'em.

"Good land! 'twas a queer sight. 'Herb Heal,' thinks I, 'now's your
chance! If you can only manage to nab that moose-head, you'll get two
hundred dollars for it at Greenville, sure!' And mighty few cents I had
jest then.

"I could a'most have cried over my tough luck in not having one dose of
lead left. But the bull's back was towards me. The water filled his ears
and nose, so that he couldn't hear or smell. And he was having a
splendid tuck-in. It was big sport to hear him crunch those lily-roots."

"I should think it was!" burst out Cyrus enviously. "But did you have
the heart to kill him in cold blood, in the middle of his meal?"

"I did. I guess I wouldn't do it now; anyhow, not unless I was very
badly off for food. But I had an old mother living at Greenville that
time,"--here there was the least possible tremble in the woodsman's
voice,--"and while I paddled alongside the moose, without making a
sound, I was thinking that the price I'd be sure to get from some city
swell for the head would come in handy to make her comfortable. The
creature never suspicioned danger till I was close to him, and had my
axe lifted, ready to strike. Then up came his head. Out went his
forefeet. Over spun the canoe. There was as big a commotion as if a
whale was there.

"I managed to keep behind the brute so as to dodge his kicks; and
gripping the axe in one hand, I dug the other into his long hair. He was
mad scared. He started to swim for the opposite shore, which was about
half a mile distant, with me in tow, snorting like a locomotive. As his
feet touched ground near the bank, I jumped upon his back. With one blow
of the axe I split his spine. Perhaps you'll think that was awful cruel,
but it wasn't done for the glory of killing."

"And what became of the head? Did you sell it?" asked Dol, who was, as
usual, the first to break a breathless silence.

There was no reply. Herb feigned not to hear.

"Did you get two hundred dollars for the head?" questioned the impetuous
youngster again, in a higher key, his curiosity swelling.

"I didn't. It was stole."

The answer was a growl, like the growl of a hurt animal whose sore has
been touched. The tone of it was so different from the woodsman's
generally strong, happy-go-lucky manner of speech, that Dol blenched as
if he had been struck.

"Who stole it?" he gasped, after a minute, scarcely knowing that he
spoke aloud.

Unnoticed in the firelight, Cyrus clapped a strong