But when I turned the corner it was another story. The first canyon had been easy climbing compared to this one. It was narrow, steep, and full of dead pines fallen from above. Running was impossible. I clambered upward over the loose stones, under the bridges of pines, round the boulders. Presently I heard a shout. I could not tell where it came from, but I replied. A second call I identified as coming from high up the ragged canyon side, and I started up. It was hard work. Certainly no bears or hunter had climbed out just here. At length, sore, spent, and torn, I fell out of a tangle of brush upon the edge of the canyon. Above me rose the swelling mountain slope thickly covered with dwarf pines.
"This way, youngster!" called the old hunter from my left.
A few more dashes in and out of the brush and trees brought me to a fairly open space with not much slope. Hiram Bent stood under a pine, and at his feet lay a black furry mass.
"Wal, I heerd you shoot. Reckon you got yourn?"
"Yes, I killed him... . Say, Mr. Bent, I don't like traps."
"Nary do I–for bears," replied he, shaking his gray head. "A trapped bear is about the pitifulest thing I ever seen. But it's seldom one ever gits into trap of mine."
"This one you shot must be the old mother bear. Where's the cub? Did it get away?"
"Not yet. Lookup in the tree."
I looked up the black trunk through the network of slender branches, and saw the bear snuggling in a fork. His sharp ears stood up against the sky. He was most anxiously gazing down at us.
"Wal, tumble him out of thar," said Hiram Bent.
With a natural impulse to shoot I raised my rifle, but the cub looked so attractive and so helpless that I hesitated.
"I don't like to do it," I said. "Oh, I wish we could catch him alive!"
"Wal, I reckon we can."
"How?" I inquired, eagerly, and lowered my rifle.
"Are you good on the climb?"
"Climb? This tree? Why, with one hand. Back in Pennsylvania I climbed shell-bark hickory-trees with the lowest limb fifty feet from the ground. . . But there weren't any bears up them."
"You must keep out of his way if he comes down on you. He's a sassy little chap. Now take this rope an' go up an' climb round him."
"Climb round him?" I queried, as I gazed dubiously upward. "You mean to slip out on the branches and go up hand-over-hand till I get above him. The branches up there seem pretty close–I might. But suppose he goes higher?"
"I'm lookin' fer him to go clean to the top. But you can beat him to it– mebbe."
"Any danger of his attacking me–up there?"
"Wal, not much. If he hugs the trunk he'll have to hold on fer all he's worth. But if he stands on the branches an' you come up close he might bat you one. Mebbe I'd better go up." "Oh, I'm going–I only wanted to know what to expect. Now, in case I get above him, what then?"
"Make him back down till he reaches these first branches. When he gets so far I'll tell you what to do." I put my arm through the coil of rope, and, slinging it snugly over my shoulder, began to climb the pine. It was the work of only a moment to reach the first branch.
"Wal, I reckon you're some relation to a squirrel at thet," said Hiram Bent. "Jest as I thought the little cuss is climbin' higher. Thet's goin' to worry us."
It was like stepping up a ladder from the first branch to the fork. The cub had gone up the right-hand trunk some fifteen feet, and was now hugging it. At that short distance he looked alarmingly big. But I saw he would have all he could do to hold on, and if I could climb the left trunk and get above him there would be little to fear. How I did it so quickly was a mystery, but amid the cracking of dead branches and pattering of falling bark and swaying of the tree-top I gained a position above him.
He was so close that I could smell him. His quick little eyes snapped fire and fear at once; he uttered a sound that was between a whine and a growl.
"Hey, youngster!" yelled Hiram, "thet's high enough–'tain't safe–be careful now."
With the words I looked out below me, to see the old hunter standing in the glade waving his arms.
"I'm all right!" I yelled down. "Now, how'll I drive him?"
"Break off a branch an' switch him."
There was not a branch above me that I could break, but a few feet below was a slender, dead limb. I slid down and got it, and, holding on with my left arm and legs, I began to thrash the cub. He growled fiercely. snapped at the stick, and began to back down.
"He's started!" I cried, in glee. "Go on, Cubby–down with you!"
Clumsy as he was, he made swift time. I was hard put to keep close to him. I slipped down the trunk–holding on one instant and sliding down the next. But below the fork it was harder for Cubby and easier for me. The branches rather hindered his backward progress while they aided mine. Growling and whining, with long claws ripping the bark, he went down. All of a sudden I became aware of the old hunter threshing about under the tree.
"Hold on–not so fast!" he yelled.
Still the cub kept going, and stopped with his haunches on the first branch. There, looking down, he saw an enemy below him, and hesitated. But he looked up, and, seeing me, began to back down again. Hiram pounded the tree with a dead branch. Cubby evidently intended to reach the ground, for the noise did not stop him. Then the hunter ran a little way to a windfall, and came back with the upper half of a dead sapling. With this he began to prod the bear. Thereupon, Cubby lost no time in getting up to the first branch again, where he halted.
"Throw the noose on him now–anywhere," ordered the hunter. "An' we've no time to lose. He's gittin' sassier every minnit."
I dropped the wide loop upon Cubby, expecting to catch him first time. The rope went over his bead, but with a dexterous flip of his paw he sent it flying. Then began a duel between us, in which he continually got the better of me. All the while the old hunter prodded Cubby from below.
"You ain't quick enough," said Hiram, impatiently.
Made reckless by this, I stepped down to another branch directly over the bear, and tried again to rope him. It was of no use. He slipped out of the noose with the sinuous movements of an eel. Once it caught over his ears and in his open jaws. He gave a jerk that nearly pulled me from my perch. I could tell he was growing angrier every instant, and also braver. Suddenly the noose, quite by accident, caught his nose. He wagged his head and I pulled. The noose tightened.
"I've got him!" I yelled, and gave the rope a strong pull.
The bear stood up with startling suddenness and reached for me.
"Climb!" shouted Hiram,
I dropped the rope and leaped for the branch above, and, catching it, lifted myself just as the sharp claws of the cub scratched hard over my boot.
Cubby now hugged the tree trunk and started up again.
"We've got him!" yelled Hiram. "Don't move–step on his nose if he gets too close."
Then I saw the halter had come off the bear and had fallen to the ground. Hiram picked it up, arranged the noose, and, holding it in his teeth began to limb after the bear. Cubby was now only a few feet under me, working steadily up, growling, and his little eyes were like points of green fire.
"Stop him! Stand on his head!" mumbled Hiram, with the rope in his teeth.
"What!–not on your life!"
But, reaching up, I grasped a branch, and, swinging clear of the lower one, I began to kick at the bear. This stopped him. Then he squealed, and began to kick on his own account. Hiram was trying to get the noose over a bind foot. After several attempts he succeeded, and then threw the rope over the lowest branch. I gave a wild Indian yell of triumph. The next instant, before I could find a foothold, the branch to which I was hanging snapped like a pistol-shot, and I plunged down with a crash. I struck the bear and the lower branch, and then the ground. The fall half stunned me. I thought every bone in my body was broken. I rose unsteadily, and for a moment everything whirled before my eyes. Then I discovered that the roar in my ears was the old hunter's yell. I saw him hauling on the rope. There was a great ripping of bark and many strange sounds, and then the cub was dangling head downward. Hiram had pulled him from his perch, and hung him over the lowest branch.