Will-o'-the-Wisp.
"Sprigg!" said the bear, and rose from his tail.
"Sir!" said the boy, as he rose from his seat.
"Can you ride a bear?"
"I don't know, sir; I never tried it," said the boy, dubiously.
"Come, and try it now," said the bear encouragingly. But being by no
means perfectly sure, even yet, of the burly monster, our hero was in no
hurry to accept the invitation.
"Come and try it, I tell you!" repeated the bear in his old, gruff
voice.
"You won't bite me with your long, sharp teeth, will you?" whined the
boy.
"No," growled the bear.
"And you won't scratch me with your long, sharp claws?" again whined the
boy.
"Scratch you with my long, sharp claws! No!" again growled the bear.
"And you won't, like the bull and the cat and the wolf, go a-jumping
over there, at that steep place in the hill?" still urged the boy,
though a little less whiningly.
"Do like the bull and the cat and the wolf? No!" rejoined the bear, a
little less growlingly.
"And you won't kick up, and rear up and cut capers, like a horse?" The
boy, by this time, not whining at all.
"Kick up, and rear up and cut capers, like a horse? No! Spur me, if I
do!" And this time, so far from growling, the monster actually
chuckled--so funny could he be when he tried.
"And now, having felt around on every side, you have, I hope, succeeded
at last in finding out on which side of your mug your nose is, and are
ready to come up and take me at my offer. And Sprigg, my boy, for once
and for all--of this be assured--that so far as you trust me, so far are
you safe. Perfect your trust--perfect your safety."
Sprigg was by no means of a confiding nature; people prone to lose sight
of the truth never are. But on receiving this reassurance of good faith,
he walked up boldly enough to the bear, who, as his young rider drew
near, swayed his back to enable him, with the greatest ease, to mount.
"But I have nothing to hold myself on by," said our hero, now fairly
astraddle of his strange steed, though pressing as lightly upon it as
possible.
"Take a lock of my hair! If a lock of hair is good for keeping one's
mind on a friend, why not as good for keeping his body there, too?" Here
he chuckled a little again, then added:
"But the young human thing, brave as he is, may not have as much faith
in a lock of hair as some people have, or pretend to have. So, up with
you, Manitou-Echo, and give him a lock of your arms."
Whereat, fetching first a nimble flounce, the red moccasins, as if their
wearer made a pivot of his head in the air, described a circular
flourish aloft, and in a twinkle, there they were at the bear's flanks,
each with a toe at one of our hero's naked heels. In another twinkle
Sprigg felt himself clasped tightly around the waist, by what seemed to
be a pair of small arms; small, but, bless me! how strong, as the boy
was but too glad to discover the moment after.
"All right?" To which, receiving an affirmative kick from the moccasins,
the bear, to Sprigg's dismay, made directly for the brink of that
horrible steep, where the bull, the cat and the wolf had vanished. Here,
on the dizzy verge, bear-like, he wheeled about, that his tail might
take the lead in the descent, which he evidently meditated. The boy
glanced fearfully over his shoulder. The top of the tallest trees which
grew at the foot of the hill were hundreds of feet beneath him, and so
directly beneath him, it seemed to him that were he to fall from the
bear's back he would drop like a stone into their branches.
In one long, smooth, unbroken slide, down they swept, from summit to
base of that tremendous steep. Well it was for Sprigg that the little
arms which held him on were so firm and strong, else must he inevitably
have slipped from the bear's back and found his way to the world below
by his own natural gravity, instead of by somebody else's super-natural
power.
The descent accomplished, the bear changed ends, that his nose might
take the lead. With a slightly waving motion, as were he swimming in the
air, now was he gliding swiftly onward at a speed which soon brought him
and his riders to the edge of a wide swamp, where the forest foliage
became so thick as wholly to exclude the moonlight. Here he paused, and
in a loud voice called out:
"Will-o'-the-Wisp! Will-o'-the-Wisp!" A voice so tremendously loud that
it must have been heard through all the wilds around; yet never an echo
it left to tell it had sounded.
Had an echo awakened, it could hardly have fallen asleep again before
the boy espied approaching them swiftly through the gloom a large ball
of light, which shown with a phosphorescent gleam, so dead and dim, that
the luminous circle it made in the pitch-black darkness of the swamp
seemed scarcely to exceed its own circumference. Without any preliminary
abatement of motion, the glimmering ball, as were it a lantern borne by
an unseen hand, came suddenly to a pause in the air directly before
them. Then followed an odd sort of a dialogue, made up of questions on
one side, with motions for answers on the other, the wisp-light moving
up and down for "yes," from side to side for "no," and for "I don't
know," 'round and 'round.
Bear. "Will-o'-the-Wisp, have you lighted the robber's feet to the
pit-fall?"
Wisp. Up and down.
B. "Did he swear?"
W. From side to side.
B. "Did he pray?"
W. Up and down.
B. "Will he be less of a thief for the pit-fall?"
W. 'Round and 'round.
B. "Has Friar's lantern lighted the hypocrite's feet to the quicksands?"
W. Up and down.
B. "Did he swear?"
W. Up and down.
B. "Did he pray?"
W. From side to side.
B. "Will he be the less of a scamp for the quicksands?"
W. 'Round and 'round.
B. "Has Jack-o'-Lantern lighted the bad boy's feet to the frog-pond?"
W. Up and down.
B. "Did he swear?"
W. From side to side.
B. "Did he pray?"
W. From side to side.
B. "Then he must have swum?"
W. Up and down.
B. "Will he be the less of a rogue for the frog-pond?"
W. 'Round and 'round.
The questions duly answered, and evidently to his entire satisfaction,
the bear wound up the dialogue thus:
"Then, Will, lead on, over mire and clay,
And when you come where the dead men lay,
Hold your lantern close to the mound,
That we may keep on Manitou ground."
With Will-o'-the-Wisp now at their head, again were they speeding
swiftly onward. Of their guide, Sprigg could at first see nothing,
saving his big, dim lantern; but, soon chancing to look a little lower,
there, directly under the light, he saw, strange to tell, a pair of red
moccasins, gliding on over the tops of the rank swamp weeds, and so
lightly that the long, lithe sedge, swaying to the slightest breeze,
bent not under their tread. The boy glanced quickly down at his heels to
reassure himself that the wispy elf had not stepped into and walked off
in his own moccasins. But there they still dangled, just the same, each
with a toe at one of his heels. Then flashed it upon his mind that he
had not really seen his own moccasins since he had flung them from him
up there on the Manitou hill; and so, for aught he or anybody else could
tell, red moccasins, if people could only see them, might prove to be
as plentiful in the world as Yankee shoes.
How long, how far they traveled Sprigg, of course, had no means of
judging; but the moon had well nigh climbed to the top of the sky, when,
having left the morass far behind them, they came to the foot of another
lofty mountain, where, under the shadow of a beetling cliff, yawned the
rocky jaws of a huge cavern, into which Will-o'-the-Wisp led the way,
his big, dim lamp beginning to brighten the moment it entered the
subterranean gloom. Hardly had they crossed the threshold when Sprigg
could perceive that they were descending as steeply as, but now, they
had been rising. Deeper and deeper into the heart of the mountain they
sank; deeper and deeper into the heart of the earth; the ball of light
no longer a phosphorescent gleam, but a flame of living fire. But it was
not long before they had descended again to the level ground, which they
traversed for some distance, then, for the first time since quitting the
farther side of the swamp, came they to a pause.
Sprigg looked around him. Nothing could he see, saving the bear, the red
moccasins behind him, the red moccasins before him; and just over the
latter the ball of light, which was now burning with such brilliancy
that the luminous hemisphere around it formed a wide and lofty dome in
the solid darkness of the cavern. For some moments past he had heard a
murmuring sound, as of abundant waters rippling over a rocky bed; and
filling all the air was a delectable perfume, as if flowery fields and
fruitful groves must be blooming and waving not far off. By this time
nothing amazed him. Nothing frightened him. He moved and felt and
thought as one in a dream; and so, indeed, had it all appeared to him
from the moment he had lost sight of his father, there at the old
hunting camp.