THE TRAPPER'S CABIN
Dan felt a glow of pleasure as he neared the log cabin which nestled
against the mountain, sheltered by rock walls on the side from which the
worst storms always came.
Eagerly he looked ahead, hoping that he would see the girl. He wanted to
thank her for having saved his life, but no one was in sight.
It was a pleasant, home-like place, with chickens clucking cheerfully in
a large, wired-in yard. Goats climbed among the rocks at the back, and a
washing fluttered on a line at one side, while, to the boy's delight,
masses of wild flowers, showing evidence of loving care, carpeted the
earth-filled stretches between boulders, and some of them that trailed
along the ground hung over the cliff in vivid bloom. It was Meg's garden,
he knew, without being told.
He rapped on the closed front door, but a voice from outside called to
him. "Whoever 'tis, come around here. I'm washin'."
Dan did as he was told and saw a thin, angular woman, who stood up very
straight and looked at him out of keen blue eyes, as she wiped her sudsy
hands on her gingham apron. Then she brushed back her graying locks.
Her smile was a friendly one. "You're Dan Abbott's son, ain't you?" she
began at once. "Hank Wallace, him as drives the stage, stopped in for
dinner to our place yesterday and he told us all about having fetched you
up. Pa and I knew your pa, and your ma, too, years back, afore any of you
children was living, and long afore I had Meg." The woman nodded toward
the wooded mountain beyond. "Meg's out studyin' some fandangled thing she
calls bot'ny." Then she waved a bony hand toward the glowing gardens.
"Them's what she calls her specimens. Queer things they get to larnin' in
schools nowadays. I didn't have much iddication. None at all is more like
the real of it. But pa, he went summers for a spell, and learned readin',
writin' and 'rithmetic. All a person needs to know in these mountains;
but Meg, now, she's been goin' ever since she could talk, seems like.
Notion Pa Heger took. He got talked into doin' it by Preacher Bellows."
Then, before saying more, the woman cautiously scanned the woods and the
road. Feeling sure that there was no one near enough to hear her, she
confided: "You see, we ain't dead sure who Meg is. She was about three
when one of the Ute squaw women fetched her, all done up in one of them
bright-colored blankets they make. It was a terrible stormy night.
There'd been a cloudburst, and the thunder made this old mountain shake
for true. Pa Heger said he heard someone at the door, and I said 'twas
the wind. He said he knew better, and he went to see. There stood a Ute
squaw, and she grunted something and held out the blanket bundle. Pa took
it, bein' as he heard a cry inside of it. That squaw didn't stop. She
shuffled away and Pa shut the door quick to keep the storm out.
"'Well, Ma,' he says, turning to me, 'what d' s'pose we've got here?'
"'Some Indian papoose,' I reckoned 'twas.
"'Well, if 'tis,' said he, 'I can't throw it out into this awful storm.
We'll have to keep it till it clears, an' then I'll pack it back to the
Utes.'
"They was over at the Crazy Creek camp then, but when that storm let up,
and Pa did go over, there wa'n't a hide or hair left of that Ute tribe.
They'd gone to better huntin' grounds, the way they allays do, and we've
never seen 'em since. None of 'em 'cept ol' Slinkin' Coyote. It's queer
the way he sticks to it that he's Meg's pa, but my man won't listen to
it. Gets mad as anythin' if I as much as say maybe it's true. He'll rave,
Pa will, an' say: 'Look at our Meg! Does she look like a young 'un of
that skulkin' old wildcat?' Pa says, an' I have to agree she don't. But
he pesters her, askin' for money. That is, he used to afore Pa Heger set
the law on him. Pa has a paper from the sheriff, givin' him the right to
arrest that ol' Ute if he ever sets eyes on him.
"But I declare to it! Here comes Pa Heger himself. He'll be glad to meet
you, bein' as he knew your pa so well."
The lad turned eagerly. He was always glad to meet someone who had known
his father in the long ago years, when he had come West, just after
leaving college, hoping to win a fortune.
Then, as the boy waited for the man to come up, he wondered why Meg did
not return. Didn't she care to make his acquaintance?
"Pa Heger," as he liked to be called, was a pleasant-faced man whose
deeply wrinkled, leathery countenance showed at once that he had
weathered wind and storm through many a long year in the mountains.
As Ma Heger had done, he seemed to know intuitively who the visitor was.
But before he could speak, his talkative spouse began:
"Pa, ain't this boy the splittin' image of Danny Abbott, him as used to
come over to set by our fire and hear you spin them trappin' yarns o'
yourn? That was afore he went away an' got married. 'Arter that he wa'n't
alone when he come climbin' up the mountain, but along of him was the
sweetest purtiest little creature I'd ever sot my eyes on. The two of 'em
were a fine lookin' pair."
Dan shook hands with the silent man, who showed his pleasure more with
his smiling eyes than with words. He was quite willing to let his wife do
most of the talking. The lad was pleased with the praise given his father
and mother, when they were young, and he at once told Mrs. Heger that his
sister Jane, who was with him, very closely resembled that bride of long
ago.
"Wall, now," the good woman exclaimed, "how I'd like to see the gal.
She'n my Meg ought to get on fine, if she's anyhow as friendly as her ma
was. Mis' Abbott used to come right out to my kitchen. She'd been goin'
to some fandangly cookin' school, the while she was gettin' ready to be
married, and she larned me a lot of things to make kitchen work easier.
I'm doin' some of 'em yet, and thinkin' of her often."
Dan did not comment on the possibility of his proud sister becoming an
intimate friend of the mountain girl, but, for himself, he found that he
very much wanted to know more about their adopted daughter.
"Mr. Heger," he turned to the man, who stood shyly twirling his fur cap,
"your daughter has just saved my life."
His listeners both looked very much surprised.
"Why, how come that?" Mrs. Heger inquired. "You didn't say as how you'd
seen Meg, all the time I was talkin' about her."
Dan might have replied that he had not had an opportunity to say much of
anything. But to an interested audience he related the recent occurrence.
"Pshaw, that's queer now!" Pa Heger scratched his gray head back of one
ear, which Dan was to learn was a habit with him when he was puzzled.
"You say the mountain lion was crouched to spring at you? Then it must o'
been that she had some young near. They're cowards when it comes to
humans, them lions are. They kill sheep an' calves an' deer, an' all the
little wild critters, but they don't often attack a man. They'll trail
'em for hours, curious, sort of, I reckon, keepin' out of sight. Makes
you feel mighty uncomfortable to know one of them big critters is
prowlin' arter you, whatever his intentions may be. But that 'un, now,
you was mentionin', I'll walk back wi' you, when you go, an' take a look
at it. Thar's a bounty paid for 'em by the ranchers. An' if young air
near by, there'll be no time better for puttin' an end to 'em."
Ma Heger glanced often toward the wooded mountain beyond Meg's "Bot'ny
Gardens." Then to her husband she said: "I reckon Meg knows thar's
company, an' that's why she's stayin' so long. She said to me, 'Ma, I
ain't agoin' to school today,' says she. 'I reckon I'll get some more
specimens.'"
At that the man looked up quickly, evident alarm in his clear blue eyes.
"Did she say anything about havin' seen that skulkin' Ute? Has he been
pesterin' her? The day arter she's given him money, she don' dare go to
school, fearin' he'll be rarin' drunk wi' fire-water an' waylay her. If
ever I come up wi' that coyote, I'll--I'll----"
The wife tried to quiet the increasing anger of her spouse.
"Pa Heger," she said, "you're alarmin' yerself needless. That Ute knows
the sheriff gave you power to jail him, an' he's mos' likely gone to whar
his tribe is."
Dan stood silently, wondering what he ought to say. He knew that Meg had
given the old Indian money, and he realized that was why she had been at
home to save his life.
"I shall be glad to have you walk back with me, Mr. Heger," he said.
Dan wanted to be alone with the mountaineer. When they had started down
the mountain road, the man at Dan's side was silent, a frown gathering on
his leathery forehead. Suddenly he blurted out: "This here business has
got to stop. That slinkin' ol' Ute's got to prove that my Meg is his gal.
In the courts, he's got to prove it, or I'll have him strung up. Jail's
too good for him. Pesterin' a little gal to get her to give up her
savin's that she's been puttin' by this five year past, meanin' to go to
school in the big city and larn to be a teacher. That's what Meg's
figgerin' on, and that skulkin' Ute drainin' it away from her little by
little. I made her pack a gun, an' tol' her to shoot him on sight, but I
reckon she ain't got the heart to take a life, though I'd sooner trap him
than I would a--well, a coyote that he's named arter."
Dan could be quiet no longer. "Mr. Heger," he said, "it was about that
very Indian that I came up here to talk to you this morning. I saw him in
hiding near our cabin. Yesterday afternoon he frightened the children,
although he did not come out into the open; then about two hours later we
saw him hiding behind boulders on the road below us. He waylaid your
daughter, just as you fear. Also she gave him money." While the boy had
been talking, the man's great knotted hands had closed and unclosed and
cords swelled out on his reddening face. "I knew it," he cried. "Dan
Abbott, I want you to help me catch that Ute. Meg won't. She ain't sure
but what he is her pa, an' it's agin nature to ask her to harm him. I
won't let on that you tol' me, but, Dan, we've got to trap him. You
needn't be afraid of him. He won't harm you or your family. He's too
cowardly for that. What's more, he's paralyzed in one arm; it's all
shriveled up so he can't hold a gun."
Dan felt greatly relieved upon hearing this, and wishing to change the
conversation to something pleasanter, he inquired how soon Meg expected
to be able to go away to school. But the subject evidently was not
pleasant to the old man. "Next fall's the time, an' me and ma can't bring
ourselves to think on it. Snowed in all winter without Meg's 'bout as
pleasin' as bein' shet in a tomb." The anger had all died out of the
leathery, wrinkled face and in the blue eyes there shone that wonderful
love-light that is the most beautiful thing the world holds. "Queer, now,
ain't it, how a slip of a baby girl could fill up two lives the way Meg
did our'n from the start. An' she cares for us jest as much as we for
her, I reckon. 'Pears like she does." The old man's voice had become
tender as he spoke.
"I'm sure of it," Dan said heartily. Then, after a pause, Pa Heger
continued slowly: "That gal of our'n has the queerest notions. One's the
way she takes to flowers." Then, looking up inquiringly, "Did Ma tell you
how she earned the money she's savin' for her iddication?" Dan shook his
head, and so the old man continued: "Teacher Bellows 'twas got her
started on it. He's what folks call a naturalist, an' when he used to
stay up to our cabin for weeks at a time an' he'd take Meg wi' him
specimen huntin'. Seems like thar's museum places all over this here
country that wants specimens of flowers growin' high up in the Rockies.
So Teacher Bellows and Meg would hunt for days, startin' early every
mornin' and late back in the arternoon, till they had a set of specimens.
They'd press 'em till they was dry as paper, then mount 'em, as they call
it, an' send 'em off to a museum, and along come a check. Arter Teacher
Bellows went back to his school, Meg kept right on doin' it by herself,
him helpin' now an' then, an' she's saved nigh enough for the two years'
schoolin' she'll need to be a low grade schoolmarm. She's got another
queer notion, Meg has. I wonder if Ma tol' you about that?" The old man
looked up inquiringly, and Dan, finding himself very much interested in
the notions of this girl whom he did not know, said that he would very
much like to hear about it.
The old man removed his fur cap and scratched his gray head again. His
voice grew even more tender. "You know what it says in that good book
Preacher Bellows is allays readin' out of, how a little child shall lead.
Wall, that's sartin what Meg's done for me and Ma Heger. When she was
about six year old, or maybe, now, she was seven, it was curious how
friendly even the skeeriest little wild critters was toward her. She
could feed 'em out of her hand, arter a little coaxin', an' how she loved
'em! You see, they was all the playmates she's ever had. Then 'twas she
started her horspital for hurt critters, an' she's kept it goin' ever
sence. Got one now, but, plague it, I can't remember what kind of
patients she's got into it. She won't keep nothin' captive arter they're
well enough to fight for themselves out in the forest. Wall, as I was
sayin' back a piece, Meg was about seven as I recollect, when she sort of
sudden like seemed to realize how 'twas I made my livin', trappin' wild
animals and sellin' their skins at the tradin' post.
"But even then, she didn't fully sense what it meant, seemed like, till
the day we couldn't find her nowhar. She'd never gone far into the
mountains afore that, but when she didn't come home at noonday, Ma asked
me to go an' hunt for her. It was late arternoon afore I come upon her,
an' I'll never forget that sight as long as I'm livin'.
"My habit was to set them powerful steel traps to catch mountain lions
and the fur animals I wanted for pelts. Then, every few days, I'd go the
round and shoot the critters that had been caught in 'em. Wall, as I was
goin' toward whar one of them big traps was. I heard sech a pitiful
cryin'. Good God, but I was wild wi' fear, an' I ran like wolves was
arter me. I'd a notion our baby gal was catched in it. An' thar she was,
sure enough, but not hurt. Instead she was down on the ground wi' her
arms around a little black bear cub that had been catched hours before
and was all torn and bleedin'.
"The fight was gone out o' him, but he wa'n't dead yet. It was our little
Meg who was doin' the cryin'. Clingin' to the little fellow, not heedin'
the blood, her sobbin' was pitiful to hear. I picked her up, an' I ain't
'shamed to be tellin' you that I was cryin' myself along about that time.
"'Take him out, Pa,' my little gal was beggin'. 'Maybe he'll get well,
Pa.'
"So I opened the great steel jaws of that trap and took out the little
cub bear. He was too small to be worth anything for a pelt, an' we
fetched him home, but he died soon arter, and Meg, she had me bury him.
But she couldn't get over what she had seen. She had a ragin' fever for
days. I sot up every night holdin' her little quiverin' body close in my
arms, an' prayin' God if he'd let my little gal live, I'd never set
another of them cruel steel traps to catch any of His critters as long as
I'd breath in my body.
"Wall, boy, sort of a miracle took place. That little gal of mine had
fallen asleep while I sat holdin' her, but jest as I made that promise,
silent to God, she lifted up her little hand and put it soft like on my
face, an' says, still asleep, seemed like--'I love you, Pa Heger.' An'
when she woke up next mornin', the fever was gone, and she was well as
ever.
"I kept my promise," he went on grimly. "I went all over the mountain an'
I took them steel traps, one by one, unsprung 'em and dropped 'em down
into that crack some earthquake had split into Bald Peak. It's
bottomless, seems like, an' what goes into that crack never does no more
harm. Now, when I kill a critter that needs killin', I shoot an' they
never know what hits 'em. Meg is a sure-shot, too, though she'd never
pack a gun if 'twant that I make her."
They had reached the spot where the mountain lion still lay, and the old
man stooped to examine it. "I reckon that was a sure shot, all right."
Then he shouldered the limp creature. "Thar's fifty dollars bounty, so I
might as well have it. I'll hunt for the cubs tomorrer. So long. Hit the
trail up our way often."
As Dan walked slowly down the mountain road toward his home cabin, he
found that he was more interested in this unknown Meg than he had ever
before been in any girl.
Jane's headache was better when Dan returned, but her disposition was
worse, and poor Julie was about ready to cry. She had been spoken to so
sharply when she had really tried to help. Gerald was angry and
indignant. He had at first urged his small sister and comrade to pretend
that Jane was being pleasant, but, after a time, even he had decided that
such a feat was too much for anyone to accomplish. Then he had
intentionally slammed a door and had declared that he hoped it would make
"ol' Jane's" head worse.
It was well that Dan returned just when he did. He entered the cabin
living-room calling cheerily, "Good, Jane, I'm glad to see you are up."
Then he looked from one to the other. Julie, tearful, rebellious, stood
near the kitchen door, and Gerald, with clenched fists, had evidently
been saying something of a defiant nature. "Why, what's the matter? What
has gone wrong?"
Dan was indeed dismayed at the picture before him. Jane, who had seated
herself in the one comfortable chair in the room, said peevishly:
"Everything is the matter. Dan, you can see for yourself what a mistake I
made in coming to this terrible place, and trying to live with these two
children who have had no training whatever. They are defiant and
rebellious."
Even as Jane spoke, a memoried picture presented itself of Julie's sweet
solicitude for her earlier that morning, but she would not heed, so she
hurried on: "I have been lying in there with this frightful headache
thinking it all out, and I have decided that either the children must go
back or I will." A hard look, unusual in Dan's face, appeared there and
his voice sounded cold. "Very well, Jane, I will help you pack. The stage
passes soon. If we hurry, we may be ready." The children could hardly
keep from shouting for joy. Something which Julie was cooking, boiled
over and so she darted to the kitchen, followed by Gerald, who stood upon
his head in the middle of the floor. But they had rejoiced too soon, for
Gerry, who a moment later went to the brook for water, returned with the
disheartening news that the stage was passing down their part of the
road. Julie plumped down on the floor and her mouth quivered, but before
she could cry, Gerald caught her hands, pulled her up and said
comfortingly: "Never mind, Jule. The stage will be going past again on
Monday. Me and you'll stay on the watch and tell Mister Sourface to stop
for Jane when he goes back to Redfords on Tuesday. That is not so awful
long. Oh, boy, then won't we have the time of our lives?"
Julie agreed that they would indeed and decided to be very patient during
the remaining two days. So she went back to her cooking and, with
Gerald's help, soon had the lunch spread.
Jane ate but little, and again shut herself up in her room for all that
afternoon. Dan was almost as glad as were the children that she was to go
back to the East, but Jane, strangely enough, was deeply hurt because her
brother, who had been her playmate when they were little, and her pal in
later years, had actually chosen the younger children in preference to
herself. That proved how much he really cared for _her_ and, as for his
health, he seemed to be recovering remarkably. He had coughed a while the
evening before, and for a shorter time that morning.
Then he had evidently been on a long hike. Of all that had happened Dan
had said nothing, knowing that Jane would not wish to hear about the
mountain girl, toward whom she felt so unkindly.
That afternoon Dan gave the children another lesson at shooting cones
from an old pine, far enough from the cabin to keep from disturbing Jane.
Julie grew braver as she watched Gerald's success, and at last she too
tried, and when, after many failures, she sent a brown cone spinning, she
leaped about wild with joy.
"Now we are both sharpshooters," Gerald cried generously. Then, glancing
over at the cabin, he added: "There's Jane sitting out on the porch. She
does look sort of sick, doesn't she?"
Dan's heart was touched when he saw the forlorn attitude of the sister he
so loved. "You youngsters amuse yourselves for a while," he suggested, "I
want to have a quiet talk with Jane." Dan neglected to tell the children
not to wander away.