CHAPTER XV
SCIENCE AND SUPERSTITION
For an instant Adrian closed his eyes that he might not see theinevitable end. But--was it inevitable? At the logging camp he hadheard of just such accidents as this and not all of them were fatal.The water in its whirling sometimes tossed that which it had caughtoutward to safety.
He flung himself prone and extended the pole. Pierre's body was makinganother circuit of that horrible pit and when--if--should it---- Thedrowning boy's head was under the current, but his legs swung roundupon its surface, faster and faster, as they drew nearer the centre.
Then--a marvel! The long pole was thrust under the invisible arms,which closed upon it as a vice.
"Hold! Hold! I'll pull you out!"
But for the hard labor of the past few weeks Adrian's muscles couldnot have stood the strain. Yet they did, and as he drew the nearlysenseless Pierre upon the rock beside himself his soul went up in suchglad thanksgiving as he had never known, or might know again. A lifesaved. That was worth all things.
For an hour they lay there, resting, recovering; then Pierre, himself,stood up to see what chance there was for a fuller deliverance. He wasa very sober and altered Pierre, and his drenched clothing added tothe forlornness of his appearance.
"Nothing left but--us. Came nigh bein' only you. Say, Adrian, I shan'tforget it."
"How are we going to get ashore?"
"'Tisn't much harder'n Margot's stepping-stones. Done them timesenough."
Again Adrian was grateful for his forest experience, but he asked withsome anxiety:
"Suppose you are strong enough to do it?"
"Isn't any supposin' about it. Got to. Might as well died in the poolas starve on this rock."
Adrian didn't see that there was much better than starvation beforethem even if they did reach shore, but he kept his fear to himself.Besides, it was not probable that they had been saved from the floodto perish in the forest. They would better look at the bright side ofthe situation, if they hoped to find such.
"I can jump them."
"So can I."
"Don't let go that pole. I mean to keep that as long as I live--'lessyou want it yourself. If you do----"
"No, Pierre, it belongs to you, and doubly now. Which should gofirst--you or I?"
"Draw lots. If that one falls in, the other must fish him out. Only wewon't try it on this side, by the pool."
They carefully surveyed the crossing, almost as dangerous an affair asshooting the rapids had been. Yet, as Pierre had said, they "had to."
Adrian picked a bit of floating weed that had swept within his reachand broke it into unequal portions. The shortest bit fell to him andwith as cheerful a "here goes!" as he could muster he sprang forthe next stone. He made it; more easily than he had hoped, and sawthat his best chance lay in looking straight ahead to the nextlanding-point--and the next--never down at the swirling river.
"Landed! Come!"
Pierre was heavier but more practiced than his mate, and in a fewseconds the two stood together on the shore, regarding the ruins oftheir boat and thinking of what they would not have for supper.
All at once Pierre's eye brightened.
"Say! there's been a camp here. Not so long ago, either. See thatbarrel in the brush? There's an old birch shed yonder. Hurrah!"
They did not linger, though Adrian kept hoping that something fromtheir lost outfit might be tossed outward toward them, even as Pierrehad been; but nothing came in sight and he reached the dilapidatedshed only a few feet behind the other.
"There's a bed left still, but not such a soft one. And there's porkin that barrel. Wonder the hedgehogs haven't found it."
But as Pierre thrust his nose into the depths of the cask heunderstood the reason of its safety.
"Whew! Even a porkypine wouldn't touch that! Never mind. Reckon ourboots'll need greasing after that ducking, or mine will, and it'llanswer. Anything under the shed?"
"Don't see anything. Wait. Yes, I do. A canvas bag hung up high. Musthave been forgotten when the campers left, for they took everythingelse, clean sweep. Hurrah! It's beans!"
"Good. Beans are good fodder for hungry cattle."
"How can you eat such hard things? Should think they'd beenresurrected from the Pyramids."
"Well, I don't know 'Pyramids,' but I do know beans, and how to cookthem. Fall to. Let's get a fire. I'm nearly frozen."
"Fire? Can you make one?"
"I can try and---- I've got to. When needs must, you know."
Adrian hastily collected some dry twigs and decaying chips and heapedthem in the sunniest place, but for this was promptly reprimanded bythe shivering Pierre.
"Don't you know anything at all? Wood won't light, nor burn after 'tislighted, in the sunshine. Stick up something to shade the stuff,whilst----"
He illustrated what he did not further say, by carefully selectingsome hard stones and briskly rubbing them together. A faint sparkresulted and a thistle-down caught the spark. To the thistle-down heheld a dried grass blade and another. By this small beginning theyhad soon a tiny blaze and very soon a comforting fire.
When they were partially dried and rested, said Pierre:
"Now, fetch on your beans. While they're cooking, we'll take accountof what is left."
Adrian brought the bag, refraining from any questions this time. Hewas wondering and watchful. Pierre's misadventures were developingunsuspected resources and the spirits of both lads rose again to thenormal.
"You're so fond of splitting birch for pictures, split me some now fora bucket, while I sharpen this knife again. Lucky for me my pocketbuttoned, else it would have gone to the bottom of that pool. Gotyours?"
"Yes. I didn't fall in, you know."
"Then I don't ask odds of anybody. I'd rather have a good axe, butwhen I can't get my rather I take the next best thing."
Adrian procured the strips of birch, which grows so plentifully tohand in all that woodland, and when Pierre had trimmed it into thedesired shape he deftly rolled it and tied it with stout rootlets, andbehold! there was a shapely sort of kettle, with a twig for a handle.But of what use it might be the city lad had yet to learn.
Pierre filled the affair with water and put into it a good handful ofthe beans. Then he fixed a crotched stick over his fire and hung thebirch kettle upon it.
"Oh! don't waste them. I know. I saw Angelique soak them, as they didat camp. I know, now. If we can't cook them we can make them swell upin water, and starving men can exist on such food till they reach asettlement. Of course we'll start as soon as you're all right."
"We'll start when we're ready. That's after we've had something to eatand have made our new canoe. Never struck a spot where there waslikelier birches. 'Twon't be the first one I've built or seen built.Say. Seems as if that God that Margot is always saying takes care offolks must have had a hand in this. Doesn't it?"
"Yes. It does," answered Adrian, reverently. Surely, Pierre was achanged and better lad.
Then his eyes rested on the wooden dinner-pot, and to his astonishmentit was not burning but hung steadily in its place and the water in itwas already beginning to simmer. Above the water line the barkshrivelled and scorched slightly, but Pierre looked out for this andwith a scoop made from a leaf replenished the water as it steamedaway. The beans, too, were swelling and gave every promise ofcooking--in due course of time. Meanwhile, the cook rolled himselfover and about in the warmth of the fire till his clothes were dry andall the cold had left his body. Also, he had observed Adrian'ssurprise with a pardonable pride.
"Lose an Indian in the woods and he's as rich as a lord. It's theIndian in me coming out now."
"It's an extra sense. Divination, instinct, something better thaneducation."
"What the master calls 'woodcraft.' Yes. Wonder how he is, and all ofthem. Say. What do you think I thought about when I was whirling roundthat pool, before I didn't think of anything?"
"Your sins, I suppose. That's what I've heard comes to a drowningman."
"Shall I help you get birch for the canoe now? I begin to believe youcan do even that, you are so clever."
This praise was sweet to Pierre's vain ears and had the result whichAdrian desired, of diverting the talk from their island friends. Intheir present situation, hopeful as the other pretended to find it, hefelt it best for his own peace of mind not to recall loved and absentfaces.
They went to work with a will, and will it was that helped them; elsewith the poor tools at hand they had never accomplished theirundertaking. Indeed, it was a labor of considerable time. Not only wasthat first meal of boiled beans cooked and eaten, but several more ofthe same sort followed. To vary these, Pierre baked some, in the samemethod as he had boiled them, or else in the ashes of their fire. Heeven fashioned a sort of hook from a coat button and with cedar rootsfor a line, caught a fish now and then. But they craved the seasoningof salt, and even the dessert of blue-berries which nature providedthem could not satisfy this longing, which grew almost intolerable toAdrian's civilized palate.
"Queer, isn't it? When I was at that lumber camp I nearly died becauseall the meat, or nearly all, was so salt. Got so I couldn't eatanything, hardly. Now, just because I haven't salt I can't eat,either."
"Indians not that way. Indians eat one thing same's another. Indianjust wants to live, don't care about the rest. Indian never eats toomuch. I'm all Indian now."
Adrian opened his eyes to their widest, then threw himself back andlaughed till the tears came.
"Pierre, Pierre! Would you had been 'all Indian' when you tackledAngelique's fried chicken! Umm! I can taste it now!"
But at length the new canoe was ready. They had put as few ribs intoit as would suffice to hold it in shape and Pierre had carefully sewnit with the roots of the black cedar, which serves the woodsman for somany purposes, where thread or twine is needed. They had made a paddleand a pole as well as they could with their knives, and having nothingto pack except themselves and their small remnant of beans, made theirlast camp-fire at that spot and lay down to sleep.
But the dreams of both were troubled; and in the night Adrian rose andwent to add wood to the fire. It had died down to coals, but hisattention was caught by a ring of white light upon the ashes, whollydistinct from the red embers.
"What's that?"
In a moment he had answered his own question. It was thephosphorescent glow from the inner bark of a half burned log,and further away he saw another portion of the same log making aghostly radiance on the surrounding ground.
"Oh! I wouldn't have missed that for anything. Mr. Dutton told me ofbeautiful sights he had witnessed and of the strange will-o'-the-wispsthat abound in the forest. I'll gather some of the chips."
He did so, and they made a fairy-like radiance over his palm; butwhile he was intently studying them, he felt his hand rudely knockedup, so that the bits of wood flew out of it.
"Pierre! Stop that!"
"Don't you know what that is? A warning--a sign--an omen. Oh! if I hadnever come upon this trip!"
"You foolish fellow. Just as I thought you were beginning to getsense. Nothing in the world but decayed bark and chemical----"
Pierre stopped his ears.
"I was dreaming of the mere. She came with her apron to her eyes andher clothes in tatters. She was scolding----"
"Perfectly natural."
"And begging me----"
"Not to eat so many half-baked beans for supper."
"There's something wrong at the island. I saw the cabin all dark. Isaw Margot's eyes red with weeping."
"No doubt Tom has been into fresh mischief and your mother haspunished him."
Pierre ignored these flippant interruptions, but rehearsed his dismalvisions till Adrian lost patience and pushed him aside.
"Go. Bring an armful of fresh wood; some that isn't phosphorescent, ifyou prefer. That'll wake you up and drive the megrims out of yourmind."
"'Tis neither of them things. 'Tis a warning. They were all paintedwith black, and all the Hollow creatures were painted, too. 'Tis awarning. I shall see death before I am----"
Even while he maundered on in this strain he was unconsciously obeyingthe command to fetch wood, and moved toward a pile left ready. Now, inraking this together, Adrian had, also, swept that spot of groundclean and exposed; and what neither had observed in the twilight wasplainly revealed by the glow and shadows cast by the fire.
This was a low, carefully made mound that, in shape and significance,could be confounded with no other sort of mound, wherever met. Bothrecognized it at once, and even upon Adrian the shock was painful;but its effect upon superstitious Pierre was far greater. With ashriek that startled the silence of the forest he flung himselfheadlong.
A Daughter of the Forest Page 15