He's a bad failure that ain't king in some little corner.
--Sayings of Sylvanne Sylvanne
The children were not astir when Rolf was off in the morning. He caught
a glimpse of Annette, still asleep under the red parasol, but the dress
goods and the brass buttons had fallen to the floor. He stepped into the
canoe. The dead calm of early morning was on the water, and the little
craft went skimming and wimpling across. In half an hour it was beached
at Callan's. In a little more than an hour's jog and stride he was at
Warren's, ready for work. As he marched in, strong and brisk, his colour
up, his blue eyes kindled with the thought of seeing Albany, the trader
could not help being struck by him, especially when he remembered each
of their meetings--meetings in which he discerned a keen, young mind of
good judgment, one that could decide quickly.
Gazing at the lithe, red-checked lad, he said: “Say, Rolf, air ye an
Injun??”
“No, sir.”
“Air ye a half-breed?”
“No, I'm a Yank; my name is Kittering; born and bred in Redding,
Connecticut.”
“Well, I swan, ye look it. At fust I took ye fur an Injun; ye did look
dark (and Rolf laughed inside, as he thought of that butternut dye), but
I'm bound to say we're glad yer white.”
“Here, Bill, this is Rolf, Rolf Kittering, he'll go with ye to
Albany.” Bill, a loose-jointed, middle-aged, flat-footed, large-handed,
semi-loafer, with keen gray eyes, looked up from a bundle he was roping.
Then Warren took Rolf aside and explained: “I'm sending down all my fur
this trip. There's ten bales of sixty pounds each, pretty near my hull
fortune. I want it took straight to Vandam's, and, night or day, don't
leave it till ye git it there. He's close to the dock. I'm telling ye
this for two reasons: The river's swarming with pirates and sneaks.
They'd like nothing better than to get away with a five-hundred-dollar
bundle of fur; and, next, while Bill is A1 on the river and true as
steel, he's awful weak on the liquor; goes crazy, once it's in him. And
I notice you've always refused it here. So don't stop at Troy, an'
when ye get to Albany go straight past there to Vandam's. You'll have
a letter that'll explain, and he'll supply the goods yer to bring back.
He's a sort of a partner, and orders from him is same as from me.
“I suppose I ought to go myself, but this is the time all the fur is
coming in here, an' I must be on hand to do the dickering, and there's
too much much to risk it any longer in the storehouse.”
“Suppose,” said Rolf, “Bill wants to stop at Troy?”
“He won't. He's all right, given he's sober. I've give him the letter.”
“Couldn't you give me the letter, in case?”
“Law, Bill'd get mad and quit.”
“He'll never know.”
“That's so; I will.” So when they paddled away, Bill had an important
letter of instructions ostentatiously tucked in his outer pocket.
Rolf, unknown to any one else but Warren, had a duplicate, wrapped in
waterproof, hidden in an inside pocket.
Bill was A1 on the river; a kind and gentle old woodman, much stronger
than he looked. He knew the value of fur and the danger of wetting it,
so he took no chances in doubtful rapids. This meant many portages and
much hard labour.
I wonder if the world realizes the hard labour of the portage or carry?
Let any man who seeks for light, take a fifty-pound sack of flour on his
shoulders and walk a quarter of a mile on level ground in cool weather.
Unless he is in training, he will find it a heavy burden long before
he is half-way. Suppose, instead of a flour sack, the burden has sharp
angles; the bearer is soon in torture. Suppose the weight carried be
double; then the strain is far more than doubled. Suppose, finally,
the road be not a quarter mile but a mile, and not on level but through
swamps, over rocks, logs, and roots, and the weather not cool, but
suffocating summer weather in the woods, with mosquitoes boring into
every exposed part, while both hands are occupied, steadying the burden
or holding on to branches for help up steep places--and then he will
have some idea of the horror of the portage; and there were many of
these, each one calling for six loaded and five light trips for each
canoe-man. What wonder that men will often take chances in some fierce
rapid, rather than to make a long carry through the fly-infested woods.
It was weighty evidence of Bill's fidelity that again and again they
made a portage around rapids he had often run, because in the present
case he was in sacred trust of that much prized commodity--fur.
Eighty miles they called it from Warren's to Albany, but there were many
halts and carries which meant long delay, and a whole week was covered
before Bill and Rolf had passed the settlements of Glens Falls, Fort
Edward, and Schuylerville, and guided their heavily laden canoe on the
tranquil river, past the little town of Troy. Loafers hailed them from
the bank, but Bill turned a deaf ear to all temptation; and they pushed
on happy in the thought that now their troubles were over; the last
rapid was past; the broad, smooth waters extended to their port.