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CHAPTER IV
JIMMIE’S PLUCK
“You can get that rope to him?”
The professor’s voice held a note of amazement and possibly one of unconscious incredulity, for Jimmie colored under his gaze.
“Sure I can.” He spoke rapidly, for it was no time to waste words. “I used ter be wid a circus for a time, see. I learned ter do a balancin’ act wid a troupe. I’ll jes’ take dat long stick dere fer a balancin’ pole, and I’ll snake him out fer youse, er – er I’ll go up de flume meself.”
Strange as it may appear, there was something in the manner of the waif that instilled a new confidence into their hearts. Under other circumstances they might not have felt it, but now, with Persimmons’ life in such danger, they were in the mood of drowning men who grasp at straws.
Jimmie was such a straw, and his self-confident manner formed to a not small degree the basis of their trust in his ability to carry out what he said he could accomplish. Carefully the rope was transferred from the dripping, half-frozen Ralph to Jimmie’s waist. This done, the lad carefully balanced a longish branch he had picked up, and appeared to find it suitable for use as a balancing pole; for, after one or two trials, he stepped out on the log and began such a “rope walking” act as has seldom if ever been witnessed.
Before starting, he had kicked off his ragged, broken boots, – stockings or socks he had none, – and was now barefooted. The rough bark of the tree trunk afforded a certain stability of footing, but they held their breath as they watched the waif’s slender, pitifully thin figure painfully making its way on that narrow bridge above the swirling, leaping waves of the torrent.
Once he hesitated and swayed, and a gasp went up from the watchers on the bank. Involuntarily they took a tighter grip on the rope. But it was only the green rush of waters under his feet that had momentarily caused Jimmie’s head to swim.
He swiftly recovered himself and, forcing his eyes to remain riveted on a definite object, he forged steadily ahead. Now he was only five feet from where Persimmons, with a sub-conscious strength, was hanging on to his precarious hold, now but four feet intervened, then three, two, – one! How the slender trunk swayed! It appeared impossible that anything human could keep its footing upon it.
But at last the young acrobat reached a point beyond which he dared not go. Holding his balancing pole with one hand, he undid the rope from his waist with the other. Bending, very slowly, very cautiously, he formed a loop and dropped it over Persimmons’ head. The numbed boy had just strength enough to work it under his armpits.
Then his strength gave out completely. He would have been swirled away had not Jimmie taken the precaution to pass the rope around the opposite side of the tree trunk to that on which the current was pulling. But Persimmons was safe. The rope held him firm. He took a brief interval for a breath, and then managed to work his way along the trunk while the others hauled.
As for Jimmie, he crouched low for a time, using his balancing pole with wonderful adroitness. Then, walking backward along that swaying, treacherous trunk, he reached shore just as they dragged young Simmons out. It was in the nick of time, too, for he could not have lasted much longer. As it was, when they laid him on the bank he collapsed utterly.
“Jimmie, if you ever were an acrobat, and there’s no room to doubt that, you must have been a marvel!” cried Ralph throwing his arms about the boy’s neck, while the professor and Hardware congratulated him hardly less enthusiastically, and the agent danced a jig.
“Gee!” exclaimed Jimmie, when he released himself, “if you tink I was a wonder, ask Sig. Montinelli, who trained me. I was so good dat he used to beat the life out uv me. Dat’s de reason I ran away frum de show and came up here, – dat and annudder reason.”
There was no time just then to ask him what he meant, for they were all immediately busied in chafing poor Persimmons’ body and bringing life back to him. The agent had rushed off up the rocky path for hot coffee, for he had been preparing his breakfast when the train came in. What with this stimulant and a brisk rub-down, Persimmons soon recovered and was able to sit up and thank his rescuer, which he did characteristically and warmly, despite the latter’s embarrassment and frequent interruptions of “It wasn’t nawthing.”
“Howling handsprings!” exclaimed Persimmons to Ralph, as the latter helped him up the rocky path, “and to think that I classed that kid in with Hardware’s dingbats! But that’s what he is, too,” he added with a sort of an inspiration; “Hardware’s got his bags and boxes full of fool fishing dingbats and cooking dingbats and chopping dingbats, but this one of yours, Ralph, is the greatest ever, he’s a life-saving dingbat. What can I give him?”
“Not money, if you take my advice,” said Ralph dryly. “While you were down and out there the professor offered him some, and his eyes blazed and he turned quite pale as he refused it. ‘I’ve joined this expedition to be generally useful, and that was only one of my jobs, see,’ was what he said.”
“Waltzing wombats! I hope he never has to be useful in just that way again,” breathed Persimmons fervently, as they reached the top of the trail.
“I hope not. But how did you ever come to get in such a fix?”
Persimmons explained that he had been looking at some wonderful trout disporting themselves in a pool some distance above where the tree trunk stretched out over the waters of the torrent. In some way his foot had slipped, and before he knew what had happened he was whirled out into midstream.
Hurried along, brushed by out-cropping rocks and bits of drift timber, he had caught at the first thing that offered, which happened to be the trunk that so providentially stretched out above the torrent.
“Bounding beetles! but it was a close shave, I tell you,” he concluded fervently. “I don’t think I could have held on a minute longer when Jimmie got that rope to me; but when I felt it, new strength seemed to come to me and I could help you fellows drag me ashore.”
For a consideration, the agent drew on his stores, and they made a hearty breakfast after this adventure. Jimmie, of course, was the hero of the occasion, although no one could have accused him of seeking honors. The boy looked actually embarrassed as they each, in turn and in chorus, told him over and over what they thought of his plucky act.
They were still eating when there came a clatter of hoofs on the cliff above.
“Something comin’ down the trail,” observed the agent; “shouldn’t wonder if that’s your man now.”
“I hope so, indeed,” said the professor, “this delay is most annoying.”
Emerging from the depot they saw a strange cavalcade coming down the dusty trail. In advance, on a wiry buckskin cayuse, rode a figure that might have stepped out of a book. His saddle was of the gaily rigged ranger’s type. But it was the person who sat in it with an easy grace that was more striking to the eye than any of his caparisons.
He was of medium height, it appeared, but of so powerful a build that his breadth of chest and massive loins seemed better fitted for a giant. His hair and beard were curly and as yellow as corn silk, his face fiery red by constant exposure to sun and wind and snow, while his eyes, deep-set in wrinkles, were as blue as the Canadian sky above them. His clothes were of the frontiersman’s type, and on his massive head was a colorless sombrero, badly crushed, with several holes cut in its crown.
Behind him came, in single file, four wiry looking little cayuses, saddled and bridled ready for their riders. These were followed by three pack animals of rather sorry appearance, but, as the party was to learn later, of proved ability on the trail.
“You Professor Summered?” he hailed, in a deep, hearty voice, as he saw the professor and the boys standing in a group outside the little depot, eying him with deep interest and attention.
“Wintergreen, sir! Wintergreen!” exclaimed the professor rather testily.
“Oh, ho! ho! Beg your pardon. I’m Mountain Jim Bothwell, at your service. Sorry to be late, but the trail up above is none too good.”
He struck his pony with his spurs, and the whole procession broke into an ambling trot coming down the trail in a cloud of yellow dust toward the waiting group of travelers.
CHAPTER V
THE START FOR THE ROCKIES
“Great Blue Bells of Scotland!”
Mountain Jim Bothwell uttered the exclamation as he gazed at the immense pile of baggage labeled H. D. Ware.
“Say, who is H. D. Ware, anyhow? He goin’ to start a hotel hereabouts? When’s the wagons comin’ for all this truck?”
“That’s my camping equipment,” struck in “H. D. Ware,” looking rather red and uncomfortable under the appraising blue eye of Mountain Jim.
“Young feller,” spoke Jim solemnly, “you’d need an ocean liner to transport all that duffle. We ain’t goin’ to sea; we’re goin’ inter the mountains. What you got in there, anyhow?”
“Dingbats,” said Ralph quietly, a mischievous smile playing about his mouth.
“Dingbats? Great Bells of Scotland, what’s them?”
“The things that the sporting goods catalogues say no camper should be without,” exclaimed Ralph; “we told him, but it wasn’t any good.”
“Well, my mother said I was to have every comfort,” said poor Hardware, crimsoning under the guide’s amused scrutiny. “When we were camping in Maine – ”
“When you were camping in Maine, I don’t doubt you had a cook – ”
Hardware nodded. He had to admit that, like most wealthy New Yorkers, his parents’ ideas of “a camp” had been a sort of independent summer hotel under canvas.
“Well, young fellow, let me tell you something. From what the professor here wrote me, you young fellers came up here to rough it. I’m goin’ to see that you do. The cooking will mostly be done by you and your chums; your elders will – will eat it, and that’ll be sufficient punishment for them.”
“But – but I’ve just engaged a lad to aid with the cooking and help out generally,” struck in the professor.
“That’s all right,” responded Mountain Jim airily, eying Jimmie, whose clothes, since they had been dried by the agent’s cook stove, looked worse than before, “that kid seems all right, and he can take his turn with the others. In the mountains it’s share and share alike, you know, and no favors. That’s the rule up this way.”
The boys looked rather dismayed. Already the standards of the city were being swept aside. Evidently this mountaineer looked upon all men and boys as being alike, provided they did their share of the work set before them.
Ralph, alone, whose wild life on the Border had already done for him what the Rockies were to perform for his companions, viewed the guide with approval. He knew that out in the wilderness, be it mountain or plain, certain false standards of caste and station count for nothing. As Coyote Pete had been wont to say in those old days along the Border, “It ain’t the hide that counts, it’s the man underneath it.”
“First thing to do is to sort out some of this truck and see what you do need and what you don’t,” decided Mountain Jim presently. “Most times it’s the things that you think you kain’t get along without that you kin, and the things you think you kin that you kain’t.”
“That’s right,” agreed Ralph heartily. “Daniel Boone, on his first journey into Kentucky, managed to worry along on pinole and salt, and relied for everything else on his old rifle and flint and steel.”
“Never heard of the gentleman,” said Mountain Jim, “but he must uv been a good woodsman. Now let’s get to work and sort out this truck.”
Ruthlessly the travelers’ kits were torn open, and it was amazing, when Mountain Jim got through, what a huge pile of things that he declared unnecessary were heaped upon the depot platform. As for poor Hardware’s “dingbats,” a new kind of compass and a hunting knife that met with Jim’s approval, alone remained.
“All this stuff can stay here till you get ready to come back,” said Jim; “the station agent will look after it and see that it is put in the freight shed.”
But it is an ill wind that blows nobody any good. Out of the rejected “Dingbats” a fine hunting suit, axe, knife and compass were found for Jimmie, who, indeed, stood sadly in need of them. When the boy had retired to the station agent’s room and dressed himself in his new garments, the change in him was so remarkable, when he reappeared, as to be nothing less than striking. In the place of the ragged looking Bowery boy, they saw a well set-up lad in natty hunting outfit. A trifle emaciated he was, to be sure, but “We’ll soon fill him out with hard work and good grub,” declared Mountain Jim, who had been told the boy’s story, and who had warmly praised his heroism in rescuing Persimmons.
The latter had also changed his wet garments and was in his usual bubbling spirits when they were ready, in Ralph’s phrase, to “hit the trail.” This was not till nearly noon, however, for the rejection of the superfluous “Dingbats,” of which even Ralph and the professor were found to have a few, had occupied much time. Then, after hearty adieus to the station agent, who had incidentally been the recipient of a generous gratuity from the professor, they mounted their ponies and, with Mountain Jim in the lead, started on their long journey into the wilds. Jimmy, whose circus experience had taught him how to ride, was mounted on one of the pack animals, for, such had been Mountain Jim’s ruthless rejection of “Dingbats,” only a tithe of the expected “pack” remained.
Up the trail they mounted at an easy pace under the big pines that shook out honey-sweet odors as the little cavalcade passed beneath them. At the summit of the rocky cliff that towered above the depot, the trail plunged abruptly into a dense, black tunnel of tamarack, pine and Douglas firs.
As the horses’ hoofs rang clear on the rocky trail and echoed among the columnular trunks that shot up on every side like the pillars of some vast cathedral roof, Mountain Jim broke into dolorous song:
“Hokey pokey winky wang;
Linkum, lankum muscodang;
The Injuns swore that th-e-y would h-a-n-g
Them that couldn’t keep w-a-r-m!”
Over and over he sang it, while the shod hoofs clattered out a metallic accompaniment to the droning air.
“Can we ride ahead a bit?” asked Ralph after a while, for the monotony of keeping pace with the pack animals and the constant repetition of Mountain Jim’s song began to grow wearisome.
“Sure; go ahead. You can’t get lost. The trail runs straight ahead. The only way to get off it is to fall off,” said Jim cheerfully, drawing out and filling with black tobacco a villainous-looking old pipe.
“Don’t get into any trouble,” warned the professor, who had been provided with a quiet horse, and who was intent, as he rode along, on a volume dealing with the geological formation of the Canadian Rockies.
“We’ll be careful! So long! Come on, boys,” shouted back Ralph, as he struck his heels into his pony.
Off they clattered up the trail, the rocks ringing with their excited voices till the sound died away in the distance. Jimmie alone remained behind. He felt that his duty as general assistant demanded it. When the last echo of the ponies’ hoofs had died out, Mountain Jim turned to the professor with a profound wink.
“I can see where we have our hands full this trip, professor,” he remarked, as they ambled easily along.
The professor looked up from his book and sighed.
“Really, I wonder my hair is not snow white,” he said mildly. “But surely that is a fine specimen of Aethusa Cijnapium I see yonder!”
“Oh, that,” said Mountain Jim, gazing at the feathery plant indicated, which grew in great profusion at the trail side, “that’s ‘fool’s parsley.’”
“O-h-h!” said the professor.
He might have said more, but at that instant from the trail ahead, came a series of shouts and yells that made it appear as if a troop of rampant Indians was on the war-path. The sharp crack of a rifle sounded, followed by silence.
CHAPTER VI
ALONG THE TRAIL
When they left the main body of the party behind, Ralph, Harry Ware, and young Simmons had kicked their ponies into a brisk “lope,” which speedily carried them some distance ahead. As they rode along, they gazed admiringly about them at the beauties of the rugged trail. The rough way soon left the tunnel-like formation of spruce and tamarack, and emerged on a muskeg, or patch of swampy ground, where rank, green reeds and flowers of gorgeous red, yellow and blue grew in the wetter places.
As they cantered into the midst of this pretty bit of scenery, a striped animal sprang from behind a patch of brush with a snort, and dashed off into the timber on the hillside beyond.
With a whoop and yell the boys, headed by Ralph, were after it.
“A wild cat!” shouted Ralph. “After him, boys!”
Their lively little ponies appeared quite to enter into the spirit of the chase. At any rate, they needed no urging, but darted off as nimbly as mountain goats among the trees. The gray and reddish form of the wild cat was speedily lost sight of; but Ralph, who had slipped his rifle from its holster, still kept on under the shadows of the forest, followed by the others.
Suddenly he thought he saw an elusive form slipping among the timbers ahead of him. Flinging the reins of his pony over the creature’s head, in Western fashion, he dismounted. Hardware and Persimmons followed his example. The eyes of all three boys were shining with the excitement of this, their first adventure in the Canadian wilds.
“Cantering cayuses, boys, but we’ll have a fine skin to take home before we’ve been on the trail ten minutes!” exclaimed Persimmons under his breath, as they crept along behind Ralph.
“Don’t count your skins before you get ’em,” was Hardware’s advice.
At this moment there was a sudden commotion among the ponies. They snorted and sniffed as if in terror of something, and Ralph rightly guessed that they had just scented the wild cat.
“You fellows go back and quiet ’em; I’ll keep on,” he said.
Dearly as his two companions would have liked to continue on the trail of the wild cat, there was nothing for them to do but to obey; for if the ponies stampeded they knew that Mountain Jim would have something to say that might not sound pleasant.
“Be careful now, Ralph,” warned Hardware, as their comrade kept on alone. “Wild cats are pretty ugly customers sometimes.”
But Ralph did not reply. With a grim look on his face and with his rifle clutched tightly, he slipped from trunk to trunk, his feet hardly making any noise on the soft woodland carpet of pine needles.
Suddenly, from a patch of brush right ahead of him, came a sort of yelping cry, not unlike that of a dog in pain or excitement.
“What on earth is up now?” he wondered to himself, coming to a halt and searching the scene in front of him with eager eyes.
Then came sounds of a furious commotion. The brush was agitated and there were noises as if two animals were in mortal combat in front of him. But still he could see nothing. All at once came distinctly the crunching of bones.
“It’s that wild cat and she’s made a kill of some sort, a rabbit probably,” mused Ralph. “Well, I’ll catch her red-handed and revenge poor Molly Cottontail.”
He cautiously tiptoed forward, making as little noise as possible. He was well aware that a cornered wild cat can make a formidable opponent, and he did not mean to risk wounding the animal slightly and infuriating it. He was raising his rifle with a view to having it ready the instant he should sight the savage wood’s creature, when he stepped on a dead branch.
It emitted a sharp crack, almost like a pistol shot, and Ralph bit his lip with vexation.
“That cat’s going to run now, taking its prey along, and I’ll not get within a mile of it,” was his thought.
But no such thing happened. Instead, from the bushes, there came an angry, snarling growl as the crunching of bones abruptly ceased. Ralph’s heart began to beat a little quicker. It appeared that the cat, far from fleeing, was going to show fight. But Ralph, after his first surprise, did not worry: He knew his automatic would be more than a match for the wild cat if it came down to a fight.
With this thought in his mind he pressed boldly forward, parting the bushes as he went. He had not advanced more than a few yards when he came upon a curious sight. A lithe, tawny creature of reddish color, with oddly tufted ears, was crouched over the dead and torn body of a rabbit. It had been savagely rending the smaller animal, and as Ralph took all this in he realized, too, another fact. It was no wild cat that he had disturbed, but another and a far more formidable animal.
“Great juniper! A Canadian lynx, and a whumper, too!” gasped the boy to himself as he gazed at the creature which was almost as large as a good sized dog.
For a moment the realization that he was face to face with an animal that some hunters have described as being more formidable than a mountain lion, made Ralph pause, while his heart thumped in lively fashion. The great yellow eyes of the lynx, whose tufted ears lay flat against its head, regarded him with blazing hatred. Its teeth were bared under its reddened fangs, and Ralph saw that it was ready to spring at him. It was only waiting to measure its distance accurately.
“I’ll give her all I’ve got in the gun,” thought Ralph, bringing the weapon to bear; “my only chance is to finish her quick.”
His finger pressed the trigger, but, to his amazement, no report followed.
“Great guns! The mechanism has stuck and I’ve not got an instant to fuss with it,” was the thought that flashed through his mind as the rifle failed to go off.
He had no time for more. With a growl and snarl the tawny body was launched into the air, as if propelled toward him by chilled steel springs. Ralph gave a hasty, almost involuntary step backward. His foot caught in an out-cropping root and the next instant he measured his length on the ground.
As he fell he was conscious of a flash passing before his face and caught a glimpse of two yellow eyes blazing with deadly hate and anger. The next instant there was a crash in the brush just beyond where he lay, and the boy realized that his fall had been the luckiest thing in the world for him. The lynx had overleaped him; but he knew that the respite would not last the fraction of a minute. He was in as great peril as before unless he acted and that quickly.
