Then he rebuked himself for easy alarm. It was merely the reflection
from a bough above in the water below. Yet it played tricks with him.
The shadow reappeared again and again, always close to the far bank, but
there were many boughs also to reproduce themselves in the mirror of the
lake. He convinced himself that his eyes and his mind were having sport
with him, and turning away, he made a little circle in the woods about
their camp. All was well. He heard a swish overhead, but he knew that it
was a night bird, a rustling came, and an ungainly form lumbered through
a thicket, but it was a small black bear, and coming back to the hollow,
he looked down at his comrades.

Tayoga and Willet slept well. Neither had stirred, and wrapped in their
blankets lying on the soft leaves, they were true pictures of forest
comfort. They were fine and loyal comrades, as good as anybody ever had,
and he was glad they were so near, because he began to have a feeling
now that something unusual was going to occur. The shadows on the lake
troubled him again, and he went back for another look. He did not see
them now, and that, too, troubled him. It proved that they had been made
by some moving object, and not by the boughs and bushes still there.

Robert examined the lake, his eyes following the line where the far bank
met the water, but he saw no trace of anything moving, and his attention
came back to the woods in which he stood. Presently, he crouched in
dense bush, and concentrated all his powers of hearing, knowing that he
must rely upon ear rather than eye. He could not say that he had really
seen or heard, but he had felt that something was moving in the forest,
something that threatened him.

His first impulse was to go back to the little hollow and awaken his
comrades, but his second told him to stay where he was until the danger