The Cruise of the Snowbird: A Story of Arctic Adventure
Page 26
noses.
"Don't they look happy?" said Rory, "and wouldn't they eat nicely?"
"Which reminds me," said Allan, "that I've something good in my bag."
"And ain't I hungry just!" Rory said; and his eyes sparkled as Allanproduced, all neatly begirt with a towel of sparkling whiteness, a dishcontaining a pie of such delicious flavour that when it was finished,and washed down with what Rory, mimicking the rich brogue of hiscountrymen, called "a taste of the stramelet," they both thought theyhad never dined so well before.
Half-a-dozen wood-pigeons flew hurriedly over them. Rory seized Allan'sgun and fired, and one dropped dead within a dozen yards of them. Sucha beauty, so plump and so large.
"That is our game," cried Rory; "let us on to the wood. We'll get suchbags as will make Ralph chew his tongue with regret that he wasn't withus."
"Hoo-hoo-hooo-o!" resounded from the spruce thickets as they neared thewoods.
"Here, at them?" cried Allan, excitedly. "Now for it, my boy!"
"Yes," said Rory; "it's all very well, but I can't pot them so well withthe rifle."
"Then in all brotherly love and fairness we'll exchange guns everytwenty minutes."
As it was arranged so it was carried out. They crept along under thetrees.
"Hoo-hoo-hooo-o!" cried the great blue-grey birds, rising in the air onflapping wings. Bang, bang, bang! Down they came thick and fast. Thesportsmen had many little mishaps, and tore their clothes considerably,but the fun was so "fine" they did not mind that much.
After about three hours of this,--
"I say," says Rory, "isn't it getting duskish!"
"Bless me!" cried Allan, looking at his watch, "I declare it is longpast seven o'clock. Let us start for the brook at once and find ourboat."
"You mustn't shout," said Rory, "till you're out of the wood."
"We came this way, I know," said Allan.
They went that way, but only seemed to get deeper and deeper into theforest. They tried another direction with the same result; another andanother, but all to no purpose. Then they looked at each other inconsternation.
"We're lost!" cried Allan. "How could we have been so mad?"
"We can gain nothing, though," said Rory, "by crying about it;" and down_he_ sat.
"I see nothing for it but to follow your example," said Allan,dolefully; and down he sat also.
"What a pretty little pair of babes in the wood we make, don't we?"continued Allan, after a pause.
"What a pity we ate all Peter's pie, though," says Rory; "but we won'tlet down our hearts. The moon will be up ere long, but sleep hereto-night we'll have to. If we tried now to find our way we'd only begoing round and round, with no more chance of finding our way than a doghas of catching his tail."
Presently there was a whirring noise, and a great black bird, apparentlyas big as a Newfoundland, alighted on an adjoining tree.
"It is an eagle," said Rory. "Down with him."
"It's a wild turkey," said Allan, coming back with the spoil.
He had hardly laid it down when an immense, great, gaunt, andhungry-looking wolf seemed to start from the very earth in front ofthem. Rory fired, but missed.
"In case," said Allan, "we have a visit from any more of these gentry,let us light a fire."
This was soon done, and the blaze from the burning wood caused the gloomof the forest to close around them like a thick black pall, and, lit upby the glare of the fire, their faces and figures stood out in boldrelief. It was like a picture of Rembrandt's.
"In the morning, you know," Allan remarked, "we will find our way out ofthe wood by blazing the trees."
"What, would you set fire to the forest?" laughed Rory.
"No, Mr Greenhorn," said Allan, "only chip a bit of bark here and thereoff the trees' stems to prevent us from going round in a circle."
"Well," said Rory, "you know how the thing is done, I don't."
The night wore on; it was very quiet in that gloomy pine-wood. The moonrose slowly over the horizon, but her beams could hardly penetrate thethick branches of the spruce firs. The fire burnt low, only startingoccasionally into a fitful blaze; the two friends from talking fell tonodding, then their weary heads dropped on their arms, and they slept.
But is this forest quite so deserted as the two friends imagined? No;for behold that dark figure gliding swiftly from tree to tree throughthe chequered moonlight; and now the branches are pushed aside, and hestands erect before them. Tall he is, gaunt and ungainly, dressed fromthe crown of the head to his moccasined feet in skins, and armed withgun, dagger, and revolver. He stands for a moment in silence, thenquite aloud, and with a strong Yankee nasal twang,--
"Well, I'm skivered!" he says.
Rory rose on his feet first, and had his rifle at the stranger's neck inthe twinkling of an eye.
"Who are you?" he cries. "Speak quick, or I fire!"
"Seth," was the reply. "Now put aside that tool, or see if I don't puta pill through you."
"What seek you here?"
"Well!" said Seth, "I _do_ like cheek when it is properly carried out.Here you two chaps have been a-prowling round my premises all day, anda-potting at my pigeons; you've been and shot my pet turkey, and you'vefired at my mastiff, and now you ask me what I want on my own property.I've heard of cheek before, but this licks all."
"Well, well, well!" cried Allan, laughing, "I declare we thought theland uninhabited."
"So it is," said the Yankee; "there ain't a soul within three days'journey o' here, bar old trapper Seth that you see before you."
"And we took your mastiff for a wolf," said Rory, "and your turkey for agaberlunzie. Troth, it's too bad entirely."
[Gaberlunzie, _Scottice_ for an old beggar man. Rory no doubt meant tosay capercailzie, the wild turkey of the Scottish woods.]
"You see there are no game laws in this land, and no trespass lawseither," said Seth, "else I'd take you prisoners; but if you'll come andhelp old Seth to eat his supper, it'll be more of a favour than anythingelse, that's all."
"That we will, with pleasure," said Rory and Allan, both in one breath.
Seth's cottage was about as wild and uncouth as himself or his mastiff.No wonder, by the way, they took the latter for a wolf, but the trappermade them right welcome. The venison steaks were delicious, andalthough they had to "fist" them, knives and forks being unknown inSeth's log hut, they enjoyed them none the less. After supper thissolitary trapper, who felt civilised life far too crowded for him,entertained them with tales of his adventures till long past midnight;then he spread them couches of skins, and their slumbers thereon werecertainly sweeter than they would have been in the centre of the coldforest.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN.
OSCAR FINDS THE TRUANTS--BREAKFAST FOR SEVEN--SETH SPINS A YARN--THEWALRUS-HUNTERS--THE INDIANS--BEAUTIFUL SCENERY--A WEEK'S GOOD SPORT.
Rap--rap--rap! Rat--tat--tat--tat!
"What, ho! within there." Rat--tat--tat!
Bow--wow--wow.
Old Seth had been up hours ago, and far away in the forest, but sleepstill sealed the eyelids of both Allan and Rory, although it must havebeen pretty nearly eight bells, in the morning watch.
Rat--tat--tat! "Hi! hi! any one within?"
After a considerable deal of the silly sort of dreaming that heavysleepers persist in conducting on such occasions, when you are tryingyour very best to awake them, Rory first, then Allan heard the sound,became sensible at once, and sprang from their couches of skins.
"Why," cried Rory, "it is McBain's voice as sure as a gun is a gun."
"That it is," said the gentleman referred to, entering the wigwam,accompanied by Ralph and Oscar, "and if I had known the door was onlylatched, it is in I would have been to shake you. Pretty pair oftruants you are."
"Indeed," said Ralph, "we had almost given you up for lost, and a wearynight of suspense we have had."
You may be sure Oscar the Saint Bernard was not slow in expressing hisdelight at this reunion. Some large dogs a
re not demonstrative, butOscar was an exception; he was not even content with simply leaping onAllan's shoulders and half smothering him with caresses. No, this wouldnot satisfy a dog of his stamp; he must let off the steam somehow, so heseized Allan's hat, and next moment he was careering round and roundamong the forest trees, in a circle with a radius of about fifty yards,and at the rate of twenty knots an hour. Having thus relieved