As Tom and Mark are watching a mother bear play with its cub the mother gets shot by a swamp hunter. Tom issues as citation to the hunter and takes the cub. Ben appears to be jealous of the cub and when the hunter's boy steals the cub Mark assumes Ben chased it off. They discover that the boy stole the cub because living in the swamp he had no friends or pets. In an on the spot judgement, Tom tells the boy that the terms of his probation are to take good care of the cub, and the boy's father goes along with it.