[5]An Italian navvy once shot and ate an owl, and when he was asked what he had eaten, he replied: “De chicken wid de big eye.”
[5]An Italian navvy once shot and ate an owl, and when he was asked what he had eaten, he replied: “De chicken wid de big eye.”
January 18th.
I arranged it all most successfully. I really believe I am diplomatic. Mr. Bang asked me to go snow-shoeing with him this morning. We went. The sky was bright, the wind was up and it was very cold, almost numbing. We crossed Norway Lake, and down into the forest, and then we felt no wind, and as we walked and walked, I felt a gentle glow come over me.
I soon found I lost myself in the interest I gained in Mr. Bang’s conversation, just as I did one day long ago. He told me of the forest wilds of British Columbia, and trappers’ tales of the deer, and the martin, and the fisher, and the beaver, and that strange creature, the Canada-Jay, or Whiskey Jack.
“You talk like an animal story book,” I remarked.
“Do I?” he asked. “I’m sorry. The animal story men are fakers, and I would not like you to think me a faker. There is not a trapper in the West who is not more or less conversant with the writings of this class of authors. All I have heard speak of them, damn them up and down. Even I dislike them, and wonder at the public taste. But then the public is an ass.”
Wapoose is the rabbit of the North. His tracks were everywhere about. In the North everybody, everything lives on the rabbit. The Indians, trappers, the owls, the fox, the wolf, all feast upon poor wapoose. And like many another faithful friend he is despised.
But the silence of the forest is oppressive. Stepping into it one feels as if one entered the realm of nature. One feels the temporary guest of the world where a ceaseless war is being waged, in which the fittest only survive, where animal life is maintained by the death of animal life. Nature is as cruel as a steel-trap that the fur-hunter sets for the fox.
And the trees stand about spectral in the silence; the firs and spruces with their branches laden with snow-droop as if in shame. They picture modesty. The clatter of a squirrel, or the squeak of a tom-tit, or the hammer, hammer of the woodpecker come at long intervals. They merely announce the great oppressive silence, each striking his own note.
All the region round about Norway Lake is a Government game and timber reserve. The streams are filled with beaver and the woods with other fur-bearing animals.
We came to a beaver-dam, Mr. Bang recognizing the rounded ridge in the snow marking the dam and domes of snow marking the houses. He told me of the strange family huddled in these humble homes and the superstitions they have engendered.
And after two hours tramp we came to Napoleon’s cabin. Napoleon is one of the game wardens, and by a strange chance was known to Mr. Bang. Mr. Bang had planned our tramp that we might call on his friend. Napoleon was at home. I really believe Mr. Bang had sent him word we were coming, as everything about the cabin was so neat, and the warm air that greeted us at the open door was in itself hospitable. It told me I might take off my wraps and rest and be comfortable.
Napoleon was a grim customer whose broken English was that of the Canadian French. His grin was expansive. He asked question after question of mutual friends in the Kootenays, but his eye was continually on me; that is, in a sly way, he was continually glancing at me.
As I sat perfectly happy and lazy it struck me I was in an odd position, deep in the forest, in the cabin of a good-natured savage. But somehow I felt safe, and I felt I was absorbing local colour by the bucket-full, and could now feel superior to the mere reader of books. I fancied my two companions fighting wolves, and bears, and wild Indians, all most exciting. This shows only that in some ways I have not yet ceased being a child.
Just as Napoleon was putting the finishing touches on the laying of the lunch table, his accumulating admiration burst its bounds.
“By gosh! shees look for nice leetle girl, some day maybe shees Messus Bang, uh?”
Of course, I blushed crimson. Fortunately Mr. Bang’s face was turned away from me, and, of course, he could not turn to look at me, and so could not measure, my confusion. But I saw his—his confusion. He flushed a moment and admonished Napoleon not to take things too seriously. But I had heard it, the spoken words, “Mrs. Bang.” Really, they did not sound so very awful. I think the pleasurable anticipation I felt for the savory lunch must have made them less objectionable.
I did enjoy that lunch!
January 20th.
I am to be Mrs. Bang and am reconciled. Fate has spoken and all sensibilities have been matched by Fate. And oh! what an adventure was ours. Has all history such another tale to tell? I know now what my hate for Jack meant; it was the fight my spirit put up against his spirit. But his has now the mastery and I love him. After all, I believe a woman’s greatest privilege is to love. It is so much more blessed to give than to receive. How infinite is the philosophy of the Bible!
As I held his poor, lacerated head in my lap in the depths of the forest last night, I gave up my soul. He murmured, “You have saved my life,” and I felt it was true. It was all so tragic, so terrible, so glorious.
As I lie in bed propped up in pillows, my own head bandaged, I can see them now, savage, furious, bristling beasts—the World, the Flesh and the Devil. What power they held, what fury, hate, and passion! How vast is the scope of nature.
Jack and I went to Napoleon’s cabin and had lunch and then it began to snow and we tarried. And then the snow stopped and we set out, and the wolves came. How my blood ran chill as I heard their howling coming near and nearer. We were too far from Napoleon’s cabin to retreat, besides their howlings came from our rear.
I suppose I have no right to call old Devil by that name, as he was leader of the pack, but it fitted him so well.
There was no hesitation in his movements. As an arrow from a twanging bow-string he sprang at Jack’s throat. Of course, I only call them the World, the Flesh, and the Devil for the purposes of this narrative. I am not trying to turn my diary into an allegory. They were all devils, but I must individualize them. Devil was the biggest, strongest, fiercest.
When Jack learned by the howling of the wolves they were on our trail, he armed himself with a great club, and after arming me with a smaller club, he lifted me into the branches of a birch tree. Then he took up his stand, my defender, my savior, my hero. He stood with his back against the tree trunk.
His views of life are so noble, so broad, so profound. I have told him everything, that is, almost all about everything. This, of course, is since the fight. His comment was so far-reaching, so generous.
Folly visits most homes and most individuals sometimes in our lives. The thing is to come through it, and having come through it not to be worse than when going in, for we must be wiser. Our grip on life is stronger. To have made an error in younger life and to recognize that error makes us surer-footed on the trail of life, and it gives us a measure of our powers of resistance.
And then I told him the real climax of my life, which is the climax of this story, came to me last Thursday as I sat in the Senate Chamber. Then the spirit of my ancestor spoke as it never spoke before. Then I made my choice; then I realized Society was indeed the folly of the age. To this he replied with the question:
“Can you wonder the Chinese worship their ancestors? Perhaps we—”
“Perhaps we may drop Christianity for ancestor—”
“It is not necessary to drop Christianity. Christianity is not incompatible with ancestor-worship.”
Dear Jack!
Darkness was settling down over the scene and Devil’s eyes gleamed fire as he came. And so did the eyes of World and Flesh, for the three were in the air at the same time. Three pairs of jaws snapped together like steel traps, pitilessly. Oh! the cruelty of those jaws.
As the three snapped their jaws, Jack’s club swung round and they were hurled away. In the attack Devil sprang at Jack with Flesh at his left and World at his right. Jack’s club caught Flesh behind the ear and made him feel very sorry. And World and Devil sat on their haunches and snapped.
Jack glared at the wolves and the wolves glared at Jack. I called to him: “Jack, why do you not come up into the tree with me?” It was the first time I had ever called him Jack.
“That would not do, for if we stayed in the tree very long we should freeze to death. I must stay below and fight for us both, dear.”
My hero!
World and Devil sat at a distance and licked their chops, while Flesh wandered about with his head bent low.
What woman knowing she was loved by such a man could help returning his love. We were primitive, and I’ve heard love is primitive, back through the ages to when man had little but his superior intelligence to guard his love.
As Flesh regained his senses, the three threshed about up and down and then they sprang, this time Devil coming at my foot. Of course, it was all fancy, but I fancied I felt his hot breath. I foiled his attempt while Jack managed to hit him over the back. It was not a very hard blow as its force was spent ere it reached him, it having actually been aimed at the other two.
Darkness was settling fast, and this fact increased my horror. Jack enquired if I were cold. I answered, no. This was between the howling of the wolves. Jack asked me if I could climb higher into the tree. I replied I could not. Then he told me to pluck from the tree all the loose bark I could and roll it into bundles. This I did as the wolves held a longer council of war. They circled round and round the tree, ugly, grey, devilish, watchful brutes. Jack told me to undo the sash I wore round my waist and lower it to him. This I did, and then he told me to shout and wave my arms to attract the wolves’ attention. When I did as he requested, he drew his knife and his match-box from his pocket and, placing his club between his knees, tied them into the end of the sash and told me to hoist away. With the knife I managed to secure a much greater quantity of birch bark. I asked if I should light any of the bark, but Jack said no, as it was no use driving the wolves away unless we beat them. By this he meant that should we merely frighten them into the forest depths we were still their prisoners. The bark was to be for an emergency.
The wolves crept closer, ever watchful, the cruel beasts! Their howlings and the snap, snap of their teeth seemed to grow louder and more frequent. Suddenly they sprang, Devil at Jack’s throat. Jack had swung his club in order to guard me; this caused his left shoulder to remain unprotected. Devil seized it in his fangs. Fortunately Jack had been able to throw up his left elbow to protect his neck, but over he went. Quick as lightning the other two were on him.
I lighted the birch bark, and with it flaming in my hand, dropped into the midst of the raging, struggling pack. Oh! the glory of it—to rescue the man I loved—and, incidentally, to save my own life, for I did not know then that Napoleon was on his way to our rescue.
First in the face of one, then in the face of another I flung the flaming bark, and screamed and shouted. The smell of singeing hair sickened me, but it frightened them away. Although they had tasted blood, dear Jack’s blood, they drew off. And then I remembered. I placed the flaming bark against the birch tree; it burst into flames; the forest round about was lighted up, and then I knelt by the side of my lover.
Napoleon came. His rifle rang out. Devil at least was dead.
And now I have Jack, my Jack! The Mounts and the Liens and all that vulgar, selfish, self-advertising, wasteful crowd; they are nothing . . . .
Mrs. Bang!
THE END
Toronto: T. H. Best Printing Co., Limited
TRANSCRIBER NOTES
Misspelled words and printer errors have been corrected. Where multiple spellings occur, majority use has been employed.Punctuation has been maintained except where obvious printer errors occur.Book name and author have been added to the original book cover. The resulting cover is placed in the public domain.
Misspelled words and printer errors have been corrected. Where multiple spellings occur, majority use has been employed.
Punctuation has been maintained except where obvious printer errors occur.
Book name and author have been added to the original book cover. The resulting cover is placed in the public domain.
[The end ofAs Others See Us, by William Henry Pope Jarvis.]