THE LOGGING CAMP
It was along toward the middle of the day when Rob announced welcome
news. He called a halt, and as the other pair stood at attention the
scout master turned on Tubby with a look that thrilled the stout chum
exceedingly.
“What is it, Rob?” he gasped, the perspiration streaming down his fat
cheeks in little rivulets, for the day had grown a bit warm after that
chilly night. “I know, you’ve run across signs at last?”
“Speak up, Rob, and give us a hint, please,” urged the hardly less
impatient Andy.
“I wanted to see if you fellows were using your eyes, first,” explained
Rob; “but Tubby seemed to be searching his inward soul for something he
had lost; and, well, I imagine Andy here was figuring on what he wanted
for his next meal, because neither one of you at this minute has thought
it worth while to take a good look down at your feet. Right now you’re
standing on the sign!”
They began to cast their eyes earthward. Andy almost immediately burst
out with:
“Whee! an old long-disused tote-road, as the lumbermen call the track
where the logs are dragged to the rivers, to be later on put behind a
boom, and wait for the regular spring rise! Am I correct, Rob?”
“Straight as a die, Andy; this is a tote-road,” replied Rob.
“But what good is that going to do us, I’d like to know?” ventured
Tubby, groping as usual for an explanation. “We don’t want to go to any
river, that I know of. What we’re itching to find is the logging camp.”
“This track is going to bring us to it, sooner or later,” asserted Rob,
with conviction in his tones. “I can give a pretty good guess which way
the logs were taken along here, from the signs that are left on the
trees and the bushes. Anybody with half a mind could tell that much.
Very well, we must follow the track back, and keep watch for another
road showing where the horses were daily taken to their sheds at the
camp. I imagine it’s going to be a simple enough solution to the puzzle,
boys.”
Andy was delighted. Tubby, having been convinced that the leader knew
what he was talking about, managed to enthuse. Truth to tell, Tubby was
yearning for the delightful minute to arrive when he might toss down
that heavy pack of his for good and all, since they expected to go out
of the pine woods much lighter than they came in.
They determined to sit down and eat a bite of lunch. After that they
would again take up their task, the rainbow of promise glowing in the
sky ahead of them.
“Have we gone a great distance away from the border, do you think, Rob?”
Andy was asking, while they devoured such food as could be prepared
quickly over a small fire.
“Well, that’s something I can’t exactly say yes or no to,” came the
answer. “I don’t know where the dividing line comes. According to my
reckoning we ought to be about as close as we were last night. In fact,
I should say we are now exactly opposite the long bridge over on the
Canadian side of the border.”
“But how could that be, Rob, when we’ve been doing considerable walking
since breaking camp this morning?” demanded Tubby incredulously, but
more as a means for increasing his stock of information than because he
entertained the least doubt concerning the statement made.
“Our tramping hasn’t covered over half a mile in a direct line, because
we went over a zigzag course,” replied the leader. “If you remember,
whenever we heard a whistle for the bridge, it came from the west,
showing that the structure lay farther that way.”
“Sure, you’re on the job when you say that, Rob!” exclaimed Andy, who
had been an interested listener. “Only twenty minutes ago we all heard a
rumbling sound, and decided it was made by a long freight train passing
over the trestle leading to the bridge. It came from a point exactly
opposite to us. You wouldn’t want any better proof than that, Tubby.”
So they chatted, and ate, and passed half an hour. Then Rob said it
would be well if they once more went forth. That tote-road was an
alluring object to Rob; he wanted to prove his theory a true one.
Once more they began to “meander,” as Tubby called it, through the
woods, which had begun to thin out considerably, since most of the
better trees had been cut down years back, and in places the ground was
almost impassable with the wreckage of dead branches. Fortunately no
fire had ever run through this region to complete the devastation begun
by the axes of the lumbermen.
It could not have been more than half an hour later when Rob announced
that he had discovered where the horses were in the habit of leaving the
tote-road and following a well-defined trail through the brush and scant
trees.
“Keep a lookout for the camp, fellows!” he told them, whereat Tubby
began to elevate his head and sniff the air with vehemence.
“I thought I caught a whiff of pine-smoke,” he said, “but I must have
been mistaken. Still, as the air is in our faces, it wouldn’t be strange
if we did get our first indication of the presence of the lumber camp
through our well developed sense of smell, rather than by reason of our
eyesight.”
“Wrong again, Tubby,” chuckled Andy. “Eyes have it this time; there’s
your camp ahead of us. Look over the top of that clump of brush, you’ll
see the flat roof of a long log shanty, which must be the bunk-house of
the lumber jacks in the days when they spent a winter here chopping.”
Even Tubby agreed with Andy after he had shaded his eyes with his hand
and taken a square look. The thought that they were finally at the end
of their search for Uncle George was very pleasing, and Tubby laughed as
though a tremendous load had already been taken from his shoulders.
“Why, it wasn’t such a great task after all,” he remarked, as though he
had never once dreamed of being despondent.
“Wait,” cautioned Rob. “Don’t count your chickens before they are
hatched, Tubby. It’s poor policy to be too sanguine.”
“But Rob, didn’t you just say that was the camp?” pleaded the other.
“No doubt about it, Tubby. But possibly the person we’re wanting to
interview may not be in the place,” reminded the scout master.
“What makes you say that, Rob?”
“Oh! I’ve got a sort of suspicion that way,” responded Rob. “In the
first place we haven’t heard a single gunshot since arriving in the
vicinity of this place yesterday, and that alone looks queer. Then we
can see the roof of the bunk-house, with the mud and slat chimney in
plain sight; it’s after the noon hour, too, and the chances are there’d
be more or less cooking going on if the place were occupied, but so far
as I can make out not the faintest trace of smoke is flowing from that
homely chimney.”
Tubby, staring hard again, saw the truth of these assertions. He heaved
a heavy sigh and shook his head dismally.
“Tough luck, I should call it, if Uncle George has never been here at
all, and ours is going to be a regular wild-goose chase. Whichever way
can we turn, Rob?”
“There you go jumping at conclusions, hand over fist, Tubby,” said Andy
quickly. “Rob doesn’t mean that at all. Why, stop and think how your
uncle was so very particular to mention that communications of
importance sent to this camp would get to him in due time. He’s handling
some big business, and couldn’t afford to drop out of the world
entirely, even for two weeks. If he’s left here be sure we’ll find
something to tell us where to look for him.”
“Come along and let’s see,” urged Tubby, “they say the proof of the
pudding lies in the eating. Inside of five minutes or so we ought to
know the worst, or the best. I’ll try and stand the shock, fellows.”
Once more they advanced. They could not always keep in a direct line on
account of the obstacles that beset their course, so that Tubby’s
estimate of the time required to reach the deserted logging camp proved
erroneous; but by the end of ten minutes the little party drew up before
the door of the long cabin which they understood had once sheltered a
score of those rough wielders of the ax known as lumber jacks.
Some of the other rude buildings constituting the “camp” were in various
stages of decay and in tumble-down ruin, but the bunk-house seemed to
have been more substantially built, for it looked as though intact.
Before they arrived all of the boys had made a discovery that increased
their haste to reach the door. There was some sort of paper fastened to
it, and Rob had a pretty good idea as to what it would turn out to be.
“Uncle George has gone away from here, and left directions where to look
for him,” announced Andy promptly, showing that he, too, had made a
guess concerning the nature of that notice on the door.
“Shucks!” Tubby was heard to grunt, at the same time giving his burden
an impatient flirt, as though almost in a humor to rebel against another
long siege of packing it over miles and miles of dreary pineland.
But a surprise, and a pleasing one at that, awaited them all as they
found themselves able to decipher the writing on the paper.
It proved to be a business sheet, with Uncle George’s printed address up
in the left-hand corner. He himself had written the message in a bold
hand, which any one capable of reading at all might easily make out; and
this was what the trio of scouts read:
NOTICE.
“We have gone over to the Tucker Pond to try again for the big moose
that for two past seasons has managed to fool me. This year I hope to
bag him. He is a rare giant in size. Make yourselves at home. The
latch string is always out. We expect to be back in a few days at the
most. The door is only barred on the outside. Enter, and wait, and
make merry.
(Signed)
“George Luther Hopkins.”
When Tubby read that delightful news he fell to laughing until he shook
like a bowlful of jelly. It evidently made him very happy, and he did
not hesitate to show it to his two faithful comrades. Indeed, all of
them had smiles on their faces, for it would be much more satisfactory
to loaf around this spot, possibly taking toll of the partridges, and
perhaps even a wandering deer, than to continue their search for an
elusive party, whose movements might partake of the nature of a
will-o’-the-wisp.
“I’m going to make a sign reading ‘_Alabama_,’ and stick it above the
door, the first thing,” announced Tubby, with a grateful heart. “It
means ‘here we rest.’ If ever three fellows deserved a spell of
recuperation we certainly are those fellows.”
“How generous of Uncle George,” said Andy, “to say the latch string is
always out! Then, too, he calls attention to the fact that the door is
only held shut by a bar on the outside, instead of within. All we have
to do, fellows, is to drop our packs here. I’ll remove that bar, and
swing the door wide open, after which we’ll step in and take
possession.”
He proceeded to follow out this nice little program,—at least he got as
far as dropping his pack and removing the bar; but hardly had he started
to open the door than Andy gave a sudden whoop, and slammed it shut
again with astonishing celerity. Tubby and Rob stared at him as though
they thought he had seen a genuine ghost.