The Seven Darlings

by Gouverneur Morris

  IX

  Gay's notion of scientific fishing might have been thus summed: Knowjust where to fish and use the lightest rod made. Her own trout-rodweighed two and a half ounces without the reel. Compared to it,Pritchard's was a coarse and heavy instrument. His weighed six ounces.

  "You could land a salmon with that," said Gay scornfully.

  "I have," said Pritchard. "It's a splendid rod. I doubt if you couldbreak it."

  "Doesn't give the fish much of a run for his money."

  "But how about this, Miss Gay?"

  He showed her a leader of finest water-blue catgut. It was nine feetlong and tapered from the thickness of a human hair to that of a threadof spider-spinning. Gay's waning admiration glowed once more.

  "That wouldn't hold a minnow," she said.

  "We must see about that," he answered; "we must hope that it will hold avery large char."

  He reeled off eighty or ninety feet of line, and began to grease it witha white tallow.

  "What's that stuff?" Gay asked.

  "Red-deer fat."

  "What for?"

  "To make the line float. We're fishing with a dry-fly, you know."

  Gay noticed that the line was tapered from very heavy to very fine.

  "Why is that?" she asked.

  "It throws better--especially in a wind. The heavy part will carry a flyout into half a gale."

  He reeled in the line and made his leader fast to it with a swift,running hitch, and to the line end of the leader he attached the flywhich they had chosen. Upon this tiny and exquisite arrangement of fairyhook, gray silk, and feathers, he blew paraffin from a pocket atomizerthat it might float and not become water-logged.

  "Do we fish from the shore or the boat?" Gay asked.

  "From this shore."

  "You'll never reach there from this shore."

  "Then I've misjudged the distance. Are you going to use the landing-netfor me, in case it's necessary?"

  Gay caught up the net and once more followed his stealthy advance uponthe brook.

  Pritchard had one preliminary look through the field-glasses,straightened his bent back, turned to her with a sorrowing face, andspoke aloud.

  "He's had enough," he said. "He's stopped feeding."

  Gay burst out laughing.

  "And our fishing is over for the day? This shall be said of you, Mr.Pritchard, that you are a merciful man. You are not what is called inthis country a 'game hog.'"

  "Thank you," he said gravely. "But if you think the fishing is over forthe day, you don't know a dry-fly fisherman when you see one. We maderather a late start. See, most of the fish have stopped feeding. Theywon't begin again much before three. The big fellow will be a littlelater. He has had more than the others; he is older; his digestion is nolonger like chain lightning; he will sleep sounder, and dream of thegolden days of his youth when a char was a trout."

  "_That_," said Gay, "is distinctly unkind. I have been snubbed enoughfor one day. Are we to stand here, then, till three or four o'clock,till his royal highness wakes up and calls for breakfast?"

  "No," said Pritchard; "though I would do so gladly, if it werenecessary, in order to take this particular fish----"

  "You might kneel before your rod," said Gay, "like a knight watching hisarms."

  "To rise in the morning and do battle for his lady--I repeat I should doso gladly if it would help my chances in the slightest. But itwouldn't."

  He rested his rod very carefully across two bushes.

  "The thing for us to do," he went on, "is to have lunch. I've oftenheard of how comfortable you American guides can make the weary, waywornwanderer at the very shortest notice."

  "Is that a challenge?"

  "It is an expression of faith."

  Their eyes met, and even lingered.

  "In that case," said Gay, "I shall do what I may. There is cold lunch inthe boat, but the wayworn one shall bask in front of a fire and lookupon his food when it is piping hot. Come!"

  Gay rowed him out of the brook and along the shore of the lake for acouple of miles. She was on her mettle. She wished him to know that shewas no lounger in woodcraft. She put her strong young back into the workof rowing, and the fragile guide boat flew. Her cheeks glowed, and herlips were parted in a smile, but secretly she was filled with dread. Sheknew that she had brought food, raw and cooked; she could see the headof her axe gleaming under the middle seat; she would trust Mary forhaving seen to it that there was pepper and salt; but whether in thepocket of the Norfolk jacket there were matches, she could not be sure.If she stopped rowing to look, the Englishman would think that she hadstopped because she was tired. And if, later, it was found that she hadcome away without matches, he would laugh at her and her pretenses tobeing a "perfectly good guide."

  She beached the boat upon the sand in a wooded cove, and beforePritchard could move had drawn it high and dry out of the water. Thenshe laughed aloud, and would not tell him why. She had discovered in theright-hand pocket of her coat two boxes of safety-matches, and in theleft pocket three.

  "Don't," said Gay, "this is my job."

  She lifted the boat easily and carried it into the woods. Pritchard hadwished to help. She laid the boat upon soft moss at the side of anarrow, mounting trail, slung the package of lunch upon her shoulders,and caught up her axe.

  "Don't I help at all?" asked Pritchard.

  "You are weary and wayworn," said Gay, "and I suppose I ought to carryyou, too. But I can't. Can you follow? It's not far."

  A quarter of a mile up the hillside, between virgin pines which made onethink bitterly of what the whole mountains might be if the science offorestry had been imported a little earlier in the century, the steepand stony trail ended in an open space, gravelly and abounding in hugebowlders, upon which the sun shone warm and bright. In the midst of theplace was a spring, black and slowly bubbling. At the base of one greatrock, a deep rift in whose face made a natural chimney, were traces offormer fires.

  "Wait here," commanded Gay.

  Her axe sounded in a thicket, and she emerged presently staggering undera load of balsam. She spread it in two great, fragrant mats. Then oncemore she went forth with her axe and returned with fire-wood.

  Pritchard, a wistful expression in his eyes, studied her goings and hercomings, and listened as to music, to the sharp, true ringing of heraxe.

  "By Jove," said he to himself, "that isn't perspiration on herforehead--it's honest sweat!"

  In spite of the bright sunshine, the heat of the fire was wonderfullywelcome, and began to bring out the strong, delicious aroma of thebalsam. Gay sat upon her heels before the fire and cooked. There was asound of boiling and bubbling. The fragrance of coffee mingled with thebalsam and floated heavenward. During the swift preparation of lunchthey hardly spoke. Twice Pritchard begged to help and was twice refused.

  She spread a cloth between the mats of balsam upon one of whichPritchard reclined, and she laid out hot plates and bright silver withdemure precision.

  "Miss Gay," he said very earnestly, "I came to chuckle; I thought thatat least you would burn the chicken and get smoke in your eyes, but Iremain to worship the deity of woodcraft. An Indian could not do moreswiftly or so well."

  Gay swelled a little. She had worked very hard; nothing had gone wrong,so far. She was not in the least ashamed of herself. But her greatesttriumph was to come.

  Uncas, the chipmunk, had that morning gone for a stroll in the forest.He had the spring fever. He had crossed Placid Brook, by a fallen log;he had climbed trees, hunted for last year's nuts, and fought battles ofrepartee with other chipmunks. About lunch time, thinking to return toArthur and recount the tale of his wanderings, he smelled a smell ofcooking and heard a sound of voices, one of which was familiar to him.He climbed a bowlder overlooking the clearing, and began to scold. Gayand Pritchard looked up.

  "My word!" said Pritchard, "what a bold little beggar."

  Now, to Gay, the figure of Uncas, well larded with regular meals, wasnot to be confounded with
the slim little stripes of the spring woods.She knew him at once, and she spoke nonchalantly to Pritchard.

  "If you're a great deal in the woods," she said, "you scrapeacquaintance with many of the inhabitants. That little pig and I are oldfriends. You embarrass him a little. He doesn't know you. If you weren'there, he'd come right into my lap and beg."

  Pritchard looked at her gravely.

  "Truly?" he said.

  "I think he will anyway," said Gay, and she made sounds to Uncas whichreassured him and brought him presently on a tearing run for her lap.Here, when he had been fed, he yawned, stretched himself, and fellasleep.

  "Mowgli's sister!" said Pritchard reverently. "Child, are there thescars of wolves' teeth on your wrists and ankles?"

  "No, octogenarian," said Gay; "there aren't any marks of any kind. Whattime is it?"

  "It is half-past two."

  "Then you shall smoke a cigarette, while I wash dishes."

  She slid the complaining Uncas from her lap to the ground.

  "Unfortunately," said Pritchard, "I didn't bring a cigarette."

  "And you've been dying for a smoke all this time? Why don't you ask theguide for what you want?"

  "Have you such a thing?"

  "I have."

  "But you--you yourself don't--do you?" He looked troubled.

  "No," said Gay. "But my father was always forgetting his, and it madehim so miserable I got into the habit of carrying a full case years agowhenever we went on expeditions. He used to be so surprised anddelighted. Sometimes I think he used to forget his on purpose, so thatI could have the triumph of producing mine."

  Pritchard smoked at ease. Gay "washed up." Uncas, roused once more fromslumber by the call of one of his kind, shook himself and trotted offinto the forest.

  Gay, scouring a pan, was beginning to feel that she had known Pritcharda long time. She had made him comfortable, cared for him in the wildwoods, and the knowledge warmed her heart.

  Pritchard was saying to himself:

  "We like the same sort of things--why not each other?"

  "Miss Gay," he said aloud.

  "What?"

  "In case I land the three-pounder and over, I think I ought to tell youthat I'm not very rich, and I know you aren't. Would that matter to you?I've just about enough," he went on tantalizingly, "to take a girl onripping good trips into central Africa or Australia, but I can't keepany great state in England--Merrivale isn't a show place, you know--justa few grouse and pheasants and things, and pretty good fishin'."

  "However much," said Gay, "I may regret my _bet_, there was nothingIndian about it. I'm sure that you are a clean, upright young man. I'ma decent sort of girl, though I say it that shouldn't. We might doworse. I've heard that love-matches aren't always what they are crackedup to be. And I'm quite sure that I want to go to Africa and hunt biggame."

  "Thank you," said Pritchard humbly. "And at least there would be love onone side."

  "Nonsense," said Gay briskly. "I'm ready, if you are."

  Pritchard jumped to his feet and threw away his cigarette.

  "Now," he said, "that you've proved everything, _won't_ you let mehelp?"

  Gay refused him doubtfully, and then with a burst of generosity:

  "Why, yes," she said, "and, by the way, Mr. Pritchard, there was nomagic about the chipmunk. He's one my brother trained. He lives at TheCamp, and he was just out for a stroll and happened in on us. I don'twant you to find out that I'm a fraud from any one--but me."