

CHAPTER VIII

THE WILD CAT'S TRAIL

"He is quite right," said my father, when, on reaching home again, we