Man-Size
Page 20
CHAPTER XX
ONISTAH READS SIGN
McRae fitted Jessie's snowshoes.
"You'll be hame before the dark, lass," he said, a little anxiously.
"Yes, Father."
The hunter turned to Onistah. "She's in your care, lad. Gin theweather changes, or threatens to, let the traps go and strike for thetoon. You're no' to tak chances."
"Back assam weputch (very early)," promised the Blackfoot.
He was proud of the trust confided to him. To him McRae was a greatman. Among many of the trappers and the free traders the old Scot'sword was law. They came to him with their disputes for settlement andabided by his decisions. For Angus was not only the patriarch of theclan, if such a loose confederation of followers could be called aclan; he was esteemed for his goodness and practical common sense.
Onistah's heart swelled with an emotion that was more than vanity. Hisheart filled with gladness that Jessie should choose him as guide andcompanion to snowshoe with her out into the white forests where hertraps were set. For the young Indian loved her dumbly, without anyhope of reward, in much the same way that some of her rough soldiersmust have loved Joan of Arc. Jessie was a mistress whose least whim hefelt it a duty to obey. He had worshiped her ever since he had seenher, a little eager warm-hearted child, playing in his mother'swigwam. She was as much beyond his reach as the North Star. Yet herswift tender smile was for him just as it was for Fergus.
They shuffled out of the village into the forest that crept up to thesettlement on all sides. Soon they were deep in its shadows, pushingalong the edge of a muskeg which they skirted carefully in order notto be hampered by its treacherous boggy footing.
Jessie wore a caribou-skin capote with the fur on as a protectionagainst the cold wind. Her moccasins were of smoked moose-skindecorated with the flower-pattern bead embroidery so much in use amongthe French half-breeds of the North. The socks inside them were ofduffle and the leggings of strouds, both materials manufactured forthe Hudson's Bay Company for its trappers.
The day was comparatively warm, but the snow was not slushy nor verydeep. None the less she was glad when they reached the trapping groundand Onistah called a halt for dinner. She was tired, from the weightof the snow on her shoes, and her feet were blistered by reason of thelacings which cut into the duffle and the tender flesh inside.
Onistah built a fire of poplar, which presently crackled like a battlefront and shot red-hot coals at them in an irregular fusillade. Uponthis they made tea, heated pemmican and bannocks, and thawed a jar ofpreserves Jessie had made the previous summer of service berries andwild raspberries. Before it they dried their moccasins, socks, andleggings.
Afterward they separated to make a round of the traps, agreeing tomeet an hour and a half later at the place of their dinner camp.
The Blackfoot found one of the small traps torn to pieces, probably bya bear, for he saw its tracks in the snow. He rebuilt the snareand baited it with parts of a rabbit he had shot. In one trap hediscovered a skunk and in another a timber wolf. When he came in sightof the rendezvous, he was late.
Jessie was not there. He waited half an hour in growing anxiety beforehe went to meet her. Night would fall soon. He must find her while itwas still light enough to follow her tracks. The disasters that mighthave fallen upon her crowded his mind. A bear might have attacked her.She might be lost or tangled in the swampy muskeg. Perhaps she hadaccidentally shot herself.
As swiftly as he could he snowshoed through the forest, following theplain trail she had left. It carried him to a trap from which she hadtaken prey, for it was newly baited and the snow was sprinkled withblood. Before he reached the second gin, the excitement in himquickened. Some one in snowshoes had cut her path and had deflectedto pursue. Onistah knew that the one following was a white man. Thepoints of the shoes toed out. Crees toed in, just the same on webs asin moccasins.
His imagination was active. What white man had any business in thesewoods? Why should he leave that business to overtake Jessie McRae?Onistah did not quite know why he was worried, but involuntarily hequickened his pace.
Less than a quarter of a mile farther on, he read another chapter ofthe story written in the trampled snow. There had been a struggle. Hismistress had been overpowered. He could see where she had been flunginto a white bank and dragged out of it. She had tried to run and hadgot hardly a dozen yards before recapture. From that point the tracksmoved forward in a straight line, those of the smaller webs blottedout by the ones made by the larger. The man was driving the girlbefore him.
Who was he? Where was he taking her? For what purpose? Onistah couldnot guess. He knew that McRae had made enemies, as any forcefulcharacter on the frontier must. The Scotchman had kicked out lazyne'er-do-wells from his camp. As a free trader he had matched himselfagainst the Hudson's Bay Company. But of those at war with him fewwould stoop to revenge themselves on his daughter. The Blackfoot hadnot heard of the recent trouble between Whaley and the McRaes, nor hadthe word reached him that Bully West was free again. Wherefore he waspuzzled at what the signs on the snow told him.
Yet he knew he had read them correctly. The final proof of it to himwas that Jessie broke trail and not the man. If he were a friend hewould lead the way. He was at her heels because he wanted to make surethat she did not try to escape or to attack him.
The tracks led down into the muskeg. It was spitting snow, but he hadno difficulty in seeing where the trail led from hummock to hummock inthe miry earth. The going here was difficult, for the thick moss wasfull of short, stiff brush that caught the webbed shoes and trippedthe traveler. It was hard to find level footing. The mounds wereuneven, and more than once Onistah plunged knee-deep from one into theswamp.
He crossed the muskeg and climbed an ascent into the woods, swingingsharply to the right. There was no uncertainty as to the direction ofthe tracks in the snow. If they veered for a few yards, it was only tomiss a tree or to circle down timber. Whoever he might be, the man whohad taken Jessie prisoner knew exactly where he was going.
The Blackfoot knew by the impressions of the webs that he was a large,heavy man. Once or twice he saw stains of tobacco juice on the snow.The broken bits of a whiskey-bottle flung against a tree did not tendto reassure him.
He saw smoke. It came from a tangle of undergrowth in a depression ofthe forest. Very cautiously, with the patience of his race, he circledround the cabin through the timber and crept up to it on hands andknees. Every foot of the way he took advantage of such cover as was tobe had.
The window was a small, single-paned affair built in the end oppositethe door. Onistah edged close to it and listened. He heard the droneof voices, one heavy and snarling, another low and persuasive.
His heart jumped at the sound of a third voice, a high-pitched treble.He would have known it among a thousand. It had called to him inthe swirl of many a wind-swept storm. He had heard it on the longtraverse, in the stillness of the lone night, at lakeside camps builtfar from any other human being. His imagination had heard it onthe summer breeze as he paddled across a sun-drenched lake in hisbirch-bark canoe.
The Blackfoot raised his head till he could look through the window.
Jessie McRae sat on a stool facing him. Two men were in the room. Onestrode heavily up and down while the other watched him warily.