Silas Strong 8

Silas Strong 8

"Good-night."

 

It was growing dark. Strong's outbreak had wearied him. He groaned and

shook his head and stood a moment thinking. In the distance he could

hear the hoot of an owl and the bull bass of frogs booming over the

still water.

 

"G-gone!" he exclaimed, presently. Soon he added, in a mournful tone,

"W-wouldn't d-dast tell Mis' Strong."

 

He started slowly towards the camp.

 

"I'll l-lie to her," he whispered, as he went along.

 

Before going to bed he made this note in his memorandum-book:

 

_"June the 26 More snags Strong says trubel is like small-pox thing to

do is kepe it from spreadin."_

 

 

 

 

VII

 

SINCE early May there had been no rain save a sprinkle now and then.

From Lake Ontario to Lake Champlain, from the St. Lawrence to Sandy

Hook, the earth had been scorching under a hot sun. The heat and dust of

midsummer had dimmed the glory of June.

 

People those days were thinking less of the timber of the woods and more

of their abundant, cool, and living green. The inns along the edge of

the forest were filling up.

 

About eleven o'clock of a morning late in June, a young man arrived at

Lost River camp--one Robert Master, whose father owned a camp and some

forty thousand acres not quite a day's tramp to the north. He was a big,

handsome youth of twenty-two, just out of college. Sinth regarded every

new-comer as a natural enemy. She suspected most men of laziness and a

capacity for the oppression of females. She stood in severe silence at

the door of the cook-tent and looked him over as he came. Soon she

went to the stove and began to move the griddles. Silas entered with an

armful of wood.

 

"If he thinks I'm goin' to wait on him hand an' foot, he's very much

mistaken," said Sinth.

 

"R-roughlocks!" Silas answered, calmly, as he put a stick on the fire.

 

Sinth made no reply, but began sullenly rushing to and fro with pots

and pans. Soon her quick knife had taken the jackets off a score of

potatoes. While her hands flew, water leaped on the potatoes, and the

potatoes tumbled into the pot, and the pot jumped into the stove-hole as

the griddle took a slide across the top of the stove. And so with a rush

of feet and a rattle of pots and pans and a sliding of griddles and a

banging of iron doors "Mis' Strong" wore off her temper at hard work.

 

The Emperor used to smile at this variety of noise and call it

"f-f-female profanity," a phrase not wholly inapt. When the "sport" had

finished his dinner, and she and her brother sat side by side at

the table, she was plain Sinth again, with a look of sickliness and

resignation. She ate freely--but would never confess her appetite--and

so leisurely that Strong often had most of the dishes washed before she

had finished eating.

 

The young man was eager to begin fishing, and soon after dinner the

Emperor took him over to Catamount Pond. On their way the young man

spoke of the object of his visit.

 

"Mr. Strong, you know my father?" he half inquired.

 

"Ay-ah," the Emperor answered.

 

"He's been a property-holder in this county for five years, every summer

of which I have spent on his land. I feel at home in the woods, and I

cast my first vote at Tifton."

 

Strong listened thoughtfully.

 

"I want to do what I can to save the wilderness," young Master went on.

 

"R-right!" said the Emperor.

 

"If I were in the Legislature, I believe I could accomplish something.

Anyhow, I am going to make a fight for the vacant seat in the Assembly."

 

Strong surveyed him from head to foot.

 

"I wish you would do what you can for me in Pitkin."

 

"Uh-huh!" Strong answered, in a gentle tone, without opening his

lips. It was a way he had of expressing uncertainty leaning towards

affirmation. He liked the young man; there was, indeed, something

grateful to him in the look and voice of a gentleman.

 

"You'll never be ashamed of me--I'll see to that," said Master.

 

Having reached the little pond, Strong gave him his boat, and promised

to return and bring him into camp at six. Here and there trout were

breaking through the smooth plane of water.

 

The Emperor took a bee-line over the wooded ridge to Robin Lake. There

he spent an hour repairing his bark shanty and gathering balsam boughs

for a bed. Stepping on a layer of spruce poles over which the boughs

were to be spread, in a dark corner of the shanty, his foot went through

and came down upon the nest of one of the most disagreeable creatures in

the wilderness. He sprang away with an oath and fled into the open air.

For a moment he expressed himself in a series of sharp reports, Then,

picking up a long pole, he met the offenders leaving their retreat, and

"mellered" them, as he explained to Sinth that evening.

 

"T-take that, Amos," he muttered, as he gave one of them another blow.

 

It should be borne in mind that he called every member of this

malodorous tribe "Amos," because the meanest man he ever knew had borne

that name.

 

He put his heel in the crotch of a fallen limb and drew his boot. Then

he cautiously cut off the leg of his trousers at the knee, and, poking

cloth and leather into a little hollow, buried them under black earth.

 

Slowly the "Emperor of the Woods" climbed a ridge on his way to Lost

River camp, one leg bare to the knee. Walking, he thought of Annette.

Lately misfortune had come between them, and now he seemed to be getting

farther from the trail of happiness.

 

At a point on Balsam Hill he came into the main thoroughfare of the

woodsmen which leads from Bear Mountain to Lost River camp. Where he

could see far down the big trail, under arches of evergreen, he sat on

a stump to rest. His bootless foot, now getting sore, rested on a giant

toadstool.

 

Thus enthroned, the Emperor looked down at his foot and reconsidered the

relative positions of himself and the Evil One. His faded crown of felt

tilting over one ear, his rough, bearded face wet with perspiration, his

patched trousers truncated over the right knee, below which foot and leg

were uncovered, he was an emperor more distinguished for his appearance

than his lineage.

 

He took out his old memorandum-book and made this note in it with a stub

of a pencil:

 

_"June the 27 Strong says one Amos in the bush is worth two in yer

company an a pair of britches."_

 

The Emperor, although in the main a serious character, enjoyed some

private fun with this worn little book, which he always carried with

him. Therein he did most of his talking, with secret self-applause now

and then, one may fancy. It has thrown some light on the inner life of

the man, and, in a sense, it is one of the figures of our history.

 

 

 

 

VIII

 

SILAS put the book in his pocket and looked down the trail. Some ten

rods away two children were running towards him, their hands full of

wild flowers. They were Socky and Sue, on their way to Lost River camp,

and were the first children--save one--who had ever set their feet on

the old trail. Gordon walked slowly, under a heavy pack, well behind

them. They knew they were near their destination. Their father could

scarcely keep them in hailing distance.

 

Sue had observed that Socky's generosity in the matter of the tin bank

had pleased her father, and so, after much thought, she had determined

to make a venture in benevolence.

 

"When I see Uncle Silas," said she, "I'm going to give him the

twenty-five cents my Aunt Marie gave me."

 

"Pooh! he's got loads of money," Socky answered.

 

They stopped suddenly. Sue dropped her flowers and turned to run. Socky

gave a little jump and recovered his courage. Both retreated a few

steps. There, before them, was the dejected "Emperor of the Woods."

 

"Says I!" he exclaimed, looking down calmly from his throne.

 

Socky glanced up at him fearfully.

 

"Who b-be you?"

 

"John Socksmith Gordon."

 

"T-y-ty!" exclaimed the Emperor, an __EXPRESSION__, as the historian

believes', of great surprise, standing, perhaps, for the old oath

"By 'Mighty." It consisted of the pronunciation of the two letters

separately and then together.

 

The Emperor turned to the girl. "And y-yourn?" he inquired.

 

"Susan Bradbury Gordon," she answered, in a half-whisper.

 

"I tnum!" exclaimed the Emperor, shaking his bootless foot, whereupon

the new-comers retreated a little farther. The singular word "tnum"

expressed an unusual degree of interest on the part of the Emperor.

"G-goin' fur?" he inquired.

 

"To Lost River, to see my Uncle Silas."

 

The Emperor gave a loud whistle of surprise, and repeated the

exclamation--"I tnum!"

 

"My father's coming," said Socky, as he pointed down the trail.

 

"Whee-o!" whistled the "Emperor of the Woods," wh 

Silas Strong 7

Silas Strong 7

"Strong's g-gainin'!" he exclaimed, cheerfully, meaning thereby to

indicate that he hoped soon to overtake his enemy.

 

The table of bark, fastened to spruce poles, each end lying in a crotch,

had been covered with a mat of ferns and with clean, white dishes. Silas

began to convey the food from fire to table. To his delight he observed

that "Mis' Strong" had gone into retirement. The face of his sister now

wore its better look of sickliness and resignation.

 

"Opeydildock?" he inquired, tenderly, pouring from a flask into a cup.

 

"No, sir," she answered, curtly, her tone adding a rebuke to her

negative answer.

 

"Le's s-set," said he, soberly.

 

They sat and ate their dinner, after which Silas went back on the trail

to cut and bring wood for the camp-fire. When his job was finished, the

rooms were put to rights, the stove was hot and clean, and an excellent

supper waiting.

 

Strong's camp consisted of three little log cabins and a large

cook-tent. The end of each cabin was a rude fireplace built of flat

rocks enclosed by upright logs which, lined with sheet-iron, towered

above the roof for a chimney. Each floor an odd mosaic of wooden blocks,

each wall sheathed with redolent strips of cedar, each rude divan

bottomed with deer-skin and covered with balsam pillows, each bedstead

of peeled spruce neatly cut and joined--the whole represented years of

labor. Every winter Silas had come through the woods on a big sled with

"new improvements" for camp. Now there were spring-beds and ticks filled

with husks in the cabins, a stove and all needed accessories in the

cook-tent.

 

Ever since he could carry a gun Silas had set his traps and hunted

along the valley of Lost River, ranging over the wild country miles from

either shore. Twenty thousand acres of the wilderness, round about, had

belonged to Smith & Gordon, who gave him permission to build his camp.

When he built, timber and land had little value. Under the great,

green roof from Bear Mountain to Four Ponds, from the Raquette to the

Oswegatchie, one might have enjoyed the free hospitality of God.

 

From a time he could not remember, this great domain had been the home

of Silas Strong. He loved it, and a sense of proprietorship had grown

within him. Therein he had need only of matches, a blanket, and a rifle.

One might have led him blindfolded, in the darkest night, to any part

of it and soon he would have got his bearings. In many places the very

soles of his feet would have told him where he stood.

 

Long ago its owners had given him charge of this great tract. He had

forbidden the hounding of deer and all kinds of greedy slaughter, and

had made campers careful with fire. Soon he came to be called "The

Emperor of the Woods," and every hunter respected his laws.

 

Slowly steam-power broke through the hills and approached the ramparts

of the Emperor. This power was like one of the many hands of the

republic gathering for its need. It started wheels and shafts and bore

day and night upon them. Now the song of doom sounded in far corridors

of the great sylvan home of Silas Strong.

 

It was only a short walk to where the dead hills lay sprinkled over with

ashes, their rock bones bleaching in the sun beneath columns of charred

timber. The spruce and pine had gone with the ever-flowing stream, and

their dead tops had been left to dry and burn with unquenchable fury at

the touch of fire, and to destroy everything, root and branch, and the

earth out of which it grew.

 

It concerned him much to note, everywhere, signs of a change in

proprietorship. In Strong's youth one felt, from end to end of the

forest, this invitation of its ancient owner, "Come all ye that are

weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest." Now one saw much of

this legend in the forest ways, "All persons are forbidden trespassing

on this property under penalty of the law." Proprietorship had,

seemingly, passed from God to man. The land was worth now thirty

dollars an acre. Silas had established his camp when the boundaries were

indefinite and the old banners of welcome on every trail, and he felt

the change.

 

 

 

 

VI

 

IT was near sunset of the second day after the arrival of Sinth and

Silas. They sat together in front of the cook-tent. Silas leaned forward

smoking a pipe. His great, brawny arms, bare to the elbow, rested on his

knees. His faded felt hat was tilted back. He was looking down at the

long stretch of still water, fringed with lily-pads, and reflecting the

colors of either shore.

 

"You'ain't got a cent to yer name," said Sinth, who was knitting. She

gave the yam a pull, and, as she did so, glanced up at her brother.

 

"B-better times!" said he, rubbing his hands.

 

"Better times!" she sneered. "I'd like to know how you can make money

an' charge a dollar a day for board."

 

Sportsmen visiting there paid for their board, and they with whom Silas

went gave him three dollars a day for his labor.

 

The truth was that prosperity and Miss Strong were things

irreconcilable. The representatives of prosperity who came to Lost River

camp were often routed by the eye of resentment and the unruly tongue.

Strong knew all this, but she was not the less sacred on that account.

This year he had planned to bring a cow to camp and raise the price of

board.

 

"You s-see," Strong insisted.

 

"Huh!" Sinth went on; "we'll mos' kill ourselves, an' nex' spring we

won't have nothin' but a lot o' mink-skins."

 

Miss Strong, as if this reflection had quite overcome her, gathered up

her knitting and hastened into the cook-tent, where for a moment she

seemed to be venting her spite on the flat-irons and the tea-kettle.

Strong sat alone, smoking thoughtfully. Soon he heard footsteps on the

trail. A stranger, approaching, bade him good-evening.

 

"From the Migley Lumber Company," the stranger began, as he gave a card

to Strong. "We have bought the Smith & Gordon tract. I have come to

bring this letter and have a talk with you."

 

Strong read the letter carefully. Then he rose and put his hands in his

pockets, and, with a sly wink at the stranger, walked slowly down the

trail. He wished to go where Sinth would not be able to hear them. Some

twenty rods away both sat down upon a log. The letter was, in effect, an

order of eviction.

 

"I got t' g-go?" the Emperor inquired.

 

"That's about the size of it," said the stranger.

 

"Can't," Strong answered.

 

"Well, there's no hurry," said the other. "We shall be cutting here in

the fall. I won't disturb you this year."

 

Silas rose and stood erect before the lumberman.

 

"Cut everyth-thing?" he inquired, his hand sweeping outward in a gesture

of peculiar eloquence.

 

"Everything from Round Ridge to Carter's Plain," said the other.

 

Strong deliberately took off his jacket and laid it on a stump. He

flung his hat upon the ground. Evidently something unusual was about to

happen. Then, forthwith, he broke the silence of more than forty years

and opened his heart to the stranger. He could not control himself; his

tongue almost forgot its infirmity; his words came faster and easier as

he went on.

 

"N-no, no," he said, "it can't be. Ye 'ain't no r-right t' do it, fer

ye can't never put the w-woods back agin. My God, sir, I've w-wan-dered

over these hills an' flats ever since I was a little b-boy. There

ain't a critter on 'em that d-don't know me. Seems so they was all my

b-brothers. I've seen men come in here nigh dead an' go back w-well.

They's m-med'cine here t' cure all the sickness in a hunderd cities;

they's f-fur 'nough here t' c-cover their naked--they's f-food'nough

t' feed their hungry--an' they's w-wood 'nough t' keep 'em w-warm. God

planted these w-woods an' stocked 'em, an' nobody's ever d-done a day's

work here 'cept me. Now you come along an' say you've bought 'em an' are

g-goin 't' shove us out. I c-can't understand it. God m-made the sky an'

l-lifted up the trees t' sweep the dust out of it an' pump water into

the clouds an' g-give out the breath o' the g-ground. Y-you 'ain't no

right t' git together down there in Albany an' make laws ag'in' the will

o' God. Ye r-rob the world when ye take the tree-tops out o' the sky. Ye

might as well take the clouds out of it. God has gi'n us g-good air

an' the woods an' the w-wild cattle, an' it's free--an' you--you're

g-goin 't' turn ev'rybody out o' here an' seize the g-gift an' trade it

fer d-dollars--you d---little bullcook!"

 

A "bullcook," it should be explained, was the chore-boy in a

lumber-camp.

 

Strong sat down and took out an old red handkerchief and wiped his eyes.

 

He was thinking of the springs and brooks and rivers, of the cool shade,

of the odors of the woodland, of the life-giving air, of the desolation

that was to come.

 

"It's business," said the stranger, as if that word must put an end to

all argument.

 

A sound broke the silence like that of distant thunder.

 

"Hear th-that," Strong went on. "It's the logs g-goin' over Rainbow

Falls. They've been stole off the state l-lands. Th-that's business,

too. Business is king o' this c-country. He t-takes everything he can

l-lay his hands on. He'd t-try t' 'grab heaven if he could g-git over

the f-fence an' b-back agin."

 

"I am not here to discuss that," said the stranger, rising to go.

 

"Had s-supper?" Silas asked.

 

"I've a lunch in the canoe, thank you. The moon is up, an' I'm going to

push on to Copper Falls. Migley will be waiting for me. We shall camp there for a day or two at Cedar Spring. Good-night."   

Silas Strong 6

Silas Strong 6

"B-bears plenty!" he exclaimed, as he felt of the socks and looked

them over. This remark indicated that a season of unusual happiness and

prosperity had arrived.

 

Worked in white yarn at the top of each leg were the words, "Remember

me."

 

"T-till d-death," he whispered.

 

"With me on your mind an' them on your feet you ought to be happy," said

Annette.

 

"An' w-warm," he answered, soberly.

 

Presently she read aloud to him from the _St. Lawrence Republican_.

 

"S-some day," said Silas, when at last he had risen to go.

 

"Some day," she repeated, with a smile.

 

The only sort of engagement between them lay in the two words "some

day." They served as an avowal of love and intention. Amplified, as it

were, by look and tone as well as by the pressure of the hand-clasp,

they were understood of both.

 

To-day as Annette returned the assurance she playfully patted his cheek,

a rare token of her approval.

 

Silas left her at the door and made his way down the dark road. He began

to give himself some highly pleasing assurances.

 

"S-some day--tall t-talkin'," he stammered, in a whisper, and then he

began to laugh silently.

 

"Patted my cheek!" he whispered. Then he laughed again.

 

At the store he had filled his pack with flour, ham, butter, and like

provisions for Lost River camp. At Annette's he had filled his heart

with renewed hope and happiness and was now prepared for the summer.

While he walked along he fell to speculating as to whether Annette could

live under the same roof with Cynthia. A hundred times he had considered

whether he could ask her, and as usual he concluded, "Ca-can't."

 

The hunter had an old memorandum-book which was a kind of storehouse

for thought, hope, and reflection. Therein he seemed always to regard

himself objectively and spoke of Strong as if he were quite another

person. Before going to bed that evening he made these entries:

 

_"June the 23. Strong is all mellered up.

 

"Snags."_

 

With him the word "meller" meant to soften, and sometimes, even, to

conquer with the club.

 

The word "snags" undoubtedly bore reference to the difficulties that

beset his way.

 

 

 

 

V

 

SILAS and his sister ate their breakfast by candle-light and were off

on the trail before sunrise, a small, yellow dog of the name of

Zeb following. Zeb was a bear-dog with a cross-eye and a serious

countenance. He was, in the main, a brave but a prudent animal. One day

he attacked a bear, which had been stunned by a bullet, and before he

could dodge the bear struck him knocking an eye out. Strong had put it

back, and since that day his dog had borne a cross-eye.

 

Zeb had a sense of dignity highly becoming in a creature of his

attainments. This morning, however, he scampered up and down the trail,

whining with great joy and leaping to lick the hand of his master.

"Sinth" walked spryly, a little curt in her manner, but passive and

resigned. Silas carried a heavy pack, a coon in a big cage, and led a

fox. When he came to soft places he set the cage down and tethered the

fox, and, taking Sinth in his arms, carried her as one would carry a

baby. Having gained better footing, he would let Sinth down upon a log

or a mossy rock to rest and return for his treasures. After two or three

hours of travel the complaining "Mis' Strong" would appear.

 

"Seems so ye take pleasure wearin' me out on these here trails," she

would say. "Why don't ye walk a little faster?"

 

"W-whoa!" he would answer, cheerfully. "Roughlocks!"

 

The roughlock, it should be explained, was a form of brake used by

log-haulers to check their bobs on a steep hill. In the conversation of

Silas it was a cautionary signal meaning hold up and proceed carefully.

 

"You don't care if you do kill me--gallopin' through the woods here jes'

like a houn' after a fox. I won't walk another step--not another step."

 

"Rur-roughlocks!" he commanded himself, as he tied the fox and set the

coon down.

 

"Won't ride either," she would declare, with emphasis.

 

"W-wings on, Mis' Strong?" Silas had been known to ask, in a tone of

great gentleness.

 

She would be apt to answer, "If I had wings, I'd see the last o' you."

 

Then a little time of rest and silence, after which the big, gentle

hunter would shoulder his pack and lift in his arms the slender

and complaining Miss Strong and carry her up the long grade of Bear

Mountain. Then he would make her comfortable and return for his pets.

 

That day, having gone back for the fox and the coon, he concluded to try

the experiment of putting them together. Before then he had given the

matter a good deal of thought, for if the two were in a single package,

as it were, the problem of transportation would be greatly simplified.

He could fasten the coon cage on the top of his pack, and so avoid

doubling the trail. He led the fox and carried the coon to the point

where Sinth awaited him. Then he removed the chain from the fox's

collar, carefully opened the cage, and thrust him in. The swift effort

of both animals to find quarter nearly overturned the cage. Spits and

growls of warning followed one another in quick succession. Then each

animal braced himself against an end of the cage, indulging, as it would

seem, in continuous complaint and recrimination.

 

"Y-you behave!" said Silas, wamingly, as he put the cage on top of his

basket and fastened a stout cord from bars to buckles.

 

"They 'll fight!" Sinth exclaimed.

 

"Let 'em f-fight," said Silas, who had sat down before his pack and

adjusted the shoulder-straps.

 

The growling increased as he rose carefully to his feet, and with a

swift movement coon and fox exchanged positions. Sinth descended the

long hill afoot, and Silas went on cautiously, a low, continuous murmur

of hostile sound rising in the air behind him. Each animal seemed to

think it necessary to remind the other with every breath he took that he

was prepared to defend himself. Their enmity was, it would appear, deep

and racial.

 

At Cedar Swamp, in the flat below, the big hunter took Sinth in his

arms. Then the sound of menace and complaint rose before and behind him.

Slowly he proceeded, his feet sinking deep in the wet moss. Stepping on

hummocks in a dead creek, he slipped and fell. The little animals

were flung about like shot in a bottle. Each seemed to hold the other

responsible for his discomfiture. They came together in deadly conflict.

The sounds in the cage resembled an explosion of fire-crackers under a

pan. Sinth lifted her voice in a loud outcry of distress and accusation.

Without a word the hunter scrambled to his feet, renewed his hold upon

the complaining Sinth, and set out for dry land. Luckily the mud was not

above his boot-tops. The cage creaked and hurtled. The animals rolled

from side to side in their noisy encounter. The indignant Sinth

struggled to get free with loud, hysteric cries. Strong ran beneath his

burden. He gained the dry trail, and set his sister upon the ground. He

flung off the shoulder-straps, and with a stick separated the animals.

He opened the cage and seized the fox by the nape of the neck, and,

before he could haul him forth, got a nip on the back of his hand. He

lifted the spitting fox and fastened the chain upon his collar. Then

Silas put his hands on his hips and blew like a frightened deer.

 

"Hell's b-bein' raised," he muttered, as if taking counsel with himself

against Satan. "C-careful!" He was in a mood between amusement and

anger, but was dangerously near the latter.

 

A little profanity, felt but not expressed, warmed his spirit, so that

he kicked the coon's cage and tumbled it bottom side up. In a moment

he recovered self-control, righted the cage, and whispered, "S-Satan's

ahead!"

 

The wound upon his hand was bleeding, but he seemed not to mind it.

 

Having done his best for the comfort of his sister, he brushed the mud

from his boots and trousers, filled his pipe, and sat meditating in a

cloud of tobacco-smoke. Presently he rose and shouldered his pack and

untied the fox and lifted the coon cage.

 

"I'll walk if it kills me!" Sinth exclaimed, rising with a sigh of utter

recklessness.

 

"'T-'tain't fur," said Strong, as they renewed their journey.

 

It was past mid-day when they got to camp, and Sinth lay down to

rest while he fried some ham and boiled the potatoes and made tea and

flapjacks by an open fire.

 

When he sat on his heels and held his pan over the fire, the long

woodsman used to shut up, as one might say, somewhat in the fashion of

a jack-knife. He was wont to call it "settin' on his hunches." His great

left hand served for a movable screen to protect his face from the heat.

As the odor and sound of the frying rose about him, his features took on

a look of-great benevolence. It was a good part of the meal to hear him

announce, "Di-dinner," in a tender and cheerful tone. As he spoke it the

word was one of great capacity for suggestion. When the sound of it rose

and lingered on its final r, that day they arrived at Lost River camp, Sinth awoke and came out-of-doors.