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THE RACE OF THE SWIFT
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[Illustration: “The gray fox was leading bravely.” Frontispiece. See
page 16]
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THE
RACE OF THE SWIFT
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BY
EDWIN CARLILE LITSEY
AUTHOR OF “THE LOVE STORY OF ABNER STONE”
Illustrated from Drawings by
CHARLES LIVINGSTON BULL
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BOSTON
LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY
1905
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Copyright, 1903, 1904,
BY FRANK LESLIE PUBLISHING HOUSE.
Copyright, 1904,
BY FIELD AND STREAM, INC.
Copyright, 1905,
BY LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY.
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All rights reserved
Published October, 1905
THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, CAMBRIDGE, U. S. A.
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TO
CARRIE SELECMAN LITSEY
I INSCRIBE THESE STORIES
E. C. L.
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The author wishes to make public acknowledgment to _Leslie’s Monthly
Magazine_ for permission to use in this volume “The Race of the Swift,”
“The King of the Northern Slope,” and “The Ghost Coon.” Thanks are also
due _Field and Stream_ for their courtesy in allowing the use of “The
Fight on the Tree-Bridge.” The other stories presented here have never
appeared in print before.
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CONTENTS
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THE RACE OF THE SWIFT 1
THE ROBBER BARON 21
THE GHOST COON 43
THE SPOILER OF THE FOLDS 63
THE FIGHT ON THE TREE-BRIDGE 83
THE GUARDIAN OF THE FLOCK 107
THE KING OF THE NORTHERN SLOPE 129
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LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
From drawings by Charles Livingston Bull
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“The gray fox was leading bravely.” _Frontispiece_
“Zigzagging nimbly, he strove to elude 41
his pursuer”
“What was this upon his bridge!” 102
“The King stopped long enough to throw 143
back his head and give one terrifying
scream of victory”
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THE RACE OF THE SWIFT
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THE RACE OF THE SWIFT
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A HALVED moon was shedding a faint glow over the rugged knob country.
The twisted, broken, distorted ground, with its spasmodic growth of
blackberry, sassafras, and juniper bushes, seemed the center of
desolation. But something was living, moving, in the midst of this
loneliness. Creeping along a ragged fence line at the base of a knob
went a stealthy figure. Sharp-muzzled, keen-eyed, lean of body and wiry
of limb, the object moved forward at a swift trot. The night was young.
Scarcely had the salmon tints which the sun had left in the west
disappeared. Through the pure, lambent air the rolling tones of the
farmer could be heard as he called his pigs home. Above the high hills
gleamed the timid tapers of the early stars. A low breeze was chanting a
gentle vesper among the pines and oaks upon the knob-side. A blundering
rabbit butted blindly through the weeds on the creek bank; a bullfrog,
fat and inert, bellowed forth his thunderous note; a muskrat splashed
softly from a half-sunken log and spread his flat paddles to propel him
to his hidden home. A whip-poor-will’s heart-broken tones came from a
point further down the hollow. Nature was saying that the day was gone.
The she-fox trotting by the worm-eaten fence stopped abruptly. The fence
was curving around the knob, and this did not coincide with her purpose.
She stopped with one fore foot upheld, and ears pricked attentively. The
sounds she heard were familiar, legitimate; a part of her nightly life.
The she-fox was painfully attenuated. Her tawny body was barred with
bulging ribs; there was a gaunt, starved look upon her bony face. The
two rows of teats along her belly were clean and bare—even moist, for
ten minutes ago a half dozen tiny tongues had striven vainly to draw
nourishment from them. But she had none to give. For two days and nights
she had tasted food but once, and during that time her hungry brood had
insistently drawn her very life from her hour after hour. She had given
it freely and without grudge, licking caressingly first one baby form
and then another; had even borne unflinchingly the sharp nips from
little teeth when the milk would not flow. The night before she had
ranged for miles, though so weak that only the deathless strength of her
mother-love sustained her in her quest. Not far from her home was a
place where human-people lived. But they were wary, and placed their
hens and chickens under lock and key at the going down of every sun.
Thither had she gone first, because it was the closest, but not a
feather could she find. At the corner of the hen-house she stopped and
sniffed eagerly. Beyond the white-washed planks were scores of fat
fowls, and the she-fox knew it, but they were safe from her long, white
teeth. She listened. The sound of rustling feathers and drowsy clucks
smote her ears, and the saliva of famine dripped from the loose skin of
her lower jaw. Emboldened by desperation, she walked around the
building. At the bottom of the door a hole had been cut, so that the
fowls could enter when the door was shut. But this was secured by a
plank, which in turn was held in place by a heavy stone. She could not
move it, because she was weak from fasting. Thrusting her sharp, black
nose into a crack about an inch wide between the planks, she drank in
the ravishing odor of many a choice pullet. Suddenly realizing that this
course was worse than futile, she turned, vaulted the fence enclosing
the cow-lot, swerved around a prostrate, ponderous figure sleepily
chewing its cud, and vanished in the direction of the stable. Here,
likewise, her investigation was fruitless, so she gave up and turned her
head towards another farm-house, five miles away.
The journey, which ordinarily would not have caused the least fatigue,
came near to overcoming the dauntless forager. Near her destination she
tottered to a brook and sank in the cool water, lapping it at intervals.
This brought back some of her strength, and she essayed to complete her
task. Through the orchard she trailed; then suddenly her delicate
nostrils conveyed to her subtle brain some welcome intelligence.
Stopping about twenty feet from the yard fence, she reconnoitred. A big
walnut tree grew close to the fence, and upon the limbs of this tree
were some huge, shapeless knots; knots with convex backs and drooping
tails; turkeys! The eyes of the starved raider glowed green and blue.
Here was a feast. Strength for her, and life for her little ones back in
their rocky den, crawling blindly about and wailing piteously for food.
Softly as a moonbeam she crept forward, then came to a halt in dismay
and sank upon her haunches. The plank with strips nailed across it, by
the aid of which the turkeys gained their roost, had been removed and
lay there upon the ground before her, to mock her baffled hopes and her
bitter despair. With a keen sense of distances, she measured with her
eye the height of the lowest limb from the ground. It was not far; she
had made greater leaps time and again. But now her leaden, paralyzed
limbs could scarcely carry her pinched body over the ground. To make the
effort would be suicide. The dog-pack were sleeping somewhere near by,
and their sleep was light! A cracking twig would rouse them, and that
night she could not lead them. There were babies at home who needed her;
she dared not make the attempt. One of the knots on a limb moved
cautiously, then toppled. The watcher sprang forward eagerly, to again
meet with disappointment. The sleepy wings flapped once or twice, a new
footing was secured, and the head of the restless turkey receded into
the neck feathers as the fowl relapsed into slumber. After a few moments
the dull red shadow on the ground moved on again, hunger-mad, yet
crafty. Into the confines of the yard crept the fox—up to a long, tall
bench by the kitchen door. The scent of something strangely like fresh
meat had reached her. There was a vessel of some sort covered with a
piece of wood on the bench. To leap up and muzzle off the cover was the
work of a second. And there was the dressed carcass of a chicken soaking
overnight to serve as a breakfast for the human-people in the morning.
Quickly as a star twinkles she of the forest-folk had the spoil in her
strong jaws. Softly as a shadow falling she dropped to earth; swiftly as
the wind she glided through the long corn rows growing in the garden
back of the house, and was soon a mile away, safe, because unpursued.
Then she sank upon her belly, and ate, and ate. Crunched the tender
bones and the juicy flesh, impregnated as they were with salt, and
gradually she felt the glad elation of returning strength. Through her
worn, famished body renewed life was running, although the edge of her
hunger had barely been removed. She lay quiet for a while, gathering
together the taxed forces of her being, and thinking of the miles
stretching between her and the little ones. But before the shadows upon
the hill-tops turned into the misty halos of morning, six tiny forms lay
at their mother’s breasts, well-fed and asleep.
Now another day had come and gone, and she was as bad off as before. Her
mate, who had bided with her until the babies came, had tired of her and
gone to seek a fairer wench, leaving her unaided to provide for the
offsprings of their wild, free love. She had planned and worked, plotted
and slain. The floor of the den was covered with feathers and sprinkled
with broken bones—dry bones which she had cracked in desperation while
searching for sustenance. It was a fight all the time. Fight for food;
fight to live. So when the night had barely come, and the salmon tints
in the west were yet a shadow, the she-fox nosed her importunate progeny
into a whining heap at one side of the den and slipped softly without
and moved down the hill-side, her waving tail like a smouldering torch
in the gloom of the woods.
Keeping in the shadow of the rickety rail fence till it could no longer
serve her, she halted a moment for deliberation, then twisted her supple
body and half leaped, half crawled through a crack near the bottom. As
she had stood with ears alert before veering her course, the faintest
kind of tone had come to her. It was different from the hill-voices. The
forest-kind know all the dozens of low noises which float along the
knob-side at night. The voices and sounds are all soft—peculiarly soft.
Only when a wild-cat is at bay, or the pack swings mouthing over the
lowlands and the hills, is the wonderful silence of that region
disturbed after the sun has gone. If her ear was not at fault—and
privation had sharpened all of her faculties—the she-fox knew that a
rich reward would soon be hers. Skirting the creek till she came to a
place where it narrowed, she leaped across, and moved on in the same
steady trot through the blackberry and sassafras bushes. Behind a low
tangle of weeds and vines she crept at last, and crouched not three feet
from a narrow hog-path winding on towards the farm-house half a mile
away. From the pond at the base of the slight elevation over which the
path led, some belated geese were ambling homeward. A half dozen or
more; awkward, matronly, placid, moving in Indian file with never a
thought beyond dipping in the hog-trough in the barnyard, or gobbling up
the food thrown to the chickens. The webbed feet plodded on—straight to
death. One, two, three, four—six plump bodies marched sedately by the
low clump of matted weeds. Destruction swift and sure seized the last.
Out of the shadows sprang a shape; two sinewy forelegs glided around the
long white neck and skilful fangs tore open the portals of death. It was
done almost without a sound. A feather or two and a few drops of blood
were the only traces of the deed. Taking the blood as it gushed from the
gaping wounds, the fox seized the neck firmly at a point near the base,
slung the heavy body across her back with a dexterous jerk of her head,
and started for her den at a swift lope. That night she feasted to
repletion, and the next day she gorged herself on her kill. Made
indolent by gluttony, she did not leave her lair for two whole days.
Then her old enemy, hunger, returned again, and drove her to action.
During the days she had been lying inert in her rocky chamber, some
things had happened which disturbed her not a little. The morning
following the night she had brought in her prize, she had heard the
dread voices of the hounds on some far-off range. All day, at intervals,
the unwelcome chant had come to her ears, and so she knew that the
human-people had missed their goose, and were abroad with the pack in
quest of its destroyer. The second day a more alarming thing had
happened. It was when the shadows of the taller trees began to lengthen
towards the east, and twilight reigned in her cave home, that she was
roused once more by the determined notes of the pursuing pack. Creeping
to the entrance, she presently saw the chase passing along the
knob-side. A great gray fox, nearly spent, was gliding, falling down the
incline, his red mouth stretched for breath, and his bushy tail
drooping. After him raced the hated friends of the human-people,
loud-tongued and tireless. The gray fox was leading bravely, and hunters
and hunted passed from view to the accompaniment of rustling leaves and
snapping twigs and triumphant bays.
The next morning, near midday, her merciless offsprings teased and
worried her so that the she-fox crept forth in spite of the warning of
the day before, and set her sharp muzzle towards the crest of the range,
with the intention of invading territory which hitherto her feet had
never pressed. There were wild turkeys back in the hills, and wary and
suspicious as she knew them to be, they were no match for her wily
woodcraft. But scarcely had her noiseless feet gone over the top of the
knob, when a sharp yelp immediately behind her caused her to jump and
turn quickly. They were there—her enemies—and their noses were smelling
out her trail, for as yet they had not seen her. Even as she leaped for
the nearest cover like a yellow flash, her first thought was of the
little ones biding at home. She must lead her foes away from that cleft
in the rocks where her love-children lay awaiting her return. And though
her life should be given up, yet would she die alone, and far away,
before she would sacrifice her young.
It was a hard and stubborn race which she ran for the next six hours. At
times her loyal, loving heart seemed ready to burst from the strain she
thrust upon it. At times fleet feet were pattering almost at her heels,
and pitiless jaws were held wide to grasp her; then again only the echo
of the stubborn cry of her pursuers reached her. She had doubled time
and again. Once a brief respite was granted her when she dashed up a
slanting tree-trunk which, in falling, had lodged in the branches of
another tree. Eight tawny forms dashed hotly, furiously by, then she
descended and took the back track. Only for a moment, however, were the
cunning dogs deceived. They discovered the artifice almost as soon as it
was perpetrated, and came harking back themselves with redoubled zeal.
So the long hours of the afternoon wore away. Not a moment that was free
from effort; not an instant that death did not hover over the mother
fox, awaiting the least misstep to descend. Back and forth, around and
across, and still the subtlety of the fox eluded the haste and fury of
the hounds. All were tired to the point of exhaustion, but none would
give up. The sun went down; tremulous shadows, like curtains hung, were
draped among the trees. The timid stars came out again and the halfed
moon arose, a little larger than the night before. And still, with
inveterate hate on the one side, and the undying strength of despair on
the other, the grim chase swept through the night. At last the
blood-rimmed eyes of the reeling quarry saw familiar landmarks.
Unconsciously, in her blind efforts, she had come to the neighborhood of
her den. Perhaps the love within her heart had guided her back. She
found her strength quickly failing, and with a realization of this her
scheming brain awoke as from a trance, and drove her to deeper guile.
Two rods away was the creek. To it she staggered, splashed through the
low water for a dozen yards, and hid herself beneath the gnarled roots
of a tree from the base of which the stream had eaten away the soil. She
listened intensely. She heard the pack lose the scent, search
half-heartedly for a few minutes, for they, too, were weary to dropping,
then withdraw one at a time, beaten. But for half an hour the brave
animal lay against the tree roots, waiting and resting. Then she came
out cautiously, looked around her, and with difficulty gained the mouth
of her den. Casting one keen glance over her shoulder through the
checkered spaces of the forest, she glided softly within, and lying
down, curled her tired body protectingly around her sleeping little
ones.
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THE ROBBER BARON
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THE ROBBER BARON
THE Robber Baron sat upon his throne—for he was also a king. No
courtiers attended him; no pages hung upon his slightest gesture. In
dignified solitude he sat, and watched, and watched, and watched.
Part of the country through which Green River runs is almost as it was
when the Master left it with the seal of completeness. Its topography is
unchanged except for the natural changes brought about by the primeval
elements of wind and water. There are vast stretches of timbered country
checkered with cultivated acres, and rugged limestone cliffs fringed
with moss and garlanded with poison ivy. The home of the Robber Baron
was on the edge of one of these timbered tracts, in an old oak tree.
This was his castle, and his alone. None of his feathered cousins dared
perch in the spreading branches, even to rest for a moment. That tree
was the property of the Baron, and he had proven his title to complete
ownership more than once with beak and claws and beating wings. At the
very top of the tree a dead snag shot up a distance of ten or twelve
feet. This was the turret of the castle—the watch-tower. On its summit
the old hen-hawk would perch, and complacently view his wide domain and
his trembling subjects. And he was indeed a king. He levied tribute from
the air, the earth, and the water alike, and whenever he poised and
swooped, a life went out. One sound only caused his warrior heart to
quake, and that was the solemn voice of the great horned owl, crying
dismally in the night from the recesses of the wood. Here was a foe
worthy of his steel; bigger, stronger, and bulldog-like in his battles.
But the hawk took care not to pit his prowess against the power of this
night marauder. During the day he was safe, for his one enemy who could
wage successful warfare with him moped on a limb from sunrise till after
dusk. In the darkness he sat high and safe, for the night-bird hunted
low. More than once the Baron, sleeping the sleep of the gorged glutton,
had awakened to the sound of mighty wings winnowing the air, and he
would draw his fierce head a little further down between his
wing-shoulders, shuddering and afraid. And if the night was moonlit, and
he happened to look down, he would see a broad, black shadow gliding
swiftly between the trees—a veritable spectre of death.
Day after day the Robber Baron sat on the top of the snag in the oak
tree. This was his home, his bed, his point of lookout, and his banquet
chamber. With almost telescopic keenness of vision, he could see what
was going on for incredible distances around him. A rabbit’s quiet
movements while feeding a half mile away on the young clover in a brown
stubble-field; the neutral tints of the prim little quail as they
scurried over the saffron leaves and through the yellow grass; a
squirrel’s bark back in the forest behind him; a leaping fish in the
stream which ran a good mile from his gray snag—all this he saw and
heard, as well as many other things. If he had recently dined and was
well filled and comfortable, he would ruffle his wings, preen his breast
feathers, and gaze calmly upon the things which were his. When he wanted
them he would go and get them, and when once those needle-pointed talons
touched fur, feathers, or fins, they never let go their hold until they
reached the snag. Then one foot would seek the familiar grasp, while the
other held the victim down rigidly until the rending beak of the spoiler
had torn out the life of his prize.
Now years of rapine and plunder and slaughter had not only schooled the
Robber Baron in the fine art of taking game of every description, but it
had made him an epicure as well. For, sailing over a barnyard one day,
he saw a plump pullet dozing in the warm dust by the side of a stone
wall. The instinct imparted by some daintily fed ancestor awoke, and
hardly knowing it, the hawk swooped and clutched. There was a terrible
outcry from the stricken pullet, and the barnyard tribe joined in the
row with one voice. The pullet was fat and heavy and struggled
desperately, but the sinewy pinions of the attacker had never failed
him, and he slowly arose, with labored flapping, taking his captive with
him. But the hubbub had reached indoors, where the farmer and his sons
were taking their noonday meal, and to them the fuss outside meant
“Hawk! Hawk!” and nothing else, for hens never cackle at any other time
as they do when a hawk or a mink invades their midst. So a boy rushed
out with a gun, and there, barely clearing the tops of the trees in the
orchard, flew the raider. The boy fired twice, but when he ducked his
head to gaze under the smoke, the hawk was still going, and with him the
pullet. The shot had whistled about the ears of the Baron, and a hot
streak had run up his back and across his neck, but no shot struck him
fairly, and he went grimly on. When he at last sighted his tower his
strength was giving down, for his burden was heavy and the way had been
long. But he went up, up, bravely up, breasting the clear air higher and
higher, and finally his feet rested on the old familiar place, and he
skilfully balanced himself with his wings.
As he feasted, he realized that he had made a great discovery. The
tender, juicy flesh which entered his greedy mouth in tempting strips
was far more suited to his palate than was the meat of the wild things
upon which he had hitherto preyed. All of the wild flesh was tainted,
more or less, with the exception of the luscious quail, but here was
something fit for even his kingly beak. So as he ate, he planned, and
his thoughts boded ill for the farm housewife.
Thus it happened that for a time a feeling of peace and security reigned
in the dominion of the king. In the rabbit world the cotton-tails came
more and more into the open, venturing out from the brier patches and
the low-growing bushes which were their natural protectors; but they
never failed to watch the air with one eye while they ate, for the
destroyer came silently, and the first warning was the fatal shadow
falling upon them, followed by the smothering swish of wings. Then woe
to the long-eared luckless one who was even a few feet from cover. The
descent of the bold robber was like a lightning bolt—as swift and as
deadly. The quail began to trot with more confidence between the
stubble-rows—for it was the autumn season—and to hunt for berries and
stray grains of wheat with less fear. So with all the different families
over which the Robber Baron held sway. Every day a broad, thin shadow
would pass over, but it never dropped, and the timid ground-people
whispered to each other that their dreaded enemy had found a new
hunting-place, and rejoiced accordingly. At times they saw him
returning, nearly always flying low and heavily, with a cumbersome prey
in his clutches. What it was, they did not know, but so long as he left
them in peace they were content not to question his doings.
One golden afternoon the Robber Baron sat upon his turret in majestic
loneliness. He was a royal bird. His head was flat; his brow niched and
frowning, and his beak was curved like a boat-hook. His mighty wings
were folded closely to his sides; his gray-white breast, flecked with
brown, bravely met the winds which blew about his towering snag. His
sturdy legs were tufted to the second joint, and his scaly talons, black
and steel-like in their powerful grasp, curved firmly around the dead
wood which formed his perch. He was a type of strength and grace, and
the embodiment of rapacity and cruelty. Calmly and proudly his bold eyes
roamed far and wide, resting for a moment upon a waving, irregular line
of sedge, caused by the passage of some four-footed thing; then being
drawn to the glinting breast of the river, where some constantly
widening circles showed the upward leap of a frolicsome fish. But no
heed at all did he pay to these signs, which upon other days would have
lured him to pursuit. His aristocratic taste would no longer admit of
such petty sacrifices and such poor food. Were not the feathers of a
plump hen even at that moment littering the ground at the foot of his
castle, and had he not heard, the night before, a prowling raccoon
crunching the bones which he had disdainfully cast aside? The air was
crisp with the tang of wild leaves which the frost had bitten, and hazy
with the Indian summer glory of the season. Back in the forest behind
him some maples were blazing in their crimson garments, and the hardier
leaves of the oak and chestnut were tingeing. A creeper, encircling with
many a close embrace the trunk of his own high tree, burned like the
fiery serpent of some magician. Emboldened by the truce which their lord
had declared, the Bob Whites sent their inexpressibly pure notes from
different points like the sounds of answering bells. In the corn-field
just across the river some men were working. With long knives in their
hands they attacked the serried ranks of yellow-uniformed soldiery, and
wherever they went they left a gap. Round pumpkins, which the Midas hand
of frost had turned to purest gold, were being carried by others to one
huge pile, forming a pyramid of plenty from the bountiful Giver. In a
hickory tree near his castle two old crows were engaged in a very silly
dispute, and the Baron turned a disgusted gaze upon the quarrelsome
black things, who knew nothing of dignity, and all of sly theft. Far
overhead a buzzard sailed along—that dumb, faithful scavenger of the
wild, who was never known to utter a sound from the beginning of time.
Him the big hawk respected. He attended to his affairs, and never
engaged in bickerings with his neighbors. That he nested on the
ground—in the caves and in the hollows of rotten tree-trunks—was no
concern of the Baron, who scorned the earth, and never touched it but to
rise again immediately.
The sun was slowly dipping towards a line of hills far to the west. The
watcher on the snag took note of this, as he did of everything that went
on around him, and he knew that if he was to have a feast that day he
must go about procuring it. The barnyard which had been supplying him
with his daily meal for the past ten days was not far away, but the wily
robber had become used to many things during his predatory existence,
and one of these things was that every house possessed a gun, and that a
gun has a remarkably long range when loaded for hawk. During his last
raid he had lost some feathers, and there was a constant, itching pain
in one of his thighs, where a shot had lodged. He had tried to pluck it
out with his murderous beak, but his efforts had only aggravated the
wound, with the result that he was continually irritated. He would visit
that barnyard no more. Sweeping his bold eyes in another direction, he
beheld, several miles away, a wavering column of smoke ascending. This
came from the chimney of a farm-house. He made his resolve quickly. The
memory of countless repasts forbade the idea of even a day’s fast. The
clamped toes unclasped, clasped, and unclasped again; the graceful body
leaned forward, and the wing feathers quivered. Squatting low, the big
bird launched himself in air and the broad wings shot out and bore him
up. Once again he was in the element he loved.
The tiny hearts of the ground-people shook with fear as the shadow of
the destroyer passed over the stubble-field, for weeks of immunity from
attack had not lessened their fear of their bloodthirsty ruler. But the
shadow passed on and disappeared; the river’s placid breast mirrored his
image as the great hawk sped on, flying leisurely, for he would need his
strength upon his return. Then over the corn-field, where the men were
husking the yellow grain. Just over the variegated floor which the
tree-tops of another forest made he passed on his flight, for there was
no reason to mount high, and thus tire himself. Very soon the farm-house
came in sight, and in the big yard was a grove of locust trees. These
afforded an excellent shelter from which to spy, and presently his feet
gripped a limb, he tilted forward from the momentum of his flight, but
regained his equilibrium instantly, and his searching eyes turned this
way and that in quest of a victim. About the yard some matronly hens
were straying, with here and there a strutting cock, self-conscious and
pompous. The daring robber did not hesitate long. A particularly
tempting Plymouth Rock hen drew his eye, and instantly he left his
perch, arose in the air, and prepared to swoop. Just as he closed his
wings for this purpose, a babel of twittering arose which he had learned
to dread, and around the corner of the house sped two martens with
fluttering wings and wild cries of anger. Dismayed, the marauder spread
his wings again and strove to escape, while a fearful tumult began among
the fowls in the yard, followed by a wild rush for cover. Swift of wing
and fearless, the tiny attackers vigorously pursued the fleeing hawk,
hovering over him with their shrill cries, and now and again dropping
upon his back to deliver a sharp peck. When they had chased the invader
from the yard they considered their duty done, and came back in wild
curves to their box on the pole in the rear of the house.
Enraged and smarting from the chastisement which he had received, the
hawk sailed up in a white ash tree to rest and consider the situation.
As he debated dusk came on, and he became aware that he was desperately
hungry. The yard was guarded, and he could not enter there. Disappointed
and sore, he was preparing to depart empty-handed, when his restless eye
caught sight of a dark spot moving over the ground not far away. It was
a foraging hen coming home to roost. Five seconds later his pinions
hissed over the head of the doomed fowl, the knife-like talons caught
and held, and he painfully arose to begin his homeward flight. His prey
was a full-grown hen and was heavy as lead, but when he arose with his
spoil he never let go his hold. So over the tops of the trees he went
again, the limp body in his grip brushing some of the leaves, so heavily
did it sag. Back over the corn-field, forsaken now by the harvesters,
and his flight was so low that a man with a club might have struck him.
Then the river, in which the first stars were beginning to gleam. How
his legs ached, and each motion of his wings wrenched his body. He had
never been so late returning before, and the distance had never seemed
so long. On the other side of the stubble-field rose his tower, waiting
for him to come home, as it had waited through all his life. Would he
ever reach it? He would if it cost him his life, for he could not sit on
the earth and eat, like a filth-devouring buzzard. His dragging flight
over the field was more than half completed, when he heard a sound that
turned his blood to ice. It was the deep, solemn note of the horned owl,
boomed forth at the edge of the wood. He had tarried too long at his
hunting, and his enemy was coming on his night-hunt for food.
[Illustration: “Zigzagging nimbly, he strove to elude his pursuer.”]
Swiftly the hawk dipped and swerved, but those big red-green eyes, to
which darkness was day, beheld him, and gave chase. The wily robber
dropped his burden, hoping to bribe the spectre in his wake. But with a
rush the owl passed over the cast-off carcass, and sped on. The hen-hawk
heard the soft, feathery wing-swish coming nearer and nearer, and though
he was no coward he knew that his hour was at hand, for he was worn and
spent, whereas his foe had fresh strength. Zigzagging nimbly, he strove
in this manner to elude his pursuer. But the big owl had waited long for
this chance, and he was resolved that it should not escape him. Suddenly
he struck out with beak and claws, and the hawk careened wildly from the
shock, then righting himself, turned to give battle—it was the last
resort. And so they clashed and clashed again. There arose the rasping
of beak on beak and the dull thud of flesh propelled against flesh.
Feathers were torn out by clawfuls, and the breast of each combatant was
streaked and dabbled with blood. At last the owl, maddened and
all-powerful in his might, beat and smothered his antagonist to the
earth, and holding that kingly head on the ground with the vise-like
grip of one foot, with his curved beak he prodded and tore till life was
gone from the Robber Baron.
The gray old snag which was his tower waited for his coming that night
in vain.
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THE GHOST COON
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THE GHOST COON
SOMETHING white was moving warily through the shadows of Beech Hollow.
It was near the turning of night, and the heart of the wide, uncleared
knob area was quiet. Not the quiet of sleep, indeed, for the wood-folk
were abroad in numbers, each bent upon a separate errand whose aim and
end was death. But they moved without noise, from the largest to the
smallest. A brown mink wriggled his serpentine way along the erratic
path which a field-mouse had made; following him, perchance, with subtle
cunning and fell purpose, was a wild-cat. A fox sniffed where a pheasant
had passed, and trailed hungrily and swiftly for a dozen yards, to a
point where the bird had risen in the air. So through the night they
went, big and little, threading the secret ways of the underbrush, and
sooner or later finding that for which they sought. Few went beyond the
limits which marked Beech Hollow on every side. The lore of the
wood-kind taught that this place was haunted by the ghost of a big coon,
and that death awaited the invader into his precincts. By a secret
telegraphic code, by purrings and by barks, there was not a denizen of
the wild but knew the fact. More than one had seen the spectre. It was
not the hallucination of a March-crazed cotton-tail. The ghost coon ran
every night from the first cock-crow till near dawn, and his hunting
ground was held inviolate by his four-footed flesh-and-blood kindred.
It was an opulent night in autumn. The half-naked beeches which gave the
hollow its name shivered in their scant covering. The hillsides were
heavy with drifted leaves, russet and gold and poppy-veined. Through the
hollow purled a small stream, sleepily. Along the trunk of a long-dead
beech, prostrate and blackened, moved something white, a figure almost
ball-shaped. Its head was held low to the surface of the log; its body
rose up in a peculiarly rounded hump, and its snow-white, bushy tail
trailed along behind. It was the ghost coon of Beech Hollow on his
nightly quest for food. His progress was most ungainly. The fore feet
would move forward a few inches and the body would lengthen. Then the
hind feet would get in motion and the back would assume an arc, and all
the time the busy nose would be smelling to left and right. Reaching the
end of the tree at last the coon reared upon his haunches, squirrel
fashion, and gazed about him keenly. Nothing was stirring beyond a
fluttering leaf; nothing was heard but the low soughing of the wind.
Suddenly the triangular head went up a little higher, and the nose
pointed directly across the hollow. Thus it was held rigidly for several
moments, while the beady eyes glowed fiercely. Then a slender red tongue
curved swiftly around his upper lip; he sank to the log again, and
thence to the ground, and moved down the hillside with a shambling,
awkward, yet incredibly swift gait.
That very day, as he was sleeping in his hollow tree at the end of the
ravine, he had been awakened by the shots of some hunters in the
corn-field bordering his valley of refuge. Then he had stretched himself
and gone to sleep again, confident of a rich banquet in the hours of the
coming night. He knew well—for he had learned the lesson when half
grown—that frightened birds always take to the nearest cover when
annoyed too much by men and dogs. Not long after sundown he had crawled
out of his hole and crouched on the limb in front of it, and listened to
the rallying call of the quail as they gathered together to squat for
the night. Then, when the night was far enough advanced, he had slid
down the tree like a patch of moonlight, and gone in search of his prey.
In a direct line with the coon’s progress, the stream below spread into
a pool of considerable breadth and some depth, and as the soft-footed
prowler gained its edge he stopped, leaned over the water, and eyed the
surface intently. A born fisherman, he could not let the opportunity
pass to land one of the small perch which had their home in this pool.
For a number of minutes he stood as still as one of the stones lining
the bank. Then he burst into action with the agility of one of the cat
tribe. One claw-rimmed foot shot forward and downward, then up again all
at one stroke, and the star rays glittered on a scaly body flying
through the air. The fish had scarcely touched the ground when the
nimble animal was beside it. Quickly the faithful paws pounced upon the
flopping object and pinioned it to the earth. Then just back of the neck
the sharp fangs crunched, and the ghostly ruler of the hollow ate
leisurely of the toothsome dainty which his craft and skill had
provided, spitting and clawing out the bones when in his greediness they
stuck in his tongue. When his supper was over, the coon, his hunger
appeased in a measure, did not at once take up the air-trail which was
still wafted gently to him from the top of the other slope. He moved
around and around the heap of bones and offal which marked his late
repast, sniffing and nibbling by turns. Finally he veered about and
started back over the track which he had come. Just then his nostrils
were tickled by another light gust, laden with the partridge smell. It
was too much to resist. He swerved again, and began to climb the slope
of his temptation.
Nestling at the base of a rugged knob not two miles distant from Beech
Hollow was a log-roller’s hut. Of its human inmates we have no word to
say, for our story has naught to do with them. But of a certain low,
heavy-bodied, vengeful, mongrel cur dog which harbored at this hut in
the day, it becomes necessary now to speak. This dog feared
nothing—absolutely nothing. He would bite at the thick sole of the shoe
which kicked him; he would fight anything that walked upon two feet or
four. He was totally wicked, totally merciless in his battles, and he
cherished an inveterate hatred for coons. Throughout the day he would
hang around the miserable shelter of the human-people—his companions,
but not his masters—and when night sank down over the broad wastes of
forest and hill he would go trailing through the dense passes of the
wild, sharp-nosed and vigilant; his stub tail moving like the pendulum
of a clock, and keeping time to his rapid footsteps. Once in his
wanderings he had entered Beech Hollow, and had run upon that which the
wood-folk feared. A large, white, ghostly figure coming towards him down
the ravine. The cur yelped and fled. Gaining the open to the south of
the hollow, the moonlight gave him courage, and he warily circled the
place, coming in at the other end and running with his keen nose not an
inch above the ground. He stumbled upon the scent quickly, and the
chase-yelp bubbled to his throat. But he choked it back, for he was
wiser than most coon dogs, who give tongue as soon as the trail is
caught, and thus warn their quarry of danger. The trail that night led
him to the base of a large beech tree, and there was the coon smell on
the bark as high as he could reach by standing upon his hind legs. From
that night the hollow held no terror for him. A coon had but one smell,
and though this one was white, whereas all with whom he had drawn blood
were gray with black-ringed tails, still it was a coon, and the one idea
in his head now was to harass and harry it into open fight.
So he began to stalk the lonely hollow which was shunned by the
forest-people, inbred guile driving him to all the cunning artifices
known to the wood-dwellers. But the ghost coon was his match in
subtlety. Never since that first night had the vindictive cur laid eyes
upon the phantom, though two and three times a week he would come with
his fangs whetted for fight. But upon that night in autumn when the coon
feasted upon the fish, and subsequently started in quest of the huddled
quail, a dark, noiseless shape entered the hollow from the north, and
glided down it as a cloud shadow glides over a field. The cur struck the
trail a few feet from the point where the coon had dropped from the
prostrate tree, and instantly he crouched and grew rigid. The odor was
fresh and strong, and he had waited long and travelled far for this
chance. Flattening his body on the damp leaves, he looked about him with
glowing eyes. Nothing was to be seen or heard. Which way was he to go?
Had his prey gone up hill or down? Guided by that unerring instinct
which all animals possess, the dog arose after an instant’s hesitation
and moved down the hill with his black muzzle brushing the leaves.
At the top of the other slope the white marauder was slowly closing in
upon his sleeping victims. Each step was taken with painful
deliberateness and extreme care, for he knew that his journey would end
in a clump of huckleberry bushes just at the edge of the wood. Onward he
glided, his tiny feet as noiseless in their progress as the fall of a
snowflake. Beneath a bending, berry-laden spray he stopped, and gazed
gloatingly for a second upon a dozen or more brown bodies crowded
together with their tails touching. Then he pounced. A few sleepy
chirrups, a wild scramble, and the sound of whirring wings followed. The
chagrined coon, cheated of his anticipated meal, shook a few downy
feathers from the claws of his right fore foot, backed out of the
bushes, and took the return trail for his tree of refuge. In his anger
at failing in his last adventure, he neglected to scan the slope before
him as he started down it. Soon he realized that a strange stump had
taken root in his path since he had trodden it a few moments before. A
squat, black, ugly thing, which he had not previously noticed. He came
on stubbornly, however, and did not stop until he saw two blazing eyes
looking at him with an expression of fiendish joy. There was nothing to
do but fight.
For a very perceptible time the two glared at each other. The dog cruel,
mean, wicked; the coon angry, furtive, sly. Then low sounds came from
the throat of each. The dog gave a deep, muttering growl; the coon a
succession of sharp hisses, not unlike those made by a goose, the while
he withdrew into himself and glanced about as if meditating flight,
though no tree grew near enough for him to reach. The dog quickly
assumed the offensive, for his eager hate would not countenance delay.
His spring was like the rebound of a cross-bow, but his enemy knew how
to fight. While the cur was yet in air the ghost of the hollow had
reared and fallen prone upon his back, his hind feet drawn close down
upon his belly, and his fore feet arched and ready. At the right moment
the hind feet shot up, and ripped a half dozen streaming seams in the
flanks of the cur as he descended with snapping jaws. A screech, a
scuffle, a howl of pain, and the dog leaped backward, drew his tongue
rapidly across the stinging rents in his side, and bounded for the
second time upon his foe. Aiming at the throat, his teeth found the
loose skin at one side of the neck instead; the coon secured one of the
stub ears of the attacker in his mouth, and thus they grappled. Strange
sounds floated through the length of Beech Hollow that night; sounds
which never before had disturbed its accustomed quiet. There were the
sounds of heavy bodies threshing the earth, the rasping snarl, the yelp
of distress, and the clashing of teeth. In the still night the noise
carried far, and the keen ears of some wood-dwellers running on a
near-by range heard it, and the forest-folk stopped, listened, and
turned their faces from it, for it came from the haunted hollow.
On the leaf-strewn slope one great ball of intermingled black and white
gradually drew near the bottom of the hill. Neither knew nor thought of
the course the fight was taking. Their hearts were inflamed with the
battle-lust, and with lightning-like movements they fought for the
death-hold. After a time the level was reached, and here, by mere
chance, the jaws of the dog found the throat of his enemy. The coon
realized his strait, and plied all four feet with such good effect that
the blood ran in streams from the ragged wounds which he inflicted. But
his breath was shut off, and nothing can live or fight without air. It
was then that he felt something cool clasp his hind leg. With his
remaining strength he threw himself backward, dragging the cur with him,
and the water of the pool closed over them both.
A coon can remain under water for a marvelously long time. A dog knows
it, and will never attack them in or near a stream. The ghost coon sank,
taking his enemy with him. In the foreign element the cur, confused,
strangled, and frightened, loosed his hold, came to the surface and
struck out for the shore. But the tables had turned, and the valiant old
boar knew it. Rising also, he received the grateful rush of air into his
strained lungs, and in another moment he was on the back of his opponent
and forcing him under. Fastening his teeth in the loose folds of skin at
the base of the skull he sank again, dragging the cur down with him. The
water boiled like a caldron, and though a leg, or even a shoulder at
times appeared, no head came into view. Soon the pool grew quiet. Then,
near the bank, a sharp muzzle came up, slowly followed by the dripping
form of the victor. His den-tree stood quite near the other end of the
hollow, and as he painfully began his march towards it, leaving a trail
of water and blood behind him as he went, his body swayed and his steps
were uncertain. At last he stood among the roots which he knew so well,
and with eyes which scarcely saw, looked up the bare trunk which he had
been wont to climb with perfect ease. Feebly he reared, and began the
ascent. Six feet from the ground he stopped, gently let his head fall
forward upon the bark, quivered from end to end, and dropped to the
earth, dead.
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THE SPOILER OF THE FOLDS
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THE SPOILER OF THE FOLDS