The Incredible Journey

by Sheila Burnford

  Again the half-submerged memory distracted him: Luath’s eyes … some difference in the pattern of his behavior … Luath’s behavior on the last morning, the gesture of his unexpected paw … With a sudden flash of insight, he understood at last.

  The door opened and he turned to Mrs. Oakes. “I know now—I know where they have gone,” he said slowly. “Luath has taken them home—he has taken them all back to his own home!”

  Mrs. Oakes looked at him in incredulous silence for a moment, then “No!” she burst out impulsively. “No—they couldn’t do that! It’s not possible—why, it must be nearly three hundred miles! And someone would have seen them—someone would have told us …” She broke off, dismayed, remembering that neither dog wore a collar. The terrier would carry no identifying marks, either, as he had been registered in England.

  “They wouldn’t be where anyone would see them,” said Longridge thoughtfully. “Traveling by instinct, they would simply go west by the most direct route—straight across country, over the Ironmouth Range.”

  “Over the Ironmouth?” echoed Mrs. Oakes in horror. “Then there’s no use hoping any more, if you’re right,” she said flatly. “There’s bears and wolves and all manner of things, and if they weren’t eaten up the first day they’d starve to death.”

  She looked so stricken and forlorn that Longridge suggested there was a good chance that they had been befriended by some remote prospector or hunter; perhaps, he enlarged, even now making his way to a telephone.…

  But Mrs. Oakes was inconsolable.

  “Don’t let’s fool ourselves any more, Mr. Longridge,” she broke in. “I daresay a young dog could cross that country, and possibly even a cat—for there’s nothing like a cat to look after itself—but you know as well as I do that old Bodger couldn’t last ten miles! He used to be tired out after I’d walked him to my sister’s and back. Oh, I know that half of it was put on to get something out of me,” she admitted with a watery smile, catching Longridge’s eye, “but it’s a fact. No dog as old as that could go gallivanting across a wilderness and live for more than a day or two.”

  Her words fell away into a silence and they both looked out at the ominous dusk.

  “You’re right, Mrs. Oakes,” said Longridge wearily at last. “We’ll just have to face it—the old fellow is almost certainly dead. After all, it’s been nearly four weeks. And I wouldn’t give a candle for Tao’s chances either,” he added, “if we’re going to be honest. Siamese can’t stand the cold. But if they did make for their own home there’s a chance at least that a big powerful dog like Luath would get there.”

  “That Luath!” said Mrs. Oakes darkly. “Leading that gentle old lamb to his death! And that unnatural cat egging him on, no doubt. Not that I ever had any favorites, but …”

  The door shut, and Longridge knew that behind it she wept for them all.

  Now that Longridge had his conviction to work on he wasted no time.

  He called the Chief Ranger of Lands and Forests, and received assurance that word would be circulated throughout the department, and the game wardens and foresters contacted—tomorrow.

  The Chief Ranger suggested calling a local bush pilot, who flew hunters into the remoter parts of the bush and knew most of the Indian guides.

  The pilot was out on a trip and would not return until tomorrow; his wife suggested the editor of the rural section of the local newspaper.

  The editor was still not back from covering a plowing match; his mother said that the hydro maintenance crew covered a large area of the country.…

  The Line Superintendent said that he would be able to get in touch with the crews in the morning; he suggested the rural telephone supervisor, who was a clearinghouse of information for miles around.…

  Everyone was sympathetic and helpful—but he was no farther on. He postponed the probable frustration of hearing that the supervisor would not be back from visiting her niece across the river until tomorrow, or that a storm had swept all the rural lines down, and searched for a map of the area.

  He round a large-scale one, then drew a connecting line between his own small township and the university town where the Hunters lived, marking down the place names through which it passed. He found to his dismay that there were few of these, the line passing mostly through uninhabited regions of lakes and hills. The last forty or fifty miles seemed particularly grim and forbidding, most of it being in the Strellon Game Reserve. His hopes sank lower and lower, and he felt utterly despondent, bitterly regretting his offer to take the animals in the first place. If only he had kept quiet and minded his own business, they would all be alive now; for he was convinced, after looking at the map, that death through exposure, exhaustion, or starvation must have been inevitable.

  And tomorrow the Hunters would be home again.… Dejectedly he picked up the phone and asked for the rural supervisor.…

  Late that night the telephone rang. The telephone operator at Lintola—Longridge glanced at the map to find Lintola a good many miles south of his line—had some information: the schoolteacher had mentioned that the little Nurmi girl had rescued a half-drowned Siamese cat from the flooded River Keg, about two weeks ago, but it had disappeared again a few days afterwards. If Mr. Longridge would call Lintola 29 ring 4 tomorrow at noon she would try and have the child there and he could talk to her himself. The supervisor had one other piece of information which she offered rather diffidently for what it was worth—old Jeremy Aubyn, who lived up at the Doranda mine, had talked about “visitors” when he came in for his monthly mail collection, whereas everybody knew that the last visitor who had made the twelve-mile walk through the bush to the mine had been his brother, who had been dead for the last three years—poor old man. His only elaboration had been that they were “delightful people.” … Old Mr. Aubyn had lived so long with only wild animals for company that he might easily be confused, she added delicately.

  Longridge thanked her warmly, and put the receiver back, picking up the map. He discounted the information about the old recluse at the Doranda mine—who had probably met some prospectors or Indians—and concentrated on Lintola. It looked as though he had been right, then—they were indeed making for their own home. Two weeks ago, he puzzled, the cat had been alive, and, according to Longridge’s map, must have traveled over a hundred miles. But what had happened to the other two? Must he now face the probability that Luath, too, was dead? Drowned possibly, as the cat would surely have been except for a little girl.…

  Lying awake in the dark that night, unable to sleep, he thought that he would have given anything to feel the heavy thud on the bed that used to announce the old dog’s arrival. How extremely unloving and intolerant he had felt so often, waking in the middle of the night to the relentless shoving and pushing of his undesirable and selfish bedfellow.

  “Tonight,” he reflected wryly, “I’d give him the whole bed! I’d even sleep in the basket myself—if only he would come back!”

  11

  LONGRIDGE’S hours of telephoning the night he returned had brought results; and in the following week he and the Hunters spent many hours patiently tracking down evidence which was sometimes so conflicting and confusing that it was useless, and sometimes so coincidental that it was difficult to believe. Sometimes they felt wearily that every man, woman or child who had seen a cat or a dog walking along a road in the last five years had called to tell them so. But on the whole everyone had been extraordinarily helpful and kind, and they had evidence of several genuine encounters. When the results had been sifted down, they bore out Longridge’s original guess as to the line of travel—the dogs (nothing further had been heard of the cat) had taken an almost perfect compass course due west, and the line he had drawn on the map had been remarkably accurate.

  The brother of one of the bush pilot’s Indian guides had met a cousin recently returned from rice harvesting who had some wild story of a cat and dog appearing out of the night and casting a spell over the rice crop so that it multiplied a thous
and-fold; and the little girl called Helvi Nurmi, her voice distressed and tearful, had described in detail the beautiful Siamese cat who had stayed for so short a time with her. Somewhere in the Ironmouth Range a forester had reported seeing two dogs; and a surly farmer had been overheard in Joe Woods’s General Store (Public Telephone), Philipville, saying that if he could lay hands on a certain white dog (“Ugly as sin he was—a great vicious powerful beast!”) who had killed a flock of prize-winning chickens and savagely beaten up his poor peace-loving collie, he would break every bone in his body!

  Peter had smiled for the first time on hearing this: it had conjured up for him a vivid picture of Bodger in his aggressive element, thoroughly enjoying himself in a fight, cheerfully wicked and unrepentant as ever. He would rather have heard this than anything, for he knew that his unquenchable, wayward old clown was not made for sadness or uncertainty. His deep grief he kept to himself, and would not undermine it now with this softening hope: Bodger was dead; Luath almost certainly so; and his conviction was steady and unalterable.

  Elizabeth’s attitude was the complete reverse of her brother’s: she was completely and utterly convinced that her Tao was alive, and that sooner or later he would return. Nothing could shake her confidence, even though there had been no word of her cat since he had left the Nurmis’ so long ago and so many miles away. She dismissed all tactful efforts to explain the odds against his return—someday, somehow, a penitent Siamese would reappear, and, after a scolding due a thoughtless truant, he would receive with pleasure and surprise his new red collar.…

  But she was the only one who held this cheerful confidence. After the kindly James Mackenzie had telephoned with the news that both dogs had been alive ten days ago, the family had pored over the map and seen the barrier that stretched between them and any admitted hope: wild, lonely terrain, rugged and cruel enough to beat down the endurance of any fresh and powerful dog, let alone the sick, half-starved, exhausted one that Mackenzie had described, leader and part sight for another whose willing heart could not withstand for long the betrayal of his years. All that could be hoped for now was that the end of their journey had come quickly and mercifully in that wilderness.

  Longridge was visting the Hunters; and, partly to get away from the depressing telephone calls from well-meaning but ill-informed people, and partly because it was Peter’s twelfth birthday the following Sunday, he suggested that they all go and camp out in the Hunters’ summer cottage on Lake Windigo. Even though it had been closed for the winter, they could take sleeping bags, using only the living room and kitchen which could be warmed by the Quebec heater.

  At first there had been some qualms from Elizabeth about leaving the house in case Tao should choose that week end to return, but Longridge showed her that Lake Windigo lay on the direct westward route that he had traced on the map, and reminded her that Tao knew the surrounding area for miles from his many expeditions with the dogs. Elizabeth packed the red collar and seemed satisfied—too easily, he suspected, dreading her disillusionment.

  The cottage was full of memories, but it was easier to accustom the mind to new ones and train it to the loss in surroundings that were so different at this time of year. It was as if they were discovering new land; a cold lake empty of boats, the few cottages nearby all blindly shuttered, locked and empty. Trails that they did not even know existed were apparent, now that the trees were bare and the undergrowth had died down. Peter had a new camera, and spent hours stalking chipmunks, squirrels and birds with it. Elizabeth spent most of the days in a precarious treehouse they had built the previous summer between three great birches on the lake shore.

  On the last afternoon, the Sunday of Peter’s birthday, they decided to make a last expedition, taking the old Allen Lake Trail, then cutting off up the face of the hill to Lookout Point, and returning by the lake shore. It was an exhilarating walk through the crisp, clear air, the leaves thick and soft along the quiet trails, and over everything the indefinable healing peace and stillness of the northland bush.

  They walked for the most part in companionable silence, each busy with his own thoughts. To Jim Hunter a walk without a dog lacked savor—and he remembered other fall days when, gun in hand, he had walked through this same peaceful solitude, Luath ranging from side to side: the excited summons to a treed partridge, and the gentleness of his dog’s mouth around the soft fallen bird; then dawns and dusks on Manitoba marshes and lakes crowded his memory—freezing hours of patient waiting shared in canoes and blinds and stubble fields. The thought of Luath’s last retrieve as Mackenzie had described it affected Hunter more than anything else; for he knew the frustrated humiliation his dog would, feel with a pain-locked mouth and a bird to be brought in.

  Peter had taken a short cut up the steep rock-bound side of the hill. He sat on a log, staring into space, and he too remembered this time last year—when he had tried to train Bodger as a gun dog by throwing a stuffed leather glove into the bush after firing a BB gun: the willing co-operation and eager retrieves the first day; then, increasingly limp-tailed boredom and sulky ears, followed by deepening deafness, limping paws, and an unbearable air of martyrdom; and terminated two days running so subtly, by Bodger’s appearance out of the bush with a diligent, puzzled expression—but no leather glove. The corners of Peter’s mouth lifted when he remembered the scene that followed—the third day’s throw and shot; then his quiet stalk after his White Hope into the depths of the bush—and the wily Bodger furiously digging a third glove grave.…

  He sighed now—in his sudden loneliness rubbing his eyes with the back of his hand—and picked up his camera, for he could hear his family coming.

  They sat for a long time on the flat rocks of the Lookout Hill, where long ago the Indians had built their warning signal fires, looking across the endless chains of lakes and tree-covered hills to the distant blur that was the great Lake Superior. It was very peaceful and quiet: a chickadee sang his poignant little piece for them, and the inevitable whisky-jack arrived on soundless wings to pick up cooky crumbs from within a few feet. Everyone was silent and pre-occupied.

  Suddenly Elizabeth stood up.

  “Listen!” she said. “Listen, Daddy—I can hear a dog barking!”

  Complete and utter silence fell as everyone strained their ears in the direction of the hills behind. No one heard anything.

  “You’re imagining things,” said her mother. “Or perhaps it was a fox. Come along, we must start back.”

  “Wait, wait! Just one minute—you’ll be able to hear it in a minute, too,” whispered Elizabeth, and her mother, remembering the child’s hearing was still young and acute enough to hear the squeaking noise of bats and other noises lost forever to adults—and now even to Peter—remained silent.

  Elizabeth’s tense, listening expression changed to a slowly dawning smile. “It’s Luath!” she announced matter-of-factly. “I know his bark!”

  “Don’t do this to us, Liz,” said her father gently, disbelieving. “It’s …”

  Now Peter thought he heard something too: “Shhh …”

  There was silence again, everyone straining to hear in an agony of suspense. Nothing was heard. But Elizabeth had been so convinced, the knowledge written so plainly on her face, that now Jim Hunter experienced a queer, urgent expectancy, every nerve in his body tingling with certain awareness that something was going to happen. He rose and hurried down the narrow path to where it joined the broader track leading around the hill. “Whistle, Dad!” said Peter breathlessly, behind him.

  The sound rang out piercingly shrill and sweet, and almost before the echo rebounded a joyous, answering bark rang around the surrounding hills.

  They stood there in the quiet afternoon, their taut bodies awaiting the relief of suspense; they stood at the road’s end, waiting to welcome a weary traveler who had journeyed so far, with such faith, along it. They had not long to wait.

  Hurtling through the bushes on the high hillside of the trail a small, black-tipped wheaten bod
y leaped the last six feet down with careless grace and landed softly at their feet. The unearthly, discordant wail of a welcoming Siamese rent the air.

  Elizabeth’s face was radiant with joy. She kneeled, and picked up the ecstatic, purring cat. “Oh, Tao!” she said softly, and as she gathered him into her arms he wound his black needle-tipped paws lovingly around her neck. “Tao!” she whispered, burying her nose in his soft, thyme-scented fur, and Tao tightened his grip in such an ecstasy of love that Elizabeth nearly choked.

  Longridge had never thought of himself as being a particularly emotional man, but when the Labrador appeared an instant later, a gaunt, stare-coated shadow of the beautiful dog he had last seen, running as fast as his legs would carry him towards his master, all his soul shining out of sunken eyes, he felt a lump in his throat, and at the strange, inarticulate half-strangled noises that issued from the dog when he leaped at his master, and the expression of his friend’s face, he had to turn away and pretend to loosen Tao’s too loving paws.

  Minutes passed; everyone had burst out talking and chattering excitedly, gathered around the dog to stroke and pat and reassure, until he too threw every vestige of restraint to the winds, and barked as if he would never stop, shivering violently, his eyes alight and alive once more and never leaving his master’s face. The cat, on Elizabeth’s shoulder, joined in with raucous howls; everyone laughed, talked or cried at once, and for a while there was pandemonium in the quiet wood.

  Then, suddenly—as though the same thought had struck them all simultaneously—there was silence. No one dared to look at Peter. He was standing aside, aimlessly cracking a twig over and over again until it became a limp ribbon in his hands. He had not touched Luath, and turned away now, when the dog at last came over including him in an almost human round of greeting.