Irish Red

by Jim Kjelgaard

  Eileen sat perfectly, and remained sitting until Joe Williams snapped his fingers. Then she thankfully gobbled her reward. The trainer looked puzzled.

  “We’ll try her again.”

  He issued the command, Eileen looked up, as though trying to understand, and wagged her tail. Again Joe Williams pressed her to a sitting position, and again the puppy remained until told that she could get up. The trainer’s puzzled frown deepened.

  “I don’t know what’s got into her. She never did anything before on command. Let’s try once more.”

  Commanded to do so, Eileen sat. It was Danny’s turn to be puzzled, but not at the puppy. Most Irish setters were very intelligent, and wanted nothing except to please. A professional trainer should be the first to see when a dog wanted to work with him. Eileen sat again, and again, upon command.

  Then, without being bidden, she rose and walked to the end of the leash. Her attention had been attracted by a robin on a fence, and intently she studied it.

  “Sit!” Joe Williams commanded.

  Eileen acted as though she had not heard, and Danny understood that too. She had wanted to do what she had been asked, and she had done it. However, she could see no reason why she should keep on doing it when she had already performed satisfactorily. Right now the robin was the center of interest. The trainer tightened his lips.

  “Bull-headed, eh? Here’s where that young lady gets a much-needed lesson!”

  Before Danny could protest, he struck her with the end of the leash. The puppy leaped like a startled deer, and turned when she came to the end of the leash. She struggled furiously, heedless of the choking collar. Her eyes became wild and rolling.

  Without thinking, Danny snatched the leash from the trainer’s hand, worked his way up to the trembling puppy, and knelt to cradle her in his arms. He turned angrily on Joe Williams.

  “Don’t you know better than that?”

  Anger flooded the trainer’s face. “I’ll overlook this, Danny, this time. But let me remind you that these dogs are in my charge!”

  “I’m not going to stand here and see you use a whip on these Irish setters!”

  “Any dog needs a whip!”

  “Not these,” Ross put in heatedly. “If you ever try it again, while I’m here, I’ll use it on you!”

  “In that case,” a new voice broke in, “perhaps you’d better not stay here.”

  They all swung to face John Price. Corning silently upon the scene, he had stayed to listen to the argument. Now his cold eyes were fastened on Danny. Danny glared back.

  “That,” he said slowly, “is the best idea I’ve heard since I started working here.”

  “Draw your pay at the house,” said John Price.

  Ross snarled, “Buy yourself another trainer with it.”

  He turned hotly away, and Danny ran to catch up with him. Side by side they walked back up the trail. For a while neither spoke, then Danny broke the silence.

  “Pappy,” he said tensely, “I couldn’t do any different. I just couldn’t. I can’t stand by and see him ruin Sheilah’s pups.”

  “Who’s arguing with you?”

  The tautness was broken by Danny’s laugh.

  “Hey Pappy. Why do I feel this way?”

  “What way?”

  “I sure ought to be down in the mouth,” Danny said. “We lost the only job we had, but maybe we never should have taken it!”

  “What d’you mean, boy?”

  “Irish setters! We’ve got Red. We can put in the winter trapping and maybe buy ourselves a good mate for him. If we had pups of our own, nobody could tell us how to handle ‘em!”

  Ross looked quizzically at him. “Do you know what you’re sayin’?”

  “Sure I know.”

  Ross heaved a big sigh of relief. “I just wanted to make sure, because it listens almighty good to me. I never did like that job. We’ll move to our Budgegummon cabin, Danny. That’s right in the best fur country and we can string good lines. Course we ain’t got much money now, but come spring we’ll have ‘most enough to buy a good bitch. Maybe we can even buy Sheilah!”

  “That’s the way, Pappy! We earned a living before we had this job, and we can do it again.”

  Ross said, “I’ll go fetch Bide Glegg’s horses and we’ll start movin’ right away! Ha! We’ll spend out winter in the woods yet!”

  Ross went striding happily past the cabin toward the upper end of the clearing. There were roads through the Wintapi, but Ross never used one when he could walk a trail. Few of the trails were man-made. Most were age-old traces beaten by deer, elk, and other game. Ross knew them all, and travelling them he could often reach a destination even before an automobile could get there over the winding roads.

  Danny floated into the cabin. Sheilah and the pups were gone, but he and Ross were again oriented. They could start once more on the trail they had struck when both decided that, of all the dogs in the world, none could equal an Irish setter. Danny reached down to tickle Red’s ears.

  “You old flea cage,” he murmured. “No more lonesome days for you! We’re going to spend the winter in the hills---you-and me and Pappy. How do you like that?”

  Danny dug some boxes out of one of the sheds^ lined them with straw, and packed the few personal belongings they would have to take with them. There weren’t many. Budgegummon was an out-cabin, one of the places where Ross took hunters who really wanted to get away from the beaten track and where Danny and Ross stayed when they ran their far-flung trap lines. All the out-cabins were equipped with cooking utensils, bedding, and dry staples that wouldn’t spoil or freeze.

  They had to take a few extra dishes; Ross was sure to get some sportsmen in to hunt or for the late fishing. Also, they needed their firearms and tools. Then they must harvest their garden and take the produce along. Otherwise raiding varmints were sure to get it.

  An hour later Ross returned with Bide Clegg’s four brown horses. Since no wheeled vehicle could get into or even near Budgegummon, the wiry, surefooted beasts carried pack saddles.

  A grin seemed permanently etched on Ross’s face as he packed the horses. Ross was one of the few Wintapi men who knew the packer’s art, and Danny wondered where he had learned it. Perhaps in the Wintapi and perhaps elsewhere. Though he seldom talked about them, Ross had hit some long trails in his early days.

  The packing completed, Ross tied the horses, one to the pack saddle of the other so they could walk single file on the narrow trail. Then he grasped the halter rope of the lead horse.

  “High, low, jack, and go!” he said. “Come on, Danny.”

  They splashed across Smokey Creek, threaded their way among the huge beeches on the other side, and struck a dim path that slanted up the mountain. It was an old logging trail, built long ago by lumbermen. The little horses, accustomed to mountain climbing, plodded steadily along.

  Though Ross took all the short cuts, it was still four hours after they left the cabin until they came to the floor of Budgegummon Valley, splashed across the creek, and climbed the other side. A worn trail, beaten by generations of deer, wound toward the head of the valley. They followed that, and five minutes later were at the cabin.

  It was built in a little clearing and against a hill. A few log outbuildings surrounded it. Poplars were scattered through the clearing and all about were the great gray beeches, the trees Danny loved best. They rested solidly on ponderous gray trunks, so huge that three men with linked arms could not have reached around them, and rose to a spreading canopy of branches. This was a fine and healthy place. Danny breathed deeply of the bracing air.

  Red prowled off to investigate scents, and Boss and Danny entered the cabin. It was big, with a combined kitchen-dining room and a bedroom with six built-in bunks. Mouse-proof cupboards were still intact and an unmarked film of dust lay heavily over everything.

  “Nobody been here for a long spell,” Ross observed.

  He checked the cabin’s supply of flour, and the various dried vegetables and fr
uits that had been stored in sealed cans. None of it had been touched.

  Catching up the two tin pails that were upended on a wooden bench, Danny walked to the creek and filled them. He washed the furniture, cupboards, and the top of the stove, with a damp cloth. Then he spilled water on the floor and scrubbed vigorously with an old broom. When he was finished it was clean enough for the present; they would finish when they came to live in it.

  Late in the afternoon, with Red running beside him, Danny rode one of the horses and drove another back to the old cabin. He locked the chickens in their coop, and the next morning put them into two slatted crates. The yellow hen’s half-feathered chicks he put into a box with their mother. Lashing one crate on each side of the free horse, he tied the box on top, and carried them up to Budgegummon. There the chickens were locked in one of the sheds, where they would stay until they became accustomed to their new home.

  Hungrily Danny sat down to the meal Ross had ready for him. There were trout fried to a crisp golden-brown, potatoes garnished with wild watercress, wild honey, hot biscuits, and wild blackberries. Danny said little until he pushed his empty plate back.

  “Well, we’re almost moved, Pappy. Of course, there’s still the garden and the two pigs.”

  “Yeah. Be a job drivin’ ‘em up here, too. Sure wish we could butcher ‘em and bring ‘em that way, but the weather’s too warm yet and meat will spoil.”

  “I think I can drive ‘em up,” said Danny. “Red and I will go back this afternoon and make an early start tomorrow.”

  The next morning Danny approached the pig pen. Driving both its inhabitants all the way to Budgegummon would be no small feat, but Red was a fair herd dog. He had helped round up Allen’s half-wild cows and, Danny hoped, he would soon get the idea of herding pigs.

  Danny ripped down a section of fence and went slowly into the pen. The two pigs looked suspiciously at him, grunting their questions, then walked unwillingly through the hole in the fence. Danny caught up a six-foot staff and steered them gently toward the beech woods.

  He knew that this first lap of the journey would be the hardest and it was most important not to frighten the pigs or make them nervous. Maybe, when they got the idea, they wouldn’t cause any trouble. Expertly Danny steered them into the woods, the bored Red walking beside him.

  Suddenly, without any warning, a chorus of yaps swelled on the morning air and Mike swept in to help. Danny muttered under his breath, and turned frantically to head off the puppy. He was too late.

  The frightened pigs each chose a different direction as they ran full speed into the woods. Danny emitted one hoarse, futile shout, then broke into a mad run as he sought to head one of the pigs. Hysterically joyful, Mike raced after the other one.

  Red levelled out to run, favoring his injured side and catching his weight oh the other, but running swiftly for all of that. He drew up beside the pig Danny had marked, reached out to take a firm grip on the pig’s ear, and braced all four feet. The pig stopped, and Danny caught up.

  “That fool pup!” he snorted.

  Mike’s clamor was dying in the forest, but he was still hot after his fleeing quarry. Danny pondered. The pig might stand and make a fight, and if he did he could hurt Mike. But it was unlikely that he would, and Danny had at least one captive. He’d better secure it while he could. Red let go and the pig whirled to face full-tilt back toward the clearing. He lumbered across it into the pig pen, and lay down in the farthest corner.

  “Watch him, Red,” Danny ordered.

  Red took a watchful stand by the break in the pig pen. Danny ran toward the place where he had last heard Mike, and fifteen minutes later he met the red puppy.

  Having run his quarry as far as he wished, Mike was coming back. Tongue lolling happily, as though he had done a wonderful bit of work, he galloped gayly up to Danny^and leaped around him, evidently expecting congratulations.

  “You!” Danny scolded. “You mutton-headed idiot! A lot of help you are!”

  He turned back, with the weary pup at his heels, and led him down the Smokey Creek trail. Danny turned Mike over to Curley Jordan.

  “Lock him up, will you?” he asked. “He was supposed to be chained, but somebody forgot to do it.”

  Danny returned to the clearing, where Red still guarded the prisoner. He picked up the staff and again urged the pig through the fence. Red stayed watchfully near, swerving to one side or the other when the pig threatened a break. But the ear-grabbing lesson had not been lost; the pig feared the big dog. Danny urged him onto the Budgegummon trail, and up it, but it was late afternoon before he reached the cabin. Ross met him.

  “Where’s the other one?”

  “I wouldn’t know. That fool Mike got on both of them just as I started, and I guess he ran one clean into the next state.”

  Ross grinned. “He does the dangdest things.”

  Danny leered. “You’d think it was funny if he ate your best boot, while your foot was in it. Well, he’s lost us a pig. What are we going to do about it?”

  “Oh, we’ll catch it again,” Ross said. “Let’s put this’n into its pen.”

  The next days were busy ones. They harvested their garden, and used Hide’s horses to haul all the produce up to Budgegummon’s root cellar. But of the lost pig or Mike, there was no sign.

  6. Fugitive

  Mike stood in a corner of the run in which he was now imprisoned and pushed his nose against the wire. The run itself, ten feet long by four wide, led into the building where Mike had his own separate kennel, complete with new cedar shavings for a bed and a trough into which fresh, clean water ran constantly.

  His movements were somewhat hampered by the long chain that was again attached to his collar and to a bolt near the kennel door. The chain worried him. He knew how to get out of the kennel run, but not when he was chained; he had been unable to solve the problem of slipping a collar over his head. Therefore it had been too long since he had been able to run as he wished. The last real fun he had had was when he had chased the pig into the beech woods. Mike remembered that, and had a great yearning to repeat it.

  Mike went into his kennel to get a drink of cold water, and licked at the dish of food awaiting him. It was strange, crumbly stuff, not nearly as good as the meal, meat, and table scraps Danny had fed him, and he ate only enough to satisfy his hunger.

  The red puppy had long since learned the layout of the kennels. He knew the exact number of runs, and the dog that occupied each. Across from them were the stock barns, and Mike not only knew that cattle and horses were kept in them but he had identified each separate animal by its own particular scent. Over all hung a strong smell of disinfectant, and Mike detested the odor thoroughly.

  He was lonesome. Danny and Ross had not been around for many days, but above and beyond that he was thoroughly bored. The kennel run was not nearly large enough to provide an outlet for Mike’s boundless vitality, and curiosity was driving him crazy. He had not yet had a real opportunity to explore this strange place where he was an unwilling prisoner, and he yearned mightily to look around the estate.

  He came back into his run. Sean occupied the run on one side and on the other was a young English setter. Mike turned a calculating eye on that puppy.

  He had tried to entice Sean into a romp, even though both would have to play on their side of the wire that separated them, and had failed to arouse even a spark of interest. Sean had done a lot of premature growing up during the short time he had been in Joe Williams’ hands. He was not the same happy companion that had romped with Mike in the clearing. Mike hoped for better luck with the young English setter.

  He pushed his nose harder against the wire separating the two runs, and whined in an unabashed effort to draw attention. Mike had all an Irish setter’s dignity, but could turn it on and off at will.

  The young English setter had his own ideas. Mischief twinkled in his somber eyes as he sat in the center of his run and gazed steadily toward the dog on his left. Mike barked pleadingly, a
nd crouched with his forequarters on the ground and his rear end in the air. His tail wagged steadily. He barked again.

  As though noticing him for the first time, the young English setter turned around. He squatted in the center of his run, pink tongue showing between his white teeth. Mike barked again, a rolling plea for attention. The young English setter rose and walked steadily to him.

  They sniffed noses through the wire and two tails began to wag happily. The young English setter withdrew, crouched, and bounced about his pen. He looked over his shoulder to see how such a demonstration affected Mike, and saw the red puppy wild with joy. The young setter came back to the fence.

  They reared, each on his own side. The young setter plastered his cheek against the fence, and Mike washed it thoroughly. Then he leaped down, snatched a stick, and began to run with it. Forgetting the last shreds of dignity and abandoning himself to play, the young setter chased him on his own side of the wire. Reaching the kennel, Mike whirled to fly back in the opposite direction.

  Then he got a strange scent and stopped abruptly.

  Three men were coming. Two were Curley Jordan, whom Mike liked, and Joe Williams, whom he did not. The third was John Price, who had not been near the kennels in a long while.

  Mike watched them walk past, but he was accustomed to that because, except when he was fed, everybody walked past his cage. He sat down, head cocked to one side as he watched the men.

  The three men stopped and turned around. Mike wagged his tail to show friendly intent, but made no move to go near. He trusted nobody completely; he wanted to discover these men’s designs before becoming too friendly.

  “This is the one;” Joe Williams said, “an out and out mutt. I haven’t even tried to work him.’.’

  “What are you going to do with him?” John Price asked.

  The trainer shrugged. “I’ve been waiting for you to tell me. If he was mine, I’d shoot him.”