I
Dan Failing stepped out of the elevator and was at once absorbed in the
crowd that ever surged up and down Broad Street. Where the crowd came
from, or what it was doing, or where it was going was one of the
mysteries of Gitcheapolis. It appealed to a person rather as does a
river: eternal, infinite, having no control over its direction or
movement, but only subject to vast, underlying natural laws. In this
case, the laws were neither gravity nor cohesion, but rather unnamed
laws that go clear back to the struggle for existence and
self-preservation. Once in the crowd, Failing surrendered up all
individuality. He was just one of the ordinary drops of water, not an
interesting, elaborate, physical and chemical combination to be studied
on the slide of a microscope. No one glanced at him in particular. He
was enough like the other drops of water not to attract attention. He
wore fairly passable clothes, neither rich nor shabby. He was a tall
man, but gave no impression of strength because of the exceeding
spareness of his frame. As long as he remained in the crowd, he wasn't
important enough to be studied. But soon he turned off, through the
park, and straightway found himself alone.
The noise and bustle of the crowd--never loud or startling, but so
continuous that the senses are scarcely more aware of them than of the
beating of one's own heart--suddenly and utterly died almost at the very
border of the park. It was as if an ax had chopped them off, and left
the silence of the wild place. The gravel path that slanted through the
green lawns did not lead anywhere in particular. It made a big loop and
came out almost where it went in. Perhaps that is the reason that the
busy crowds did not launch forth upon it. Crowds, like electricity, take
the shortest course. Moreover, the hour was still some distance from
noon, and the afternoon pleasure seekers had not yet come. But the
morning had advanced far enough so that all the old castaways that had
slept in the park had departed. Dan had the path all to himself.
Although he had plenty of other things to think about, the phenomena of
the sudden silence came home to him very straight indeed. The noise from
the street seemed wholly unable to penetrate the thick branches of the
trees. He could even hear the leaves whisking and flicking together,
and when a man can discern this, he can hear the cushions of a mountain
lion on a trail at night. Of course Dan Failing had never heard a
mountain lion. Except on the railroad tracks between, he had never
really been away from cities in his life.
At once his thought went back to the doctor's words. Dan had a very
retentive memory, as well as an extra fine imagination. The two always
seem to go together. The words were still repeating themselves over and
over in his ears, and the doctor's face was still before his eyes. It
had been a kind face; the lips had even curled in a little smile of
encouragement. But the doctor had been perfectly frank, entirely
straightforward. Dan was glad that he had. At least, he was rid of the
dreadful uncertainty. There had been no evasion in his verdict.
"I've made every test," he said. "They're pretty well shot. Of course,
you can go to some sanitarium, if you've got the money. If you
haven't--enjoy yourself all you can for about six months."
Dan's voice had been perfectly cool and sure when he replied. He had
smiled a little, too. He was still rather proud of that smile. "Six
months? Isn't that rather short?"
"Maybe a whole lot shorter. I think that's the limit."
There was the situation: Dan Failing had but six months to live. Of
course, the doctor said, if he had the money he could go to a
sanitarium. But he had spoken entirely hopelessly. Besides, Dan didn't
have the money. He pushed all thought of sanitariums out of his mind.
Instead, he began to wonder whether his mother had been entirely wise in
her effort to keep him from the "rough games" of the boys of his own
age. He realized now that he had been an under-weight all his
life,--that the frailty that had thrust him to the edge of the grave had
begun in his earliest boyhood. But it wasn't that he was born with
physical handicaps. He had weighed a full ten pounds; and the doctor had
told his father that a sturdier little chap was not to be found in any
maternity bed in the whole city. But his mother was convinced that the
child was delicate and must be sheltered. Never in all the history of
his family, so far as Dan knew, had there been a death from the malady
that afflicted him. Yet his sentence was signed and sealed.
But he harbored no resentment against his mother. It was all in the
game. She had done what she thought was best. And he began to wonder in
what way he could get the greatest pleasure from his last six months of
life.
"Good Lord!" he suddenly breathed. "I may not even be here to see the
snows come!" Perhaps there was a grim note in his voice. There was
certainly no tragedy, no offensive sentimentality. He was looking the
matter in the face. But it was true that Dan had always been partial to
the winter season. When the snow lay all over the farmlands and bowed
down the limbs of the trees, it had always wakened a curious flood of
feelings in the wasted man. It seemed to him that he could remember
other winters, wherein the snow lay for endless miles over an endless
wilderness, and here and there were strange, many-toed tracks that could
be followed in the icy dawns. He didn't ever know just what made the
tracks, except that they were creatures of fang and talon that no law
had ever tamed. But of course it was just a fancy. He wasn't in the
least misled about it. He knew that he had never, in his lifetime, seen
the wilderness. Of course his grandfather had been a frontiersman of the
first order, and all his ancestors before him--a rangy, hardy breed
whose wings would crumple in civilization--but he himself had always
lived in cities. Yet the falling snows, soft and gentle but with a kind
of remorselessness he could sense but could not understand, had always
stirred him. He'd often imagined that he would like to see the forests
in winter. He knew something about forests. He had gone one year to
college and had studied all the forestry that the university heads would
let him take. Later he had read endless books on the same subject. But
the knowledge had never done him any good. Except for a few boyish
dreams, he never imagined that it would.
In him you could see a reflection of the boy that played beside the pond
of snow water, twenty years before. His dark gray eyes were still rather
large and perhaps the wasted flesh around them made them seem larger
than they were. But it was a little hard to see them, as he wore large
glasses. His mother had been sure, years before, that he needed glasses;
and she had easily found an oculist that agreed with her.
Now that he was alone on the path, the utter absence of color in his
cheeks was startling. That meant the absence of red,--that warm glow of
the blood, eager and alive in his veins. There was, indeed, another
color, visible only because of the stark whiteness of his skin. He was
newly shaven, and his lips and chin looked somewhat blue from the heavy
growth of hair under the skin. Perhaps an observer would have noticed
lean hands, with big-knuckled fingers, a rather firm mouth, and closely
cropped dark hair. He was twenty-nine years of age, but he looked
somewhat older. He knew now that he was never going to be any older. A
doctor as sure of himself as the one he had just consulted couldn't
possibly be mistaken.
It was rather refreshing to get into the park. Dan could think ever so
much more clearly. He never could think in a crowd. Someway, the
hurrying people always seemed to bewilder him. Here the leaves were
flicking and rustling over his head, and the shadows made a curious
patchwork on the green lawns. He became quite calm and reflective. And
then he sat down on a park bench, just beneath the spreading limb of a
great tree. He would sit here, he thought, until he finally decided what
he would do with his remaining six months.
He hadn't been able to go to war. The recruiting officer had been very
kind but most determined. The boys had brought him great tales of
France. It might be nice to go to France and live in some country inn
until he died. But he didn't have very long to think upon this vein. For
at that instant the squirrel came down to see if he had a nut.
It was the squirrel of Destiny. But Dan didn't know it then.
Now it is true that it takes more than one generation for any wild
creature to get completely away from its natural timidity. Quite often a
person is met who has taken quail eggs from a nest and hatched them
beneath the warm body of a domestic hen. Just what is the value of such
a proceeding is rather hard to explain, as quail have neither the
instincts nor the training to enjoy life in a barnyard. Yet occasionally
it is done, and the little quail spend most of their days running
frantically up and down the coop, yearning for the wild, free spaces for
which they were created. But they haven't, as a rule, many days to spend
in this manner. Mostly they run until they die.
The rule is said to work both ways. A tame canary, freed, will usually
try to return to his cage. And this is known to be true of human beings
just as of the wild creatures. There are certain breeds of men, used to
the far-lying hills, who, if inclosed in cities, run up and down them
until they die. The Indians, for instance, haven't ever been able to
adjust themselves to civilization. There are several thousand of them
now where once were millions.
Bushy-tail was not particularly afraid of the human beings that passed
up and down the park, because he had learned by experience that they
usually attempted no harm to him. But, nevertheless, he had his
instincts. He didn't entirely trust them. Occasionally a child would
come with a bag of nuts, and he would sit on the grass not a dozen feet
away to gather such as were thrown to him. But all the time he kept one
sharp eye open for any sudden or dangerous motions. And every instinct
warned him against coming nearer than a dozen feet. After several
generations, probably the squirrels of this park would climb all over
its visitors and sniff in their ears and investigate the back of their
necks. But this wasn't the way of Bushy-tail. He had come too recently
from the wild places. And he wondered, most intensely, whether this
tall, forked creature had a pocket full of nuts. He swung down on the
grass to see.
"Why, you little devil!" Dan said in a whisper. His eyes suddenly
sparkled with delight. And he forgot all about the doctor's words and
his own prospects in his bitter regrets that he had not brought a
pocketful of nuts. Unfortunately, he had never acquired the peanut
habit. His mother had always thought it vulgar.
And then Dan did a curious thing. Even later, he didn't know why he did
it, or what gave him the idea that he could decoy the squirrel up to
him by doing it. That was his only purpose,--just to see how close the
squirrel would come to him. He thought he would like to look into the
bright eyes at close range. All he did was suddenly to freeze into one
position,--in an instant rendered as motionless as the rather
questionable-looking stone stork that was perched on the fountain.
He didn't know it, at the time, but it was a most meritorious piece of
work. The truth was that he was acting solely by instinct. Men who have
lived long in the wilderness learn a very important secret in dealing
with wild animals. They know, in the first place, that intimacy with
them is solely a matter of sitting still and making no sudden motions.
It is motion, not shape, that frightens them. If a hunter is among a
herd of deer and wishes to pick the bucks off, one by one, he simply
sits still, moving his rifle with infinite caution, and the animal
intelligence does not extend far enough to interpret him as an enemy.
Instead of being afraid, the deer are usually only curious.
Dan simply sat still. The squirrel was very close to him, and Dan seemed
to know by instinct that the movement of a single muscle would give him
away. So he sat as if he were posing before a photographer's camera.
The fact that he was able to do it is in itself important. It is
considerably easier to exercise with dumb-bells for five minutes than to
sit absolutely without motion for the same length of time. Hunters and
naturalists acquire the art with training. It was therefore rather
curious that Dan succeeded so well the first time he tried it. He had
sense enough to relax first, before he froze. Thus he didn't put such a
severe strain on his muscles. And this was another bit of wisdom that in
a tenderfoot would have caused much wonder in certain hairy old hunters
in the West.
The squirrel, after ten seconds had elapsed, stood on his haunches to
see better. First he looked a long time with his left eye. Then he
turned his head and looked very carefully with his right. Then he backed
off a short distance and tried to get a focus with both. Then he came
some half-dozen steps nearer.
A moment before he had been certain that a living creature--in fact one
of the most terrible and powerful living creatures in the world--had
been sitting on the park bench. Now his poor little brain was completely
addled. He was entirely ready to believe that his eyes had deceived him.
All the time, Dan was sitting in perfectly plain sight. It wasn't as if
he were hiding. But the squirrel had learned to judge all life by its
motion alone, and he was completely at a loss to interpret or understand
a motionless figure.
Bushy-tail drew off a little further, fully convinced at last that his
hopes of a nut from a child's hand were blasted. But he turned to look
once more. The figure still sat utterly inert. And all at once he forgot
his devouring hunger in the face of an overwhelming curiosity.
He came somewhat nearer and looked a long time. Then he made a
half-circle about the bench, turning his head as he moved. He was more
puzzled than ever, but he was no longer afraid. His curiosity had become
so intense that no room for fear was left. And then he sprang upon the
park bench.
Dan moved then. The movement consisted of a sudden heightening of the
light in his eyes. But the squirrel didn't see it. It takes a muscular
response to be visible to the eyes of the wild things.
The squirrel crept slowly along the bench, stopping to sniff, stopping
to stare with one eye and another, just devoured from head to tail with
curiosity. And then he leaped on Dan's knee.
He was quite convinced, by now, that this warm perch on which he stood
was the most singular and interesting object of his young life. It was
true that he was faintly worried by the smell that reached his nostrils.
But all it really did was further to incite his curiosity. He followed
the leg up to the hip and then perched on the elbow. And an instant more
he was poking a cold nose into Dan's neck.
But if the squirrel was excited by all these developments, its amazement
was nothing compared to Dan's. It had been the most astounding incident
in the man's life. He sat still, tingling with delight. And in a single
flash of inspiration he knew he had come among his own people at last.
The creatures of the wild,--they were the folk he had always secretly
loved and instinctively understood. His ancestors, for literally
generations, had been frontiersmen and outdoor naturalists who never
wrote books. Was it possible that they had bequeathed to him an
understanding and love of the wild that most men did not have? But
before he had time to meditate on this question, an idea seemed to pop
and flame like a Roman candle in his brain. He knew where he would spend
his last six months of life.
His own grandfather had been a hunter and trapper and frontiersman in a
certain vast but little known Oregon forest. His son had moved to the
Eastern cities, but in Dan's garret there used to be old mementoes and
curios from these savage days,--a few claws and teeth, and a fragment of
an old diary. The call had come to him at last. Tenderfoot though he
was, Dan would go back to those forests, to spend his last six months of
life among the wild creatures that made them their home.