THE STRANGE STORY
Jean's fervent declaration that he prayed never to be obliged to use his
rifle against a human being may have acted as a potent charm against
evil. At any rate, the welcome light of a gray October morning saw the
little company still undisturbed by any unpleasant intruder. It had been
a strenuous night for the three men, yet daylight found them signally
cheerful and alert. The long weary vigil that David and Jean had kept,
the greater part of it standing on their feet, was a watch of pure
affection. The object of their solicitude had been hardly more
comfortable. The cold, rain-beaten rock on which Jean had spread his own
and David's blankets was a poor couch at best. But to Tom it represented
the freedom he had despaired of ever again attaining, and he was more
than satisfied with his makeshift bed. Worn out by his recent exertion,
he had fallen asleep directly after they had eaten supper. He awakened
at daybreak declaring that he felt refreshed and much stronger.
As soon as the first indications of dawn appeared in the still-cloudy
sky, Jean was about and stirring. As they devoured the few sandwiches
they had left, he gravely urged the necessity of starting at once for
the spot where he had cachéd their supplies. Among these supplies was a
coil of thin, tough rope which Jean proposed should serve in the
construction of a litter on which to carry Tom. Once that important
detail had been attended to, they would be able to proceed much faster
toward Mr. Mackenzie's camp.
Again old Jean had insisted that Tom must postpone the telling of his
story until they were well on the way to camp. "You talk now, you get
tire', M'sieu' Tom," he said with a solemn wagging of his gray head. "We
know wil' man have shut you up an' keep you hid for long time. It is
enough to know. We are satisfy." Privately Jean was alive with curiosity
regarding the mysterious "wil' man," yet his duty to Tom came first and
he did not intend to slight it in any particular.
The hike to the cachéd supplies was painful for Tom Gray, yet he limped
along uncomplainingly, part of the time supported by Jean's ready arm;
then again helped over the rough spots by David. Though they had set
forth with the dawn, it was after mid-day when they reached their goal.
Almost immediately after they arrived, Jean scoured the vicinity for
enough dry wood to build a fire. Once a blaze was well started David
prepared the simple meal, while the intrepid old man turned his
attention to the construction of the litter. Armed with a hatchet he
hacked sufficient boughs from the trees with which to make it, and went
at his task with a will.
He left his task only long enough to snatch a hasty bite, then returned
to it, his wiry fingers fairly flying as he worked. When completed, the
litter would be a rude affair at best, made somewhat more comfortable by
the folded blankets which covered it. Tom, meanwhile, was rejoicing
openly over his coffee and crisp fried bacon. "It's the first square
meal I've had for over a week," he declared. "If you only knew--but I'll
have to wait to tell you. Won't I, Jean?" He called this last to Jean,
who was putting the finishing touches to the litter.
"It is for M'sieu' Tom's own good that I mak' the reques'," replied
Jean. "But for this, that you min' what ol' Jean tell you, I will give
you the rewar'." His shrewd black eyes very tender, Jean fumbled in an
inner pocket of his rough coat. Drawing forth Grace's letter he rose and
tendered it to the astonished young man.
"Now him is done," Jean referred, not to Tom, but to the finished means
for Tom's transportation. "I go, put 'way the t'ings till we com' after,
som' day." With this pointed assertion, Jean promptly made good his
word. David followed him with alacrity, leaving Tom alone with his
unexpected treasure. Despite Jean's frequent admonitions that they "mus'
'urry," it was fully fifteen minutes before either he or David returned
to the wan, but happy-faced figure by the fire. Man-like, not one of the
three made any allusion to the letter which was now tucked away in one
of Tom's coat pockets. Jean and David had seen the light of a great joy
flame up in their comrade's gray eyes, and in the old hunter's
vernacular, they were "satisfy."
Having again cachéd their few effects, with the exception of Jean's
trusty rifle, Tom was soon established on the litter and the hike was
again renewed. Difficult as it had been for David and Jean to make their
way to the point in the woods which they had just left, the return was a
trebly laborious journey. The approach of night found them not yet
halfway to the lumber camp. They had calculated that the increased
supplies in David's knapsack would furnish them with supper, leaving a
comfortable allowance for breakfast the next day. By starting again at
daylight the following morning they hoped to reach camp before the
middle of the next afternoon. As they drew nearer to the camp they knew
they would find the road less difficult.
"We hav' not done bad," congratulated Jean when, at twilight, they
halted to prepare supper. "We hav' meet no one that hav' the wish to
'arm us. M'sieu' Tom he get better all the time. Mebbe now because he
get better an' we so near camp, after supper he tell about wil' man.
Then we turn in; go to sleep quick, an' to-morrow we are safe."
"You are right, Jean. I am getting better every minute, thanks to you
fellows. Since I have your permission at last to talk about myself, I'll
tell you what I've been crazy to say ever since I heard the call of the
Elf's Horn and you found me." Tom gave an involuntary sigh as the events
of the past few weeks came to his mind.
Supper was somewhat hastily disposed of. Both David and Jean were as
anxious to hear Tom Gray's story, as the latter was to tell it.
Self-denial in this respect had been hard to practice. Yet all three had
acquitted themselves with credit. Seated on a log, with his friends on
either side of him, Tom started his strange narrative with:
"At the very beginning I'll say that I'm primarily to blame for my own
troubles. The afternoon I landed in that little village nearest to the
camp, I had made up my mind to get to camp that same day. When I found I
couldn't get any kind of conveyance to take me there, I decided to walk.
The station master warned me that a big storm was coming, but I thought
I could make the trip before it came. The sky didn't look very
threatening to me.
"He was a better weather prophet than I, for I hadn't gone two miles
when the storm broke. And such a storm! It was a terror! At first it was
a gale of wind, and maybe it didn't hit the trees, though. The way they
came crashing down made me sick at heart. You know how I feel about
trees. That I might get hurt didn't bother me half so much as to see the
way those magnificent old wonders were being demolished.
"Though it was summer it grew pretty dark in the woods and, for the
first time I ever remember, I lost my way, I didn't know it just then. I
thought I was going north, when all the time I must have been going
west. I didn't want to stop. I thought I would be courting just as much
chance of getting hit by a falling tree if I stood still as if I kept on
going. Besides I was anxious to reach the camp. I had been following a
narrow trail, as well as I could under the circumstances, and I supposed
I was still on it. It was not until long afterward that I realized that
I had made a mistake.
"Well, I plodded along for hours thinking I'd soon reach the camp. It
was then pitch dark and raining hard. I was beginning to tire, too. I
wasn't in the least worried about not finding the camp. I knew, of
course, by that time that I was lost, but I knew, too, I'd be all right
when morning came. What bothered me was to hunt some place where I could
get out of the rain and spend the night. But I couldn't find even an
overhanging rock, though I kept my pocket searchlight going constantly.
"The last time I turned it on my watch I saw it was ten o 'clock. After
that--well here comes the queerest story you ever heard. I was stumbling
along in the dark, when all of a sudden the ground seemed to disappear
under my very feet. I felt myself falling. I don't suppose it was more
than ten feet, but it seemed a mile. I struck something hard, all in a
heap. After that I didn't remember anything until I opened my eyes,
groaning terribly. It was just getting daylight. I was lying at the
bottom of a gorge. Bending over me was the most terrifying person I had
ever seen in all my forest wanderings. It was a man and he was a regular
giant. He had a head of long snow-white hair and a long white beard that
made him look like Father Time. But his face was young, almost
child-like, except his eyes. They were big and black and wild. When he
saw my eyes were open he gave a kind of leap into the air and shouted at
the top of his lungs: 'He is alive again! My son has come back!'
"Before I could say a word he stooped and grabbed me up in his arms. As
my left leg hurt me terribly, I knew it must be broken. I groaned and
tried to tell him, but he hung me over his shoulder as though I were a
feather and went crashing through the woods. I fainted with pain and
didn't come to myself again for quite a while. We were still traveling
along as though the fellow had on seven league boots. The pain in my leg
became even worse and I fainted again. When I came to myself the second
time, the sun was shining down through the trees. I was lying on the
ground and this crazy fellow--I was sure by that time that he _was_
crazy--was circling around me, muttering and laughing to himself.
"I tried again to talk to him, but I was suffering too much to do more
than mumble. I don't know how long we'd been there. I suppose he'd only
stopped to rest, for before long he hoisted me over his shoulder again
and away we went. Quite a while after that we struck that little valley
where the hut stands. He carried me into the shack and laid me on the
floor. I hadn't the least idea of what he was going to do, and I was too
sick to care. I knew he was crazy and that I could expect almost
anything to happen. What really happened was the biggest kind of a
surprise. He undressed me with the greatest gentleness and then examined
my broken leg, and afterward set it and fixed it up with the skill of a
doctor, in spite of the fact that he had no conveniences to help him.
You can imagine how I suffered during the process. I groaned a good deal
and he must have really sympathized with me, for he crooned and lamented
over me all the time he was doing it. He kept calling me his dear son
and said over and over, 'God has given you back to me at last.'
"Then he went out of the hut and came back after a while with a forest
of balsam boughs. He made me a bough bed in one corner of the room,
spread a blanket over it and laid me on it. After that he rummaged
around the place and fished out an iron kettle from a heap of stuff in a
corner. Then he took it and went out of the shack, and I heard him lock
the door after him. He was gone a long time, several hours, I presume.
When he returned he hunted up a battered tin dish and went out again.
Pretty soon he came back with part of a cooked rabbit and some broth.
And I was glad to get it.
"Matters ran along in about that way for some days. I tried at first to
keep track of them, but I was in so much pain that I soon lost count. It
wasn't physical pain alone, either. I went almost crazy myself wondering
what Grace and Aunt Rose would think at not hearing from me. I knew that
as soon as they realized that I had disappeared, they would send some
one to find me. I hadn't the least idea of where I was. I still supposed
that I wasn't far from the lumber camp and expected any moment to see a
search party descend on the hut. I soon found that I couldn't expect any
help from my host. He was crazy as a loon and besides he had a fixed
idea that I was a son of his who had evidently been supposed to be dead
for several years and had now come to life again in the woods. I tried
once to explain to him that I wasn't his son, but it made him so angry
that I was afraid to say anything more about it for fear he'd finish me.
He wouldn't talk much. When he did say anything it was absolutely
without sense. But he'd sit on the floor beside my bed by the hour, and
stare at me out of his wild black eyes. He was good to me, though. He
fed me and took care of me in a way that surprised me.
"Twice he left me for a whole day and a night. When he came back he
brought a lot of provisions with him. He had quite a bit of money in
notes in the shack. He kept it in a box under a board in the floor and
almost every day he'd go there to look at it. He never counted it. He'd
lift the board, haul out the box, pat the roll of bills, croon over it,
and stuff it back again. One thing kept me thinking we were near to the
camp was the provisions he brought in. How he managed to get them
without getting himself locked up was a mystery to me.
"As my leg began to get better, he began to grow less careful of me.
Knowing that I couldn't possibly get away, he would set food and water
beside my bed, lock me in the cabin--he never failed to do that--and go
away for three or four days at a stretch, sometimes longer. Often I used
to be faint with hunger before he'd come back. On one of those jaunts
somebody must have seen him, for he came tearing into the hut late one
night saying, 'I am afraid they saw me! I hid in the woods until dark
for fear they would follow me. They must not see me nor find out where I
live. If they do, they will try to take you away again and then tell me
you are dead. They would not believe that you have come to life again.
If they ever come I will kill them.'
"After that he stayed in or near the shack for days. He was so upset for
fear someone would find me that instead of going around as usual without
saying much, he would talk all the time. He was cunning enough not to
talk loudly, though. He had a glimmer of sense even if he was crazy, for
he kept his voice down to a mutter. I dare say my broken leg would have
healed a good deal faster, if he had gone on giving me as good care as
he gave me at first. He wasn't anxious for me to get well. He used to
say, 'When you can walk again, you will have to stay shut up just the
same. If you go into the woods, they will see you and take you away.'
"Privately I made up my mind that as soon as I was well enough I
wouldn't wait for 'them' to 'take me away'; I'd go of my own accord. But
I had to be careful. As I've already told you he was a giant. He was at
least six feet three and strong as a gorilla. I often used to wonder who
he was and all about him. One day, about a week before you came, I
thought I'd try my damaged leg to see if I could use it. He was off on
one of his jaunts or I wouldn't have dared to try it. I found I could
hobble about a little and just for curiosity I lifted up the board in
the floor, not because I wanted to count his money, but to see what else
he kept in the little old-fashioned box he always took it from. All I
found besides the money was a battered photograph of a little boy. On
the back of it was written in a round, childish hand: 'To my father. You
little son, Wallace Lindsey, twelve years old.' I suppose it must have
been----"
Old Jean interrupted Tom's recital with a sudden ringing cry of, "It is
the wil' man! He hav' the name Lindsey. You remember, M'sieu' David, I
hav' tell you 'bout him!" In his excitement Jean leaped from the log,
Tom and David viewing him in amazement. "But w'en I hav' see his son, he
big man lak' his father."
"What do you know of him, Jean!" Tom's question was freighted with
eagerness. "It's evident you must know something."
"Do you mean, Jean, that you think this fellow is the one you were
telling me of?" demanded David skeptically.
"It is the sam'," almost shouted the hunter. "I hav' know the name when
I hear it, but never could I remember. But I think he dead long time,
because after his son who he hav' love much get kill by tree, he turn to
wil' man an' run 'way to Canada, an' no one know after where he hav'
gone. Of a truth we hav' done well not to meet him. No wonder you say
'urry an' get away, M'sieu' Tom."
"Yes, I knew the danger if you didn't," returned Tom. "He had been gone
three days when you came and I was expecting him back at almost any
minute. Now I understand why he called me his dear son. How we managed
to dodge him is a miracle."
"Finding you was a miracle!" was David's reverent exclamation. "I feel
as though I'd been living in a nightmare and just awakened from it."
"_Le bon Dieu_ never forget the one' he lov'," nodded Jean positively.
"An' he hav' lov' Mam'selle Grace an' M'sieu' Tom much or we never fin'
the M'sieu'." Jean made his usual sign of reverence for the Supreme
Being in which his faith was firmly grounded. "Now we mak' ready to
spen' another night outdoors. Jean will watch while his frien's sleep.
To-morrow an' we see the camp. Then, M'sieu' David, it is for you to go
to the village an' sen' the message that we hav' not fail, to those who
watch an' wait."
Late the following afternoon the overseer of the lumber camp received
the surprise of his life. The sight of two exhausted, weather-beaten men
who toiled painfully into his front yard, bearing a rude litter on which
reclined a third man, sent the amazed Scotchman racing joyfully to meet
them. A little later Tom Gray was surrounded by the comforts which had
so long been denied him. After a hearty meal and a brief rest, David
Nesbit set off for the village on the overseer's horse to telegraph to
Grace Harlowe and Mrs. Gray the glorious news that Tom Gray had been
found and would soon be restored to them.
But David had also another equally important commission to execute which
directly concerned Jean's "wil' man." After sending the two telegrams he
went at once to the home of the county sheriff, who lived in the
village. Completely disgusted with the lax manner in which the sheriff
had conducted the search, David reported to him the finding of Tom, with
a scathing arraignment which the inefficient official accepted in
scowling silence. Convinced by David's rebuke that it was high time to
redeem himself, he agreed to send out a posse of men the very next day
to cover the western stretch of forest in which the demented man had
managed to keep himself so cleverly concealed.
It may be said here that the sheriff kept his word. For two weeks the
hunters of the unfortunate man scoured the forest to find him. Due to
the wildness of the region they had great difficulty in locating the
place of Tom Gray's imprisonment. Once discovered, they found the hut
empty. A guard was posted around it, but the fearsome tenant never
returned. It was not until almost a year afterward that those whose
lives fate had briefly linked with his, read in a newspaper a lengthy
account of his capture in a town a long distance from the territory
surrounding the lumber camp. The news that he had been placed in an
asylum for the insane was a matter of relief to all concerned.
* * * * *
On the very afternoon that Tom Gray was carried into the overseer's yard
Grace Harlowe and J. Elfreda Briggs were making arrangements to leave
Oakdale for a brief visit to Emma Dean at Overton College. They had
planned to depart for Overton on the nine o'clock train the next
morning, little dreaming of the remarkable upheaval that was soon to
take place in their plans. Having waited long and patiently for news
from the north Grace was feeling the suspense most keenly. She had
expected so much from Jean that with each day's dawn the struggle to
maintain a hopeful aspect grew more difficult. It was now over two weeks
since Jean had departed from Oakdale, and aside from two brief letters
from David, written during the first week of the renewed search for Tom
Gray, she had heard nothing further from him. From Jean she had not
expected to receive a letter. It had been agreed beforehand that David
should do the letter-writing.
Despite her efforts at concealment, her deep depression now began to
stamp itself so strongly upon her sensitive features, that Elfreda
Briggs had again pleaded with her to consider paying a brief visit to
Emma Dean. Fond as she was of Emma, Grace's heart was not in the
proposed trip to Overton. She finally made reluctant consent, merely to
please the girl who had stood by her so staunchly.
It was therefore a most mournful Loyalheart who listlessly packed a
traveling bag, preparatory to the next morning's journey. Long after the
house was quiet for the night, she lay awake, debating with herself
whether or not it were wise to go to Overton. Morning found her still
undecided. When at half-past eight o'clock she and Elfreda descended the
stairs, luggage in hand, she experienced a wild desire to refuse flatly
to go. The thought that the taxicab ordered to convey them to the
station was probably on its way to the house, brought her a remorseful
reflection that she had no right to back out at the last moment, thus
disappointing Elfreda.
"What's the matter with that taxicab, I wonder?" grumbled the latter.
Standing beside Grace on the veranda, she was engaged in peering
frowningly down the street. "When I make up my mind to go, I want to go.
If that driver loiters along the way until he makes us miss our train,
he'll hear what I have to say about it. The idea of him being so
late----"
"Oh!" A sharp cry from Grace, whose gray eyes had been pensively staring
up the street, put an abrupt end to Elfreda's remark. Coming down the
street toward the house a bicycle appeared ridden by a youngster in the
uniform of a messenger from a world-known telegraph company. Where was
he going? Was the telegraphic communication he bore for her? Grace cried
out again as she saw him stop before the gate and dismount.
Before he was fairly through the gate a lithe figure had darted down the
steps toward him. Halfway up the walk they met. "Telegram for you, Miss
Harlowe," announced the boy cheerily. "Sign here, please." Handing her a
stub of a pencil, he held the book. With a shaking hand she managed to
trace her name. As he turned and went down the walk whistling shrilly,
Grace stared at the yellow envelope, hardly daring to open it.
In the same instant she felt Elfreda Briggs' reassuring arm about her.
From the veranda the stout girl "could see" and had acted accordingly.
With a quick gasping breath Grace tore open the envelope, her trembling
fingers fumbling at its contents. Then the world seemed suddenly to
recede, leaving her alone with the unbelievable information: "Tom found.
O.K. Sends love. Coming home Tuesday. Will wire train. David."