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Chapter Eleven.
To the Rescue
Elsie and Cora Ravenshaw were seated at a table in Willow Creek, with their mother and Miss Trim, repairing garments, one night in that same inclement January of which we have been writing.
Mr Ravenshaw was enjoying his pipe by the stove, and Louis Lambert was making himself agreeable. The old man was a little careworn. No news had yet been received of Tony or of Victor. In regard to the latter he felt easy; Victor could take care of himself, and was in good company, but his heart sank when he thought of his beloved Tony. What would he not have given to have had him smashing his pipe or operating on his scalp at that moment.
“It is an awful winter,” observed Elsie, as a gust of wind seemed to nearly blow in the windows.
“I pity the hunters in the plains,” said Cora. “They say a rumour has come that they are starving.”
“I heard of that, but hope it is not true,” observed Lambert.
“Oh! they always talk of starving,” said old Ravenshaw. “No fear of ’em.”
At that moment there was a sound of shuffling in the porch, the door was thrown open, and a gaunt, haggard man, with torn, snow-sprinkled garments, pale face, and bloodshot eyes, stood pictured on the background of the dark porch.
“Baptiste Warder!” exclaimed Lambert, starting up.
“Ay, what’s left o’ me; and here’s the remains o’ Winklemann,” said Warder, pointing to the cadaverous face of the starving German, who followed him.
Need we say that the hunters received a kindly welcome by the Ravenshaw family, as they sank exhausted into chairs. The story of starvation, suffering, and death was soon told—at least in outline.
“You are hungry. When did you eat last?” asked Mr Ravenshaw, interrupting them.
“Two days ago,” replied Warder, with a weary smile.
“It seems like two veeks,” observed the German, with a sigh.
“Hallo! Elsie, Cora, victuals!” cried the sympathetic old man, turning quickly round.
But Elsie, whose perceptions were quick, had already placed bread and beer on the table.
“Here, have a drink of beer first,” said the host, pouring out a foaming glass.
Warder shook his head. Winklemann remarked that, “beer vas goot, ver goot, but they had been used to vatter of late.”
“Ah!” he added, after devouring half a slice of bread while waiting for Cora to prepare another; “blessed brod an’ booter! Nobody can know vat it is till he have starve for two veek—a—I mean two days; all de same ting in my feel—”
The entrance of a huge bite put a sudden and full stop to the sentence.
“Why did you not stop at some of the houses higher up the river to feed?” asked Lambert.
Warder explained that they meant to have done so, but they had missed their way. They had grown stupid, he thought, from weakness. When they lost the way they made straight for the river, guided by the pole-star, and the first house they came in sight of was that of Willow Creek.
“How can the pole-star guide one?” asked Cora, in some surprise.
“Don’t you know?” said Lambert, going round to where Cora sat, and sitting down beside her. “I will explain.”
“If I did know I wouldn’t ask,” replied Cora coquettishly; “besides, I did not put the question to you.”
“Nay, but you don’t object to my answering it, do you?”
“Not if you are quite sure you can do so correctly.”
“I think I can, but the doubts which you and your sister so often throw on my understanding make me almost doubt myself,” retorted Lambert, with a laughing glance at Elsie. “You must know, then, that there is a constellation named the Great Bear. It bears about as much resemblance to a bear as it does to a rattlesnake, but that’s what astronomers have called it. Part of it is much more in the shape of a plough, and one of the stars in that plough is the pole-star. You can easily distinguish it when once you know how, because two of the other stars are nearly in line with it, and so are called ‘pointers.’ When you stand looking at the pole-star you are facing the north, and of course, when you know where the north is, you can tell all the other points of the compass.”
It must not be supposed that the rest of the party listened to this astronomical lecture. The gallant Louis had sought to interest Elsie as well as Cora, but Elsie was too much engrossed with the way-worn hunters and their sad tale to think of anything else. When they had eaten enough to check the fierce cravings of hunger they related more particulars.
“And now,” said Warder, sitting erect and stretching his long arms in the air as if the more to enjoy the delightful sensation of returning strength, “we have pushed on at the risk of our lives to save time. This news must be carried at once to the Governor. The Company can help us best in a fix like this.”
“Of course, of course; I shall send word to him at once,” said his host.
“All right, Baptiste,” said Lambert, coming forward, “I expected you’d want a messenger. Here I am. Black Dick’s in the stable. He’ll be in the cariole in ten minutes. What shall I say to the Governor?”
“I’ll go with you,” answered Warder.
“So vill I,” said Winklemann.
“You’ll do nothing of the sort,” retorted Ravenshaw. “You both need rest. A sound sleep will fit you to do your work more actively in the morning. I myself will go to the fort.”
“Only one can go, at least in my cariole,” remarked Lambert, “for it only holds two, and no one can drive Black Dick but myself.”
Baptiste Warder was immoveable; it ended in his going off in the cariole with Lambert to inform the governor of the colony, who was also chief of the Hudson’s Bay Company in Red River, and to rouse the settlement. They had to pass the cottage of Angus Macdonald on the way.
“Oh! wow!” cried that excitable old settler when he heard the news. “Can it pe possible? So many tead an’ tying. Oh! wow!—Here, Martha! Martha! where iss that wuman? It iss always out of the way she iss when she’s wantit. Ay, Peegwish, you will do equally well. Go to the staple, man, an’ tell the poy to put the mare in the cariole. Make him pe quick; it’s slow he iss at the best, whatever.”
Lambert did not wait to hear the remarks of Angus, but drove off at once. Angus put on his leather coat, fut cap, and mittens, and otherwise prepared himself for a drive over the snow-clad plains to Fort Garry, where the Governor dwelt, intending to hear what was going to be done, and offer his services.
With similarly benevolent end in view, old Ravenshaw harnessed his horse and made for the same goal, regardless alike of rheumatism, age, and inclement weather. At a certain point, not far from the creek, the old trader’s private track and that which led to the house of Angus Macdonald united, and thereafter joined the main road, which road, by the way, was itself a mere track beaten in the snow, with barely room for two carioles to pass. Now, it so happened that the neighbours came up to the point of junction at the same moment. Both were driving hard, being eager and sympathetic about the sufferings of the plain-hunters. To have continued at the same pace would have been to insure a meeting and a crash. One must give way to the other! Since the affair of the knoll these two men had studiously cut each other. They met every Sabbath day in the same church, and felt this to be incongruous as well as wrong. The son of the one was stolen by savages. The son of the other was doing his utmost to rescue the child. Each regretted having quarrelled with the other, but pride was a powerful influence in both. What was to be done? Time for thought was short, for two fiery steeds were approaching each other at the rate of ten miles an hour. Who was to give in?
“I’ll see both carioles smashed to atoms first!” thought Ravenshaw, grinding his teeth.
“She’ll tie first,” thought Angus, pursing his lips.
The instinct of self-preservation caused both to come to a dead and violent halt when within six yards of the meeting-point. A happy thought burst upon Angus at that instant.
“Efter you, sir,” he said, with a palpable sneer, at the same time backing his horse slightly.
It was an expression of mock humility, and would become an evidence of superior courtesy if Ravenshaw should go insolently on. If, on the other hand, he should take it well, a friendly reference to the roads or the weather would convert the sneer into a mere nasal tone.
“Ah, thanks, thanks,” cried Mr Ravenshaw heartily, as he drove past; “bad news that about the plain-hunters. I suppose you’ve heard it.”
“Ay, it iss pad news—ferry pad news inteed, Mister Ruvnshaw. It will pe goin’ to the fort ye are?”
“Yes; the poor people will need all the help we can give them.”
“They wull that; oo ay.”
Discourse being difficult in the circumstances, they drove the remainder of the way in silence, but each knew that the breach between them was healed, and felt relieved. Angus did not, however, imagine that he was any nearer to his desires regarding the knoll. Full well did he understand and appreciate the unalterable nature of Sam Ravenshaw’s resolutions, but he was pleased again to be at peace, for, to say truth, he was not fond of war, though ready to fight on the smallest provocation.
Baptiste Warder was right in expecting that the Company would lend their powerful aid to the rescue.
The moment the Governor heard of the disaster, he took immediate and active steps for sending relief to the plains. Clothing and provisions were packed up as fast as possible, and party after party was sent out with these. But in the nature of things the relief was slow. We have said that some of the hunters and their families had followed the Indians and buffalo to a distance of between 150 and 200 miles. The snow was now so deep that the only means of transport was by dog-sledges. Dogs, being light and short-limbed, can travel where horses cannot, but even dogs require a track, and the only way of making one on the trackless prairie, or in the forest, is by means of a man on snow-shoes, who walks ahead of the dogs and thus “beats the track.” The men employed, however, were splendid and persevering walkers, and their hearts were in the work.
Both Samuel Ravenshaw and Angus Macdonald gave liberally to the cause; and each obtaining a team of dogs, accompanied one of the relief parties in a dog-cariole. If the reader were to harness four dogs to a slipper-bath, he would have a fair idea of a dog-cariole and team. Louis Lambert beat the track for old Ravenshaw. He was a recognised suitor at Willow Creek by that time. The old gentleman was well accustomed to the dog-cariole, but to Angus it was new—at least in experience.
“It iss like as if she was goin’ to pathe,” he remarked, with a grim smile, on stepping into the machine and sitting down, or rather reclining luxuriously among the buffalo robes.
The dogs attempted to run away with him, and succeeded for a hundred yards or so. Then they got off the track, and discovered that Angus was heavy. Then they stopped, put out their tongues, and looked humbly back for the driver to beat the track for them.
A stout young half-breed was the driver. He came up and led the way until they reached the open plains, where a recent gale had swept away the soft snow, and left a long stretch that was hard enough for the dogs to walk on without sinking. The team was fresh and lively.
“She’d petter hold on to the tail,” suggested Angus.
The driver assented. He had already left the front, and allowed the cariole to pass him, in order to lay hold of the tail-line and check the pace, but the dogs were too sharp for him. They bolted again, ran more than a mile, overturned the cariole, and threw its occupant on the snow, after which they were brought up suddenly by a bush.
On the way the travellers passed several others of the wealthy settlers who were going personally to the rescue. Sympathy for the plain-hunters was universal. Every one lent a willing hand. The result was that the lives of hundreds were saved, though many were lost. Their sufferings were so great that some died on their road to the colony, after being relieved at Pembina. Those found alive had devoured their horses, dogs, raw hides, leather, and their very moccasins. Mr Ravenshaw and his neighbour passed many corpses on the way, two of which were scarcely cold. They also passed at various places above forty sufferers in seven or eight parties, who were crawling along with great difficulty. To these they distributed the provisions they had brought with them. At last the hunters were all rescued and conveyed to the settlement—one man, with his wife and three children, having been dug out of the snow, where they had been buried for five days and nights. The woman and children recovered, but the man died.
Soon after this sad event the winter began to exhibit unwonted signs of severity. It had begun earlier, and continued later than usual. The snow averaged three feet deep in the plains and four feet in the woods, and the cold was intense, being frequently down to forty-five degrees below zero of Fahrenheit’s scale, while the ice measured between five and six feet in thickness on the rivers.
But the great, significant, and prevailing feature of that winter was snow. Never within the memory of man had there been such heavy, continuous, persistent snow. It blocked up the windows so that men had constantly to clear a passage for daylight. It drifted up the doors so that they were continually cutting passages for themselves to the world outside. It covered the ground to such an extent that fences began to be obliterated, and landmarks to disappear, and it weighted the roofs down until some of the weaker among them bid fair to sink under the load.
“A severe winter” was old Mr Ravenshaw’s usual morning remark as he went to the windows, pipe in hand, before breakfast. To which his better half invariably replied, “Never saw anything like it before;” and Miss Trim remarked, “It is awful.”
“It snows hard—whatever,” was Angus Macdonald’s usual observation about the same hour. To which his humble and fast friend Peegwish—who assisted in his kitchen—was wont to answer, “Ho!” and glare solemnly, as though to intimate that his thoughts were too deep for utterance.
Thus the winter passed away, and when spring arrived it had to wage an unusually fierce conflict before it gained the final victory over ice and snow.
Chapter Twelve.
Victory!
But before that winter closed, ay, before it began, a great victory was gained, which merits special mention here. Let us retrace our steps a little.
One morning, while Ian Macdonald was superintending the preparation of breakfast in some far-away part of the western wilderness, and Michel Rollin was cutting firewood, Victor Ravenshaw came rushing into camp with the eager announcement that he had seen the footprints of an enormous grizzly bear!
At any time such news would have stirred the blood of Ian, but at that time, when the autumn was nearly over, and hope had almost died in the breast of our scholastic backwoodsman, the news burst upon him with the thrilling force of an electric shock.
“Now, Ian, take your gun and go in and win,” said Victor with enthusiasm, for the youth had been infected with Rollin’s spirit of gallantry.
“You see,” Rollin had said to Victor during a confidential tête-à-tête, “ven a lady is in de case ye must bow de head. Ian do love your sister. Ver goot. Your sister do vish for a bar-claw collar. Ver goot. Vell, de chance turn up at last—von grizzly bar do appear. Who do shot ’im? Vy, Ian, certaintly. Mais, it is pity he am so ’bominibly bad shot!”
Victor, being an unselfish fellow, at once agreed to this; hence his earnest advice that Ian should take his gun and go in and win. But Ian shook his head.
“My dear boy,” he said, with a sigh, “it’s of no use my attempting to shoot a bear, or anything else. I don’t know what can be wrong with my vision, I can see as clear and as far as the best of you, and I’m not bad, you’ll allow, at following up a trail over hard ground; but when it comes to squinting along the barrel of a gun I’m worse than useless. It’s my belief that if I took aim at a haystack at thirty yards I’d miss it. No, Vic, I must give up the idea of shooting altogether.”
“What! have you forgotten the saying, ‘Faint heart never won fair lady?’” exclaimed Victor, in surprise.
“Nay, lad, my memory is not so short as that, neither is my heart as faint as you seem to think it. I do intend to go in and win, but I shall do it after a fashion of my own, Vic.”
Rollin, who came up at the moment and flung a bundle of sticks on the fire, demanded to know what “vas the vashion” referred to.
“That I won’t tell you at present, boys,” said Ian; “but, if you have any regard for me, you’ll make me a solemn promise not in any way to interfere with me or my plans unless you see me in actual and imminent danger of losing my life.”
“Jus’ so,” said Rollin, with a nod, “ye vill not step in to de reskoo till you is at de very last gasp.”
Having obtained the requisite promise, Ian set off with his comrades to examine the bear’s track. There could be but one opinion as to the size of the grizzly which had made it. As Victor had said, it was enormous, and showed that the animal had wandered about hither and thither, as if it had been of an undecided temperament. Moreover the track was quite fresh.
Of course there was much eager conversation about it among the friends; carried on in subdued tones and whispers, as if they feared that the bear might be listening in a neighbouring bush. After discussing the subject in every point of view, and examining the tracks in every light, they returned to the camp, at Victor’s suggestion, to talk it over more fully, and make preparations for the hunt. Ian, however, cut short their deliberations by reminding his comrades of their promise, and claiming the strict fulfilment of it.
“If this thing is to be undertaken by me,” he said, “I must have it all my own way and do the thing entirely by myself.”
“Nobody objects to your having it all your own way,” retorted Victor, somewhat testily, “but why should you be so secret about it? Why not give a fellow some sort of idea what your plan is, so that, if we can’t have the pleasure of helping you, we may at least enjoy the comfort of thinking about it?”
“No, Vic, no. I won’t give you a hint, because my plan is entirely new, and you would laugh at it; at least it is new to me, for I never heard of its having been attempted with grizzlies before, though I have heard of it in connection with other bears. Besides, I may fail, in which case the less that is known about my failure the better. Only this much will I say, the idea has been suggested to me by the formation of the land hereabouts. You know there is a gap or pass in the rocks just ahead of us, through which the bear seems to have passed more than once in the course of his rambles. Well, that gap is the spot where I will make my attempt. If you follow me to that gap I will at once return to camp and let you manage the matter yourselves.”
“Well, well, do as you please,” said Victor, with a laugh, “and the sooner you set about it the better. Rollin and I will ride away some miles in the opposite direction and see if we can’t get hold of a wild goose for supper.”
“Ha! perhaps de grizzly vill get hold of anoder and a vilder goose for supper,” said Rollin, with a shake of his head.
When his companions had departed, Ian Macdonald cleaned his gun carefully and loaded with ball; then placing his axe in his belt beside his scalping-knife, he proceeded with long and rapid strides towards the gap or pass above referred to. The bear’s track led through this pass, which was a narrow cut, not more than thirty feet wide, in a steep rocky ridge with which the country at that place was intersected for a considerable distance. The ridge itself, and the pass by which it was divided, were thickly covered with trees and dense undergrowth.
The floor of the pass was level, although rugged, and the rocks on either side rose in a sheer precipice, so that whoever should attempt to penetrate without wings to the region beyond must needs go by that narrow cut.
Arrived at the middle of the pass, where it was narrowest, Ian leant his gun against the precipice on one side, took off his coat, tucked up his sleeves, grasped his axe, and attacked a mighty tree. Like Ulysses of old, he swung the axe with trenchant power and skill. Huge chips flew circling round. Ere long a goodly tree creaked, groaned, and finally fell with a crash upon the ground. It was tough work. Ian heaved a sigh of satisfaction and wiped his streaming brow as he surveyed the fallen monarch. There was another king of the same size near to the opposite precipice, which he felled in the same way. Both monarchs mingled and severely injured their royal heads in the middle of the pass, which thus became entirely blocked up, for our woodsman had so managed that the trees fell right across it.
Next, Ian attacked the united heads, and with great labour hewed a passage through them, near to a spot where a large boulder lay. Selecting another forest king, Ian cut it so that one end of it fell on the boulder. The result of all this hewing and guiding of the falling monarchs was that the only available track through the pass was a hole about four feet in diameter, with a tree of great weight suspended above it by the boulder.
To chop off the branches and convert this latter tree into a log did not take long. Neither did it take much time or exertion to fashion a sort of support, or trigger, in the shape of a figure 4, immediately under the log, so as to obstruct the hole before mentioned. But to lower the log gently from the boulder on to this trigger without setting it off was a matter of extreme difficulty, requiring great care and much time, for the weight of the log was great, and if it should once slip to the ground, ten Ian Macdonalds could not have raised it up again. It was accomplished at last, however, and several additional heavy logs were leaned upon the main one to increase its weight.
“If he returns this way at all, he will come in the evening,” muttered Ian to himself, as he sat down on a stump and surveyed his handiwork with a smile of satisfaction. “But perhaps he may not come back till morning, in which case I shall have to watch here all night, and those impatient geese in the camp will be sure to disturb us on the plea that they feared I had been killed—bah! and perhaps he won’t come at all!”
This last idea was not muttered; it was only thought, but the thought banished the smile of satisfaction from Ian’s face. In a meditative mood he took up his gun, refreshed the priming and slightly chipped the flint, so as to sharpen its edge and make sure of its striking fire.
By that time it was long past noon, and the hunter was meditating the propriety of going to a neighbouring height to view the surrounding country, when a slight noise attracted his attention. He started, cocked his gun, glared round in all directions, and held his breath.
The noise was not repeated. Gradually the frown of his brows melted, the glare of his eyes abated, the tension of his muscles was relaxed, and his highly-wrought feelings escaped in a long-drawn sigh.
“Pshaw ’twas nothing. No bear in its senses would roam about at such an hour, considering the row I have been kicking up with hacking and crashing. Come, I’ll go to the top of that crag, and have a look round.”
He put on his coat and belt, stuck his axe and knife into the latter, shouldered his gun, and went nimbly up the rocky ascent on his left.
Coming out on a clear spot at the crag which had attracted him, he could see the whole pass beneath him, except the spot where his trap had been laid. That portion was vexatiously hidden by an intervening clump of bushes. Next moment he was petrified, so to speak, by the sight of a grizzly bear sauntering slowly down the pass as if in the enjoyment of an afternoon stroll.
No power on earth—except, perhaps, a glance from Elsie—could have unpetrified Ian Macdonald at that moment. He stood in the half-crouching attitude of one about to spring over the cliff—absolutely motionless—with eyes, mouth, and nostrils wide open, as if to afford free egress to his spirit.
Not until the bear had passed slowly out of sight behind the intervening bushes was he disenchanted. Then, indeed, he leaped up like a startled deer, turned sharp round, and bounded back the way he had come, with as much caution and as little noise as was compatible with such vigorous action.
Before he had retraced his steps ten yards, however, he heard a crash! Well did he know what had caused it. His heart got into his threat somehow. Swallowing it with much difficulty, he ran on, but a roar such as was never uttered by human lungs almost stopped his circulation. A few seconds brought Ian within view of his trap, and what a sight presented itself!
A grizzly bear, which seemed to him the hugest, as it certainly was at that moment the fiercest, that ever roamed the Rocky Mountains, was struggling furiously under the weight of the ponderous tree, with its superincumbent load of logs. The monster had been caught by the small of the back—if such a back can be said to have possessed a small of any kind—and its rage, mingled as it must have been with surprise, was awful to witness.
The whole framework of the ponderous trap trembled and shook under the influence of the animal’s writhings. Heavy though it was, the bear shook it so powerfully at each spasm of rage, that it was plainly too weak to hold him long. In the event of his breaking out, death to the trapper was inevitable.
Ian did not hesitate an instant. His chief fear at the moment was that his comrades at the camp might have heard the roaring—distant though they were from the spot—and might arrive in time to spoil, by sharing, his victory.
Victory? Another struggle such as that, and victory would have rested with the bear! Ian resolved to make sure work. He would put missing out of the question. The tremendous claws that had already worked a small pit in the earth reminded him of the collar and of Elsie. Leaping forward, he thrust the point of his gun into the ear of the infuriated animal and pulled the trigger. He was almost stunned by the report and roar, together with an unwonted shock that sent him reeling backward.
We know not how a good twist-barrelled gun would behave if its muzzle were thus stopped, but the common Indian gun used on this occasion was not meant to be thus treated. It was blown to pieces, and Ian stood gazing in speechless surprise at the fragment of wood remaining in his hand. How far it had injured the bear he could not tell, but the shot had not apparently abated its power one jot, for it still heaved upwards in a paroxysm of rage, and with such force as nearly to overthrow the complex erection that held it down. Evidently there was no time to lose.
Ian drew his axe, grasped it with both hands, raised himself on tiptoe, and brought it down with all his might on the bear’s neck.
The grizzly bear is noted for tenacity of life. Ian had not hit the neck-bone. Instead of succumbing to the tremendous blow, it gave the handle of the axe a vicious twist with its paw, which jerked the hunter violently to the ground. Before he could recover himself, the claws which he coveted so much were deep in his right thigh. His presence of mind did not forsake him even then. Drawing his scalping-knife, he wrenched himself round, and twice buried the keen weapon to the haft in the bear’s side.
Just then an unwonted swimming sensation came over Ian; his great strength seemed suddenly to dissipate, and the bear, the claw collar, even Elsie, faded utterly from his mind.
The stars were shining brightly in the calm sky, and twinkling with pleasant tranquillity down upon his upturned countenance when consciousness returned to Ian Macdonald.
“Ah, Vic!” he murmured, with a long sad sigh; “I’ve had such a splendid dream!”
“Come, that’s right, old boy. Here, have another mouthful,” said Victor, holding a tin can to his friend’s lips. “It’s only tea, hot and strong—the best thing in the world to refresh a wounded man; and after such a fight—”
“What!” exclaimed Ian, starting and sitting bolt upright, while he gazed in the faces of his two comrades. “Is it true? Have I killed the—the—grizzly?”
“Killed him!” exclaimed Victor, rising; “I should think you have.”
“Killed ’im!” echoed Rollin. “You’s killed ’im two or tree time over; vy, you’s axed ’im, stabbed ’im, shotted ’im, busted ’im, squashed ’im—ho!—”
“Am I much damaged?” inquired Ian, interrupting, for he felt weak.
“Oh! no—noting whatsocomever. Only few leetil holes in you’s legs. Be bedder in a veek.”
“Look here,” said Victor, kneeling beside the wounded man and presenting to him a piece of wood on which were neatly arranged a row of formidable claws. “I knew you would like to see them.”
“How good of you, Vic! It was thoughtful of you, and kind. Put them down before me—a little nearer—there,—so.”
Ian gazed in speechless admiration. It was not that he was vain of the achievement; he was too sensible and unselfish for that; but it was such a pleasure to think of being able, after all, and in spite of his bad shooting, to present Elsie with a set of claws that were greatly superior to those given to her mother by Louis Lambert—the finest, in short, that he had ever seen.
