"Pity they will eat their suppers in the dark," muttered Frank, to relieve his vexation at the disappointment.
He returned slowly to the house, and went up to his room, where he sat down and read awhile. After an hour or more he became too sleepy to read; so he laid aside his book, put out the light, and popped into bed. Just as he was falling asleep he heard several cries over in the woods. They were half whistle, half scream--a sort of squeal. He sprang up in bed to listen. The cries ceased, and for several minutes all was silence. Then there arose a succession of screams, much nearer, and in a different voice. It was interrupted and broken. It seemed something between the squeal of a pig and the cry of a child.
Frank said to his father the next morning that "it sounded as if it was a young one, and the mother was cuffing it and driving it back. At any rate, the last of the cries sounded as if the little 'coon had turned, and was going away."
"Very likely," said his father; "the little 'coon was probably hungry for the rest of his supper, and was going back to the corn sooner than the old 'coon thought was prudent."
Frank heard no more of the 'coons, and soon went to sleep, but in the morning he found that more corn had been spoiled than in the first night. The 'coons had only run off to come back again, and begin their depredations in a new place. He therefore came to the conclusion that he must watch all night, and every night, if at all.
The hired man told how some boys where he worked once caught a 'coon by setting a trap at the hole in a board fence near the corn piece. There was a wall beside the woods not far from Frank's corn, and there were a plenty of holes in it, but which particular hole the 'coons came through nobody could tell.
[Illustration: "FOR A FEW SECONDS THERE WAS A LIVELY BATTLE."]
"I'll find out," said Frank. He went to a sand-bank with the wheelbarrow, and shovelled in a load of sand. This he spread at the bottom of every large hole, and on the rocks at every low place in the wall. In the morning he walked along there, and the foot-prints in the sand showed where the path of the 'coons crossed the wall. There he set his steel-trap, and another which he borrowed of a neighbor. In the morning he went over to see what had happened. One trap was sprung, and held a few hairs; the other trap had disappeared. It didn't go off alone, Frank thought; but it had a long stick fastened to its chain that would be sure to catch in the bushes before it went far. He sprang over the wall, and peeped round among the knolls and bushes. Suddenly, as he went around a clump of little spruces, a chain rattled, and a brownish-gray creature, "'most as big as a bear," as Frank afterward said, sprang at him, with a sharp, snarling growl, and mouth wide open. The sight was too much for Frank's nerves, and set them in such a tremor that he ran away. When he came in sight of his corn he began to grow angry, and his courage came up again. He now got him a larger stick than he had first carried, and set out for the animal again. He had considered that, after all, it could be only a 'coon, though bears had been heard of in the corn fields further north. Frank and the corn-eater now met again face to face, and for a few seconds there was a lively battle, in which mingled the snarling of the 'coon, the rattling of the chain, and the blows of the stick. At length the 'coon lay still, and Frank stood guard over him with a broken stick. The next day he ate a slice of roast 'coon for dinner with great relish.