CHAPTER XXIV
_In the High Mountains_
Tom's second tour of guard duty ended at four o'clock in the morning,and he woke the Doctor to succeed him. Then, without attracting theother boys' attention, he rolled his blanket into a compact bundle andstrapped it high upon his shoulders. He next loaded his cartridge beltwith twenty buckshot cartridges on one side and twenty cartridges thatcarried turkey shot on the other. He put a box of matches into onepocket and two thick slices of bear beef into another. Finally, he tookone of the empty meal bags, carefully folded it up and thrust it intothe breast of his hunting shirt.
Thus equipped he sallied out, and bidding the Doctor good morning as hepassed the picket post, started off up the mountain. He had to pick hisway very carefully till daylight came, and by that time he had passedwell over the side of a ridge and was completely out of sight of CampVenture.
Selecting a suitable spot where the wind had swept a rock clear of snow,he laid aside his gun and blanket, and set to work to build a littlefire and cook one slice of his meat for breakfast. The other he reservedfor a late dinner.
As he moved on after breakfast, he came upon a flock of quails--orpartridges, as they are more properly called in Virginia. They werehelplessly huddled under the edge of a stone and were manifestlyfreezing to death. For when Tom, who was too much of a sportsman toshoot birds in the covey, tried to flush them, meaning to shoot them onwing, they were barely able to flutter about on the ground, and whollyincapable of rising in flight.
"I may as well have them," said the boy, "seeing that they'll be frozento death in another half hour." So, after a little scrambling, he caughtthe eleven birds and quickly put them out of their suffering. Drawingsome twine from a pocket, he strung the birds together and threw themover his neck for ease of carrying.
The mountain up here was rugged and uneven, scarred and seamed withchasms and deep hollows. Tom devoted all his energies to peering intothese as if searching for something. At one time, as he was hunting fora place from which to get a good view of a small but deep ravine, heflushed a flock of wild turkeys, seven or eight in number, and scarcelymore than twenty feet distant from him. Curiously enough, he let themscamper away without so much as taking a shot at them.
That was exceedingly unlike little Tom Ridsdale, and obviously it meantsomething. But what it meant did not appear. But shooting makes a noiseand attracts attention. Tom did not want to attract attention.
About two o'clock in the afternoon, Tom carefully reconnoitered a spotwhere great blocks of stone had fallen from cliffs above to a ledgebelow lying loosely there and making small caverns. Having satisfiedhimself that neither human habitation nor any human being was withinmiles of this little hiding place, Tom collected some sticks and built alittle fire in one of the crevices between the great blocks of stone.Here, he cooked and ate his remaining piece of bear beef. Then he openedhis blanket, rolled himself in it, and disposed himself to sleep, in ahalf sitting, half lying posture with his head and shoulders restingagainst the rock.
"I must get a little sleep now," he said to himself, "as I didn't getany too much last night, and, of course, can't take any at all to-night.For if I slept without a fire in this weather, I'd freeze to death,and it would never do to build a fire up here at night, when it could beseen for miles away."
Healthy boy that he was, he fell almost immediately into slumber, and itwas nightfall when he woke. He took the risk of throwing two or threesmall sticks on his well-hidden fire, in order to broil one of hispartridges for his supper. That done, he repacked his blanket, took uphis gun, and set out again on his search for that something for which hehad been looking all day.
All night long Tom toiled about, up and down hills, over rocks andcliffs, through snow that was now beginning to soften as the weather wasgrowing milder, but the search resulted in nothing. When morning came,the well-nigh exhausted boy sought out what seemed a safe spot for thepurpose, created a little fire, cooked three partridges and ate them,seasoning them with a little salt which he always, on his hunting trips,carried in a little India rubber tobacco bag. Then he stretched himselfout for a sleep, no longer fearing to freeze, as the weather had becomevery much warmer than before.
It was four o'clock in the afternoon when Tom awoke. As he did so, hefelt a hand pulling at that part of his blanket in which his head waswrapped--for all huntsmen and all soldiers, when they sleep in theopen, even in the warmest weather, find it necessary to wrap up theirheads.
HE FELT A HAND PULLING AT HIS BLANKET.]
"Well, law's sakes!" exclaimed the mountaineer, who, rifle in hand, wasbending over him, "Ef it ain't Little Tom! Well, I'm glad I didn'tshoot, as I was fust off about to! Why, Tom, I wouldn't have shot youfer another of the Doctor's twenty dollar bills! No, not fer a pocketfull of 'em! You don't know what you done fer me an' fer my little galwhen you pay-rolled me"--the man always pronounced "parole" "pay-roll.""You see, I got home jest in time to save the little gal from starvin'.Her mother was dead in the cabin--you 'member I tole you she wasconsumptive like--well, she got to bleedin' one day at the nose an'mouth an' jist quit livin' like. So the little gal was left all alonethere, an' there wan't nothin' whatsomever in the place to eat an' ofcourse a little gal only six year old didn't know what to do. So fur twodays before I got there she hadn't had a mouthful. Well, I had a littleleft from what you fellers had giv' me to eat when I left camp, an' Ifust off fed her on that. It made her sick like, 'cause she hadn't beenused to eatin' as you mout say, an' maybe I give her too much at oncet.But she quick got over that, an' I had that twenty dollar bill! You jestbet I hustled off down into the holler to a still an' brought some o'the ground up corn an' rye an' a gallon of the 'lasses that they useswith it to make whiskey out'n an' took it home fer the little gal toeat."
"I am very sorry," said Tom, "to hear of your wife's death, but veryglad you got home in time to save the little girl."
"Well, as to my ole woman, of course I can't help mournin', cause anyhow she was always a better wife than a no 'count feller like medeserves to have. But you see it wan't unexpected, like. We'd both on usseed it a comin' for a year or two, an' always comin' a little nigher,so it didn't seem so onnateral like as it would ef she'd been strong an'healthy an' laughin' like, as she used to be before I went away toprison."
With that the man buried his face in his hands and sobbed. After all,the well-to-do, the refined, the cultivated people of this world have nomonopoly of love or of tender sensibilities.
Tom took the man's hand and pressed it warmly. Then by way of turningthe conversation he said:
"I suppose you're wondering what I am doing up here in the highmountains?"
"Well, yes--it's risky of you, like. You see, I've done all the talkin'I could to persuade our people, like, that you fellers ain't here tointerfere with 'em, an' lately they've let you alone. But still itain't safe fer you, an' my earnest advice to you still is to git downout'n these mountings. I'm agoin' to keep on a talkin' in your favor an'a doin' all I kin fer to make it safe fer you to stay, but it won'tnever be real safe. You see, there's them up here in the high mountingswhat's suspicious like. They don't want to take no risks. They're alwaysa lookin' out fer tricks, an' they won't believe but what you fellersmout be up to some trick. Anyhow they say 'men that ain't up in themountings can't tell what's a goin' on up in the mountings,' an' some of'em says, says they, 'men that's dead don't tell nothin' to the revenueofficers.'"
"Nevertheless we're not going to be driven out, as you know," said Tom."So now let's get to business."
"All right, Tom. Ef there's anythin' in this world I kin do fer youwithout hangin' fer it, I'll do it."
"Well," said Tom, "I came up here at risk of my life to look for you. Ithought I might find your cabin or more probably find you standing guardover some still somewhere, and so I've been looking out for stills."
"Now, that's curious," said the man, "very curious. Fer that's edzactlywhat you found me a doin'. You see, they's a still near here an' it'sabout
as snugly tucked away as any still ever was in all thesemountings. You'd never find it in the world, though you ain't at thisminute more'n two hundred yards away from it. Still the folks what runsit don't feel overly safe in spite of their hidin' of the still. Sothey've give me a job like to climb about over the cliffs an' look outfer spies. That's how I come to find you, Tom."
"Well, I'm glad you did find me," said Tom, "for in all probability Inever should have found you, and I stood a good chance of getting myselfshot in trying. You said just now that you would do anything you couldfor me."
"Yes, an' I will!" answered the man, with emphasis. "Jest you try me,Tom, an' see ef I don't."
"Very well," said Tom. "I believe you. Now, what I want isn't much. Weboys down there in Camp Venture ran out of something to eat the otherday, and we nearly starved for a time. Finally, by good luck, we got abear, and we have more than half of it left, and of course, now that thesnow storm has passed away, I can get more game as we need it. But wehaven't had any bread for more than a week, and we're hungry. So I havecome out here to look for you, to see if you can't get me a bag ofground-up corn or rye from one of the stills. I have money with me withwhich to pay for it."
"But you can't pay fer it, Tom," said the man solemnly. "They ain't anybody around the still now, 'cause it's knocked off runnin' fer the nextweek er so, but they's plenty of ground corn an' rye there, an' I'llbring you all you kin carry of it, ef you'll wait here fer fifteenminutes, an' not a cent to pay."
"But it doesn't belong to you?" said Tom.
"No, in course not. I don't own no still. I wish I was rich enough."
"Then of course I can't let you give me the meal. I must pay full pricefor it or I'll go without it."
"But say, Tom, that stuff ain't never measured up or weighed up, an'nobody'd ever miss a bagful or two. Why, I carry a small bagful of it tomy cabin every mornin', jest as a sort o' safeguard like fer the littlegal till blackberry time comes. I'll bring you a bagful an' I tell youit shan't cost you a cent."
"And I tell you," said Tom, "that I won't take an ounce of it on anysuch terms. That meal belongs to other people. I want some of it--justas much as I can carry to Camp Venture with me--but I must pay for everyounce of it or I won't take any of it. I never steal, and I don'tintend to let you steal for me."
"Oh, it ain't stealin' like," answered the man; "you see people nevercare fer what they lose ef they don't know that they loses it."
"I don't suppose I can make you understand," said Tom, realizing theutter inability of the mountaineer's mind to grasp an ethical principle,even of the simplest kind, "but I tell you plainly that I want thisbagful of corn meal if you'll let me pay honestly for it, and otherwiseI don't want it at all, and won't take it. I would rather see every boyin Camp Venture starve than do a dishonest thing."
"Well, you see, you people from down the mounting draw these things agood deal finer than us folks up here in the mountings kin. I'm a memberof the church an' I tries to behave accordin'. You never heard me swearan' you never will. You've done me the greatest favor any body ever doneme, an' like an honest man I want to repay it a little, but you won'tlet me."
Tom saw that there was no use in trying to enlighten the mountaineer'sperverted ethical sense and so he gave up the effort and simply said:
"Will you let me have the meal and let me pay for it, or will you not?"
"In course I will," said the mountaineer. "How many bags is you got?"
"Only this one," said Tom. "I couldn't carry more than that. It willhold a hundred pounds of meal."
"Yes, but I kin carry some," said the man, "and I'm a goin' to. I tellyou you done me the biggest turn any body ever done me, when you put meon pay-roll, an' I'm bound to get even with you ef I kin. So I'm a goin'to fill your bag an' one that I've got down there of my own, an' I'm agoin' to tote one of 'em while you tote the other. I know easier pathsthan you do about these mountings an' I'm a goin' to show 'em to you. Insome places we kin slide the meal bags down a incline fer a quarter of amile at a time, jest on the ice, without no totin' at all. So we'll gittwo big bags o' meal to your camp betwixt this an' mornin'."
"But why not wait for daylight?" asked Tom.
"'Cause then the fellers would lynch me fer carryin' food to the enemy.You see it won't do fer me even to go into yer camp. I'll tote my bag tothe top o' that bluff like, that rises this side o' the camp. Then I'llgit out quick an' afterwards you kin slip the bag over the bluff likean' I'll git into no trouble."
With that the mountaineer took Tom's bag and disappeared over a sort ofcliff. Ten minutes later he returned with the bag full of a rude meal,made by grinding corn in a big coffee mill of the kind that grocers use.
"Now you jest stay here fer ten minutes or so an' I'll be back with theother sack. It's a good deal bigger'n this 'un, but I kin tote a gooddeal more'n you kin, an' you'll need all the meal you kin git."
"Wait a minute," said Tom. "How much am I to pay for this meal? I haveonly two dollars with me and perhaps it will not be enough."
"Well, you see, Tom, I done tole you you needn't pay nothin' fer it, butyou wouldn't have it that way on no account. So I reckon I'll charge youthe same price I pay when I buy that sort o' meal from the still. That'sa dollar fer them two bags."
"That's very cheap," said Tom. "Are you sure it's a proper price?"
"Sartin' sure," answered the man. "You see it's a mighty poor sort o'meal--jest soft mounting corn ground up like in a coffee mill to makewhiskey out'n. You'll have to wet it up mouty soft like to make it sticktogether fer bread, an' I'll tell you a trick about that. You jest wetit up with boilin' hot water. That sort o' cooks it like. Make it verywet an' don't mind even ef a little o' the water stan's on top o' thedough in the pan. That'll cook away an' your bread'll be all the betterfer it. But a dollar is a high price fer it."
By the time the second bag of meal came it was high time for the pair tostart if they were to reach Camp Venture before daylight. But themountaineer knew all the short cuts, and better still, all the easycuts--paths that gave a minimum of up-hill work while presenting otheradvantages of importance. At one point, for example, he led Tom to aspot where there was a steep shelving rock, completely coated with hardice.
"Now," he said, "You an' me couldn't go down that slide without breakin'every bone we've got. But we kin slip our meal bags down it 'thout nohurt to nobody. Then I'll show you a way round it, so's we kin git themeal agin."
With that he placed his meal bag in position, gave it a little push, andinstantly it disappeared down the hill in the darkness. Tom did the samewith his bag, and then, striding off to the right, the mountaineer ledthe way by a difficult but practicable path around the rock to a pointquite a quarter of a mile below, where the two found their bags of mealsafely reposing in a snow bank.
This was repeated at several points on the journey, while at otherpoints where the bags could not be thus slidden down, because of aninsufficient incline, it was easy for the two to drag them as theywalked and this they did. As the way was almost entirely down hill,there was very little of what the mountaineer called "toting" to bedone.
About three o'clock in the morning the two reached the brow of thatcliff under which the boys had made their first temporary encampment,and which constituted the mountainside limit of Camp Venture. There theyparted, the mountaineer protesting his eager desire to hurry back and"look arter the little gal."
"Wait a minute," said Tom. "I've paid you for this meal, but I haven'tpaid you for carrying it down the mountain or for the risk you've takenin doing that."
"I don't want no pay, Tom," protested the man with eagerness. "I hain'tfergot that you put me on pay-roll jest in the nick o' time."
"That's all right," said Tom. "But I took two dollars with me and Iexpected to pay all of it for the meal. Now I want you to take theremaining dollar to the 'little gal' as a present from Tom. There, don'tstop to say anything or you'll be late in getting back," added Tom, ashe pressed the dollar bill into the man's hands.
> "Well, all I'll stop to say, Little Tom," said the mountaineer, "isthis: Ef you git out'n meal agin, you come to the same place I found youin. I'll keep a look out fer you there every day. An' ef they's war madeon you it won't be long before I'm takin' a hand on your side with myrifle, an' it don't make no difference whatsomever who it is that's afightin' of you."