ed it in an hour. Then a warm wind blew and
in a few more hours the earth was dry. On the third day Albert
took his repeating rifle from the hooks on the wall and calmly
announced that he was going hunting.

"All right," said Dick; "and as I feel lazy I'll keep house until
you come back. Don't get chewed up by a grizzly bear."

Dick sat down in the doorway of the cabin and watched his brother
striding off down the valley, gun on shoulder, figure very erect.
Dick smiled; but it was a smile of pride, not derision.

"Good old Al! He'll do!" he murmured.

Albert followed the brook into the larger valley and then went
down by the side of the lake. Though a skillful shot, he was not
yet a good hunter, but he knew that one must make a beginning and
he wanted to learn through his own mistakes.

He had an idea that game could be found most easily in the forest
that ran down the mountain side to the lake, and he was thinking
most particularly just then of elk. He had become familiar with
the loud, whistling sound, and he listened for it now but did not
hear it.

He passed the spot at which Dick had killed the big cow elk and
continued northward among the trees that covered the slopes and
flat land between the mountain and the lake. This area broadened
as he proceeded, and, although the forest was leafless now, it
was so dense and there was such a large proportion of evergreens,
cedars, and pines that Albert could not see very far ahead. He
crossed several brooks pouring down from the peaks. All were in
flood, and once or twice it was all that he could do with a
flying leap to clear them, but he went on, undiscouraged, keeping
a sharp watch for that which he was hunting.

Albert did not know much about big game, but he remembered
hearing Dick say that elk and mule deer would be likely to come
into the valley for shelter at the approach of winter, and he was
hopeful that he might have the luck to encounter a whole herd of
the big elk. Then, indeed, he would prove that he was an equal
partner with Dick in the work as well as the reward. He wished
to give the proof at once.

He had not been so far up the north end of the valley before, and
he noticed that here was quite an expanse of flat country on
either side of the lake. But the mountains all around the valley
were so high that it seemed to Albert that deer and other wild
animals might find food as well as shelter throughout the
winter. Hence he was quite