"Say, speaking about heavy bears puts me in mind of a story I heard!" cried Shadow, his face lighting up for the first time since the escape of Link Merwell. "This yarn was told by an old western hunter and trapper, and he said it was strictly true. He said he was out on the ranges one day when he found himself suddenly pursued by three Modoc Indians. He shot at them several times without hitting anybody, and then, to his consternation, he found that his ammunition had given out. He legged it up a mountain-side, and the three Modocs came after him, yelling to beat the band. Just as they were following him up the steep trail, he saw a monstrous bear come plunging out from a thicket near by. He was so upset that he hardly knew what to do, but he grabbed up a big rock and sent it at the bear. It struck the monstrous animal on the head and keeled him over, and the bear rolled down the steep mountain-side, and knocked over the three Modoc Indians, smashing every one of them." "Wow! That's some bear story!" exclaimed Luke. "Shadow, how could you bear to tell such a story?" asked Dave, reproachfully. "That knocks out all the dime novels ever written," said Ben. "Why, Ben! do you mean to say you have read them all?" cried our hero, in pretended surprise. "All? I don't read any of them!" snorted Ben. "Just the same, that's the biggest whopper I ever heard." "Well, I'm not vouching for the story," interposed Shadow, dryly, "I'm just telling it as it was told to me." "Speaking about being frightened by a bear puts me in mind that it's queer we haven't seen or heard anything more of that wild man," remarked Roger. "We don't want to see or hear anything more of him!" burst out Laura. "One scare was enough." "It's queer that the Pooles don't send some one up here to look for him," remarked Jessie. "If he were my uncle I certainly wouldn't want him to be roaming around in the woods that way." "If he is just roaming around I wonder how he manages to live," said Dave. "And where does he get all that outlandish outfit?" "He must have some sort of a habitation here," returned Phil. "Maybe he has taken possession of some bungalow or cabin that was locked up. If he has, won't the owners of the place be mad when they find it out, especially if he is using their things!" "I wonder if we couldn't go up to that cliff and track him in some way from there?" said Phil. "He may have left some sort of trail behind him. Unless he follows some kind of paths through the woods he would be apt to get lost, just like anybody else." "If he really is Wilbur Poole, I'd like to capture him and send him back to the sanitarium; where he belongs," remarked Roger. "I think Nat would like us to do it." "What do you say about starting on a regular hunt to-morrow?" asked Dave. "We might go out directly after breakfast and carry our lunch with us. Who knows but what in looking for the wild man we might run across some trace of Link Merwell."