PERIL AT THE BRIDGE
Any person of real judgment, so Hugh realized even at the time, would
have thrown away the pack and rifle and run to safety unimpeded. He did
think of it, but somehow he could not. So he stumbled on, the men behind
him gaining, the river and the fallen tree seeming a long distance away.
He reached the sheltering underbrush, turned sharply upstream and was
hidden for a moment from his pursuers as they came dashing down the
hill. He had just leaped upon the tree-trunk when they came out upon the
bank.
“Look out, Hugh,” came a shout from the other shore, where stood Dick,
who had shamelessly deserted his brother. “Look out! They are going to
shoot.”
Hugh did not stop to look, but ducked quickly and heard a bullet whistle
over his head. The next second, “ping,” another buried itself in the
pack that hung from his shoulder. The impact almost destroyed his
balance; he staggered and dropped to his knees and crawled the last few
yards to safety.
“Are you hurt?” cried Dick. “Are you safe? Lie down behind that log
until they have stopped shooting.”
In absolute defiance of his own advice he, as well as Nicholas, was
standing among the trees, the one shouting, the other barking in wild
excitement. But Hugh would not come, for his very danger on the now
tottering bridge had given him an idea for the furthering of their own
safety. He was standing knee deep in the running water with his shoulder
against the tree-trunk, pushing against it with all his might.
“Go back; stay with your brother,” he called to Dick. “What would he do
if you were to be shot?”
A bullet carried away his woolen cap and another cut the bark beside his
hand, but he did not give up. He pushed until the big tree swayed, moved
a little, then suddenly rolled all the way over. Just as the first
Indian’s foot was upon it, the great log fell splashing into the water,
was whirled over and over by the current and rushed away down stream.
Dripping and delighted, Hugh ran up the trail to join Dick, the angry
bullets still whistling behind him. He looked back to see one of the
Indians wade into the water, stand waist deep, reeling under the force
of the flood, then struggle back to the shore. All three of the pirates
strode away through the bushes, talking earnestly together.
For some time after the boys returned to the cabin they were busied
caring for John Edmonds. While they were working, they exchanged their
various experiences, so that Dick learned how Hugh came to be in the
cabin on Jasper Peak, and Hugh, of the Edmonds’ adventures in the
forest.
This illness of John’s, it seemed, had been coming on gradually. Dick
had noticed that he was restless, erratic and worried over his work, at
which he often had to toil late into the night. The hunting trip, Dick
had thought, would help to put him on his feet again, and he had,
indeed, seemed better the first day, but after that grew rapidly worse.
“It was the last thing we could do together,” Dick explained, “for I was
going to enlist when I got back; I had only been waiting until they
could find some one to fill my place at the mine. We started off in
great spirits; the Indian, Kaniska, was our guide, a man we had had
before, who always seemed reliable enough. He was a friend of John’s, in
a way, and that queer squaw of his, Laughing Mary, had always professed
to be devoted to us, especially to my brother. I can’t imagine how
Kaniska could have done such a thing to us.”
“And what did he do?” inquired Hugh eagerly.
“He took us in a direction we had never been before,” said Dick,
“through a perfect network of streams and little lakes and swamps, and
made us push on as fast as we could, saying that we were getting to a
place where there was famous shooting. We did not camp until very late
that first night and I was so tired that I slept like the dead. When I
woke up in the morning, he was gone.”
“He left you alone?” exclaimed Hugh in horror.
“Not only that, but he took all our stores with him, and our axes and
our compass. To leave men in the woods, stripped of everything they
need, is very little short of murder. I had been sleeping with my rifle
beside me, so he didn’t dare take that. It was the only thing that saved
us.”
“And you have lived only on what you could shoot?” questioned Hugh.
“Why, you must be half famished!”
“I am,” assented Dick, cheerfully, “rather more than half, to tell the
truth, but we must attend to Johnny first.”
When at last there was time to stir up the fire and prepare a meal, Hugh
realized on seeing Dick eat how near he had been to real starvation.
“Berries and things are pretty scarce so late in the year as this,” Dick
continued his tale as they sat at the table. “I managed to catch a few
fish now and then, and I shot any kind of bird that I could hit. We ate
some queer things, but you get so that you don’t care much. Nicholas
could catch rabbits and he always brought them to me, although, poor
fellow, he could have eaten a hundred of them himself.”
He related how, after a few hours of bewildered searching for the
vanished Indian, he had decided that the stream upon which they were
encamped, being larger than the others and flowing north, must be the
outlet of Red Lake and was therefore the best guide to follow. If he
could find the lake, he could find Rudolm, he thought, but what a long
and hopeless way it seemed! Now and then, in trying to cut off some of
the windings of the stream, they had strayed away from it altogether and
had only found it again after the loss of much time and effort.
“And all the time Johnny kept getting sicker and sicker,” he said, “so
that I got more frightened about him than about anything else. At night
he would be out of his head, sometimes, and in the daytime he would just
trudge along at my heels and never say a word. Only once, when I said
that if we ever found the lake we might come out somewhere near Oscar
Dansk’s house, he got furiously angry and made me promise that I would
never ask him for help. I don’t know yet what idea he had in his poor
confused head, but I had to promise, to quiet him.”
He told further of their growing weakness, of the shorter and shorter
distances they could travel in a day, of a final afternoon when, having
gone to shoot a partridge, he had come back and found his brother had
disappeared.
“Perhaps I hadn’t realized until that minute how desperately ill he was.
He had wandered off; I could see the storm coming and I looked and
looked and called and called, but I couldn’t find him. I felt pretty
hopeless, I can tell you.”
It was Nicholas who had discovered John Edmonds at last, lying
insensible under a big tree near the foot of Jasper Peak. They had sat
by him a long time, the boy and the dog, helpless and exhausted both of
them. Dick had caught a glimpse of the cabin on the side of the mountain
and had decided, when the storm broke, that they must get there at any
cost.
“I carried Johnny on my back,” he said, “don’t ask me how, but some way
or other we made it. I was so anxious to get him in out of the storm
that it didn’t matter much where we went. I don’t think I had sense
enough to mind a great deal even when I realized it was Jake’s cabin. We
found something to eat, although we didn’t take more than we could
possibly help. John seemed to revive a little, but still I was
desperately anxious, and felt that I must do something, no matter what.
I think I believed Two Rivers and Rudolm were much nearer than they are
and I had not counted on the streams all being in flood. I could see the
light from your cabin, but—well, I had promised. Now, I can understand
that the promise was a foolish business, but your judgment isn’t quite
so good when you are worn out and half starved, as when you are rested
and fed. You don’t see things quite so clear.”
“But weren’t you afraid of Jake’s coming back?” Hugh asked.
Dick, it appeared, did not have such horror of the Pirate of Jasper Peak
as had Hugh. He did not even yet seem to suspect that the half-breed had
been concerned in their being lost in the forest nor had he heard the
full tale of what Jake had done to Oscar Dansk. One anxiety had overcome
the other and he had left his brother, ordering Nicholas back when he
would have come too, and finally shutting him in so that John Edmonds
should not feel himself quite alone.
“But almost as soon as I was gone he broke out and went across the
valley to you,” Dick concluded. “Nicholas had more sense than I had,
didn’t you, old fellow?”
The big dog, lying on his side before the hearth, opened one eye and
beat gently on the floor with his plumy tail at mention of his name.
Then he heaved a great sigh, stretched himself luxuriously to the fire
and fell asleep again, completely satisfied that those he loved were
safe at last.
Dick, also, being assured that at least his brother was no worse, went
away to sleep off some of the exhaustion of his journey through the
forest, and Hugh was left to sit alone, still watching for Oscar’s
return and wondering more and more anxiously why he did not come. The
little cabin was peaceful and absolutely quiet except for the ticking of
the clock and the deep breathing of the dog at his feet, but far from
peaceful were Hugh’s racing thoughts. Where had his comrade been during
that furious storm? What had happened to keep him so long? Oh, if he
only had not parted from Oscar in such churlish ill-nature how much
easier it would be to bear this anxious waiting!
He looked at Oscar’s recovered rifle hanging on the wall and thought
with satisfaction of how glad he would be to see it. He felt a good deal
of pride in having been able to get it back, but, as he sat thinking, he
began to feel his pleasure give way to a certain lingering doubt. Had he
really been wise in returning to the Pirate’s house, was the value of
the rifle greater than the value of the help he could give the two
exhausted Edmonds, help that they would have lost had his venture ended
in his being shot? It was an unwelcome thought, yet he was forced to
conclude that this was another of those errors in judgment of which his
father had accused him, a rash failing to count the cost at the critical
moment.
“Oh, dear,” he sighed, quite out loud, “when will I ever get sense
enough to qualify for a soldier?”
Nicholas, hearing his voice, raised his head to look at him inquiringly.
He seemed to hear something else also, for he got up, went to the door
and stood listening intently. Then he turned to Hugh and whined to be
let out. Hugh listened, but heard nothing save the rushing of the stream
and the sighing of the wind in the trees.
“There isn’t anything,” he said to Nicholas, but the big dog still
insisted, so at last he opened the door.
He stood before the cottage, looking in every direction, north, south,
east; the sun was in his eyes so that he shaded them with his hand to
look across the open meadows to the west. Was that something moving, was
it a distant, plodding, weary figure slowly making its way up the slope?
He could not be mistaken. It was Oscar!
With a shout of joy Hugh ran to meet him, but stopped short in surprise
and dismay when he came close. Oscar’s forehead was cut and had been
bleeding; his cheek was discolored with a great bruise; he carried
neither pack nor gun, and he limped as he came toiling painfully up the
hill.
“I had a fall,” he explained briefly, in answer to Hugh’s anxious
questions.
Long after, Hugh learned the real details of the mishap, how Oscar had
taken shelter from the storm under a mass of overhanging rock, how the
fury of wind and water had loosened it above him and how he had been
swept down in the midst of an avalanche of plunging bowlders, sliding
earth and uprooted trees, to lie stunned for he knew not how many hours,
but—
“I had a fall,” was all he said, then added quickly, “What is that?
Nicholas, _Nicholas_!”
He sat down abruptly on a fallen tree as though sudden relief had
weakened his knees; he put his arms around the great dog’s neck.
Nicholas, in turn, overwhelmed him with endearments, licked his face,
nuzzled his hand, nearly pushed him from the log in his clumsy efforts
to show his joy. There seemed no need to tell Oscar that the two
brothers had been found, for he seemed to guess the whole of the good
news from the mere presence of the big wolfhound. Hugh, as he stood
looking at the greetings of the two, had a sudden understanding, from
Oscar’s overwhelming relief and delight, what was the real depth of the
friendship he bore John Edmonds.
When he and Hugh reached the cottage, Oscar went straight to John’s bed
and sat down beside it. The sufferer had lain in heavy stupor for hours,
only arousing once, much earlier in the day, to stare at the boys with
no recognition and then to drop into unconsciousness again. But now,
almost as soon as Oscar’s firm hand closed about his wrist to feel his
pulse, he opened his eyes, looked at the other with slowly dawning
comprehension and said:
“I was wrong about that road, Oscar, and you were right.”
“It wass no matter,” his friend answered hastily, his voice sounding
Swedish again in the extremity of his feeling. “Opening up these wheat
lands might not have been advisable then, when it was just a question of
dollars and cents. Now it is different, it is a matter of daily bread
and lives and victory.”
But Johnny Edmonds did not hear. Having given voice to the thought that
had so long been uppermost in his mind, he drifted contentedly away into
sleep again, real sleep this time, with no further mutterings and
restless movements of his head upon the pillow. Oscar got up quickly and
went to stand at the window, looking out with that queer far-off look
that his face sometimes wore. Turning at last he met Dick’s anxious eyes
and smiled slowly and happily.
“It was just a year ago we quarreled,” he said. “I thought he should
have stood by me when I wanted to build the road; he thought, like the
rest, that I was a mad dreamer—perhaps I was. This war has overturned
all things; what was a far vision once may be what the world most needs
to-day. But your brother is a better friend than I, Dick Edmonds. I
could not have been the first to say that I was wrong. And now all is
well again.”
The next day and the next, John Edmonds’ fever ebbed and flowed, leaving
them sometimes full of hope that recovery was beginning, sometimes in
terror that such recovery might never be. In the end, however, the
crisis passed, leaving him pale and shaky, but clear-headed and himself
again at last. It was on the first day that he was able to be propped up
in bed that Oscar, sitting by him, began to discuss, with unreserved
bluntness, what was being said in Rudolm about John’s books and the
state in which the bank’s affairs had been left. For a moment Edmonds
looked astonished, dismayed and angry, then he laughed.
Three of his clerks had gone to war, he explained, and he was so
short-handed that he used to work fourteen, sixteen, eighteen hours at a
time, trying to keep things going, reeling with exhaustion, his brain at
last so weary and confused with illness that he scarcely knew what he
was doing.
“Now my head is cleared up again,” he said, “I begin to realize what
queer things I must have done to those books. The expert who is trying
to make them out must be having a glorious time of it. I wonder how far
he has got and what he thinks he has found.”
Then Oscar broached the plan that he had evidently been turning over and
over in his mind. Edmonds must get back to Rudolm as soon as possible,
he said, for affairs must be cleared up and the anxiety of bank
directors and stockholders must be brought to an end. The moment he
could be moved Oscar himself would take him home; they would go by
water, the whole length of Red Lake, a two or three days’ journey by
canoe. He stated the plan and its urgency very briefly, even more
briefly told the need of the boys’ staying behind.
Both immediately raised their voices in clamorous objection. Dick must
get back, he was going to enlist; Hugh wished to go with him, in fact
the two boys had been laying their heads together and making plans of
their own. But in all of their arguments they found Oscar’s calculations
had been before them.
Did Dick know the bars and channels and bays between here and Rudolm? He
did not. Could he, or could he and Hugh together, be sure of handling a
heavily laden canoe successfully in the face of chance winds on the open
stretches of the lake? They were not able to say they could. Could John
be taken overland, paddled up rivers, carried around portages, risk a
meeting in the forest with Half-Breed Jake or some of his followers? No.
Or could Oscar go with Dick and John and leave Hugh behind to hold the
cabin alone? Most certainly not.
So the plan stood as Oscar first proposed it, and, on John’s continuing
to improve steadily, preparations were made for a start three days
later. The night before they were to go, Oscar went with Hugh all over
his small domain, indoors and out, showing him just how this was to be
cared for and how that was to be done. They were coming up the path from
Hulda’s stable, picking their way over the rough stones in the
moonlight, the big dog following them, while Oscar gave his final
directions. The wide valley of the Promised Land lay at their feet in
sharp outline of black and white, while above them the sky was powdered
thick with stars and, across the ravine, rose the dark heights of Jasper
Peak with one gleaming light shining from its rugged shoulder.
“And you must look out for Jake,” Oscar ended. “Every hour, every
minute, you must watch for him. In three weeks the date for my proving
up will have passed, the claim will be really mine—if I can hold it
until then.”
“But surely there is nothing that he can do now,” Hugh protested.
“He and his comrades will perhaps do the worst they have ever done,
between now and that day,” returned Oscar quietly. “They will not come
openly to shoot or rob or burn, they will lie in wait and play some
trick on you, for the crooked way is always their way. What they will do
I cannot guess, I can only tell you to watch and never cease watching
and in the end I know we will win.”
“Still,” insisted Hugh, “I do not see how they can ruin your plan so
near its end as this.”
“Suppose,” said Oscar, “he should drive you out, burn down the buildings
and destroy the fields and, before I can file my final papers, prove to
the Land Office that none of the required improvements are really here.
We could take the matter into court and establish in time that it was he
who laid things waste, but that would take months, the season would pass
and the lands would not be open in time for a harvest next year. And a
year in terms of wheat and bread counts now for more than ten ordinary
years.”
“And you think that when the place is yours and you are settled here,
then the people of Rudolm will follow?”
“I know they will. Their fear of Half-Breed Jake is partly habit, partly
a sort of superstition; it is not real cowardice. When they see that one
man has been able to hold out against him alone they will not hesitate
longer.”
“They should be very grateful to you,” observed Hugh, his voice grave
with the thought of what weight of responsibility was to be laid upon
him. He shivered a little. The autumn air was very cold.
“I do not want gratitude,” returned Oscar quickly. “What would I have to
say to them if they tried to thank me? No, when I see these hillsides
covered with the grain for which the whole world is crying; when I can
sit here on my doorstep and see many red roofs warm in the sunshine, or
the moonlight making sharp black shadows of the pointed gables or yellow
lights shining from the windows there, and there, and there; when I can
think that all within are warm and safe and happy, why, I can ask for
nothing more on earth, except—except, perhaps, that little black Hendrik
might be back again.”
Nicholas, who had been sitting on the grass beside them while they stood
and talked, came now to rub against Oscar and push his great head under
his hand.
“You are a good fellow, Nicholas,” said Oscar, patting his curly
shoulder, “but you are not my Hendrik. It is strange how a man and a
little black dog can learn to love each other when each is all the other
has.”
There was much hurrying to and fro before dawn next morning when the
journey was actually to begin. There was carrying of loaded packs down
to the canoe, there was running back for things forgotten, there were
many instructions given by every one to every one else. The day promised
to be a clear one, although now the sky was dark and the water gray.
John Edmonds was made comfortable in the bottom of the boat; the packs
were put on board; there was no time for elaborate farewells, even when
it came to pushing out from shore.
“Shove her easy,” directed Dick, and—
“A little more,” said Oscar. “There, now we are afloat. Good-by,
good-by.”
His paddle dipped, the canoe shot forward, a sharp ripple rose beneath
her bow. The two boys stood watching as she moved steadily away. The
water was turning from gray to silver and shining in the morning light,
while a gold and scarlet glow behind Jasper Peak showed where the sun
was soon to rise. Hugh and Dick still stood as the boat dwindled to a
black speck on the glittering lake, turned into Harbin’s Channel and
disappeared. Even then they waited, shading their eyes, hoping for one
more sight of it. Finally Hugh heaved a long sigh and the two turned to
look at each other. The valley of the Promised Land was their very own,
to hold or to lose.