PREPARING CAMP FOR WINTER
Colonel Howell being a far from hard taskmaster, especially in his
dealings with the Indians, it was not until the morning of the second day
that Moosetooth and La Biche led their men out of camp on the
three-hundred mile tramp to Athabasca Landing. But the beginning of work
in the camp did not await their departure. Colonel Howell took time to
explain his plans so far as they concerned his young friends, and the
morning after the arrival of the boats work at once began with the
regularity of a factory.
The things to be done included a substantial addition to the present
cabin, to be made in the main out of the straight poplar timber. The roof
of this was to be of sod and the new bunk house formed a "T" with the old
cabin. A clay floor was packed within and on this a board floor was made
of some of the inside timber from one of the scows. New timber and poplar
posts were used to make the bunks, which, packed heavily with shredded
balsam, soon provided clean and fragrant sleeping berths. Colonel Howell
had learned of a sheet-iron stove to be had in the McMurray settlement,
and this was to be installed before cold weather arrived.
The other cabin was renovated and thoroughly cleaned. A provision
storehouse was added in the rear, and the clay fireplace was enlarged and
extended into the room. This work under way, Norman and Roy, assisted by
Paul, undertook to construct a rough but adequate aerodrome. The open
space in front of the cabin was not sufficient for a landing and a large
part of the clearing in the rear of the cabin was leveled for the airship
shed. To decrease the size of the structure, it was also made in "T"
shape, the extension for the tail of the machine reaching back toward the
cabin, for the new shelter faced away from the cabin so that there might
be no obstacle in starting and landing the machine.
In spite of its simple character, the boys made elaborate sketches for
this shed and used in the main small uniform poplar trees easily carried
on their shoulders. The entire frame of the building was made of this
timber. The front of it was to be made of the colonel's three enormous
tarpaulins. The sides and top being of heavy hemlock bark, this feature
of the work required many days and it was often tiresome.
In the three weeks that this work went on, Colonel Howell appeared to be
in no hurry to resume his prospecting. The boys learned that the old
Kansas oil men had not been wholly idle in this respect and that they had
located several good signs, all of which Colonel Howell took occasion to
examine.
The boys also learned that the best prospects were not those found where
the derrick had been erected. From their experience, the men who had been
left in camp strongly urged another location in a dip of land farther
inland.
"It's as good a surface sign as I ever saw," Colonel Howell explained to
the young men. "It's a rock cut, but there's enough tar floating loose to
show that there's oil mighty close. But there's no use getting excited
about it and tapping a gusher. We'd only have to cap it and wait for the
tank cars. Everything around here is prospective, of course. All we can
do is to cover the field and establish our claim. And I guess that's a
good winter's job."
"Ain't you goin' to work this derrick?" asked Paul, indicating the one
erected near the camp.
"Looks like there might be gas around here," was the colonel's laughing
response. "We'll sink a shaft here an' maybe we can find a flow of
natural gas. That'd help some when she gets down to forty below."
It was surprising how all these preparations consumed time. It was nearly
the end of August when these plans had been worked out and with the
setting up of the _Gitchie Manitou_ in its novel aerodrome and the
storing away of its oil and gasoline in a little bark lean-to, the camp
appeared to be ready for serious work.
For a week Ewen and Miller had been setting up the wood boiler and engine
for operating the derrick. From the night he unceremoniously left camp,
Chandler, the Englishman, had not been heard from.
Each Sunday all labor ceased in camp and Ewen and Miller invariably spent
the day, long into the night, in Fort McMurray. The boys also visited
this settlement, which had in it little of interest. There was no store
and nothing to excite their cupidity in the way of purchases. They heard
that Chandler had gone down the river, but the information was not
definite and, although Colonel Howell left messages for his discharged
employee, the man did not reappear and sent no word.
Colonel Howell's other workmen, Ewen and Miller, were not companionable
and did not become comrades of the boys. Now and then, in the month's
work, Norman and Roy had heard Colonel Howell freely criticize them for
the method of their work or for some newly omitted thing they had failed
to do during the winter.
When the stores and supplies had been compactly arranged in the rear of
the living room and the new storehouse, the cabin and its surroundings
seemed prepared for comfortable occupancy in the coldest weather.
The only man retained out of the river outfit was a Lac la Biche
half-breed, a relative of Moosetooth, who was to serve both as a cook and
a hunter. At least once a week, the entire party of young men went with
Philip Tremble, the half-breed hunter, for deer or moose. This usually
meant an early day's start, if they were looking for moose, and a long
hike over the wooded hills to the upland.
One moose they secured on the second hunt and to the great joy of the
boys Philip brought the skin of the animal back to camp. The antlers,
being soft, were useless. This episode not only afforded a welcome change
in meat which, as Colonel Howell had predicted, could not be told from
tender beef, but it sadly interfered with the work on the aerodrome.
When the Indian had prepared a frame for dressing the skin and lashed the
green hide with heavy cord between the four poplar sides and had produced
a shaving knife from somewhere among his private possessions, the boys
fought for the opportunity to work upon the hide.
For almost two days, Norman, Roy and Paul, by turns, scraped at the
muscle, sinews and fat yet adhering to the skins until at last their
first trophy shone as tight and clean in the sunshine as a drumhead.
Philip had also brought, from the upland, the animal's brains tied up in
his shirt. In the tanning process he then took charge of the cleaned skin
and buried it until the hair had rotted, and in this condition the
outside of the skin was also cleaned. Then came a mysterious process of
scouring the skin with the long preserved brains.
At Colonel Howell's suggestion, and with the complete approval of the
boys, this part of the process was carried on at some distance from the
cabin. Thereafter, when the weather was clear, Philip exposed the skin to
the smoke of a smouldering fire, devoting such time as he had to rubbing
and twisting the hide while it turned to a soft, odorous yellow.
Before the real winter began, the skin, which is the wealth of the
Canadian Indian, began to make its appearance in strong moccasins, which
were usually worn around the fireplace and often in bed.
From somewhere in the outfit a calendar had made its appearance, and this
had found a lodging place in the front of the fireplace. The morning that
Colonel Howell made a mark on September 1, with a bit of charred stick,
he remarked:
"Well, boys, the postman seems to have forgotten us. What's the matter
with running up to Athabasca and getting our mail? A piece of beef
wouldn't go bad, either. How about it?"
So intense had the interest of Norman and Roy been in the hundreds of
things to be done in camp that the aeroplane, although not out of mind,
was not always foremost in their thoughts. No reply was needed to this
suggestion. Instantly, the proposition filled the air with airship talk.
This first trip had been discussed many times. It required no particular
planning now.
"I like to travel about fifty miles an hour," exclaimed Norman, "and it's
three hundred miles to the Landing. We'll leave to-morrow morning at five
o'clock and land on the heights opposite the town at eleven. One of us'll
go across in the ferry--"
"Both of us," broke in Roy. "There's no need to watch the
machine--everybody's honest in this country."
"Let me go and watch it?" asked Paul, who was now the constant associate
of the other boys in their work and pleasures.
"Not this time," answered Norman. "It isn't exactly a bus, you know. We
can take care of it all right."
"Then we'll have dinner at the good old Alberta," suggested Roy with his
features aglow, "do our errands, and start back about three o'clock. It's
a cinch. With the river for our guide, we ought to give you a beefsteak
about nine o'clock."
"And don't forget a few magazines," put in Paul.
This flight, which began promptly on time the next morning, after an
early breakfast of toasted bannock, bacon and the inevitable tea, which
Philip never spoiled with smoke, however, was made with all the ease of
the exhibitions at the Stampede.
The _Gitchie Manitou_ was wheeled out of the hangar for a thorough
inspection. Then the boys climbed in and the engines were started. With a
wave of the hand they were off.
For a short time after the yellow-winged monoplane had mounted and turned
south and westward over the vapory river, the boys had a new sensation.
The rising fog started air currents which for a time they did not
understand. Perhaps Norman's hand was a little out of a practice and at
times Roy showed nervousness.
When Norman finally guessed the cause, he mounted higher and took a
course over the uplands where, as the sunshine cleared the atmosphere,
the _Gitchie Manitou_ became more easily manageable. The line of vapor
rising from the river some distance on their left was sufficient guide.
This at last disappeared in turn and Norman threw the car back on its old
course.
Once again above the river, whose brown, oily surface now shone clearly
beneath them, Roy especially busied himself with the many attractions of
the stream. Animal life was plentiful and, despite Norman's renewed
protests, his companion insisted now and then in fruitlessly discharging
his rifle at small game.
They made better time than fifty miles and made a safe landing on the
heights opposite Athabasca some time before eleven o'clock. What had
seemed to them, from Athabasca, to be an uninhabited bluff, was now found
to contain several poor cabins. Afraid to leave the car alone near those
who would certainly be curious, Norman decided to stay with the monoplane
and Roy undertook to visit the town across the river. But dinner at the
Alberta was eliminated and Roy, in addition to his mail and meat and
magazines, was to bring back luncheon for both the aviators.
Norman accompanied him to the brow of the hill and saw him scramble down
the winding road to the ferry landing below. Here, also, he saw him wait
nearly a half hour before the cumbersome gravity flatboat put out from
the other shore, and then he devoted himself to picking and eating
Saskatoon berries, with which the hills were covered.
It was two o'clock when Roy returned, burdened with packages. For an hour
Norman had been asleep in the invigorating hill air. Roy had certainly
gone the limit in the matter of meat. He had two roasts and six thick
steaks and, what was more to his own taste, he proudly displayed a leg of
lamb. His mail, of which there seemed to be a great deal for everyone, he
had tied in one end of a flour sack. In the other end he had six loaves
of fresh bread. On his back in another bag he had a weight of magazines.
"I thought we'd take what we could," he began, "and I guess it's a good
thing we came when we did. Somebody's been pounding telegrams in here for
several days for Colonel Howell. I got a half dozen of 'em and I sent all
he gave me. I got off some messages to the folks, too, but I wonder what
the colonel's so busy about."
"This ain't the only iron he has in the fire," answered Norman drowsily.
"But where's our own eats?"
Roy dumped his bags and bundles on the grass and then began to explore
his own capacious pockets. From one he took a can of salmon and from
another a box of sardines.
"And here's the lemon for 'em," he explained, producing it from his shirt
pocket. "Help yourself to the bread."
"Is that all?" complained Norman. "I'll bet a nickel you had dinner at
the Alberta!"
"All but this," went on Roy, and he began unbuttoning the front of his
flannel shirt. "It feels kind of soft."
While Norman watched him, he extracted a greasy bag, flat and crumpled,
and tore it open to expose what was left of an originally fine hot raisin
pie.
His companion turned up his nose in disgust.
"I fell down on the hill," explained Roy, "but if you don't want it,
don't bother. It's just a little squashed. I'll eat it all right."
Norman began to straighten out the crumpled pieces with his finger, when
his chum added, with some exultation: "And these."
Then, from within his unbuttoned shirt, he began to unload a dozen large
sugar-coated doughnuts.
As Norman's mouth began to water, and he turned to the bread bag, a new
odor caught his nostrils.
"What's this?" he exclaimed, pulling another greasy bag from among the
bread loaves.
"Oh, I forgot," sputtered Roy, a part of one of the doughnuts already in
his mouth; "that's some baked ham I found at the butcher shop. I guess
that's some eats."
"Didn't you get any pop?" was Norman's only answer, a look of added
disgust spreading over his face.
Roy turned, with a startled look: "I couldn't carry any more," he
answered a little guiltily, "but I drank a couple o' bottles myself."
"I knew I'd get stung if I let you go!" growled his companion.
Norman looked at him with indignation. Then, having already appropriated
a doughnut, he mounted quickly on the side of the car and sprang down
again with the aluminum basin in his hand.
"Now you go down to the river and get me a drink. You've had it soft
enough."
The return trip was almost a duplicate of the morning flight. In this,
however, the aviators were able to follow the stream itself, and they
flew low, protected from the evening breeze by the river hills. The ride
did not seem long, and the boys were particularly interested in another
view of the Rapids, which they had been unable to study in the morning
flight. Not a single human being, going or coming, had they seen on the
long stretch of river.
In Athabasca, Roy had learned that their boat crew had not all returned,
but that La Biche and Moosetooth had reached town and that both were
already serving as pilots on the new Hudson's Bay Company steamer that
had been launched in their absence and was now making its first trip up
the river. They were almost passing the oil camp when the sound of a shot
attracted their attention and then, guided by Paul's worn and faded hat,
they banked and landed in the rear of the aerodrome at ten minutes of
nine.