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"Hello! Come to supper, boys! Come to supper right away!"
Half eagerly, half shrinkingly, Dol emerged from the woods, feeling a very torment of hunger quickened in him by the tantalizing sound of that oft-repeated invitation.
A sight met him which, because of what went before and all that came after, will be forever chief among the forest pictures which rise in exciting panorama before his memory, when camping is a thing of the past.
A broad dash of evening light, the sun's afterglow, fell upon a patch of clearing bordered by clumps of slim, outstanding pines, the scouts of their massive brethren. That this was used as a camping-ground the first glance revealed. A camp which looked to the tired eyes of the lost boy a real "home-camp," though it consisted of rude log cabins, occupied it. A couple of birch-bark canoes reposed amid a network of projecting roots. Withered stumps and tree-tops littered the ground.
In the foreground of the picture stood a man with a horn in his uplifted hand, which he had just taken from his mouth. He was minus a coat; and the rough-and-tumble disarray of his attire showed that he had been lounging by his camp-fire, or perhaps overseeing the preparation of supper. Dol had a vague impression that the individual was not a forest-guide like Uncle Eb, nor a rough lumberman such as he had heard of. He would have taken him for a pioneer farmer,—not having yet encountered such a character,—but there could be no farm on this little bit of clearing. And he was too dazed to see that there were signs of a cultivated intelligence in the tanned, beaming face under the horn-blower's broad-brimmed hat. Indeed, the hat itself, its wearer, log huts, canoes, and trees seemed to have a strange propensity to waltz before the lad's eyes, and there was a queer waving sensation in his own legs, as if they, too, would join in the spinning movement. For as he advanced into the light out of the sombre shadows, a dizziness from long tramping in the woods, and from a hunger such as he had never before experienced, overcame him. He reeled against an outstanding tree, troubled by an affliction which Uncle Eb had called "wheels in his head."
"Ho! you boys. Where in thunder are you? Come to supper, or the venison will be spoiled!" shouted the possessor of the horn again, shutting one eye into which a crimson ray was pouring, while he swept the skirts of the woods with the other; and there was music as well as bluster in his shout.
Lo! the first to answer this fetching invitation was the foot-sore, leg-weary boy, pale from exhaustion, with his strange equipment of powder-horn, coon-skin pouch, and ancient shot-gun, who, getting partly the better of his giddiness, crossed the clearing slowly, as if he was groping his way. Within a few feet of the horn-blower he halted; for the man had lowered his horn, and was gazing at him with keen, questioning eyes. Dol tried to find suitable speech to express his need; but though words came with considerable effort, his voice sounded hoarse and creaky in his own ears, and threatened to crack off altogether.
He was doing his best to brace up and speak plainly, when his sentence was stopped by a noise of pounding footsteps. The next moment he saw himself surrounded by three well-grown, daring-looking lads, one about his own age, one older, one younger, who were gazing at him with critical curiosity. All the pluck in Dol Farrar rose to meet this emergency. He felt as if his legs were threatening to smash under him like pipe-stems. There was a whirling and buzzing in his head. It seemed as if his words had such a long way to travel from his brain to his tongue that they got confused and changed before he uttered them.
But through it all he was conscious of one clear thought: that he was an Old-World boy on parade before these strapping New-World lads. He set his teeth, drove his gun hard against the ground, and, as it were, anchored himself to it, while strange, doubting lights came into his eyes as he tried to get a grip of his senses.
Dol Sights A Friendly Camp.
Dol Sights A Friendly Camp.
He succeeded. At last he addressed the gentleman with the horn, knowing that he was speaking to the point,—
"Good-evening, sir," he said. "I—I—we're camping out somewhere in the woods. I—I got lost to-day. I've walked an awful distance. Perhaps you could tell me"—
But the man stepped suddenly forward, with a blaze of welcome in his eyes; for he saw the brave effort which the lad was making, and that his strength was giving out. He put a kindly arm through Dol's, as if to warmly greet a fellow-camper, but really to support him.
"I'll not tell you about anything until you've had a good, square meal," he said. "That's our way in woodland quarters,—to eat first, and talk afterwards. If you're lost, you've struck a friend's camp, and at the right time too, son; so cheer up! After supper you can tell us your yarn, and I guess we can set you right."
Here at last was a surprise of unmixed blessedness for poor Dol; namely, the brotherly hospitality which is always extended to a stranger in a Maine camp, whether that be the temporary home of a millionnaire or the shanty of a poor logger.
His new friend led him into the largest of the cabins, which contained a fireplace built of huge stones, where red flames frisked around fragrant birch logs, a camp-bed of evergreen boughs about ten feet wide, a rude table, a bench, and a few stools of pine-wood.
Over the camp-fire was stooping a bright-eyed, muscular fellow, whose dress somewhat resembled Uncle Eb's, but who had no negro blood in his veins. He was frying meat; and such tempting whiffs mingled with the steam which floated up from his pan, that Dol's nostrils twitched, and his hungry longing grew almost unbearable as he inhaled them.
"I guess this chunk of ven'zon is about cooked, Doc," said this personage, as Dol's kindly host entered the hut, with him in tow, followed closely by the boys of his own camp.
"All right, then! Let's have it!" was the reply. "I'm pretty glad our camp-fare is decent to-night, Joe, for we've a visitor here; a hungry bird who has strayed from his own camp, and has wandered through the forest until he looks like a death's head. But we'll soon fix him up; won't we, Joe? Give him a mug of hot tea right away. Hot tea is worth a dozen of any other drink in the woods for a pick-me-up."
A spark of fun kindled in Dol's eyes when he heard himself described as "a hungry bird." It brightened into an appreciative beam as the reviving tea trickled down his throat.
"Eatin's wot he wants, I guess," said Joe, the camp guide and cook, placing some meat and a slab of bread of his own baking on a tin plate for the guest.
Dol began on them greedily; and though the first mouthful or two threatened to sicken him, his squeamishness wore off, and he gained strength with every morsel.
"How do you like Maine venison, my boy? Like it well enough to have another piece, eh?" asked his host, when he saw that the haggard, gray look was leaving the wanderer's face, and that the appalled, dazed expression, the result of being lost in the woods, had disappeared from his eyes.
"I think it's the best meat I ever tasted," answered Dol heartily. "It's so tender, and has a splendid taste."
"Ha! ha! It ought to be prime," chuckled the owner of the camp. "It was cut from the quarters of a buck which my nephew here, Royal Sinclair," pointing out the tallest of three lads, "shot four days ago. He was a regular crackerjack—that buck! I mean, he was as fine a deer as ever I saw; weighed over two hundred pounds, had seven prongs to his horns on one side and six on the other. Royal is going to take the antlers home with him to Philadelphia. We were mighty glad to get him, too; for we have been camping here for five weeks, and were running short of provisions. Roy had quite an attack of buck-fever over it, though he didn't think he was killing the 'fatted calf', to entertain a visitor; did you, Roy?"
"I guess not, Uncle! But I'm pretty glad, all the same," answered Royal, with a smiling glance at Dol.
Young Farrar found himself in very pleasant quarters; and, now that he was recovering, his laugh rang from one log wall to the other.
"What's 'buck-fever'?" he questioned, while Joe filled his plate with more venison.
"A sort of disease of which you'll learn the meaning before you leave these woods," answered his host merrily. "It attacks a man when he's out after a deer, and makes him feel as if one leg stands firm under him, while the other shakes as if it had the palsy.
"Now I guess you'd like to know whose camp you're in, my boy, and then you can tell your story. Well, to begin with the most useful member of the party. That knowing-looking fellow over there, who cooked your supper, is Joe Flint, the best guide that ever pulled a trigger or handled a frying-pan in this region—barring one. These three rascals," here the speaker beamed upon the strapping lads, with whom Dol had been exchanging sympathetic glances of curiosity, "are my nephews, Royal, Will, and Martin Sinclair. And I—I—
"Good gracious! Listen to that, Joe! What's up now? Another fellow lost in the woods? Somebody is firing a round with his rifle! Perhaps he wants help. Those are signal shots, anyhow!"
The camper whose horn had been Dol's signal of deliverance, broke off abruptly in his introductions, just as he had arrived at the most interesting point, and was proclaiming his own identity. He rattled off his short exclamations in excitement, and dashed out of the cabin, followed by Joe, his nephews, and Dol, the latter limping painfully, for his feet now felt like hot-water bags.
"That Winchester has spoken eight or ten times," said the leader, counting the shots fired by somebody away in the dark recesses of the forest from a powerful repeating-rifle. "Let's give the fellow, whoever he is, an answer, Joe!"
He seized his own rifle hastily, loaded the magazine with blank cartridges, and fired a noisy salute.
In the pause which followed, while all strained their ears to listen, the sound of a shrill, distant "Coo-hoo!" the woodsman's hail, reached them from the forest.
Joe instantly responded with a vehement "Coo-hoo! Coo-hoo-oo!" the first call being short and brisk, the second prolonged into a roar which showed the strength of the guide's lungs,—a roar that might carry for miles.
Shortly afterwards there was a crashing and tearing amid some undergrowth near the edge of the forest. A man bounded forth from the pitch-black shadows into the clearing, where a little daylight still lingered. As he approached the group, Dol, who was in the background, gave a startled, yearning cry; but it was drowned in a loud burst from his host.
"Why, Cyrus Garst!" exclaimed the latter, peering into the new-comer's face. "How goes it, man? I never expected to see you here. Surely you haven't come to grief in the woods? You look scared to death!"
Cyrus—for it was he—grasped the welcoming hand which the owner of this camp extended to him. But his dark eyes did not linger a moment meeting the other's. They turned hither and thither, flashing in all directions restlessly, like search-lights.
"I'm glad to see you, Doc," he said. "I didn't know you were anywhere near. But I'm half distracted just now. A youngster belonging to our camp is missing. I've been scouring the forest for hours, and firing signals, hoping he might hear them. But"—
Here Cyrus caught sight of Dol, who with a cry which in its changing inflections was longing, penitent, joyful, was making towards him. The Harvard student strode forward, and gripped the boy by his elbows. In the dusk their eyes were near together; Garst's were stern, Dol's blinking and unsteady.
"Adolphus Farrar," began Cyrus in a voice as if he was making an arrest, "have you been here in this camp, or where have you been, while your brother and I were searching the woods like maniacs? What unheard-of folly possessed you to go off by yourself?"
Dol made a gurgling attempt to answer, but his voice rattled and died away in his throat. His eyes grew decidedly leaky.
"Say, Cyrus!" interrupted the man who had befriended him and now proved his champion, "let the youngster get breath and tell his story from start to finish before you blow him up. I guess he wasn't much to blame; and if he was, he has suffered for it. He found his way here not quite half an hour ago, so played out from wandering through the forest that he was ready to drop in his tracks. And I tell you he showed his grit too; for he managed to brace up and keep on his feet, though he was as exhausted a kid as ever I saw."
The "kid," forgiving this objectionable term because of the soothing allusion to a trying time when he had behaved like a man, winked and gulped to get rid of his emotion, and twisted his elbows out of Cyrus's hold. The latter lost his angry look, and released them.
"I must fire three shots to let Neal and Uncle Eb know I've found you," he said. "We parted company a while ago, and they're beating about the woods in another direction. Whoever first came upon any trace of you was to fire his rifle three times."
The signal was instantly given.
More far-reaching "Coo-hoos!" were exchanged. Ere long Neal was beside his brother, looking at him with eyes which showed the same tendency to leak that Dol's had done a while ago, and battling with a desire to squeeze the wanderer in a breathless hug. He relieved his feelings instead by "blowing up" Dol with withering fire and a rough choke in his voice.
But when, in response to an invitation from the genial camper whom Cyrus and Joe called "Doc," the whole party, guides included, had gathered around the camp-fire in the big log hut, and Dol told his story from start to finish, he became the hero of the evening.
His only fault had been a rash venturing into the unknown; and well it was that he had not followed the unknown to his death.
"Why, boy!" exclaimed Cyrus, with a strong shudder, when Dol had described the false trail which led him to the foot of the crag, "that wasn't a human trail at all. It was a deer-road. The deer spend their day up in the mountains, and come down to the ponds at evening to feed and drink. Now, a buck or doe in its regular journeys to and fro will follow one line, to which it becomes accustomed. Perhaps fifty others, seeing the ground trodden, will run in the same track. And there you have your well-used path, which looks as if it was made by men's feet!
"You may thank your lucky star, Dol, every hour of this night, that the false trail didn't lead you away—away—higher—higher—up the mountain, until you dropped in your tracks, and died there alone, as others have done before."
A shocked hush fell upon the group around the camp-fire. Even the guides were silent. But the fragrant birchen logs sputtered and glowed, darting out playful tongues of flame. They seemed to call upon everybody to dismiss gloomy thoughts of what might have been; to crack jokes, sing songs, tell yarns, and be as merry as befitted men who had a log hut for a shelter, fresh whiffs of forest air stealing to them through an open doorway, and such a camp-fire.
Joe began to prepare supper for the three who had searched so long and distractedly for Dol that they confessed to not having eaten for hours. While more venison was being cooked, the juveniles, American and English, who had been secretly taking stock of each other, cast aside restraint, and became as "chummy" as if they had been acquainted for years instead of hours.
Such a carnival of fun and noise was started through their combined efforts in the old log camp, that its owner declared he "couldn't hear himself think." Seizing his horn, he blew a blast which called for order.
"Say, my boy, let me have a look at your feet," he said, cornering Dol. "A deer-road isn't a king's highway, as I dare say you've found out to your cost. Pull off your moccasins and socks, and let me doctor your poor trotters."
Young Farrar very gladly did as he was bidden.
"Humph!" said his friend. "I thought so. They're a mass of bruises and blisters. You've been pretty well branded, son. Moccasins aren't much use to protect the feet from roots and sharp stones, if you happen to strike a bad place in forest travelling, unless you have taken the precaution to put double soles in them; didn't you know that? Now, Cyrus Garst," turning to the student, "you're all going to camp with us to-night. This lad can't tramp any more. As a doctor I forbid it."
"Are you a doctor, sir?" questioned Dol, with a thrill of surprise, which he managed to conceal.
"Something of the kind, boy," answered his host, smiling. "I don't look much like a city physician, do I? I graduated from a medical college in Philadelphia, and took my degree. But I had an enthusiasm for the woods. One hour of forest life in dear old Maine was to me worth a year spent amid streets, alleys, and sky-scraping buildings; so I fixed my headquarters at Greenville, and have spent most of my time in the wilderness."
"Where every trapper, guide, and lumberman knows Dr. Phil Buck, whom they disrespectfully and affectionately call 'Doc,'" put in Cyrus. "And many a poor fellow owes his life or limbs to Doc's knowledge and nursing in some hard time of sickness, or after one of the dreadful accidents common in the forests."
Dol could well understand this; for he now was benefiting by Dr. Phil's lively desire to relieve suffering, and was silently breathing blessings on his head. The doctor had bathed his puffy feet in warm water taken from Joe's camp-kettle, and was anointing them with a healing salve, after which he tucked them into a loose pair of slippers of his own. Meanwhile, he chatted pleasantly.
"This isn't the first time that your friend Cyrus and I have run against each other in the wilds," he said, "nor the first time that we've camped together, either. Bless you! we could make you jump with some of our stories. Do you remember that night in '89, Cy, when you, with your guide, came upon me lying under a rough shelter of bark and spruce boughs, which I had rigged up for myself near Roaring Brook, on the side of Mount Katahdin?"
"I guess I do remember it," answered Cyrus, laughing.
"A mighty hungry man I was, too, that evening," went on Doc; "for I had no food left but one little package of soup-powder and a few beans. I had been trying all day to get a successful shot at a moose or deer, and muffed it every time. It wasn't the lucky side of the moon for me. Well, you behaved like the Good Samaritan to me, then, Cy; shared your meat and all your stuff, and we slept like twin brothers under my shelter."
"Yes; and a bear visited our temporary camp in the night!" exclaimed Cyrus, bursting into uproarious mirth over some over-poweringly funny recollection; "he made off with my knapsack, which I had left lying by the camp-fire. I suppose old Bruin thought he'd find something good in it to eat; but he didn't. So he tore my one extra shirt and every article in the pack to shreds, and chewed up the handle of my razor, so that I couldn't shave again until I got back to civilization, when I was as bristly as a porcupine."
"Perhaps Bruin tried to shave himself," suggested Dol.
"At all events, he had wisdom enough not to cut his throat," answered the story-teller. "We three—Doc, my guide, and myself—were stupidly tired, and slept so soundly that we did not discover the theft nor who the marauder was until the following morning. Then we found my knapsack gone, and the tracks of a huge bear in some soft earth near our shelter. We traced his footprints through a bog until we found the spot, not far off, where, overcome by greed or curiosity, he ripped up that strong leather knapsack as if it was papier maché and made hay of its contents."
The boys had all crowded near to listen. It was now the social hour for campers. By the camp-fire more reminiscences followed; and the two guides chimed in it with moose stories, bear stories, panther stories, wild tales of every imaginable and unimaginable kind of adventure, until the lads thought no mythology which they had ever learned could rival in marvels the forest lore.
At this opportune time, Neal suddenly thought of describing, or attempting to describe, that strangest of strange calls which he had heard, after the capsizing of the canoe, on the preceding night, when Cyrus and he were jacking for deer on Squaw Pond.
Joe grunted expressively. "So help me! it was the moose call!" he ejaculated. "What say, Doc?"
"I guess it was," answered Dr. Phil. "It was either the cow-moose herself calling, or some hunter imitating her with his birch-bark trumpet. It's a weird sort of experience, to hear that call for the first time; I shouldn't wonder if your heart went whack-whack, lad?"
"I only hope he'll get a chance to hear it again before he goes back to England," said Cyrus.
Forthwith, the Harvard man proceeded to explain that he was bent on pressing forward for a distance of sixty miles or so, to the heart of the wilderness, to search for moose, but that he intended to do the journey in a leisurely, zigzag fashion, camping for a couple of nights at various points, in order to do the honors of the forest to his English comrades.
"So you're English, are you! Ha! Ha! Ho! Ho!" exclaimed the doctor, looking at the young Farrars. "Well, I suppose we'll have to put our best foot foremost to give you a good time in American woods."
"I think that's what we're having, sir—such a jolly good time that we'll never forget it," answered Neal courteously.
"Yes, it's jolly enough now; but I tell you I didn't find it so to-day," grumbled Dol, while his eyes gleamed like polished steel with the light of present fun. "But as long as I live I'll remember the sound of your horn, Doctor, when I was dead-beat."
"Is that so? Well, I guess I'll have to make you a present of that horn, boy, when we part company, and you go back to civilization, and of the piece of birch-bark, too, which led you to our camp. 'Twas Joe who fixed that to the pine near the swamp; for my lads had a habit of following the trail to the alders, looking for moose or deer signs. He scrawled his sentence on it with the end of a cartridge. I guess it would be a sort of curiosity in England."
Dol whooped his delight.
"I'll put it under a glass shade! I'll"—
While he was casting about in his mind for some way of immortalizing that bit of white bark, Doc's genial bluster was heard again,—
"Come! come! you fellows! No more skylarking in this camp to-night! It's high time for all campers to be snoring. Turn in! Turn in!"
But nobody was in a hurry to obey the summons to bed. While hands and feet were being stretched out to the sizzling birch logs for a final toast, Royal Sinclair, who had a trick of speaking very quickly, with a slight click in his utterance, as if his tongue struck his teeth, began to pour some communications into Neal's ear in rapid dashes of talk,—
"This is just about the jolliest night we ever had in the forest, and we've had a staving time all through. We live in Philadelphia, and Uncle Phil—we call him 'Doc' like everybody else—brought us out here for our summer vacation. This old log camp was built several years ago by a hunting-party, of whom he was one. The walls were getting mouldy; but he cleaned up the largest of the huts, with Joe's help, and made it our headquarters. He never needs a guide himself; not a bit of it! He can find his way anywhere through the woods with his compass. But he is a good deal away, so he engaged Joe to go out with us.
"He often starts off at a moment's notice, and travels dozens of miles on foot, or in a birch canoe, if he hears of a bad accident far away in the forest. Sometimes a lumberman or trapper cuts his foot in two, or nearly chops off his leg with his axe; and these poor fellows would probably die while their comrades were lugging them through the woods on a litter, trying to reach a settlement, if it weren't for our Doc.
"Once in a while, when he comes to visit us in Philadelphia, a few people call him a crank, because he lives out here and dresses like a settler; but I call him a regular brick."
"So do I," said Neal with spirit.
"You're awfully lucky to be able to camp out during October," rattled on Roy. "That's the month for moose-hunting, jacking, and all the most exciting sort of fun. We have to go home in a day or two, for our school has reopened, unless"—
"When Royal Sinclair gets a streak of talking, you might as well try to bottle up the Mississippi as to stop him," said Dr. Phil, laughing. "I can't hear what he's saying, but I know that his tongue is clicking like a telegraph instrument. But I hope it has given its last message for to-night. You really must turn in, boys. I let you have an extra social hour, because to-morrow will be Sunday, a day of rest after the travels and excitements of the week. Think of it, lads! A Sunday in the woods—God's first cathedral! May it do us all good!"
The guide, Joe, built up the fire. Fresh birch logs blistered and sputtered as creeping curls of bluish flame enwrapped them. Kindling rapidly, they threw out fantastic lights, which danced like a regiment of red elves around the old log walls of the cabin.
"If a fellow could only drop off to sleep every night in the year seeing and smelling such a fire as that!" breathed Neal, as, accepting a share of Royal's blankets, he stretched his tired limbs on the evergreen mattress.
"Then life would be too jolly for anything," answered Roy.