AMONG THE LUMBERJACKS
“How’s your back, Bluff?” asked Jerry, something like four hours after
the conversation in the smoking-car related in the preceding chapter.
“Don’t believe I’ve got any,” replied the other, with a grunt,
“because there’s only a numb feeling where it ought to be.”
“If you find your pack heavy now, Bluff,” Frank remarked, over his
shoulder, “I’d like to know what would have happened if I’d let you
fetch all that junk along you laid out to bring.”
“Please don’t mention it, Frank, but give us some good news. Tell us
we’re close to Lumber Run Camp, won’t you?”
“If you listen you’ll not need any answer from me!” replied Frank.
“What’s that I hear?” exclaimed Bluff, in evident delight. “Sounds
like the whack of axes away off there to the left!”
“And there goes a tree down!” added Will, who was staggering along
under his weighty pack, though with compressed lips, and a
determination not to show any weakness.
“Well, it’s high time we struck somewhere,” grumbled Jerry. “We’ve
been on the hike all of three hours and perhaps nearer four. Must have
covered a heap of territory in that time.”
“Oh! not many miles,” Frank told him, “because we made up our minds
we’d take it easy. But I can see smoke rising above the trees ahead
and pretty soon we’ll be at the lumber camp.”
“Anyhow, I’m glad we had a chance to say good-by to that pigpen of a
smoking-car, and have been getting fresh air ever since,” Will added.
“Huh! the car wasn’t the worst part of it,” Bluff remarked bitterly.
“That Bill Nackerson got on my nerves. I’d just like to see somebody
give him the punching he needs.”
“Small good anything like that would do,” Frank told him. “A licking
only makes such a man more bitter than before. He is sure to take it
out on some person or object that can’t resist.”
“Either poor Teddy, you mean, or the hunting dog,” Jerry suggested.
Frank nodded his head to show that this was what he had in mind.
A short time later they found themselves approaching a number of long,
low frame buildings that were evidently used by the lumbermen for
sleeping and eating quarters. A couple of men were hammering as though
engaged in making the new additions more secure against the cold.
Standing in the doorway of what seemed to be the kitchen was a black
man. He appeared to be genial, and so Frank led his comrades in that
direction.
“We’re looking for Mr. Darrel; can you tell us where he is to be
found?” Frank asked, as the others dropped their packs to the ground,
and sought any kind of seats nearby.
“I done ’spects him in et enny minnit, now, sah; he allers shows up
afore de time foh distributin’ de grub, tuh see dat eberything is
correct,” was the reply. “An’ dar he kirns right now, trudgin’ through
de woods. Speakin’ ob an angel an’ yuh suah am gwine tuh heah dey
wings.”
A heavy-set man was approaching. He was evidently no ordinary person,
for his strongly-marked face told of considerable character.
“Hello! what have we got here; and where under the sun did you boys
drop from?” was the way he saluted them.
Apparently visitors were next to unknown in Lumber Run Camp. Later on
an occasional sportsman, with his Indian or native guide, might bob
up; but the sight of four boys must have surprised the lumberman very
much.
He was even more taken aback when Frank explained.
“We have come up here to see you, Mr. Darrel. We’re carrying an
important paper from a gentleman you have had business dealings with,
and who was so crippled with lumbago that he couldn’t make the journey
himself.”
“Do you mean Felix Milton?” demanded the other quickly.
“Yes, sir, and this is his nephew, Will. My name is Frank Langdon;
this is Jerry Wallington, and the other boy is Bluff Masters. We are
fond of living in the woods, and in our section out toward the
Mississippi they call us the Outdoor Chums.”
The bluff lumberman seemed pleased to meet such self-reliant boys. He
shook hands all around with considerable enthusiasm.
“Glad to know you,” he said, “and I can easily believe that you are
pretty well able to take care of yourselves. And so you’ve come all
the way up into Maine to find me? Well, that’s a pretty big journey.”
“Mr. Milton was ready to send us three times as far, so that he might
keep his word, and have that document signed,” Frank continued. “There
are only a couple of weeks left, and he had neglected it longer than
he intended. The journey meant little to us, for we are used to
traveling long distances. Twice we’ve been away down South, and once
hunting in the Rockies.”
“That sounds fine,” remarked Mr. Darrel, his eyes showing
appreciation, “and I hope that now you’ve come to Maine you’ll not
think of hurrying back home without a little sport. They tell me that
game is unusually plentiful this year.”
“Oh! we made sure to get our licenses to hunt, sir; Mr. Milton
insisted that we do that part in the beginning,” Jerry spoke up.
“That’s right,” returned the lumberman, evidently relieved on hearing
this, “and as soon as you are rested we’ll get the signing of that
paper through with. By that time the men will be coming in, and supper
will be ready. I hope you are used to rough woods fare.”
“Just what we are, sir,” Frank assured him. “We like nothing better.”
“Of course we haven’t had time as yet to get venison, or any kind of
game,” he was told by the genial lumberman, “but Cuba, here, is a
master hand at slinging appetizing dishes together, and if you’re
hungry you’ll give him a vote of thanks when the meal is over.”
Cuba grinned from ear to ear at this compliment and nodded his woolly
head in appreciation.
“I suppose we’ll have to ask you to put us up somewhere for to-night,
Mr. Darrel; to-morrow we’ll get a tip from you, and start into the
woods, so as to get some miles away from the wood cutting.”
“Plenty of room here for a dozen, because we haven’t got our full
force up in the woods yet,” the owner of Lumber Run Camp answered.
“And after supper I’ve got something to say to you about a certain
little shack that belongs to me, and which I’d like you to occupy
while you’re up here.”
“Do you mean in the woods, sir?” asked Bluff eagerly, for the thought
of having to go to all the trouble of building some sort of shelter
had been worrying him.
“Just what I do, son,” the lumberman told him. “I spent one winter in
it, and that gave me a chance to travel over this whole section, so
finally I organized the company that purchased this tract.”
The boys exchanged pleased looks. Really, things were coming out
better than any of them had dreamed.
Mr. Darrel showed them where they could leave their packs. There was
a bunk for each in the building where he had his own sleeping
accommodations. This suited Frank much better than if they had had to
stay with the loggers, some of whom were a rough lot, as he saw when
they came trooping in.
It was an experience the boys enjoyed to the full. At the supper table
they heard considerable talk about lumbering, and picked up some
valuable information by using their ears.
Afterward they sat with Mr. Darrel before the fire in his smaller
building, and listened to what he had to tell them. The paper had been
duly signed in the presence of witnesses. One of the lumberjacks,
really the foreman of the crowd, being a duly appointed notary public,
was in a position to handle the affair according to law.
The paper was now safely fastened in Frank’s inner pocket, where it
could hardly be lost, no matter what happened.
After the lumberman had spoken of many things of which the boys
manifested an eager curiosity to hear, he in turn began to ask
questions. This resulted in their telling him some of the queer
happenings that had accompanied their numerous past outings; in all of
which he evinced great interest.
“I must say you are boys after my own heart,” he said, as the evening
grew late, and Bluff had even yawned openly as many as three times.
“If my little fellow had lived I would have wished him to be built on
just the same pattern. I meant that he should love the Great Outdoors,
and yet never be cruel in his pursuit of what we call sport. But he
was taken away from me. What I am piling up now will some of these
days go to a poor little crippled nephew in a New England town.”
As Bluff again yawned at a fearful rate their kind host realized that
the boys were more or less played out after their long journey, and
the task of “toting” their heavy packs into the Big Woods.
So he told them it was about time they all turned in, an invitation
that was joyfully accepted by every one, not even excepting Frank.
It is doubtful whether they knew anything from the time they rested
their heads on the pillows, made of hemlock needles stuffed into
cotton-sacks, until there was a tremendous din that made them think of
the fire signal at home.
“That’s the getting-up gong!” they heard Mr. Darrel call. “Breakfast
will be ready in fifteen minutes, so perhaps you’d better hurry. My
men have big appetites these brisk days, and might clear off the table
before you had a show.”
Of course the lumberman was only joking, for Cuba had gone to extra
pains to have an abundance of food prepared. He had made fresh
biscuits, and there was also oatmeal and coffee, with some fried ham
and potatoes, as well as an egg apiece for the favored young guests of
the “boss.”
Pretty soon the big lumberjacks started off to their daily work of
chopping down trees. These would be trimmed into logs, and eventually
be drawn by teams of horses to the river, where their voyage down to
the sawmills or the pulp factories would begin.
The boys had never been in a lumbering region before, and numerous
things interested them. Each brawny axman shouted good-by to the boys
ere departing, for they were a jovial as well as a brawny lot. Frank
could see how a life like this must develop any one physically.
Having received full directions from their host how to find his lonely
lodge in the heart of the Big Woods, the four chums set out. Mr.
Darrel would have accompanied them but for the fact that he had his
hands full just then, and was expecting a new lot of employees to
arrive that day.
“But a little later on you can expect a visit from me, lads,” he told
them, as he squeezed each boy’s hand in a way that made them wince.
“I’ll be looking forward to seeing you again with considerable
pleasure.”
So the chums started off. Being fresh after a good night’s sleep, they
did not mind the weight of their packs so much now. Later on in the
day, if the tramp proved protracted, they might murmur again,
particularly Bluff. He was addicted to that habit, though he really
did not mean anything by it, as Frank knew from experience.
They tramped for more than an hour. Frank was always on the watch. He
had been given explicit directions, which he was following closely.
For a mile they had kept along the little creek, now beginning to
freeze. Arriving at a spot where a spruce tree hung half-way across
the bed of the stream, they had turned sharply to the left, and
commenced making their way through a dense wilderness of firs.
In this way the second mile had been covered, while a third had taken
them to what seemed to be quite a little hill.
“Sure we’re on the right track, are you, Frank?” asked Will, when they
had left this elevation behind them nearly half an hour.
“Yes, we’re going as straight as a die,” Bluff hastened to say, before
the leader could utter a word. “I know it because right ahead of us I
can see that other little stream Mr. Darrel was saying we’d strike.
Down that two miles and we’ll come to his cabin.”
“I only hope we find it unoccupied, that’s all,” ventured Will.
“No danger of anybody breaking in,” Frank declared. “Up here in the
Maine woods there’s a queer sort of law among the natives. They are
honest as the day in that way. Nobody ever thinks of locking his door
at night.”
“Small game seems to be plenty enough,” Bluff went on to say. “But
where are all the deer they’ve been telling us about? I’d like to run
across something worth taking a crack at with my pump-gun.”
“Then there’s your chance, Bluff!” suddenly remarked Will. “Why, it
looks for all the world like a gray wolf to me!”
“It must be a wolf, because Mr. Darrel said they sometimes come down
here from over the Canadian border!” exclaimed Jerry.
“I’ll wolf him with that buckshot charge I’ve got ready for a deer!”
muttered Bluff fiercely, as he dropped his pack and started to bring
his repeating shotgun up to his shoulder.
“Hold on!” cried Frank, pulling the weapon hastily down. “Look again,
Bluff, and you’ll see that’s no wolf, but a dingy dog. Yes, and we’ve
seen that dog before, too!”