[Illustration: BRUSHING THE HEMLOCK BOUGHS, HE WALKED STEALTHILY]
Eut-le-ten started with no arms but his courage, to face the dread
witch who had spirited away the children. The trail lay long, unknown
and untrodden, save by the timber wolf, panther and black bear. It
was feared by the Indians for dangers most dreadful--the greatest
of all the chehah E-ish-so-oolth. He broke through dense shalal,
fringing the green woods, making the shore line all but impenetrable.
Into the thick woods, under the silvery spruce, brushing the hemlock
boughs he walked stealthily. Salmon berry thickets impeded his
progress, scratched his round limbs with the thorns on their canes.
He passed white helebore, so tall and so handsome. He saw how the
black bear had fed on swamp lily, tramping the glossy leaves into the
black mud. He spurned the devil's club with berries so red and with
poisonous thorns on stem and on leaf. Such was the trail as it led
him far inland, inland away from his home by the sea. At last by a
cool stream, the path lay before him. Hard by the stream a lodge was
erected, a house of such size the boy stood dumbfounded, and he knew
that this must be the dwelling of the children's dread captor.
Night time had come, the shadows had fallen and Eut-le-ten was tired
with the long weary trail. Should he proceed or wait until morning?
He climbed a tree which grew by the water, and hid in the branches
to keep vigil, there to crave strength from the Saghalie spirit, the
Hyas Tyee who dwells in the heavens, to grant him the strength, the
wisdom, the courage to kill the dread witch. The night was long and
the vigil lone, soundless except for the night hawk on wing, or the
howl of the wolf in the quest of the red deer, or the splash of the
salmon in the stream underneath.
Early next morning, before he descended, he plainly saw the form of
the witch, coming to wash in the stream just below him. The water was
clear reflecting her visage, fearsome in its hideous detail. Up in
the tree brave Eut-le-ten saw her, he thought himself safe from her
fierce prying eyes; he forgot that he too was mirrored below in the
still water which lay at her feet. When she had finished her morning
ablutions, she filled her vessel with water and turned to depart,
when she saw just below her, the features of Eut-le-ten in the still
water. Upturning her eyes to the branches above her, she saw there
the boy half concealed in the foliage, and she smiled with a smile
triumphant and cruel, thinking once more her fortune had found her,
and brought to her lodge the boy she was wanting.
She greeted him, "Come, why tarriest up there? Come to my lodge,
perchance thou art hungry; the fire has been kindled, the water is
boiling, a welcome awaits thee, why tarriest longer? Descend from
the tree and let me behold thee".
Down climbed Eut-le-ten nothing affrighted, but filled with the
knowledge no harm could befall him.
"Why hast thou come, and whence dost thou go? Why didst thou leave
thy home by the sea?" Such were the questions E-ish-so-oolth asked
him. Then struck by his fairness and beauty of limb, she questioned
him thus, "Why is thy skin so fair, and why are thy limbs so
beautiful?"
Then Eut-le-ten answered her, "When I was a boy my Mother laid me
upon the bare ground with my head on a stone, my Father placed a
large rock on my forehead. Thus I was given the gift of the fair."
E-ish-so-oolth was envious of Eut-le-ten and much desired to look
as young as he, so that with face so comely and so fair, she could
entice the children to her lodge, wherefore she asked with evil
ill concealed, "Can I by any means obtain this gift?"
Then Eut-le-ten divining her base thought and much desiring to make
an end of her, declared that if she would lie down, and on the stone
which lay beside the creek recline her head, he would place upon her
forehead the stone which would both mould her features like to his,
and make her skin as fair. The witch determined to try the charm at
once, stretching her great length upon the ground, placed her head
upon the stone.
Then Eut-le-ten lifted a great rock and hurled it down upon the
witches head. "Die dread E-ish-so-oolth," he cried. "No more with
evil charms wilt thou entice the children to thy lonely forest home."
So died the witch, and nevermore do mothers say when children
misbehave. "Be good or I will call E-ish-so-oolth."