II
Sam
Sam Raften turned out to be more congenial than he looked. His slow,drawling speech had given a wrong impression of stupidity, and, aftera formal showing of the house under Mr. Raften, a real investigationwas headed by Sam. "This yer's the paaar-le-r," said he, unlocking asort of dark cellar aboveground and groping to open what afterwardproved to be a dead, buried and almost forgotten window. In Sangersettlement the farmhouse parlour is not a room; it is an institution.It is kept closed all the week except when the minister calls, andthe one at Raften's was the pure type. Its furniture consisted of sixpainted chairs (fifty cents each), two rockers ($1.49), one melodeon(thirty-two bushels of wheat--the agent asked forty), a sideboard madeat home of the case the melodeon came in, one rag carpet woofed athome and warped and woven in exchange for wool, one center-tablevarnished (!) ($9.00 cash, $11.00 catalogue). On the center-table wasone tintype album, a Bible, and some large books for company use.Though dusted once a week, they were never moved, and it was yearslater before they were found to have settled permanently into thevarnish of the table. In extremely uncostly frames on the wall werethe coffin-plates of the departed members of the family. It was thecustom at Sanger to honour the dead by bringing back from the funeralthe name-plate and framing it on a black background with some supposedappropriate scripture text.
The general atmosphere of the room was dusty and religious as itwas never opened except on Sundays or when the parson called, whichinstituted a sort of temporary Sunday, and the two small windows werekept shut and plugged as well as muffled always, with green paperblinds and cotton hangings. It was a thing apart from the rest of thehouse--a sort of family ghost-room: a chamber of horrors, seen butonce a week.
But it contained one thing at least of interest--something that atonce brought Sam and Yan together. This was a collection of a scoreof birds' eggs. They were all mixed together in an old glass-toppedcravat box, half full of bran. None of them were labelled or properlyblown. A collector would not have given it a second glance, but itproved an important matter. It was as though two New Yorkers, onedisguised as a Chinaman and the other as a Negro, had accidentlymet in Greenland and by chance one had made the sign of the secretbrotherhood to which they both belonged.
"Do you like these things?" said Yan, with sudden interest and warmth,in spite of the depressing surroundings.
"You bet," said Sam. "And I'd a-had twice as many only Da said it wasdoing no good and birds was good for the farm."
"Well, do you know their names?"
"Wall, I should say so. I know every Bird that flies and all about it,or putty near it," drawled Sam, with an unusual stretch for him, as hewas not given to bragging.
"I wish I did. Can't I get some eggs to take home?"
"No; Da said if I wouldn't take any more he'd lend me his Injun Chiefgun to shoot Rabbits with."
"What? Are there Rabbits here?"
"Wall, I should say so. I got three last winter."
"But I mean _now_," said Yan, with evident disappointment.
"They ain't so easy to get at _now_, but we can try. Some daywhen all the work's done I'll ask Da for his gun."
"When all the work's done," was a favourite expression of the Raftensfor indefinitely shelving a project, it sounded so reasonable and wasreally so final.
Sam opened up the lower door of the sideboard and got out some flintarrow-heads picked up in the ploughing, the teeth of a Beaver datingfrom the early days of the settlement, and an Owl very badly stuffed.The sight of these precious things set Yan all ablaze. "Oh!" was allhe could say. Sam was gratified to see such effect produced by thefamily possessions and explained, "Da shot that off'n the barn an' thehired man stuffed it."
The boys were getting on well together now. They exchangedconfidences all day as they met in doing chores. In spite of the longinterruptions, they got on so well that Sam said after supper, "Say,Yan, I'm going to show you something, but you must promise neverto tell--Swelpye!" Of course Yan promised and added the absolutelybinding and ununderstandable word--"Swelpme."
"Le's both go to the barn," said Sam.
When they were half way he said: "Now I'll let on I went backfor something. You go on an' round an' I'll meet you under the'rusty-coat' in the orchard." When they met under the big russet appletree, Sam closed one of his melancholy eyes and said in a voice ofunnecessary hush, "Follow me." He led to the other end of the orchardwhere stood the old log house that had been the home before thebuilding of the brick one. It was now used as a tool house. Sam led upa ladder to the loft (this was all wholly delightful). There at thefar end, and next the little gable pane, he again cautioned secrecy,then when on invitation Yan had once more "swelped" himself, herummaged in a dirty old box and drew out a bow, some arrows, a rustysteel trap, an old butcher knife, some fish-hooks, a flint and steel,a box full of matches, and some dirty, greasy-looking stuff that hesaid-was dried meat. "You see," he explained, "I always wanted to be ahunter, and Da was bound I'd be a dentist. Da said there was no moneyin hunting, but one day he had to go to the dentist an' it cost fourdollars, an' the man wasn't half a day at the job, so he wanted me tobe a dentist, but I wanted to be a hunter, an' one day he licked meand Bud (Bud, that's my brother that died a year ago. If you hear Matalk you'll think he was an angel, but I always reckoned he was acrazy galoot, an' he was the worst boy in school by odds). Wall, Dalicked us awful for not feeding the hogs, so Bud got ready to clearout, an' at first I felt just like he did an' said I'd go too, an'we'd j'ine the Injuns. Anyhow, I'd sure go if ever I was licked again,an' this was the outfit we got together. Bud wanted to steal Da's gunan' I wouldn't. I tell you I was hoppin' mad that time, an' Bud waswuss--but I cooled off an' talked to Bud. I says, 'Say now, Bud, itwould take about a month of travel to get out West, an' if the Injunsdidn't want nothin' but our scalps that wouldn't be no fun, an' Daain't really so bad, coz we sho'ly did starve them pigs so one of'em died.' I reckon we deserved all we got--anyhow, it was all dumbfoolishness about skinnin' out, though I'd like mighty well to be ahunter. Well, Bud died that winter. You seen the biggest coffin plateon the wall? Well, that's him. I see Ma lookin' at it an' cryin' theother day. Da says he'll send me to college if I'll be a dentist or alawyer--lawyers make lots of money: Da had a lawsuit once--an' if Idon't, he says I kin go to--you know."
Here was Yan's own kind of mind, and he opened his heart. He told allabout his shanty in the woods and how he had laboured at and loved it.He was full of enthusiasm as of old, boiling over with purpose andenergy, and Sam, he realized, had at least two things that he hadnot--ability with tools and cool judgment. It was like having the bestparts of his brother Rad put into a real human being. And rememberingthe joy of his Glen, Yan said:
"Let's build a shanty in the woods by the creek; your father won'tcare, will he?"
"Not he, so long as the work's done."