Chapter I

THE cave had been their hiding-place as children； it was a secret refuge now against hunger or darkness when they were hunting in the woods. The primitive meal was finished； ashes were raked over the red coals； the slice of bacon and the little bag of meal were hung high against the rock wall； and the two stepped from the cavern into a thicket of rhododendrons.

Parting the bushes toward the dim light, they stood on a massive shoulder of the mountain, the river girding it far below, and the afternoon shadows at their feet. Both carried guns-the tall mountaineer, a Winchester； the boy, a squirrel rifle longer than himself. Climbing about the rocky spur, they kept the same level over log and bowlder and through bushy ravine to the north. In half an hour, they ran into a path that led up home from the river, and they stopped to rest on a cliff that sank in a solid black wall straight under them. The sharp edge of a steep corn-field ran near, and, stripped o

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