Chapter X. GEDNEY RAFFER
It was fortunate for Nan Sherwood that on the day of parting with herparents she had so much to do, and that there was so much to see, and somany new things of which to think.
She had never traveled to Chicago before, nor far from Tillbury at all.Even the chair car was new to the girl's experience and she found itvastly entertaining to sit at a broad window with her uncle in theopposite chair, gazing out upon the snowy landscape as the train hurriedover the prairie.
She had a certain feeling that her Uncle Henry was an anomaly in thechair car. His huge bearskin coat and the rough clothing under it; hisfelt boots, with rubber soles and feet; the fact that he wore no linenand only a string tie under the collar of his flannel shirt; his greatbronzed hands and blunted fingers with their broken nails, all thesethings set him apart from the other men who rode in the car.
Papa Sherwood paid much attention to the niceties of dress, despite thefact that his work at the Atwater Mills had called for overalls and,frequently, oily hands. Uncle Henry evidently knew little about stiffcollars and laundered cuffs, or cravats, smart boots, bosomed shirts, orother dainty wear for men. He was quite innocent of giving any offenceto the eye, however. Lying back in the comfortable chair with his coatoff and his great lumberman's boots crossed, he laughed at anything Nansaid that chanced to be the least bit amusing, until the gas-globes rangagain.
It seemed to Nan as though there never was such a huge man before. Shedoubted if Goliath could have looked so big to young David, when theshepherd boy went out with his sling to meet the giant. Uncle Henrywas six feet, four inches in height and broad in proportion. The chaircreaked under his weight when he moved. Other people in the car gazed onthe quite unconscious giant as wonderingly as did Nan herself.
"Uncle Henry," she asked him once, "are all the men in the Big Woods astall as you are?"
"Goodness me! No, child," he chuckled. "But the woods don't breed manyrunts, that's a fact. There's some bigger than I. Long Sam Dorgan isnear seven feet he isn't quite sure, for he's so ticklish that you can'tever measure him," and Uncle Henry's chuckle burst into a full-fledgedlaugh. "He's just as graceful as a length of shingle lathing, too. Andfreckles and liver spots on his hands and face, well, he certain sure isa handsome creature.
"He went to town once and stayed over night. Wasn't any bed long enoughat the hotel, and Sam had got considerably under the weather, anyhow,from fooling with hard cider. So he wasn't particular about where hebedded down, and they put him to sleep in the horse trough."
"The horse trough!" gasped Nan.
"Yes. It was pretty dry when Sam went to bed; but right early in themorning a sleepy hostler stumbled out to the trough and began to pumpwater into it for the cattle. Maybe Long Sam needed a bath, but not justthat way. He rose up with a yell like a Choctaw Indian. Said he wasjust dreaming of going through the Sault Ste. Marie in a barrel, and hereckoned the barrel burst open."
Nan was much amused by this story, as she was by others that the oldlumberman related. He was full of dry sayings and his speech had manyqueer twists to it. His bluff, honest way delighted the girl, althoughhe was so different from Papa Sherwood. As Momsey had said, UncleHenry's body had to be big to contain his heart. One can excuse muchthat is rough in a character so lovable as that of Uncle Henry's.
The snow increased as the train sped on and the darkness graduallythickened. Uncle Henry took his niece into the dining car where theyhad supper, with a black man with shiny eyes and very white teeth, whoseemed always on the broad grin, to wait upon them. Nan made a mentalnote to write Bess Harley all about the meal and the service, for Besswas always interested in anything that seemed "aristocratic," and to theunsophisticated girl from Tillbury the style of the dining car seemedreally luxurious.
When the train rolled into the Chicago station it was not yet late;but it seemed to Nan as though they had ridden miles and miles, throughlighted streets hedged on either side with brick houses. The snow wasstill falling, but it looked sooty and gray here in the city. Nan beganto feel some depression, and to remember more keenly that Momsey andPapa Sherwood were flying easterly just as fast as an express traincould take them.
It was cold, too. A keen, penetrating wind seemed to search throughthe streets. Uncle Henry said it came from the lake. He beckoned to ataxicab driver, and Nan's trunk was found and strapped upon the roof.Then off they went to the hotel where Uncle Henry always stopped when hecame to Chicago, and where his own bag was checked.
Looking through the cab windows, the girl began to take an immediateinterest in life again. So many people, despite the storm! So manyvehicles tangled up at the corners and waiting for the big policemento let them by in front of the clanging cars! Bustle, hurry, noise,confusion!
"Some different from your Tillbury," drawled Uncle Henry. "And just asdifferent from Pine Camp as chalk is from cheese."
"But so interesting!" breathed Nan, with a sigh. "Doesn't it ever get tobe bedtime for children in the city?"
"Not for those kids," grumbled Uncle Henry. "Poor creatures. They sellpapers, or flowers, or matches, or what-not, all evening long. Andstores keep open, and hotel bars, and drug shops, besides theatres andthe like. There's a big motion picture place! I went there once. Itbeats any show that ever came to Hobart Forks, now I tell you."
"Oh, we have motion picture shows at Tillbury. We have had them in theschool hall, too," said Nan complacently. "But, of course, I'd liketo see all the people and the lights, and so forth. It looks veryinteresting in the city. But the snow is dirty, Uncle Henry."
"Yes. And most everything else is dirty when you get into these brickand mortar tunnels. That's what I call the streets. The air even isn'tclean," went on the lumberman. "Give me the woods, with a fresh windblowing, and the world looks good to me," then his voice and face fell,as he added, "excepting that snake-in-the-grass, Ged Raffer."
"That man must make you a lot of trouble, Uncle Henry," said Nansympathetically.
"He does," growled the lumberman. "He's a miserable, fox-facedscoundrel, and I've no more use for him than I have for an egg-suckingdog. That's the way I feel about it."
They reached the hotel just then, and Uncle Henry's flare of passion wasquenched. The hostelry he patronized was not a new hotel; but it wasa very good one, and Nan's heart beat high as she followed the porterinside, with Uncle Henry directing the taxicab driver and a secondporter how to dispose of the trunk for the night.
Nan had her bag in which were her night clothes, toilet articles, andother necessities. The porter carried this for her and seated her ona comfortable lounge at one side while Uncle Henry arranged about therooms.
To do honor to his pretty niece the lumberman engaged much betterquarters than he would have chosen for himself. When they went up to therooms Nan found a pretty little bath opening out of hers, and the maidcame and asked her if she could be of any help. The girl began to feelquite "grown up." It was all very wonderful, and she loved Uncle Henryfor making things so pleasant for her.
She had to run to his door and tell him this before she undressed. Hehad pulled off his boots and was tramping up and down the carpeted floorin his thick woolen socks, humming to himself.
"Taking a constitutional, Nan," he declared. "Haven't had any exercisefor this big body of mine all day. Sitting in that car has made me ascramped as a bear just crawling out of his den in the spring."
He did not tell her that had he been alone he would have gone out andtramped the snowy streets for half the night. But he would not leaveher alone in the hotel. "No, sir," said Uncle Henry. "Robert wouldnever forgive me if anything happened to his honey-bird. And fire, orsomething, might break out here while I was gone."
He said nothing like this to Nan, however, but kissed her good night andtold her she should always bid him good night in just that way as longas she was at Pine Camp.
"For Kate and I have never had a little girl," said the big lumberman,"and boys get over the kissing stage mighty early, I find. Kate and Ia
lways did hanker for a girl."
"If you owned a really, truly daughter of your own, Uncle Henry, Ibelieve you'd spoil her to death!" cried Nan, the next morning, when shecame out of the fur shop to which he had taken her.
He had insisted that she was not dressed warmly enough for the woods. "Wesee forty and forty-five below up there, sometimes," he said. "You thinkthis raw wind is cold; it is nothing to a black frost in the Big Woods.Trees burst as if there were dynamite in 'em. You've never seen thelike.
"Of course the back of winter's about broken now. But we may have somecold snaps yet. Anyhow, you look warmer than you did."
And that was true, for Nan was dressed like a little Esquimau. Her coathad a pointed hood to it; she wore high fur boots, the fur outside. Hermittens of seal were buttoned to the sleeves of her coat, and she couldthrust her hands, with ordinary gloves on them, right into these warmreceptacles.
Nan thought they were wonderfully served at the hotel where theystopped, and she liked the maid on her corridor very much, and the boywho brought the icewater, too. There really was so much to tell Bessthat she began to keep a diary in a little blank-book she bought forthat purpose.
Then the most wonderful thing of all was the message from Papa Sherwoodwhich arrived just before she and Uncle Henry left the hotel for thetrain. It was a "night letter" sent from Buffalo and told her thatMomsey was all right and that they both sent love and would telegraphonce more before their steamship left the dock at New York.
Nan and Uncle Henry drove through the snowy streets to another stationand took the evening train north. They traveled at first by theMilwaukee Division of the Chicago and Northwestern Railroad; and nowanother new experience came Nan's way. Uncle Henry had secured a sectionin the sleeping car and each had a berth.
It was just like being put to sleep on a shelf, Nan declared, when theporter made up the beds at nine o'clock. She climbed into the upperberth a little later, sure that she would not sleep, and intending tolook out of the narrow window to watch the snowy landscape fly by allnight.
And much to her surprise (only the surprise came in the morning) shefell fast asleep almost immediately, lulled by the rocking of the hugecar on its springs, and did not arouse until seven o'clock and the carstood on the siding in the big Wisconsin city.
They hurried to get a northern bound train and were soon off on whatUncle Henry called the "longest lap" of their journey. The train sweptthem up the line of Lake Michigan, sometimes within sight of the shore,often along the edge of estuaries, particularly following the contourof Green By, and then into the Wilderness of upper Wisconsin and theMichigan Peninsula.
On the Peninsula Division of the C. & N. W. they did not travel as fastas they had been running, and before Hobart Forks was announced on thelast local train they traveled in, Nan Sherwood certainly was tiredof riding by rail. The station was in Marquette County, near theSchoolcraft line. Pine Camp was twenty miles deeper in the Wilderness.It seemed to Nan that she had been traveling through forests, or thebarren stumpage where forests had been, for weeks.
"Here's where we get off, little girl," Uncle Henry said, as he seizedhis big bag and her little one and made for the door of the car. Nanran after him in her fur clothing. She had found before this that he wasright about the cold. It was an entirely different atmosphere up here inthe Big Woods from Tillbury, or even Chicago.
The train creaked to a stop. They leaped down upon the snowy platform.Only a plain station, big freight house, and a company of roughlydressed men to meet them. Behind the station a number of sleighs andsledges stood, their impatient horses shaking the innumerable bells theywore.
Nan, stumbling off the car step behind her uncle, came near to collidingwith a small man in patched coat and cowhide boots, and with a rope tiedabout his waist as some teamsters affect. He mumbled something in angerand Nan turned to look at him.
He wore sparse, sandy whiskers, now fast turning gray. The outthrust ofthe lower part of his face was as sharp as that of a fox, and he reallylooked like a fox. She was sure of his identity before uncle Henrywheeled and, seeing the man, said:
"What's that you are saying, Ged Raffer? This is my niece, and if youlay your tongue to her name, I'll give you something to go to law aboutin a hurry. Come, Nan. Don't let that man touch so much as your coatsleeve. He's like pitch. You can't be near him without some of hismeanness sticking to you."
Nan Sherwood at Pine Camp; Or, The Old Lumberman's Secret Page 10