'Anything else?'
'Used five matches to light your pipe. Struck 'em on a wore-out box. Heads come off, too. That don't happen when you have a new scraper to your box.'
'I say, Joe, I shouldn't like to have you on my trail if I'd committed a crime.'
Joe smiled a singularly pleasant smile. 'I guess I'd catch you all right,' said he.
It was long after dark when we reached November's shack that evening. As he opened the door he displaced something white which lay just inside it. He stooped.
'It's a letter,' he said in surprise as he handed it to me. 'What does it say, Mr Quaritch?'
I read it aloud. It ran:
I am in trouble, Joe. Somebody is robbing my traps. When you get home, which I pray will be soon, come right over.
S. Rone
'The skunk!' cried November.
I had never seen him so moved. He had been away hunting for three days and returned to find this message.
'The darned skunk,' he repeated, 'to rob her traps!'
'Her? A woman?'
'S. Rone stands for Sally Rone. You've sure heard of her?'
'No, who is she?'
'I'll tell you,' said Joe. 'Sal's a mighty brave girl – that is, she's a widow. She was married on Rone four years ago last Christmas, and the autumn after he got his back broke to the Red Star Lumber Camp. Didn't hump himself quick enough from under a falling tree. Anyway, he died all right, leaving Sally just enough dollars to carry her over the birth of her son. To make a long story short, there was lots of the boys ready to fill dead man Rone's place when they knew her money must be giving out, and the neighbours were wonderful interested to know which Sal would take. But it soon come out that Sal wasn't taking any of them, but had decided to try what she could do with the trapping herself.'
'Herself?'
'Just that. Rone worked a line o' traps, and Sal was fixed to make her living and the boy's that way. Said a woman was liable to be as successful a trapper as a man. She's at it near three year now, and she's made good. Lives with her boy about four hours' walk nor'west of here, with not another house within five miles of her. She's got a young sister, Ruby, with her on account of the kid, as she has to be out such a lot.'
'A lonely life for a woman.'
'Yes,' agreed November. 'And now some skunk's robbing her and getting her frightened, curse him! How long ago was that paper written?'
I looked again at the letter. 'There's no date.'
'Nothing about who brought it?'
'No.'
November rose, lighted a lantern, and without a word stepped out into the darkness. In five minutes he returned.
'She brought it herself,' he announced. 'Little feet – running – rustling to get home to the little chap. She was here afore Thursday morning's rain, some time Wednesday, not long after I started, I guess.... I'm off soon as ever I can stoke in some grub. You coming?'
'Yes.'
Not much later I was following November's nimbly moving figure upon as hard a woods march as I ever care to try. I was not sorry when a thong of my moccasin gave way and Joe allowed me a minute to tie it up and to get my wind.
'There's Tom Carroll, Phil Gort, and Injin Sylvester,' began November abruptly, 'those three. They're Sally's nearest neighbours, them and Val Black. Val's a good man, but...'
'But what?' said I absently.
'Him and Tom Carroll's cut the top notches for Sally's favour so far.'
'But what's that got to do with...'
'Come on,' snapped November, and hurried forward.
I need say no more about the rest of the journey, it was like a dozen others I had made behind November. Deep in the night I could just make out that we were passing round the lower escarpments of a great wooded mountain, when we saw a light above glimmering through the trees. Soon we reached the lonely cabin in its clearing; the trees closed about it, and the night wind whined overhead through the bareness of the twigs.
Joe knocked at the door, calling at the same time: 'It's me. Are you there, Sally?'
The door opened an inch or two. 'Is it you, Joe?'
November thrust his right hand with its deep scar across the back through the aperture. 'You should know that cut, Sal, you tended it.'
'Come in! Come in!'
I followed Joe into the house, and turned to look at Sally. Already I had made a mental picture of her as a strapping young woman, well equipped to take her place in the race of life, but I saw a slim girl with gentle red-brown eyes that matched the red-brown of her rebellious hair, a small face, pale under its weather-tan, but showing a line of milk-white skin above her brows. She was in fact extremely pretty, with a kind of good looks I had not expected, and ten seconds later, I, too, had fallen under the spell of that charm which was all the more powerful because Sally herself was unconscious of it.
'You've been long in coming, Joe,' she said with a sudden smile. 'You were away, of course?'
'Aye, just got back 'fore we started for here.' He looked round. 'Where's young Dan?'
'I've just got him off to sleep on the bed there'; she pointed to a deerskin curtain in the corner.
'What? They been frightening him?'
Mrs Rone looked oddly at November. 'No, but if he heard us talking he might get scared, for the man who's been robbing me was in this room not six hours ago and Danny saw him.'
November raised his eyebrows. 'Huh! That's fierce!' he said. 'Danny's rising three, ain't he? He could tell.'
'Nothing at all. It was after dark and the man had his face muffled. Danny said he was a real good man, he gave him sugar from the cupboard!' said Sally.
'His hands ... what like was his hands? ... He gave the sugar.'
'I thought of that, but Danny says he had mitts on.'
November drew a chair to the table. 'Tell us all from the first of it... robbing the traps and to-night.'
In a few minutes we were drinking our tea while our hostess told us the story.
'It's more'n three weeks now since I found out the traps were being meddled with. It was done very cunning, but I have my own way of baiting them and the thief, though he's a clever woodsman and knows a heap, never dropped to that. Sometimes he'd set 'em and bait 'em like as if they were never touched at all, and other times he'd just make it appear as if the animal had got itself out. I wouldn't believe it at first, for I thought there was no one hereabouts would want to starve me and Danny, but it happened time after time.'
'He must have left tracks,' said Joe.
'Some, yes. But he mostly worked when snow was falling. He's cunning.'
'Did any one ever see his tracks but you?'
'Sylvester did.'
'How was that?' said Joe with sudden interest.
'I came on Sylvester one evening when I was trailing the robber.'
'Perhaps Sylvester himself was the robber.'
Mrs Rone shook her head.
'It wasn't him, Joe. He couldn't 'a' known I was comin' on him, and his tracks was quite different.'
'Well, but to-night? You say the thief come here to-night? What did he do that for?' said Joe, pushing the tobacco firmly into his pipe-bowl.
'He had a good reason,' replied Sally with bitterness. 'Last Thursday when I was on my way back from putting my letter under your door, I come home around by a line of traps which I have on the far side of the mountain. It wasn't anything like my usual time to visit them, not but what I've varied my hours lately to try and catch the villain. I had gone about halfway to Low's Corner when I heard something rustling through the scrub ahead of me, it might have been a lynx or it might have been a dog, but when I come to the trap I saw the thief had made off that minute, for he'd been trying to force open the trap, and when he heard me he wrenched hard, you bet, but he was bound to take care not to be too rough.'
'Good fur, you mean?'
'Good?' Sally's face flushed a soft crimson. 'Good? Why I've never seen one to match it. It was a black fox, lying dead there, but still warm, for it had but just
been killed. The pelt was fair in its prime, long and silky and glossy. You can guess, November, what that meant for Danny and me next winter, that I've been worrying about a lot. The whooping-cough's weakened him down bad, and I thought of the things I could get for him while I was skinning out the pelt.' Sally's voice shook, and her eyes filled with tears. 'Oh, Joe, it's hard, hard!'
November sat with his hands upon the table in front of him, and I saw his knuckles whiten as he gripped it.
'Let's hear the end of it!' he said shortly, man-like showing irritation when his heart was full of pity.
'The skin was worth eight hundred dollars anywhere, and I come home just singing. I fixed it at once, and, then being scared-like, I hid it in the cupboard over there behind those old magazines. I'd have locked it up, but I've nothing that locks. Who has on this section? Once or twice, being kind of proud of it, I looked at the skin, the last time was this morning before I went out. I was proud of it. No one but Ruby knew that I had got it. I left Ruby here, but Mrs Scats had her seventh yesterday morning, and Ruby ran over to help for a while after she put Danny to bed. The thief must have been on the watch and seen her go, and he knew I was due to visit the north line o' traps and I'd be late anyway. He laid his plan good and clever . . . '
She stopped for a moment to pour out another cup for Joe.
'Where's Ruby now?' he inquired.
'She's stopping the night; they sent over to tell me,' replied Sally. 'Well, to go on, I had a lynx in one of my traps which got dragged right down by Deerhom Pond, so I was more than special late. Danny began at once to tell me about the man that came in. I rushed across and looked in the cupboard; the black fox pelt was gone, of course!'
'What did Danny say about the man?'
'Said he had on a big hat and a neckerchief. He didn't speak a word; gave Danny sugar, as I have said. He must 'a been here some time, for he's ransacked the place high and low, and took near every pelt I got this season.'
Joe looked up. 'Those pelts marked?'
'Yes, my mark's on some, seven pricks of a needle.'
'You've looked around the house to see if he left anything?'
'Sure!' Sally put her hand in her pocket.
'What?'
'Only this.' She opened her hand and disclosed a rifle cartridge.
Joe examined it. 'Soft-nosed bullet for one of them fancy English guns. Where did you find it?'
'On the floor by the table.'
'Huh!' said Joe, and, picking up the lamp, he began carefully and methodically to examine every inch of the room.
'Any one but me been using tobacco in here lately?' he asked.
'Not that I know of,' replied Sally.
He made no comment, but continued his search. At last he put down the lamp and resumed his chair, shaking a shred or two of something from his fingers.
'Well?' questioned Mrs Rone.
'A cool hand,' said November. 'When he'd got the skin, he stopped to fill his pipe. It was then he dropped the cartridge; it came out of his pocket with the pipe, I expect. All that I can tell you about him is that he smokes "Gold Nugget" – he pointed to the shreds – 'and carries a small-bore make of English rifle. . . . Hello! where's the old bitch?'
'Old Rizpah? I dunno, less she's gone along to Scats's place. Ruby'd take her if she could, she's that scairt of the woods; but Rizpah's never left Danny before.'
Joe drained his cup. 'We've not found much inside the house,' said he. 'As soon as the sun is up, we'll try our luck outside. Till then I guess we'd best put in a doze.'
Mrs Rone made up a shake-down of skins near the stove, and disappeared behind the deerskin curtain. Before sleep visited me I had time to pass in review the curious circumstances which the last few hours had disclosed. Here was a woman making a noble and plucky struggle to wring a living from Nature. In my fancy I saw her working and toiling early and late in the snow and gloom. And then over the horizon of her life appeared the dastardly thief who was always waiting, always watching to defeat her efforts.
When I woke next morning it was to see, with some astonishment, that a new personage had been drawn into our little drama of the woods. A dark-bearded man in the uniform of a game warden was sitting on the other side of the stove. He was a straightforward-looking chap getting on for middle age, but there was a certain doggedness in his aspect. Mrs Rone, who was preparing breakfast, made haste to introduce him.
'This is Game Warden Evans, Mr Quaritch,' she said. 'He was at Scats's last night. There he heard about me losing fur from the traps, and come right over to see if he couldn't help me.'
Having exchanged the usual salutations, Evans remarked goodhumouredly:
'November's out trailing the robber. Him and me's been talking about the black fox pelt. Joe's wasting his time all right.'
'How's that?' I asked, rather nettled, for wasting his time was about the last accusation I should ever have brought against my comrade.
'Because I can tell him who the thief is.'
'You know!' I exclaimed.
Evans nodded. 'I can find out any time.'
'How?'
'Care to see?' He rose and went to the door.
I followed. It was a clear bright morning, and the snow that had fallen on the previous day was not yet melted. We stepped out into it, but had not left the threshold when Evans touched my shoulder.
'Guess Joe missed it,' he said, pointing with his finger.
I turned in the direction indicated, and saw that upon one of the nails which had been driven into the door of the cabin, doubtless for the purpose of exposing skins to the warmth of the sun, some brightcoloured threads were hanging. Going nearer, I found them to be strands of pink and grey worsted, twisted together.
'What d' you think of that?' asked Evans, with a heavy wink.
Before I could answer, Joe came into sight round a clump of bush on the edge of the clearing.
'Well,' called the game warden, 'any luck?'
November walked up to us, and I waited for his answer with all the eagerness of a partisan. 'Not just exactly,' he said.
'What do you make of that?' asked Evans again, pointing at the fluttering worsted, with a glance of suppressed triumph at Joe.
'Huh!' said November. 'What do you?'
'Pretty clear evidence that, ain't it? The robber caught his necker on those nails as he slipped out. We're getting closer. English rifle, "Gold Nugget" in his pipe, and a pink and grey necker. Find a chap that owns all three. It can't be difficult. Wardens have eyes in their heads as well as you, November.'
'Sure!' agreed Joe politely but with an abstracted look as he examined the door. 'You say you found it here?'
'Yes.'
'Huh!' said Joe again.
'Anything else on the trail?' asked Evans.
November looked at him. 'He shot Rizpah.'
'The old dog? I suppose she attacked him and he shot her.'
'Yes, he shot her first.'
'First? What then?'
'He cut her nigh in pieces with his knife.'
Without more words Joe turned back into the woods and we went after him. Hidden in a low, marshy spot, about half a mile from the house, we came upon the body of the dog. It was evident she had been shot – more than that, the carcass was hacked about in a horrible manner.
'What do you say now, Mr Evans?' inquired Joe.
'What do I say? I say this. When we find the thief we'll likely find the marks of Rizpah's teeth on him. That's what made him mad with rage, and...' Evans waved his hand.
We returned to breakfast at Mrs Rone's cabin. While we were eating, Evans casually brought out a scrap of the worsted he had detached from the nail outside.
'Seen any one with a necker like that, Mrs Rone?' he asked.
The young woman glanced at the bit of wool, then bent over Danny as she fed him. When she raised her head I noticed that she looked very white.
'There's more'n one of that colour hereabouts likely,' she replied, with another glance of studied indifference.
'It's not a common pattern of wool,' said Evans. 'Well, you're all witnesses where I got it. I'm off.'
'Where are you going?' I asked.
'It's my business to find the man with the pink necker.'
Evans nodded and swung off through the door.
Rivals of Sherlock Holmes, The Page 29