h careful observation during the day had failed to reveal any sign
of their prowling foe, whoever he might be, Ree and John agreed to divide
the guard duty of the night between them. Ree took the first watch and
reported all quiet when John relieved him at midnight.

When daylight came John went a little way up the wooded hillside opposite
the mound to pick up some dry wood for their fire. Suddenly he stopped
and a startled look came upon his face. There in the snow were
foot-prints made by moccasined feet. They followed the trail the sled had
made the day before, up to the very edge of the clearing in which their
camp was made.

There, John found, as he guardedly investigated, they circled off to one
side a little way, hovered about, here and there, then re-crossed the
sled's track and disappeared in the woods. What could it mean? Instantly
he remembered that the foot-prints of the person who had several times
fired upon their camp, had been made by boots. He hurried to the camp
mentally ejaculating: "What will Tom Fish say of this?"

Tom was still asleep, but Ree had commenced the breakfast. "It is too
bad," he said, thinking aloud, as he learned of John's discovery. "I
suppose we ought to follow those tracks if only for safety's sake, and
find out who made them, but I do hate to lose the time when we ought to
be getting a cabin built."

The discovery was pointed out to Tom when he awoke a little later.

"A prowlin' Mingo!" the old hunter exclaimed as he inspected the
foot-prints. "Kittens both, the's trouble brewin'. It's a wonder the
varmint didn't shoot. I don't see what he's up to, always doggin' us this
way! But I'll tell ye what I'll do. You lads get yer axes an' go to work,
an' I'll foller up them tracks. An' bust my galluses, kittens both, I'll
give the varmint a dose as'll make him think of his pore ol' granddad, if
I ketch him!"

Tom's suggestion found favor at once, though the boys could not explain
the varying moods of their friend, which made him cool and courageous one
day and dejected and fearful another. But breakfast being over, Tom set
out.

"Be careful," Ree called after him. "Don't get yourself or us into any
row with the Delawares, unnecessarily." The hunter made no answer.

CHAPTER XII.

Building a Cabin.

By reason of having been the first to see the strange foot-prints, and
having come upon them, too, in the gray light of the early morning, when
alone in the forest solitudes