Afloat on the Flood Part 15

Somehow the feel of the weapon gave Max a sensation of renewed confidence. With such a reliable tool he fancied that there would be little cause for anxiety, even should that pack of snapping hungry dogs dash into the camp, seeking to raid their larder, and ready to attack them if prevented from carrying out their design.

"Get hold of clubs, boys, if you can find them!" he told the others; "because the yelping and barking is certainly coming straight this way, and we'd better be ready to beat them off if they try to rob us.

Anything that will make an impression will do; and when you strike, do it with vim!"

"Will we?" cried Steve, who still had a splendid club he had picked up some time back; "just let me get a single whack at a dog, I don't care what his breed or size or color, and his name will be Dennis, or Mud, I don't know which. But just as you said, Max, they are coming this way full tilt. Whew! sounds like there might be a round dozen in the bunch, and from a yapping ki-yi to a big Dane, with his heavy bark like the muttering of thunder."

"Leave that big one to me, remember," said Max; "and you fellows look after the smaller fry. We'll have to show them that because they're running loose and in a pack, they don't own the woods by a long shot.

Now, climb up into that tree, girls, because they'll be here in a minute or so, I'm afraid!"

CHAPTER XIII

THE DEFENCE OF THE CAMP

"Mabel first, please, Max!" said Mazie, as all of them hastened over to the tree that had been selected as the harbor of refuge on account of the fact that its lower branches seemed to invite an ascent.

Max gave Steve a knowing nod, and the two of them quickly whisked the little lame French girl up in the first crotch like magic.

Before Mazie really knew what they were going to do she was following after the first climber; and as they made room for the others, first Mrs. Jacobus, and then last of all Bessie found lodgment there.

"If you can manage to get up a little higher it would be safer all around," Max told them, though he tried his best not to alarm the girls by intimating that the lower limb of the tree might still be within jumping distance of an agile hound.

Immediately after performing his duty Steve picked up his club again.

Meanwhile the other three boys had brushed around and armed themselves with the most available weapons the dead wood afforded. Bandy-legs was fortunate in having one already to his suiting, and the others did the best they could; so that there was quite a formidable a.s.sortment of cudgels swinging back and forth as the owners tested their capacity for mischief; much as the intending batter at a critical stage of a baseball game may be seen to practice with two clubs before stepping up to the plate.

There could no longer be any doubt as to the speedy coming of the dog pack, as their eager yelps and barks sounded very close. It must have been that in their hungry condition they had picked up the odor of food far away, because a dog's sense of smell is remarkably acute, especially when half starved.

Max only waited in order to throw plenty of dry fuel on the fire before joining the battle line. If they were compelled to put up a stiff fight in order to keep their food supply intact, he knew that they would need all the light they could get, because with the coming of night, darkness had settled upon the forest lining the western bank of the flooded river.

"Whee! listen to the way they're tearing along, would you?" exclaimed Bandy-legs, as the noise drew rapidly nearer.

Every fellow seemed to take in a big breath. It was as though he meant to nerve himself for the exciting times to follow.

"Remember, leave the biggest dog to me!" Max told them, desirous of impressing this fact upon their minds; for with that powerful little automatic pistol in his possession, handed over to him by the owner of the abandoned cabin, he felt much better able to cope with a monster Dane or a huge mastiff than any of those who simply carried sticks might have been.

Max did not fancy the job before him. He had always confessed to a great liking for dogs of almost all kinds, and the thought of being compelled to shoot one, even in self-defense, did not appeal to him; though it was a grim necessity that forced him to contemplate such a ma.s.sacre.

These animals having been shut off from their regular food supply because of the flood that had driven their masters from home, were only following out the dictates of their natures, in seeking to satisfy the demands of hunger. Under ordinary conditions they may have been the most desirable of companions, and valued highly by those who owned them.

There was no other way to meet the emergency save by dispersing the savage pack. And Max knew that the animal of the heavy bark must be a powerful brute, capable of inflicting serious damage to any one upon whom he descended; hence he must in some way manage to dispose of the beast before he could leap on his intended prey.

"I see 'em!" suddenly almost shrieked Bandy-legs; and all of the boys might have echoed his announcement, for they caught sight of a confused scrambling ma.s.s approaching at a furious pace.

This almost immediately developed into separate units, as the dogs rushed directly into the camp. Max could see that there were no two alike, and in the lead was a mastiff as large as any wolf that ever followed in the wake of a wounded stag, a tawny colored animal, with wide-open jaws that must have filled the watching girls with a sense of abject horror, even though they were apparently safe from attack up among the branches of the tree.

Max had eyes for no other after that. Let his chums and Shack Beggs take care of the New Foundland, the Irish setter, the beagle, the rabbit hound, and several more, even to a st.u.r.dy looking squatty bulldog that must have used his short bowlegs to some advantage to keep pace with the rest of the pack; his duty was to meet the oncoming of that natural leader, and wind up his career.

The five boys had stationed themselves partly in front of the shelter where all of their food supplies had been placed, though at the same time they stood between the tree and the rushing dogs.

Straight at them the pack went, helter-skelter. It may not have been so much a desire to attack human beings that animated the animals as the keen sense of smell telling them that provisions were to be found back in that rustic shack.

Max waited until the big leader was almost upon them before he started to use his automatic. Indeed, one of the girls in the tree, gasped his name in terror, under the impression that Max may have been so petrified with astonishment at sight of the size of the mastiff that he could not pull the trigger of his weapon.

But it was not so, and Steve, who was alongside, knew it full well, because he could hear Max saying steadily all the while:

"Hold firm, boys; don't get rattled! I've got that big thief potted!

Steady now, everybody; and hit the line _hard_!"

That was the encouraging way Max used to call out to his players on the high school eleven when they were fighting for victory on the gridiron with a rival school. It did much to nerve those who heard; and Steve especially needed some such caution to keep him from springing to meet the coming attack halfway.

Then there sounded a peculiar snapping report. It was the automatic doing its duty. Firm was the hand that gripped the little weapon, and unflinching the eye back of the same.

A shriek from the tree told that the girls were watching every move in the exciting game that was being played. The mastiff was seen to stop in his headlong rush, and roll over in a heap; then he struggled to his feet again, only to have another flash directed into his eyes; and this time Max must have made sure work of it, because the huge animal did not attempt to rise again.

Meanwhile the rest of the pack had continued its forward progress, and as those waiting clubs began to swing and play there was a confused exchange of shouts, yaps and yelps that must have filled a listener's heart with wonder, providing he did not know the meaning of the fracas.

Deprived of the dominating spirit of their leader, and met with such a furious bombardment at the hands of the four boys, the balance of the pack could not hold out long. Their hunger did not seem to be equal to their fear of those clubs striking with such tremendous vim that in many cases the victim was hurled completely over. The attack became weaker and weaker; first one animal went howling away completely cowed, and then another took flight, until presently the bulldog was the only one left.

He had managed to seize Toby's club and was holding on with a death grip, straining his best to pull the same out of the hands of the owner. Steve was for turning on him, and belaboring the beast with his own cudgel; but Max, who knew the nature of the beast better than any of the others, felt sure that this sort of treatment would only result in a general fight, and that in the end the animal would either have to be shot, or else he must bite one of them seriously.

"Wait!" he called out; "keep back, the rest of you, and leave him to me!"

Thinking of course that he meant to advance, and use his firearm in order to finish the stubborn bulldog, the three other boys backed away, leaving only Toby standing there, holding one end of his club, while the canine enemy maintained that savage grip on the other, and sought to wrest it away.

But Max had had enough of dog killing for one night, and meant to try other tactics in this case. He dodged into the shelter, and almost immediately reappeared bearing with him some food that had been left over, sc.r.a.ps of bread and fragments from their supper.

These he tossed close to the nose of the stubborn bulldog, while the rest of the party watched to see the result. Would hunger prevail, or the disposition to continue fighting cause the animal to keep on chewing the end of Toby's club?

Presently they saw the unwelcome visitor begin to sniff eagerly. Then he suddenly released those terrible teeth of his, the iron jaw relaxed, and the next thing they knew the ferocious bulldog was devouring the food Max had thrown down, with every symptom of satisfaction.

Max went back and secured more of the same kind.

"We can get plenty, once we leave here in the morning," he told Bandy-legs when the latter showed a disposition to murmur against the seeming extravagance; "and I'd hate to kill that dog. I'm sure from his looks he must be of fine stock, and worth a heap to his owner.

Besides, I've knocked one over, and that's one too many to please me.

Now watch what I'll do."

With that he approached, and offered the dog the rest of the food. In another minute he could have patted the heretofore savage beast on the back, only that Max was too wise to trouble a feeding dog.

"Nothing more to be feared from him, I guess," remarked Steve, who had watched all this with distended eyes; "you know dogs from the ground up, Max. But do you think it's safe to have that terror around? The girls won't want to come down out of the tree while he's in camp."

"You're mistaken there," said Bessie, as she dropped beside him; "I'm not at all afraid of dogs when they're natural; and besides, I know this fine fellow quite well. He belongs to a neighbor of my uncle, and he used to come to me as though he rather liked me; didn't you, Bose?"

At mention of his name the ferocious looking bulldog with the bowed legs actually wagged his crooked stub of a tail, and gave the girl a look. As he was now through feeding, and seemed to be in a contented frame of mind, Bessie continued to talk to him in a wheedling way; and presently was able to slip a hand upon his head, though it gave Steve a cold chill to see her do it.

Max had meanwhile dragged the other dog out of sight in the bushes, though Toby had to help him, such was the size of the wretched mastiff that had been brought to a bad end through his hunger, and a determination to raid the camp of the flood fugitives.