“Yes, Ethan and myself have about come to the conclusion he must be a chip of the old block, a Baylay, afraid of nothing; though he did bite off more than he could chew when he started off on a hunt for big game in winter time, and found himself lost in the forest, with the snow half way up to his neck in places.”
They talked it all over, but no one could suggest any particular thing they could do, save to keep the boy in camp, and wait to see what would turn up.
It came time for them to think of getting supper. X-Ray generously offered to “spell” Lub, for he was afraid they were overdoing it in allowing the stout youth to fill the office of cook continually, and that he might suddenly rebel.
“I don’t mind having some help, since you are so kind, X-Ray,” Lub told him; “and so the first thing you do fetch me some more wood.”
X-Ray had perhaps thought to be the “chief-cook-and-bottle-washer” himself for once, as he himself expressed it, for he made a wry face upon being ordered about in such a summary fashion. However, he nodded his head toward the autocrat of the culinary department, and went off to get his arms full of fuel, saying as he did so:
“Anything to keep peace in the family; and besides I’ll have some say about the bill of fare we put up at our hotel this night.”
While supper was cooking Ethan caught hold of Phil’s sleeve and pointed over to where the little chap had been placed, rolled up in Lub’s blanket. He was now sitting bolt upright, and rubbing his eyes with his knuckles as though he did not know what to make of it all.
Phil immediately hurried over, and threw himself down beside the little fellow.
“It’s all right, bub, we’re your friends, and mean to keep you here with us until your daddy comes along for you. Went out hunting, eh, and got lost? Well, never mind, plenty of bigger men than you have done the same thing. You tried the best you knew how to light a fire, too; and I believe you’d have done it if the ground had been clear of snow, so you could find plenty of small wood. But supper will be ready soon, and we’re expecting you to be pretty hungry.”
Somehow there was that about Phil Bradley to invite the confidence of any one, especially when he smiled as Phil was doing now, and spoke so soothingly, and directly from the heart.
It was not long before he had the little chap smiling; and when Lub came over into the shelter with a cup of warm soup for the boy, he drank it ravenously. This told Phil that it must have been many hours since the child had tasted any food.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if he left his home, wherever that can be, early this morning, and had been pushing his way through the snow ever since. No wonder he was all tired out, and couldn’t say a word, but keep on moaning. But he’s all right now.”
“If they start out and follow his trail,” ventured X-Ray, with one of those bright inspirations that had given him his nick-name, “they’ll show up here in our camp some time or other, I should say. Whee! I hope now, that terror of the pines will be reasonable, and believe what we tell him; that is, I don’t want him to suspect we tried to kidnap Johnny here.”
“By the way, I wonder what his name really is?” said Lub.
“Ask him, Phil; he seems to think a heap of you already,” suggested X-Ray.
Accordingly Phil bent over the boy, while the others crowded around.
“We want to know whose boy you are, and what your name is, my little man. Do they call you Johnny at home?” he asked, and as clearly as possible.
The small urchin shook his curly head vigorously; he even in a measure returned Phil’s smile; and then started to make a series of unintelligible noises that sent a thrill through Phil’s heart.
The latter turned with piteous look toward his chums, whose faces reflected his expression of commiseration, almost horror.
“No wonder he didn’t say anything, boys!” exclaimed Phil; “for don’t you see the poor little chap is tongue-tied?”
“The poor little kid!” gasped warm-hearted Lub, as he impulsively threw an arm around the boy they were entertaining as their guest in camp.
Both X-Ray Tyson and Ethan also betrayed their intense interest by sympathetic looks that spoke volumes.
“I don’t know that I ever ran across a case just like this,” X-Ray remarked, as he turned on Phil.
“You mean that while you’ve met people who were deaf and dumb you never saw one who was what they call tongue-tied; is that it, X-Ray?” the latter asked.
“Yes, you’ve got it straight, Phil; but tell me, is this sort of thing incurable?”
“It all depends on the conditions,” was the reply. “Some are afflicted worse than others; and then again I believe that if it’s taken in hand at an early stage there’s much more chance of the operation being successful than if it becomes an old affliction.”
“But my stars, why haven’t the parents of this fine little chap looked after it before now?” demanded Ethan.
“Well, when you’re saying that, just stop and think what you’re up against,” Phil told him. “We’re not down in New York City, where paid doctors visit the poorer sections, and there are wards in all hospitals where such operations can be undertaken free of expense. This is away up in the wilds of Canada.”
“Like as not,” interrupted Lub, “his folks never dreamed that any remedy could be found to help him get his speech. I reckon now his mammy has grieved her heart sore many a time wondering what would become of a boy growing up to manhood who’d never be able to say a single intelligible word.”
“Yes,” added Ethan, bent on entering another wedge to the debate, “and money has a heap to do with these things, even if they did know. It costs considerable to send a boy all the way down to Montreal, and keep him there, not to speak of the doctor’s big fee.”
Phil looked grave, and then a smile began to slowly creep athwart his face. This was discovered by the sharp-eyed X-Ray, for he quickly demanded an explanation.
“You’ve thought ofsomething, Phil; that look gives you away. Now speak up and confide in your chums. We’re all just as much interested in this queer business as you can be, I want you to remember. What’s caught you?”
Phil smiled in even a broader sense.
“Why, to be sure you have a right to know, fellows,” he told them, frankly. “I’m not intending to keep it a secret. I was just wondering why I shouldn’t try and take this little chap down with me when we leave here, and see that he has one good chance to have this impediment to his speech removed. We can go to Montreal without a great deal of trouble; and in fact we had decided that we’d visit there, as we saw Old Quebec on the way up to the Saguenay region. What d’ye think of it?”
“I object!” burst out Lub, to the surprise of his mates.
“Why, what’s got you, Lub?” demanded X-Ray, indignantly; “I always thought you’d be the last one to kick up a row, when a thing like this was being talked over.”
“I object on the grounds that it isn’t fair for Phil to take the burden all on himself,” continued the stout chum, resolutely, with his affectionate arm still hovering about the small boy, who had cuddled closer to him, as though recognizing a warm friend in Lub.
“Oh! I haven’t said I meant to do that, Lub!” exclaimed Phil.
“Well, we know you too well to believe it wasn’t in your mind to stand for every cent of the expense such an operation would cost,” continued the fat boy. “Course you wouldn’t feel it any more’n a flea-bite; but then that isn’t the question. You’ve got to think of us. We cut some punkins in this arrangement, and we insist on standing our share of any expense. How’s that, X-Ray, Ethan?”
“Bully for you, Lub!” ejaculated the former, enthusiastically, slapping the fat chum on the shoulder with almost crushing force that made Lub wince, though he immediately forced a broad smile to dominate his rosy face.
“Share and share alike, that’s the ticket!” declared Ethan, though doubtless the poor fellow was at the same time making a rapid mental calculation as to the state of his finances, for he had no private fortune, or rich parents, or doting aunt to help him tide over. “I’ve got another bundle of ginseng roots ready to ship down to my dealer, and if they fetch anything like the splendid price the last lot did I can spare enough to square my share of the bill. And I’ll do it willingly too, if it’s the means of giving this little fellow the gift of speech.”
There never were four boys quite as generous as Phil Bradley and his chums. Fond of manly sport they were, and full of a love for frolic, and such good times as came their way; but never failing to respond to a call for help, no matter what the source from which the appeal came.
Phil threw up both hands as if in surrender.
“You never will let me do anything like this by myself, fellows,” he told them; “even when I’ve got money to burn. But I want to say right here that I think ten times as much of you, Lub, X-Ray and Ethan, as if you did. It means something to all of you to make this sacrifice, while to me it isn’t a bit of difference. So I say and I repeat it, that you deserve a whole lot more credit than I ever can. And what’s more, I’m as proud as anything to shake hands with such chums.”
He gravely went around pumping a hand of each fellow, and there was a deal of sincerity in the act, even though they all laughed—perhaps to hide the fact that there might be a suspicious moisture in their rapidly winking eyes.
“Isn’t it queer how we seem to rub up against something of this kind everywhere we go on our trips?” remarked X-Ray.
“Why, so it is,” Ethan added; “in the first place, when we were in the Adirondacks there was that old hermit and his little girl, Mazie; we had a hand in bringing them a measure of joy, and reuniting Meredith with his estranged wife. They’ve been writing ever since how grateful they were on account of the little we managed to do for them.”
“Yes,” Lub hurriedly continued, “and even around our home town of Brewster, when we were gathering nuts for the children in the orphan asylum remember how we had a chance to help that country boy, Casper Bunce, who had run away from the farmer he had been bound to. The courts fixed all that, and he’s got a happy home now on the farm of Miss Bowers.”
“Even down on the Shore, when we were duck shooting on Currituck Sound,” X-Ray went on to say, not wishing to be left out entirely, “we managed to bridge over the troubles between the young bayman Malachi Jordon, his little wife, and her savage old dad who was separating the couple. When we left they were all bunched and waving us good-by.”
“It does seem to be the bounden duty of the Mountain Boys to carry some sunshine along with them wherever they go,” laughed Phil; “and to tell you the truth I’m not so very much surprised.”
“You mean it’s getting to be a regular thing with us; is that it, Phil?” questioned Lub.
“That’s what you might call it, when you keep on repeating a certain thing,” Phil declared. “There’s an old chestnut of a story you may remember that illustrates the point I’m making. It seems that a lawyer was trying to get a witness to admit a certain point that would favor his side of the case, and the old fellow kept on doggedly avoiding committing himself. So the lawyer asked him what he would call it if he leaned from the window and fell out. ‘I’d call that an accident,’ replied the witness. ‘Then suppose you deliberately walked up-stairs and repeated the identical performance, what would you call that?’ demanded the lawyer. ‘Oh! I should say that was a coincidence,’ the witness told him. ‘Well, now what if you even went up again, and for the third time looked out of that same window, only to fall again; what would you call it?’ And the witness without the least hesitation bawled out: ‘Why, sir, I’d say it was ahabit!’ And that’s what it’s getting to be with us Mountain Boys.”
Of course they all laughed at Phil’s description of the condition into which it seemed they were drifting.
“It’s a habit that gives us a heap of lively satisfaction let me tell you,” said Lub, earnestly. “For one I like to look back and think of a lot of things we’ve had a hand in carrying through.”
“Yes,” said Phil, “we’ve enjoyed them to the limit, and the best part of it all is that they leave no regrets behind. I hope it will always be that way with the Mountain Boys.”
A little later on Phil took his turn at cuddling the small boy up close to him. He was talking to him in a low tone, and the others, knowing what he had in mind, did not bother him, but conversed among themselves of other things.
Presently Phil called softly to Ethan.
“Come and take him off my arm; he’s sound asleep, and my arm is too, so I can’t move it. Easy now, and lay him down where he’ll be the warmest.”
“That’s where my blanket happens to be,” spoke up Lub; “I’ve figured on having him with me to-night, Phil; so please don’t interfere.”
“I guess he’ll be snug enough alongside such a hot-box as you are, Lub,” interrupted X-Ray; and consequently Ethan gently laid the small chap so that Lub’s generous blanket could be tucked in around him.
“Did you manage to find out anything worth while, Phil?” asked X-Ray.
“Well, he’s some shy yet; and I’m a poor hand at trying to hold a talk-fest with a child that can’t say a single word,” admitted Phil; “but I’m sure now he does belong to the people we spoke about.”
“Meaning that terror of a poacher, Baylay?” said Ethan.
“Yes,” Phil continued, “but until we rub up against the man ourselves, and can testify to some of his awful ways, perhaps we’d better go slow about calling him all those names, boys. He may be a rough man, but what more could you expect up here in this wilderness? All loggers are of that stripe. For one I’m going to form my opinion of this Baylay more from how he treats his family, than from his relations to game laws he considers unjust, or other rough men who meet him on the level of give and take.”
“I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a whole lot of good sense in that policy, Phil,” assented Lub, for it agreed with his ideas exactly.
“But he does seem to have gotten a terrible bad reputation around these districts you’ll admit?” ventured Ethan.
“There may be two sides to every story,” Phil told him; “and so far we’ve heard only one. I’d like to know just what that kid over yonder thinks of Baylay; then I’d have a better pointer to the true character of the man than I could get from outside talk. He’s a fighter, as nearly all these loggers are. He has licked lots of other scrappers in his time, and you couldn’t expect them to say nice things about Baylay. So let’s hold off a bit, and not condemn him unheard.”
Even Ethan admitted that such a course was nothing more than fair.
“We’ll wait then,” continued Phil, “till the time comes when we can see into his home, and find out if he’s a big brute there or not. Yes, that’s the way to learn the truth; surface indications don’t amount to much. You’ve got to scratch a man on the back and find out what he does when he’s alone, or with his own family, to learn his real nature.”
Though the boys may not have known it there was a deal of sound philosophy in what Phil was advancing; and if more people would carry it out there might be less misunderstandings and suffering in this world.
Some time later on they began to feel sleepy themselves, and Lub was the first one to crawl under his covers. Ethan helped him get settled, for the fat chum had to be unusually careful, so as not to awaken his little blanket-mate, who was apparently sleeping soundly.
The night wore on.
Though the wind outside might be cold and bleak the campers had managed to fix things so well that little of it could find entrance to their shack. The fire was to be allowed to take care of itself, unless one of the boys chanced to wake up in the night, and chose to crawl out in order to throw more fuel on the embers.
It is not the most pleasant task in the world to do a thing like this on a bitter cold night, when all seems so comfortable under the covers. Even Phil might conclude to let it pass, since a fire was so easy to start in the morning, and he could have a merry blaze going long before any of the rest thought of sticking their noses out.
No doubt Lub, and perhaps the others also, dreamed of home as they lay there so many hundreds of miles away from those they loved. It would have been only natural, because their thoughts often dwelt with the distant scenes, even though they might be enjoying every hour of their vacation in Canadian wilds.
If any of them awoke they had no means of telling how the night was passing unless they cared to peep out and note the position of the planets, those telltale clocks of the skies. All of the boys had paid more or less attention to such things, knowing how useful the knowledge can be when there is no watch in the party; and many times they had vied with one another in seeing who could display the better judgment in explaining where certain bright stars would be at a designated hour.
Lub was lying squarely on his back, and breathing so hard that some of his comrades would have reproached him for “snoring” had they heard him. But Lub seemed to be far away in his dreams, and not concerning himself in the slightest degree as to whether he emitted little snorts or not.
From this happy condition, so free from care, the fat boy was suddenly and rudely aroused by a terrifying sound. It was a shout, and undoubtedly came from the throat of X-Ray, who could elevate his voice in a shrill manner that few of his friends could ever hope of emulating. He was the cheer captain of their school football squad in Brewster, just on that account.
And what he now shouted was not calculated to cheer the hearts of his comrades but to send a pang of fear through every fiber of their being:
“Hello! hello! rouse up everybody! Our shack’s on fire!”
Everybody was awake in an instant. Even though the cry had thrilled Lub through and through somehow he did not seem to forget about the little fellow who was under the covers with him; for his very first act was to lift him up, blanket and all, and struggle to get out of the shack.
They had all seen a light, though it had remained for the keen eyes of X-Ray to discover what caused it. But as soon as they emerged from the shelter, Phil, Ethan and Lub found no difficulty in seeing that the alarm had not been a false one; for one side of the shack was all afire.
“Go for it, everybody!” cried Phil, as he started to throw all the snow he was able to snatch up on the fiercely burning mass.
“Fire-fighters get busy!” echoed X-Ray, copying the other’s example; nor was Lub long in finding a place where he could deposit his burden and join in the attack.
Thus beset on all sides the fire quickly died down as the snow melted and drowned the ardor of the flames. Before many minutes had passed away they had it under control.
“We want to save a part of it for our regular fire, because we’ll need it to get warm by!” observed long-headed Ethan.
“Warm!” gasped Lub. “Why, I’m fairly roasting right now.”
“Well, you won’t be in a jiffy, when that cold wind strikes down your back,” the other warned him; “how about the fire business, Phil?”
“It’s a good idea,” he was told; “but don’t bother carrying any of what is left of this stuff over; we have plenty of good wood handy, you remember. And I want to look a little closer into this brush-heap, you see.”
“Ginger popguns; that’s so,” cried X-Ray; “however did that stuff get there, I’d like to know? We didn’t bank it up that I remember.”
“Never mind about that yet,” Phil told him; “get the fire going, and then we can talk it over. There’s something about this affair that looks pretty suspicious to me, I want you to know.”
All of them were thinking the same thing as they hurried to get their own fire going in front of the shack.
When this had been accomplished they found time to look around. The boy was sitting up, and Lub had seen to it that he had the warm folds of the blanket about him, so he was in no danger of taking cold. He looked both puzzled and full of wonder, but Phil noticed that he did not appear to be afraid.
“He’s made of good stuff, most likely,” he told himself; “and is a chip off the old block all right, if he’s Baylay’s boy; because they admit the poacher is a man without fear.”
“Now,” remarked Ethan, after they were all seated near the fire, “let’s try and get a little light on this mystery. How did that fire come to be started; and who put all that brush up against the back of our shack, I want to know?”
“That’s so, who did?” echoed Lub, wagging his head with the words, and looking unusually solemn.
“Notice in the first place,” Phil continued, “that it was piled up on the windward side; that was done so it would take hold in a hurry, once the match was struck. I even got a whiff ofkerosenewhen I was working at putting out the blaze; and it strikes me some of it was used over the brush to make it burn more furiously.”
“Whee!” gasped Lub; “then you mean to say, Phil—”
“I mean that this thing didn’t come about by accident,” the other interrupted Lub to say positively; “none of us put that stuff there, and we have no kerosene to waste throwing it around. Besides, every one was sound asleep inside the shack when it happened.”
“Somebody meant to burn us out, that’s it, Phil!” declared X-Ray.
“Baylay?” cried Ethan, on a hazard.
“Not on your life,” X-Ray told him; “Baylay doesn’t know there are any such fellows as the Mountain Boys on earth. But there is one man who does, because he ran up against a couple of the same latterly, and had to duck. I’m referring to the eminent capitalist and financier millionaire, Mr. James Bodman.”
“Whee!” breathed Lub again, as his emotions almost overpowered him; he did not venture to interrupt, but just sat there and listened with all his might to the exciting talk that was going on among his chums.
“Well,” said Ethan, slowly, “from the description of that sportsman, and the way he acted when he found he couldn’t bulldoze the pair of you, I wouldn’t put a thing like this past him; but how would he know where we were camped?”
“Oh! that is easy to answer,” Phil told him; “don’t you remember how we learned where they were settled by seeing smoke rising in the cold air, straight as a church pillar?”
“I reckon they could see the same if they happened to look this way,” admitted Ethan, “because Lub uses all kinds of wood, and some of it makes a black smudge. Well, I’ll admit for the sake of argument that they could easy enough learn where our camp lay; but do you believe that stout sportsman would go to the trouble to sneak all the way over here, several miles it must be, just to try and make us some nasty mean trouble?”
“No, I don’t,” replied Phil, instantly.
“Then what follows?” demanded the other, desperately.
“He knows the power of money, because he uses it right along to further some of his big schemes,” Phil exclaimed.
“You mean he could bribe a couple of his guides to come over here and do the burning racket; is that what you have in mind, Phil?” asked Ethan.
“Yes, there’s no doubt of it in my mind,” he was told.
“But we’d always have to just guess at it, because we could never know for sure,” X-Ray went on to say, in a dubious tone that told of disappointment.
“Perhaps not,” Phil remarked; “come over with me, and let’s take a look; for I’ve got a notion we can settle that thing in our minds, even if nothing might ever be done to punish the sneaks who did the job.”
He picked up a burning brand from the fire that promised to serve fairly well as a torch; and with this swinging from his hand led the others to the back of the scorched shack.
“Close by we’ve all trodden things into a mass,” he explained; “but let’s look further away. Here’s a place where it happens we find only a couple of inches of snow, and you can see footprints plainly marked. Look again, and tell me if any of us made those tracks coming and going?”
“They carried the brush along here, too, Phil, because you can see little twigs lying on the surface of the snow!” announced Ethan.
“But examine the footprints, because they will tell the story,” said Phil.
“Why, they are not like our tracks at all,” said X-Ray, immediately.
“None of them show any sign of heels, Phil!” exclaimed Ethan; “does that mean they can be moccasins made of tough hide, and not hunting-boots like ours?”
“Now you’re getting close to the heart of it,” the leader assured him; “for most of the guides up here in this region wear such foot coverings, as the Indians did before them. I believe there were two men concerned in this outrage, and that they were paid by Mr. James Bodman to come over here and burn us out.”
“The coward!” muttered Lub, indignantly, as his pent-up feelings broke bounds; “why, they might have smothered us while we slept.”
“Oh! I don’t suppose the millionaire believed it would be as bad as that, for I hardly think he’s got to the point where he’d commit murder outright; but he meant to give us all the bother he could. That was his way of trying to get even because we refused to knuckle down to him, and let him claim our caribou.”
“Huh! guess then he’s been crazy to shoot game like that for a long time; and was a whole heap disappointed when he found it was our shots that had downed the young buck,” and X-Ray chuckled as though he felt that after all the score was still decidedly in their favor.
“What surprises me, and makes me feel small,” continued Phil, “is how I could sleep through it all and never know that they were creeping up, fetching that brush along with them, and piling it against the back of the shack.”
“Oh! we’re all in the same boat,” said Ethan, “because I was hundreds of miles away from here, and going to singing school with Sally Andrews when X-Ray let out that yawp!”
“And I own up that it was just by a lucky chance I happened to wake up,” X-Ray Tyson admitted; “you know smoke always makes me choke, and that’s why I try to sit on the windward side of fires. It must have got in my throat as I slept, because I suddenly sat upright to get my breath. Course I knew right away something was on the boards that ought to be attended to, and so I woke the rest up gently.”
“Gently!” echoed Lub; “say, it seemed to me as if an electric current heavy enough to execute a criminal had been shot through my system. I bet you I’ve lost as much as five pounds in weight just through the nervous excitement.”
“Poor chap!” said X-Ray; “it’s a pity then it doesn’t happen oftener. I think I’ll take to giving you a regular shock like that every few nights. You could drop forty pounds and be all the better for it.”
“Who’s running my heft, me or you, I want to know?” demanded Lub; “it suits me just as it is. When I get a notion that I want to start to join your Living Skeleton class I’ll give you due notice. And until that time comes please let me sleep in peace.”
“Well, what can we do about this outrage?” asked Ethan.
“Nothing much,” admitted Phil.
“It would be silly to think of going over and entering a complaint to that red-faced grunter,” declared X-Ray; “because we’d only be insulted to our faces. Why I wouldn’t put it past him to threaten to have us kicked out of his camp, though of course James would have too much sense to try the job himself.”
“We’ll have to pocket the insult, and try to guard against having it happen again, that’s all,” was Phil’s conclusion. “And let me tell you we have to be thankful it turned out no worse than it did. The damage isn’t worth mentioning, and it’s opened our eyes to the fact that we have dangerous neighbors who will bear watching from this time out.”
“But, Phil, we don’t mean to let them chase us away from here, do we?” interposed Lub, who came of good Revolutionary stock, and was a sticker.
“Well, I guess not, if we have to keep on the watch every single night,” retorted X-Ray, belligerently.
“Are we going to sit here till it’s time to get breakfast?” asked Lub, casting a solicitous glance over toward the spot where the boy was wrapped in his blanket—it would be hard to say whether Lub were concerned about the welfare of the little fellow, or coveted the warmth of the said blanket; perhaps he might have been influenced by both motives, for his heart was warm, even when he shivered with the cold breeze on his back.
“No use of that, when it’s hardly an hour after midnight right now!” declared Phil, with a look aloft to where the star-studded sky gave him the information. “The rest of you toddle back to the shack and let me sit here a while,” Ethan told them, as he gathered his blanket closer about him, after picking up his gun, as Phil noticed.
“I was just going to say the same thing myself, Ethan,” remarked the leader.
“But first come, first served, that’s the rule we go by, remember, Phil.”
“I’ll agree, on one condition,” he was told.
“Name it then, Phil.”
“There’s Jupiter away up yonder; in just about two hours he’ll be setting below the horizon. Promise to call me before he disappears from sight, will you, Ethan.”
“Agreed, though I wouldn’t mind sticking out the watch till daylight,” said the other, and his manner told that he certainly meant every word of it.
“But how about me?” complained X-Ray; “there’s another star up yonder that will set by five o’clock; you’ve got to promise to let me stand guard from then on to daylight. I refuse to be left out in the cold in any deal.”
“And don’t I have any show at all?” whined Lub, though rather faintly, as though he knew very well they would not consent; for he had a failing with respect to going to sleep on his post, having been tested on numerous occasions and found wanting.
It was presently arranged then that Phil would arouse X-Ray when the second star was about to disappear. He smiled faintly when making this concession, but X-Ray did not appear to notice it. The fact of the matter was Phil knew very well that there had been a serious miscalculation on the part of the ambitious sentinel, because that second star would still be half an hour from the horizon when the sun was due to send his flaming banners athwart the eastern sky to herald his approach.
The fire had scorched the back of their shelter but no serious damage had been accomplished. That was owing to the fact of smoke affecting the sensitive throat of X-Ray Tyson; a thing that may have caused him more or less discomfort in times past, but which certainly stood them all in good stead on this particular night.
On this account they could sleep just as well as before, granting of course that their nerves had not been too much disturbed by the sudden peril, and the fight they had had to put up in order to save their possessions.
The fire was now to be kept up without intermission, day and night. Should any of those unprincipled men come over again from the other camp, bent on doing them an injury, they might well pause and abandon the attempt when they discovered how the boys maintained a constant watch, with arms in their hands, and sufficient light to discover a creeping figure, which they would be justified in firing at.
True to his promise Ethan aroused Phil when Jupiter was about to dip behind the horizon.
“All well, and getting colder right along, so that the fire feels bully!” was all the report the late sentry thought fit to make, after he had seen Phil take his place on the log, gun in hand, and blanket about his shoulders.
“Then crawl in, and go to sleep,” advised the new guard, as he watched Ethan trying to smother a huge yawn.
“Guess I will, because it’s quite some time to daylight, and there’s little use for a pair of us to stand sentry duty.”
So Ethan vanished inside the shack, and Phil was left to insure their safety, as the brilliant heavenly bodies kept up their steady western march, and the night breeze sang mysterious chants through the snow-covered branches of the firs.
“Is that the way you keep a promise, Phil?” asked X-Ray, reproachfully, as he came crawling out of the shack, to find it beginning to get daylight, and with the sentry busying himself before a cheery fire, where he meant evidently to forestall Lub in starting breakfast.
“Oh! the joke is on you, that’s all,” laughed Phil.
“I don’t see how,” complained X-Ray, who really felt hurt in that he had not been allowed to stand his share of the night watch after being told he might.
“You’ll have to learn to figure better, that’s all, my boy,” the other told him.
“Figure; how’s that, Phil?”
“Well, learn to judge distances that are millions of miles away, to be more definite. Look over there to the west; see that star just going down? Well, that’s the one you told me would set in two hours after Jupiter disappeared. I’ve been watching it right along, and somehow it just refused to vanish. There, I believe it’s just dropped out of sight. If you were asleep, X-Ray, I’d think it my duty to go and get you on deck, because I promised I would.”
X-Ray looked a bit foolish, and then laughed.
“Another time I’ll see to it that I’m Johnny on the spot!” he declared. “Chances are you knew I’d figured wrong at the time, Phil?”
“What if I did, it wasn’t in the bond that I should take you to task for that blunder. A little thing of this kind is going to impress it on your mind better than any words of mine could ever do. You’ll never forget again to prove your sums so as to make doubly sure.”
And Phil was right. X-Ray would never look up at the stars and try to figure on how long it would be before a certain one would set, without remembering his error of judgment, and taking especial pains that it was not repeated.
The others soon made their appearances, hearing this talking outside.
“Whew! but it’s sharp this morning!” exclaimed Ethan as he joined them. “That blanket of mine isn’t as warm as it might be, and I don’t believe it’s all wool and two yards wide. Where’s the ax?”
“Going to cut some wood so as to get warm?” asked X-Ray Tyson.
“What, me?” cried Ethan, pretending to scoff at the idea; “why, fact is I want to chop a hole in the lake ice, and take a bath just to get my blood in circulation. They say there’s nothing like it, you know.”
All the same, after he had picked up one of the axes he was found to be cutting wood, which proved his daring assertion that had made Lub gasp to be pretty much in the nature of a great “bluff.”
The boy was sitting by the fire where Lub had found him a place. Lub had insisted on Phil giving over the completion of breakfast into his charge.
“I’ve been elected chief cook by unanimous vote,” he said, as he waved a big spoon about his head to emphasize his assertion; “and I expect you all to do what I tell you.”
So he set them each one a task, Phil “spelling” Ethan at the woodpile, X-Ray to fetch plenty of fuel up, and Ethan something else when he had recovered his wind after his recent violent exertions.
As he cooked the breakfast Lub talked confidentially to the boy, who was looking quite contented and happy, as indeed who would not when finding such good friends, and being treated to such bountiful spreads?
“Are we going to try and take him back to his mammy to-day, Phil?” asked Ethan, later on, as they sat on the log, and discussed the eggs and bacon and coffee and flapjacks which had been produced so bountifully under the deft manipulation of the obliging Lub.
“Oh! what’s the hurry?” the cook hastened to say; “it’s threatening again, you can notice if you look at that bank of storm clouds coming up yonder. Better put it off a while. We’ve got oceans of grub, you know; and I like to feel him wrapped up in a blanket with me first-rate.”
All of them looked to Phil to give the deciding word, though as a rule he always consulted his chums before saying anything, and tried to have it so that majority ruled the camp.
“I quite agree with Lub,” he went on to say, quietly, as he gave that individual a smile, and then nodded his head toward the little chap.
“Good for you, Phil!” burst out Lub, clapping his hands together in delight.
“I don’t altogether like the looks of things over there where those clouds are coming up,” continued Phil. “It wouldn’t be the nicest thing in the world to try to take this boy miles away, and then get caught in a howling blizzard. We’d do better to hold our horses and see what turns up.”
“Oh! then you expect that some one may come along looking for him, do you?” asked X-Ray, jumping to conclusions.
“It’s possible,” he was told. “If they care at all for the child, when he’s missed it seems to me there would be some stir; and one of the first things that ought to occur to his father would be to notify any campers around here, so they could be on the lookout for the kid as they trailed through the bush.”
“Phil is right,” asserted Ethan Allen, hastily. “It’s sure up to Baylay to get a move on him and do something, if he’s lost his boy. He couldn’t expect to stay at home and wait for others to find the lost child.”
“We don’t know,” said Phil, “but the chances are the mother and father have been pretty near being distracted because by now they must feel there’s no chance of the kid being alive, unless he was picked up by a roving hunter or trapper.”
The boy listened to all they said, though of course it was not likely that he understood much of it. He could see nothing but friendly smiles on each one of the four faces by the fire; and he knew as well as anything could be known that his lines had fallen in pleasant places.
When this matter had been settled all of them seemed to be relieved of a weight. The fact of the matter was they had already taken a great fancy to the waif, and like Lub none of them wanted to see him depart.
It did begin to blow and snow heavily ere another hour had passed. X-Ray declared that from the signs they were in for a fierce blizzard; and he told some fearful stories he had read concerning these dreadful storms.
Lo! and behold the treacherous weather played him a sly trick, for the sun came out even while he was in the midst of the most doleful yarn, and his chums gave him a merry laugh in consequence.
At the same time there was enough of threat in the clouds to keep them in camp that morning, finding plenty to do to employ their time.
In prowling around Phil had made several little discoveries concerning the abiding places or haunts of certain small fur-bearing animals that frequented the border of the lake. His collection of flashlight pictures was lacking in some particulars, and he believed it would pay him to commence work trying to obtain results while on the spot.
“I wouldn’t want to go back home without a few additions to my splendid series of flash exposures,” he told the others while getting things ready so that he could place his cunning little trap when the shadows of evening began to gather; “and I want to see if the animals up here in this half Arctic region are as obliging as they are down in our section of the country, so as to take their own pictures for a poor hard worked photographer who needs sleep, and can’t afford to sit up all night just to press a button and fire the cartridge.”
“You always make it a paying business for the victim, Phil,” declared Lub; “for you give him a jolly lunch to settle for his trouble. Huh! seems to me I’d like to just pull a string and get a flash if only it meant grub every time, and no harm done. They’re a lucky lot, I’ll be bound.”
Lub had taken a turn during the morning in trying to talk with the tongue-tied boy. Of course it could only be done through the use of many signs, although there was always a chance that the little chap might know a name if he heard it.
“When I kept repeating the word Baylay I could see that he seemed interested,” Lub told the others. “It’s too bad we didn’t ask Mr. McNab what the names of the Baylay kids were. I’ve tried every one I could think of and none seemed to fit. He shook his curly head every time as if he wanted me to know he owned to no such name. I reckon now they must be out of the ordinary.”
And it afterwards turned out that Lub was quite right when he chanced to make this assertion, for the boy’s name was indeed out of the ordinary; so it was no wonder Lub failed to strike it in his vocabulary.
Noon came and found things just about as before.
Some of them had been half expecting to see a bulky figure pushing toward the camp; but the hours had crept on without such a thing coming to pass.
“It’s too late now to think of starting out to try and find the place where the Baylay cabin is located,” asserted Ethan, when the afternoon was fairly well advanced, and the clouds seemed to have given up the battle for supremacy, for they were retreating all along the line, leaving a cold blue sky in evidence instead.
“Of course it is,” Lub hastened to add, a wrinkle making its appearance across his forehead, a “pucker” Ethan always called it, and which was apt to show whenever the fat chum became worried over something or other.
The quick look he took in the direction of his charge explained the cause on this particular occasion. Lub always was fond of kids, and they loved him too. In this case the fact of their visitor being a waif of the snow forest had more or less to do with his feelings; and then, besides, the poor little chap being unable to do more than make those distressing sounds when he did want to express his feelings the worst kind brought a pang to Lub’s tender heart.
“Yes,” Phil decided, “it would be foolish to attempt anything of the kind now. It can wait until morning. They’ve given up all hope by now, I’m afraid, so they’ll not be apt to suffer much worse for a little more delay. And getting the boy back safe and sound will make them all the happier.”
“That’s the way it treats me always,” affirmed Lub, looking inexpressibly relieved at hearing the dictum pronounced that meant another night with his little blanket-mate; “I never wanted a thing real bad, and kept being put off and put off but that it got to be what my mother would call an absorbing passion with me.”
“Yes, just like the baby in the bath leaning over and trying to reach a cake of well known soap, you’d ‘never be happy till you got it,’ eh, Lub?” jeered X-Ray.
“It’s contradiction that makes men great,” said Lub, ponderously. “Difficulties bring out all there is in a fellow, and Phil will tell you so too. The life that flows on calmly never amounts to much. That’s what makes these mountaineers such a hardy lot; they have to fight for everything they get, while the people on the fertile plains make an easy living.”
“Gee! listen to the philosopher talk, will you?” said Ethan, pretending to be much surprised, when in truth he knew very well that once in so often Lub was apt to drop into this moralizing mood, and air some pretty bright views, for the benefit of his comrades in arms.
“No trouble now telling where that other camp is,” X-Ray informed them. “All you have to do is to take a glance over that way, and you’ll see a thick black smoke rising up.”
“If we’d had any idea there’d be trouble lying in wait for us around here,” ventured Ethan, “we might have kept them guessing where we had our camp. It would be easy to pick out good dry wood, of which there is plenty lying around, and using only that kind. It gives out so little smoke they never would have noticed; whereas the half-green stuff tells anybody with half an eye where the fire is.”
“What you say about the wood and the smoke is all very true, Ethan,” remarked Phil; “but all the same I doubt whether it would have prevented their finding our location, once Mr. James Bodman started to make things interesting by offering a bonus to his guides to smell us out. They’d have heard us chopping, it might be, for in these still woods sounds carry a long ways when the air is just right.”
“Yes, I guess that’s so,” X-Ray admitted, “because several times I’ve been positive I heard the sound of a faraway ax at work; and I noticed that the wind was coming from that quarter too.”
“To-night we keep watch as we planned, eh, Phil?” Ethan asked.
“We’d be wise to do it just as long as we expect to hang out around this section, and that crowd is over there,” he was informed.
“Yes, and I ought to be given the first watch, because I managed to get off so slick last night,” asserted X-Ray; “promise me that, won’t you?”
“If it’s going to worry you the sooner we say yes the better,” laughed Phil; “so we’ll consider that the night is to be cut up into thirds, and I choose the second watch for my turn; Ethan, you have to tag on at the end.”
“So long as I get my full share of the work it doesn’t matter a bit to me where I come in; but let there be no tricks on travelers played to-night. What’s fair for one is fair to all.”
“I suppose you mean to count me out, as usual?” complained Lub, feebly protesting.
“You have all you can do attending to the grub question,” said X-Ray, sternly. “If you do happen to wake up in the night, and can’t get to sleep again, why you might employ yourself fixing up in your mind some new dish you want to spring on us as a surprise. But as a sentry, wide awake and vigilant, you know you’re a rank fizzle, Lub. Now please don’t fire up, and want particulars, because I’d hate to rake up bygone happenings.”
“Oh! well, if you’re three to one against me there’s no use in my kicking,” admitted Lub, trying to look only resigned, whereas in spite of him a grin would persist in spreading across one side of his rosy features.
He had done his duty in showing a willingness to take part in the protection of the camp; if his chums were a unit in deciding against him having a share in the sitting-up business he could not say anything more.
“Your part to-night will be to see that our little friend here is kept cozy and warm,” Phil told him, as he patted the boy on his curly head, and was surprised when the little fellow in the gratitude of his heart suddenly seized hold of his hand and actually pressed it to his childish lips.
Never would Phil Bradley forget the sensation he experienced upon receiving mute evidence of affection; it drew him more than ever to the hapless one whom affliction had marked for its own in refusing him the great gift of speech.
“Hello! listen to all that row going over there, will you?” cried X-Ray Tyson.
As they started up with strained ears there came floating on the wind faint but unmistakable sounds that somehow thrilled the listeners through and through.
“What in the dickens can it all mean?” exclaimed Ethan Allen.
“I’m all up in the air about it,” admitted Lub, helplessly.
“I heard several shots from guns!” declared X-Ray Tyson, positively enough.
“Yes, we all did,” affirmed Phil; “and there was a howl in the bargain that sounded to me like that of a dog.”
“Whew! I bet you one of their animals has gonemad, and had to be shot!” burst out Lub, in still further excitement.
“What, at this season of the year?” cried X-Ray; “I thought curs only went mad in the heat of summer, and that was why they called a part of August the dog days.”
“That isn’t a fact, is it, Phil?” appealed Lub.
“They used to think so,” came the reply, “but of late it’s been learned that the heat has little if anything to do with a dog going mad. Because they always run with their tongues hanging out people had an idea the heat affected them. On the contrary the very sight of water causes a mad dog to go into spasms. It’s just a terrible disease, and in cities is said to be more frequent in winter than in summer.”
“The racket has died out now,” remarked X-Ray, partly to change the subject, and hide the little confusion he felt at displaying his ignorance in his little dispute with Lub.
“And I guess the dog has been killed,” Ethan went on to remark; “but it took a whole lot of gunning to do the job, seemed like. They must have been pretty badly rattled, those New York City sportsmen who are up here to run the country about as they see fit.”
“I’d like to have seen the affair,” observed X-Ray Tyson, meditatively, as if he might be trying to draw a mental picture of what must have been an exciting episode; for a mad dog in camp is likely to create considerable of a wild stampede.
“Excuse me from that sort of fun,” Lub protested; “I’m too fond of dogs to want to watch one running around, frothing at the mouth, and having to be executed.”
“Shot down like a dog, you mean,” interposed Ethan; “and I wouldn’t be much surprised if that old saying originated in a mad dog scare.”
All seemed quiet and serene once more over in the direction of the other camp. Whatever the cause of all that shooting and shouting may have been, it had become a thing of the past, apparently.
“Well, it isn’t any of our funeral,” X-Ray remarked, with a queer shrug of his shoulders; “and so I guess we’d better forget all about it.”
Lub noticed that Phil did not seem to agree with the last speaker. He had a serious expression on his face that told of some idea forming in his brain.
“Perhaps it wasn’t a mad dog scare after all,” Phil suggested.
“But what else could it have been?” asked Ethan.
“Those sort of sportsmen always fetch lots of liquor along with them into the woods,” asserted Phil; “and it might be one of them had a fit ofdelirium tremens, so that he even tried to shoot up the camp, and had to be restrained.”
“Well, now, there might be something in that,” admitted X-Ray, nodding his head reflectively. “And p’raps right now they’ve got a badly wounded man over there, with no doctor inside of a hundred miles.”
“I was thinking of that,” ventured Phil; and something in his tone and manner caused Ethan to instantly leap to a conclusion.
“Were you figuring on going over that way, Phil?” he demanded, “and offering to help that tough crowd if they needed any assistance, you knowing so much about looking after gunshot hurts that we often threatened to call you Doctor Bradley?”
“Yes, I was considering doing that,” Phil said, smiling, “though there might be no necessity for our entering the camp, if we seemed to find it all serene.”
“I take note of the fact,” continued Ethan, “that you use the plural pronoun ‘we,’ Phil, which would indicate that you meant to have one of us go along. I’d like to speak for that privilege, if it’s all the same to you.”
“Shucks! you beat me out in saying that, hang the luck, Ethan,” grumbled X-Ray Tyson, who was not often caught napping, and therefore felt additionally sore in connection with this instance.
“Yes, if we think it a wise thing to do, you might as well help me out, Ethan,” Phil told him; at which the Allen boy grinned happily, and could not keep from casting a side look full of triumph toward X-Ray.
“I don’t see that it could do any harm,” Lub advanced in his ponderous way, “if you scouted in that direction. You wouldn’t have to brush in on them unless you saw signs that they were all mixed up, and in need of the right kind of help. And like as not you’d easily enough be able to find out what all the row was about, so as to tell us stay-at-homes.”
“Come on, let’s go, Phil?”
Somehow the idea seemed to appeal more and more to Ethan as he thought it over. The other camp was only a couple of miles, more or less, away, and on their snow-shoes they could make it in what the boys would call “double-quick” order.
Phil looked up at the sky. It was only a part of his customary caution, and not that he really expected there would be any signs of trouble in that quarter.
“All right, then, Ethan; get your gun and your snow-shoes. We’ll take that scout and see if we can find out anything worth while.”
“I hope both of you keep your eyes smartly about you while you’re passing along through the woods,” urged Lub. “A mad dog is a terrible thing to run across; and for all we know the beast might have got away.”
“Ten to one, Phil,” sang out Ethan, with a carefree laugh, “poor old timid Lub here will spend every minute of the time we’re away sitting on a log by the fire with his gun on his lap, and ready to whack away at any suspicious four-legged beast that shows up.”
“Well, can you blame me?” demanded the stout boy; “I read about a fellow who was bitten by a mad dog, and it’s haunted me ever since. I guess I’d rather be taken prisoner by hostile Indians, and burned at the stake, than bitten by a dog suffering with the rabies.”
He stepped over and securing his gun found a comfortable spot on the log near the fire. Here he drew the small waif close to his left side, and looked as though he meant to stay there in that one position as long as two of the guardians of the shack were absent on their risky errand.
Phil only loitered a couple of minutes to snatch up his camera. There could be no telling when he might run across a chance to make use of this. It is like a gun in that respect, for you often see the most marvelous pictures when you have unfortunately left the camera at home.
They started off with the best wishes of those left behind.
“Course you’ve thought to put your little medicine-case in your pocket, Phil?” sang out Lub; “it came in mighty handy down on the Coast, when we found that young bayman doubled up with pain, after eating some canned stuff that gave him a little touch of ptomaine poisoning; yes I can see it bulging out on the left side of your coat. Well, so-long; and hurry back, because the night isn’t so far away, and supper will be cooking, you know.”
The two boys made a bee-line for the other camp. Both of them remembered its location, from having taken note of the column of smoke so often. Ethan was doing better work with his snow-shoes right along now, for there is nothing that serves one so well in this respect as practice.
They had covered the first mile with ease.
“Must be all of half way there, Phil?” suggested Ethan.
“Yes.”
“And do we keep straight on as we’re going now, or make a little detour so as to come on the camp from the other side?” continued Ethan.
Phil smiled.
“I see you’re up to all the little dodges of the profession, Ethan,” he chuckled, “and are bound to make an A Number One tracker yet. Yes, we might as well begin to circle some from here on, always keeping in mind the point we’re aiming to reach.”
“No trouble at all about locating the camp, Phil, as long as they continue to burn that half-green wood.”
“It does send up a pile of black smoke for a fact,” admitted Phil, looking in the direction his chum was pointing; “and we’ll keep an eye on it as we go.”
Of course as they made progress through the bush the boys did not neglect to observe everything around them. Lub’s solemn warning may not have made much of an impression on their minds, but habit proved strong, with Phil at least, and it was his custom to be on the alert.
“We’re getting in close now,” whispered Ethan; “I thought I heard a cough, then.”
“That’s right, and I can see the fire beyond that thick bunch of pines,” was what the other replied, in the same low tone.
Still advancing cautiously they gradually reached a spot where they were able to look in on the rival camp. The fire was burning, but things seemed to be rather quiet. At least the two scouts failed to discover any furious rushing to and fro that would indicate excitement and alarm.
“Looks peaceful enough, Phil, doesn’t it?” whispered Ethan, in rather a disappointed fashion, that would indicate he had felt hopeful the services of his chum might be needed, and that they could thus heap coals of fire on the head of the boastful and vindictive Mr. James Bodman, millionaire sportsman.
“There’s one of the guides near the fire,” remarked Phil.
“Yes, and he seems to be rather upset over something,” pursued Ethan; “notice how he keeps on looking to the right and to the left. See him start to hold up his hands then, will you? What in the wide world can have been going on over here?”
“Seems like a mystery,” admitted Phil, still staring at the vicinity of the camp fire where only that one guide was visible.
“Where d’ye suppose the others all are?” ventured Ethan, keeping his voice down to the lowest possible pitch, although there did not seem to be any reason for such caution.
“I suppose in those two shacks we see,” came the hesitating answer; and then the other heard Phil give a little gasp.
“You’ve discovered something; what is it?” Ethan asked, eagerly.
“They did shoot a dog, it seems, Ethan!”
“How do you know?” continued the other, craning his neck to look.
“You can see it lying there over by the woodpile,” Phil told him.
“Great Cæsar! so it is, and with his feet up in the air. It’s a dead dog, Phil; no fooling about that.”
“Yes, and has been shot, but who did it we don’t know yet, Ethan.”
“Whew! I wonder if he bit that ugly red-faced sportsman you told us about, Phil? I don’t wish my worst enemy to meet with such a fate, it would seem as if it might be a judgment on that bully and railroad wrecker if he did get a good scare.”
“Queer where the rest of the party are?” continued Phil; “let’s creep along this way a bit. We may get to a place where we can glimpse them.”
“There may have been another dog that got away, and the rest are hunting for him in the bush right now?” suggested Ethan; but the supposition could not have struck Phil very strongly for he made no comment.
They made their way along as silently as they could. The soughing of the wind through the tops of the pines and the larches and the firs deadened any little scratching sound their snow-shoes may have made as they moved onward.
It was while they were making this change of base that suddenly without the slightest warning Phil laid his hand on the arm of his companion, and at the same time drew him down behind some bushes.
When the startled Ethan turned his eyes upon Phil he saw that the other had a finger pressed upon his lips. This indicated additional caution. It also meant that silence was desirable for some reason or other, which of course Ethan could not immediately fathom.
Then he saw Phil gradually raise his head. He was looking carefully over the tops of the bushes at something. Ethan, quivering with suspense, could hardly restrain his natural impulse to follow suit; and fortunately for his peace of mind Phil just then made a gesture with his hand as though inviting him to join him.
As Ethan did so he saw his chum extend his hand with a pointed finger. Looking on a line with this latter digit he made a discovery.
Something was moving near by. In place of a giant tree that had succumbed to the tempest many years previously, there had grown up a bunch of suckers, and some five of these offshoots had become quite good-sized trunks. They were arranged very much like the fingers and thumb of a partly-closed hand, so that there was a cup which the five protecting trunks surrounded.
It was just a natural hiding place, and apparently some one was even then occupying the cup; for as Ethan looked he saw a head projected, and held there for a dozen seconds, to be withdrawn, and then almost immediately come into view again.
Whoever the party might be he evidently had his whole attention taken up with watching the camp, as though it might hold something that had an important bearing on his condition of happiness and peace of mind.
“He’s spying on the camp, Phil!” whispered Ethan, in the other’s ear.
“Looks like it,” murmured Phil.
“Can it be your fire-eater of a Baylay, then?” was the next thing Ethan suggested.
“Hardly,” replied Phil. “This man isafraid; his every action tells that he’s been in a big panic lately, and hasn’t recovered.”
“Go on, Phil?” urged the other, eager to know what next his chum would say.
“I think I know who he must be, Ethan.”
“Good. Tell me then, Phil.”
“Now watch again when he pokes out and take notice of what sort of a thing he’s got on his head.”
“There he comes once more, and he certainly does act like a man who’s afraid. But what’s this I see? Makes me think of thechefin a hotel; for he’s wearing a white cap without a peak!”
“Well, that’s just what he is, thechefthese railroad magnates have fetched up with them to give them the best of meals while in camp,” whispered Phil.
“But whatever can he be doing hiding that way, and acting as if he was in mortal fear of his life? If you’ve got an idea please tell me, Phil.”