CHAPTER TWENTY.
LITTLE BILL BECOMES A DIFFICULTY.
We must now pass over another winter, during which the Red Riversettlers had to sustain life as they best might--acquiring, however, indoing so, an expertness in the use of gun and trap and fishing-line, andin all the arts of the savages, which enabled them to act with moreindependence, and to sustain themselves and their families in greatercomfort than before.
Spring, with all its brightness, warmth, and suggestiveness had returnedto cheer the hearts of men; and, really, those who have neverexperienced the long six-or-eight-months' winter of Rupert's Land canform no conception of the feelings with which the body--to say nothingof the soul--opens up and expands itself, so to speak, in order toreceive and fully appreciate the sweet influences of spring.
For one thing, seven or eight months of cold, biting, steely frostcauses one almost to forget that there ever was such a thing as summerheat, summer scents, summer sounds, or summer skies. The first thaw istherefore like the glad, unexpected meeting of a dear old friend; andthe trumpet voice of the first goose, the whirring wing of the firstduck, and the whistle of the first plover, sounds like the music of thespheres to one's long unaccustomed ears. Then the trickle of watergives one something like a new sensation. It may be but a thread ofliquid no thicker than a pipe-stem faintly heard by an attentive eartinkling in the cold depths far under the ice or snow, but it is liquid,not solid, water. It is suggestive of motion. It had almost beenforgotten as a sound of the long past which had forsaken the terrestrialball for ever.
It does not take a powerful imagination to swell a tiny stream to arivulet, a river, a lake, a mighty ocean. Shut your eyes for a moment,and, in memory, the ice and snow vanish; the streams flow as in the daysof old; flowers come again to gladden the eyes and--but why trouble you,good reader, with all this? We feel, sadly, that unless you have tastedthe northern winter no description, however graphic, will enable you todrink in the spirit of the northern spring.
About this time Okematan, the Cree chief, took it into his head that hewould go a-hunting.
This last word does not suggest to a dweller in the wilderness thatcrossing of ploughed lands on horseback, and leaping of hedges,etcetera, which it conveys to the mind of an Englishman. The Creechief's notion of spring-hunting was, getting into a birch-bark canoe,with or without a comrade, and going forth on the lakes and rivers ofthe wilderness with plenty of powder and shot, to visit the native homeof the wild-goose, the wild-duck, the pelican, the plover, and the swan.
For such a trip not much is essential. Besides the gun and ammunitionreferred to, Okematan carried a blanket, a hatchet, several extra pairsof moccasins, a tin kettle in which to boil food, a fire-bag for steel,flint, and tinder, with a small supply of tobacco.
On hearing of his intention, Dan Davidson resolved to accompany him.Dan had by that time associated so much with the chief that he hadlearned to speak his language with facility. Indeed nearly all thesettlers who had a turn for languages had by that time acquired asmattering more or less of Indian and French.
"You see," said Dan to the chief, "there is not much doing on the farmjust now, and I want to see a little of the country round about, so, ifyou don't object to my company, I'd like to go."
"The Cree chief will be proud to have the company of the Palefacechief," replied the Indian, with grave courtesy.
Dan wanted to say "All right," but was ignorant of the Cree equivalentfor that familiar phrase; he therefore substituted the more sober andcorrect, "It is well."
"But," said he, "you must not call me a Paleface chief, for I am only anordinary man in my own land--what you would call one of the braves."
"Okematan is thought to have a good judgment among his people," returnedthe Indian, "though he has not the snows of many winters on his head,and he thinks that if Dan'el had stayed in the wigwams of his peoplebeyond the Great Salt Lake, he would have been a chief."
"It may be so, Okematan, though I doubt it," replied Dan, "but that is apoint which cannot now be proved. Meanwhile, my ambition at present isto become a great hunter, and I want you to teach me."
The chief, who was gratified by the way in which this was put, gladlyagreed to the proposal.
"There is another man who would like to go with us," said Davidson. "Myfriend, Fergus McKay, is anxious, I know, to see more of the lands ofthe Indian. You have no objection to his going, I suppose?--in anothercanoe of course, for three would be too many in your small canoe."
Okematan had no objection.
"Three would not be too many in the canoe," he said, "but two are betterfor hunting."
"Very good. But we will want a fourth to make two in each canoe. Whomshall we invite?"
"Okematan's counsel is," answered the chief, "to take a brave who isyoung and strong and active; whose eye is quick and his hand steady;whose heart never comes into his throat when danger faces him; whoseface does not grow pale at the sight of approaching death; whose heartis as the heart of the grisly bear for courage, and yet tender as theheart of a Paleface squaw; whose hand can accomplish whatever his headplans, and whose tongue is able to make a sick man smile."
Davidson smiled to himself at this description, which the chief utteredwith the sententious gravity that would have characterised his speechand bearing in a council of war.
"A most notable comrade, good Okematan; but where are we to find him,for I know nobody who comes near to that description."
"He dwells in your own wigwam," returned the chief.
"In Prairie Cottage?" exclaimed the other with a puzzled air. "Youcan't mean my brother Peter, surely, for he is about as grave asyourself."
"Okematan means the young brave who loves his little brother."
"What! Archie Sinclair?" exclaimed Dan, with a surprised look. "I hadno idea you had so high an opinion of him."
"Okematan has seen much of Arch-ee: has watched him. He sees that hethinks nothing of himself; that he thinks always for the sick brother,Leetle Beel, and that he will yet be a great chief among the Palefaces."
"Well, now you come to mention it, there _is_ something about Archiethat puts him high above other boys; and I suppose his unselfishness hasmuch to do with it; but don't you think he's too young, and hardlystrong enough?"
"He is not young. He is fifty years old in wisdom. He is very strongfor his size, and he is _willing_, which makes his strength double."
"But he will never consent to leave Little Bill," said Dan.
"Okematan had fears of that," returned the Indian, with, for the firsttime, a look of perplexity on his face. "If Arch-ee will not go withoutLeetle Beel, Leetle Beel must go too."
It was found, on inquiry, that they were right in their surmise. Whenthe proposal was made to Archie that afternoon by Dan, the boy's eyesseemed to light up and dance in his head at the prospect. Then thelight suddenly went out, and the dancing ceased.
"Why, what's the matter, Archie?" asked his friend.
"Can't go. Impossible!" said Archie.
"Why not?"
"Who's to look after Little Bill, I should like to know, if I leavehim?"
"Elspie, of course," said Dan, "and Elise, to say nothing of Jessie,mother, and brother Peter."
Archie shook his head.
"No," he said, "no! I can't go. Elspie is all very well in her way,and so is Elise, but _they_ can't carry Little Bill about the fields andthrough the bush on their backs; and Peter wouldn't; he's too busy aboutthe farm. No--ever since mother died, I've stuck to Little Bill throughthick and thin. So I _won't_ go."
It was so evident that Archie Sinclair's mind was made up and fixed, andalso so obvious that a delicate little boy would be a great encumbranceon a hunting expedition that Dan thought of attempting the expedient ofwinning Little Bill himself over to his side. He had no difficulty indoing that, for Billie was to the full as amiable and unselfish as hisbrother. After a short conversation, he made Billie promise to do hisvery best to induce Archie to go with t
he hunters and leave him behind.
"For you know, Little Bill," said Dan in conclusion, and by way ofconsoling him, "although nobody could take such good care of you asArchie, or make up to you for him, Elspie would take his place very wellfor a time--."
"O yes, I know that well enough," said the poor boy with someenthusiasm; "Elspie is always very good to me. You've no notion hownice she is, Dan."
"Hm! well, I have got a sort of a half notion, maybe," returned Dan witha peculiar look. "But that's all right, then. You'll do what you canto persuade Archie, and--there he is, evidently coming to see you, soI'll go and leave you to talk it over with him."
Billie did not give his brother time to begin, but accosted him on hisentrance with--"I'm so glad, Archie, that you've been asked to go onthis hunting expe--"
"O! you've heard of it, then?"
"Yes, and I want you to go, very very much, because--because--"
"Don't trouble yourself with _becauses_, Little Bill, for I won't go.So there's an end of it--unless," he added, as if a thought had suddenlyoccurred to him, "unless they agree to take you with them. They mightdo worse. I'll see about that."
So saying, Archie turned about, left the room as abruptly as he hadentered it, and sought out Okematan. He found that chief sitting in LaCerte's wigwam, involved in the mists of meditation and tobacco-smoke,gazing at Slowfoot.
That worthy woman--who, with her lord and little child, was wont toforsake her hut in spring, and go into the summer-quarters of a wigwam--was seated on the opposite side of a small fire, enduring Okematan'smeditative gaze, either unconsciously or with supreme indifference.
"Hallo! Oke,"--thus irreverently did Archie address the chief--had anyone else ventured to do so, he might possibly have been scalped--"Hallo!Oke, I've been huntin' for you all round. You're worse to find than anarrow in the grass."
It may be said, here, that Archie had learned, like some of the othersettlers, a smattering of the Cree language. How he expressed the abovewe know not. We can only give the sense as he would probably have givenit in his own tongue.
"Okematan's friends can always find him," answered the Indian with agrave but pleased look.
"So it seems. But I say, Oke, I want to ask a favour of you. DanDavidson tells me you want me to go a-hunting with you. Well, I'm yourman if you'll let me take Little Bill with me. Will you?"
"Leetle Beel is not strong," objected the Indian.
"True, but a trip o' this sort will make him strong perhaps. Anyhow, itwill make him stronger."
"But for a sick boy there is danger," said the chief. "If Arch-eeupsets his canoe in a rapid, Arch-ee swims on shore, but Leetle Beelgoes to the bottom."
"Not as long as Arch-ee is there to hold him up," returned the boy.
"Waugh!" exclaimed the Indian.
"Humph!" remarked the boy. "What d'ye mean by `Waugh,' Oke?"
"Okematan means much that it is not in the power of the tongue to tell,"replied the Indian with increasing gravity; and as the gravity increasedthe cloudlets from his lips became more voluminous.
"Arch-ee hopes, nevertheless, that the tongue of Oke may find power totell him a little of what he thinks."
This being in some degree indefinite, the chief smoked in silence for aminute or two, and gazed at Slowfoot with that dreamy air which oneassumes when gazing into the depths of a suggestive fire. Apparentlyinspiration came at last--whether from Slowfoot or not we cannot tell--for he turned solemnly to the boy.
"Rain comes," he said, "and when sick men get wet they grow sicker.Carrying-places come, and when sick men come to them they stagger andfall. Frost often comes in spring, and when sick men get cold they die.Waugh!"
"Humph!" repeated the boy again, with a solemnity quite equal to that ofthe Red-man.
"When rain comes I can put up an umbrella--an _umbrella_. D'you knowwhat that is?"
The Indian shook his head.
"Well it's a--a thing--a sort of little tent--a wigwam, you know, with astick in the middle to hold on to and put it up. D'you understand?"
An expression of blank bewilderment, so to speak, settled on the chief'svisage, and the lights of intelligence went out one by one until hepresented an appearance which all but put the boy's gravity to flight.
"Well, well, it's of no use my tryin' to explain it," he continued."I'll show it to you soon, and then you'll understand."
Intelligence began to return, and the chief looked gratified.
"What you call it?" he asked--for he was of an inquiring disposition--"abum-rella?"
"No, no," replied the other, seriously, "an um_brella_. It's a clevercontrivance, as you shall see. So, you see, I can keep the rain offLittle Bill when he's in the canoe, and on shore there are the trees,and the canoe itself turned bottom up. Then, at carryin' places, I cancarry Little Bill as well as other things. He's not heavy and doesn'tstruggle, so we won't leave him to stagger and fall. As to frost--havewe not hatchets, and are there not dead trees in the forest? Frost andfire never walk in company, so that Little Bill won't get cold and die,for we'll keep him warm--waugh!"
When human beings are fond of each other disagreement seldom lasts long.Okematan had taken so strong a fancy to Archie that he felt itimpossible to hold out; therefore, being a man of strong common sense,he did not attempt the impossible.
Thus it came to pass that, two days later, a couple of birch-bark canoeswere launched on the waters of Red River, with Dan Davidson in the sternof one and Fergus McKay acting as his bowman. Okematan took the sternof the other, while Archie Sinclair wielded the bow-paddle, and LittleBill was placed in the middle on a comfortable green blanket with thecelebrated "bum-rella" erected over him to keep off, not the rain, but,the too glorious sunshine.
The Buffalo Runners: A Tale of the Red River Plains Page 20
