Over the boys' heads, having just risen from the feathery marshes, skimmed a feathered telltale, live counterpart of the one he touched, its legs golden spindles in the sunshine, its shrill joy-whistle: "Wheu! Wheu! _Whe-eu!_" proclaiming the thanksgiving which had rioted through Colin's mind on the fragrant salt-marshes: "Glad I'm alive! Glad I'm alive! _Glad_--I'm alive!" A smothered exclamation broke from Coombsie as he followed the finger and the flight. Leon snatched up the gun. "One can't have too much of a good thing: I guess I could drop that 'telltale,' too!" But Marcoo's hand fastened upon his arm with an impulsive cry. "Eh! What's the matter with you--Flutter-budget?" Lowering the pointed shotgun, Leon whisked round; his restless brown eyes had a lightning trick of shutting and opening, as if he were taking a photograph of the person addressed, which was in general highly disconcerting to the boy who differed from him. "No need to make a fuss! I wouldn't let her off here, anyhow," he added, fondling the gun. "Father would be fined if I should fire a shot on the highroad." "_We're_ starting off on a hike--for a long tramp into the woods, Leon," began Coombsie hurriedly, anxious to create a diversion. "We want you to come with us, as leader; Colin says that _you_ know the way to Varney's Paintpot!" The other's expression changed like a rocket: Starrie Chase enjoyed leading other boys, even more than he reveled in "popping yellow-legs"--for the former Nature had intended him. "All right!" he responded with swift eagerness. "Just, you fellows, keep an eye on my gun while I run home with the birds; I'll be back in a minute!" "Oh! you're not going to take your gun into the woods?" "Sure--I am! I might get a chance at a fox!" "Won't it be an awful nuisance carrying it all the way through the thick undergrowth--we want to go as far into the woods as the Bear's Den?" suggested Marcoo tactfully. "Well, perhaps it would. I'll just scoot home then, and be back in no time!" He snatched the dead birds from the fence, raced away and reappeared in three minutes, with the terrier barking at his heels. "I'm going to let Blink come anyhow; he'll have a great time chasing things--eh, Blinkie?" Leon made a hurdle of his outstretched arm for the scampering dog to jump over it. And the terrier replied in a volley of excited barks, saying in doggy talk: "Fellows! if there's fun ahead, I'm in with you. The woods are a grand old playground!" He led the way, and the four boys followed, jostling each other merrily, rubbing their high spirits together and bringing sparks from the contact--bound for that mysterious forest Paintpot. But the stranger, Nixon Warren, could not forbear throwing one backward glance from under his wide-brimmed hat at the poor dog-scorned yellow-legs, its joy-whistle silenced, stiffening in the dust. CHAPTER II ONLY A CHIP'