Silas Strong 20

Silas Strong 20

Strong made no question of that, claiming only that the cutting should

be "reg'lated," an __EXPRESSION__ which he rarely took the trouble to

explain. It stood for a meaning well considered--that the forest

belonged to the people, the timber to the owner of the land; that

the right of the owner should be subject to restraint. He should be

permitted to cut trees of a certain size only. So the forest would be

made permanent, and the owner and the generations to follow him would

get a crop of timber every eight or ten years.

 

The sun was setting when they came into the little forest hamlet. The

Migleys put up at the Pitkin general store, where one might have rude

hospitality as well as merchandise. There Strong left pack and coon

behind the counter and hastened to the home of Annette. The comely young

woman rose from the supper-table and took both his hands in hers.

 

"Strong's ahead!" he answered, cheerfully, as she greeted him.

 

In response to her invitation he sat down to eat. Her father lighted his

pipe and left them. Silas told of the swishers and the big trout and the

children.

 

"M-me an' Sinth is b-bein' cut over," here-marked, with a smile, as he

thought of the children.

 

"What do you mean?"

 

"B-bein' cleared an' p-ploughed an' sowed."

 

She laughed a little as the Emperor unfolded his pleasantry. He thought

of his improved account in the matter of swearing and of the better

temper of Sinth.

 

"G-gittin' p-proper," he added.

 

Annette was amused.

 

"G-got t' leave Lost R-river," he said, presently.

 

"Got to leave Lost River!" Annette exclaimed.

 

"Ay-ah," Strong answered. He looked down for a second, then he added,

sorrowfully, "G-goin' to tear down the w-woods."

 

"It's an outrage. Couldn't you go to the plains?"

 

"S-sold an' f-fenced."

 

"How about the Rag Lake country?"

 

"B-bein' cut."

 

Annette shook her head ruefully.

 

"W-woods got t' g-go," said Strong, leaning forward and resting his

elbows on his knees. .

 

"What'll you do?"

 

"G-git tame," Strong answered, as he rose and went to the squirrel cage

and began to play with his old pet. The little animal came to his wire

gateway and stood upon the palm of the Emperor's hand.

 

"T-trespasser!" he remarked, stroking the squirrel. "Th-they'll have me

in a c-cage, too, purty s-soon."

 

He put the squirrel away and offered his hand to Annette.

 

"S-some day," he whispered.

 

"Some day," she answered, with a sigh.

 

"Y-you're g-goin' to hear me d-do some t-talkin'," he assured her. The

Lady Ann had often mildly complained of his reticence.

 

They now stood in front of the little veranda. She was looking up at

him.

 

"It'll 'mount to s-suthin', t-too," he went on. It seemed as if he were

making an honest effort to correct the idleness of his tongue. He was

looking down at her and groping in his mind for some other cheerful

sentiment. He seemed to make this happy discovery, and added,

"W-won-derful good t-times comin'."

 

With a full heart she pressed his great hand in both of hers.

 

"K-keep ahead," said he, cheerfully, and bade her good-night.

 

With this he left her and was happy, for the taming of Sinth had seemed

to bring that "some day" of his promise into the near future.

 

At the Pitkin general store his two companions had retired for the

night, and he joined a group of woodsmen who occupied everything in the

place which had a fairly smooth and accessible top on it. They were all

in debt to the storekeeper and seemed to entertain a regard for him not

unmingled with pity. This latter sentiment was, the historian believes,

rather well founded. They called him "Billy," with the inflection of

fondness. Two sat slouching, apologetically, on the counter. One

rested his weight, as tenderly and considerately as might be, on a

cracker-barrel. Another reposed with a look of greater confidence on

the end of a nail-keg. They were guides, two of whom had come out for

provisions; the others, like Strong, were on their way to Hillsborough.

 

"Here's the old Emp'ror," said one, as Strong entered and returned their

greetings and sat down astride the beam of a plough.

 

"I'd like to know what he thinks of it," said a guide from the Jordan

Lake country.

 

Strong looked up at him without a word.

 

"A millionaire has bought thirty thousand acres alongside o' my camp,"

the guide explained. "He won't let me cross on the old trail. I had to

go six mile out o' my way to git here."

 

He smote the counter with his fist and coupled the name of the rich man

with vile epithets.

 

"My father and my grandfather travelled that trail before he was born,"

the angry woodsman declared.

 

Strong leaned forward, his elbows on his knees, and looked at his hands

without speaking. One laughed loudly, another gave out a sympathetic

curse.

 

"I'll git even with him--you hear me." So the aggrieved party expressed

himself.

 

"How?" Strong inquired, looking up suddenly.

 

"I'll git even. I'll send a traveller into that preserve who'll put him

off it." He spoke with a sinister suggestion.

 

"Huh!" the Emperor grunted. He understood the threat of the other, who

clearly meant to set the woods afire.

 

"Ain't I right? What d' ye come to, anyway, when ye think it all over?"

The words came hot and fast off the tongue of the com-plainer.

 

"F-fool," Strong stammered, calmly. There was something in his way of

saying it that made the others laugh.

 

A faint smile of embarrassment showed in the face of the angry woodsman.

 

"Me or the millionaire?" he inquired.

 

"B-both," Strong answered, soberly, as the storm ended in a little gust

of laughter.

 

Strong had stripped the guide of his anger as deftly as a squirrel could

take the shell off a nut. In the brief silence that followed he thought

of another maxim for his memorandum-book, and soon it was recorded

therein as follows:

 

_"Man that makes trouble sure to have most of it."_

 

Presently he who sat on the cracker-barrel remarked, "If them air woods

git afire now, they'll burn the stars out o' heaven."

 

All eyes turned upon the once violent man.

 

"Of course, I wouldn't fire the woods," he muttered. He was now cool,

and could see the folly and also the peril which lay in his threat.

"I never said I'd set the woods afire, but the ol' trail has been a

thoroughfare for nigh a hunderd year.-I believe I've got as good a right

to use it as he has."

 

"Th-think so?" the Emperor inquired.

 

"Yes, sir."

 

"Then d-do it," Strong answered, dryly. There was much in those three

words and in the look of the speaker. It said, plainly, that the other

was to do what he thought to be right and never what he knew to be

wrong.

 

"Lumbermen are more to blame," said another. "Where they've been nobody

wants to go. They cut everything down t' the size o' yer wrist an'

leave the soil covered with tinder-stacks. They think o' nothin' but the

profit. Case o' fire, woods 'round 'em wouldn't hev a ghost of a show."

 

"Look at the Weaver tract," said he who sat on the nail-keg. "Four

thousand acres o' dead tops--miles on 'em--an' all as dry as gunpowder.

If you was t' touch a match there ye'd have to run fer yer life."

 

"Go like a scairt deer," said he of the cracker-barrel. "'Fore it

stopped I guess ye'd think the world was afire."

 

"W-woods g-goin'," said the Emperor, sadly.

 

He thought of the cold springs at which he had refreshed himself in the

heat of the summer day and which were to perish utterly; he thought

of the brooks and rivers, slowing their pace like one stricken with

infirmity, and, by-and-by, lying dead in the sunlight--lying in a chain

of slimy pools across the great valley of the St. Lawrence; he thought

of green meadows which, soon or late, would probably wither into a

desert.

 

"What 'll become of us?" said he on the nail-keg.

 

"Have t' be sawed an' trimmed an' planed an' matched an' go into town." It was the voice above the cracker-barrel.