CHAPTER VIII: Wit Against Wit

It was a dreadful game the hunter with the terrible gun and
Lightfoot the Deer were playing in the Green Forest. It was a
matching of wit against wit, the hunter seeking to take
Lightfoot's life, and Lightfoot seeking to save it.
The experience of other years had taught Lightfoot much of the
ways of hunters and not one of the things he had learned about
them was forgotten. But the hunter in his turn knew much of
the ways of Deer. So it was that each was trying his best to
outguess the other.

When the hunter found the hiding-place Lightfoot had left at the
warning of Sammy Jay he followed Lightfoot's tracks for a short
distance. It was slow work, and only one whose eyes had been
trained to notice little things could have done it. You see,
there was no snow, and only now and then, when he had stepped on
a bit of soft ground, had Lightfoot left a footprint. But there
were other signs which the hunter knew how to read, -- a freshly
upturned leaf here, and here, a bit of moss lightly crushed.
These things told the hunter which way Lightfoot had gone.

Slowly, patiently, watchfully, the hunter followed. After a while
he stopped with a satisfied grin. "I thought as much," he
muttered. "He heard that pesky Jay and circled around so as to
get my scent. I'll just cut across to my old trail and unless I
am greatly mistaken, I'll find his tracks there."

So, swiftly but silently, the hunter cut across to his old trail,