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diff --git a/old/62950-0.txt b/old/62950-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index aebac39..0000000 --- a/old/62950-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,6055 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Timber Treasure, by Frank Lillie Pollock - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - -Title: The Timber Treasure - -Author: Frank Lillie Pollock - -Release Date: August 16, 2020 [EBook #62950] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE TIMBER TREASURE *** - - - - -Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - - - - - - - - - THE TIMBER TREASURE - - - - -[Illustration: Tom arose and shouted to them] - - - - - THE - TIMBER TREASURE - - BY - - FRANK LILLIE POLLOCK - - Author of “Wilderness Honey,” “The - Woods Rider,” etc. - - ILLUSTRATED - - THE CENTURY CO. - New York and London - 1923 - - - - - Copyright, 1923, by - The Century Co. - - Copyright, 1913, 1921, by - Perry Mason Company - - PRINTED IN U. S. A. - - - - - This story has appeared serially in “The - Youth’s Companion,” and my thanks are due - the publishers for permission to reprint it. - - Frank Lillie Pollock. - - - - - CONTENTS - - I The End of a Trail - II Indian Charlie - III The Fish Sharp - IV Burned Out - V Across the Wilderness - VI Defeat - VII Not Too Late - VIII The Treasure - IX Victory - X A Fight in the Dark - XI Fire and Water - - - - - ILLUSTRATIONS - - Tom arose and shouted to them - - Tom rushed in and dragged him out - - The game was up - - Tom caught the half-directed blow - - - - - THE TIMBER TREASURE - - - - - CHAPTER I - - THE END OF A TRAIL - - -The heavy spruce forest broke away into scattered clearings; the -road began to show more sign of use. The shriek of a sawmill began -to be audible through the trees, and then the stage rolled into -Oakley, splashed with mud from wheels to top, and the tired horses -stopped. Tom Jackson crawled out, cramped and chilled with the rough -twenty-mile drive, and looked about anxiously for a familiar face. - -The stage was standing opposite an unpainted frame hotel, where a -group of men had collected to meet it. There were rough woodsmen, -forest farmers, dark-faced French habitants, an Indian or two, -slouching and silent; the driver as he got down from his seat was -exchanging jocularities with some of these, but no one spoke to Tom, -and he saw no one whom he recognized. He had a twinge of anxiety. He -had written to Uncle Phil to meet him that day. There had been -plenty of time, and he had felt certain of seeing either Uncle Phil -or one of his sons. Could the letter possibly have gone astray? - -Tom’s canvas dunnage sack was handed out to him, and his rifle in -its case. He deposited these on the hotel steps, and again searched -the group with his eyes. Becoming certain that he knew no one there, -he applied to the nearest man, a raw-boned, bearded person in the -rough dress of a backwoods settler. He had been talking freely, and -seemed to know everybody. - -“Have you seen anything of Mr. Phil Jackson around here to-day—or -either of his boys?” - -“Don’t believe as I know ’em,” returned the pioneer, looking Tom -over with acute curiosity. “Was you expectin’ to see ’em?” - -“Yes, I wrote them to meet me here, but I don’t see any of them.” - -“Well, the town ain’t very big. You can’t miss ’em if they’re here,” -the other said, encouragingly. - -This had already struck Tom’s mind. The straggling, muddy street of -log houses, frame shacks, three or four stores was barely a hundred -yards long, and then the vast northern Canadian forest closed in -again. Away at the end of the village he had a glimpse of a -good-sized river, yellow and swollen with melting snow. There were -stray drifts of snow and patches of ice still lingering in sheltered -places everywhere, rather to Tom’s surprise, for spring had seemed -well advanced when he left Toronto; and despite the sunshine the air -was full of a raw harshness, charged with a smell of pine and snow. - -He carried his baggage into the hotel and left it there, glancing -into the bar and sitting-room. Emerging again, he found the knot of -idlers had scattered, and the horses were being unharnessed from the -stage. He walked down the board sidewalk as far as it went, -scrutinizing every face, looking into the stores, with anxiety -growing upon him. Oakley was his uncle’s post-office, but his -homestead was some thirty miles back in the woods, and Tom had no -idea in which direction nor how to get there. - -All at once it occurred to him that they must know at the -post-office. That was the place for information. He had passed it -already; he had seen the sign, and he turned more hopefully back. -The post-office was a general store as well. It was full of a mixed -smell of leather and molasses and tobacco, and there was a group of -fur-capped settlers smoking and talking beside the big stove. Among -them Tom recognized the man he had already spoken with, and they all -stopped talking and looked at the boy with great interest. Tom felt -that they instantly recognized him as from the city, though he had -taken pains to wear his roughest and heaviest clothes, a flannel -shirt and high shoepacks which he had used in the woods before; but -his hands and face were suspiciously untanned. - -The postmaster, a spectacled elderly man, was behind a wire -compartment at the rear of the store, and had just finished sorting -the mail brought in by the stage when Tom approached him. - -“Why, no,” he answered. “I ain’t see Phil Jackson to-day. Fact is, I -don’t believe I’ve set eyes on him all winter. Seems to me I heard -he’d gone away—him and the boys.” - -It was indeed six or eight months since Tom had heard from any of -his uncle’s family, but he had never dreamed that they could have -left the north Canadian ranch where they had been for five years, -and where they were doing prosperously. - -“No, Jackson ain’t gone away,” put in one of the men by the stove. -“Mebbe he don’t come in to Oakley no more, but he’s still on his -homestead.” - -“He ain’t been gettin’ his mail here lately, anyways,” said the -postmaster. “There’s a letter here for him now—been here a week.” - -He reached up to the pigeonholes, and took out a letter, peering at -it through his glasses. With a shock Tom recognized the handwriting -of the address. - -“Why, that’s my own letter!” he cried. “That’s the letter I wrote -him. He never got it.” - -There was a silence in the store. Tom endeavored to collect himself. - -“I fully expected him to meet me here,” he said at last. “Now I’ve -got to get out to his ranch some way. Do you know where it is?” - -There was a difference of opinion. Nobody seemed to be quite sure. - -“I believe he lives over north somewheres,” said the postmaster. “I -dunno.” - -“Down the river, ain’t it?” said another. - -“No, it ain’t,” said a third, decisively. “I know where the Jackson -place is. It’s up on Little Coboconk, just below the narrers. I seen -Dave Jackson there one day last fall. He was gettin’ out -beaver-medder hay.” - -“How far is it? How can I get there?” cried Tom. - -“Must be ’bout thirty mile. I dunno how to get there—’less you had a -canoe. You go right up the river to the Coboconk lakes,” said the -postmaster. - -“Me and my pardner’s plannin’ to go up past there,” said the man who -knew the place. “Guess we could fix it to go to-morrow. We could -take you up, if you know how to ride in a canoe without fallin’ -out.” - -“I’ve paddled a canoe a good many hundred miles,” said Tom -indignantly. “I’d be glad to go if you can take me. How much’ll you -charge me for the trip?” - -The frontiersman glanced sidewise at the boy, and spat against the -hot stove. - -“Run you up for ten dollars.” - -Tom knew well that this was outrageous. If he had been a dweller in -that neighborhood he would have been welcome to go for nothing, for -the sake of an extra hand at the paddles. And about twenty dollars -was all he owned. - -“Can’t afford to pay more than five,” he said firmly. - -“Oh, well; make it five,” said the other, a little shamefacedly. -“We’ll start early—six o’clock, say. You stoppin’ at the hotel?” - -Tom had no other place to stop, though he could ill spare the -additional dollar or two. He went back and engaged a room, and tried -to amuse himself for the rest of the afternoon by looking over the -straggling little backwoods village and its environs. He had seen -others exactly like it, but he had never before been so close as -this to Uncle Phil’s homestead, though he had been many times -invited to visit it. - -Tom’s home was in Toronto, where his father was in the wholesale -lumber business. But there had been a frequent inter-change of -letters between the city and the north woods; Uncle Phil always sent -down a deer in November, and twice the boys, Dave and Ed, had paid a -visit to Toronto. They were three and five years older than Tom, but -the cousins had become great friends, and the tales Tom heard of -backwoods adventure made him regard it as a sort of ideal life. - -Tom had spent his whole life in Toronto, but he did not care for the -city. He had unusual physical strength for his seventeen years; he -had made several summer camping and canoeing trips into the north -woods; he could use a rifle, an ax, and a paddle; and he would -immensely have liked to be old enough to go into the woods, secure a -hundred acres of free government land, trap, hunt, prospect for -minerals. There was iron in those wildernesses, graphite, mica, -asbestos, silver, maybe gold too. There were pulp-wood and pine and -fine hard woods. Dave had found a clump of “bird’s-eye” maple and -obtained three hundred dollars for half a dozen logs. All this -appealed much more strongly to Tom than his present university -studies and the prospect of a subsequent desk in his father’s -office. He came by these tastes honestly enough, for his father in -his younger days had been a trapper, a timber-cruiser, a prospector -in these same woods, until, growing older and making money, he had -settled into a conservative city business. - -Mr. Jackson looked with no favor on his son’s disinclination for -business. There was time enough, however. Tom had finished his -second year at Toronto University, where he had distinguished -himself mainly in other ways than scholastically. He was a brilliant -Rugby halfback, and had come close to breaking an intercollegiate -record for the half-mile. Tom had enjoyed these two college years -hugely, and had, in fact, taken little thought of anything but -enjoyment. His father was not a millionaire, but Tom had usually -only to ask for money in order to get it, and he had spent it with a -tolerably free hand. Thinking now of the sums he had squandered, he -squirmed with remorse. - -The lumber business in Ontario is no longer what it was. Mr. Jackson -was a dour and silent trader, who would no more have brought -business troubles home with him than he would have discussed -household matters with his office staff. He rarely mentioned the -business to his son. Perhaps he hoped that Tom would volunteer an -interest in the business, but it never occurred to the boy to do -this. In fact, as Tom thought of it now, his father had become -almost a stranger to him since he had entered the university and had -taken up a multiplicity of new personal interests, social and -sporting. He met his father only by chance at home, it seemed: at -dinner, rarely at luncheon, on Sundays, sometimes of an evening. Tom -almost never entered the big lumber-yards and office at the foot of -Bathurst Street, and he had spent most of the last two vacations -canoeing and camping near the Georgian Bay with a party of young -friends. - -He had planned to do the same this last summer. A party of college -friends was going north to a club-house that some of them possessed -near the Lake of Bays. It was to be rather an expensive outing; they -were to take three motor-boats, several guides, a cook, and a -princely outfit of supplies. Tom’s share of the expenses came to -upward of a hundred dollars. He applied to his father for a check, -and received a rather curt refusal, accompanied by no explanation. - -It was the first time that he could remember having been denied -money, and he felt bitterly aggrieved. He canceled his plans, -however, and the motor-boats went without him. - -About three weeks later his father summoned him to the office. - -“I guess I can let you have that money after all, Tom,” he said; -and, as he took out his checkbook, he added almost apologetically: - -“I really couldn’t do it when you asked me before. Money was like -blood to me just then. In fact, I don’t know whether the bank would -have cashed the check.” - -“Why, has business been as bad as that, Father?” Tom exclaimed, -appalled. “I had no idea, or I’d never—” - -“The lumber business is pretty well played out in this part of the -country,” replied Mr. Jackson. “It’s only far in the north that -there’s any white pine left, and I’ve always been a white pine man. -I’ll have to go in for pulp-wood, or move west, or shut up shop -within a few years. This spring things were worse than I ever knew -them to be. For a while it really looked as if I’d have to shut up -shop.” - -Jackson had never before said so much upon business affairs to his -son. The revelation came upon Tom like a thunderbolt. Looking at his -father with awakened eyes, he saw for the first time the deep-drawn -lines of age and worry upon the face of the veteran lumberman. - -“Things are much better now, though,” Jackson hastened to say. “I -have a deal or two in hand that should make everything smooth. I -think the worst is over.” - -“I don’t want this money, Father!” Tom cried. “Look here, can’t I do -something? Let me come into the office—or into the yards.” - -“Afraid you wouldn’t be much use there, Tommy. We’re too busy to -break in new hands. No, take your good time while you can. Your -business just now is to get an education. That’s all I want to say -to you, Tommy. Don’t neglect it. Foot-ball is all right, but don’t -neglect the important thing.” - -Tom went away from this interview ashamed, humiliated, and full of -good resolutions. He put the check into his bank, resolved to draw -no more money for personal expenses that whole year, and instead of -going on a holiday trip he, like many other students, secured a job -as government fire ranger in the new country north of Lake -Temiscaming. - -He spent three months thus, mostly in a canoe, and came back brown -and hard-trained in the early autumn, for the collegiate term. His -good condition made him more than ever in demand for athletics, and -his ardor for reform had lost a little of its fine edge during the -summer. Nobody ever studied during the autumn term anyhow, he -reflected, and he played foot-ball assiduously until the season -closed. With the coming of the winter he took a lively interest in -hockey; and not until the end of February did he begin to realize -that he had made an even worse hash than usual of his scholastic -year, and that he would almost infallibly fail to pass the June -examinations. - -With characteristic impulsiveness he dropped all sports, took no -exercise, and plunged heavily into study to make up for lost time. -He burned the midnight oil until daylight came; he grew pale and his -health fell off, and, as a natural result, in March he was attacked -by a serious inflammation of the eyes. He spent a week or so in a -darkened room, and came out under orders not to look at a printed -page for a month, and not to think of study for the rest of the -spring and summer. - -He was thrown into compulsory idleness, and he had the pleasure of -knowing that it was by his own fault and foolishness. He thought -again of suggesting that he take some minor part in the lumber -business; but Mr. Jackson was evidently undergoing troubles of his -own just then. Business was bad again; he was in ill health besides; -he was short-tempered and sarcastic, and Tom’s conscience made him -afraid. His eyes, besides, negatived office work; and at last he -went down and spoke privately to Williams, the yard foreman, for a -job on the lumber piles. - -Williams smiled at first, but when he found that Tom really meant it -he grew serious, and spoke plainly: - -“We couldn’t have the boss’s son in the yard, Mr. Tom; you know we -couldn’t. I couldn’t let you loaf on the job, and I couldn’t drive -you like the rest of the hands. Oh, I know you wouldn’t loaf, but -there’s nothing to learn here anyway. It’s all manual work—lifting -and loading and handling. Stay around with me for a day and you can -learn it all—if that’s what you’re after.” - -Checked again, Tom’s thoughts turned back to the north, where his -heart had always been. It was too early for fire ranging; that work -is not undertaken until midsummer; but he began to think of Uncle -Phil’s homestead in the backwoods, and, little by little, in his -hours of enforced inaction, he formed a plan. - -His eyes were good enough for all outdoor purposes, and his health -needed strong exercise. He would go up and stay with Uncle Phil and -the boys, and help them at the spring cultivation, the logging, all -the forest and farm work. There would be no doubt about his welcome; -another strong arm is always useful in the woods. He would look over -the surrounding country. Within a few months he would be eighteen, -and capable of homesteading a hundred acres himself. Why should he -not do it? There would be pulp-wood on the land, perhaps minerals. -If necessary, he could still return to the city rather late next -autumn, and continue his studies. - -“But I’ll never be any good as a student or at business,” he thought -mournfully. “I’m no good at anything but foot-ball, and paddling a -canoe and shooting and chopping timber. I’d better go in for what I -can do.” - -He ventured to confide part of this project to his mother, who -endeavored to dissuade him, but finally admitted that a summer in -the woods might do him good. He casually introduced the subject to -Mr. Jackson, and got an ironical remark that he would “probably be -no more useless there than anywhere else,” which put an end to the -conversation. It left Tom with some feeling of bitterness. He was -not going to ask for any money; on the contrary, he was going to be -self-supporting. He had enough money in his bank-account for the -articles of outfit he needed, and for his railway fare and for the -stage across to Oakley; and while at his uncle’s farm he would have -no need of money. He left with the casual manner of going on a -pleasure-trip, but he was inwardly determined that it should be -winter before the city should see him again, and that he would have -something definite to show for the time between. - -It had been a great disappointment to find no one at Oakley to meet -him. He had counted on a jubilant welcome from his cousins; but he -ought to have remembered that pioneers do not go thirty miles to the -post-office every week. He would have a little more trouble and -expense; that was all; and he went to bed in the bare, cold hotel -room in the sure expectation of sleeping the next night at Uncle -Phil’s farm. - -He was up at daylight, breakfasting early; and when the canoemen -called for him punctually at six o’clock he was ready to shoulder -his dunnage sack and rifle and go down to the river at the far end -of the street. - -They put Tom in the middle, and entrusted him with a paddle when he -assured them that he was used to this sort of navigation. The -Coboconk River was running full and strong with the April freshets -and the melting snows, and the three of them found it stiff work to -propel the loaded Peterboro up against the current. The roofs of the -village passed out of sight, and after the first mile there was no -trace of settlement along the wooded shores. It was a rough, -picturesque country, densely timbered with small pine and spruce and -hemlock, and streaks of snow still lay in the shaded woods. Half a -dozen times they started a flock of wild ducks splashing and -squawking from the water. There was plenty of game in these woods. -Tom had eaten venison steak for supper at the hotel, he felt sure, -though it was called beef out of deference to the game-laws. There -were bears in this spruce wilderness, and deer and lynxes and -sometimes wolves; and muskrats and minks and ermines swarmed along -the streams and in the swamps. - -Toward noon they reached the end of the river, where it flowed out -of the Coboconk lakes, and here they stopped to eat a cold lunch. -There were two of the Coboconk lakes: Little Coboconk and Big -Coboconk, connected by a narrow strait. The little lake, which they -now entered, was perhaps three miles long, and Tom’s destination was -just at the upper end. They skirted up close along the shores, and -the canoemen scanned the shores narrowly. There was no clearing, nor -smoke, nor any trace of a farm. They passed the mouth of a small -river and went on almost to the connecting straits, and then the men -ran the canoe up to a stranded log. - -“Here you are,” said his guide. “See this here trail? That takes you -on to Dave Jackson’s barn, where he put his hay. I dunno just where -the house is, but you keep a-follerin’ the trail and you can’t miss -it.” - -They heaved Tom’s dunnage ashore after him, and paddled quickly on -toward the upper lake. Tom felt indignant and cheated. He had -expected to be landed at his uncle’s door for his five dollars, and -he found himself put ashore with a hundred pounds of dunnage and his -destination indefinitely distant. But the canoe was already out of -sight in the spruce-bordered channel, and there was no help for it. - -It was impossible to think of carrying the heavy canvas sack for any -distance, and so he hoisted it into the low fork of a tree, -intending to get Dave to come down and help him bring it home. He -had brought a few delicacies as presents for the younger children—a -box of candy, a box of dates and figs—and he crammed these into his -pockets, put his rifle under his arm, and started inland. - -There was a sort of trail, as the canoeman had said—a faint -indication of wheelmarks certainly made no later than last autumn. -It was possible to follow them, however, and here and there trees -had been cut to open the way; after perhaps a mile of tramping Tom -came in sight of the barn he expected. - -It was a rough, unchinked log structure, with the door yawning wide, -standing close by a wide flat of long grass and reeds, through which -a tiny stream slowly wandered—evidently the beaver meadow where Dave -had cut his hay. But there was no house in sight, and the woods came -up densely around the beaver meadow, with no trace of either road or -clearing. - -Tom’s heart sank with discouragement. Nevertheless, the barn -indicated that he was on the right track, and the house could not be -very remote. Experimentally he uncased his rifle and fired it—three -shots, the wilderness signal of distress. No woodsman would neglect -to answer that call, and he listened long for an answering signal, -but none came. The whiskey-jacks squalled from the spruces, excited -by the shots, but there was nothing else. - -He struck off, however, beyond the beaver meadow, still in the same -direction he had been going. Within half a mile he came upon a -rushing, swollen little river, doubtless the same which he had seen -flowing into the lake. He followed its shores for some distance, and -then struck away into the woods, on the watch for a blazed trail or -any sign of clearing. But he had been walking in irregular -directions for nearly an hour when he suddenly stumbled into a -half-cleared road and saw the opening of a large clearing ahead. -Full of hope, he rushed forward and then stopped short with a cry of -despair. - -Before him lay a stumpy clearing of perhaps a dozen acres, showing -something green at one end but overgrown with dead weeds at the -other. There was no house, but a great heap of charred timber and -ashes showed where a house had once stood and had been burned down. - -“This must be the wrong place; it must be further on,” Tom muttered, -struggling against a horrible conviction. But he went up and -examined the wreck left from the fire. - -Amid the pell-mell confusion of half-burned logs, joists, and planks -was a litter of tin cans, broken kitchenware, scraps of paper and -cloth. He could not make out any relics of any sort of furniture; -most of the household effects must have been salvaged. There was a -broken iron pot, half full of water and deep red with rust—an old ax -with the handle burned out. Everything showed signs of having been -exposed to the wet a long time. Plainly the fire had not taken place -this spring. It must have been during the winter, or, more likely, -last autumn. - -But surely this wretched place, this tiny clearing, could not be the -prosperous homestead that he had imagined Uncle Phil to possess. He -groped over the rubbish in search of some evidence. He turned up a -scrap of planed board which might have been part of a door-casing. -Letters were cut on it with a jack-knife. They were partly charred -away, but what was left was plain enough, and he spelled the -confirmatory letters “ave Jackso.” It was Dave’s work, he could -hardly doubt; and a few moments later he unearthed a tattered book, -a copy of Scott’s “Ivanhoe,” water-soaked and scorched, but with his -cousin Ed’s name scribbled a dozen times on the fly-leaves. - -Tom groaned. There could be no further doubt, nor hope. It was the -place, right enough; but the house had been burned and the family -had gone, abandoning the claim. Where they had gone he could not -even guess; probably it was far, since none of them had been seen at -Oakley all winter. - -Tom sat down on a blackened log, and tears started into his eyes. -Bitterly now he regretted his rashness in coming on without an -answer to his letter. There was nothing for it now but to go back to -Oakley. He would have to walk. It was thirty miles; and how could he -carry his dunnage? And, once there, he would have to make the still -more humiliating retreat to Toronto. - -He sat there for some time, too confused to be able to think -clearly. It was growing late in the afternoon. He could not possibly -start on the long tramp back that night. But he shrank from the -notion of staying in the neighborhood of that ruined dwelling, where -there was no shelter whatever; and he determined to go back to the -log barn, which would at any rate afford him cover. - -Having a definite notion of his directions, he struck a bee-line -across the woods and succeeded in coming out within a hundred yards -of the old beaver marsh. It was not more than a mile in a direct -line from the burned house, and he investigated the barn with a view -to its possibilities for a camp. - -It was rather better than he had expected. There were great chinks -in the walls, and the roof did not seem tight; but part of the place -had been floored with planks and was partitioned off with stalls for -two horses. The rest of the flooring was earth, damp and muddy, but -at the farthest end was a remnant of the old hay. - -Pulling out scraps of boards from the building, he lighted a fire -just outside the door. Dusk was beginning to fall, and the snap and -glow of the flames lightened the dreariness a little. He went into -the woods and gathered up what dead and fallen timber he could drag -in. It is hard to collect fuel without an ax, but worse yet to have -the camp-fire fail in the night, and he labored until he thought he -had enough to last through the dark hours. He had blankets in his -dunnage pack, but he did not feel equal to the task of carrying it -up from the lake; and he dragged out a heap of hay to the barn-door -and threw himself down upon it. By good luck he had saved a portion -of his noonday lunch; there had been more than he wanted then, and -if it was not much now it was better than nothing, and he ate it -hungrily. What he would eat on the tramp back to Oakley he could not -imagine. He would have to trust to his rifle; but he did not have -the heart to grapple with any more difficulties just then. - -Darkness fell. Through the woods, in the intense stillness, he could -hear the faint rush of the little river pouring over its rocks. Owls -hooted occasionally from the woods. Once he heard the discordant -squall of a hunting lynx; but he was tired out and heart-sick, and -he felt reckless of any wild animal. - -The air grew frosty, and the stars glittered white in the -steely-blue sky. He piled on more wood, brought out all the rest of -the hay he could find, and burrowed under it, with his rifle beside -him; and despite his misery, he fell soundly asleep at last. - - - - - CHAPTER II - - INDIAN CHARLIE - - -Tom awoke with a vague sense of impending disaster, and looked -about, unable for a moment to realize where he was. It was just -dawn. A gray light hung over the woods. The remains of his fire -barely smoked, and frost lay white as snow over everything. Then he -remembered—the journey, the wreck of the burned house, the ruin of -all his plans; and he got up from his nest of hay, unable to remain -quiet. - -He built up the fire again, feeling empty and miserable. His supper -had been a poor one, and there was nothing for breakfast. Perhaps he -might shoot a partridge, he thought, but he felt too inert and -lifeless to go on the hunt. At this point he recollected the boxes -of dates and candy he had with him, and he got them out and devoured -them. It was a queer breakfast, but it comforted his stomach -considerably. The heat of the fire began to take the chill out of -his blood. Over the trees in the east the sun began to come up -gloriously, and with some renewed courage Tom began to think of the -journey back to Oakley. - -He hated intensely to do it, yet there seemed no other course. It -would be a hard, long tramp besides, lasting more than one day, and -he would have to depend on what he could shoot. The best thing would -be to acquire some provisions before starting; and he filled the -magazine of his rifle from the box of cartridges in his pocket, and -started into the woods. - -He was eager, besides, to explore a little farther before leaving -the place. It was just possible that Uncle Phil’s house was still in -the vicinity. The burned building might have been some unused -structure; the real place might be farther on. He skirted the old -beaver meadow and plunged into the woods—a jungle of small spruces -and jack-pine, much of it dead as if attacked by some disease. A -hare bobbed out from the thickets, incautiously sat up to look at -the intruder, and rolled over the next moment. Tom picked it up and -hung it at his belt, reflecting that here was meat for at least one -meal. - -He listened intently for a possible answer to the echo of his shot, -but there was no human sound. Pushing on, he reached the deserted -clearing, glanced over the fire ruin again, and went on to examine -the roughly cut road he had stumbled into the evening before. - -This trail led him out to the bank of the little river, and ended. -He followed the stream up some rods. Here and there a tree had been -cut at least a year ago, but there were no further signs of -settlement, not even a blazed trail. He made a wide circle with a -radius of a mile and came back to the clearing, unable to cherish -any more hope. This clearing was all the settlement there was. - -He looked at it disconsolately. It was untidy and studded with -stumps. All around its edges great heaps of logs and brush had been -piled up. South of the former house these had burned, and the fire -had penetrated for some distance into the woods, probably catching -from the dwelling. At the farthest end of the clearing there were -about three acres of struggling green, the green of some -autumn-planted grain. Other green sprouts showed near the -ruin—perhaps the relics of a garden. It was not in the least the -sort of homestead he had pictured from his cousins’ descriptions, -and he thought rather indignantly of the exaggerated accounts they -had given him. - -He poked over the rubbish again. The ashes were full of nails and -screws, bits of glass, and bits of iron. He picked up the old -ax-head, and thought of taking it with him. It would be better than -nothing, perhaps, in collecting firewood; but he decided that it was -too heavy to carry. He put the torn and stained copy of “Ivanhoe” in -his pocket; it would be something to read. Nothing else seemed to be -of the slightest value to him. - -There was no use in lingering about the place any longer. He turned -back irresolutely through the woods, and headed toward the river. -Ricks of dead driftwood were piled along its rocky banks. A couple -of swimming muskrats dived in a circle of ripples as he came up. Tom -paused, and as he stood there a lithe black form popped up between -two logs within twenty yards. - -It was a mink, and a large one. Almost instinctively he put up his -rifle and drew a bead on the little fur-bearer’s head. It was -broadside to him, but it was a small mark to hit at that distance, -and a bullet anywhere but in the head would ruin the pelt. He aimed -long, expecting it to dodge away, but it vanished only at the -report. - -He hardly hoped to have hit, but he found it on the other side of -the log, almost decapitated. It was a nearly black pelt and in prime -condition. If it had been trapped it might have been worth twenty -dollars, but the mangled head would reduce its value. He carefully -wiped the fur, however, and skinned the animal, reflecting that this -would help pay the expenses of his ill-starred venture. - -He rolled up the skin temporarily and put it in his pocket, till he -should have time to stretch it, and continued his way down the -stream. There were plenty of traces of fur everywhere. He saw -several more muskrats though no more of the shy minks. But the signs -showed that there were minks there in abundance, and there were -probably martins in the woods, foxes, skunks, and perhaps sables and -fishers. Dave had said that there was plenty of fur in the district, -and he had been right in this, at any rate. - -It would be a splendid place for a winter’s trapping, Tom thought, -and he almost regretted that it was not November instead of April. -The trapping season was almost over now. It crossed his mind that he -might stop here for the remainder of it and make what he could. But -he had no traps, no grub, none of the necessary camping outfit. - -He followed the stream down to the lake, and turned up the shore to -the spot where he had landed the day before. His dunnage sack was -still safe in the tree fork. He opened it and got out the camp -cooking outfit of nested aluminum that he had packed in Toronto. -There were salt and pepper boxes, both luckily full, and he put -these in his pocket, hesitated, and then walked back over the shore -to the old barn again. - -Here he relighted the fire, skinned the rabbit, and set the quarters -to roast on forked sticks. He was voraciously hungry after the long -walk and his insufficient breakfast. While the meat was browning he -carefully cleaned the fat from the mink skin and stretched it on a -bent twig, and then devoured half the hare, gnawing the bones, -sitting back on his pile of hay. - -Despite salt and pepper, it was rather dry and flavorless, but the -meat heartened him wonderfully. He felt equal now to starting on the -tramp to Oakley. He could make fully half the distance to-day, and -finish it to-morrow. He would, however, have to abandon his dunnage. -He might be able to send for it, but it was a poor chance. - -He hesitated, reluctant to go. He crumbled the hay in his hands. It -was good hay—wild rich grass from the flats where the beavers of old -time had their pond. Dave must have made a good profit out of this -hay, he reflected, glancing over the brown meadow beyond him. There -were perhaps eight or ten acres of it, a long oval, with the remains -of the old beaver dam still visible at the lower end. Evidently it -had been mowed last summer, and this wild hay always brings a good -price at the winter lumber camps. - -“This meadow would make ten tons easily,” he said to himself; -“likely more. It’ll bear over a hundred dollars’ worth of hay this -summer, and nobody to cut it. If I want some easy farming, here’s my -chance.” - -The idea came to him carelessly, but it suddenly assumed weight. He -could make something more by trapping in the next few weeks—at least -another hundred dollars. - -“It’ll be hard luck if I can’t get rabbits and birds enough to live -on,” he muttered. “There’ll be trout soon, too. It’s getting warm. -This old barn would be a good enough place to live in.” - -The hay would have to be mowed in July. He would have to cut it, -turn it over, and stack it entirely by hand, but he knew he could -sell it in the stack as it stood. Living here would cost hardly -anything. At the end of the summer he could go back to Toronto with -a hundred dollars or so to show for his time. - -Or why should he not stay up here till Christmas for the early -winter trapping? It would be more profitable than playing foot-ball; -and he could spare the time, for he was going to have to take his -last year’s collegiate work over again anyhow. For that matter, why -should he not keep control of this homestead? It was assuredly -abandoned. It had a clearing, at least one building, some grain -planted, a field of hay. He had wished for such a forest farm. Here -was one at least partly made to his hand. He would be eighteen years -old that summer, and eligible to take a government homestead grant. -If Uncle Phil had made no sign by that time he could apply to have -the rights transferred to himself, and he was perfectly certain that -his relatives had no intention of ever resuming possession. - -He laughed to himself, but with a new thrill of hope. All sorts of -possibilities seemed suddenly to be opening out, just when things -had looked blackest. He got up and walked back toward the river, -thinking hard, more and more fascinated by his scheme. It was wild -enough, but almost anything was better than creeping back in -humiliation to Toronto. There was pulp-wood on the place too, which -he could cut in his spare time. As for the land itself, it did not -promise extraordinary fertility. Much of it was rocky, and the -stunted growth of the trees indicated poor soil. Just south of the -barn ran an immense ridge of gravel lightly overgrown with white -birches. But Tom did not at that moment dwell much on the actual -details of agriculture. - -He went down to the lake shore and brought his dunnage sack up to -the old barn. It was a heavy load to carry on his shoulder, and he -had no tump-line; but he dropped it at the barn-door at last, aching -and played out, so that he had to drop on the hay and rest. He was -getting out of training, he told himself. - -When he had recovered breath, he began to unpack his belongings. -Without having definitely pronounced a decision to stay here, he -went on acting as if the decision had been made. To stop a day or -two would do no harm anyway, he thought, if he could pick up food -enough; and he went into the log barn to see what could be done with -it. - -It could be turned into a shack that would at least be good enough -for the summer, he thought. The chinks between the logs would not -matter much, and he could stop the worst of them with moss. Clearing -away all the loose hay at the farther end disclosed a pile of loose -boards, which would be useful for patching. He might build a -partition across one portion of the building. Under the hay were -also a long piece of very good rope, a bit of chain and a broken -pitchfork, and a number of loose nails. There were plenty of other -nails in the fire wreck. - -Growing interested, Tom made a huge broom of spruce branches and -swept out the litter from the floored portion of the barn and -brushed down the walls. There was a hole in the roof just above. He -climbed up with a board or two and contrived to cover it in a -temporary fashion. In one corner of the old stalls he fitted a rude -bunk and filled it with hay. Unpacking his dunnage, he spread the -blankets he had used on camping trips before, and hung up his -clothing, his aluminum cooking utensils, the few odds and ends he -had brought with him. - -After this, he tramped over to the burned cabin to look for nails. -There were plenty; he quickly filled his pocket, but they were -fire-killed and brittle. They would be of some use, however, and he -secured the old ax-head also. The broken iron pot struck him as -still having possibilities; the lower half at any rate could be -used. He came upon an old tin plate that had not been burned. It -might have been the dog’s dish, kept outdoors; but he was not too -proud to take it; and, laden with this junk, he returned to the barn -again. - -The glow of the fire and the blowing smoke as he came up, and the -litter of his activities gave him a queer thrill of home. In a -couple of days more, he promised himself, it would look still more -homelike. - -He scoured out the rusty pot with sand and water, and cleaned the -tin plate in the same way. The ax-head was in bad condition, but -with two of the hardest stones he could find he ground laboriously -at the edge until some sharpness was restored. The temper was -entirely out of the metal, and so he heated it dull-red in the fire -and then dropped it into cold water. After this hardening he again -ground the edge and reheated it, this time to a brighter red, and -again cooled it suddenly. This treatment produced a rough sort of -temper. The edge held at any rate, and Tom shaped a crude, straight -handle from an ironwood sapling. - -Rough as it was, this ax was an immense and immediate help. He -chopped up a supply of firewood with very little difficulty and was -delighted to find that the edge did not blunt. If anything, he had -made the steel too hard; it had chipped a little. - -His foraging about the ruin had been so successful that he -determined to go back on the morrow and turn over the ashes -thoroughly. There might be many more things that would be useful. -The most worthless rubbish took on astonishing value in his complete -destitution, and he found an extraordinary pleasure in thus -salvaging broken junk and making use of it. - -His mind recurred to the fur trade. By lying in wait along the creek -he might shoot an odd mink, but this was a most uncertain and -wasteful method. He thought of figure-four traps, of deadfalls. - -These are seldom very successful where fur animals are shy and much -trapped, but in this unfrequented spot he thought they might work. -He split up one of the pine boards and whittled out half a dozen -sets of figure-fours, which would fall to pieces at a touch of the -baited spindle. - -Half a dozen whiskey-jacks had been squalling about the roof of the -barn for hours, and he shot one of them for bait. He set two of his -deadfalls beside the tiny creek in the beaver meadow, where there -were muskrat signs, building a little inclosure of stakes and logs -with a heavy timber supported over the entrance on the figure-four -spring. Going through the woods to the river, he set four more traps -along the shore, close to the driftwood where the minks were sure to -pass. - -It was growing late in the afternoon, and he was hungry again. -Remembering that he had nothing eatable but half a rabbit, for which -he felt no appetite, he made a circuit through the woods in the hope -of picking up a grouse. He did start up several; three of them -perched on a tree and sat in full view, craning their necks stupidly -to look at him, but he managed to make a clean miss, and they went -off with a scared roar of wings. With a shot-gun he might have -bagged half a dozen; but no more sitting shots presented themselves, -and he came back to the barn empty-handed. - -The sky had clouded over, and a raw April wind blew. Twilight fell -drearily over the bare woods and the black spruces. Tom cooked his -rabbit and ate it without any great relish. He was very tired, and -felt once more filled with indecision and distress. More than ever -it seemed madness to attempt to remain in this place indefinitely. -To make the discomfort worse, the wind changed so that it drove the -fire toward the barn. He had to put it out, lest the building should -catch fire. Vainly he longed for an interior hearth so that he could -heat the place, but he got into his bunk, piled all his blankets and -spare clothing over himself, and shivered for some time, but -eventually went to sleep. - -He awoke about sunrise, feeling stiff and cold. Once more he felt -that he had been a fool to stay here even as long as this. Already -he might have been back in Oakley, headed for Toronto. - -He built up the fire and warmed himself. There were some scraps of -rabbit left from last night, and he ate them morosely, feeling that -he had carried a diet of rabbit about as far as it would go. This -morning he would have to pick up something better; afterward he -would plan his retreat to Oakley, and when he had finished the -scanty meal he took up his rifle and started toward the river, where -he had set the deadfalls. - -He had a stroke of luck at once. Coming quietly out by the stream he -espied four ducks on the water close to the shore. It was not more -than twenty yards, and he knocked over one, and missed with a second -bullet; then the birds went splashing and squawking away through the -air. - -He retrieved the duck with a long stick, hung it on his belt and -walked up the shore. The first of his traps was untouched. The -second was sprung and the bait taken, but the animal had eluded the -falling log. Tom reset it, rebaiting it with the head of the duck. -He had not much faith in his deadfalls, but the next one was down -and had a muskrat in it—a dark, sleek pelt, quite flattened with the -weight of the heavy timber. - -Tom was unreasonably elated over his prize. It showed that his traps -were good for something after all, and it ran through his mind that -he might set a whole string of them up and down the river. He -skinned the musquash and put the pelt in his pocket; then he walked -slowly up the shore, on the lookout for more ducks. - -He saw no more, but, turning into the woods, he managed to pick a -partridge out of a tree. He followed his former trail toward the -burned cabin, for he wanted to look over the ruins again for -something useful. He laid down his rifle and game, and pulled the -burned timbers apart pretty thoroughly. He took out a number of good -boards that might some time be of service, and found a broken cup, -an unbroken saucer, and a useless table knife, but nothing else that -was worth taking away. - -Walking about the clearing, however, he made a much more important -find. He observed a slight mound of earth, some scattered boards and -straw almost filling a depression in the ground, and he guessed that -it was a last year’s potato pit. It had been emptied, of course, but -Tom burrowed about among the earth and straw at the bottom and was -rewarded by finding, one by one, nearly a peck of rather small -scattered potatoes. - -He yelled with delight. He had grown terribly nauseated with a meat -diet. His mouth watered at the sight of these grubby little spuds. -Taking off his coat, he wrapped them up sack wise in it, and started -back immediately for his barn, which already had come to be home. - -He had a real dinner that day—wild duck roasted in fragments, and -potatoes baked in the ashes and eaten with salt and grease from the -duck. Nothing had ever seemed so delicious. There might be still -more potatoes in the pit—possibly some other vegetables. Stimulated -by the food, his courage revived again, and he definitely resolved -to stay here at least until the end of the spring trapping season. -If necessary he could tramp down to Oakley and exchange a pelt or -two for flour, pork, and sugar. As for a longer stay, there would be -time to decide upon that later. - -He went back that afternoon to the burned cabin to look for more -potatoes, but, after turning the pit thoroughly out, he found only -three. He shot a rabbit, however, that had come out of the woods to -nibble at the sprouting grain in the clearing, and with the potatoes -in his pocket and the rabbit at his belt he walked across to the -river and down the shore. - -A half a mile down, the stream broke into a series of rapids, -swirling among black boulders. The rocks and piled drift logs at the -foot of the rapids looked like a good place for mink, and he stopped -to examine the “sign.” Minks and musquashes dwelt there, surely; -their traces were abundant. He sat down on a log, looking the place -over, considering where he might construct a few deadfalls, when he -was startled by the sudden appearance of a canoe at the head of the -rapid above him. - -It shot into sight like an arrow, steered by a single paddler, a -dark-faced young fellow, with a big pack piled amidships. The -canoeman had not seen him; his whole attention was fixed on running -the rapid; he was half-way down it, going like a flash, when Tom -foolishly sprang up and shouted from the shore. - -The paddler cast a quick, startled glance aside, and it was his -undoing. The canoe swerved, and capsized with the suddenness of -winking. Tom caught a glimpse of the overturned keel darting past -him. The man had gone out of sight in the smother of spray and foam; -then Tom saw him come up in the swirl of the tail of the rapid, -struggling feebly. - -The water was not waist-deep, and Tom rushed in and dragged him out. -It was a young Indian, half choked and perhaps partly stunned, but -not drowned by any means. He coughed and kicked when Tom deposited -him on the shore; and, seeing, that he was safe, Tom made another -plunge and rescued the big bale of goods that was drifting fast -down-stream. The capsized canoe had lodged against a big -half-submerged log lower down, and was secure for the time being. - -[Illustration: Tom rushed in and dragged him out] - -Returning to his Indian, he found him sitting up, looking dazed and -angry, and spitting out water. It was a young fellow of about Tom’s -own age, wearing a Mackinaw coat and trousers, and a battered felt -hat which had stuck to his head, and he looked at Tom with intensely -black and angry eyes. - -“Hello! Feeling better?” Tom cried. - -The Indian boy spluttered a rapid mixture of unintelligible French -and Ojibway. - -“What you do that for?” he swerved into English. “You make me -upset—mos’ drown. I lose canoe—pelts—gun—everyt’ing.” - -“Oh no. I got your stuff ashore, and there’s your canoe yonder,” -said Tom. “Sorry I scared you. I shouldn’t have called out, but -there’s nothing lost, anyway.” - -The Indian got to his feet, went dripping to the rescued pack, and -turned it over carefully. - -“All right, eh? Merci,” he said, his anger dying out. “All my winter -trapping here. Thought heem sure lost. Say, you live here? What your -name?” - -“Tom Jackson. Yes, I guess I live here.” - -“You good fellow, Tom. Me, I’m Charlie. Say, must make a fire, -quick.” - -Both of them were drenched and shivering, and the breeze was cold. - -“Come along over to my camp. Fire there,” said Tom. “We’ll put your -canoe safe first.” - -They pulled the canoe high and dry, rescuing a shot-gun that was -tied in it, and then the two boys took up the heavy pack and started -across the ridge to the old barn. - -The fire was still smoldering, and Tom built it up to a roaring -flame. He hastened to change his wet clothes for dry ones; but -Charlie, who had no other clothes, merely stood in the heat until he -steamed like a kettle, finally becoming passably dry. He said there -was tea in his pack, however, and Tom hastened to get it out. There -was a little sugar, too; and they hastened to boil the tea, and -drank great mugs of the hot, strong, sweet beverage, the first hot -drink Tom had had for several days. - -As Charlie thawed out he explained that he belonged to an Ojibway -village north of Oakley, but he had been trapping far in the -northwest with two friends all winter. They had taken another route -home; he was returning this way alone with his fur pack, and after -selling the plunder he was going to spend the summer at his village. -The boy had been partly educated at a mission station. He spoke both -English and French in some fashion, frequently mixing them, and when -excited he combined them with his native tongue in a manner that -would have shattered the nerves of a philologist. - -He presently opened up his pack of furs, and Tom was astonished at -the showing. There were nearly fifty minks, scores of muskrats, -besides skunks, sables, foxes, fishers, and weasels. Altogether -there must have been upward of a thousand dollars’ worth of peltry, -and all the skins were taken off, cured, and stretched with a -neatness that showed the boy an expert at his craft. There were -several deer hides also, and one bearskin. Charlie told a great tale -of how they had smoked the bear out of his winter nest. - -“You trap, too,” he said, his eye lighting on Tom’s single mink -skin. “Good pelt, if it ain’t shot. Too bad. Ain’t stretched right -neither. You git mebbe seven dollar.” - -“More than that,” said Tom. “Look here, you want to trade? I’ll swap -you that pelt for some of your traps and grub and—what else you -got?” - -“Dunno,” said Charlie cunningly. “What you want?” - -The boys plunged into a war of bargaining, in which the Indian -patience wore out the white nerve. In the end Tom secured four good -steel traps, a little tea and sugar and flour from the remains of -Charlie’s provisions, and a box of matches, in exchange for the mink -and the muskrat skin, an old pair of trousers, and a brilliant red -and green necktie which irresistibly took Charlie’s fancy. - -When it was over Charlie thawed out still more, and his black eyes -twinkled as he looked over his acquisitions. - -“Tom, you good fellow. Say, I show you how to trap. You git heap -mink here.” - -Charlie kept his promise. He stayed three days, looked the field -over, and gave Tom quantities of concise expert advice where to set -his traps and what bait to use. He expounded deadfalls to him—how to -lay blood trails along a trap line, how to stretch and cure the -pelts properly. Altogether his instructions were worth almost as -much as his traps, and during his stay Tom caught another mink and -two muskrats. The boys grew to be great friends in those days, and -then Charlie collected his property again and launched his canoe. - -“_Bo’ jour_, Tom!” he said. “You good fellow. I see you again some -time, mebbe.” - -He went off down the stream, the red and green tie fluttering over -his shoulder. Tom hated to see him go. The old barn by the lake -seemed doubly lonesome now, but the visit had given him the dose of -fresh courage he needed to carry out his enterprise. - - - - - CHAPTER III - - THE FISH SHARP - - -It rained all the next day—a cold, dismal rain that was enough to -depress anybody’s spirits. The fire sizzled and smoked, sending -choking clouds into the old barn, where Tom had to keep under cover. -He employed himself in putting a better edge on the broken ax, and -in trying to reharden some of the old nails he had gathered. Before -another rain could come, he decided, he would construct some sort of -shed over his fireplace, so that it would be water-tight. - -Getting out the old boards from the rear of the barn, he put up a -partial, rough partition so as to make a room about fifteen feet -square near the door. Almost destitute of tools, he made a poor job -of it, but it helped to pass a dreary day. When the rain slackened -once or twice he made brief excursions into the wet woods with his -rifle, returning once with a partridge and once with a rabbit. In -the bad weather the game lay close and was not shy. - -But the next morning the weather had turned mild and sunny and -seemed likely to stay so. Visiting his traps late in the afternoon, -he found two minks in the steel traps, and a muskrat under one of -the deadfalls. He was greatly encouraged and prepared the pelts with -the utmost pains, according to Indian Charlie’s directions. - -Cold as the rain had seemed, yet it brought the spring. The birches -on the ridge began to be shrouded in a mist of pale green, the -maples showed crimson buds, and the patch of struggling grain in the -old clearing began to come on vigorously. Apparently it was autumn -rye, and Tom began to look at it with more interest. It would be yet -another small source of profit, if he stayed to harvest it. - -Spring came on with the magical swiftness of the North. Leaves -sprang from the trees. The snow water left the river, trout began to -rise, and Tom got out his fishing-tackle and secured a welcome -variation of diet. He needed it, for the last of Charlie’s flour and -sugar went quickly, and at last he was absolutely driven to make the -long-projected trip to Oakley. It was a wearisome tramp and worse -still on the return; for he came back on the fourth day, carrying -thirty pounds on his shoulders—bacon, tea, salt, flour, sugar, a saw -and hammer. After his solitude, Oakley had seemed almost -metropolitan, and the village was indeed unusually astir, for a big -dam was to be built there for a paper-pulp factory, and the place -was full of imported laborers. - -The old clearing looked almost like home when he got back. He found -four trapped muskrats and a mink. Nothing had disturbed his -possessions. The grass was beginning to sprout in the old beaver -meadow, and the determination grew in him that he would never give -the place up. He felt sure that nobody would claim it now, and in a -few months he could file homestead papers for it himself. In the -autumn he could return to Toronto and continue his collegiate work -during the winter. He would plant more grain and clear more land. If -Oakley should happen to boom into an industrial town, the claim -might become very valuable. - -He continued his improvements upon the old barn till it had some -suggestion of real comfort. He tended his traps assiduously, making -the most of the short remainder of the season. He lived roughly and -worked hard, living on flour cakes, meat, and fish, and drinking -water. He was a poor cook; he grew very sick of this monotonous -diet, and there were times when he would have traded the best of his -mink pelts for an apple-pie. There were dreary days of cold spring -rain—once of flurrying snow—days that held him idle indoors, when he -grew half mad with loneliness and discouragement. - -The trapping season came to an end. For some time he had noticed -that the fur was deteriorating. He had not done quite so well as he -had hoped, but he had seven minks, sixteen muskrats, two raccoons, -and a fox pelt. With a little luck he might have had a bearskin, for -he caught sight of the animal in plain view within fifty yards, but -his rifle happened to be back at the cabin. - -He had grown thin, wiry, brown, and bright-eyed. He had never been -in such training before, and when he started to Oakley with his fur -he had no difficulty in making the journey in a little more than a -day. The local storekeeper took advantage of the fact that Tom’s -furs were all not thoroughly dried to drive a hard bargain; but the -boy finally secured $180, most of which he was expected to take in -trade. Goods were what he needed, however, and he laid in a stock of -food, ammunition, a new ax, a spade, and a number of miscellanies, -together with what few books he could pick up. It was far too much -to pack back to his farm, and he invested another twelve dollars in -a second-hand canoe—a very dilapidated and much-patched Peterboro, -which looked sound enough for all practical purposes. - -In this craft he made the trip back a great deal more quickly and -comfortably than he had come down. It was late in the afternoon when -he turned up into the little river, now much shrunken, paddled up to -his trapping ground, put the canoe ashore, and struggled over the -ridges with his load of supplies. The old barn stood as he had left -it, but when he approached the door he received a shock. - -Some one had been there—indeed, more than one person. The door, -which he had left closed, was half open, and there were fresh -footmarks all about the place. Tom hastily glanced over his -possessions. They showed traces of having been disturbed, but so far -as he could see nothing was missing. The tracks, going and coming, -pointed toward the lake, and at least two persons had made them. He -could detect one moccasin track, and one showing the print of -leather heels. - -It was growing dusk by that time, and Tom was too tired to follow up -the trail. After satisfying himself that nothing had been stolen, he -unpacked his fresh supplies and reëstablished himself, cooked his -supper, and went to his blankets early. - -Being tired, he slept later than usual, and on arising his mind at -once recurred to his late visitors. He got through breakfast -hurriedly and, taking his rifle, started to follow up the trail -toward the lake. - -It was hard to follow, for the weather had been dry and the ground -was hard. The carpet of pine and spruce leaves under the trees left -little sign, but Tom got the general direction of the trail, picked -it up at intervals, and finally came out on the shore. Some distance -down the beach he caught a faint curl of smoke. Hastening that way, -he came upon the camp. - -There was a small gray canvas tent, a half-dead fire, cooking -apparatus scattered about, a pair of wet trousers hung up to dry, -but no one in sight. Tom called but got no answer. It was, he -judged, the camp of a trout-fishing party, and they were probably -somewhere out on the water. Then he caught sight of a boat drawn -half ashore and went down to look at it. - -It was a flat-bottomed punt, a most unusual craft for the north -woods, but it had a more unusual feature still. A square foot of the -bottom had been cut out and a glass-bottomed box inserted. Tom -perceived its purpose at once. He had seen the like before. It is a -device adopted by nature students for looking into the depths of -clear water; but he had not expected to find a naturalist on the -Coboconk lakes. - -Considerably puzzled, he looked up and down the water and thought he -made out the shape of a floating canoe far up at the end of Big -Coboconk, but he was not sure. Again he shouted two or three times, -and at last he went back to his own place again. Crossing the -gravelly ridge below the barn, he saw the footprints clearly, and -saw too that some one had dug into the gravel and had driven deep -holes as if with an iron bar. Prospecting, perhaps. There was -mineral in the district, Tom knew. He wondered if there might be a -mine on his property. But, if there had been one, Cousin Dave would -surely have discovered it; for Dave had done a good deal of -prospecting, though without any great success. - -Tom half expected another visit from the strange campers that day -and kept within sight of his dwelling, but no one appeared. On the -following morning he went over to the river, got his canoe, and -paddled down to the lake. He went slowly up through the narrows into -the bigger lake, and saw, as he had rather expected, two boats lying -a quarter of a mile ahead and not far from the shore. - -One was a canoe, with a single man in it, doing nothing. The other -boat, the punt, looked empty at that distance, but as he watched it -a man’s head and shoulders rose out of it and then sank again. The -canoeman, leaning over, shoved the punt ahead a little. - -Tom paddled quickly up, highly interested. The canoeman turned and -looked, and then the occupant of the punt rose out of his crouching -position in the bottom. He was a tall man of middle age, with a -black mustache and a square jaw. He was roughly dressed as any -woodsman, yet somehow he did not seem quite to belong to the -wilderness. His assistant was a much less pleasing individual, an -unmistakable frontiersman, rough and slovenly, with a shock of -grizzled reddish hair, and a surly and suspicious face. - -“Hello!” called the punter, in answer to Tom’s hail. “Where’d you -come from? Camping? Fishing?” - -“No, I live back yonder,” said Tom, indicating the direction. “I -think you paid a call there the other day. I was away at Oakley. - -“Oh!” exclaimed the other. “I thought that was Jackson’s homestead.” - -“Yes. I’m Tom Jackson,” returned Tom, quietly. - -Both men looked at the boy curiously. - -“Well, my name’s Harrison,” said the man in the punt. “This is Dan -McLeod, my guide. Is there anybody at your ranch?” - -“I’m there,” Tom assured him, growing somehow uneasy. - -“Yes, but your father? Or any of the rest?” - -“Why, they’re all away for a while,” Tom explained cautiously. “The -house got burned, you see.” - -“And in the meantime you’re holding down their homestead for them?” - -“I surely am,” said Tom firmly. “Sorry I missed you the other day. -Are you on a fishing trip yourself, or—what?” with a curious glance -at the glass-bottomed boat. - -Harrison laughed. - -“Want to see? Take a look, then.” - -Tom leaned over and tried to look, finally getting into the punt and -putting his face close to the glass plate. The water, though deep, -was extremely clear, and the stones and sunken logs could be seen -distinctly on the floor of the lake. - -“Naturalist?” he inquired. - -“Ichthyologist—fish sharp,” said Harrison, nodding. “I’m writing a -series of articles for a sporting paper on fly-fishing, and I’m -experimenting to see how different flies actually look when seen -through water. See here.” - -And he hauled up from the water a long gut cast, decorated with a -number of trout and bass flies placed at short intervals. - -“Studying baits from the point of view of the fish,” he went on. “At -the same time I observe the movements of the fish while feeding.” - -Tom looked at this apparatus with considerable respect. - -“Are you writing for one of the Toronto papers?” he asked. “I know -most of them.” - -“Are you from Toronto?” said Harrison quickly. “You’re not by chance -related to Jackson the lumber merchant there, are you?” - -“Why—er—yes, I am some relation of his,” returned Tom, embarrassed. -He bent to look through the glass again, and a memory of a legend of -the Coboconk lakes came into his mind. - -“Haven’t seen anything of the lost raft down there, have you?” he -inquired, laughingly. - -“Never heard of it. What is it?” - -“Your guide ought to know, if he belongs to this district. Why, a -raft of valuable timber—black walnut—was sunk and lost on this lake -twenty-five or thirty years ago. Everybody has taken a look for it -but it’s never been located.” - -“Sunk? Why, timber floats, doesn’t it?” said Harrison puzzled. - -“Not walnut, unless it’s buoyed with some lighter wood. This raft, -they say, was cut by the Wilson Lumber Company. It was floated with -pine logs, but it got caught in a storm, broke up, and the walnut -went to the bottom—nobody knows where.” - -The “fish sharp” looked rather quizzically at him, as if he -suspected a joke. - -“Some catch in that, isn’t there?” he said. “Never heard of dry wood -sinking before. I’d as soon expect to see an ax float.” - -As a matter of fact, however, the thing had happened exactly as Tom -had said. The “lost raft” had become a tradition of the Coboconk -lakes. It was Dave Jackson who had told Tom the story, and Dave had -searched for traces of the walnut himself. Tom also had thought of -having a look for it when he had nothing else to do. But the -lumbering off of the heavy timber had, as usual, affected the -watercourses, and the lake had shrunk somewhat and changed its -configuration considerably in the last twenty years, so that nobody -now knew exactly where the raft had started from shore. The lake had -a sandy and soft bottom, and it was probable that the scattered logs -had long since sunk deep in the ooze. Experts said, however, that -the timber would not be injured by its long immersion. - -“Well, if you happen to see a pile of walnut logs on the bottom, I -advise you to hook your line on them,” said Tom, laughing. “It was a -big raft, and they say that at present prices it would be worth a -hundred thousand dollars.” - -The ichthyologist gave a cheerfully incredulous laugh, and the -sullen-faced guide grinned. Tom paddled away. - -“Come up and see me again when I’m home,” he shouted over his -shoulder, and Harrison called an acceptance, diving immediately -afterward into the bottom of his boat to peer through the glass -window. - -Tom expected to see his visit returned, but day after day passed in -solitude. Twice he went down to the lake but could see nothing of -the sporting writer and his guide, though the camp was still there -and showed that it was occupied. The weather turned unseasonably -warm, almost hot. Birches and maples were in full leaf, and -mosquitoes began to be troublesome. Once Tom thought he saw human -figures moving about the thickets down toward the lake shore, but no -one came near his shack for a week. Then one afternoon Harrison and -McLeod tramped in from the woods. - -“Hello,” Harrison greeted him. “Sorry we couldn’t get up to see you -sooner. But we’re going away to-morrow, and I thought we’d just say -good-by.” - -“Finished your fish experiments?” Tom asked. - -“Yes—got some good fresh material. I think I’ll make a hit with my -articles.” - -They sat down in front of the old barn in the sunshine. Harrison and -his guide lighted pipes, and for some time they chatted casually. - -“By the way,” said Harrison at last, “how far does this claim of -yours extend? What’s its boundary?” - -“Why, down to the lake,” Tom responded, though he was by no means -sure of it. - -“I see. I suppose you wouldn’t care to sell the place?” - -“I couldn’t. It’s my uncle’s.” - -“Yes, but he seems to have abandoned it. You’ve taken it over. Isn’t -that how it stands? I don’t think your cultivation and improvements -would satisfy the government land agents, though. I don’t know -exactly what your legal position is, but I might pay you something -for them, whatever they are, on condition that you turn the ranch -over to me at once.” - -“What in the world do you want of it?” Tom demanded. - -“It would make a good fishing camp,” Harrison returned. - -There were a dozen places along the lake that were as good, Tom knew -well. He had a strong revival of the queer suspicion that had -associated itself with these strangers. He thought again of the -drill-holes he had found in the sand and gravel. There was something -behind Harrison’s offer. - -“I certainly couldn’t do anything till I’ve seen Uncle Phil or the -boys,” he said firmly. “They might turn up any day; I can’t tell. I -can let you know if they do.” - -“All right,” returned the other, with an air of indifference. “It’s -not an important matter. But your uncle’ll never be back. I heard at -Oakley that he’d left the county. I’d pay a few hundred dollars to -have the place turned over to me, so I could start building a camp. -Fact is, I think I could sell it to a city fishing club for a good -price. Well, do as you like. I’ll be at Oakley for a while. Come and -see me if you’re there.” - -Tom bade them good-by with an appearance of cordiality and -confidence, but inwardly he was in a turmoil of excitement. Harrison -had discovered something valuable on this claim; he felt sure of it. -Perhaps his scientific investigations into the water had been only a -blind. For a moment Tom thought of the lost raft of walnut. But this -would be in the lake, if anywhere, and Harrison’s interest was in -the land. It must be mineral. Tom thought of gold and silver, -graphite and mica, iron and nickel—all of them found now and again -in that district. He hardly dared to go out prospecting just then -himself; he gave the other party plenty of time to get away, and -passed that evening in perplexed planning. But the next morning at -sunrise he hurried down to the gravel ridges where he had seen the -traces of Harrison’s digging. - -First of all he assured himself that the camp was broken and the -intruders really gone. All along the sand of the shore he saw places -where they had been probing deep, as if with an iron bar. But most -of these traces lay farther back. A gravelly ridge, overgrown with -small birches, showed marks of having been prospected from end to -end. - -Tom knew little of prospecting, but he did know that gold was the -only sort of valuable mineral that could possibly be found in that -bank of sand and gravel. He went back to camp for a cooking pan, and -with excited hopes he began to examine and wash out the possibly -precious sand. - -A tiny rivulet cutting across the ridge supplied him with water. He -swirled the stuff in his pan, throwing out the gravel by degrees, -peering eagerly into the bottom for the faintest yellow glitter. But -there seemed to be nothing but mere sand and gravel. He went from -place to place, washing out samples here and there with such -scrupulous care that he felt sure he could have detected the tiniest -flake of metal. He worked from one end of the ridge to the other but -could find no trace of anything but ordinary gravel. - -He stopped, deeply disappointed. Still, he had by no means looked -over his whole claim. Some of the rocks, some of the hills might -show the outcrop of something valuable. He would have to prospect -the whole place; and then a fact came to him that threw out all his -calculations. - -If a discovery of mineral can be made and proved, a claim may be -staked out anywhere, even on homesteaded land. If Harrison had found -mineral he had nothing to do but stake his claim. The rights of none -of the Jacksons could have interfered with him at all, and he could -have had no object in wishing to oust Tom from the property. - -It could not be mineral that Harrison had found. Again Tom thought -of the sunken raft, and dismissed the notion. He sat on the ground, -idly stirring up the gravel with his foot. It reminded him of the -enormous heaps of gravel he had seen piled at Oakley for the -concrete work on the new dams. Wagons were hauling it ten miles, he -had heard; there were no good gravel deposits nearer. And then it -flashed upon him that this gravel itself was perhaps the mineral -that Harrison wanted. - -What was more likely? This great bank of thousands of cubic feet lay -near the lake and could be floated down the river on flatboats and -unloaded right at the required spot, almost without expense for -transportation. Tom felt certain that he had hit on the truth. A -gravel quarry cannot be staked like a mining claim; it goes with the -homestead rights. - -And then Tom remembered that he had no rights in the place at all; -and what the rights of his uncle or of Dave were in the deserted -farm he did not know. But he firmly determined to hold on to that -valuable ground with all his might. What it might be worth he could -not guess, but several thousand dollars’ worth of gravel and sand -ought to come out of that quarry, and the cement workers at Oakley -could use it all. - -Tom spent the next two days in great perturbation and anxiety. He -was tempted to paddle down to Oakley and to make inquiry of every -man in the place for information regarding Uncle Phil; but he -disliked leaving the claim. Harrison might somehow steal a march -upon him. Those days passed slowly and anxiously. A hot wave swept -over the wilderness, as often happens in early spring. The woods -grew dry and smoky through the spring green. Tom slept outside his -cabin for greater coolness. And then on the third day he saw a man -coming up from the lake, and recognized Harrison’s guide, McLeod. - -McLeod, carrying a rifle under his arm, came up and greeted the boy -with a curt nod. Tom felt that some crisis was approaching, and -gathered his wits. - -“I thought you and Harrison had gone back to Oakley,” he said. - -“Left Harrison there,” said McLeod. “I come back. I wanter talk to -you. Now look here! What’s all this? You ain’t young Jackson. This -here ain’t your ranch.” - -“Yes, I’m Tom Jackson, sure enough,” Tom affirmed. - -“No, I knowed all the Jacksons, and there wasn’t no Tom. You ain’t -got no rights—” - -“Look here,” Tom interrupted. He took out a small snap-shot -photograph, taken in Toronto of himself and his two cousins, which -he had carried for a long time pasted in his pocket-book. The -woodsman looked at it scrutinizingly. - -“Looks like you,” he admitted. “And that’s Dave, sure enough. But -that thar pictur don’t give you no rights here. Dave took this -place—bought it off me, he did. He never told me nothin’ about you. -I homesteaded the place first. I built this here barn myself. I sold -it to Dave, and now he’s deserted it I’m goin’ to have it back. -Who’s goin’ to stop me?” - -“There’s plenty more land just as good and better, all around here,” -said Tom. “What do you and Harrison want this for?” - -“Dunno what Harrison wants,” McLeod muttered, with a crafty glance. -“I want it ’cause it’s mine by rights.” - -“Quarry rights?” said Tom. “Gravel rights, eh? Is that the idea? -They’re using lots of gravel at Oakley now, and you could bring it -down from here cheaper than hauling it.” - -McLeod looked a little dazed for an instant. Then he cast a swift, -cunning glance at Tom’s face. - -“Say,” he said, “can’t we split on this? Mebbe I can steer Harrison -off, and—” - -“No, I won’t split anything,” returned Tom curtly. - -“Well, if you won’t, then you’ve got to clear out of here. If you -don’t, we’ll run you off.” - -“See here!” Tom exclaimed. “You just run off yourself. If it comes -to that, I’ve got a rifle, too. I’ve got a right here as the -Jacksons’ representative, and I’m going to stay; and if there’s any -gravel or anything else sold off this place I’ll sell it myself. Now -you get out and tell Harrison what I said.” - -McLeod glowered at him for a moment, shifting his rifle under his -arm. Tom’s own weapon was ten feet away. Then the woodsman shrugged -his shoulders slightly, turned on his heel, and departed without -another word. - -When he was out of sight Tom took his rifle and crept after him. -Arriving at the lake, he espied McLeod’s canoe far over by the other -shore. It was moving slowly downward, and passed out of sight. -Presumably the man was really bound back to Oakley. - -Tom remained on the shore for an hour or two to make sure that the -man did not come back. He felt desperately lonely now and -unsupported. He was uncertain of his rights, with no one to advise -him, with war almost openly declared against him, and with, perhaps, -a small fortune at stake. - -He turned back at last slowly toward his old barn again, turning -plans of defense over in his mind. To his surprise he saw from a -distance that the fire had been freshly built up. A brisk smoke was -rising; the kettle was on, and a humped figure sat with its back -toward him. Tom hurried up in alarm and suspicion, and saw a dark, -familiar face. - -“Fur all sold,” said Indian Charlie. “I come stay with you, Tom.” - - - - - CHAPTER IV - - BURNED OUT - - -Tom gave a loud hurrah, and whacked Charlie on the shoulder. Nothing -could have delighted him more than this reinforcement, just when the -air was full of trouble. - -“You’ve come at the right time, Charlie!” he exclaimed. “I needed -you. But say!” he added anxiously, “have you got any grub?” - -“Got flour, pork, tea,” answered the wild boy. “Beans, sugar too. -Sure, we eat heap. Ketch plenty fish, shoot plenty deer, rabbit.” - -“Shoot maybe more than rabbit,” said Tom, sitting down on the other -side of the fire. “There’s trouble, Charlie. I’m on the warpath.” - -Charlie fixed bright black eyes on him with an interested grunt, and -Tom endeavored to explain briefly that enemies were trying to -dislodge him from his position, which he intended to hold, by force -if needful. - -“Sure, I help you, Tom,” he agreed. “We fight him if he come. You -watch for him—I hunt grub—then we fight. We do firs’ rate.” - -To Charlie’s aboriginal mind it perhaps seemed a reduction of life -to the natural and simple elements of fighting the enemy and getting -something to eat; but Tom was not able to take it so easily. He was -greatly cheered by Charlie’s companionship, however, and he knew -that the Indian boy’s woodcraft would make him most useful as a -provider of game. It would be needed. Tom had none too much -provision, and the two youthful appetites made deadly inroads on the -supplies. - -In fact, Charlie went out before dawn the very next morning and -killed a deer—a feat which Tom had not yet performed. It was out of -season, of course; but Charlie, being an Indian, was exempt from the -game-laws, and they would need the meat. - -It secured their food supply for a long time, and the Ojibway busied -himself in cutting the venison in strips and drying it over a slow, -smoky fire. It made a curiously tasteless mess when boiled, but -Tom’s stomach was grown hardened to unsavory fare, and Charlie could -eat and digest anything, and was anxious only that there should be -enough of it. - -From that time Charlie took charge of the provisioning, and spent -most of the time prowling in the woods, almost always coming back -with a hare, a duck, or some other game. He caught trout; he found -an early nest of wild duck’s eggs, which he robbed without scruple. -He hunted with an old, inferior, muzzle-loading shot-gun, and was a -far worse shot than Tom; but he made up for it by craft, and he -could have lived well in a country where the white boy would have -starved. - -Meanwhile Tom did little hunting. He had lost interest in the -growing grass of the beaver meadow and in the planted rye of the -last year’s field. His thought was concentrated on the quarry claim, -for he felt not the slightest doubt that this was the valuable -point—worth more than all the grain and hay the farm could grow for -years. If he could put through a contract for that gravel and go -back to Toronto with a profit of a few thousand dollars to show his -father he would feel that he had redeemed all his dignity and laid -the basis for a new life. But for the moment he could do nothing -whatever, and it was maddening to feel his inability. He was afraid -to leave the claim. He expected an attack from some direction, but -he did not know where to look for it. Every day he went down to the -lake and looked over the water, but he never saw any sign of a canoe -or camp. - -A week later Charlie had started to the spring for water before -breakfast, when he stopped, stooped, scrutinized the ground, and -came back hurriedly. - -“Somebody been here las’ night!” he announced. - -Tom went to look. He was unable to make out anything where the -Indian boy pointed, nothing but a shapeless indentation in the dry -earth. - -“Yes—you look hard!” Charlie insisted, pointing to one spot after -another; and at last with a cry of triumph he indicated the clear -imprint of a moccasined foot in soft earth just below the spring. - -“An Indian?” said Tom, bending over it. - -“White man,” corrected the trailer. “Indian walk straight; white man -turn out toes like bird.” - -He pointed to his own feet and to Tom’s for confirmation, and -proceeded to follow up the trail with what seemed to Tom a -super-natural acuteness. - -“Him stop here—see—set down gun,” Charlie went on with his eyes on -the ground. “Go on again, close up to cabin. Stop here—long -time—look—listen. Mebbe think steal something. Then him turn -round—go back. Let’s see where him go.” - -But the earth was hard and dry with the long, hot spell, and even -Charlie’s eyes failed to keep the trail more than a hundred yards -from the barn. After breakfast they cast about in a wide circle. -They did not pick up the trail again, but on the shore of the little -river they found a place where a canoe had recently been beached. -Moccasined tracks led away from it and returned. - -There was no way to tell whether the canoe had gone up-stream or -down. Getting into Tom’s canoe, the boys paddled down to the lake, -reconnoitered, and then went up the river for a couple of miles, -without being able to discover any trace of a landing. - -The thought of that mysterious prowler in the dark preyed on Tom’s -mind. He felt sure it must have been McLeod, scouting for a chance -to “run him off.” He decided that a guard ought to be kept, and for -the next two nights he did lie awake till long after midnight, when -sleep overcame him. But there was no further sign of any visitor. - -It might have been, after all, only some stray _voyageur_ or Indian, -attracted by the camp-fire; though in that case he would almost -surely have come in openly. But the effect of the incident wore off, -and the boys settled again to their steady watchfulness, hunting and -scouting. - -The hot, dry weather showed signs of breaking up. The sky clouded; a -strong wind rose a few days later from the northwest. - -“No good hunt to-day,” said Charlie, looking at the sky; but he went -out nevertheless immediately after breakfast, leaving Tom at the -camp. - -He had been gone no more than half an hour when Tom’s nose caught -the smell of cedar smoke. It was coming down the wind, a sharp, -aromatic odor, growing stronger momentarily. He could not see any -smoke, however, and did not pay much attention until in another -half-hour he perceived a dark cloud rising over the woods in the -west and driving across the tree-tops. - -The wind would carry it straight toward the old barn, but even now -he did not feel much uneasiness, for a spring fire in the woods -seldom burns long or does much damage. But the smoke continued to -increase in volume, and the smell of burning to grow more -pronounced. Tom wondered that Charlie did not come back. At last he -went over to the river, carried his canoe up past the rapid, and -paddled up the stream to look at the fire. - -In half a mile the smoke made him stop. It was chokingly dense, -seeming to fill all the woods in front of him. He saw not a flash of -flame, though ashes and live sparks were falling thick, and he could -see them driving in swirls overhead on the gale. - -At this rate it might go clear over the barn and burn him out. It -dawned upon Tom that perhaps McLeod had fired the woods. At that -time of year a casual spark could hardly have started so wide a -blaze. He let the canoe drop down-stream for a few hundred yards and -then rushed into the woods to see if there was any chance of the -fire being checked. - -The smoke of green wood and cedar leaves was still choking and -blinding. He was well in front of the fire now, but a great wisp of -flaming bark dropped from the air almost at his side into a tangle -of half-dead spruces. It flashed up with a roar. Flames drove out -streaming into the green shrubbery, and the resinous leaves of the -evergreens sizzled and burned like paper. He had to draw back again. -A fresh center of conflagration was started; and he realized that -under this roaring gale the fire was bound to sweep unchecked -through the woods, burning whatever would burn, jumping spots too -green or too damp; and nothing was likely to stop it until it -reached the lake. - -He tore back to the river—just in time to save his canoe, for a -cedar bush had caught fire close beside it. Jumping in, he shot -down-stream. He would have to try to save the barn—save his -supplies, at any rate. But he had hopes that the beaver meadow would -act as a fire-break. - -Down the stream he shot, through smoke so dense that he could -scarcely see to avoid the rocks and turns of the channel. He lost -time by having to portage around the rapid where Charlie had come to -grief. Arriving at the usual landing, he observed that Charlie’s -canoe was gone. The Indian had evidently returned, secured his -canoe, and fled. - -Tom rushed across to the barn. Even here the smoke was growing -thick, and hot ashes and sparks were flying far overhead. Back in -the woods fire and wind roared together. A hasty glance into the -barn showed that the blankets were gone, most of the food, the -kettles, his own dunnage sack. Charlie had salvaged the place -already. - -Tom crammed a few small loose articles into his pockets and -hesitated. If he had water, if he could keep the roof wet, it might -be possible to save the barn. But the nearest water was fifty yards -away, and he had nothing to carry it in. Sparks were falling every -moment more thickly. The barn would have to take its chance; he -would better try to rejoin Charlie; and he ran back to the river and -paddled down toward the lake. - -Waves were running high and white-capped over Little Coboconk in the -strong wind, and so dense a haze lay over the water that it was -impossible to see the other shore. Tom lay close to the river mouth -for some time, disliking to venture out upon the rough water. Smoke -began to roll heavily over the trees along the shore, and at last he -paddled out, up through the shelter of the narrow water neck joining -the lakes, and into Big Coboconk. - -Here the smoke was heavier still, and the wind seemed even more -dangerous. He could see nothing at any distance. The gale was -driving him offshore and toward the center of the lake, when he -thought he heard a shout. He paddled toward the sound. A long object -appeared floating on the choppy waves in the smoke. It was a -capsized canoe, with a man astride its keel, clinging with arms and -legs. Tom thought it was Charlie; he drove up to it, but the face -that looked up to him was white. It was Harrison, the “fish sharp.” - -“What, you—?” Tom exclaimed; and then shut his mouth and, frowning, -steered his canoe alongside for a rescue. It is a ticklish business -to transfer a man from one canoe to another. Tom threw his weight -far over the stern, and Harrison managed to climb into the bow -without another upset, though shipping several bucketfuls of water -in the process. - -Tom immediately turned his canoe before the wind and paddled toward -the other shore. The capsized craft vanished in the haze. The boy’s -heart was savage within him. He laid the responsibility of the -forest fire on Harrison and his guide, who had no doubt been hanging -about the lake for days, awaiting their opportunity. - -There was no chance to talk then. It took all his attention to keep -the canoe straight and to prevent it from being swamped by the wind -and water. The other shore loomed up dimly through the smoke. He -could not pick a landing; he had to drive straight ahead. The canoe -grounded heavily. He heard a smash of the delicate wood; then they -both jumped overboard in the shallows and dragged the craft safely -up above the wash of the waves. - -“Made it!” said Harrison breathlessly. “Good thing you came up when -you did. I upset when I was fifty yards from land. I’m not much of a -canoeman.” - -“Where’s your partner?” Tom demanded. “Where’s McLeod? Starting -fires back in the woods, isn’t he? You nearly got caught in your own -trap.” - -“I don’t know what you mean,” retorted Harrison. “We didn’t start -any fires. I thought this started from your own camp. I don’t know -where McLeod is. He went up the river this morning.” - -“Don’t bluff any longer, Harrison,” said Tom. “I know what you are -after. You’re not up here to study fish. You want to run me off this -place. I know all about the gravel quarry. You’ve got a contract for -the concrete work at Oakley, I expect, and you can get the gravel -down from here cheaper than any other way.” - -Harrison stared, and then suddenly began to laugh. - -“Gravel?” he exclaimed. “Why, the Oakley contracts were all let -months ago. I haven’t got any of them. They’re hauling the gravel -from a pit only three miles out of the town. Float it down from -here? And keep a steamboat to haul the barges back empty? You’d -better learn a little about construction work.” - -Tom was taken aback by this convincing denial. - -“What did you want this land for, then?” he muttered. - -“I told you. For a fishing camp. I don’t know that I do want it now, -anyway. It’ll be nothing but ashes and burnt logs after this. I -guess nobody will try to take it from you.” - -Tom was silenced but not convinced. He dropped the subject, and -examined his canoe, which had a good-sized hole punched in the -bottom from collision with a rock as they came ashore. It was beyond -repair. - -“We’ve got nothing to eat,” he remarked, “and no way of getting -anywhere—unless your partner comes back, or unless I can locate -mine.” - -“I saw somebody that looked like that Indian youngster of yours,” -said Harrison, “just before I started out. He was paddling pretty -fast up the lake in a loaded canoe. If he’s got away with all your -outfit you’ll never see him back again.” - -Tom had more confidence in Charlie, but the surface of Big Coboconk -was shrouded in whirling vapor, and it would be impossible for -anybody to find anything, except by chance. The fire had burned down -close to the other shore now and seemed to be working down toward -the narrows. Ashes and sparks sifted down even where they stood, but -there was not much danger of the fire jumping the lake. In the hope -of sighting either Charlie or McLeod, they established themselves on -the point of a rocky promontory and stared through the bluish smoke -drift, but without sighting any canoe. Harrison seemed to hold no -grudge for Tom’s suspicions and talked easily, but Tom could not rid -himself of a sense of hostility. He felt beaten. His barn was -certainly burned; the beaver-meadow hay would be scorched and -probably ruined; the whole homestead was uninhabitable now. He would -have to find another or go home. As for the gravel quarry, -Harrison’s words had sounded only too genuine. Probably the gravel -was really of no value, after all. - -They both grew very hungry, with nothing to eat. So far as they -could judge, the fire seemed to be burning down along Little -Coboconk, over a wide area, but the wind was perceptibly falling. -Toward the middle of the afternoon Tom was startled by a prolonged, -sullen reverberation that seemed to come from overhead. - -“Thunder!” exclaimed Harrison. “Can it be going to rain? It’s too -good to be true.” - -Above the smoke clouds the sky was invisible, but within fifteen -minutes the rain did begin to sprinkle and then came in torrents. It -lasted three quarters of an hour, and then the thunderstorm seemed -to move away westward, though the rain continued to fall in a steady -soaking drizzle. - -The two castaways sheltered themselves under a great thick spruce, -which the rain scarcely penetrated. The rain made the smoke hang -lower, and it seemed to be mixed with steam—an impenetrable, reeking -gray smother over the whole lake and the forest. But it was certain -that the fire would go no further, with the wind falling and the -woods wet. - -For an hour or so they stood wretchedly under the big spruce. The -fine drizzle penetrated the leaves at last, but it did not make much -difference, as both of them were wet already to the skin. Harrison’s -spirits flagged at last, and they said little, gazing out into the -ghostly white drift of smoke and steam and rain. - -“This won’t do,” Harrison exclaimed at last. “We’ve got to have -something to eat—got to have a canoe. My canoe must have drifted -ashore somewhere, and there was a package of grub tied in it. It’ll -be soaked, but we can make something out of it. Let’s look for it.” - -Tom agreed. Anything was better than standing there any longer -hungry and shivering. They separated, Harrison going down toward the -narrows, and Tom toward the upper end of the lake, and whoever -discovered the canoe was to paddle in search of the other. - -Tom discovered the lost canoe within a hundred yards, lying stranded -upside down on the shore gravel. If they had only known it they -might have left the place at any time that day. The food was gone, -though. Only a string loop and the soaked relic of a paper package -was left, greatly to Tom’s disappointment. But with the canoe he -felt sure of being able to locate Charlie, who must have plenty of -supplies with him. - -Tom righted and launched the canoe, and shouted for Harrison, but -the man was out of hearing. A spare paddle was lashed in the canoe, -and Tom got aboard and struck out. It occurred to him that he might -as well scout about for Charlie before rejoining Harrison, and he -paddled out into the wet reek that overhung the lake. - -He followed up the shore a little way and then struck straight -across. At intervals he shouted, but got no answer. The other shore -of the lake presently loomed up mistily, a desolation of wet ashes, -tangles of half-burned thickets and steaming, smoking spruces. He -half expected to find Charlie searching for him along this shore, -and he paddled downward, looking out sharply for a canoe. - -Nothing like a canoe showed, either on the water or ashore. Growing -more anxious, for he was desperately hungry, Tom followed the shore -down till he came to the narrows connecting the two lakes. At one -time, not so long ago, these two lakes had been one, and the land -about the narrows was low and sandy, cut with swampy hollows and -densely overgrown with small evergreens. But the fire had swept over -it, and the spruces and jack-pines were only stubs and skeletons -with all their twigs and leafage burned away, leaving only the damp -trunks standing amid sand, ashes, and ancient logs half buried in -the earth. - -As he came up Tom thought he dimly spied a canoe drawn ashore, and -paddled up to it. But it was only a great log, laid bare by the -burning off of the thickets. He drew up alongside it and stared -about. Harrison was nowhere within his restricted area of vision, -nor Charlie either, and it was hardly likely that the Indian boy -would have gone down into the lower lake. - -Tom sat there for a minute, discouraged, absently contemplating the -scattered logs. Half consciously he realized that there were a great -many of them, mostly showing above ground, that the ends of all of -them were sawed square across, as if they had been cut by lumbermen. -On the end of the log nearest him he noticed that the letters “D W” -had been roughly cut with a tool. - -What could “D W” stand for? The name of Daniel Wilson floated into -his mind, but for a moment the name conveyed nothing to him, and he -did not know where he had heard it. And then he remembered. - -It was the Daniel Wilson Lumber Company that had cut the black -walnut raft that had been lost on the lake, as the story said. - -It struck Tom like an electric flash. He jumped out of the canoe, -almost trembling, weariness and hunger forgotten. There were perhaps -a hundred logs in sight, on the surface or almost covered by sand -and mud, and “D W” was cut on the ends of all of them. - -They were blackened by the fire and smoke, but not charred. Between -black of fire and the wearing of age it was impossible to make out -the kind of wood, but Tom whipped out his knife. Chipping off the -outer skin, he saw the unmistakable rich, dark, hard grain. It was -walnut. He had discovered the lost raft—or part of it, at all -events. - -Here it must have sunk in the shallow water near the shore where it -had been driven that stormy night twenty-eight years ago. This point -had formed part of the lake bottom then. Later the water had -receded; the narrows had been formed. A crop of evergreens springing -up quickly had concealed the visible part of the scattered raft from -the few men who ever passed that way. It might have lain there -forever if the fire had not laid it bare. - -Tom tried to remember all he had heard of the loss of the raft. -Walnut had never been a plentiful timber in that part of the -country; but the Wilson Lumber Company, of which Wilson himself was -sole owner, had discovered and cut a small tract of it—five or six -hundred thousand feet, report said. At that time nobody regarded -black walnut as extremely valuable. A market was lacking, and the -rich timber was used for firewood and fence-rails, but Wilson had -got a government contract for wood for gun-stocks for the army. - -The timber was brought out to the head of Coboconk Lake and the raft -built there, to be floated down to Oakley, where at that time there -was a sawmill and nothing else. But the start of the raft was, for -some unknown reason, delayed till too late in the autumn. It was -November when it was finally put together, with plenty of pine logs -to keep it afloat, and launched down the lake. There is a gentle -drift from north to south, and the lumbermen helped with huge -sweeps. - -When they were half-way down the lake a strong northwest wind sprang -up; it turned cold and began to snow. It was then late in the -afternoon. The wind continued to rise, and toward midnight the huge -raft began to go to pieces. The men aboard had to take to their -_bateaux_ and row ashore in a howling storm of wind and snow. - -A blinding blizzard blew all the next day, and when it cleared there -was nothing to be seen of the raft. A search of the shore revealed a -good deal of the pine framework, but all the walnut timber was -finally judged to have broken loose and gone to the bottom. - -That storm marked the opening of a very early winter. In another day -the lake was freezing over. Nothing more could be done, and in the -spring no trace could be found of the lost raft. But the story -became a local tradition, and for years spasmodic efforts were made -to locate it, but never with any success. The lumbermen were by no -means sure just where the raft had been when it broke up in that -dark night; the lake is large, and it had generally come to be -believed that the timber must be sunk too deep in the mud to be -recovered. - -But the change in the level of the lake had brought some of the -former shallows above water. Some of the timber, at any rate, was -there in sight, and it was impossible that it was anything else than -the wreckage of the old-time raft. Glancing over the scattered logs, -Tom thought that there must be thirty or forty thousand feet along -that shore, and there was more, perhaps, buried at a little depth. -Walnut was then worth, in logs, about three hundred dollars a -thousand feet; but if the wood were cut up and dressed in his -father’s Toronto yards it would fetch three or four times that -price. It was a fortune, and not a small one, that was in sight. - -Then suddenly the question of the ownership of the raft struck him. -He was the finder, but, after all, not necessarily the owner. Daniel -Wilson was dead, and his company long since dissolved. The timber -lay on land belonging to his uncle, or his cousin; all the timber on -that land belonged to them, whether standing or lying, and this -would surely cover driftwood. But was this, after all, Uncle Phil’s -homestead; or had he abandoned it; or might it be filed on by the -first comer? - -Tom did not know. It was the problem of the gravel quarry again, -with tenfold intensity. He turned the question over in his mind. In -any event he was determined to cling to this treasure-trove if it -took the last drop of his blood. And at that moment, glancing up, he -perceived Harrison on the other side of the narrows, looking -silently at him across the channel. - -Tom jumped up almost guiltily. Harrison instantly shouted and waved -at him. - -“Have you got the canoe? Come over.” - -Tom got into the canoe. He felt perfectly certain that Harrison had -been watching him for some time—that he knew very well what Tom had -discovered—that he had previously discovered it himself. For a -moment the boy half hesitated to cross over to the enemy; but after -all he had his rifle, and Harrison was unarmed, and moreover he did -not think Harrison was a man to resort to open violence. - -“What were you doing over there, digging up the ground? Find any -grub?” said Harrison with a sharp glance as Tom paddled up beside -him. - -“I thought I’d seen another canoe there, and I went to look. No, the -grub’s all washed away, I’m afraid,” returned Tom. - -“Too bad. Well, we’ll just have to put in a hungry night, I guess, -but we can get out of here in the morning anyhow.” - -He made no further reference to Tom’s prospecting, and they went up -the lake to the place where they had spent most of the day, where -Tom’s own canoe had been wrecked. It was growing dusk already, and -the rain had ceased. The wind had stilled, and the air was thick and -fogged with smoke and damp. - -With difficulty they collected a little dry kindling from the -interior of hollow logs, and managed to start a fire. Fortunately it -was a warm night for the season, since they had no blankets, and the -only possible camping preparations were to pull off armfuls of damp -spruce twigs for a softer couch than the bare ground. - -Harrison was silent, busying himself in drying out a piece of plug -tobacco which he had found in his pocket, and trying to smoke it. -Finally he settled himself back on his _sapin_ and appeared to -sleep. But Tom was determined not to close an eye that night. - -He was afraid of some treachery; he did not know what. He settled -back on his spruce boughs, with his rifle close beside him, and -tried to think out a course of action. Harrison was after the same -thing as himself, and he must know now that Tom knew it. Which of -them had the better legal right, or whether either of them had any -legal right at all, Tom had no idea. He would have given anything -for his father’s advice. He thought of making a bolt for Oakley and -sending out a telegram to Mr. Jackson to come immediately. But he -dared not leave the place, and besides his father would very likely -disregard the wire as a piece of boy’s foolishness. - -Time passed. It had grown very dark. Harrison snored from his couch. -Tom himself was growing very weary, but he was resolved not to let -himself sleep. - -He was desperately hungry besides, faint and miserable. He got up -quietly and built up the fire, feeling chilled. At moments a nervous -panic swept over him. Fifty thousand derelict dollars lay by that -lake, and the gain or loss of them hung on his single wit and skill. -Thinking it over he felt that Uncle Phil or Dave held the key of the -problem. They must be the owners of this land—hence the owners of -the timber. If that was the case, Tom knew well that he would get -his rightful share. But this could not be settled without locating -them. Greatly he regretted now that he had not made more searching -inquiries at Oakley. - -Harrison turned over uneasily and appeared to sleep again. Tom -envied him his rest. His own eyes were desperately heavy, and he -felt worn out with physical and mental fatigue. He must have dozed -then, for presently he roused with a start and saw that the fire had -burned low. Looking at his watch, he saw that it was after midnight. - -Harrison did not appear to have stirred. Tom got up and replenished -the fire again. Lying down, he tried to keep his eyes open, once -more turning over the heavy problem in his mind. An owl was calling -dismally from a tree-top not far away. The soft wailing note mingled -with his confused thoughts, growing more and more confused till they -melted into something dreamlike. - -He awoke next with daylight in his eyes. With a rush of panic he sat -up. The fire was burning brightly. A figure was squatting beside -it—not Harrison. Harrison was nowhere to be seen, but Tom looked -into the dark face of Ojibway Charlie. - -“Charlie!” he stammered, jumping up. “Where did you come from? -Where’s that man? Where’s Harrison?” - -“No see um,” returned Charlie, stolidly. “I see your smoke—come -here. You sleep—nobody else here.” - -With an exclamation, Tom rushed down to the lake. Charlie’s canoe -was there, piled with salvaged outfit from the old barn; but -Harrison’s canoe was gone, and Tom’s own canoe with the hole in the -bottom now lay capsized with almost the whole bottom smashed out of -her. The “fish sharp” had vanished. - - - - - CHAPTER V - - ACROSS THE WILDERNESS - - -Harrison had crept away in the latter part of the night taking the -only serviceable canoe with him, leaving Tom, as he imagined, -without food or means of transport. It might have been a serious -matter for the boy, worn out with hunger, but for Charlie’s -opportune appearance. - -Tom was, in fact, so empty and exhausted that he turned sick and -dizzy, as much with wrath as with weakness, when he realized the -treacherous trick Harrison had played. But after all no great harm -was done, except that Harrison was away now with a long start on his -plan—whatever that was—to get possession of the walnut timber. - -Charlie meanwhile had at once begun to put bacon to toast and the -pot to boil, which he had previously refrained from doing so as not -to waken Tom. Tom was so hungry that he could have eaten the food -raw. In fact he did chew a scrap of raw pork while he waited for the -rest to cook; but after he had consumed an enormous breakfast of -bacon, hard bread, and tea he felt much better, and his spirits -rose. - -Getting into the canoe, they paddled down to the narrows. There was -no sign of Harrison about the place, but Tom thought he saw tracks -that had not been made by himself. He pointed out the half-buried -logs to the Indian boy, and explained that they were valuable stuff. - -“Worth thousands of dollars—more than ten times all your fur catch,” -he said. “Those other men want to get it—want to run us off. We -mustn’t let them have it.” - -The wild boy nodded, and looked at Tom with a sudden spark in his -black eyes. - -“Sure—they try to burn us off,” he said. “I see him—that red-hair -man. He light fire. I see him—too late. I think mebbe I shoot him; -then I think better not. I come an’ git stuff from our camp—look for -you everywhere almost.” - -“Well, I thought all along that McLeod had started that fire,” said -Tom. “But I’m glad you didn’t shoot him. But how we’re going to hold -the fort here I don’t know. It’ll take a lot of men, money, teams, -to get this timber out. Maybe I’d better send you down to Oakley to -get a telegram off to my father.” - -Charlie had no idea what a telegram was. He shook his head. - -“I stay here. I fight um,” he said. - -“You see, this land doesn’t belong to me,” Tom went on, half -absently going over the argument he had mentally rehearsed so often. -“I haven’t any real rights here, I suppose. But no more has -Harrison. This place belongs to Uncle Phil, or maybe one of the -boys. Here they are, Charlie.” - -And Tom took from his pocket the photograph of the group of himself -and his cousins which he had shown to McLeod. - -Charlie looked at it with great interest and grinned as he -recognized the central figure. - -“That-um you, Tom,” he said, pointing. Then, indicating one of the -others, “Who that man?” - -“That’s my cousin Dave.” - -“I know him,” Charlie announced, gazing hard. - -“No, I guess not,” Tom replied. - -“Sure!” Charlie insisted. “I see him this spring. He work in mine -camp, ’way up Wawista, what you call Blackfish River.” - -“You don’t mean to say you saw Cousin Dave there? When?” burst out -Tom. - -“Sure I see him. I stop there for grub. I talk to him. He ask me if -any prospectors up where I trap. Just ’fore I come out—two, three -days ’fore I see you, mebbe.” - -Tom gave an almost hysterical yell of laughter. - -“Good gracious! To think you had the clue to the puzzle all the -while. Charlie, I’ve got to go and bring him quick. Is it far?” - -“I go git him,” Charlie offered. - -Tom thought for a moment. He would prefer to stay himself, but -Charlie could hardly explain the situation; he feared to commit it -to writing. Besides, when he came to think of it, he had no writing -materials. No, he would have to go himself, and he sought directions -from the Indian. - -With intense deliberation, Charlie explained that he had seen Dave -at a small settlement where there was a mine. Its name was something -like Roswick, and it was only two, three days by canoe. It was an -easy road to find, with only one long portage. He could not say -whether Dave was still there, of course; but the camp must have been -just opening for the spring, and it was hardly likely that he would -have left so soon. - -“You go up this leetle river,” Charlie explained, “mebbe half-day, -mebbe day, up to big carry place by long rapid. Make long portage -then. Bad trail over portage—hard to find. But then you hit Wawista -River, and you go up him, and then up Fish River, and come to -Roswick, mebbe two, three days. I go quicker’n you.” - -“I dare say you would,” said Tom, digesting this knowledge. “But if -you help me to hit the long portage I’ll go alone. You stay here, -and keep Harrison from getting away with this timber.” - -“Yes, I lay for him,” said the Ojibway. “Hope he come back. He git -good dose buck-shot next time.” - -“No, don’t kill anybody!” Tom cried; but the Indian looked at him -reproachfully. - -“How I keep um off if I no shoot um?” - -“Well, I don’t know,” Tom admitted. “But if Dave’s where you left -him I ought to be back before those other fellows turn up again.” - -Tom made his preparations to start without delay. He was to take -Charlie’s canoe, and he laid out a due proportion of food—pork, tea, -sugar, flour—enough to last him two or three days. Charlie stirred -up a large pan of flapjack and baked it—enough for one day at any -rate. Long before noon they were ready to start, and Charlie -accompanied him as far as the “long portage” to make sure that he -should not miss the spot. - -The smoke had dissipated; the sky was clearing, and the sun showed a -tendency to come out. The first half-mile of the route up the little -river lay between burned and charred thickets, and then the fire -limit ceased. The stream was low, and several times they had to get -out or make a short carry, and it was afternoon when they reached -the point where Charlie said he should strike across country to the -Wawista. They stopped here to make tea; then Charlie indicated the -direction once more and without a word of farewell faded away into -the thickets, starting back to the treasure he was to guard. - -Two miles due north was the direction, and Charlie said there was an -old blazed trail, “hard to find.” He would have to make two trips, -once with his pack and once with the canoe. The pack was not very -heavy, not more than fifty pounds, and Tom shouldered it and set off -with a light heart. - -The blazed trail was indeed hard to find, and Tom lost it almost -immediately. He did not concern himself much, however, for he knew -that if he kept due north he could not fail to hit the river -eventually. But fifty pounds on the shoulders means much, over rough -ground, and he did not have a regular tump-line. Hard trained as he -was, he had to sit down several times and rest. He gasped, in fact, -and the sweat burst out in streams; but he kept on and finally broke -through a dense belt of willows and saw the Wawista, a broad, slow -stream winding away toward the west. - -He cached his pack in the low fork of a tree, and went back -leisurely for his canoe. This was an even more awkward load to -transport. Its length concealed the ground ahead; it tangled itself -with the underbrush; two or three times he tripped and fell with the -canoe on top of him. He lost his own back trail, and had to drive -straight ahead, so that at last he came out on the river a quarter -of a mile from the spot where he had left his dunnage. - -He secured it, however, and sat down for a final rest before -beginning the canoe voyage. It was growing late in the afternoon. -The sun shone clearly and warmly now. Not a breath stirred the -leaves, fresh and green from the recent rain, and the river flowed -with a peaceful murmur. But a feeling of uneasiness came suddenly -upon the boy, as if he was under the eyes of some enemy. - -It was so strong that he stood up and peered about, rifle in hand. -But nothing stirred in the forest, except two noisy whiskey-jacks -that discovered him at that moment. It was an attack of nerves, he -told himself; but he could not resist a strong inclination to be off -immediately. - -He piled his dunnage into the canoe and started down the river. A -last glance over his shoulder showed the shore deserted; yet the -vaguely uneasy feeling pursued him down the stream. He found himself -continually glancing back without intending it. The sudden splash of -a rising duck made him start violently; but he saw no larger living -thing, and as he rounded every curve there was nothing behind nor -ahead but the empty stretch of water between the wooded shores. - -The voyage down the river was easy. The current ran smooth and -strong. There were no portages, and he made good speed even without -much hard paddling; yet he had not yet reached the junction with the -Fish River when sunset came on. Charlie had said that he should make -it that night, but he had lost time on the long portage. - -Selecting an open bit of shore, he landed and drew the canoe out of -the water. It was a fine, warm night and he did not think it -necessary to build a shelter; he merely built fire enough to boil -tea, and he ate his lunch of hard bread and cold fried bacon which -he had brought with him. For some time he sat by the blaze, -reluctant to lie down. Once more he felt uneasily suspicious; but at -last he rolled the blanket around his body and stretched out to -sleep. - -Several times he dozed lightly, awaking with a nervous start. Clear -starlight was overhead. The dense spruces looked inky black against -the dark-blue sky, and in the light stillness the ripple of the -river sounded loud. - -He lay awake for some time at last, and finally got up and put fresh -wood on the fire. It blazed up suddenly, and he thought he heard a -startled stamp and rush through the dark thickets—probably a hare. - -He was tired and wanted to sleep, but sleep would not come to him. -He thought of the treasure in timber that was to be gained or lost. -Harrison would stick at nothing to gain it, he felt sure. In his -anxiety, Tom felt half inclined to break camp and go through the -night; but he knew that he would gain nothing by wearing himself -out. He got up again and went down to the river, bathed his face, -and drank, looking up and down the long, dark current in the -starlight. Then he came back, feeling less restless, and in time he -succumbed to sleep. - -When he did sleep he slept long, and awoke to find the early sun on -his face. He jumped up uneasily. Everything about the camp was just -as he had left it, and in the clear daylight his nocturnal alarms -seemed the height of folly. Nevertheless, while the breakfast kettle -was heating, he went into the woods where he had heard the sound, -and discovered a certainly fresh, shapeless track. It might have -been a bear track; it might have been made by a sitting rabbit; or -it might have been the tread of a moccasined foot. - -He could not determine nor could he trace it for any distance. -Vainly he wished for Charlie’s skill as a trailer. He decided that -it must have been a bear, and, angry at himself for his nervousness, -he went back to the fire, drank his tea, fried pork, and then -launched the canoe again. - -But the uncanny sense followed him of something’s being on his -trail. It seemed as if a pursuer must be just around the last bend -of the river. A dozen times he looked quickly back, but the water -shone empty in the sun. - -Shortly before noon he arrived at the mouth of the Fish River, -recognizing it at once from Charlie’s description. Roswick lay a -day’s travel or two up this stream, and there he would find Dave -Jackson; at least, he hoped so. He felt as if the end of the journey -was almost in sight, and he headed the canoe joyfully against the -current of the swifter tributary—and glanced quickly and -involuntarily back. - -Nothing was in sight. There could be nothing, he told himself. - -“But I’m going to settle this,” he reflected, after a moment. -“Either something’s after me, or there isn’t. I’ll just wait here a -bit, and end this foolishness.” - -Half ashamed of himself, he dragged the canoe ashore and hid it. -Then he took his rifle, and ambushed himself just at the peninsula -where the two rivers met, well out of sight under a thicket of -willows, and waited. It would be a relief to settle this suspense at -the cost of an hour’s time. - -Silence settled down, except for the rush of the meeting currents. A -mink ran down the shore and into a log heap, popping out again and -into the water, busy about its hunting. A pair of wild ducks came -swimming down the Wawista, dipping their heads deep, and halted -close opposite his ambush. He could have shot the head off one of -them, and he contemplated doing it, to secure a bit of fresh meat. -His suspicions of pursuit were vanishing. He had been there a long -time—an hour, surely. It was scarcely worth while to wait longer, he -thought, when the ducks suddenly splashed into flight, and went off -quacking over the tree-tops. - -Tom’s heart bounded. He caught a glimpse of a canoe coming slowly -down the Wawista. The next moment it was in full view. - -A single man was in it, handling the paddle with the skill of a -practised _voyageur_; and even at fifty yards Tom recognized the -glint of the fox-colored hair under the cap. The paddler paused at -the forks of the river, held the canoe balanced while he looked this -way and that, and then, as if by some intuition, turned up the Fish -River as Tom had done. - -The canoe, hugging the shore, came within twenty feet of the willow -clump, when Tom stood up suddenly, with the repeater at his -shoulder. - -“Halt!” he hailed. - -McLeod cast a sudden glance at him and then dropped his paddle and -reached back like lightning for the gun that stood behind him. - -“None of that! Hands up, now—quick! I’ll shoot!” Tom yelled at him; -and the woodsman slowly put up his hands, with a grin like a trapped -weasel. The canoe drifted backward. - -“Paddle in this way—slow,” Tom ordered. “Don’t make a move toward -that gun.” - -McLeod looked into the rifle muzzle and seemed to hesitate. Then he -suddenly took the paddle and forced the canoe up close to the shore, -where it hung almost motionless in the slack water. - -“Now what are you up to?” Tom demanded. “You tried to burn me out. -Now you’ve been trailing me since yesterday; I know it. What are you -and Harrison planning to do?” - -“Why, I told you I was goin’ to run you off’n that there homestead,” -McLeod growled. “You ain’t got no more right there than that Injun -boy of yourn. I was there first. If there’s anything in it, I’m the -one that gits it.” - -“I know what’s in it,” Tom returned, “and so do you. But you haven’t -got the ghost of a show, McLeod. I know where Dave Jackson is now. -It isn’t over twenty miles from here, and I’ll be back on Coboconk -with him in three days. He’s still got the rights to the place, I -guess. You’d better drop this and go back home, before you do -something that gets you into trouble.” - -“These here woods is free, I guess,” said the man. “And you’ll never -find Dave Jackson where you’re going.” - -But he looked considerably dashed by Tom’s announcement. - -“We’ll see about that,” retorted Tom. “And I can’t have you -following me. I’m going to stop you. I ought to take your canoe, as -Harrison did to me; but you might starve. I don’t want to shoot -you.” - -He reflected. It is a terrible thing to deprive a man of his canoe -in that wilderness, where he may very likely perish before reaching -any point where he can obtain supplies. And it is not easy for even -a good hunter to live on the country. - -“Throw me your paddle,” Tom ordered at last. “It’ll take you some -time to make another, I guess, and you’ll never catch up with me -when I have that start.” - -Under the threat of the rifle McLeod tossed the paddle ashore. With -a long pole Tom gave the canoe a strong shove out into the current. -It went drifting out into the Wawista, turning helplessly end for -end, down the current till it was a hundred yards away. Then McLeod -snatched up his gun and fired both barrels. - -Tom heard the buck-shot rattle on the leaves around him, and -impulsively he fired back, almost without aim. It was a perfectly -bloodless duel, and in another minute the canoe went out of sight -behind the trees of a bend in the stream. - -With a sense of triumph and of infinite relief, Tom launched his -canoe again, and proceeded up the river. He no longer felt uneasy; -that strange instinct of danger was quiet now. He knew that McLeod -could never catch up with him. The rest of the journey should be -easy and safe, and he was impatient to reach the end of it. - -Travel up the Fish River was not so easy, however. It was a smaller, -swifter stream than the Wawista, and more broken by rapids. For an -hour at a time he had to discard the paddle for a pole in going up -swift water, and portages were so frequent that he thought he walked -almost as much as he floated. He did not expect to reach Roswick -that day, but he began to look out for signs of mining-camp work or -prospecting. It was a district of rock and stunted woods, a mineral -country by its look, but he detected no trace of man, and all that -day he pushed on, “bucking the river,” paddling, poling, and -carrying. It was almost sunset when the appearance of a formidable -rapid just ahead brought him to a stop. - -He had gone far enough for that day. He landed, looking about for a -good camp ground; then he determined to carry the canoe and outfit -up to the head of the rapid and camp there, so as to be ready for -the start next morning. After a short rest he made the portage, -unpacked his supplies, and lighted a fire; and the idea came to him -of trying to pick up some small game for supper. He was growing very -tired of fried salt pork. - -Leaving the kettle on the fire, he turned into the woods from the -river. Usually it was easy to find rabbits or partridges almost -anywhere, but he wandered about for a full half-hour, and then, -seeing a rabbit sitting up in the twilight, he missed it cleanly. - -Disgusted at his clumsiness, he turned down parallel with the river, -but the bad luck lasted. He found no game, and dusk was deepening. -Veering out to strike the shore, he found himself a long way below -the big rapid, and he began to walk rapidly up the stream. - -He heard the rapid roaring ahead, and he had almost come to it when -he stopped with a shock. There was a canoe lying at the shore, a -battered Peterboro that he recognized well. - -He sprang back into the shadow of the trees, but another glance -showed him that nobody was by the boat. Rage boiled up in him at -this persistent trailing. There was a paddle in the canoe; he should -have remembered that McLeod was sure to have a spare paddle lashed -in the canoe. But this time he would cripple him effectually. With a -strong shove he sent the canoe whirling down the stream. It would -take a day to overtake it on foot, unless it were smashed against a -rock, and Tom stood with cocked rifle, grimly waiting for its owner -to appear. - -Looking up and down the shore he could see nothing of McLeod. He -grew uneasy. He was about to scout up toward his camp when a -canoe—his own canoe—appeared shooting down the rapid. - -McLeod was in her, steering with magnificent skill through the -dangerous, broken water; and he did not risk a single glance aside, -even when Tom whipped up his rifle and fired desperately. The boy -fired to hit; it was a matter of life and death; but it was like -shooting at a flying duck. The canoe was past in a twinkling, was -down in the tail of the rapid, was almost out of sight, while Tom -pumped the lever of the repeater till his magazine was empty. Then -McLeod swung his paddle high with a far-away, triumphant whoop. - -Tom began to run wildly after him, checked himself, and hurried up -to his camp. But he knew too well what he would find. - -The fire had burned almost out. The kettle was gone. So were his -blankets, his little ax, everything. Nothing was left except what he -carried on him. He was afoot in the wilderness in earnest. - -As he took in this catastrophe, Tom’s heart seemed to sink into his -boots. The river roared savagely over the rapid. He looked round at -the darkening wilderness, and it seemed suddenly to have turned -sinister, murderous. Without canoe or food, he knew that his life -hung by a hair. Plenty of men have died in such a predicament, in -that tangled country, where streams are the only highways. - -McLeod had intended that this should be his fate. Tom sat down -weakly on a log, beside the dying fire. He was likely to leave his -bones there, he thought. McLeod was racing back to Coboconk to -rejoin Harrison. Between them, they would get out the timber without -danger of interruption. Charlie was there, to be sure; but Charlie’s -only idea of resistance was, by weapons, which would probably only -make matters worse. - -But by degrees Tom recovered from the shock. - -“I won’t be beaten!” he vowed to himself. “It can’t be more than -thirty miles to Roswick now. I can do that on foot, following up the -river. I’ve got a rifle and a beltful of cartridges, and it’ll be -queer if I can’t pick up enough to keep from starving.” - -For a moment he thought of trying to trail McLeod in his turn, to -recover one of the two canoes, but he decided that this would be -hopeless. McLeod might be miles away already, and he would surely -push on with the greatest possible speed. - -As he sat there in silence, collecting his nerve, a shadow came out -of the thickets by the shore and hopped dimly about in the twilight. -It was a rabbit. The light was all but gone; Tom could not see his -gun-sights, but he fired. It was almost sheer good luck, but when he -went to look he found the rabbit shot through the body, considerably -mangled by the bullet but eatable. It had come at the very moment to -encourage his resolution, and it would make rations for one day, at -any rate. - -He built up the fire, dressed the game, and set it to roast on -pointed sticks. But he had no salt, and he remembered that unsalted -rabbit is perhaps the most flavorless food on earth. It reminded him -of those first dreary days after his coming to Coboconk Lake. But -the meat had nutriment in it at any rate, and he ate of it -sparingly, reserving the greater portion for the next day. - -Pulling a heap of dead leaves between two logs, he tried to rest, to -sleep; but he was far too uneasy. Without a blanket, the night -seemed cold, despite the fire. His little ax was gone, and he had no -means of cutting logs large enough to make an efficient heat. He -tried to huddle under the leaves, dozed intermittently with horrible -dreams of danger, and at last got up in the gray dawn, feeling -aching and empty. - -The fire had burned entirely out while he slept. There was not even -a spark left in the ashes, and to his horror he found that he had no -matches. He had used the last in his pockets, and the water-tight -box in reserve was gone with the stolen supplies. - -This blow almost took away his remaining courage. Fortunately he had -roasted the whole hare last night, and most of it was still left. It -would last one day. - -“After that, I’ll have to eat raw meat, like a wolf,” he thought. - -But it was as easy to go on toward Roswick as in any other -direction, and he was still determined not to let Harrison win. It -occurred to him that the prospecting season was well advanced; he -was in the mining country, and he might fall in with a party of -mineral hunters at any time. If not—well, he was tough and muscular, -and he could surely endure hardships for a day or two. - -So he put the rest of the cooked meat carefully in his pockets, his -rifle under his arm, and started briskly up the river. There was no -trail, and it was rough going. The margin of the stream was grown -thickly with willow and spruce and cedar, frequently marshy, -sometimes rocky, always hard to get through. From time to time he -had to wade a tributary creek. Worse still, the river went in huge -curves, so that he felt sure he was traveling two miles for every -mile he made westward. - -But he was afraid to leave the guidance of the river, and he -struggled along. He grew very hungry; hare meat was not filling, but -he controlled his desire to eat until noon. Then, after swallowing -far less than he wanted, he clambered into a tall tree on the crest -of a hill and looked anxiously off into the west. - -He could see a long way. It was an infinity of sweeping hill and -hollow, all blue-green with the spruces in the sunshine, smoky, -unlimited, with here and there a gray gleam of rock. Far away to the -right he detected the glitter of a long strip of water—no doubt his -river, sweeping in one of its long curves. - -He stayed there for some time surveying the desolate landscape. -There was nowhere any sign of fire or indication of human life. It -occurred to him that he would do well to make straight across -country to the water, instead of wasting muscle by following the -river around its many bends. He fixed the direction well in his -mind, slid down to the ground, and struck out across the woods. - -For a time he found the traveling easier. The forest was light and -scattered, and the ground firm. Twice he was encouraged by coming -upon what seemed to be an old trail, and once he found prospect -holes dug the season before. - -Feeling sure that he was nearing the end of his journey, he hurried -on gaily till he arrived at the edge of the water he had seen from -afar off. But it was not the river. It was a little, long lake, with -a creek flowing out lazily from near the point where he had struck -it. - -Now he bitterly repented his folly in leaving the river, his only -guide. He had no idea which way it had curved since he left it. It -might be close ahead; it might be a dozen miles away to the left. -But the only chance of safety was to try to find it again, and he -steered off diagonally into the woods to the southwest. The woods -became difficult to get through. He struggled for more than two -miles through dense tamarac swamps, and at last did come upon a -medium-sized river. - -Was it the Fish River? He could not tell. He thought it must be; yet -it seemed too small, and moreover did not appear to be flowing in -the right direction. The sun was sinking low, and all at once it, -too, seemed to be in the wrong quarter of the sky. The woods turned -dizzily around him; all directions seemed to be reversed. - - - - - CHAPTER VI - - DEFEAT - - -He had just sense enough to control his panic. Tom had never before -been thoroughly “turned around,” but he remembered the hunter’s -maxim for those in such a predicament: sit down, shut your eyes for -half an hour, and let things right themselves. - -He sat down and shut his eyes, but things did not right themselves. -The sun dipped below the trees. He was afraid to start in any -direction, and he thought he might as well spend the night where he -was. Indeed, he felt too weak and empty to go farther without -eating. - -He gnawed the bones of his rabbit without satisfying his appetite. -The idea of eating raw meat did not seem so repulsive to him now, -and he stole hungrily into the darkening woods. A pair of feeding -grouse whirred up and alighted together in a tree. It was an easy -shot, but his hands trembled. He missed, and almost wept with -disappointment. Ten minutes later, however, he had better luck, and -he bagged a hare, tearing the body badly with the bullet. - -He skinned and dressed it hastily, and chewed strips of the raw -flesh. It tasted almost delicious, but half an hour afterward he -grew deathly sick and vomited. The fit passed, leaving him weak and -worn out, and too miserable to care whether he was lost or not. - -He had not energy enough to look for a better place for the night, -nor to pull twigs for a bed. He lay down and drew himself together -as well as he could under his heavy jacket, slept a little, awoke -shivering a dozen times, and at last wearily saw the dawn breaking. -There was white frost on the earth. - -The night, however, had restored his normal sense of direction. It -seemed right that the sun should rise where it did, and the light -and warmth brought a little comfort. He ventured to chew a little -more of the raw meat and this time felt no evil effects. Thinking -over the situation, he came to the conclusion that this could not be -the Fish River. He would not follow it but would strike due west in -the hope of running into some settlement or camp. - -So he started again across the woods. The ground grew more broken -and rocky. Creeks flowed down rocky gullies; almost impassable -swamps alternated with boulder-strewn hillsides. Once he came upon -the “discovery-post” of an ancient mining claim. What mineral had -been sought he did not know, but a great pit had been dug, the grave -of somebody’s hopes, long since deserted, and showing no trace of -recent life. - -Half a dozen times during that forenoon he dropped to rest, quite -worn out. Noon did not mean dinner-time. His sickness had not -recurred, but he was afraid to eat much of his uncooked hare, and -only chewed morsels as he stumbled along. So far as shooting any -more game was concerned, luck seemed still against him, and he did -not greatly care. - -The sun wheeled from his shoulder to straight ahead, and began to -sink. He almost lost expectation of getting anywhere at all. Roswick -and the mining-camp seemed a myth. There seemed to be nothing in the -whole world but the endless miles of spruce and jack-pine, swamp and -rock, which he kept doggedly struggling through. - -He was too wearied even to keep up his anger against McLeod, or to -think with any interest of the timber treasure. It was all a dulled -memory. It was only the force of a past determination that kept -driving him ahead. - -The sun went down almost without his noticing it, until the woods -began to grow dark. He threw himself recklessly on the ground where -he happened to be. Probably he could survive that night, but he felt -sure that another one would be his last. But he was so bone-weary -that he slept with merciful soundness, hardly even disturbed by the -cold, till he awoke to find the earth once more powdered with the -frost. - -He arose stiffly, feeling rheumatic twinges, and plodded forward -once more. The weight of the light rifle was growing intolerable. He -was mortally afraid lest he should begin to walk in the deadly -circle of lost men, and he kept one eye on the sun. His mind was so -confused that its changing position disconcerted him sadly. - -Then all at once a sound electrified him—a crashing through the -undergrowth not many rods ahead. It sounded as if several men were -going through at a run. Tom made a staggering rush forward, shouting -loudly. In five minutes he heard running water, and then broke out -upon the shore of a small river. On the shore opposite him he saw -the marks of many heavy boots, but no one was in sight. - -Again and again he shouted, but no one answered. He could only guess -that a party of hunters had gone past after a deer or a bear. -Shaking with exhaustion and excitement, he sat down on a rock to -listen and wait. - -After he had waited half an hour a boat shot up the stream, poled -rapidly by four roughly dressed white men. They ran the boat ashore -close to him, pitched out a collection of picks, shovels, and -dunnage, and were about to rush away when Tom arose and shouted to -them. - -They turned and stared, spoke together hastily, and seemed about to -go on. But Tom’s forlorn appearance must have struck them, for one -of the men came forward hurriedly. - -“We’re in a hurry. Are you in on the rush? Why, what’s the matter?” - -“The rush?” said Tom dizzily. “I—I don’t know. I’ve been on the -trail—lost. Can you give me something to eat?” - -The man stared, darted back to his outfit, and returned in a moment -with a large lump of bread and a slice of meat. - -“Here,” he said. “Eat this. We can’t stop. There’s a big gold -discovery in the next township, and everybody’s on the dead run for -it. Stop here, and you’ll see lots of fellows pass. You’re all right -now. Want anything else? Well, so long!” - -And the prospecting party rushed into the woods, leaving Tom -ravenously devouring the food. It gave him new life. When he had -eaten it he lay back and rested luxuriously, feeling sleepy. He was -near the mining-camps at last, and hope flowed back into him. - -Within ten minutes another _bateau_ came up and landed a little -below him, and its crew vanished in the woods without noticing him. -Close behind that boat came another, its occupants singing and -shouting in French, as if on a lark. - -Tom got up and went down the shore, where the boats seemed to land. -But it was nearly an hour before he saw another party. Then two men -came by in a canoe, paddling fast, scarcely giving a glance to the -boy on the shore. They were almost past when Tom saw clearly the -face of the man in the stern, and he gasped as if he had been hit by -a bullet. - -“Dave!” he exclaimed. - -He was not heard. He shouted again, and fired his rifle in the air. - -“Dave Jackson! Cousin Dave!” he yelled. - -The men glanced curiously back, but the canoe did not stop, and it -disappeared around a bend in the stream. But Tom, electrified with -surprise and anxiety, rushed after it. Rounding the bend, he saw it -far up the river, driving hard ahead with all the force of two -strong paddlers, who were evidently determined not to stop for -anything. - -The ground along the shore was rough and tangled, and he could not -pause to pick his way. He tripped and fell, blundering into thickets -and morasses, struggling on, almost weeping at the thought of -failure at the last inch. - -He would certainly have failed; he could have never have overtaken -the paddlers, but the canoe ran suddenly inshore. The men hastily -unloaded her, shouldered the packs and the canoe itself, and started -into the woods. Evidently they planned to portage to some other -waterway. - -Tom reached the spot of debarkation a few minutes after they had -left it. He struck off on their well-marked trail, and, as they were -bent double under their loads, he had no difficulty now in -overtaking them. Dave Jackson was carrying the canoe, and he stared -from under the inverted gunwale in utter astonishment when Tom -breathlessly hailed him. - -“Tom!” he exclaimed. “It isn’t possible. What in the world are you -doing up here? Surely that wasn’t you who yelled at us from the -shore?” - -“Thank goodness, I’ve come up with you, Dave!” Tom gasped, almost -dropping where he stood. “Hold on! Put down that canoe. I’ve been on -the trail for days—got robbed—almost starved—trying to find you.” - -Then he did drop, dizzily collapsing on a log. Dave set down the -canoe, but his partner, a big, bearded prospector, growled -impatiently. - -“Got no time to stop, Jackson. All them fellows’ll get in ahead of -us. If that young chap wants to talk to you, let him come along -too.” - -“I can’t go another inch,” Tom protested. “And you’ve got to come -back with me, Dave. It’s awfully important. I’ve come from Coboconk -Lake—your old homestead.” - -Dave uttered an exclamation of surprise. - -“My old hay farm? You don’t say! Then you’ve been at father’s farm. -Bet they were glad to see you. Did they tell you I was up this way?” - -Tom stared bewildered. - -“No, there wasn’t anybody there. The place was burned out. I thought -you’d all abandoned it. But never mind that. Dave, I’ve found the -lost walnut raft.” - -“You’re joking!” his cousin ejaculated. - -“Not a bit of it. I saw the timber. It’s ashore now—part of it -anyway. It’s on your land, and you’ve got to come back to claim it.” - -And Tom briefly summarized the story of his adventures. - -“Gracious, what luck!” Dave exclaimed. “I’d looked, off and on, all -around that lake for signs of the old raft, but I never thought of -poking into that swamp at the narrows. But you’re all wrong, Tom. -That isn’t my land. I didn’t even have the land where I put up the -old barn. It was just a hay-making place. I homesteaded a hundred -acres back where you saw the burned shack, but when the shack burned -I let it go.” - -“But wasn’t that Uncle Phil’s place?” stammered Tom. - -“I should say not!” Dave laughed. “Was that what you thought? You -must have thought we were a pretty shiftless lot. I guess your -guides didn’t know where we really lived. Our ranch is west of the -river. You leave it before you come to the lake. There’s a trail -cut, that you ought to have seen. We’ve got a good farm there, sixty -acres planted, house, barns, live stock, and all the rest. It’s -about twelve miles from my old shack.” - -“You don’t mean to say Uncle Phil was living only twelve miles from -me all the time?” cried Tom. “Why, at Oakley they said they hadn’t -seen any of you all winter.” - -“Likely not. I’ve been up here in the camps, and we don’t get our -mail and things at Oakley any more. There’s a new post-office and -store eight miles nearer, started last summer.” - -“But what about the walnut? Haven’t we any rights in it at all?” -asked Tom, in despair. - -“I’m afraid not,” said his cousin, after some thought. “But then, -neither has your man down there who’s trying to get it. He evidently -thinks I own that land. McLeod squatted there for a while before my -time. But he never homesteaded any of it. He wasn’t a farmer. No, -the only person who can claim that raft, it seems to me, is the -Daniel Wilson Lumber Company, that cut it—or its heirs or assigns, -if it has any. If it hasn’t, I expect the government’ll claim it.” - -Tom groaned. He had never anticipated such a flatly crushing -conclusion to the expedition that had almost cost him his life. - -“I’d go to the land agent in Oakley and make a claim,” Dave went on. -“Maybe you can homestead that land where the raft lies. You’re not -old enough? Put it in my name. Go and see father and see what he -says.” - -“But you’ll come back with me, Dave?” said Tom. “It’s a matter of -maybe fifty thousand dollars.” - -“If we get it. But I don’t honestly think there’s a chance. I’ve got -a better thing up here. With a little luck, I’ll make my everlasting -fortune. The samples of free-milling ore out of this new field are -something wonderful. It’s better shot than any timber—that doesn’t -belong to us anyway. Better come along with me, and we’ll make a big -strike together.” - -Tom shook his head. He did not have the gold-fever, and he could not -relinquish hopes of the walnut timber that he had suffered so much -to secure. There was a loud crashing of brush in the distance. -Another party of gold hunters was on the trail. - -“Say, Jackson, we’ve got to be moving!” cried the bearded man, -fuming with impatience. - -“All right—in a second. Look here, Tom, we can’t stop. Your best -plan is to go back there and try to stand Harrison and McLeod off -till you find out definitely what’s right. They can’t claim the raft -any more than you can—unless,” he added, “they’ve gone and -homesteaded the land where the timber lies. That would give them -possession, anyway, and that’s nine points of the law. But they’d -likely have done that the first thing if they had thought it was -open for filing. You go and see father. And look here, I’ll come -down myself as soon as I get our claims staked—in a week, maybe.” - -“All right,” said Tom, gloomily. “But where am I now? How do I get -out of here?” - -“You’re about six miles from the Roswick camp. You made a pretty -good shot at it, after all. Follow this river straight down to -Roswick; then you have to take the stage out to the railway, and -that’ll take you round to Waverley, and you come in to Oakley the -same way as you did the first time. Got any money?” - -“Not a cent.” - -Dave plunged his hand into his pockets. “How much do you want? the -railway fare’ll be about six dollars. Here’s fifteen. Will that do?” - -“Plenty,” said Tom gratefully. “I sha’n’t forget this, Dave, and -I’ll repay you when—” - -“You’ll never need to. I’m going to be a rich man by fall. Now we -really must rush on, or my partner’ll have a fit. Tell father and -mother I’m all right. Sure you won’t come with us yet? You’d -better.” - -“No,” said Tom. “I’m going to see my own game played out.” - -“Good luck with it, then. Good-by!” - -Dave and his partner picked up their loads and vanished crashing -through the underbrush. Tom turned back toward the river, rather -despondently. Physically he felt better; the rest and the food and -the talk with Dave had done him good, but he was deeply depressed by -his cousin’s pessimistic outlook. Still, he was determined not to -let go while there was the slightest chance left. Harrison had no -more right to the raft than he himself, at any rate, it appeared. He -would see that Harrison did not get it, then, until the real -ownership of the walnut could be ascertained. - -He made his way down the river shore, meeting three or four parties -of prospectors, in _bateaux_ and canoes, and one on foot. It took -him a good three hours to reach the mining-camp, where he found -merely a collection of sheds and shanties, a store and a towering -derrick or two. The place was almost depopulated, for all its -inhabitants were on the gold-rush. - -He was able to get dinner at the mine boarding-house, and then hung -about until the stage left late in the afternoon. An hour’s ride -placed him at the railway station, and he boarded a mixed train, -which carried him about fifty miles. He changed to a connecting -line, waited half the night, and once more took the long stage drive -to Oakley. - -It was late in the afternoon, but he was desperately anxious to find -what was going on at Coboconk Lake. By this time Tom was somewhat -known at Oakley, and he was able to borrow a canoe, by paying four -dollars for the accommodation; and, after snatching a hurried meal, -he started up the river. - -Daylight lasted late at that season, and Tom pushed ahead as fast as -possible. The recent plentiful food and rest had restored his -youthful physique to its full strength, and he was expert at the -paddle now. Night found him on the river, however, but an almost -full moon rose immediately after sunset, making it possible to go -on. He was on the lookout for the trail of which Dave had spoken as -leading to his uncle’s homestead, but in the dim light on the shore -he could not pick it out. The house was several miles back, anyhow, -and he had no idea of trying to reach it that night. He wanted to -visit the timber treasure first. - -Little Coboconk spread dark and silvery under the moon as he came -into it from the river. He paddled ahead, straight up to the -narrows, and then paused, checking the paddle. There was a fire on -the shore, apparently a large fire that had burned low, and close to -it in the shadow two or three large white blurs that looked -strangely like tents. - -He went on cautiously, in desperate anxiety. They were tents, sure -enough, two very large ones, and a smaller one. But no one was in -sight about the encampment. It was little after midnight, and -doubtless everybody was asleep. - -Tom could hardly doubt who had set up this camp. All his hopes sank -to nothing; nevertheless, determined to find out the truth, he -paddled up to the shore, landed, and stood looking about for a -moment. He saw that several of the half-buried logs had been dug out -and rolled together, but before he could investigate any further a -tent flap was pulled open, there was a sudden exclamation, and a man -bounded out, half dressed, presenting a revolver. - -“We’ve got you this time! Throw up your hands!” he cried, -triumphantly. - -Tom instantly put his hands up. The man approached. The boy had -never seen him before. He looked like a woodsman or lumber-jack. He -peered into Tom’s face, and uttered an exclamation of surprise. - -“I thought it was that murdering young Injun. Who are you? What do -you want here?” - -“Who are you yourself?” returned Tom angrily. “This is my place. I -was here before you. What are you camping here for?” - -And he took down his hands. Two other men came out of the big -tent—rough lumbermen both of them. - -“Better wake up the boss and tell him we’ve caught some spy prowlin’ -round here, that says he owns the camp,” said Tom’s captor. - -One of the men went over to the smaller tent. There was a sound of -voices; a few minutes elapsed. Then a man came hastily out, carrying -a flashlight, and Tom recognized Harrison, as he had expected. - -But Harrison was far from expecting the meeting. He turned the light -on Tom as he came up, and started. For several seconds there was -silence, while the flashlight wavered. - -“I didn’t expect to see you back here, Jackson,” said Harrison at -last, in his usual easy tone. “I thought you’d gone for good. I only -wished you’d taken that young Ojibway with you. He’s been—” - -“I guess you didn’t expect to see me,” retorted Tom hotly. “You -thought I was dead up in the woods, didn’t you? McLeod did his best. -You tried to burn me out, and you tried to murder me, and now you -come in and steal—” - -“Hold on! That’s a pretty rough way to talk,” Harrison interrupted -him. “You must be crazy. Here, if you’ve got anything to say to me, -come along to my tent.” - -Tom, boiling with indignation, was conducted to Harrison’s -sleeping-tent, where the man turned on an electric lantern, and sat -down on the cot-bed from which he had lately arisen. - -“You’ve got no kick coming at all,” Harrison resumed. “I made you a -proposition to get out, right at the start, even though you had no -particular rights here. I discovered this walnut before you thought -of looking for it—” - -“And then you tried to burn me out, and you sent McLeod to kill me -in the woods.” - -“As for the fire, it was an accident. McLeod? Well, McLeod tells me -that you ambushed him and held him up and threatened to kill him. By -way of a joke, after that, he ran off with your canoe and hid it a -couple of miles down the river. Didn’t you find it again?” - -Tom listened in absolute disbelief. - -“Anyhow, you’ve got no sort of right to take out this timber,” he -said. “It belongs—if it belongs to anybody—to the man who cut it.” - -“And he’s dead. Exactly,” said Harrison. “You see, I took the -precaution of going into all that matter long ago. Daniel Wilson -died ten years ago, but his son is living in Montreal. This son is -Wilson’s only heir. I went to see him, and came to an arrangement. -I’ll show you.” - -Harrison opened a small box, and after rummaging through it, he -produced a large folded document, glanced at it, and handed it to -Tom. - -It was worded in legal phraseology, hard to comprehend; but the boy -made out that Henry Wilson, whose name was undersigned, transferred -to A. C. Harrison all his rights in a certain quantity of walnut -timber supposed to be in or about Coboconk Lake, formerly the -property of the father of the said Henry Wilson. - -“I get it out on a basis of paying him a royalty of ten dollars a -thousand feet, as you see,” said Harrison. “I paid him a hundred -dollars down. It was a gamble, for I wasn’t sure; but I’d been up -here before, and I had an idea of where that old raft might have -drifted. But you see it’s all straight and aboveboard—” - -Tom was hardly listening. The paper appeared to be correctly drawn -up, properly signed, and witnessed. He could not doubt its validity. -There was nothing to do, then. Harrison had out-manœvered him at -every point. The game was up. - -He turned almost sick with chagrin and defeat. He threw down the -paper and stood up, turning away without a word. - -“Hold on. Where are you going?” cried Harrison. - -“None of your business! I’m not likely to trouble you any more; -that’s all,” Tom returned through clenched teeth. - -[Illustration: The game was up] - -“Well, all right. Only I wish you’d call off that confounded Ojibway -boy you left here,” said Harrison, agreeably. “He seems to think -we’re trespassers. He’s shot up the camp twice. One of my men got a -buck-shot in the leg. It isn’t safe to go into the woods. Tell him -that if he doesn’t clear out we’ll hunt him down, and kill him or -take him out for the penitentiary.” - -Tom had a moment’s pleasure at the thought of Charlie’s “shooting -up” Harrison’s camp; but he did not return a word. He strode down to -his canoe, and went shooting out into the moonlight of the lake. On -the shore he could see the little group of men looking after him. - - - - - CHAPTER VII - - NOT TOO LATE - - -Tom felt singularly inclined to shoot up the camp himself, but he -restrained himself and paddled down the lake, almost without knowing -where he was going. He had, in fact, no plan in his mind. All his -plans had fallen into ruin together. He thought of getting away from -these woods; he thought of going back to the city. It seemed the -only thing left to do. But first it occurred to him, he must see -Charlie. - -Not merely to give him Harrison’s warning, though the boy would -certainly have to be checked in his now unnecessary warfare. But he -had no food nor supplies, not even enough for the trip back to -Oakley, nothing but his rifle and a few cartridges. Moreover he had, -after some hesitation, left all his money with Charlie rather than -risk taking it over the trail. There must be about seventy dollars, -and he would need it badly. - -He had very little idea where the Indian boy was to be found, but he -paddled down the lower lake to the mouth of the little river that -led up to his old camping ground. In the moonlight and shadow he -made his way up this almost to the point where he had shot the mink -on that far-away spring morning. Here he disembarked and started -into the woods by the way he used to take. - -It was rather dark in the shade, but the way was familiar to him, -and he went ahead easily. But he had gone no more than two hundred -yards when he heard something like a queer, metallic click not far -ahead. An instinct made him stop short; and the next moment there -was a blaze and a bang, and a load of heavy shot crashed into the -tree trunk right at his side. - -By good luck, he was not touched. He sprang behind the tree, -guessing at once who had fired that shot. - -“Don’t shoot, Charlie!” he yelled. “It’s me. It’s Tom.” - -Dead silence followed. Nothing seemed to stir in the undergrowth. -Tom began to imagine that perhaps it was not Charlie who had fired. -It might have been McLeod, come up from the lake to ambush him -again. He listened and looked more keenly, but heard nothing, till a -voice spoke quietly, almost at his elbow. - -“You get back, Tom? You fin’ your cousin?” - -Tom was so startled that he jumped. The Ojibway had crawled like a -serpent through the brush to get a close look at the intruder before -he spoke. - -“Gracious, Charlie!” he exclaimed. “Is that you?” - -The young Indian came out into the moonlight and surveyed Tom -carefully. - -“You come—camp this way,” he announced, and, turning, he started off -through the woods. - -Within a hundred yards or so Tom perceived the glimmer of a very -small fire, almost hidden between two rocks. Charlie put on a few -fresh sticks, and placed the kettle, and produced a lump of bacon. - -“You eat,” he observed. “I wait for you long time. Other man -come—git timber, like you say. I lay for ’em—shoot their camp—no -good. I hope you come back. I hear noise down by lake to-night—then -I hear you come. T’ink you somebody else—shoot you, pretty near.” - -“Rather,” said Tom. “I’m glad you’re such a bad shot. You’ve done -your best, Charlie, but it’s all up. I can’t have that timber. I’m -going away.” - -Charlie looked up quickly, with a somber flash in his black eyes. - -“You come back, Tom?” he inquired. - -“I don’t know. Maybe not.” - -Charlie pondered, gazing into the fire. The tea-kettle boiled. -Charlie poured out the hot strong stuff into tin cups and handed one -to his friend. - -“You stay here, Tom,” he proposed. “We git that timber. We lay for -them fellows. We can kill them all—easy.” - -“No, Charlie. That wouldn’t do,” said Tom, smiling at this too -simple solution. “Those fellows have got a right to the timber, and -I haven’t, and that settles it. You must stop your shooting at them. -You’d better go away too.” - -Charlie looked depressed. Probably he had been thoroughly enjoying -the guerrilla warfare of the last few days. From his sparing remarks -Tom gathered that he had been continually changing his camp, -prowling, scouting, feeling himself thoroughly on the warpath. He -had fired on Harrison’s party several times; Tom felt devoutly -thankful that nobody had been killed. Charlie had most of his -smaller possessions cunningly cached in hollow logs and trees, and, -on Tom’s inquiry, he went off into the darkness and presently -returned with the money—a roll of bills carefully wound in birch -bark. Tom would have liked to share it with this faithful comrade, -but he would sorely need it all himself. He presented to Charlie, -however, all the rest of his outfit: the aluminum cooking utensils, -the ax, the odds and ends that had been rescued from the burning -barn, and a few worn articles of clothing. - -“I stay round ’bout here, Tom,” said Charlie. “You come back.” - -“You’d better go and get some work,” Tom suggested. “Go down to -Oakley.” - -Charles looked disdainful. - -“Work hard all winter,” he said. “Trap—hunt—walk snow-shoes. Rest in -summer. Say, Tom, you come with me next winter. We trap—hunt—ketch -heap fur.” - -“I don’t know, Charlie,” Tom answered, regretfully. He wondered -where he would be next winter. He had little notion of what he ought -to do. He might go to Uncle Phil’s farm, as he had at first -intended; but this seemed now to promise nothing. Almost he -regretted not having joined Dave in the gold hunt. On the whole it -seemed better to go back to Toronto for the time. His clothes were -torn; his shoes were almost worn out. He had a little money, -however—more than he had started with. He could buy clothes, and -then, perhaps, secure a job as before as a summer fire ranger. This -might enable him to pay his way at the university, for he was -determined to have no more of his former parasitic existence. He -felt five years older, ten times as self-reliant as when he had left -Toronto only a few months ago; and the thought of his college years -of casual study, much foot-ball and hockey, and thoughtless -scattering of money filled him with disgust. - -“I’ve acted like a kid,” he reflected. “Time I was getting grown up -a little. No wonder father wouldn’t have me around the business.” - -Anyhow, he had to return the canoe to Oakley, and at dawn he bade -Charlie farewell and started down the river again. - -“You come back, Tom,” the Ojibway called after him. “I wait for -you.” - -He went straight down Little Coboconk without looking again at the -lost treasure, and entered the river. A mile down he noticed the -opening of a well-cut trail,—doubtless the road to Uncle Phil’s -place,—and he wondered that he had never observed it before. He felt -rather languid from the recent wearing days, and from short sleep -for two nights; the river ran smoothly, and he drifted along without -any great efforts at paddling, so that it was well into the -afternoon when he came into Oakley. - -He was late for the stage to the railway, which left only in the -forenoon; and he had to spend the rest of the afternoon and the -night at the hotel. But the rest was welcome. He managed to improve -his wild and wilderness-worn appearance a little, and took the train -next morning. - -The city seemed strangely noisy, crowded, hot, and dirty when he -came out from the station and boarded a street-car to go home. His -own tattered and weather-beaten appearance seemed even stranger to -the passengers on the car. He was carrying his rifle still, and he -must have looked like a trapper from the utmost frontiers. The -attention he attracted was so embarrassing that Tom was in haste to -get home. He walked hurriedly for a block up Avenue Road after -leaving the car and saw his house in the distance; but even then he -perceived that the curtains were down everywhere and that the place -had a vacant, deserted look. - -The front door was locked. He rang the electric bell repeatedly, but -in vain, and then tried the side door and the back door, with no -more success. Not even a servant was at home. He peeped into the -garage through a crack in the door. The car was gone. Evidently the -whole family had gone away, though it was the first time he could -remember that his father had taken a summer vacation. - -Tom was much too familiar with the house to allow locks to keep him -out. He knew a basement window that could be opened with a piece of -wire, and without much trouble he got himself inside. From the -interior of the house he judged that the family had been gone for -several days, at least. He went to his own room, hunted out an -outfit of fresh clothing more suited to the city, took a bath, and -dressed himself. The feel of the stiff collar was strange and -irritating. Investigating the kitchen, he could find nothing but -some crackers, part of a pot of jam, and a tin of sardines; but -these simple foods seemed delicious, and he greedily ate everything -in sight. - -He looked through the house to see if he could find any indication -of where his family had gone. He could discover nothing, but the -appearance of the rooms and of the covered furniture seemed to -indicate that a long absence was intended. Tom began to grow a -trifle uneasy. But they would know all about it at his father’s -office, and he left the house and took a downtown car. - -To his alarm he found no signs of life about the big lumber-yard at -the foot of Bathurst Street. No teams were moving; no one was at -work; the great gates were closed and padlocked, with a “No -Admission” sign. But the office building was open, and Tom went in. - -None of the usual clerks were in the outer office. But he thought he -heard a sound from his father’s private room beyond, and he opened -the door, and looked in. - -Mr. Jackson was not there. But in his usual place at the desk sat a -stout man with iron-gray hair, surrounded by an enormous mass of -papers and ledgers. His back was to the door, but he wheeled -sharply, with a look of annoyance, at hearing the door open. - -Tom recognized Mr. Armstrong, his father’s lawyer. For many years -Mr. Armstrong had been not only Mr. Jackson’s legal adviser, but his -closest personal friend. He did not often come to the house, -however, and Tom really knew him very slightly. He had always been -somewhat repelled by the lawyer’s dry, ironical manner, and had -always had a feeling that Mr. Armstrong did not approve of him. - -“Mr. Tom Jackson. Really! The last person I expected to see,” said -the lawyer with a chilly smile. Adjusting his eye-glasses, he -examined Tom from head to foot. “You look as if you’d been roughing -it. Your family has been very anxious about you, you know.” - -“Where are they? I’ve just come down from the north woods, and the -house is empty,” Tom cried. “What’s happened? Surely father hasn’t -left town?” - -“Your father has gone to Muskoka with his family, for a little -rest—to the Royal Victoria Hotel, Muskoka Beaches,” replied the -lawyer. “They were anxious to get in communication with you, but -didn’t know how to reach you. I have the key of the house.” - -And he produced it from a pigeonhole in the desk. - -“But why did they go? Father isn’t ill?” - -“Your father is an extremely sick man. To get him out of town, away -from business, was his only chance for life, the doctors thought.” - -“But what—what is the matter?” cried Tom, paralyzed by this news. - -“Why, nothing; that is, nothing very physically serious, I think. -And that’s the worse of it. The doctors don’t know what to get hold -of. Has your father told you anything about his business affairs?” - -“Not much—only that they were a little involved, some time ago. But -I thought he had them straightened out all right.” - -“So he might have done, with a little bit of luck. He had several -large contracts pending. He had bought options of some pulp-wood -tracts; he expected to close a deal with the railroad for a big lot -of ties. Nothing went right, though. He even failed to get the tie -contract. Everything seemed to go back on him at once. He couldn’t -take up his options, and he’s been obliged to close out nearly all -his holdings at a big loss. At last he broke down. He gave up, and -when a man like your father gives up, at his age, it means something -serious.” - -Tom uttered a horrified exclamation. Armstrong looked at him coldly, -but it was easy to see that the lawyer, under his frigid exterior, -was deeply affected by the misfortunes of his old friend. - -“So you didn’t know anything about it?” he resumed. “Well, the -doctors forbade him to think of business for months, and they sent -him up north. He put all his affairs into my hands—gave me power to -go through the business, and act as I see fit—either to go into -bankruptcy, or to try to fight it out.” - -“Bankruptcy!” Tom exclaimed. The idea seemed preposterous to him, -who had always regarded his father’s business as a source of wealth, -varying, indeed, but inexhaustible. “Surely that’s impossible! What -have you found?” - -“I haven’t finished going through the books. But it looks about as -bad as it can be. The lumber business has been slumping for the last -year. Three months ago I advised your father to make an assignment -and have the thing over. But he said that every dollar of his paper -had always been worth a hundred cents, and always would be while he -lived. I think he was speaking truth. For if the business goes under -I don’t believe he will survive it long. Business was his whole -life.” - -Tom tried to collect his shocked mind. - -“How long will it take you to come to a conclusion?” he asked. - -“I don’t know. A considerable time. The accounts are very -complicated.” - -“How much money would it take to clear everything?” - -“It’s hard to say, at this point. Perhaps thirty thousand. I think -that twenty thousand might pull it through, in hard cash, at this -minute. Are you thinking of furnishing it?” he added, with a return -to his ironical manner. - -Tom had really come nearer to being able to furnish it than the -lawyer imagined; and if Mr. Armstrong had shown himself a little -more sympathetic the boy might have told his story and sought -advice. But, as it was, he turned away in silence, full of grief and -distress. - -“I suppose you’ll be going up to join your family in Muskoka,” the -lawyer said. “Don’t let your father talk about business when you see -him. Get him out in the open air, canoeing, fishing, if you can. -Will you dine with me to-night?” - -Tom would rather have gone hungry than spend the evening with what -seemed to him Armstrong’s sneering and cynical personality. He -muttered an excuse, took the key, and went home again. He dined by -himself at a lunch-counter, spent the night in the empty house, and -next morning took the early train for Muskoka Beaches. He felt that -he could make no plans for the summer now until he knew how his -father was, and whether his help could be of any avail. - -The season was opening well at the summer resort, and the lake in -front of the Royal Victoria Hotel was alive with canoes, -motor-boats, and skiffs. The lawns were gay with tennis; automobiles -roared and thudded, and the wide verandas of the big hotel were -crowded with rocking-chairs. It struck Tom that this was anything -but a quiet retreat for a man with nervous breakdown. He mounted the -steps to the first veranda, looked about uncertainly, and was lucky -enough to espy his youngest sister in a far corner, reclining in a -camp-chair with a novel. - -“Oh, Edith!” he exclaimed, hastening toward her. “How’s father? -Where is he?” - -The girl jumped up with a cry of astonishment. - -“Why, Tom! When did you get here? We wanted to write to you, but we -didn’t know where you were. Where _have_ you been? You look like an -Indian—all brown and thin.” - -“Up in the woods. I’ve just been in town—saw Armstrong, and he told -me about father. Do you think he’s dangerously sick?” - -“I don’t know, Tom. He’s up all the time, but he can’t sleep and -doesn’t eat. We can’t get him to do anything. I think he’s worrying -about business, but he never says anything, not even to mamma. You’d -better come and see him. He’s up-stairs.” - -Tom followed his sister through the hallways of the great hotel, up -a flight of stairs, and into the suite of rooms that his father had -taken. No one was in them just then; for Mrs. Jackson had gone -down-stairs, and her husband was on the private balcony outside, -where he spent the sunny part of the days. - -Here Tom found him, lying back in a long chair, wrapped closely in a -steamer rug, looking pitifully old and broken. Tom could not -remember having ever seen his father ill before; and a lump rose in -his throat, and he could barely mutter something as he grasped the -sick man’s hand. Mr. Jackson greeted him with some pleasure, but his -manner was absent and almost indifferent. Tom had a heartbreaking -sense that he had meant nothing to his father’s life; he had a -conviction also that Armstrong was right, and Mr. Jackson would not -long outlast the business he had created. - -“This is a good place to come to, Father,” he said, with an effort -to be cheerful. “It ought to set you up in no time.” - -“The place is well enough,” said the lumberman slowly. “It’s too -fashionable to suit me, but your mother likes it, and you can smell -the pine woods here. That smell does me good; but I’m getting to be -an old man, and there’s no medicine for that.” - -“Nonsense! You’re just overworked. You’ll be a young man again after -a month’s rest,” Tom remonstrated. “I’m going to take you out in a -canoe, trolling for salmon trout.” - -Mr. Jackson did not appear to welcome this suggestion. - -“Where have you been all this time? What have you been doing with -yourself?” he inquired, with no great interest. - -“I’ve been up in the woods—on the Coboconk lakes—near Uncle Phil’s -place,” Tom answered with some hesitation. “Looking for—for -government land to take up. I saw Cousin Dave, just starting on a -gold-rush.” - -And to entertain his father he gave a humorous description of the -hurrying prospectors. - -“You’ve been in town. Did you see Armstrong there? What did he tell -you?” Mr. Jackson inquired, after listening indifferently to Tom’s -story. - -“He told me—that you were on no account to talk about business,” Tom -evaded, laughing. - -“He’s an old fool. But it’ll not bear much talking about, maybe. He -told you the shape it’s in, I’ve no doubt. I left it all in his -hands. I was at the end of my rope. If the business goes down, Tom, -you’ll have to start life a poor man, the same as your father did; -and I’m afraid you haven’t got the training or the mind for it,” he -added, ruthlessly. “It’s partly my own fault.” - -“It wasn’t your fault a bit, Father!” Tom groaned. “It was all my -own foolishness. It’s going to be different after this. I’ve learned -a lot up there in the woods. I had a rough time and nearly starved. -I thought things all over.” He hesitated, and then went on. “I did -think once, too, that I was going to make a big strike.” - -Mr. Jackson was looking at his son with a little more interest. - -“Well, if you can get a bit more practical, Tom, it’ll be a good -thing. In fact, it looks as if you’d have to do it. What kind of a -strike were you trying to make? Gold? There’s no mineral around the -Coboconk lakes. I’ve lumbered all through that district, years ago.” - -“You have?” cried Tom. “I never knew that. Then very likely you’ve -heard of the big raft of walnut logs that was lost on Coboconk a -good many years ago?” - -“Everybody’s heard of it up there. What about it?” - -“Well—I found it.” - -The old lumberman opened his eyes, and sat up briskly. - -“You found it? Where? Why, it was sunk in the lake.” - -“Don’t get stirred up, Father. There’s nothing in it, I’m afraid. -But I did find it. It had been sunk, but close to the shore, near -the place where the two lakes connect. The water has gone back a -good deal: and, besides, the lake was very low this spring, so that -the place where the raft had sunk is clean out of the water now. -Some of the timber was sticking out of the sand, and most of it -seemed to be only a foot or so down, so I had great hopes of getting -it out. It seemed to be in first-rate condition.” - -“Well, what did you do?” demanded Mr. Jackson, impatiently. - -“Why, you see, the timber didn’t belong to me. I thought it was on -Uncle Phil’s land, and that’s why I hunted up Dave. But it isn’t.” - -“You ought to have sent word to me at once!” exclaimed Mr. Jackson. -His eyes were alive now with interest, and he looked ten years -younger all at once. - -“Just what I was thinking of doing. But it wouldn’t have made any -difference, I’m afraid. There was another man prospecting for it—a -fellow named Harrison, who had been up there last summer too. He -played me a nasty trick, but he had the rights to the raft.” - -“The rights? How did he make that out?” cried Mr. Jackson. - -“He had the papers. It seems old Daniel Wilson, who cut the raft, -has a son living in Montreal, and Harrison had made some deal with -him to get out the timber, if he could find it. He’s paying young -Wilson a royalty, I believe.” - -“No such thing! The fellow must be an impostor. You should have let -me know of this at once, Tom. I can’t imagine what you were thinking -of. Do you know the value of walnut now? Never mind! I guess it -isn’t too late, if we act quick.” - -And, to Tom’s astonishment and alarm, his father threw off the rug -and stood up, his eyes bright, looking revitalized. Tom regretted -that he had told the story, which he had meant merely to entertain -his father. - -“Sit down, Father,” he urged, taking his arm gently. “It’s no good. -Harrison may be a villain; he certainly tried some rough work on me. -But then he made me a cash offer first to leave the place. But, so -far as the timber goes, he seems to have his title good. I saw the -papers made out by Wilson’s son, all signed and witnessed in proper -shape. I don’t see how we can do anything.” - -“Papers? A pack of lies! Forgeries!” snorted Mr. Jackson. “Why, I -knew old Dan Wilson well. He’s got no son living. Even if he had it -would make no difference; for the Daniel Wilson Lumber Company -failed five years before Dan’s death, and I bought out all the -concern, all the assets, every stick and scrap of them. Paid fifteen -hundred dollars, and lost about a thousand on it; but I only meant -it to help Dan out. The raft was included in the assets; I’ll show -you the papers. They’re in the safe. I never expected to see any of -that walnut, but it’s mine—all of it. Why, I’m the Wilson Lumber -Company myself, now!” - - - - - CHAPTER VIII - - THE TREASURE - - -“You mean to say you really own the timber yourself, Father?” Tom -cried, almost stupefied. For just a moment he had the idea that his -father’s mind had become slightly deranged; but Mr. Jackson’s -practical and competent manner, growing more vigorous every minute, -put that idea to flight. - -“Of course I do. Armstrong knows all about it. What a pity you -didn’t tell him when you were in town! But it can’t be helped. We’re -not too late—I hope. What has that Harrison done toward lifting the -walnut?” - -“Not very much, when I left, three days ago. I think he’d just got -to work. They had dug out quite a number of the logs.” - -“How many men did he have? How many teams? You don’t know? You -should have found out, Tom. Anyhow, it’ll be a matter of weeks to -get all that lumber up and raft or haul it away. But we don’t want -him to have any claim for salvage against us. We must get on the -spot the first minute we can. We’ll start for Coboconk at once, my -boy.” - -“Let me go alone, Father. Give me authority to act for you. You’re -not strong enough to go into the woods.” - -“I guess I’m plenty strong enough when there’s something really to -be done,” laughed the old lumberman. “It was doing nothing that was -killing me—sitting still and seeing nothing but ruin. No, this is -just the medicine I want.” - -Tom still felt dubious, but Mr. Jackson insisted on action. - -“I don’t see why we can’t start to-morrow,” he said. “We can get our -outfit and men at Ormond. I guess that’s the nearest railway point -to the lake.” - -“I thought Oakley was the nearest.” - -“Oakley’s down the river—thirty-five miles or so, isn’t it? And we -couldn’t take teams up the river in canoes. Ormond is straight west -from the Coboconk lakes, only twenty miles, and there’s a logging -road, or used to be. That’s the way you go to Phil’s ranch. You -can’t teach me much about that district, Tom. Just wait till we get -out there.” - -Tom’s mother was astounded, half an hour later, to find Mr. Jackson -walking briskly up and down the balcony arm in arm with his son, -talking with enthusiasm about business matters. Mr. Jackson laughed -at her alarm; he declared he felt a hundred per cent. better -already, and, in fact, he presently ate a better lunch than he had -eaten for a long time. Afterward, however, he consented to take his -prescribed nap, and while he was sleeping Tom detailed the new -enterprise to his mother. On her suggestion Tom went to consult the -doctor who was attending his father. For a dangerously sick man to -start suddenly upon the trail did seem a risky experiment. - -“This may be just the thing he needs,” said the physician, after -listening to Tom’s tale. “Inaction and worry were the hardest things -on him. He hasn’t any real disease at all. Make him travel as -comfortably as possible, and try to keep him from overexerting -himself, and you may bring him back cured.” - -Tom did not tell his father about this visit to the doctor, but he -was able to throw himself into the preparations with a much better -conscience. They did not, however, leave for a day or two. It was -not so very far to the Coboconk district, but it was a very -circuitous journey by rail. They had to go half-way to Toronto and -then back upon a branch line to reach Ormond, and it was late in the -afternoon when they at last got off at that backwoods village. The -timber treasure lay only twenty-two miles to the east, but it was -twenty-two miles of dense second-growth forest penetrated only by -the almost disused logging roads. - -Ormond was a village of two-score houses and a store or two, larger -than Oakley but not now so flourishing. Once this district had been -the seat of a thriving lumber industry; Mr. Jackson had worked over -it before setting up in Toronto; but most of the pine had been long -ago cut, and dull times had come upon Ormond. But Tom was astonished -to find his father well known and remembered there still. The -proprietor of the hotel, elderly, bearded, and rough, stared at his -guests for a moment, and then uttered a shout of recognition. - -“Jumping crickets! If it ain’t Matt Jackson!” - -Mr. Jackson shook the hotel man’s hand heartily. - -“I didn’t know you were up here yet, Andrews,” he said. “I used to -know Mr. Andrews well, years ago, when I was lumbering around -Coboconk,” he said to Tom. “I expect there may be some of my old -lumber-jacks here still. If there are they’re just what we need now. -I’ve got a little timber proposition on,” he added to the -proprietor. - -“Sure, I’ll find ye some of the boys,” exclaimed Andrews. “They’ll -be powerful glad to work for ye again, too—the more as jobs is -scarce around Ormond these days.” - -Tom went up to his room to wash, pleased immensely at the reception -they had received. Coming down again, he found his father in -animated conversation with a group of old residents, and looking -more alive and interested than he had seen him for years. Mr. -Jackson was tired, indeed, and went early to bed that night; but he -was far from exhausted by the journey, and was up the next morning -before his son. - -Tom found his father down-stairs, consulting with a big, roughly -dressed fellow, bull-necked and huge-chested. His hair was grizzling -a little, but his strength appeared noway abated with years, and he -treated the lumber merchant with marked deference. - -“This is Joe Lynch—Big Joe, they used to call him, and likely do -yet,” said Mr. Jackson. “He’s one of the best bushmen in the north, -and it isn’t the first time he’s worked for me. He’ll be our foreman -now, and he thinks he can pick up six or eight men for us right -away. We want to get started at once. Teams and supplies can come on -later. Remember, Joe,” he added, “I want men who wouldn’t be afraid -of a little trouble. Not roughs, you know, but fellows who can fight -if they need to. Maybe there’ll be a row where we’re going.” - -“Trust me for thot, sorr,” responded Lynch, with a wink. “They’ll -like nothing better. I’ll get ye a bunch that’ll fight their weight -in wildcats, any day.” - -At that moment breakfast was called, and Tom and his father went -into the dining-room. - -“I’ve heard news of your man Harrison,” said Mr. Jackson. “He was -here ten days ago, hiring men and getting supplies. Nobody knew what -he wanted them for. He’s got five men and one team of horses, and he -can’t have made any great progress at getting out the walnut yet. -But I think we’d better hurry ahead as soon as we can. It’ll take -some time to get our outfit together here, but I suppose I can leave -that to Lynch—though I’d rather see after it myself. Something’s -sure to be overlooked.” - -“Better let me scout ahead, Father!” Tom urged. “We can’t tell what -Harrison may be doing. He might raft down the timber in small -quantities as fast as he got it out, and sell it at Oakley.” - -“That’s a fact,” said Mr. Jackson, struck by this danger. “I suppose -you could stop anything like that, if you took a man or two with -you. I’d give you written authority.” - -“But Uncle Phil’s ranch must be on the way,” cried Tom, struck with -a fresh idea. “He’d go over with me, or Cousin Ed—maybe somebody -else.” - -This proposition was so evidently sound that Tom set out soon after -breakfast. Plenty of people knew where Phil Jackson’s farm lay, and -Tom regretted that he had not originally come to Ormond instead of -Oakley. But then he would probably never have reached Coboconk and -the lost raft. - -He carried only his rifle and a package of cold lunch, expecting to -reach the farm some time that afternoon. It was supposed to be only -fifteen miles, and there was a road,—not much used, indeed, but -still a road,—which it would be easy to follow. Mr. Jackson was to -collect his men and their outfit and come on the next day, to rejoin -Tom where the trail struck the river, below Little Coboconk. - -The old road proved rough traveling. Apparently it had not been used -at all for a long time, and it was grown up thickly with small -spruces and raspberry thickets—so jungly, in fact, that Tom often -found it easier to take to the woods. - -It was not going to be easy traveling for the wagons, he thought; -and wondered if Harrison’s men had come in this way. Still, he -plodded on and ate his lunch about noon, and within the next few -miles he began to look for traces of settlement. Nothing appeared, -however, and he began to travel slowly, looking about him more -carefully for trails. An uneasy qualm began to assail him, but he -kept on until, as the sun came down close to the tree-tops, he -became assured that he had somehow missed the way. - -He turned back at once on his own trail. Once he came to what seemed -a cow track crossing the path, but it presently became untraceable. -The sun was going down, and he stopped. By this time he was grown -hardened to being lost in the woods; but he was hungry, and the -prospect of a supperless night was not attractive. - -It was warm, however, and he built a fire and made himself as -comfortable as possible. Despite an empty stomach, he managed to -sleep; and in the earliest morning, rested but famished, he started -back on the road over which he had come. But it was only after an -hour or so that he came upon an obscure-looking cross trail that he -had previously overlooked. He might have passed it again, had not -his attention been caught by something like the far-away bellow of a -cow. - -He followed up the trail toward the sound, and within a quarter of a -mile he struck a wide, stumpy, pasture clearing. Beyond another belt -of trees he emerged upon a plowed field, with a view of a large log -house and barns, which he knew must be the elusive homestead of -Uncle Phil. - -So it proved. Tom hurried up to the house and got an astonished but -enthusiastic welcome. He had come at an unfortunate moment, however. -Uncle Phil and Cousin Ed had started within the last hour for the -store and post-office, nine miles away on a bush road that Tom had -not suspected, and were not likely to be back before evening. - -No one was at home but his aunt and the younger children. Tom ate a -huge breakfast, told his story, and gave news of Dave on the gold -trail, and rested for an hour or so. But he was uneasily impatient -to reach the lakes. He was afraid to wait for his uncle’s return, -and he got an early dinner, took a packet of lunch, and set out -again shortly after midday. - -He had his directions more accurately laid now; but it was rough -travel through the woods, and he went more slowly than he had hoped. -The sun was almost setting when he emerged at last on the shore of -the river. He was still a mile or two below Little Coboconk, but he -hastened up the stream and saw the long, placid expanse of the lake. - -Nothing moved on its waters. From away up by the narrows he thought -he saw a curl of smoke in the evening air. The emptiness relieved -him; somehow he had almost expected to see the raft afloat and -steering down the lake. But he knew that it was almost impossible -for Harrison to have salvaged any great quantity of the timber so -soon. - -Peering ahead, he walked up the stony margin of the lake in the -twilight. He had a strange, uneasy feeling that eyes were upon him, -as he had had during the journey to Roswick; but this time he was -certain that no one could have followed him through the woods. More -than once, all the same, he turned quickly to look, but nothing -stirred on the surface of the lake or the darkening shores. - -Smoke was certainly rising from Harrison’s encampment, but he was -afraid to go within sight of the place while the light lasted. He -sat down in the thickets just back from the shore and ate his -lunch—wise enough this time to reserve a portion for breakfast. -Darkness fell on the water. A half-moon grew visible over the trees, -and up by the narrows a red glow began to shine. - -Tom resumed his course up the shore, careful to make no noise. The -glare over the trees looked as if Harrison had set fire to the -forest again. But it was not until he reached the head of Little -Coboconk that he could see what was going on. - -Harrison’s camp lay across the narrows from him, and there were -great fires burning on the shore that cast a flood of red light -across the water. Dark figures moved through the lurid illumination; -he heard the rattle of chains, the thud of axes, and the cries of -men hauling and heaving at the timbers. Evidently Harrison, in his -desperate haste to get the walnut out, was working day and night. - -Tom crept up closer to the narrow channel, feeling secure in the -outlying darkness. From the opposite shore he made out a huge, dark -shape stretching like a pier. The raft was being rebuilt. And then -Tom distinguished Harrison himself, standing in the full light of -one of the fires, talking earnestly to another man, a stranger, an -elderly man, who did not look in the least like a lumber-jack. - -For a long time Tom crouched in the shadows, watching the scene of -activity. Logs were being dug out and piled in place. They were not -working on the raft just then. Probably daylight was needed for -that. But it looked rather certain that no timber was likely to be -floated away for some time, and Tom felt vastly relieved. By the -next night his father would be here. - -He wondered if they were going to work all night. He was tired of -waiting on the shore, and he had a great desire to examine the -partly constructed raft more closely. Toward nine o’clock, however, -he observed the activity slackening. The fires began to die down. -Work was knocked off. He perceived that a kettle was being boiled at -a smaller and more distant fire. The men gathered around and were -served with food. They smoked for a little while after this, while -Tom watched impatiently, and then one by one they disappeared into -the tents. There were evidently not men enough for the day and night -shifts, and so Harrison had simply extended the day as long as -possible. - -Tom still waited and listened. Silence fell on the camp. The red -shine of the fires grew dim, and the pale moonlight began to take -its place. But for the fifty yards of channel, Tom would have -ventured to reconnoiter the raft more closely; and he was in fact -thinking of taking off his clothes and wading and swimming over when -a faint, unmistakable splash close at hand caught his attention. - -He shrank back into the bushes, cocking his rifle. For full five -minutes he stood motionless, every sense alert, but without hearing -a twig rustle. Then a shadow moved out of a thicket. - -“Tom!” said a subdued voice. - -Tom started violently, half raising his rifle. - -“You no shoot me, Tom. I watch you long time,” said the shadow. - -“Charlie!” exclaimed the boy, recovering himself. “That isn’t you? -Why, I thought you were gone long ago. How did you see me?” - -“I see you when you come out on river, ’fore dark. Think it’s you, -not sure. I follow you—watch long time. I think mebbe you come back -some time, Tom. I look for you every day.” - -“Charlie, you’re a good scout!” said Tom, his heart warming. “Yes, -I’ve found out that timber really is mine after all, so I came -back.” - -“We fight um, then?” asked Charlie, hopefully. - -“Not to-night, anyhow,” Tom responded, smiling. “My father is coming -to-morrow. May be a fight then. But how did you get here? Got a -canoe? Where’d you get it?” - -“My canoe. That red-hair man steal him from you—I steal him back -again.” - -“Good!” Tom looked across at the dying firelight and the dim tents. -“Put me across there, Charlie. I want to see how much of that timber -they’ve got out.” - -The Ojibway seemed to vanish without a word into the gloom. Within a -few minutes the canoe glided up, a darker shadow in the shadow of -the lake-side spruces. Tom stepped in cautiously, and Charlie, -dipping the paddle without a sound, guided the canoe across the -channel and touched the extremity of the half-built raft. - -It was not all of walnut, of course. It had to be buoyed with -lighter wood, and even in the faint light Tom could see the -fresh-cut spruce and pine logs. It was impossible to estimate how -much of the old timber there was. He climbed out of the canoe and -stood upon the raft itself, which felt as solid under him as a ship. - -He raked the silent camp with another cautious glance and walked -toward the shore. Reaching the land he could see the earth torn up -in wild hollows and mounds, where the walnut had been disinterred. -Piles of logs lay in every direction. It looked as if surely the -greater part of the lost raft was there, ready for rebuilding again, -and Tom was filled with renewed anxiety. They were running it fine. -If anything should delay his father and the men from Ormond, -Harrison might still get away with his plunder. - -He stepped off the raft upon the earth and looked keenly about -again. Through his mind passed the idea of doing something to wreck -operations—to halt them, at any rate; but he dismissed it. The gain -would not be worth the danger. Next day he would have reinforcements -on the spot. The best thing would be to retreat into the darkness -again and wait. - -He had taken half a dozen steps, and he turned to go back. Some dim -obstacle lay at his feet. Trying to avoid it, he tripped on -something, with a clashing of chains. He stumbled forward and -blundered into a hole where a log had been dug up, knocking down a -pile of cant-hooks and spades, mingled with chains, which made a -deafening crash and clatter. The rifle flew out of his hand. - -Almost instantly he heard a voice asking what was the matter. A man -dived out of the nearest tent, stared about, and then started toward -him. Tom lay flat where he had fallen, invisible, as he hoped, in -the darkness. The man came within two yards of him, gazed about -again, while Tom lay holding his breath, and then, with a muttered -exclamation, struck a match. In the quick, brilliant flare Tom -caught a glimpse of the man’s fox-colored hair. He jerked his legs -under him and made a plunge to get away, but the fellow was even -more agile. He was upon him before Tom touched the raft, and the boy -was pulled back by rough hand on his collar. - -McLeod turned Tom’s face to the moonlight. - -“I declare, ef it ain’t that youngster again!” he exclaimed. “Can’t -keep away, hey? All right—I got him!” he called over his shoulder. -“It’s that same—” - -Tom was aware that Harrison and the stranger were hurrying toward -him. Other men were appearing from the tents. He glanced toward the -end of the raft. Charlie and his canoe had vanished. He was ashamed -at being caught so ignominiously, but he was not particularly -afraid. He felt in possession of authority now. He had the -whip-hand. - -“What’s this?” Harrison cried, turning on the white beam of a -flashlight. “Oh, it’s you, is it? Didn’t I warn you to clear out?” - -“I’ve come back to stay this time,” Tom retorted. “I know all—” - -“Who is it? Do you know him?” interrupted the strange man, who had -an honest and good-humored face. He wore a soft collar and a tie, -and had slightly the air of a sportsman from town. - -“He’s been hanging about all spring,” said Harrison, impatiently. “I -don’t know his name. Trying to steal something, I guess.” - -“That won’t do,” said Tom. “I know a good deal more than I did when -I was here last. I’ve heard all about Daniel Wilson. My father’ll be -here in the morning. Just now, I’m in his place.” - -“You must be crazy!” Harrison exclaimed. “Look here, you get out of -this camp at once.” He took Tom by the shoulder, and propelled him -toward the woods. “Got anything to say to me? Well, say it quick!” - -The rest of the party remained where they were, laughing. Harrison -shoved Tom into the shadows of the trees, gripped his arm hard, and -led him on, stumbling over fallen timber. - -“You want to talk to me?” he repeated. “Well, go ahead.” - -He had dropped the bluff tone of intimidation, and his voice was -subtle, conciliating. They were out of ear-shot of the camp now. - -“I haven’t much to say,” returned Tom. “I saw my father—Matthew -Jackson, of Toronto—and told him all about the raft. You can guess -the rest. He took over Dan Wilson’s business, you know. You haven’t -any rights here at all. We might pay you something for the work -you’ve done already on it, but that’ll be all we’ll do. You’ll have -to get ready to quit.” - -Harrison steered Tom a little way farther into the woods, saying -nothing. Then he stopped, and spoke in a low tone of intense -passion. - -“Do you think I’d quit now? It’s a year that I’ve been working for -this. Part of the timber’s sold already. I’m going to float out a -raft to-morrow or the next day. Do you want to have one fight now -and another in the courts? Look here, I’ll make a reasonable deal. -I’ve got maybe a third of this stuff ready to move. Let me get away -with that and I’ll leave the rest of it for you.” - -“Can’t do it,” returned Tom promptly. “I couldn’t make such a deal -myself, and I know father wouldn’t. He’ll be here to-morrow, and—” - -“Your father won’t be here to-morrow. He’s going to be turned back -before he gets to the lake,” said Harrison. - -“Turned back? What do you mean?” Tom exclaimed, with a sudden, -horrified vision of his father being ambushed, perhaps shot on the -trail. “Are you going to try another trick? You can’t work it, -Harrison!” - -They were standing close together and face to face, and at that -moment Tom felt something hard against his body. Glancing down, he -saw a revolver that glittered dimly, its muzzle digging into his -stomach. - -“I gave you a chance!” Harrison muttered between clenched teeth. -“What do you take—life or death? You young fool, I’m a desperate -man. I’m going to have that timber now, and I don’t care what stands -in my way—not even murder.” - -Tom shrank back involuntarily from the revolver barrel, which sent a -cold thrill to his very backbone. He had lost his rifle; he was -entirely unarmed. But reason told him that Harrison would not really -shoot. He would not go the length of murder, with a dozen men within -fifty yards. It was a bluff! Charlie was surely lurking somewhere in -the shadows offshore. Tom filled his lungs, and suddenly opened his -mouth to yell. - -“Char—!” - -Before the sound could leave his lips Harrison had him by the throat -like a tiger, forcing him back against a tree. Tom hit out savagely -into the man’s face, but that iron grip seemed to choke the life out -of his body. His head swam; everything turned black before him. For -an instant the throttling grasp relaxed, and then he received a -fearful blow on the head, that sent him plunging down, it seemed -into darkness. As he fell he was scarcely aware of another -shattering blow, and he knew nothing whatever afterward. - - - - - CHAPTER IX - - VICTORY - - -The next hours were blank for Tom, or almost blank. He seemed at -last to hear a roaring sound like water. He seemed to be rushing at -dizzying speed through worlds of darkness. Then he thought he saw -the malicious face of McLeod peering into his own, and again -blackness and silence covered everything. - -Something aroused him; something was pulling at him. Opening his -eyes, he saw strangely an outline of tree-tops sharp against a -starry sky. He was being dragged violently by the shoulder. - -“Git up, Tom—quick!” a voice penetrated his ears. “They come back -soon.” - -Tom’s head ached so dizzily that it fell back when he tried to lift -it. He could not remember where he was. He did not know who was -beside him. He tried feebly to raise his arms, and found that they -were roped together; and his legs, too, were tightly bound at the -ankles. - -“Wait—I see now. I cut you loose,” muttered the hurried voice, which -Tom now dimly recognized. A knife-blade flashed, and sawed at the -rope. His arms were free, then his legs. He made a feeble effort to -get up, and collapsed again. - -“No use! Can’t do it!” he murmured thickly. - -Charlie seemed to hesitate. - -“I carry you,” he said with determination, and, getting his arms -around Tom’s body, he sought to heave him on his shoulders. He -really might have carried him, for Charlie was used to carrying -tremendous loads over canoe portages, but Tom’s faintly reviving -spirit rebelled. He slipped down, clung to a tree for several -seconds, and tried to steady his whirling head. - -“You come,” said Charlie anxiously. “That red-hair man, he be back -quick, mebbe. I wait long time.” - -Tom had only a vague notion of what the Ojibway meant. He could not -remember what had happened; he knew only that some danger hung over -him like a nightmare. He let the tree go and attempted to walk. He -reeled, and would have fallen but for Charlie’s quick grasp. Then -Charlie got an arm around his body, and, half carrying, half leading -him, managed to steer him through the woods. - -It seemed an endless way to Tom, but it could have been only a few -rods, when the Indian uttered a wearied grunt of satisfaction, and -Tom saw the shimmer of moonlight on water. Charlie let him go, to -sink on the ground, and vanished. In a minute or two he was back, -and helped Tom down to the shore. Tom saw a canoe without surprise. -He managed to get into it somehow without upsetting it, and settled -down into a crumpled heap amidships. Charlie got into the stern, and -without a sound the craft glided down the shore, keeping in the -shadows of the trees. - -By slow degrees the boy’s wits returned, helped by the fresh lake -air. Leaning over, he splashed water on his head, which hurt -severely. The douche cooled and refreshed him. Memory struggled -back. - -Painfully he remembered the knock-out he had received—Harrison’s -proposal—his scouting at the raft—groping his way back step by step. -Of what had taken place after he had been struck senseless he had no -idea, nor how much time had passed. From the feeling of the air, it -seemed to him that it must now be late in the night. - -“Where are we going, Charlie?” he said thickly, over his shoulder. - -“By gar, I think you mebbe dead, Tom!” exclaimed the Indian, in -excited, though subdued tones. “We go good place. I fix you up all -right. Mos’ there now.” - -They were going down Little Coboconk now, taking less care to keep -out of the moonlight. Just at the lower end of the lake Charlie ran -the canoe ashore beside a great log, got out, and helped Tom to -disembark. He lifted the canoe out of the water and stowed it -somewhere in the dark undergrowth; and then, with an air of being -familiar with the place, he grasped Tom’s arm and conducted him -among the spruces by several mazy turnings, and at last indicated by -a pressure on his shoulder that he was to sit down. - -Tom dropped gratefully, finding himself on a thick pile of spruce -twigs. Above him he found a rough shelter of bark and boughs. - -“I camp here,” said Charlie, “ever since you go ’way. I look down -river for you, mos’ every day—think maybe you come back. I see you -yesterday when you come.” - -“You’re the best friend I ever had, Charlie!” said Tom gratefully. -“Maybe you saved my life to-night. How did you find me? Where was -I?” - -Charlie burst into an explanation, compounded of English and French, -which he was apt to use when excited. It made Tom’s head ache, but -he gathered that Charlie had slipped out of sight on seeing his -friend’s capture, but had stayed close inshore in the canoe. He -heard the sound of Tom’s choked-off cry and fall, but had not dared -to interfere as Harrison was almost immediately joined by the -red-haired man. Between them, they had tied Tom up and carried him -several hundred yards farther down the shore, depositing him in a -little valley full of evergreens. McLeod remained on guard, while -Harrison returned to the camp. Charlie had scouted close up, and -thought of shooting the red-haired man, but restrained himself. -Finally, McLeod went back to the camp also, to get matches for his -pipe, Charlie thought; and the Indian boy seized the opportunity for -a rescue. - -“We safe here,” he concluded. “Good place—can look up, down—they -never find us. Besides, you say your father come.” - -“I declare, so he is!” Tom exclaimed with a start. In his confusion -and pain he had totally forgotten that fact. Mr. Jackson was coming, -was doubtless on the way; and then Tom remembered also Harrison’s -statement that his father would be “turned back.” - -“We must meet him, Charlie!” he cried. “Those fellows may catch him, -murder him perhaps.” - -“Plenty time. He not come till daylight,” said Charlie, glancing up -at the sky. “Three hours, mebbe. Sleep now.” - -And the young Indian stolidly stretched himself on the spruce twigs -also, and appeared to fall instantly asleep. - -Tom could not rest so easily. It was true, no doubt, that his father -would not come in the darkness. Morning would be time enough to look -for him. But he felt nervously uneasy, impatient, and alarmed. His -head still ached and spun at the slightest movement. Feeling it -cautiously, he found it badly swollen on the left side, and blood -had dried and caked in his hair. Harrison must have struck him with -the revolver butt, he thought. - -He tried to compose himself, lay awake for a long time grew drowsy -at last and drifted through a series of nightmares, awaking with a -painful start. But at last he did sleep, and was disturbed only by -hearing Charlie making a fire. - -It was daylight, but not yet sunrise. The sleep had done him good. -His head ached less, and he felt more in command of his nerve. The -Indian boy produced tea, some fragments of pork, and some very hard -bread; and the food still further restored Tom’s strength. He was -eager to intercept his father, however, and they had no sooner eaten -than they took to the canoe again, and dropped down the river to a -point where Mr. Jackson would surely pass in coming over the trail -from Ormond. - -Here, for hour after hour, they waited, watchful alike for friends -and for enemies, for Tom more than half expected to espy McLeod -scouting down the river shore to prepare some ambush. Tom’s head -still ached, but the effects of the blow were fast passing, and -under frequent applications of cold water the swelling was going -down. They ate a cold lunch, not venturing to light a fire, but it -was not until well into the afternoon that Charlie suddenly sat up -alertly from the ground where he was lounging. - -“Somebody come!” he said in a low voice, staring into the woods. - -Tom had heard nothing, and in fact it was nearly ten minutes before -he heard trampling and crashing in the undergrowth. The sound -instantly reassured him. Harrison’s scouts would not have made so -much noise and in fact within a few minutes a party emerged upon the -shore a few yards below. In the first two figures Tom recognized his -father and “Big Joe” Lynch. - -There were four other men with them. Tom burst out from the woods -and rushed down to meet the new-comers, followed by Charlie. He was -recognized from a distance; there was a waving and a calling of -greetings. Tom grasped his father’s hand; then he found himself, -being hailed by two others of the party, whom he finally recognized -to be Uncle Phil and Cousin Ed. - -“Is it all right? We couldn’t—” Mr. Jackson began. - -“We missed you yesterday,” put in Ed, a wiry young fellow a year -younger than Tom. “But we started out to catch Uncle Matt on the -trail this morning.” - -“Found him broken down,” said Phil Jackson. - -“Yes,” said Tom’s father. “The wagon couldn’t get on very fast. Had -to stop and chop the trail. We left three of the men to bring it up, -and the rest of us came along on foot. I was getting uneasy about -you. How did you find things? Why, what’s the matter with your -head?” - -“A collision with Mr. Harrison,” said Tom; and he rapidly described -his misadventures of the night. Mr. Jackson’s face turned grim as he -listened. - -“The scoundrel! He was planning to keep you out of the way, I -suppose, till he could dispose of some of his loot. He must have -planned something to head me off, too. Never mind! his finish is -close now. I struck another piece of luck in Ormond. This -gentleman,” indicating one of the party whom Tom did not recognize, -“is Joe Gillespie, the postmaster there. I used to know him, and he -was concerned in the liquidation of the Wilson Lumber Company, so he -can testify that I really bought the raft. He’s a magistrate too, so -we have the law with us.” - -“Good. That’ll fix Harrison!” said Tom, rejoicing. “Let’s hurry -ahead.” - -“Better not go up lake. Mebbe him lay for us. Go through woods,” put -in Charlie. - -“I’d take Charlie’s advice on anything now,” said Tom. “He’s right. -Better not let Harrison see us coming, though I don’t think he’d -make any resistance to so large a party as this.” - -First of all it was necessary to cross the river, and Charlie -brought up the canoe and ferried them all over. Thence they filed up -the shore for half a mile, and then, under the Indian’s guidance, -turned into the woods, and made a detour to come around to the -narrows at the head of Little Coboconk. - -Part of these woods had been swept by the fire, and the walking was -bad, choked with fallen timber and half-burned logs. Tom was -astonished at his father’s strength. Even after the long tramp he -had had that day he pushed through the woods almost as actively as -any of them. The familiar atmosphere of the woods and the prospect -of action had restored the invalid to health almost magically. - -Remembering the doctor’s caution not to overdo the exercise, -however, Tom insisted on their stopping for occasional rests. With -this slow progress it was almost two hours before Charlie veered to -the left. They caught a glimpse of the waters of the lake beyond the -scraggly and scorched spruces, and thenceforth they had to move more -cautiously. - -The shore was a quarter of a mile farther, and by glimpses they saw -the white tents, the dark bulk of the raft, and the men’s figures -moving about it. Work seemed to be going slowly, however; as they -halted at last about a hundred yards from the camp, crouching behind -a half-burned clump of willow, Tom thought that operations were -entirely suspended. - -“Harrison’s found out that I’ve vanished and doesn’t know what to do -next,” he chuckled to his father. “Look, that’s Harrison—the man in -the brown shirt and soft hat. I don’t know the man with him—some -stranger.” - -Mr. Jackson took out a field-glass and scrutinized the camp for a -few minutes. - -“No, not much doing,” he said at last. “But that stranger with your -Harrison—I think I know him. Unless I’m much mistaken, he’s a -certain lumber dealer of Montreal whom I know very well. Looks as if -Harrison was trying to make his sale on the spot.” - -And Mr. Jackson put away the glasses, rose to his feet, looked about -for a moment, and then walked coolly toward the camp. - -Tom gave a cry of protest and then jumped up and followed, and the -whole party came after. It happened that nobody noticed them until -they were almost at the shore. Harrison was talking earnestly to his -companion, looking the other way, until he chanced to turn and -beheld the eight advancing figures. - -He started forward, uttering an exclamation; and then his eye fell -on Tom, and he stopped short again. His face was almost livid. - -“What—?” he began, blusteringly; but Mr. Jackson paid not the -slightest heed to him. He walked up to the strange man, who was -looking surprised, and held out his hand cordially. - -“How are you, Archer?” he said. “What are you up here in the woods -for—business or pleasure?” - -“Why, Jackson, man!” exclaimed the other, after an amazed stare. -“You’re the last person I thought of seeing here. I heard you were -sick. Pleasure, eh? I guess we’re both here for the same thing. But -you’re too late for once, Matt. I’ve made the deal.” - -“Not so you can’t break it, I hope,” returned Mr. Jackson, smiling. -“For this fellow has no right whatever to any of this walnut -timber.” - -At this Harrison recovered himself. - -“No right to it?” he snarled. “We’ll see about that! Who are you, -anyway? Why, this boy here admitted that I had the right of it, and -he saw all the papers.” - -“You were able to bluff a boy, perhaps, but you can’t bluff Matt -Jackson,” returned the lumberman. “You know who I am now. I bought -out Dan Wilson. Here’s Mr. Gillespie from Ormond, who’s a magistrate -and knows all about it.” - -By this time Harrison’s men had come crowding up, curious and -hostile. But several of them recognized Mr. Jackson, and all of them -knew Gillespie, who greeted two or three of them by name. - -“Yes, that’s right,” said the postmaster. “Mr. Jackson bought out -Dan Wilson when he failed, and so far as I know this timber was in -the deal.” - -“Then you don’t know much!” persisted Harrison, furiously. “I’ll -fight to the last court for it.” - -“Take it to the courts if you want to,” said Mr. Jackson. “You’ll -face a warrant for murderous assault on my son, and another for -forgery—” - -Harrison sprang savagely forward, raising his clenched fist. Tom -jumped to protect his father, caught the half-directed blow on his -elbow, and drove his fist into Harrison’s face. The next instant he -went down himself from a savage uppercut, and heard the rush of a -sudden scrimmage. Joe Lynch had grappled with Harrison, and while -the two wrestled frantically there was a rush of men from both sides -to the spot. - -“Stop it! Let him go, Lynch. Here, you young savage, drop that gun!” -Mr. Jackson shouted; and Tom struggled to his feet to see the -postmaster wrenching the shot-gun out of Charlie’s hands. Harrison -went down, with Big Joe on top of him; but Archer and Gillespie -dragged the men apart. - -[Illustration: Tom caught the half-directed blow] - -Lynch arose laughing. A moment later Harrison gathered himself up -sullenly. - -“I’ll settle with you! This ain’t the last—” he began, his voice -thick with rage. - -“Whenever you like. But now—you get out of this camp!” Mr. Jackson -ordered. - -“This is my camp. These tents—that team—” Harrison snarled. - -“Hold on! That team’s mine,” put in one of his men. - -“And you ain’t paid us our last week’s wages,” said another. - -“I’ll settle your wages,” Mr. Jackson promised. “Take away your -tents and your outfit, Harrison, if you want to.” - -Harrison looked about him. - -“Take down those tents. Pack up the outfit,” he commanded his men. - -Not a lumber-jack stirred. Plainly they had not found Harrison’s -service congenial. Harrison glared, snapped a savage curse, and then -went into his own tent, coming out in a minute with a dunnage sack. -He dragged this down to the shore, dark-faced with rage, but without -a glance at anybody, flung it into a canoe, and darted away with -fierce strokes of the paddle. - -“Seen the last of him, I guess,” said Mr. Jackson. “And he’s left us -his outfit. If he doesn’t come back for it we’ll leave it for him at -Ormond.” - -“Him go to meet red-haired man,” remarked Charlie, who was watching -the vanishing canoe. “I seen him, that man, ’way down lake.” - -“You did?” exclaimed Mr. Jackson. “Scouting for us, I suppose. -You’re a valuable youngster to have around. Want to work for me? -I’ll give you a job.” - -Charlie shook his head stolidly. - -“No work in summer-time. Work hard in winter—hunt—trap. Rest in -summer—hunt little, fight mebbe.” - -“Well, we won’t have any more fighting, I hope,” said the lumberman. -“But there’s a heap of work. You men, Harrison’s gang, I’ll take you -all on, if you want to stay with me, and pay you the same as my own -men. What do you say?” - -All the men agreed, with evident pleasure. - -“Always did think there was somethin’ crooked about that feller,” -remarked that one of them who owned the team. “Never could git no -money out of him.” - -“And now,” said the Montreal lumber dealer, “I certainly wish, -Jackson, that you’d tell me what all this is about. I spend -considerable money to come up here, and find myself landed in a -fight.” - -“Think yourself lucky that you didn’t get landed for something -worse,” Mr. Jackson laughed. “You haven’t paid any money out yet? -No? Good. I’ll tell you how the thing stands.” - -And he proceeded to detail the circumstances, which were -corroborated by the Ormond postmaster. - -“I see,” said Archer. “Harrison offered me the stuff at a great -bargain, but I didn’t see how there could be anything fishy about -it. Well, I’m glad I’m only out my expenses. I suppose you wouldn’t -think of selling any of it yourself? I thought not. You’ll make a -good thing out of it. Walnut’s almost off the market now, and -bringing any sort of fancy price. But I don’t need to tell you -anything about that. All I’ve got to do is to look for a way to get -home.” - - - - - CHAPTER X - - A FIGHT IN THE DARK - - -“I do believe we’ve got possession of the thing at last, Father,” -said Tom, surveying the raft with joy, despite his aching head, -which Harrison’s blow had jarred afresh. - -“Yes, I don’t see what’s to stop us now,” returned Mr. Jackson. - -It was near sunset, and peace had fallen on the camp again. The men -of the two parties had fraternized and were sitting about on the -logs and smoking. In the background the cook was preparing supper at -an open-air fire. Mr. Archer had discreetly withdrawn into a tent, -leaving Tom and his father to examine the property they had at last -secured. - -Harrison must have worked his men skilfully and hard while he had -them. The partly built raft already stretched far out from the -shore. It was by no means all of walnut, of course. Harrison had cut -down all the spruce, jack-pine, and hemlock in sight for the -floating foundation. They were put together in “cribs,” connected by -strong traverses, pinned down with huge hardwood bolts. The walnut -was piled on top of this foundation, and each log was “withed” down -to its support with ironwood saplings as thick as a man’s wrist, -twisted like rope around the timbers. There were already more than -seventy cribs put together, each of them containing fully a thousand -feet of walnut. - -“His men knew how to handle logs,” Mr. Jackson remarked, looking -with an expert eye at the way the timber was withed and pinned -together. “Never saw a better built raft. If Dan Wilson had built it -as well as this, it mightn’t have broken up so easily. That’s fine -walnut, too. It’ll take some drying out and seasoning again, of -course, but it’s practically as good as the day it was cut. I don’t -believe there’s as much walnut timber as this anywhere else in one -spot in all Canada.” - -“And nobody knows how much that isn’t dug out yet,” Tom returned. -“We ought to be thankful to Harrison, maybe, for all the work he’s -done for us. We’ll have the use of his tents and tools too, until he -comes to take them away. Not to forget that if he hadn’t tried to -drive me out by burning the woods I’d probably never have found the -walnut at all.” - -“Yes, he seems to have cheated himself all around,” said his father. -“If he presents a reasonable bill for labor, I’ll pay it. But I -don’t think he ever will. As for what walnut is left,” he added, -looking over the scarred surface of the shore, “I suspect that there -isn’t much more of it.” - -There was some, however, and the combined gangs went to work -vigorously on the morrow. About noon the delayed wagon came in from -Ormond, with two more men and the supplies, and Mr. Archer and the -postmaster rode back in it when it returned. They promised to send -out more provisions, for, with Harrison’s gang, Mr. Jackson had more -men than he had counted on. - -With this strong force the work of getting out the timber went -forward rapidly. Tom went over the shore inch by inch, sounding deep -into the sand with a long, sharp steel rod. When he struck wood, -they dug down to it. Sometimes it was walnut, sometimes merely an -old spruce stump, but little by little the precious stuff -accumulated, and more cribs were built out upon the raft. By the end -of the week they seemed to have got everything that lay in the sand -of the shore, and they began to dig at the bottom of the shallow -water nearest land. - -But evidently they were nearing the end. Mr. Jackson’s shrewd guess -had been right. With great exertions and inconvenience they -recovered three or four hundred logs from the shoal water, but the -labor almost outweighed the gain. These logs, too, were heavily -water-soaked. They would dry out in time, but meanwhile they -required much light timber to buoy them up, and were spongy and -easily damaged. But from Mr. Jackson’s measurements, and he was an -experienced “scaler,” the raft then contained about 125,000 feet of -walnut. Besides, there was the soft-wood foundation, which was not -without value. - -“This ought pretty well to clean up all business troubles, my boy,” -said Mr. Jackson to Tom, as they viewed the majestic outlines of the -raft, which surged and heaved at its moorings in a strong southwest -gale. “It’ll net us three hundred dollars a thousand feet; more than -that, in fact, for we’ll cut it up ourselves, with thin saws. The -ordinary mill wastes ten per cent. in sawdust, and you’ve no idea -how valuable even the scraps of such wood are. They make veneer, -brush backs, knobs, all sorts of small things. We don’t waste a chip -of the stuff.” - -For some time, Tom noticed, Mr. Jackson had been saying “we,” and -the implied partnership was very pleasant to him. Working day by day -with him, Tom had come to realize and respect his father’s science -and energy as he never had done before. Up here in the woods, “Matt” -Jackson’s reputation was an established one. The rough lumber-jacks -jumped at his orders and took his advice unhesitatingly about all -sorts of timber craft. The veteran lumberman was in his element and -seemed to have almost entirely recovered his health and spirits. - -The future no longer looked black to him. He had arrived at the -point of talking to his son freely about his business affairs, a -compliment which Tom appreciated deeply. On leaving Toronto Mr. -Jackson had seen nothing ahead but a voluntary assignment. He had no -faith in Mr. Armstrong’s being able to straighten things out. Thirty -or forty thousand dollars would be needed, and he could not see any -source from which they were to come. - -“That’s what it would have come to if you hadn’t dug up this old -timber, Tom,” he said. “I wasn’t very genial when you came north, I -guess, but I give you the credit, my boy.” - -“I don’t deserve it,” said Tom earnestly. “I came up here like a -fool. I didn’t have any reasonable idea what I was going to do. It -was blind luck that made me stumble on this old raft. But I do think -it ought to make enough to clear the business, and something over. -Shouldn’t you let Mr. Armstrong hear of it? He’ll be astonished, -when we produce a new asset like this.” - -“Yes, I suppose so,” agreed his father. “Things have been so busy -that I’ve neglected it, and there’s no hurry anyway. He’d write or -wire me before he did anything important, and a message would be -forwarded at once from the Royal Victoria. I suppose he thinks I’m -still lying on my back there. But I’ll send a letter out to him -to-morrow.” - -Charlie could have taken a letter out to Ormond or down to Oakley. -The Ojibway boy was still hanging about the camp, watching the work -impassively, seeking out Tom whenever Tom had any leisure. He -brought in trout almost daily, and occasionally ducks and partridge, -and Mr. Jackson remarked on the advantage of having an Indian about -the camp who was exempt from the game-laws. But Charlie was -obviously not so happy in the midst of all this activity as he had -been at the original camp in the old barn. - -Mr. Jackson, however, did not write his letter the next day. It was -windy and rainy. One of the last cribs of lumber showed signs of -breaking loose under the strain of the weather and had to be -refastened. Then they unexpectedly found a “pocket” of eight or ten -more walnut logs at a spot where they had not previously looked, and -these were dug out and loaded. Altogether it was a busy day and a -stormy one. The rain ceased at sunset, but the wind grew even -stronger, driving white-capped waves racing across Big Coboconk. - -The wind kept Tom awake that night. It roared over the forest and -thrummed on the stiff canvas flaps. On the cot opposite him his -father slept profoundly rolled in his blankets, but Tom could not -settle himself to rest. His mind dwelt on the raft. They had thought -of launching it the next day, but this would be out of the question -unless the wind went down. It would be impossible to float it down -the lake in the face of that gale. - -He wondered if there could be any danger of damage as it lay at its -mooring. At last, unable to rest, he got up and looked from the -tent. It was after eleven o’clock. The night was warm and not very -dark. Not a man was in sight. The fires, which had burned low, threw -off gusts of fizzing sparks in the wind. A high sea was crashing on -the shore, but he could make out the dark expanse of the raft, -rising and falling, but apparently secure. - -Somewhat reassured, he went back to his cot and lay down again, -leaving the lantern burning. He did not undress and lay awake for -some time longer, but at last he grew hardened to the roaring of the -wind and dozed off. Finally he must have slept soundly, for he -wakened with a shock to feel a hand gently gripping his shoulder. -Blinking up, he saw Charlie’s battered black hat leaning over him in -the dim light. - -“You come, Tom. Raft gone,” the Indian said softly. - -Tom leaped up with an exclamation. He gave a single glance at his -father, who was still sleeping, and bolted from the tent. Outside -the water and the wind still roared and crashed; but at the first -glance Tom saw in the pale starlight that the raft was no longer -there, nor anywhere in sight. - -“I wake up—think I hear something,” said Charlie at his elbow. “I -go—look. Raft gone.” - -Tom rushed down to the landing where it had been moored. Then to his -relief he sighted it, a hundred yards from land, a huge expanse like -an island, heaving and plunging and drifting out diagonally over the -lake. - -Tom raised a tremendous shout to alarm the camp, and thought he -heard an answer from the tents. The raft must have broken loose in -the gale; yet he could hardly understand how that had happened, for -six strong ropes had bound it to trees ashore. But Charlie picked up -the slack of one of the ropes that was trailing in the wash of the -waves and held it silently under his eyes. Tom gasped. The end was -not frayed; it was cut squarely off. - -“Cut!” he exclaimed. - -“I think mebbe so,” said Charlie. “That man come back, I guess. We -git him this time, mebbe.” - -Tom gave another alarm shout, and jumped into a boat on the shore, -followed by the Ojibway. It was a _bateau_ that had been left there -by Harrison, heavy to row, but the wind drove them fast in the wake -of the raft. Laboring at the oars, Tom saw the outline of the -floating timber growing clearer. His blood boiled with wrath; he -knew that Harrison must have done this as a last act of revenge. -They had not set eyes on the fellow for a week; they thought he had -gone for good, but he had come back to retaliate for his loss. Well -timed, too, his return had been. The raft was hardly built for rough -seas. Under the full force of the gale in the center of the lake it -might go to pieces, or be driven against the opposite shore and -broken up, repeating the ancient history of the original raft of Dan -Wilson. - -Fortunately Charlie’s alertness had detected it in time. Tom was -disconcerted at seeing that no stir was visible yet in the camp -behind. His yells could not have been heard. It was useless now to -try to shout in the teeth of the gale, but he strained his muscles -to reach the raft. - -It was too big to drift very fast, and Tom’s oars overtook it before -it had gone another two hundred yards. It looked alarming as he came -close, and it was going to be risky to get aboard, for the great -mass of logs heaved on the waves, and crashed down on the water. A -touch would have crushed the _bateau_-like bark, but Tom, watching -his chance, jumped, landed on his knees, clutched the logs, and -staggered to his feet. The boat with Charlie in it recoiled away, -thrust backward by his leap. - -He was scarcely up when he saw a dark figure shoot across the raft -just behind him. Startled, Tom rushed after it. It flashed upon him -that this must be Harrison. But the man jumped,—apparently over the -side,—and a canoe went spinning away into the gloom, dipping and -reeling in the heavy sea. - -It had not looked like Harrison’s build. It had more resembled the -woodsman McLeod. Tom had no weapon or he would have fired and by the -time Charlie had joined him, carrying his shot-gun as always, the -canoe was lost in the windy obscurity. - -“Got away again!” Tom exclaimed in disgust. “But we’ve got the raft -again, anyhow.” - -Then he wondered what he was going to do with it. The huge mass of -timber was beyond any control. He could only let it drive. -Continually he had expected to see the men from ashore following -him, but no one seemed to have become aware of what was going on. -The sparks whirled up from the low fires, and that was all. Every -minute the raft was getting farther from shore, and it would be -impossible to tow it back against the wind. It was well out in the -open lake now, and it heaved and swung up and down with a motion -that strained all the fastenings of the cribs and made Tom’s stomach -turn with a qualm like seasickness. - -“Fire your gun, Charlie!” he said anxiously. “Maybe they’ll hear it. -Hold on! What’s that?” - -A report like a pistol-shot had sounded from the far forward end of -the raft. Tom rushed forward over the heaving logs. In the center -was a great heap of material used in building: withes, cross -timbers, pike-poles, axes, ropes, spikes. As he passed around this -obstruction he saw, to his horror, one of the cribs swing loose and -drift clear, spilling its load of walnut as it went. - -Was the raft breaking up already? Tom caught up a pike-pole and -rushed forward. Buffeted by the wind and almost deafened by the -noise of it and by the creaking and threshing of the timbers, he -slipped and staggered in his unspiked boots over the wet logs. As he -crossed the fourth crib he stopped with a thrill. He saw the dim -figure of a second man close to the forward edge of the raft, with -an ax poised over his shoulder. - -The miscreant was actually cutting the raft apart. When Tom realized -it, he charged forward with a shout. Apparently the man had been -quite unaware that the boys had come aboard. He glanced about -quickly. The ax blow never fell. He waited till Tom was within ten -feet, charging with the steel-shod pole, and then he swung the ax -round his head and flung it with all his force. - -Tom ducked just in time to dodge the whirling missile as it went -over his head with a “whish.” It came so close that the boy lost his -balance and stumbled down on one knee, and before he could recover -himself the man had pounced on him, forcing him down. - -Tom was able to let out a single yell. He recognized Harrison; he -had felt that grip before. Again Harrison tried to seize him by the -throat, but this time Tom was less off guard. He was lighter than -his enemy, but more active. He was a good wrestler, his muscles were -hardened now with labor, and he fought like a wildcat. - -He squirmed free from the fierce grip and got to his feet. Loosing -his arm an instant, he drove a heavy blow into Harrison’s face and -heard him grunt. But the next moment Harrison surged upon him with -all his weight, and Tom despite his utmost effort, was gripped -almost helplessly. He put forth every ounce of strength he had. -Defeat meant the loss of the raft. But he could not hold Harrison. -He was forced down; he went heavily against the slippery logs, and -the next instant he felt Harrison’s knee on his chest. - -He caught a glimpse of Charlie’s form flitting distractedly around -them with gun half raised, and he was afraid of getting an -accidental charge of shot himself. Then Charlie seemed to swing the -butt. Tom scarcely heard the thud of the blow, for at that instant -the logs seemed to give way under him. A great rift opened, and he -went down into the black water, with Harrison still clutching him. - -For a second he was dazed and went deep down. His enemy’s grip -relaxed and fell away. Then, with a half-involuntary stroke, he came -toward the surface. His head knocked against something hard. He was -under the raft itself. - -In terror he struck out blindly. He knew no directions. He might be -swimming toward the center of the raft, where he would surely drown. -His breath grew short; then, all at once, his head came out into the -fresh air, and he filled his lungs with a great gasp. The raft -plunged almost over his shoulders. Tom dodged and ducked to escape -having his skull crushed, and caught sight of the Indian peering -wildly out into the darkness. He shouted hoarsely, and Charlie -helped him aboard with an extended pike-pole. - -There was no sign of Harrison, neither swimming on the water nor -aboard the raft. He might also have gone under the logs, and be -drowning there. - -“See anything of him—that other man?” Tom gasped; but Charlie shook -his head. - -“Think him drown, mebbe. Good job, too!” - -Tom cast another anxious glance over the water, ready to rescue his -late enemy if he sighted him. But just then the front of the raft -swung up and down with a tremendous plunge. Several withes gave way -with snapping reports, and another crib disengaged itself from the -main body. In his confusion and fright, Tom imagined the whole raft -was going to pieces under him. The loose crib still hung by one end, -however, and he rushed to the pile of material amidships, seized a -bundle of rope, and looped one end over the head of one of the great -hardwood pins in the loosened crib. Taking a hitch around another -bolt-head on the main raft, he tried to bring the two sections -together again. Assisted by the pull of the waves, he brought them -together inch by inch, closed the gap to a foot’s width, tied the -rope firmly, and repeated the lashing in two other places. - -He glanced ashore, where there was still no sign of life. Bitterly -now he repented his rashness in going in chase of the raft instead -of immediately arousing the camp. But the _bateau_ was still there. - -“Get into the boat and make for shore as fast as you can, Charlie,” -he commanded. “Rouse them up. Tell them the raft is going to -pieces.” - -“All right!” said the Ojibway, without emotion. “Can’t paddle much -’gainst wind,” he added. “Mebbe have to cross lake—go round.” - -“Any way you like—only do it quick!” cried Tom; and just then -another crib, whose transverse bar had split, began to break away. - -Tom brought more rope and lashed this also, straining at it as -Charlie got into the boat and cast off. He saw the Indian struggling -hard against the wind and waves, and then lost sight of him in the -darkness. Charlie would do the best he could, Tom knew well; it was -only a question of whether he could bring help in time. - -Another ironwood withe snapped. Fearing that all the cribs would -break apart, Tom set to work to strengthen their fastenings. He -dragged up the flattened pieces of timber that had been prepared for -transverse and cap-pieces, laid them across the logs wherever there -was any sign of weakening, and spiked them down with eight-inch -spikes, which he drove home with an ax. Not content with that, he -lashed the cribs together with rope as long as the rope lasted; then -with odd pieces of chain, and then tried to use the withes. But the -ironwood saplings were too stiff for one pair of hands to twist. - -He ran to and fro, staggering and slipping on the reeling raft, and -he looked almost hopelessly at intervals toward the shore. Nothing -could be seen of Charlie’s boat. The Indian might have been driven -far up the lake, and obliged to make a long detour by land. The -camp-fire was nearly a mile away now. It was a mere red point, and -there was no sign of any help coming. - -The raft was now well into the middle of the lake, and it plunged -and tossed fearfully. It had not been built for any such strains; it -was threatening to go as the first raft had gone years ago. To keep -it together was work for more than one man; and Tom was, after all, -an inexperienced raftsman. Over the wet, swaying surface he hastened -up and down, spiking down cross-bars and reinforcing the cap-pieces, -but, despite his efforts, the timbers continually worked loose. In -the darkness it was impossible to see a part giving way till it was -almost beyond mending. - -All at once, as he crouched over his work, he was aware of a faint -glow on the sky. He looked up. One of the camp-fires ashore had -sprung suddenly to a tremendous blaze—a vast, glaring flame blown -into long streamers by the wind, whose light spread far out over the -water, almost, indeed, to the raft itself. - -“Charlie’s stirred them up! Hurrah! Who-oo-p! This way!” Tom -shrieked. His voice could not have carried half the distance, but -almost immediately a second fire flared up. The men ashore could -hardly have been able to see the raft, and Tom had no means of -making a light, but they would surely know that it would drift down -wind. Tom saw the distant scurrying of figures about the shore, and -presently a boat pushed off, and then another. - -He lost sight of them, but they must have come fast and rowed hard, -with the wind behind them. In ten minutes he heard shouts, and he -shouted back to give his direction. There was a rattle of oars, and -the excited murmur of men’s voices. He saw the boats now, heaving -high and low on the waves, and the leading one steered up alongside. -Tom hooked it with a pike-pole; the men caught hold, and Mr. Jackson -scrambled actively aboard the raft, followed by Joe Lynch and two -more men. - -“That you, Tom?” cried Mr. Jackson. “Are you all right? How’s the -raft?” - -“Pretty near breaking up,” Tom shouted back. “I’m all right—a little -wet. Tell you about it later. Must get the raft fastened together.” - -Mr. Jackson gave Tom’s arm a rough, affectionate squeeze. “Good for -you, old boy! We’ll save the timber—don’t fear. Lynch, get the men—” - -Big Joe had not needed any orders. With his two men he was already -at work on the raft timbers. The other boat came up at this moment, -with four more men in her. Lynch ordered two of them to row back to -camp at once and bring out all the rope, chain, spikes, and pieces -of heavy plank they could lay hands on, for Tom had already used up -nearly all the loose material aboard. - -That left a crew of five men. They had a doubtful fight before them, -for the raft was laboring under the full force of the wind, out in -the open lake, and it was already weakened at every joint. But the -lumbermen set vigorously to work. In their spiked boots they raced -over the shifting logs, retwisting withes, and lashing and spiking -cross-bars with a skill that produced more effect than Tom’s -inexpert efforts. - -Tom still took his share of the work, and so did Mr. Jackson. The -lumber dealer ran over the raft as fearlessly and almost as actively -as any of the men, encouraging them, taking in the needs of each -spot with a quick glance, using ax and pike-pole himself whenever he -could. The break-up of the raft seemed checked; the fight seemed a -winning one. No more cribs had escaped, and, though the whole -framework was badly strained, it seemed capable of holding together -at least until the boat came off with more men and material. - -But there was no relaxation of effort. Unexpectedly half a dozen of -the withed walnut logs broke loose, rolled off the raft, and, being -already saturated, went to the bottom almost like stones. All the -rope and chain was used up, but the lumbermen brought up more withes -and proceeded to make the rest more secure. Tom and his father were -bending over among a group of men who bent a thick ironwood sapling. -The butt of it was pegged into a huge auger-hole in the lower -framework, and it was to be twisted over the walnut and down into -the loading timbers beneath. The men put all their brawny arms into -it, when the walnut log rolled suddenly with a heave of the raft. -The butt of the withe slipped and flew up with the force of a -catapult. It touched one man on the shoulder and sent him sprawling, -and the full force of it seemed to catch Mr. Jackson on the side of -the head. He reeled over, and went off backward into the water. - -There was a shout of alarm. Tom poised himself at the edge of the -raft, ready to plunge if he should see his father’s head come up. -The rest stood ready with pike-poles, but moment and moment passed, -and they saw nothing. - -“He’s gone under the raft!” exclaimed Tom. - -“Cut her apart!” Big Joe yelled. “Never mind them timbers now. The -boss is under ’em!” - -Recklessly the men chopped the fastenings they had so labored to -secure. A crib swung aside and left a strip of black water—empty. -Another gap opened, and this time something was floating on it. In -another moment a pike hooked the floating clothing, and they drew -the lumberman out upon the logs. He was quite unconscious. - -“He’s dead!” Tom gasped. - -“You bet he ain’t,” said Lynch, who had put his head over the -dripping figure. “He’s breathin’, and his heart’s a-beatin’ strong. -He ain’t drowned—just knocked out. He’ll come to!” - -The men carried him carefully to the center of the raft, the safest -place, and Tom sat down beside him in unspeakable anxiety. The men -were working afresh to secure the cribs they had cut apart, but for -the moment Tom had lost his concern for the raft. Mr. Jackson did -not “come to,” as they had hoped. He breathed, but seemed in a heavy -stupor, from which he could not rouse. Tom feared his skull might be -fractured, and there was no doctor nearer than Ormond. - -The other boat came back with three men and more supplies, and the -whole crew worked more furiously than ever. Whenever any of them -passed the center of the raft they paused to ask after the “boss” -and hurried on again. The raft still held together, but Tom gave it -only scant thought; and as he sat by his father’s side he saw at -last the grayness of dawn begin to spread over the lake. - - - - - CHAPTER XI - - FIRE AND WATER - - -The raft was now nearing the northwestern shore of the lake, and -luckily its course seemed to carry it into a wide bay, where it -would be somewhat sheltered from the weather. The wind was lessening -a little, it seemed. It had done deadly work, however. The raft -seemed to have lost a third of its area, and all around could be -seen floating masses of the soft-wood cribs, which had mostly -spilled their walnut loose. But Tom looked at it almost -indifferently. His whole thought was concentrated on his father, who -still lay unconscious, with a deathlike face. - -Big Joe came up and looked down sorrowfully at the boss. - -“I guess the raft’s all right now,” he remarked. “She’s going to -float right behind that headland, and I’ll have the boys build a -boom around her as soon as she gets there. It’ll break the waves. I -don’t believe we’ve lost such a lot, after all. - -“Don’t you worry, boy,” he added. “Your father’ll be all right. I’ve -seen men knocked out a heap worse’n that; you don’t know the rough -knocks that lumber-jacks get. We’ll get him ashore just as soon as -we get into quieter water.” - -It would indeed have been risky to try to get the wounded man into a -boat while they were still on those plunging waves, and it was still -more than an hour before the raft slowly headed its way behind the -long rocky peninsula. Here the water was less broken. They brought -one of the boats around to the forward end, carried Mr. Jackson into -it with infinite care, and ferried him across the hundred feet of -water to the land. Here they constructed a rough stretcher with -saplings and boughs, and Tom, Lynch, and two other men set out with -it toward camp. The rest of the men remained to make the raft fast -and gather up what scattered drift timber they could salvage. - -A quarter of a mile down the shore they came upon a crib that had -grounded without entirely breaking up. The track of a man’s heavy -boots led from it into the woods, and Tom guessed that Harrison had -come ashore on those logs. It relieved his mind somewhat, for he did -not want to consider himself responsible for the man’s death, but he -had not much thought just then to spare on Harrison. Still further -down, they sighted a canoe, Charlie’s canoe, which McLeod must have -stolen, and in which he had fled from the raft. It had been run -ashore roughly, and was badly split down the bow. But, like -Harrison, McLeod had left nothing but tracks behind him, and Tom -sincerely hoped that he would never see anything more of him. - -Arriving at the camp, they put Mr. Jackson to bed in his tent. He -seemed partly to revive; his eyes half opened; he muttered something -and then sank into unconsciousness again. But even this symptom of -returning life was encouraging. - -“The nearest doctor’s at Ormond,” said Tom. “I’m going after him at -once.” - -“Send Charlie down to Oakley,” Lynch suggested. “There’s a doctor -there. You might go out to Ormond too, if you like. Maybe one of ’em -will be away, and if they both come, no harm done. But say, you’ve -got to eat and rest a bit, boy. You look done up.” - -Tom indeed felt the strain of the hard night, and his head once more -ached splittingly. He summoned Charlie and sent him up the lake to -get his canoe. It would have to be calked or patched where it was -cracked, and meanwhile Tom swallowed a little breakfast and lay down -with the intention of resting half an hour. - -He fell into a dead sleep, and was awakened at last by Joe Lynch. - -“A fellow’s just come in from Ormond with a telegram for the boss.” - -Tom took the yellow envelope and sat up in a daze. Gathering his -wits, he opened the message: - - Assigned to Erie Bank. Creditors’ meeting Wednesday - night. Letter follows. Wire further instructions. - - Armstrong. - -Wednesday night! It flashed upon Tom that to-day was Wednesday. He -jumped out, bolted from the tent, and confronted the messenger. The -telegram had been sent on Saturday, and was directed to the Royal -Victoria Hotel. - -“Why didn’t this get here sooner?” he demanded angrily. - -“We didn’t get it till yesterday. I started out with it as soon as I -could, but I tried to take a short cut and got turned around. Had to -stay in the bush all night.” - -Tom stifled an exclamation of impatience and despair. Armstrong had -given up hope and made an assignment after all, unaware of all the -wealth they had been accumulating in the north. Tom did some hard -thinking in that moment. If the bankruptcy went through they might -pay a hundred cents on the dollar, but it would leave nothing else. -If it could be averted, the walnut would float the business with -ease, with a prospect of better fortune. - -“How long was I asleep? How’s father?” he demanded. - -“You slept more’n an hour. Didn’t like to rouse you,” said Joe. “The -boss kinder roused up once and said something, but then went off -again. But I reckon he’s better.” - -Tom went to look at Mr. Jackson, who looked slightly less deadlike, -he thought. He would have given almost anything to be able to -consult with him for just five minutes. But at this crisis of the -whole affair Tom was forced to shoulder the entire responsibility. - -If it was humanly possible he would have to get to Toronto in time -to stop that creditors’ meeting that night. The assignment could be -withdrawn. As yet probably nothing irrevocable had been done, but by -to-morrow the arrangements for liquidation would have been made, and -it might be too late. - -He could, indeed, send a telegram to Mr. Armstrong if he could reach -the wire in time; but he doubted whether that would be enough. The -situation needed a personal explanation. - -He knew that a stage left Oakley, connecting with the morning train -going down. - -“What’s the shortest way to the railroad?” he demanded. “I’ve got to -get to the city by evening.” - -“Well, there’s the morning train down from Ormond,” said the -messenger. “But you can’t make it. It’ll take you ’most all day to -get to Ormond.” - -“That’s mebbe the shortest way, but it ain’t nohow the quickest,” -remarked Lynch. “Leastways, if you’ve got a canoe. I reckon -Charlie’s got his pretty near patched up by this time.” - -“How do you mean?” Tom demanded. - -“Why, paddle down to the foot of Little Coboconk, and then right -down the river, for mebbe fifteen or sixteen miles. You’ve been that -way. You remember where a little creek runs out through a big swamp -and into the river? Well, you land on the side opposite the creek, -and the railway ain’t much more’n five miles straight west, right -across the bush. It’ll be rough traveling, maybe, but you ought to -make it in three or four hours.” - -Tom glanced at his watch. It was just after seven o’clock. The train -left Ormond at ten-thirty. He could surely make it. A moment later -Charlie came up for instructions, having finished the repairs to his -canoe. - -“Hold on, Charlie! I’m going with you,” Tom exclaimed. “I’ll try it, -Lynch. Are you sure the raft’s safe?” - -“Safe as if she was in the sawmill. You can trust her to me. Trust -the boss to us, too. Charlie can go on to Oakley and bring back the -doctor.” - -“And mind you telegraph me what he says,” Tom insisted. “Here’s my -Toronto address. But I’ll be back here in three or four days, I -hope.” - -It did not occur to Tom to change into his city clothes. He hastened -to get into the canoe, taking the bow paddle while Charlie sat at -the stern; and they started down the lake, almost in the face of the -wind, which still blew strongly. - -It was rough, breathless paddling, though they hugged the shelter of -the shore as much as possible. They made slow time on that stage of -the journey, but when they reached the river things went more -easily. The river ran swiftly and was rather shallow now, but there -was always plenty of water for the canoe, and the faster the current -the better. Down the stream they shot, past the old trail to Uncle -Phil’s ranch, around the wide curves bordered by the incessant green -of the spruces, silently and swiftly, with a speed that filled Tom -with renewed hope. He was in fine physical condition; the hour’s -rest had restored him, and the rough and sleepless night behind him -had left only a nervous tension that for the time being actually -stimulated his sinews. - -At half-past eight by his watch he felt sure that they must have -come nearly ten miles. He suddenly smelled smoke, and was alarmed. - -“What’s that, Charlie? Fire?” he called over his shoulder. - -The Ojibway sniffed. - -“Fire—sure. Long piece from here, though,” he answered. - -Smoke certainly smelled strong in the air, coming up on the wind, -but no fire was anywhere in sight. The river grew wider and deeper, -running with a strength that almost outstripped the paddles. The -miles reeled off swiftly. Tom was keeping a close watch on the -shore, and it was not much after nine o’clock when he shouted to -Charlie and pointed ashore. - -On the left bank a great tamarac swamp came down to the water, and -just opposite them a small creek flowed sluggishly into the river, -oozing through a jungle of evergreen and fern. - -“Hold on!” he cried, and the steersman guided the canoe ashore. He -looked at the landmarks more carefully. It must be the place Lynch -had meant. Somewhere about five miles to the west lay the railway. - -“I stop here, Charlie,” he said hurriedly. “You go on to Oakley as -fast as you can paddle, and get the doctor. I’ll be back soon.” - -Charlie had already been provided with a note for the doctor, tucked -safely inside his felt hat. He nodded impassively. - -“Sure, I go quick, Tom,” he said. “I watch for you come back.” - -He put Tom ashore, and went on down the stream with quick -paddle-strokes, not once glancing back. Tom did not stay to watch -him, either. He glanced at the compass on his watch-chain and struck -straight in from the river. - -The train was due at half-past ten. He had an hour, and -long-distance running had been his speciality in track athletics. It -was only five miles, and, however rough the country might be, he -felt quite confident of being able to cover the distance in time. - -For a little way he had to go slowly, pushing his path through a -dense tangle of spruce and tamarac, but, once well away from the -river, the woods opened out. He went up and down one rolling ridge -after another, splashed through a rock-strewn brook or two, crossed -a strip of level forest, and then had to slow down for a last year’s -burned slash, where the ground was terribly encumbered with dead, -charred logs and jagged spikes of branches and roots. - -A smell of smoke seemed to hang about the place still, he fancied, -and then a veering gust brought him a whiff of smoke that was -certainly fresh. He was afraid to swerve from the compass bee-line, -but he felt extremely uneasy. He passed the old “burn” and entered a -region of jack-pine, and presently there was no mistaking the bluish -haze and the odor of ashes and smoke that filled the air. Then the -woods ceased all at once, and he found himself on the edge of a -great ruined slash that fire had made within two or three days, at -the most. - -He halted, despairingly. There seemed no end to the burned strip, -north or south, and he could get no clear notion of its width, for -the air was full of smoke and clouds of fine ashes that drove in -whirls before the wind. It might not be very wide, but it looked too -dangerous to cross. Yet he felt sure that he must be near the -railroad; he had surely come three or four miles, and as he stood -irresolute he heard the long blast of a locomotive far away through -the trees. - -He thought it was miles up toward Ormond. The railway must be only a -short distance ahead, and he plunged desperately into the smoky -belt. - -The fire was really entirely burned out, as he discovered -immediately, but at the first steps he went ankle-deep in ashes, and -felt the heat strike through his boot-soles. The ground was still -hot, and beds of embers smoldered here and there beneath the ashes. - -His heart almost failed him again. He might step into a mass of hot -coals that would scorch and cripple him. But there was no way -around; he had to cross this barrier or give up, and he went on -again, moving in long leaps to touch the ground as little as -possible. Wherever he could, he paused on a log to gain breath and -lay his course. - -The ground was cumbered with masses of fallen trees, charred, spiky, -a continual _chevaux-de-frise_ of tangled stubs and roots. They lay -at every possible angle, and Tom had to edge his way round them, -climb over, or squeeze through. It was like the “burn” he had -already crossed, but this one was fresh and hot. By sheer good luck -he escaped stepping into any spots of fire, but the ground burned -under his feet, and the ashes rose in smothering clouds as he plowed -through them. - -The ground was treacherous under its thick gray covering. It was -mined with holes and strewn with hidden entanglements. Two or three -times Tom tripped and went headlong, almost choked in the ashes. His -eyes grew filled with the fine powder; he could not see clearly nor -make sure of his directions, and he had a terrible feeling that his -strength was failing. - -He heard the locomotive whistle again, and much nearer. It spoke -failure, he thought. He could never reach the station now in time -for the train. To his blurred eyes his watch seemed to mark -half-past ten already. He was desperately tired, and burning with -thirst. He thought that he might as well rest a little; he longed -more than anything to sink down in the ashes, anywhere, and sleep. - -Still he kept doggedly moving, driven by he hardly knew what force. -The rest of the journey was a kind of nightmare, whose details he -could never quite remember. Hours seemed to pass in the torment of -that suffocating atmosphere—hours of intense heat, of stumbling, of -terrible thirst, and of overwhelming exhaustion. Then he seemed to -see trees ahead. They were charred evergreens, but the carpet of hot -ash ceased, and a little beyond he saw the cool, blessed green of -living spruces. - -Stimulated now by the consciousness that he had come through, he -made a last spurt, and in a few minutes he emerged suddenly upon the -railway. He stopped, confusedly; and then perceived, a hundred yards -down the track, a red-painted wooden station and the smoke of a -locomotive. - -He rushed toward it. The place was no more than a flag-station with -a log house or two in the background; and this was not a -passenger-train that stood there. It was not even a mixed train; it -was a long freight-train, engaged just then in coupling up a few -flat-cars loaded with fresh-cut ties. - -The conductor was standing on the platform, talking leisurely with -the station agent, and they both stared in amazement as Tom dashed -up, blackened, ash-smeared, and wild-eyed. - -“Give me a ticket to Toronto!” he exclaimed. “Am I in time? Has the -train—” - -“The morning train went down half an hour ago,” said the agent. -“There’s no other till six-fifteen to-night. What’s the -matter—anything happened?” - -“What time does that night train reach Toronto?” - -“At ten, when she’s on time.” - -That would be hours too late. Tom’s heart went down like lead. He -had lost the race after all. He felt discouraged and utterly played -out, but a last resource occurred to him. - -“Can’t you fix me up to go down on this freight?” he pleaded. - -“It’s against the rules to carry any passengers on freight-trains,” -said the agent. “Can’t be done, I’m afraid. Besides, this freight -only goes to Bala Junction, forty miles down.” - -Tom turned away, tears rising irrepressibly in his eyes. This time -he seemed to have reached a barrier which there was no passing. He -saw the agent and the conductor looking curiously after him, as he -walked down to the end of the platform. It occurred to him that he -ought to telegraph at any rate; and he went into the station and -wrote a rather long message for Mr. Armstrong and another to the -manager of the Erie Bank. - -The agent came in to take the messages. Tom had money in his pocket; -he paid for them, and went out to the platform again, where the -freight conductor watched the manipulation of his train. It was -going to Bala Junction, and Bala Junction, Tom remembered, was on -the main line north from Toronto. Many trains passed that point -daily. If he could get there, he could surely make a connection for -the city that afternoon. The conductor looked good-natured, and Tom -ventured to approach him. - -“Look here, can’t you let me ride as far as Bala Junction?” he -entreated. “It’s an important matter—almost life and death. I’ll pay -fare,—double fare, if you like,—but I’ve got to get to the city by -seven o’clock.” - -“My boy,” returned the conductor, not unkindly. “You heard what the -agent said. I’m not allowed to carry any passengers at all—might get -into trouble if I did. But,” he added, “there’s an empty box-car -half-way up the train, and I’d never know whether there was anybody -in it or not. We get to the Junction half an hour before the -south-bound express arrives.” - -Tom burst out with a grateful ejaculation, but the conductor winked -at him, and then turned and looked rigidly in the other direction. -The boy rushed down the track alongside the train, found the open -door of the box-car, and swung himself into it. He sat down on the -floor in a corner, and almost instantly lapsed into a sort of stupor -of weariness, from which he was roused by the violent shock and -crash of the train’s getting under way. He saw the station slide -past the open door; the endless line of spruce trunks succeeded it. -The train gathered speed; he was really started for the city at -last. - -It was not a comfortable ride. The freight-cars jolted and pitched, -crashing together with shattering jolts as the train slackened or -increased speed. Despite this, however, Tom dozed during a good deal -of the forty miles to Bala, arousing fully only at the occasional -halts. No one came near him, and nobody appeared to see him when he -slipped out of his box-car at the Junction, and made haste to buy -his ticket for Toronto on the express. - -The express was late, and he filled in the time by endeavoring to -brush and clean himself a little, with imperfect success. He -obtained something to eat at the lunch-counter, and paced up and -down the platform counting the minutes. The express arrived at last, -and he was the only passenger to get aboard. He longed to take a -sleeper berth, but he was so disreputable-looking that he dared not -attempt it. He feared even to enter the first-class coaches, and -dropped into a seat in the smoker. - -The hard part of the journey was over. Everything depended now on -the train, and he resigned himself to chance, with a dull fatalism. -He had done all he could, and he was too deadly weary to speculate -any more upon his chances of winning. He slept through most of the -journey, and came out, dazed and confused, upon the platform of the -Union Station, to see the big illuminated face of the clock -indicating eight. - -It stung him again to desperate anxiety. He hastened to a telephone -booth in the waiting-room and called Mr. Armstrong’s office. Central -was unable to get any answer. The office must be closed. He then -rang up the lawyer’s house. A woman’s voice answered. - -“Mr. Armstrong is downtown, attending a business meeting at the King -Edward Hotel. Is there any message?” - -Tom dropped the receiver into the hook. He knew well what that -business meeting was. They were holding it at the King Edward, then. -Luckily, the hotel was not far from the depot, and a direct -street-car line carried him there in five minutes. - -The throng of well-dressed people about the door of the big hotel -stared at the grimed, smoky, ragged young man who burst in, and the -outraged door-porter made an ineffectual grab to stop him. Few such -disreputable figures had ever passed that portal. Tom cast a rapid -glance around the leather chairs of the marble lobby, failed to spy -the face he sought, and hurried up to the desk. - -“Mr. Henry Armstrong—the lawyer—is he here?” - -“Haven’t seen him,” returned the clerk, eyeing Tom with indignation, -and he beckoned privately to a porter, indicating that the young man -should be removed. - -Tom glanced over the lobby again. He would have to wait. He dropped -into one of the big easy-chairs, but the porter laid a hard hand on -his shoulder. - -“Come now, you can’t sit here. You’ve got to get out.” - -Tom rose, confused and humiliated. He was aware of scores of curious -and amused faces looking at him. The porter was edging him toward -the exit, when somebody touched his arm. - -“Bless my soul, Tom Jackson! I saw you come in, but didn’t know you. -What in the world have you been doing to yourself?” - -Tom almost gasped with deep relief. It was Mr. Armstrong himself, -who had been in conversation with a small, alert-looking man with a -gray mustache. - -“Where’s your father? I got your telegram, but couldn’t make out -what you were driving at,” pursued the lawyer. - -“Father’s badly hurt. The meeting—is it over yet?” Tom exclaimed, -choking with excitement. - -“The meeting? No, it hasn’t started yet. We’re waiting for one of -the important men. This is Mr. Laforce, of the Erie Bank. He says he -had a telegram from you, too.” - -“Of course I wired him!” cried Tom. “You must call the meeting off. -We’re not bankrupt. We’re all right now. We’ve got upward of fifty -thousand feet of good black walnut, worth three hundred dollars a -thousand—as good as cash—” - -Mr. Laforce gave Tom a keen glance. - -“You have, eh? Your wire sounded mysterious. Something in this, -Armstrong?” - -“I think it’s worth looking into,” said Mr. Armstrong, laughing. - -“If you’ve got all that, I guess the bank can carry you,” continued -the financier. “Of course we don’t want to push Matt Jackson into -bankruptcy. I guess anyway we’d better call the meeting postponed.” - -That meeting was never held. Tom held a long conference with the -lawyer and the banker that evening, going home at last to his -deserted house, to tumble into bed and sleep like one dead till the -middle of the next forenoon. Late that day a telegram arrived from -the north: - - Boss waked up and doing good. Doctor says no danger. - Raft safe. - - Lynch. - -Tom had another long talk over a dinner-table with Armstrong that -evening, finding the lawyer more human than he had ever considered -him before. The next morning he left for the Coboconk lakes again, -accompanied by a representative of the Erie Bank. - -They found Mr. Jackson conscious and much recovered, weak indeed, -but eager to be out again. The skull had not been fractured; he had -suffered merely a concussion, and had been half drowned into the -bargain, and when Tom and his companion arrived he insisted on -sitting up and talking business. - -The big raft still lay behind its boom in the northern bay, and was -an imposing sight, even after all the damage it had suffered. Nearly -a third of it had broken away in the storm. Some of the cribs had -remained afloat; some had gone ashore; and Lynch had been -energetically picking up everything that could be salvaged. Much of -the walnut had been spilled off the loose cribs, but altogether -Lynch estimated that they still had a good hundred and twenty -thousand feet. - -At any rate the sight of the timber so impressed the bank -representative that he willingly agreed to “carry” the business a -little longer. All that remained was to get the timber out. Mr. -Jackson had originally thought of sawing it up at Oakley, but -finally decided to team the logs out from that place and ship it to -Toronto, where the precious wood could be more carefully handled. - -They had to wait several days for a north wind to enable the raft to -go down the lake, and during this time, to Tom’s immense surprise, -appeared his cousin Dave. With some embarrassment Dave explained -that the “gold boom” had turned out a disappointment. He had staked -some claims, but there was nothing in them. He looked over the raft -with amazement and some chagrin. - -“To think that I spent two years within a mile of all that and never -knew it!” he commented. - -“We’ll give you a job as Lynch’s lieutenant—four dollars a day and -board,” Tom suggested, laughing. - -Dave declined. He was needed on the farm, but he gladly accepted the -return of the fifteen dollars that Tom had borrowed at that critical -moment in the woods. - -The raft went down to Oakley without mishap, a timely rainfall -having swollen the river to a good depth, and it aroused great -excitement at that town. Here they broke it up, and for a long time -the heavy logging teams were busy, slowly hauling the timber out to -the railway. - -Two dozen logs or so vanished mysteriously between Oakley and -Toronto, but the rest of the timber was stored safely in Mr. -Jackson’s yards to dry out thoroughly. It was then carefully sawed -up. It sold somewhat slowly but at a high price, and not a scrap of -it was wasted. Altogether, the walnut brought a gross sum of -$44,000, besides several hundred dollars obtained from the rough -spruce and jack-pine of the floats, which was left at Oakley. - -Charlie followed the raft down to Oakley and hung about till the -last load was teamed out. Tom looked forward with genuine regret to -saying good-by to this companion who had stood by him through so -many adventures. By way of deadening the farewell, he sent to -Toronto for a magnificent repeating-rifle with a stock of -ammunition, a new canoe, a miscellaneous camp outfit, and a set of -traps, and presented this unexpected wealth to Charlie just before -he left. - -“If you ever need anything, Charlie,” he said, “if the trapping -turns out bad or you have any trouble, you go to my uncle Phil -Jackson. You know where he lives. He’ll give you anything you want.” - -The Ojibway looked over the new outfit, which would make him the -envy of all his tribe, and raised his eyes to Tom’s, full of a deep -glow. - -“You good fellow, Tom,” he said. “You come back some time, mebbe. I -watch for you.” - -“Sure I’ll come back, Charlie,” Tom promised. “We’ll go trapping -together yet.” - -Thus far, however, Tom has not gone back. He reëntered the -university that autumn, with renewed ambition to finish his studies; -and, without altogether neglecting collegiate athletics, he spent -most of his spare time in his father’s office and yards. - -The forty-odd thousand dollars was not a fortune, but it carried the -business over a bad time, and was enough to set Mr. Jackson on his -feet again. Though, as he says, the lumber trade is no longer what -it used to be, the Jackson establishment seems to be prospering. -After Tom’s graduation, however, the office stationery bore the new -heading: - - MATTHEW JACKSON & SON. - -Perhaps the change brought luck. - - THE END - - - - - -End of Project Gutenberg's The Timber Treasure, by Frank Lillie Pollock - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE TIMBER TREASURE *** - -***** This file should be named 62950-0.txt or 62950-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/6/2/9/5/62950/ - -Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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