There was one large track in the snow that they saw several times--it
was like that of a marten, but much larger. “Pekan,” said the Indian,
“the big marten; the very strong one, that fights without fear.”
“When my father was a papoose he shot an arrow at a pekan. He did not
know what it was; it seemed only a big black marten. It was wounded, but
sprang from the tree on my father's breast. It would have killed him,
but for the dog; then it would have killed the dog, but my grandfather
was near.
“He made my father eat the pekan's heart, so his heart might be like it.
It sought no fight, but it turned, when struck, and fought without fear.
That is the right way; seek peace, but fight without fear. That was my
father's heart and mine.” Then glancing toward the west he continued in
a tone of menace: “That trap robber will find it so. We sought no fight,
but some day I kill him.”
The big track went in bounds, to be lost in a low, thick woods. But they
met it again.
They were crossing a hemlock ridge a mile farther on, when they came to
another track which was first a long, deep furrow, some fifteen inches
wide, and in this were the wide-spread prints of feet as large as those
of a fisher.
“Kahk,” said Quonab, and Skookum said “Kahk,” too, but he did it
by growling and raising his back hair, and doubtless also by sadly
remembering. His discretion seemed as yet embryonic, so Rolf slipped
his sash through the dog's collar, and they followed the track, for the
porcupine now stood in Rolf's mind as a sort of embroidery outfit.
They had not followed far before another track joined on--the track
of the fisher-pekan; and soon after they heard in the woods ahead
scratching sounds, as of something climbing, and once or twice a faint,
far, fighting snarl.
Quickly tying the over-valiant Skookum to a tree, they crept forward,
ready for anything, and arrived on the scene of a very peculiar action.
Action it was, though it was singularly devoid of action. First, there
was a creature, like a huge black marten or a short-legged black fox,
standing at a safe distance, while, partly hidden under a log, with hind
quarters and tail only exposed, was a large porcupine. Both were
very still, but soon the fisher snarled and made a forward lunge. The
porcupine, hearing the sounds or feeling the snow dash up on that side,
struck with its tail; but the fisher kept out of reach. Next a feint was
made on the other side, with the same result; then many, as though the
fisher were trying to tire out the tail or use up all its quills.
Sometimes the assailant leaped on the log and teased the quill-pig to
strike upward, while many white daggers already sunk in the bark showed
that these tactics had been going on for some time.
Now the two spectators saw by the trail that a similar battle had
been fought at another log, and that the porcupine trail from that was
spotted with blood. How the fisher had forced it out was not then clear,
but soon became so.
After feinting till the Kahk would not strike, the pekan began a new
manceuvre. Starting on the opposite side of the log that protected the
spiny one's nose, he burrowed quickly through the snow and leaves. The
log was about three inches from the ground, and before the porcupine
could realize it, the fisher had a space cleared and seized the spiny
one by its soft, unspiny nose. Grunting and squealing it pulled back and
lashed its terrible tail. To what effect? Merely to fill the log around
with quills. With all its strength the quill-pig pulled and writhed, but
the fisher was stronger. His claws enlarged the hole and when the victim
ceased from exhaustion, the fisher made a forward dash and changed
his hold from the tender nose to the still more tender throat of the
porcupine. His hold was not deep enough and square enough to seize the
windpipe, but he held on. For a minute or two the struggles of Kahk were
of desperate energy and its lashing tail began to be short of spines,
but a red stream trickling from the wound was sapping its strength.
Protected by the log, the fisher had but to hold on and play a waiting
game.
The heaving and backward pulling of Kahk were very feeble at length; the
fisher had nearly finished the fight. But he was impatient of further
delay and backing out of the hole he mounted the log, displaying a much
scratched nose; then reaching down with deft paw, near the quill-pig's
shoulder, he gave a sudden jerk that threw the former over on its back,
and before it could recover, the fisher's jaws closed on its ribs, and
crushed and tore. The nerveless, almost quilless tail could not harm him
there. The red blood flowed and the porcupine lay still. Again and again
as he uttered chesty growls the pekan ground his teeth into the warm
flesh and shook and worried the unconquerable one he had conquered. He
was licking his bloody chops for the twentieth time, gloating in gore,
when “crack” went Quonab's gun, and the pekan had an opportunity of
resuming the combat with Kahk far away in the Happy Hunting.
“Yap, yap, yap!” and in rushed Skookum, dragging the end of Rolf's sash
which he had gnawed through in his determination to be in the fight,
no matter what it cost; and it was entirely due to the fact that the
porcupine was belly up, that Skookum did not have another hospital
experience.
This was Rolf's first sight of a fisher, and he examined it as one does
any animal--or man--that one has so long heard described in superlative
terms that it has become idealized into a semi-myth. This was the
desperado of the woods; the weird black cat that feared no living thing.
This was the only one that could fight and win against Kahk.
They made a fire at once, and while Rolf got the mid-day meal of tea and
venison, Quonab skinned the fisher. Then he cut out its heart and liver.
When these were cooked he gave the first to Rolf and the second to
Skookum, saying to the one, “I give you a pekan heart;” and to the
dog, “That will force all of the quills out of you if you play the fool
again, as I think you will.”
In the skin of the fisher's neck and tail they found several quills,
some of them new, some of them dating evidently from another fight
of the same kind, but none of them had done any damage. There was no
inflammation or sign of poisoning. “It is ever so,” said Quonab, “the
quills cannot hurt him.” Then, turning to the porcupine, he remarked, as
he prepared to skin it:
“Ho, Kahk! you see now it was a big mistake you did not let Nana Bojou
sit on the dry end of that log.”