There was no other disturbance that night. Frank was asleep at the time of the accident, and knew nothing of it until the next morning, when seeing Nanny fastened near the tent, he asked why that was, and where was the other kid. "Poor Jinny!" he exclaimed, on hearing of its fate (the kids, being a male and female, had been called Paul and Virginia). "Poor Jinny! So you are gone!" He went to Nanny, the chief mourner, and patting her smooth side said, in a pitying tone, "Poor Nanny! Ain't you sorry for your daughter? Only think, Nanny, that she is eaten up by a panther!" Nanny looked sorrowful enough, and replied, "Baa!" But whether that meant, "I am so sorry my daughter is dead," or, "I wish you would loose my chain, and let me eat some of this nice grass," Frank could not determine. After a breakfast, by no means the most cheerful, Harold said,
"Robert, we must make a picket fence for the protection of these poor brutes. But as I have a particular reason for wishing some fresh venison before night, I want to arrange matters so that either you or I shall go out early enough to be sure of obtaining it."
Robert urged him to go at once, but disliking the appearance of avoiding labour, he preferred to remain, and aid them through the most laborious part of the proposed work. The palisade was made of strong stakes, eight or ten feet long, sharpened at one end, and driven into a narrow trench, which marked the dimensions of the enclosure. Harold assisted to cut and transport to the spot the requisite number of stakes; and shortly after noon took Frank as his companion, and left Robert and Sam to complete the work. He had not been gone more than an hour and a half, before Robert heard the distant report of a heavily loaded gun, in the direction of the spot where the brant and ducks had been shot.
"Eh! eh!" said Sam, "Mas Harrol load he gun mighty hebby for a rifle!"
"Yes," said Robert, "and he has chosen a very poor weapon for shooting ducks."
The workmen were too intently engaged to reflect that the report which they heard could not have proceeded from a rifle. In the course of half an hour another report, but of a sharper sound, was heard much nearer, and appearing to proceed from the neighbourhood of the orange-trees, on the tongue of land. Robert now looked inquiringly at Sam, and was about to remark, "That gun cannot be Harold's--it has not the crack of a rifle;" but the doubt was only momentary, and soon passed away. Long afterwards the familiar sound of Harold's piece was heard in the west, and a little before sunset Harold and Frank appeared, bearing a fat young deer between them.