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CHAPTER XI – THE NEW-FOUND FRIEND

Old Joe Picquet came to an abrupt halt. All that morning they had followed the trail of the thief and had now arrived at a small lake, Dead Rabbit Lake.

“Boosh!” exclaimed the old man angrily, “I am one fool. Someteeng I jus’ see I nevaire notice before.”

He pointed down at the trail of the man they were pursuing.

“You look! You see something funny 'bout dat snowshoe?” he asked.

Both Tom and Jack examined the footmarks without seeing anything odd in them. It was then that Joe gave them an exhibition of his skill in trailing.

“His toe turn oop,” he said. “Dese snowshoes mooch broader, too, than dose we wear here. Dese shoes made in some factory. See! They no good.”

“Like the man that wears them,” sniffed Jack. “Then you think, Joe, that he must be a stranger up here?”

“I not know,” rejoined Joe with a shrug, “no can tell. But dose snowshoes no made oop here. Come from south, maybe. Boosh!”

“If he is a stranger, he is a good traveler anyhow,” was Tom’s comment.

Not long after, they came upon a spot where the man had halted and built a fire. Joe Picquet felt the ashes, running them slowly through his gnarled fingers.

“Boosh! He still long way in front of us,” he said disgustedly. “Dis fire been cold long time. He keel his dogs, he no look out. Boosh! Allez, Pete! Hey, Dubois!”

On they went again on the monotonous grind of the chase. They passed small lakes, sections of muskegs, swamps, rocky hillsides and deep valleys. But all lay deep under snow and ice. The sun beat down, and the glare from the snow began to affect Jack’s eyes.

“I soon feex that,” said old Joe.

“How?” asked Jack, winking and blinking, for everything looked blurred and distorted.

“I get you pair of snow-glasses. Boosh.”

“Snow-glasses. Have you got some with you?” asked Tom.

Old Joe shook his head.

“Non. But I get some vitement. Very quickly.”

“Are we near to a store, then?” asked Jack.

“No, Otter Creek is twenty miles away.”

“Then I don’t see – ”

“One second, mon ami. You shall see. Old Joe live long in the woods. He can do many teeng. You watch.”

Near the trail they were still following with the same pertinacity stood a white birch clump. Old Joe called a halt, and with his knife stripped off a big slice of bark from one of them. This he fashioned into a kind of mask. But instead of cutting the eye-holes all round, he left part to stick out like shelves under the orifices. These were to prevent the light being reflected from the snow directly into Jack’s eyes. A bit of beaver skin from the load formed a string to tie the odd-looking contrivance on, and from that moment Jack was not bothered with his eyes.

“In wilderness men do widout many teengs; except what dey make for demself,” quoth old Joe, as they took up the trail once more.

Soon after noon they stopped to eat. It was a hasty meal, for they felt that they could ill afford to waste any of the daylight. Then on again they went, old Joe urging his dogs along remorselessly.

“They look pretty tired,” suggested Tom once.

Old Joe gave one of his shrugs and took his pipe from his mouth.

“Dey what you call beeg bluff,” said he. “All time dey play tired. Boosh! Dey no can fool me. Allez!”

Crack went the whip, and the cavalcade moved on as briskly as before.

It was twilight when, on rounding a turn in the trail in a deep valley, they suddenly heard the barking of dogs. Those of their own team answered vociferously, old man Picquet yelling frantically at them above the din.

The cause of the noise ahead of them was soon apparent. From the midst of a clump of second growth Jack-pine proceeded a glow of firelight. It was a camp. They soon saw that it consisted of one tepee. From the opening in the roof of this, sparks were pouring and smoke rolling out at a great rate, telling of a good fire within.

The barking dogs rushed at them savagely, and old Joe had all he could do to keep his own from attacking the strangers. In the melee that would have been sure to follow such an attack, the sled would certainly have been upset even if one or two of the dogs had not been killed; for when mamelukes fight, they fight to the death.

In the midst of the uproar, the flap of the tepee was thrust aside and a figure came toward them. It was an Indian. He called to his dogs, who instantly crept back toward the tent, growling and snarling and casting backward glances at the invaders.

“Boosh!” exclaimed old Joe as he saw the Indian coming toward them, “dat Indian my fren’ long time! Bon jour, Pegic. How you do to-day?” Then followed some words in the Indian dialect which, of course, the boys did not understand.

The Indian invited them into his tepee. He was camping alone and had killed a small deer that morning. The meat hung in the tepee, and as soon as his guests were seated, he set about cutting steaks and frying them over the fire.

Then, on tin plates, he handed each of the boys and old Joe a portion, accompanied by a hunk of baking powder bread. The long day’s journey in the cold, nipping air had made them ravenously hungry. They fell to with wolfish appetites on Pegic’s fare. The Indian, his jaws working stolidly, watched them eat. He was a small man and rather intelligent-looking.

After the meal, the dogs were fed and old Joe told the boys that they would stay with Pegic for the night. As both lads were just about tired out, this arrangement suited them down to the ground, and in the glow of Pegic’s fire they lay down and were soon asleep.

Then old Joe began to ask the Indian questions. Indians must be dealt with calmly and above all slowly, and in a roundabout way. Haste or undue curiosity upsets them. To ask an Indian a brief question is in all probability to have it unanswered. Hence old Joe proceeded with caution. The conversation was carried on in Pegic’s dialect, which the old French-Canadian understood perfectly.

First of all he asked the Indian how long he had been camped there.

“Two days,” was the reply.

“To-day a man passed here?”

The Indian nodded gravely, staring into the fire.

“It is even so. Just as you say, my friend.”

CHAPTER XII – THE FRIENDLY INDIAN

“I am teenking dat perhaps he stopped at your tepee. Is dat so?” inquired old Joe, wise in the way of Indians.

Pegic nodded gravely.

“It is even so, my white brother.”

“Bon. And he was a small man and gray?”

“He was.”

“And carried skins on his sled?”

“Yes. Many skins and one he showed to me. It was the skin of a black fox. Truly a fine pelt, my brother. You are wise in the ways of trapping, but your eyes would have glittered and your fingers itched had you beheld it.”

Old Joe nodded his satisfaction. Clearly, then, they were on the right trail and the man had the skin with him.

“So de man showed you de skins? Yes?”

“He did. He was swollen with pride. But to Pegic he looked like a man who is sick.”

“Seeck?”

“Yes, my brother. His eyes were overbright and his skin was flushed. He was sick.”

“Boosh! He’ll be seecker yet when we find him, myself and de two garçons. Pegic, dose skins were stolen!”

“Stolen, do you say, my brother?”

“Yes, Pegic, it is even so. And how long ago was he here?”

“About two hours before the dropping of the sun. I urged him to stay, but he would not. He said he was in much haste, and truly his dogs showed signs of being hard pressed.”

Old Joe chuckled grimly.

“Bon, so we close up the gap. Boosh! Mon ami, we shall meet before very long. Voila!”

“It was while I was cutting up the deer,” volunteered Pegic, his reserve now thawed by old Joe’s skillful way of leading him on. “I sat on my blanket – so. My dogs barked, and, going to the door of the tepee, I saw this white man coming. He wished food for himself and his dogs. I gave to him, and then he asked the way to the nearest trading post. I told him, and then he inquired for the one even beyond that.”

“For which he had good reason,” muttered old Joe. “He wished to gain on us a good distance before he traded in his furs – bien!”

“His talk was smooth and without stoppage, like a deep stream,” went on the Indian, “but he would ever and anon arise and go to the door of the tepee and look back along his trail. Then I wondered much at this, but now I know why this was so. Then he left, after pressing some silver upon me which I would not have taken but for owing Jumping Rabbit much money, which I lost when we did last play at ‘chuckstones.’ After he had left I lay on my blankets, thinking of many things. But chiefly of how my brother, Walking Deer, was killed at Old Squaw Rapids when his paddle did break and left him to the mercy of the waters. If you like, I will tell the tale to you. I am thinking that it is a story that would delight you much.”

But old Joe, who well knew how an Indian can drag out a story to interminable lengths, diplomatically pleaded fatigue and sought his blankets. Long after he slept the Indian sat motionless, squatting on his haunches, smoking without ceasing and gazing into the fire. Then he, too, curled himself up, and the firelight in the tepee glowed upon four slumberers.

Bright and early the next morning they took up the trail. Old Joe was in high spirits. He flourished his aged rifle vindictively. He belabored his dogs without mercy.

“Courage, mes camarades!” he kept crying to the boys. “Before long we catch up by dis robber, for he is seeck and his dogs are weary. Bien. Before long, we shall have a reckoning.”

At noon they stopped and ate a hasty lunch. A few miles back they had passed the ashes of a cooking fire. Old Joe declared that the embers were not more than a few hours cold. They were gaining on the man. The boys began to feel the excitement of the chase gripping them more and more every instant. The meal was eaten almost in silence. Then – on again.

The day died out; but allowing only a halt for supper and to rest the dogs, old Joe insisted on pressing on. It was a brilliant, starry night, and onward over the creaking snow under the twinkling luminaries of the sky the relentless pursuers of the man with the black fox skin pressed steadily on. Had their excitement been less, or their frames more unused to hardship and long “treks,” the boys might have felt the pace. As it was, they hardly noticed the fatigue that was slowly but surely creeping over them till it was almost midnight.

Old Joe was quick to notice the first signs of flagging. He called a halt.

“Mes enfants, you are très fatiguè,” he exclaimed, “we must rest and sleep.”

“We’re all right,” protested Tom, but his objections were feeble and were not seconded by Jack, who, now that they had actually stopped, felt about ready to drop in his tracks.

“Non, we will stop and camp here and you must get some sleep,” insisted old Joe. “Let me see. We are now near end of Spoon Island. Bien! Just below is Hawk Island. Many times have I camped dere, and dere I have a petit cache in a tree. We will go on as far as dat and den rest and eat.”

Two or three miles below the end of Spoon Island lay Hawk Island. They took to the frozen surface of the river and soon reached it. It was a small, rocky speck of land thickly wooded with balsam, spruce and poplar.

“Long time ago many t’ous’and hare live here,” said Joe, “now not so good. But I like camp here. Boosh! So now we will stop.”

While the old voyageur unharnessed his ravenous dogs and fed them, the boys looked about them. Sticking up from the snow they could see the ends of some poles set in a quadrangular form. This marked the site of one of Joe’s former camps. Having unharnessed the dogs and left them to fight and snarl over their supper, old Joe next set about making a camp.

The boys watched him with interest. It was the first camp of the kind they had ever seen.

“Come help me dig,” admonished the old trapper. “Do like I do. Soon we have fine camp. Warm and snug – bien!”

He set to work digging with a snowshoe, and the boys followed his example, working under his directions. Before long they had excavated a square hole some four feet deep in the snow. By the time they had banked and patted it smooth they stood in a pit which reached about to their shoulders.

This done, old Joe wetted his finger and held it up. The side to the wind immediately grew cold and indicated to him from which direction the light breeze came.

“Bien!” he exclaimed, when he had done this, “now four poles from dose trees, mes amis, and we are snug lak zee bug in zee rug, – n’est-ce pas?”

CHAPTER XIII – THE INDIAN’S PREDICTION

When the four poles had been obtained, old Joe erected them in the snow to windward of the excavation. Then from his sled he got an oblong of canvas which he stretched over them.

“Boosh! So now we get firewood and start a blaze and den everyteeng is fine,” he exclaimed, briskly stepping back to admire his handiwork. Although the boys did not know it, this camp which Joe had just erected is a favorite form of temporary resting place in the frozen North. The canvas stretched above the poles serves a double purpose, to keep out the wind and to act as a reflector to the fire in front so that those down in the pit are kept delightfully snug and warm.

The boys next set about getting wood for the fire. This did not take long. Then branches stripped from the balsam boughs were thrown into the snow pit to a depth of several inches, to form a soft, springy mattress for their blankets. The fire was lighted and plenty of wood heaped near by to keep it going.

Finally the kettle was filled with snow, which was set by the fire to melt. From the sled old Joe got some deer meat, by this time frozen hard, which he had obtained from Pegic. While the meat was thawing the boys helped spread their beds in the warm, fire-lighted pit, and then old Joe cooked supper.

The boys were certainly learning woodcraft from the old French Canadian. They would hardly have thought it possible, an hour before, that such a cozy camp could have been made in the snow with such simple means. But the wilderness traveler has had to learn by many hard experiences how to make the best of things, and the experiments of successive travelers have resulted in a score or more of makeshift devices for comfort and safety.

While the party of adventurers ate their supper with hearty appetites, washing it down with big drafts of scalding tea, the dogs outside made their own camp in their peculiar fashion. The mamelukes make themselves comfortable very easily. Having gorged themselves on fish, they burrowed into the snow and slept the sleep of the faithful sled dog.

In their improvised camp the travelers slept till daylight, which to the boys, at least, seemed to be an interval of not more than five minutes. Breakfast, consisting of the remains of supper and more tea, having been consumed, the dogs, which had been routed out and fed, were harnessed up once more. Then, trail sore and stiff after their sleep, the boys resumed their travels.

They followed the river and, of course, the track of the runners of the thief’s sled, which still lay clear and sharp on the snow. About two hours after the start they came upon another of his camps. Clearly he had allowed his dogs to sleep, for there were the marks of their burrowings to be observed in the snow.

“Aha, dey are tiring, mes enfants!” cried old Joe. “Not veree long now. Courage! Boosh!”

At the expiration of another period of travel, and not long before noon, on rounding a bend in the river they sighted another party coming toward them. There were three figures and a dog sled. The figures speedily resolved themselves into a Black River Indian and two squaws.

“Bien! Now we get news, maybe!” chuckled old Joe.

Then, as they neared the other party, which had come to a halt awaiting them, old Joe breathed a caution.

“Let me do zee talking. Boosh! Indians are hard to talk unless you know dem, and den – not always easy. Tiens!”

Old Joe did not drive right up to the Indians, who were squatting down on their sled. Instead, he halted at some little distance. There followed an exchange of greetings in the Black River dialect, and then pipes were produced and both sides, squaws and all, smoked gravely for a time. The boys looked on, much amused at all this ceremony, which, however, as old Joe knew, was necessary. To quote an old proverb, “The longest way round is the shortest way home,” with an Indian.

The Indian was a short, squat fellow with straight black hair. He was very dirty, but otherwise very like Pegic in appearance. One of the squaws was old and very hideous. The other was a younger woman and not uncomely in a way. She was evidently considered a belle, for she was hung lavishly with beadwork, while the homely old squaw did not display any ornaments.

Old Joe was the first to speak, addressing the man in his own dialect. We will translate the conversation that followed into “the King’s English.”

“It is very fine weather. The traveling is very pleasant and the wind gods sleep.”

The Indian nodded gravely.

“It is even so, my white friend,” said he. “The sky is soft as the cheek of a baby and the storm slumbers like an old man by the fire. But there will come a change before long. Early to-day the river smoked, the frost was low on the trees and the wind stirred in its dreams. Before long we shall get much snow and the wind, too, will awake and set out upon the trail.”

“What you say may well be true,” rejoined old Joe. “The same signs have I noticed. But who are we that we should control the winds or the snows?”

Old Joe paused. The Indian did not reply, and for some moments they both smoked on in silence. Blue wreaths rose almost straight from their pipes in the still air. The cracking of the ice on the river alone broke the silence.

Then the Indian removed his pipe and spoke once more in his slow, measured tones.

“The owl was abroad in the night and at daybreak my squaw’s mother, the ill-favored one yonder, did see one with a weasel in its claws. What think you is the meaning of that sign, my white brother?”

Old Joe shrugged his shoulders expressively.

“No man can read the owl, my friend,” he replied. “Tell me, how do you interpret the sign?”

“That ere long a white man – the weasel that my squaw’s ill-favored mother did see – shall be caught by the bearded white man and the two unbearded boys that do travel with him.”

This was a typically Indian way of stating a conclusion, and old Joe appeared to feel highly flattered at the comparison of himself to an owl. He smiled and said:

“It is even so. The owl that is Joe Picquet does pursue the weasel that is a thieving white man, a robber of trappers, a despoiler of cabins in the woods.”

“Then ere long you will catch him,” the Indian assured him gravely, “for so do the signs read and no man may gainsay them.”

The moment in these roundabout negotiations had now arrived when old Joe deemed he could diplomatically ask a direct question.

CHAPTER XIV – SWAPPING STORIES

“It is as you have said,” rejoined old Joe, “the signs are seldom in the wrong. But I have been thinking, my friend, that perhaps on your way you have seen this weasel of a white man whom the owl and the two young hares pursue?”

But, to Joe’s disappointment, the Indian shook his head.

“I did meet no white man who is as the weasel and whom the owl and the two young hares pursue,” he rejoined; “neither, till I met you, have I met any man, either white or Indian, since I left Blue Hare Lake.”

“You do not come from the way of the setting sun, then?” For the trail of the fleeing thief had so far led west.

Another negative sign was the reply as the Indian said:

“We come from the north. But some half day’s journey back I crossed a trail which was even as the trail you now follow.”

“I am sorry,” said old Joe. “The weasel must travel as the wind.”

“It may well be even so,” rejoined the Indian. “But hasten, my brother, if you would still follow the trail, for the snows are awakening and the wind stirs in its sleep.”

They bade the Indian and his two silent women “Good day,” and pushed on. Now there was good reason for haste. Indians are rarely or never mistaken in their weather prophecies, and if the snow came before the pursuers had caught up with the thief, they stood a fair chance of losing him altogether, for the snow would infallibly blot out his trail.

That night they came to a small trading post kept by a tall, gangling American, by name Ephraim Dodge. He had a thin, hatchet face and a bobbing goatee, and on either side of his prominent bridged nose twinkled a shrewd, although kind, eye.

Yes, Ephraim had seen the man they were pursuing and “allowed he was pretty badly tuckered out.” He had stopped at his post and purchased some canned goods and oatmeal. Then he had pressed straight on. No, he had not offered any skins for sale, and, according to Ephraim, was an “ornery-lookin’ cuss, anyhow.”

When he heard their story Ephraim was sympathetic, but he could not offer much in the way of consolation except to assure them that they were bound to catch the man, for he appeared to be “right poorly.” There was no possibility of their pushing on that night, for old Joe, anxious as he was to continue the pursuit, decided that his dogs must have rest. So they spent the evening with Ephraim, who brought out an old violin and amused them by executing jigs and double shuffles while his old fiddle squeaked out the “Arkansas Traveler” and other lively airs.

After Ephraim had exhausted his repertoire they sat about the big stove and talked. Ephraim was a lively companion, and was frankly glad of company. He “allowed it was plum lonesome with nothing but Injuns and mamelukes fer company.” It was not necessary to attempt to join in his incessant flow of talk. He talked like a man who has pent up his thoughts and words for months and lets them go in a flood of conversation.

The talk turned to California, which Ephraim “’lowed was a white man’s country, fer sure.” He wished he was back there. What a climate it was! What wonderful air!

“Why,” declared Ephraim, “that air out thar is so wonderful deceiving that two fellers who set out fer the mountains from a plains town, thinking the hills weren’t but two miles away, rode two days without gettin’ any closer to ’em. Then they come at last to a river. One of ’em was fer crossing it, but the other, he 'lowed they wouldn’t. ‘It don’t look to be more’n a few feet across,’ says he, ‘but in this climate it’s liable ter be Christmas afore we ford it,’ an’ so they come back ag’in,” he concluded.

“'Nother time I’ve got in mind,” he went on, while his auditors gasped, “a friend of mine went fishin’. He was known as the most truthful man in the San Juaquin Valley, so there ain’t no reason ter suppose that his word wasn’t gospel truth and nothin’ else. Anyhow, he was known as a mighty good shot and right handy with his shootin’ iron, so nobody ever was hearn to doubt his word.

“Well, sir, as I’m a-saying, William Bing – that was his name, gents, William Bing – went a fishin’. He went up in the mountains, where the air is even clearer than it is on the plains. Bing, he moseyed along, lookin’ fer a likely place and totin’ his pole, when all at once he happened ter look down over a bluff, and what do you think he seen? Right below him thar was a fine hole in a big creek, and right in that hole, gents, William Bing, he seen hundreds and hundreds of trout and black bass swimming about so thick they was regularly crowdin’ one another.

“Bing says he could see their gills pumpin’ an’ their fins wavin’ jes’ like they was a-sayin’, ‘Hello, Bill! We’re waitin’ fer you. Throw us down a line and a bite ter eat, old sport.’ Waal, Bing, he didn’t lose no time in lettin’ down his line. He figgered it was erbout a hundred feet down to that hole, and he had a hundred and fifty feet on his pole. But he fished and fished all that mornin’ without getting a bite, not even a nibble. An’ thar below he could see all them fish swimmin’ about and every now and then looking up at him sort of appealin’ like. Bing says it looked jes’ as if they wanted to be caught and was reproaching him fer not doin’ the job an’ doin’ it quick.

“Bing, he reckoned something was wrong, so he changed his bait. But still nary a bite. Then he changed it again. Not a flicker, and there was those fish jumping around like peas on a griddle. It was plum aggervatin’, Bing 'lowed, and he couldn’t figger it out noways.

“He ate his lunch up thar on the top of the bluff, and then he decided that he’d kinder investigate the mystery of why those fish didn’t bite. He kind of pussyfoots around on the top of the bluff fer a while, and then he finds a place whar he reckons he can climb down right by that pool and dig inter the mystery in due and legal form.

“He sticks his pole in the bluff, leaving his bait on the end of the line, thinking that maybe he’ll git a bite while he’s carryin’ on his investigations. Then Bing, he starts to climb down. Waal, sirs, he clumb and clumb, did William Bing, and at last he got to the bottom. And then what do you suppose he found out?

“That clear air had fooled him. Made a plum jackass out’n him. Instid of bein’ a hundred feet high, that bluff was all of three hundred! Then he looked down in that hole whar the trouts and bass were swimming about. Gee whillakers, sirs, that thar hole 'peared to be more’n a hundred feet deep! And thar was all them fish per-ambulatin’ and circumambulatin’ erbout in it an’ looking up at William Bing’s bait that was danglin’ in the air a good hundred and fifty feet above that thar gosh almighty hole. Yes, sirs,” concluded Ephraim, “that Californy air is some air.”

“I should say so,” laughed Tom. “I don’t see how they can field a ball in it without being gone for a week on the journey.”

“Waal, that may hev happened, too,” rejoined Ephraim gravely, “but I never hearn tell on it. Leastways, not frum any reliable source such as William Bing.”

“Boosh!” exclaimed old Joe. “Long time 'go I out West. An’ you talk 'bout cleefs! In one part of zee country dere ees beeg cleef. More big dan Beeng’s cleef. Bien, I had a friend dere. His name Clemente Dubois. He ver’ fine man, Clemente. But, poor fel’, he dead long time ago.”

“How’d he die?” inquired Ephraim.

“Poor Clemente, he fall off’n dat cleef. Oh, he beeg cleef, more’n t’ousand feet high!”

“Mashed plum ter mush, I reckon?” queried Ephraim, while the boys, who had caught a twinkle in old Joe’s eye, listened to see the storekeeper’s discomfiture.

“No, Clemente, he not mashed to pieces. Leesten, I tell you how Clemente die. He was miner. Ver’ well. One day Clemente take peek, shofel an’ he go to aidge of dis cleef. Clemente, he have on one beeg pair rubbaire boots. Oh, ver’ beeg rubbaire boots. Bien! Clemente, he work an’ teenk he strike fine colors. Zee colors of gold. He get ver’ excited. He deeg an’ deeg, an’ bimeby he deeg so hard zee aidge of zee cleef geev way.

“Bang! Clemente, over he go right into zee air. He land on zee ground below, but den hees rubbaire boots begin to work. Clemente, he bounce back. Jus’ lak zee rubbaire ball. He bounce up and down, up and down and no one can stop Clemente. He bounce all zee day, and once in a while some of zee boys from zee camp zey t’row heem biscuits to keep Clemente from starving. But Clemente, he no can catch zem. Two days he bounce up and down and no stop.

“Den zee head man of zee camp, he say: ‘Boys, Clemente, he starve if we no do someteeng. We have to put heem out of zee misery of die lak dat way. Somebody have to shoot Clemente.’ Everybody say, ‘No, no,’ but zee boss, he make dem draw lot. Man name Beeg Terry, he be zee one as draw lot to shoot Clemente. Everybody feel ver’ bad, but no can be help. Beeg Terry, he shoot Clemente zee next mornin’. Poor fellow, it was hard on heem, but it was better dan starving to deat’ in meed-air. After dat, nobody go near zee cleef wiz rubbaire boots on zeer feet.”

This truly remarkable and pathetic narrative brought the evening to a close, as a glance at Ephraim’s alarm clock showed that it was almost eleven o’clock. With old Joe still chuckling triumphantly over the manner in which he had “capped” Ephraim’s brief and truthful story, they turned in, sleeping in regular beds for the first time since they had taken to the trail.