THE LETTERS OF FIRE ON THE CLIFF.
"Now, how'd he know that, Allan? D'ye reckon he tells the same way you
would?" asked Step Hen, immediately interested.
Some of the others had seen the Maine boy do various "stunts" along
the line of woodcraft, on previous occasions; and among others he had
been able to tell just about how many hours previous a fire had been
abandoned, by the "feel" of the ashes, as Giraffe always declared.
"Pretty much the same, I suppose, Step Hen," replied the other,
pleasantly, for Allan, being one of the officers of the patrol, was
always glad to find any of the scouts interested in picking up
information; and never refused to assist to the best of his ability.
Toby was examining the ground around the ashes with those snapping
eyes of his, small in point of size, but capable of taking in every
point going.
"How d'ye suppose he did do it?" persisted Step Hen, who was very
determined, once he had set his mind on anything--stubbornness some of
his camp-mates called it.
"Oh! there are ways easier to grasp in your mind than explain," Allan
remarked. "You just _seem_ to know a thing. Some hidden instinct tells
you, I might say. You feel a deadness in the ashes that's different
from fresh ones. And then the looks tell you whether the dew has
fallen on them or not. In this case Toby, I reckon, has found out that
they seem mighty fresh; and so no night has passed since the last
spark of fire died out. There are other ways of telling about how many
nights ago it may have been made, if an old one. But you ought to make
a practice of studying these things connected with fires, Giraffe,
instead of being always wanting to make fresh blazes. You'd find the
matter mighty interesting, and worth while, I give you my word."
"Say, that gives me an idea!" exploded the tall scout; "and mebbe I
will. Just as you say, Allan, everybody's getting sore on me for
wanting to always build fires and fires, _and_ fires. I've been able
to start 'em every which way, from flint and steel, to twirling a
stick with a bow, after the style of them South Sea Islanders; and
like old Alexander I'm cryin' for new worlds to conquer. Well, here
they are, just like you say; and connected with fires too; right in my
line, so to speak. Thank you for giving me the tip, Allan; I'm sure
goin' to think it over."
"Thank goodness!" exclaimed Step Hen, fervently.
"Now, what d'ye say that for?" demanded Giraffe, taking umbrage at once.
"If ever you devote your colossal mind to the job of seeing how many
ways fires can be _put out_, instead of started, the rest of us'll
have a chance to get some decent sleep nights; because we won't be
always afraid of the woods burnin' up with your crazy experiments,"
and Step Hen moved a little further away from his chum as he said
this, not knowing how Giraffe might take it.
But the tall scout, after meditating over the matter for part of a
minute only remarked indifferently:
"Oh! that's all right, Step Hen; you've got your faults too, and big
ones in the bargain. Ask Bumpus here if my faculty for makin' fires
didn't save us from a whole peck of trouble that time up in Maine when
we found ourselves lost, a cold night comin' on, two partridges shot,
and not a single match in the crowd to start a fire to cook the game
and keep us from freezing stiff. He knows."
"That's right," declared the fat scout, instantly, and with a fond
look toward Giraffe, as memories of the occasion referred to came
trooping into his mind, so that he could almost smell the odor of
those cooking birds, thrust near the delightful fire on the points of
long splinters of wood.
Meanwhile the guide had come back to where the little party began to
make preparations for the night, the packs having been taken from the
backs of Mike and Molly, and everybody finding something to do in the
bustle.
"Get anything?" asked Thad, as Toby Smathers came up, a grin
decorating his sunburnt but honest face.
"Oh! it was the kunnel, all right," replied the guide. "I knows the
mark o' his hoof among a thousand. An' he's got them two pizen sharks
along o' him, Waffles and Dickey Bird. They been kicked out of nigh
every camp in the silver region, but they just about suit the ijee of
the kunnel, when he wants any dirty work done."
"And that's what you call finding the long lost silver mine, do you?"
asked the scoutmaster, smiling.
"Well, accordin' to the ijee of most decent miners, that same Rawson
had the first claim on that ere mine; and any feller that rediscovers
it ought to turn a third of the proceeds over to the fambly of the man
as got thar first. But you don't ketch Kunnel Kracker doin' any such
foolish business as that. He'd gobble the whole business, and snap his
finger at the widow and orphans. But they's one thing I don't just
exactly understand about the marks hereabouts. Seems to be a boy along
with the gang. Now, whatever could such an old seasoned prospector and
miner as Kracker want with a half grown boy up in this part of the
country, when he's huntin' for a mine that seems to have dropped out
of sight, like it fell through to China? That's what gets _me_."
"Perhaps it might be an Indian boy; we had a glimpse of such a half
grown brave skulking along, one day. He seemed to want to count noses
in our crowd the worst kind, and we wondered if he meant to steal
anything; but after a while he just cut stick and cleared out, looking
a lot disappointed over something. Giraffe here tried to get close
enough to him to speak, but he was that shy he kept moving off all the
time. We thought he might have expected to see somebody he knew among
us, a boy perhaps, and when he found that we were a pack of strangers
he didn't want anything more to do with us."
"This wa'n't any red-skinned boy, but a white," Toby declared,
positively. "An Injun would a toed-in, and wore moccasins; but he had
on shoes, and turned his toes out, all right, civilized way. But then,
just as you say, p'raps it don't matter a row of beans to us who he
was. We may run acrost 'em sooner or later; and again mebbe we won't."
When the two tents were in position it began to look "jolly much like
a camp," as Step Hen declared.
The mules were allowed to graze on the little tufts of grass that grew
in spots around, where there was enough earth to allow of such a
thing. Close by was an occasional stunted tree, from which the boys
easily secured all the firewood that was apt to be needed.
And how genial that blaze did look in the coming night, as it shone
upon the tents, the smiling faces of the scouts, and the general
surroundings, so wild and lonely.
"Looks like we owned the whole world," remarked Bumpus, "when you just
squint around, and see the old Rockies towerin' up to the right and to
the left, behind and before. Say, this is what we've been lookin'
forward to a long time, ain't it, fellers?"
Bumpus seemed to be happier over the situation than any of the others.
Really, it was queer how deep an interest the stout youth had always
taken in this trip to the Wild Northwest. He it was who first
suggested the same, and on every occasion he had fostered the idea. Up
in Maine, when they first heard about that rich reward offered for the
recovery of the missing valuables that had been stolen from a bank,
Bumpus had been the one to declare that they ought to recover them, so
as to have plenty of funds in the treasury, to pay the expenses of a
grand trip to the backbone of the continent, those glorious mountains
which he saw so often in his day dreams, and yearned so much to visit.
Of course, by this time every one of his chums had become filled with
enthusiasm also, and there was no faint answer to this question on the
part of Bumpus.
Pretty soon supper was started, and that was a time when the scouts
began to be more or less restless. Tired as they might be, when the
delicious odors permeated the outermost limits of the camp, no one
seemed able to sit still. The fact of the matter was that they were
ravenously hungry, and it was tantalizing to get the "smell" of the
cooking, with the knowledge that it would be at least half an hour ere
they could begin to satisfy their appetites. Any one who knows the
make-up of average boys, understands that.
"I wouldn't like to be caught in parts of this valley, in a
cloud-burst," Davy Jones remarked; "I've been alookin' around some,
and there's signs that tell of floods long ago. Guess a feller'd have
hike some, to get away if a wall of water came whirlin' down here."
"But the hunting ought to be fine, don't you think, Toby?" asked Step
Hen, who had begun to have aspirations to equal the record of several
of his comrades; and more than once declared that nothing less than a
big-horn Rocky Mountain sheep would satisfy his ambition. "I c'n just
think I see the jumpers playin' leap-frog up along some of the cliffs
that stand out against the sky yonder."
"We'll find sheep, sooner or later, all right," asserted the guide,
who was engaged in cutting wood for the fire; and more than that he
would not say, being a man of words rather than big promises.
"Look at Giraffe, would you?" remarked Step Hen. "He just can't quit
playin' with fire all the time."
"What's he doing now?" asked Thad, with a laugh, and not bothering to
look up; for it happened that just then he was making some notes in
his log book, fearing lest they slip his mind, if he waited until
after supper.
"Oh! he's got a firebrand, and standing out there in the dark he's doing
all sort of queer stunts! with it--whirling it around several times;
then movin' it up and down, quick like; after which he crosses it
horizontally a few times. Why, just to look at him you'd think he was
sending a message like we do with the wigwag flags in the day time."
"Well, that's just what Giraffe is pretending to do, right now," said
Thad, after he had taken one quick look. "Only instead of using flags,
he's taking a light to make the letters with. Giraffe is a pretty good
hand at heliograph work and all kinds of wigwagging, you know. I've
talked with him by means of a piece of looking glass, on a sunshiny
day, more than a mile away; and we managed to understand each other
first-rate. Leave Giraffe alone, Step Hen. He's a nervous scout, you
understand, and has to work off his steam some way. There couldn't be
any better than brushing up his Morse code, I think."
"Huh! p'raps you're right," grunted the other; "but it does beat all,
how Giraffe, always finds satisfaction in playing with fire."
"There's one good thing, about it these days," ventured Davy Jones.
"What might that be, suh?" asked the Southern boy, Bob White, looking
up; for he was assisting to get supper ready.
"Why, we don't have to be afraid of Giraffe setting the woods on fire
any more. It'd take a job bigger'n he could manage to get a fire goin'
in this rocky valley," and Step Hen laughed as he said this; for
indeed, the sparse and stunted trees that grew at intervals along the
sides of the mountains did not seem to offer much encouragement to a
would-be incendiary.
"How much longer do we have to wait for grub?" asked Bumpus, sighing
dismally.
"What's that to you?" demanded Giraffe, from outside the limits of the
camp proper; he having heard the plaint. "If you went without a bite
for a week, sure, you could live on your fat, Bumpus; but think of
_me_. Why, in two days' time my back-bone'd be rubbing up against my
front ribs; and in another they would have a riot. I've got a space to
fill all the time. Please hurry up, fellers. Somebody blow the fire,
and make it cook faster, won't you?"
"You might be doing the same, Giraffe, 'stead of wastin' all your
surplus energy aswipin' the empty air out there," called out Step Hen
disdainfully, and yet with a slight touch of envy in his voice; for,
truth to tell, he aimed to equal the proficiency of the lanky scout in
the signal line.
So they went on exchanging remarks, as the minutes dragged slowly
past, each seeming more like an hour to the half-starved boys. In vain
did those who were doing the cooking tell them to keep their eyes
anywhere but on the fire, because "a watched pot never boils."
But by slow degrees the supper was nearing readiness. Bumpus was even
making his mouth give signs of his eagerness to begin; and some of the
others had even taken up their tin platters hoping to be helped first,
when Giraffe suddenly came jumping into camp, wildly excited.
Thad looked up from his writing, half expecting to see him followed by
a savage mountain wolf, or possibly a full-grown grizzly bear; but to
his astonishment the boy who carried the burning fagot of wood cried
out as well as he could in his great excitement:
"Thad--Allan--look! look! somebody's making wigwag letters with a
blaze like mine, away up yonder on the face of that high cliff; and I
could read it, sure I could! And Thad, oh! what do you think, it
keeps on sayin' the same thing over and over all the time, aspellin'
out the one word: 'help! help! help!'"
The scoutmaster jumped to his feet instantly, ramming the note book deep
down in his pocket as he grasped Giraffe eagerly by the arm, exclaiming:
"Come and show me what you mean! I hope you haven't mistaken a star
for a torch!"