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Then turn them off and wait."
"How long do we wait?" Brad asked.
"Till we call you in with this whistle," Mark said. He sounded three short
whistles and then three long whistles.
"Any questions?"
The four boys looked at each other uneasily.
"What about those other animals you talked about?" Paul said. "What if we see
them?"
"Or the murderer?" Ty added with a whisper.
Mark just shrugged his shoulders and looked at his watch.
"Time to start walking," he said. "And remember to count two hundred fifty
steps. Then turn off your lights."
Ty glanced over at Paul and Brad and Jimmy. They looked as scared as he felt.
Mark told Brad to start walking toward the north. Then he sent Jimmy off to
the east and Paul to the west.
"Ty," he said, "you walk south."
Ty gulped, switched on his flashlight, and turned to face the south. He took
a step away from the campfire and started counting. At first he took long
steps; then he took shorter ones that wouldn't carry him so far into the
woods.
Ty had counted a hundred steps when he first turned around. The campfire was
just a yellowish glow in the darkness of the woods. He shone his light into
the woods in front of him and started walking and counting again. The dead
leaves that had fallen from the trees crackled under his feet. Several times a
raised root caught at his foot and almost sent him sprawling onto the ground.
Night animals scurried away as his light pierced the darkness. Once an owl
swooped down across the moon and passed its shadow over him.
Ty had counted two hundred steps. He turned around. The thick trees blocked
out the campfire now. He couldn't hear the older boys' voices and laughter
anymore. He hoped he would be able to hear Mark's whistles.
Fifty more steps to go. Ty forced his legs to go on through the woods until
he had counted to two hundred fifty. Then he swung his flashlight around in
the place where he had stopped. It was a small clearing that had a thick
carpet of leaves covering the ground.
The flashlight picked up the outline of a big tree stump about three yards
from where Ty stood. Tall hickory trees with shaggy bark stood around the
small clearing. Ty pointed the light up and saw their long limbs reaching up
to the sky like the arms of skeletons. Then he flicked off the flashlight and
crouched down on the ground. He clutched the burlap bag in both hands and
waited. The snipe hunt had begun.
The wind blew through the tree branches above him, making a strange rattling
sound. Ty waited and waited. Once he saw a big shadow move near the tree
stump. He froze, not sure if it was a bear or a man. But the shadow
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disappeared and didn't come back again. Ty's hands were growing numb with cold
and fatigue. He thought he would go crazy if he had to stay out in the dark
alone one more minute.
Then he heard a strange noise come from the direction of the tree stump. It
was a shrill animal sound, unlike anything he'd ever heard before. He strained
his eyes to see in the moonlight. He glimpsed the pale, gray body of an animal
walking toward him from the tree stump. It kept making its shrill call as it
slowly wobbled across the bed of leaves.
Ty had never seen an animal like it before. He knew it must be a snipe. He
leaned over and set the burlap bag down in front of where the animal was
walking. It didn't seem to be able to see the bag and headed straight toward
it. Ty held his breath until the small animal had walked into his bag. Then he
shut the opening of the bag and gripped it tight.
A minute later, three short whistles and three long whistles cut through the
stillness of the night. Ty picked up his flashlight and started to run in the
direction of the sound. He held the sack away from his body and listened as
the animal begin to make shrill noises in a panic.
Ty burst into the light of the campfire with his breath coming in short
gasps. Everyone else was standing there, waiting for him. Paul, Brad, and
Jimmy had already made it back.
"We thought the murderer might have got you, Ty," Mark said. The boys around
the campfire laughed. Ty stood by the fire with his bag, waiting for Mark to
ask about the snipe. But Mark didn't even look at his bag.
"The four of you did a great job," he said, looking at Paul, Brad, Jimmy, and
Ty. "None of you chickened out. You all passed the test, and now you're in the
club."
"But what about the snipe?" Ty asked.
"Come on, Ty, that was just a joke," Robbie said.
"Ty, what do you have in that bag?" Mark asked..
"A snipe," Ty answered.
Just then, the animal cried its weird call.
"He caught something!" Brad said. "Let's see it."
Everyone jumped up and crowded around Ty.
"Drop the bag into this box, Ty," Mark ordered, pulling over an empty food
box.
Carefully Ty put the bag into the box and let go of its opening. The other
boys peered down into the box. Slowly, the animal Ty had caught crawled out of
the bag. It turned its face up at the boys staring down at it. Then it let out
a hiss and a shrill screech.
The boys all jumped back.
"What is it?" Robbie asked.
"That's the strangest-looking animal I've ever seen," Mark said.
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Again the boys stared down at the animal. It had short gray fur and a thick,
stout body. Its paws had sharp white claws and its long tail ended in a jagged
point. But its head was weirdest of all. The ears were high and pointed, and
the mouth had four long, sharp teeth.
"I think it's a baby that was just born," Mark said. "Its eyes are still
shut."
"Look, it's trying to open them," Ty said.
Suddenly the animal's strange eyes flew open. They were orange and glowed in
the night.
"Is it a snipe?" Ty asked.
"I don't know," Mark said. "Nobody's ever seen a snipe. We just made up the
snipe hunt to scare you guys."
"So what is it?" Brad asked.
The animal started to shriek louder and louder and show its pointed teeth at
the boys.
One by one, they backed uneasily away from the box.
"What waa that?" Robbie suddenly asked, turning around to look into the
woods. "I thought I heard something out there."
"Me, too," said Paul.
The boys fell silent and listened as the animal in the box made its shrill
call over and over again. And from different parts of the woods, the same call
came back.
"What are we going to do?" Ty asked.
"I don't know," Mark answered, looking scared.
The calls from the woods became louder and louder. Then the leaves on the
floor of the woods started to rustle. The boys huddled closer together around
the campfire.
Suddenly Ty screamed and pointed to the woods. A pair of strange orange eyes
were glowing from the shadows of the trees. They were like the eyes of the [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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