After the chinking and calking was done, we dug into a clay bank and got clay, which we mixed with ashes taken from the fire then added sufficient water to make a rather stiff mortar. We filled the spaces between the logs, going over every crack on the outside of the shack. Now and again Frank would notice a mink or coon track along the creek, while he was gathering moss from the old logs. These tracks would drive Frank nearly wild, and he would double his energy so as to get the shack finished so we could hit the trap line. After we got the shack in good shape, we went to work getting up a good supply of wood, sufficient to last through the season. We had an open fireplace, so we cut the wood about three feet long. The wood was now up near the camp door, ranked up in good snug piles. We then cut crotched stakes and drove them in the ground on each side of the ranks, and laid poles in, then placed cross poles on and covered with hemlock boughs. Frank was so anxious to get to work on the trap line, that he at first objected to putting in so much time in getting up the wood, saying that we could get the wood at odd times. But when told that there are no odd times on the trap line, he then worked the harder to get the supply of wood, including a good supply of dry pine for kindling fires, which we got by cutting a dry pine stub. The camp now being in good shape, we hit the trap line and began building deadfalls for marten. We went onto the ridges into the thick heavy timber, where the marten were most likely to be found. We would select a low hemlock to build the deadfalls under, so the trap would be protected from heavy falls of snow, as much as possible. Some of the traps we would drive crotched stakes and lay poles in them and then cover with hemlock boughs to keep the snow off. After we had several lines of marten traps built, we went onto the stream and branches and built deadfalls for mink and coon. Nearly every day we saw deer, but the weather was still too warm to keep venison any length of time, so we did not carry our guns with us. When Frank would see a deer he would make grave threats that he would carry his gun the next day. We were about two miles from the stage road. The stage made only one trip a week, so there was no way of disposing of a deer as long as the weather was so warm. It took but little persuasion to convince Frank that it would be poor policy to kill deer as long as we could make use of but a small part of a single deer. After we had gotten out a good line of deadfalls for marten, mink and coon, and as it was now about the first of November and time to bait up the deadfalls, and set out what steel traps we had for fox, I told Frank that we would carry our guns with us and try to kill a deer for bait and camp use. Frank could hardly sleep that night; he was so delighted to think that the time had come to quit the monkey business, as he called it, and begin business.