X THE LOOMING SAILBOAT
Though favored by the weather most of the time for several days insuccession, the brothers went ahead but slowly. The discovery of the wornmoccasin and the stained tunic had raised their hopes of finding thewrecked bateau soon. At any moment they might come upon it. Accordinglythey were even more vigilant than before, anxiously scanning every footof open shore, bay, cove, stream mouth and island.
One evening before sunset, they reached a beautiful bay with smallislands and wooded shores, where they caught sight of a group of barklodges. Blaise proposed that they land and bargain for provisions. Thereproved to be about a dozen Indians in the encampment, men, squaws andchildren. Luckily two deer and a yearling moose had been killed the daybefore, and Blaise, after some discussion in Ojibwa, succeeded inobtaining a piece of fresh venison and another of moose meat. The Indiansrefused Hugh's offer of payment in money, preferring to exchange the meatfor ammunition for their old, flint-lock muskets. They were from the deepwoods of the interior, unused to frequenting trading posts, and with noidea of money, but they understood the value of powder and shot.
To one of the men Blaise spoke of having seen the outlaw Ohrante. TheOjibwa replied that he had heard Ohrante had come from his hiding placeseeking vengeance on those who had captured him. He had never seen thegiant Iroquois, the man said, but he had heard that it was through hisgreat powers as a medicine man that he had escaped from his captors.Without divulging that he was the son of the man who had led theexpedition against Ohrante, Blaise asked the Indian if he knew when andwhere the outlaw had first been seen since his exile.
"I was told he was here at this Bay of the Beaver late in the Moon of theSnow Crust," the Ojibwa replied, and the boy's hazel eyes gleamed.
Not until they had made camp did Blaise tell Hugh of the information hehad received.
"In the Moon of the Snow Crust!" the latter cried. "That is February orMarch, isn't it? And it was late in March that father died!"
The younger boy nodded. "Ohrante killed him, that I believe. Some day,some day----" Blaise left the sentence unfinished, but his elder brotherhad no doubt of the meaning. Hugh's heart, like the younger lad's, washot against his father's murderer, but he remembered the powerful figureof the Iroquois standing out dark against the dawn. How and when wouldthe day come?
After thoroughly exploring the Bay of the Beaver that night, the boyswere off shortly after dawn the next morning. Just as the sun was comingup, reddening the white mist that lay upon the gently rippling water,they paddled out of the bay. As they rounded the southern point, Blaiseuttered a startled exclamation.
Hugh, in the stern, looked up from his paddle. "A ship!" he cried.
Coming directly towards them, the light breeze scarce filling her sail,was a ship. So high she loomed through the morning mist Hugh thought shemust be at least as large as the _Otter_, though she seemed to have butone square sail. What was a ship doing here, so far south of theKaministikwia and even of the Grand Portage? Did she belong to some ofthe Yankee traders who were now invading the Superior region? Hugh knewhe had been in United States waters ever since passing the mouth of thePigeon River.
And then, as the canoe and the ship approached one another, a curiousthing happened. The ship shrank. She was no longer as large as the_Otter_. She was much smaller. She was not a ship at all, only a woodenboat with a sail. There was something about the light and the atmosphericconditions, the rising sun shining through the morning mist, that haddeceived the eye and caused the approaching craft to appear far tallerthan it really was.
The sailboat was coming slowly in the light wind. As the boys paddledpast, they saw it was a small, flat-sided, wooden boat pointed at bothends. It was well loaded and carried three men. Hugh shouted a greetingand an inquiry. A tall fellow in blanket coat and scarlet cap, who wassteering, replied in a big, roaring voice and bad French, that they werefrom the Fond du Lac bound for the Kaministikwia.
Blaise had been even more amazed than Hugh at the deceptive appearance ofthe sailboat. When they landed later to inspect a stream mouth, thehalf-breed said seriously that some spirit of the lake must have beenplaying tricks with them. He wondered if one of the men aboard thatbateau was using magic.
"I doubt that," Hugh answered promptly. "I think the queer light, thesunrise through the mist, deceived our eyes and made the boat looktaller. Once on the way from Michilimackinac to the Sault, we sawsomething like that. A small, bare rock ahead of us stretched up like ahigh island. The Captain said he had seen the same thing before in thatvery same spot. He called it 'looming,' but he did not think there wasanything magical about it."
Blaise made no reply, but Hugh doubted if the lad had been convinced.
Several times during the rest of the trip down shore, the boys met canoesloaded with trappers and traders or with families of Indians journeyingto the Grand Portage or to the New Fort. The two avoided conversationwith the strangers, as they did not care to answer questions aboutthemselves or their destination.
The journey was becoming wearisome indeed. The minuteness of the searchand the delays from bad weather prolonged the time. Moreover the store offood was scant. The lads fished and hunted whenever possible without toogreatly delaying progress, but their luck was poor. Seldom were they ableto satisfy their hearty appetites. They lay down hungry under the starsand took up their paddles at chilly dawn with no breakfast but a bit ofmaple sugar. Hugh grew lean and brown and hard muscled. Except for theredder hue of his tan, the light color of his hair and his gray eyes, hemight almost have been whole brother to Blaise. The older boy had becomeexpert with the paddle and could hold his own for any length of time andat any pace the half-breed set. As a camper he was nearly the Indianlad's equal and he prided himself on being a better cook. It would takeseveral years of experience and wilderness living, however, before hecould hope to compete with his younger brother in woodcraft, weatherwisdom or the handling of a canoe in rough water.
As mile after mile of carefully searched shore line passed, without signof the wrecked bateau or trace of Jean Beaupre's having come that way,the boys grew more and more puzzled and anxious. Nevertheless theypersisted in their quest until they came at last to the Fond du Lac.
Fond du Lac means literally the "bottom of the lake," but the name wasused by the early French explorers to designate the end or head of LakeSuperior, where the River St. Louis discharges and where the city ofDuluth now stands. To-day the name is no longer applied to the head ofthe lake itself, but is restricted to the railway junction and town ofFond du Lac several miles up the river. There was no town of Fond du Lacor of Duluth in the days of this story. Wild, untamed, uninhabited, rosethe steep rock hills and terraces where part of the city now stands.
As they skirted the shore, the boys could see ahead of them a narrow linestretching across the water to the southeast. That line was the long, lowpoint now known as Minnesota Point, a sand-bar that almost closes theriver mouth and served then, as it does now, to form a sheltered harbor.Drawing nearer, they discovered that the long, sand point was by no meansbare, much of it being covered more or less thickly with bushes,evergreens, aspens and willows. The two lads were weary, discouraged andvery hungry. Since their scanty breakfast of wild rice boiled with alittle fat, they had eaten nothing but a lump of sugar each, the lastremnant of their provisions. Nevertheless they paddled patiently alongthe bar to the place where the river cut diagonally through it to reachthe lake. Entering the narrow channel, they passed through to absolutelystill water.
The sun was setting. Unless they went several miles farther to a tradingpost or caught some fish, they must go to sleep hungry. They decided totry the fishing. Luck with the lines had been poor throughout most of thetrip, but that night fortune favored the lads a little. In the shallowerwater within the bar, they caught, in less than half an hour, two small,pink-fleshed lake trout, which Hugh estimated at somewhat less than threepounds each.
On the inner side
of the point, the brothers ran their canoe upon thesand beach. Then they kindled a fire and cooked their long delayedsupper. When the meal was over, nothing remained of the fish but heads,fins, skin and bones.
Usually both fell asleep as soon as they were rolled in their blankets.That night, on the low sand-bar, the mosquitoes came in clouds to theattack, but it was not the annoying insects that kept the boys awake.They wanted to talk over their situation.
"It seems," Hugh said despondently, "that we have failed. That wreckedboat must have been battered to pieces and washed out into the lake. Ouronly chance of discovering the cache was to find the boat, and thatchance seems to be gone."
"There is still one other chance, my brother," Blaise replied quietly."Have you forgotten what we found at the River of Devil Tracks? We mustgo back there and make search again."
"You are right," was Hugh's quick rejoinder. "We didn't find any sign ofthe boat, yet it may once have been there or near by."
Blaise nodded. "The bateau was perhaps driven on the bar at the rivermouth and afterwards washed out into the lake. We must make speed backthere. But, Hugh, if it was Ohrante who killed our father, he may alsohave found the furs."
"And carried them away." Hugh slapped savagely at a mosquito. "I havethought of that. I believe in my heart that Ohrante killed father. Yetthe murderer may not have taken the furs. Father told you he was wreckedin a storm, and, unable to carry the furs with him, he hid them. Thatmuch you say he made clear. When and where he was attacked we do notknow, but I believe it must have been after he cached the furs. When hetold of the wreck and the hiding of the pelts, he said nothing of hiswound?"
"Nothing then or afterwards of the wound or how he got it. He bade meseek you out and find the furs and the packet. When I asked him how hecame by the hurt, he was beyond replying."
Both boys were silent a moment listening to the howling of a lonely wolffar off in the high hills to the north.
Then Hugh said emphatically, "We must go back and search every inch ofground about that river. We will not give up while a chance remains offinding the cache," he added with stubborn determination.