But there might be a dog.

The hunter, in his slow advance, used keen and unrelaxing vigilance, and at length he decided that if there had been a dog he would have been tied outside to give an alarm.
Wade had now reached his objective point.

He was some eighty paces from the cabin, in line with an open aisle down which he could see into the cleared space before the door.

On his left were thick, small spruces, with low-spreading branches, and they extended all the way to the cabin on that side, and in fact screened two walls of it.

Wade knew exactly what he was going to do.