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 gobbler, sometimes came to these woods in the early forenoon for a midday siesta. Twice he had startled this gobbler from the same tall pine. He planned now to post himself in ambush near the foot of this pine and wait for the gobbler to come in for its noontide nap; and meanwhile, as he approached the place, he scanned the wood's vistas keenly because more than once he had found amid the pinestraw scratches which proved that turkeys occasionally came there to feed.

Presently, when the gobbler's big tree loomed close in front of him, he found a spot which suited his purpose. Sitting on the pinestraw, his back against the trunk of a young water oak at the edge of a small thicket of gallberry which partly encircled him, he was almost invisible in his dun corduroy and khaki—a soundless, inconspicuous figure, motionless as a stump. Probably a long wait lay ahead of him, but he looked forward to it with satisfaction, even with pleasure.

He knew that the woods, lonely and empty though they seemed, were alive. Softly as he had moved, he was aware that keen ears had heard him, though he could not tell what ears. Keenly as he had scanned the ground and the branches, he was sure that sharp eyes which he had not been able to see had studied him as he made his way amid the tree trunks.