ers invariably follow this rule when after water animals, and it is
not always through a spirit of mercy toward the victim that actuates
their motive, but the fact that they would otherwise lose many a catch,
since the captive in despair over its inability to escape would gnaw its
foot off.

Having finished with the trap, Darry walked further into the marsh. It
was a lonely place, seldom visited save by a few hunters in the season,
who looked for mallard ducks there; or it might be some boy trapper,
endeavoring to make a few dollars by catching some of the shy denizens
wearing marketable fur coats.

Here a brace of snipe went spinning away, and a little further a blue
crane got up and flapped off, his long legs sticking out like fishing
poles.

In an hour or so the boy had placed all his traps. He had followed Joe's
directions to the letter, and the morning would show as to whether he
was to make a success of the venture.

One thing was positive, and it was this, that even should he find
nothing in the traps he did not mean to give up; if he had made a
mistake, then it must be rectified, even if he had to secure some old
boat in order to carry out his operations without leaving a scent behind
to alarm the game.

It was late in the afternoon when he reached home.

The twins ran to meet him as though already they looked upon him in the
light of a member of the little family.

Darry threw first one and then the other up into the air, while they
shrieked with laughter, and he could see that Mrs. Peake was looking on
approvingly, as if her desolated mother heart was warming toward this
lad who had never known what it was to have any one love him.

He had been thinking much that afternoon of Paul Singleton, even
repeating the name of the young man over and over, as though striving to
remember whether he could have ever heard it before, which did not seem
likely.

And it was not so much anticipation of the good times coming that
engaged his thought as that queer look on the face of Paul while they
had been talking.

What could it mean?

CHAPTER XII

THE STOLEN TRAPS

In the morning Darry occupied himself repairing the damage done by the
fire.

After he had done all the chores, even to assisting Mrs. Peake wash the
breakfast dishes, and there seemed nothing else to be undertaken, he
took Joe's shotgun on his shoulder and walked toward the marsh.

The woman, seeing how much he looked like her lost bo