THE START FOR THE ROCKIES.
“Great Blue Bells of Scotland!”
Mountain Jim Bothwell uttered the exclamation as he gazed at the
immense pile of baggage labeled H. D. Ware.
“Say, who _is_ H. D. Ware, anyhow? He goin’ to start a hotel
hereabouts? When’s the wagons comin’ for all this truck?”
“That’s my camping equipment,” struck in “H. D. Ware,” looking rather
red and uncomfortable under the appraising blue eye of Mountain Jim.
“Young feller,” spoke Jim solemnly, “you’d need an ocean liner to
transport all that duffle. We ain’t goin’ to sea; we’re goin’ inter the
mountains. What you got in there, anyhow?”
“Dingbats,” said Ralph quietly, a mischievous smile playing about his
mouth.
“Dingbats? Great Bells of Scotland, what’s them?”
“The things that the sporting goods catalogues say no camper should be
without,” exclaimed Ralph; “we told him, but it wasn’t any good.”
“Well, my mother said I was to have every comfort,” said poor Hardware,
crimsoning under the guide’s amused scrutiny. “When we were camping in
Maine----”
“When you were camping in Maine, I don’t doubt you had a cook----”
Hardware nodded. He had to admit that, like most wealthy New Yorkers,
his parents’ ideas of “a camp” had been a sort of independent summer
hotel under canvas.
“Well, young fellow, let me tell you something. From what the professor
here wrote me, you young fellers came up here to rough it. I’m goin’
to see that you do. The cooking will mostly be done by you and your
chums; your elders will--will eat it, and that’ll be sufficient
punishment for them.”
“But--but I’ve just engaged a lad to aid with the cooking and help out
generally,” struck in the professor.
“That’s all right,” responded Mountain Jim airily, eying Jimmie, whose
clothes, since they had been dried by the agent’s cook stove, looked
worse than before, “that kid seems all right, and he can take his turn
with the others. In the mountains it’s share and share alike, you know,
and no favors. That’s the rule up this way.”
The boys looked rather dismayed. Already the standards of the city
were being swept aside. Evidently this mountaineer looked upon all men
and boys as being alike, provided they did their share of the work set
before them.
Ralph, alone, whose wild life on the Border had already done for him
what the Rockies were to perform for his companions, viewed the guide
with approval. He knew that out in the wilderness, be it mountain or
plain, certain false standards of caste and station count for nothing.
As Coyote Pete had been wont to say in those old days along the Border,
“It ain’t the hide that counts, it’s the man underneath it.”
“First thing to do is to sort out some of this truck and see what you
do need and what you don’t,” decided Mountain Jim presently. “Most
times it’s the things that you think you kain’t get along without that
you kin, and the things you think you kin that you kain’t.”
“That’s right,” agreed Ralph heartily. “Daniel Boone, on his first
journey into Kentucky, managed to worry along on pinole and salt, and
relied for everything else on his old rifle and flint and steel.”
“Never heard of the gentleman,” said Mountain Jim, “but he must uv been
a good woodsman. Now let’s get to work and sort out this truck.”
Ruthlessly the travelers’ kits were torn open, and it was amazing, when
Mountain Jim got through, what a huge pile of things that he declared
unnecessary were heaped upon the depot platform. As for poor Hardware’s
“dingbats,” a new kind of compass and a hunting knife that met with
Jim’s approval, alone remained.
“All this stuff can stay here till you get ready to come back,” said
Jim; “the station agent will look after it and see that it is put in
the freight shed.”
But it is an ill wind that blows nobody any good. Out of the rejected
“Dingbats” a fine hunting suit, axe, knife and compass were found for
Jimmie, who, indeed, stood sadly in need of them. When the boy had
retired to the station agent’s room and dressed himself in his new
garments, the change in him was so remarkable, when he reappeared, as
to be nothing less than striking. In the place of the ragged looking
Bowery boy, they saw a well set-up lad in natty hunting outfit. A
trifle emaciated he was, to be sure, but “We’ll soon fill him out with
hard work and good grub,” declared Mountain Jim, who had been told
the boy’s story, and who had warmly praised his heroism in rescuing
Persimmons.
The latter had also changed his wet garments and was in his usual
bubbling spirits when they were ready, in Ralph’s phrase, to “hit the
trail.” This was not till nearly noon, however, for the rejection of
the superfluous “Dingbats,” of which even Ralph and the professor were
found to have a few, had occupied much time. Then, after hearty adieus
to the station agent, who had incidentally been the recipient of a
generous gratuity from the professor, they mounted their ponies and,
with Mountain Jim in the lead, started on their long journey into the
wilds. Jimmy, whose circus experience had taught him how to ride, was
mounted on one of the pack animals, for, such had been Mountain Jim’s
ruthless rejection of “Dingbats,” only a tithe of the expected “pack”
remained.
Up the trail they mounted at an easy pace under the big pines that
shook out honey-sweet odors as the little cavalcade passed beneath
them. At the summit of the rocky cliff that towered above the depot,
the trail plunged abruptly into a dense, black tunnel of tamarack, pine
and Douglas firs.
As the horses’ hoofs rang clear on the rocky trail and echoed among the
columnular trunks that shot up on every side like the pillars of some
vast cathedral roof, Mountain Jim broke into dolorous song:
“Hokey pokey winky wang;
Linkum, lankum muscodang;
The Injuns swore that th-e-y would h-a-n-g
Them that couldn’t keep w-a-r-m!”
Over and over he sang it, while the shod hoofs clattered out a metallic
accompaniment to the droning air.
“Can we ride ahead a bit?” asked Ralph after a while, for the monotony
of keeping pace with the pack animals and the constant repetition of
Mountain Jim’s song began to grow wearisome.
“Sure; go ahead. You can’t get lost. The trail runs straight ahead. The
only way to get off it is to fall off,” said Jim cheerfully, drawing
out and filling with black tobacco a villainous-looking old pipe.
“Don’t get into any trouble,” warned the professor, who had been
provided with a quiet horse, and who was intent, as he rode along, on a
volume dealing with the geological formation of the Canadian Rockies.
“We’ll be careful! So long! Come on, boys,” shouted back Ralph, as he
struck his heels into his pony.
Off they clattered up the trail, the rocks ringing with their excited
voices till the sound died away in the distance. Jimmie alone remained
behind. He felt that his duty as general assistant demanded it. When
the last echo of the ponies’ hoofs had died out, Mountain Jim turned to
the professor with a profound wink.
“I can see where we have our hands full this trip, professor,” he
remarked, as they ambled easily along.
The professor looked up from his book and sighed.
“Really, I wonder my hair is not snow white,” he said mildly. “But
surely that is a fine specimen of Aethusa Cijnapium I see yonder!”
“Oh, that,” said Mountain Jim, gazing at the feathery plant indicated,
which grew in great profusion at the trail side, “that’s ‘fool’s
parsley.’”
“O-h-h!” said the professor.
He might have said more, but at that instant from the trail ahead,
came a series of shouts and yells that made it appear as if a troop
of rampant Indians was on the war-path. The sharp crack of a rifle
sounded, followed by silence.