Frank saw one or two small objects floating just outside the grass across the pond. They seemed to be a very long way off, and though he feared that he could not keep the sights upon any of them standing, the ground looked horribly quaggy to kneel in. This could not be helped, however, for it seemed that getting wet and torn did not count when one was hunting, and he pressed his right knee down into the mire. He could just see one of the ducks when he closed his left eye, and he had misgivings as to the result when he squeezed the trigger. Harry's rifle flashed immediately after his, there was a rattle of wings and a startled quacking, and he saw two ducks with long necks stretched out fly off above the trees. Another seemed to be lying on the water, and remembering the size of the bullet, he had no fear of that one getting away. "The next thing is to get it," said Harry. "It's not going to be easy." He was perfectly right. They spent a long while struggling around the pond, into which they had to wade nearly waist-deep before Harry contrived to rake the duck in toward him with the muzzle of his rifle. It did not look a sightly object when he had secured it, but he decided that there was enough of it left to eat. "Is it the one you shot at?" he asked with a grin. "I can't say," Frank answered. "I shouldn't be surprised if it wasn't." "Well," said Harry, "we're not going to quarrel about the thing. What we have to do is to make a bee-line home. We'll come along again in a week or two. The ponds are full of ducks for a little in the spring and fall." "Only then?" "They're not so plentiful between-whiles," Harry answered. "Of course, our worst winters aren't marked by the cold snaps you have back East, and quite a few of the ducks stay with us, while some put in the summer, too; but in a general way every swimming bird of any size heads north to the tundra marshes by the Polar Sea in spring. In the fall they come back again, how far I don't know--lower California, Mexico, perhaps, right away to Bolivia and Peru. Going and coming, the big flocks stop around here to rest a while." He smiled at his companion. "A mallard duck's a little thing, but he covers a considerable sweep of country." He picked up the deer and they went on again, but darkness overtook them before they reached the ranch, utterly worn out, with most of their garments rent to tatters; and Frank, who had carried the deer the last mile or two, gave a gasp of relief when he laid it down. CHAPTER XVII MR. WEBSTER'S GUNS