I
Fraternity has not changed in a hundred years; yet is there always some
new thing in Fraternity. It may be only that Lee Motley’s sow has killed
her pigs, or that choleric Old Man Varney has larruped his
thirty-year-old son with an ax helve, or that Jean Bubier has bought six
yearling steers. But there is always some word of news, for the nightly
interchange in Will Bissell’s store, before the stage comes in with the
mail. You may see the men gather there, a little after milking time,
coming from the clean, white houses that are strung like beads along the
five roads which lead into the village. A muscular, competent lot of men
in their comfortable, homely garments. And they sit about the stove, and
talk, and smoke, and spit, and laugh at the tales that are told.
Fraternity lies in a country of little towns and villages, with curious
names something more than a century old. Liberty is west of Fraternity,
Union is to the southward, Freedom lies northwest. Well enough named,
these villages, too. Life in them flows easily; there is no great
striving after more things than one man can use. The men are content to
get their gardening quickly done so that they may trail the brooks for
trout; they hurry with their winter’s wood to find free time for
woodcock and partridge; and when the snow lies, they go into the woods
with trap for mink or hound for fox.
Thirty years ago there were farms around Fraternity, and the land was
clear; but young men have gone, and old men have died, and the birches
and the alders and the pines have taken back the land. There are moose
and deer in the swamps, and a wildcat or two, and up in Freedom a man
killed a bear a year ago....
The hills brood over these villages, blue and deeper blue from range to
farther range. There is a bold loveliness about the land. The forests,
blotched darkly with evergreens, or lightly splattered with the gay tops
of the birches, clothe the ridges in garments of somber beauty. Toward
sunset a man may stand upon these hilltops and look westward into the
purple of the hills and the crimson of the sky until his eyes are drunk
with looking. Or in the dark shadows down along the river he may listen
to the trembling silences until he hears his pulses pound. And now and
then, with a sense of unreality, you will come upon a deer along some
old wood road; or a rabbit will fluster from some bush and rise on
haunches, twenty yards away.
The talk in Will Bissell’s store turns, night by night, upon these
creatures of the woods that lie about the town; and by the same token
the talk is filled with speech concerning dogs. The cult of the dog is
strong in Fraternity. Every man has one dog, some have two. These, you
will understand, are real dogs. No mongrels here; no sneaking, hungry,
yapping curs. Predominant, the English setter, gentlest and kindest and
best-natured of all breeds; and, in second place, the lop-eared hounds.
A rabbit hound here and there; but not many of these. Foxhounds more
often. Awkward, low-bodied, heavy dogs that will nevertheless nose out a
fox and push him hard for mile on mile. These are not such fox-hounds as
run in packs for the sport of red-coated men. These are utilitarian
dogs; their function is to keep the fox moving until the hunter can post
himself for a shot. A fox skin is worth money; and cash money is scarce
in Fraternity, as in all such little towns, and very hard to come by.
There are few sheep in Fraternity, so the dogs are free of that
temptation; but there are deer. The deer is sacrosanct, to be taken only
with rifle and ball, and by a woodcraft that bests the wild thing at its
own game. No dog may justly chase a deer; and a dog so pursuing is
outlawed and may legally be shot by any man. Men without conscience and
dogs without honor will thus pursue the deer, in season and out;
nevertheless, deer running is for the dogs of Fraternity the black and
shameful crime.
They were talking dogs, on a certain night in late September, in Will
Bissell’s store. A dozen men were there; most of them from the village
itself, two or three from outlying farms. Jim and Bert Saladine, both
keen hunters of the deer, who killed their legal quota year by year,
leaned side by side against the candy counter, and Andy Wattles sold
them licorice sticks. Lee Motley had driven down from his farm above
the Whitcher Swamp; and Jean Bubier had come in from the head of the
Pond; and there was Gay Hunt; and there was George Freeland, and two or
three besides. Proutt was one of these others, Proutt of South
Fraternity, a farmer, a fox hunter, and a trainer of setter dogs.
Finally, Nick Westley, a North Fraternity man, appointed within six
months’ time to be game warden for the district; a gentle man, well
liked in spite of his thankless job; a man with a sense of humor, a
steady and persistent courage, and a kindly tongue.
This night, as it happened, was to be the beginning of the enmity
between Proutt and Westley. One-sided at first, this ill feeling.
Two-sided at the last, and bitter enough on either side. A strange
thing, dramatic enough in its development, fit to be numbered among the
old men’s tales that were told around the stove....
Proutt, the dog breaker, was a man who knew dogs. None denied him that.
“Yes,” they would say; “Proutt’ll break a dog for you. And when he gits
done with your dog, your dog’ll mind.” If you scented some reservation
in word or tone, and asked a question, you got no explanation. But your
informant might say casually: “Hepperton’s a good man with a dog, too.
Over in Liberty. Gentles ’em.”
Persistent inquiry might have brought out the fact that Hepperton never
whipped a dog; that Proutt knew no other method. Lee Motley, who loved
dogs, used to tell an incident. “Went out with Proutt once,” he would
explain. “After woodcock, we was. He was breaking a two-year-old. Nice
a dog as I ever see. First bird, she took a nice point; but she broke
shot. He had him a rawhide strap; and he called her in and I never see a
dog hurt worse. And after that he, couldn’t get her out from under his
legs. Ain’t been out with him since. Not me.”
Proutt was not liked. He was a morose man, and severe, and known to
nurse a grudge. But he turned out dogs which knew their business, and
none denied him this. So had he his measure of respect; and his
neighbors minded their own affairs and kept out of the man’s harsh path.
Curiously enough, though he trained setters, Proutt did not like them.
He preferred the hound; and his own dog--a lop-eared brown-and-white
named Dan--was his particular pride. This pride was like the pride of a
new father; it showed itself in much talk of Dan’s deeds and Dan’s
virtues, so that Fraternity’s ears were wearied with the name of Dan,
and it was the fashion to grin in one’s sleeve at Proutt’s tales and to
discredit them.
Proutt spoke, this night, of a day’s hunting of the winter before. How,
coursing the woods, he had heard a hound’s bay far below him, and had
taken post upon a ledge across which he thought the fox would come. “Dan
’uz with me,” he said, in his hoarse loud voice. “I says to Dan: ‘Set’
and he set on his ha’nches, right aside me, cocking his nose down where
t’other dog was baying, waiting, wise as an owl.
“I had my old gun, with Number Threes in both bar’ls; and me and Dan
stayed there, awaiting; and the baying come nearer all the time, till I
see the fox would come acrost that ledge, sure.
“Cold it was. Wind ablowing, and the snow acutting past my ears. Not
much snow on the ground; but it was froze hard as sand. I figured Dan’d
get uneasy; but he never stirred. Set where I’d told him to set; and us
awaiting.
“Time come, I see the fox, sneaking up the ledge at that long, easy lope
o’ theirs. Dan see him too. His ears lifted and he looked my way. I
says: ‘Set.’ And he let his ears down again, and stayed still. Fox come
along, ’bout five rods below us. Crossed over there. So fur away I
knowed I couldn’t drop him. Never pulled; and he never saw me; and old
Dan set where he was. Never moved a mite.
“After a spell, Will Belter’s hound come past; and then come Will
himself, cutting down from where he’d been waiting. Says: ‘See a fox go
by?’ And I told him I did. He ast why I didn’t shoot; and I says the fox
was too fur off. And he says: ‘Where was your dog?’ So I told him Dan
was setting right by me.”
Proutt laughed harshly, and slapped a triumphant hand upon his knee.
“Will wouldn’t believe me,” he declared, “till I showed him tracks,
where he wuz, and where the fox went by.”
He looked around for their admiration; but no one spoke at all. Only one
or two glanced sidewise at each other, and slowly grinned. The tale was
all right, except for a thing or two. In the first place, Proutt was no
man to let a fox go by, no matter how long the shot; and, in the second
place, Dan was known to be a surly dog, not overly obedient, unruly as
his master. And, in the third place, this incident, thoroughly
authenticated, had happened two years before to another man and another
dog, as everyone in the store knew. Proutt had borrowed his tale from a
source too close home....
So they knew he lied; but no one cared to tell him so. Only, after a
little silence, Nick Westley, the game warden, said with a slow twinkle
in his eye: “Proutt, that reminds me of a story my father used to tell.”
Proutt grunted something or other, disgusted with their lack of
appreciation; and Westley took it for encouragement, and began to
whittle slow, fine shavings from a sliver of pine which he held in hand,
and told the tale.
* * * * *
“It was when he was younger,” he explained, “before he was married,
while he still lived at home. But I’ve heard him tell the story many a
time.
“My Uncle Jim was living then; and he and my father had a hound. Good
dog he was, too. Good as Dan, I think, Proutt.
“Well, one winter morning, with six or eight inches of loose snow on the
ground, they were working up some old wood in the shed; and they saw the
old hound drift off into the pasture and up the hill. And after a spell
they heard him yelling down by the river.
“Jim said to my father: ‘He’s got a fox.’ And father said: ‘Jim, let’s
go get that fox.’ So they dropped their axes, and went in and got their
guns, and they worked up through the pasture and over the hill till
they located the dog’s noise, and they figured the fox would come up
around the hill by a certain way; and so they posted themselves there,
one on either side of the path they thought he would take. And set to
waiting. And it was cold as could be, and cold waiting, and they stamped
their feet a little, but they couldn’t move much for fear the fox would
see them.
“So they were both well pleased when they saw the fox coming; and they
both shot when he came in range, because they were cold and in a hurry
and anxious to be done.
“Well, they shot into each other. Jim yelled: ‘Damn it, my legs are full
of shot!’ And my father said: ‘Mine too, you clumsy coot!’ So they made
remarks to each other for a spell; and then Jim said: ‘Well, anyway,
there’s the fox; and I’m full of your shot, and I’m half froze. Let’s
skin the darn critter and get home.’
“So father agreed; and they went at it. The old dog had come up by then,
and was sitting there with an eye on the fox, as a dog will. And father
took the front legs and Jim took the hind legs, and they worked fast.
And they kept cussing their hurts, and the cold, and each other. But
they slit the legs down, and skinned out the tail, and trimmed up the
ears and all, knives flying. And when they got about done, Jim, he said:
“‘Look ahere, there’s not a bullet in this fox.’
“Well, they looked, and they couldn’t find a hole. Only there was a blue
streak across the fox’s head where a bullet had gone. And that was queer
enough, but father said: ‘I don’t give a hoot. There’s bullets enough
in me. Skin out his nose and let’s go.’
“So they cussed each other some more, and finished it up; and Jim, he
heaved the carcass out into the brush, and father slung the skin over
his shoulder, and they turned around to start home.
“Well, just about then the old dog let out behind them, and they whirled
around. And father always used to say that, mad as they were at each
other, they forgot all about it then; and they bust out laughing. He
said you couldn’t blame them. He said you never saw anything funnier.
“You see, that fox was just stunned. The cold snow must have revived
him. Because when my father and Uncle Jim looked around, that skinless
fox was going up over the hill like a cat up a tree--and the old dog hot
on his heels.”
* * * * *
The store rocked with their mirth as Westley stopped. Lee Motley roared,
and the Saladines laughed in their silent fashion, and Will Bissell
chuckled discreetly behind Proutt’s back. Westley himself displayed such
surprise at their mirth that they laughed the more; and fat little Jean
Bubier shook a finger at Proutt and cried:
“And that will put the bee to your Dan, M’sieu Proutt. That will hold
your Dan for one leetle while, I t’ink.”
Proutt himself was brick-red with fury; and his eyes were black on
Westley; but he pulled himself together, and he laughed ... shortly.
His eyes did not leave Westley’s face. And Lee Motley found a chance to
warn the warden a little later. “It was a good joke,” he said. “You
handed it to him right. But look out for the man, Westley. He’s mad.”
Westley, still smiling, was nevertheless faintly troubled. “I’m sorry,”
he said. “I did it for a joke.”
“He can’t take a joke,” said Motley.
The warden nodded, considering. “I’ll tell you,” he told Motley. “I’ll
square it with him.”
“If it was me,” Motley agreed, “I would.”
Westley did not like to make enemies. And there had been only the
friendliest malice in his jest. He took his measures to soothe Proutt
before they left the store that night.
Westley had a dog, a setter, clean-blooded, from one of the country’s
finest kennels. A New York man who had shot woodcock with the warden the
year before had sent the dog as a friendly gift, and Westley accepted it
in the same spirit. In its second year and still untrained, it had
nevertheless won Westley and won his wife and his children. They all
loved the dog, as they loved each other....
Originally this dog had been called Rex. The Westleys changed this name
to Reck, which may be short for Reckless, or may be a name by itself. At
any rate, it pleased them, and it pleased the dog....
* * * * *
The dog was untrained, and Westley had no time for the arduous work of
training. He had meant to send Reck, this fall, to Hepperton, in
Liberty; but, to make his amends to Proutt, he took the latter aside
this night and asked Proutt to take the training of the dog.
On longer consideration, he might not have done this; but Westley was a
man of impulse and, as has been said, he was anxious to keep Proutt as a
friend. Nevertheless, he had no sooner asked Proutt to take the dog than
he regretted it, and hoped Proutt would refuse. But the dog trainer only
gave a moment to slow consideration, with downcast eyes.
Then he said huskily: “I charge fifty dollars.”
“Sure,” said Westley.
“He’s a well-blooded dog,” said Proutt. “I’ll come to-morrow and fetch
him.”
And with no further word--they were outside the store--he drove away.
Westley, watching him go, was filled with vague disquiet. He wished he
might withdraw; he wished Proutt would change his mind; he wished the
trainer might not come next day....
But Proutt did come, and Westley himself bade Reck into the trainer’s
buggy and watched the dog ride away with wistful eyes turned backward.
Westley’s wife was more concerned than he; and he forgot his own anxiety
in reassuring her.