*CHAPTER XI.*
_*THE HUNTERS' CAMP.*_
A burst of merry laughter made the two boys look round, half afraid thatit might be at their own expense.
Wilfred felt a bit annoyed when he perceived a little party of horsemenspurring towards the fort. But Gaspe ran after them, waving his armswith a bonjour as he recognized his own Louison's cousin, Batiste, amongthe foremost.
Dog training and dog driving are the never-failing topics of interestamong the hunters and trappers. Batiste had reined in his horse to watchthe ineffectual efforts of the boys to disentangle the two dogs, whowere fighting and snarling with each other over the upturned sled.
Batiste and his comrades soon advanced from watching to helping. Thesled was lifted up, the traces disentangled, and Wilfred and Gaspe weretold and made to feel that they knew nothing at all about dog driving,and might find themselves in a heap all pell-mell at the bottom of theriver bank some day if they set about it in such a reckless fashion.They were letting the dogs run just where they liked. Dogs wantedsomething to follow. Batiste jumped from his horse at last, quite unableto resist the pleasure of breaking in a young dog.
"It takes two to manage a dog team," he asserted. "It wants a man insnow-shoes to walk on in front and mark a track, and another behind tokeep them steady to their work."
Dogs, horses, men, and boys all turned back together to discuss Yankee'sundeveloped powers. But no, Batiste himself could do nothing with him.Yankee refused to haul.
"I'll make him," said Batiste.
But Gaspe preferred to take his dog out of the traces rather thansurrender him to the tender mercies of a hunter. "I know they are verycruel," he whispered to Wilfred. So Yula was left to draw the emptysled back to the fort, and he did it in first-rate style.
"He is just cut out for hauling, as the hound is for hunting," explainedBatiste. "It is not any dog can do it."
They entered the gate of the fort. The men stood patting and praisingYula, while Batiste exchanged greetings with his cousin.
Before he unlocked the door of his shop, Mr. De Brunier called Wilfredto him.
"Now is your chance, my boy," he said kindly. "Batiste tells me hepassed this Bowkett on his way to the camp, so you are sure to find himthere. Shall I arrange with Batiste to take you with him?"
The opportunity had come so suddenly at last. If Wilfred had anymisgiving, he did not show it.
"What do you think I had better do, sir?" he asked.
"There is so much good common sense in your own plan," answered hisfriend, "I think you had better follow it. When we shut up, you cannotremain here; and unless we take you with us, this is the best thing todo."
Wilfred put both his hands in Mr. De Brunier's.
"I can't thank you," he said; "I can't thank you half enough."
"Never mind the thanks, my boy. Now I want you to promise me, when youget back to your home, you will make yourself missed, then you will soonfind yourself wanted." Mr. De Brunier turned the key in the lock as hespoke, and went in.
Wilfred crossed the court to Gaspe. He looked up brightly, exclaiming,"Kusky is the boy for you; they all say Kusky will draw."
"I am going," whispered Wilfred.
"Going! how and why?" echoed Gaspe in consternation.
"With these men," answered Wilfred.
"Then I shall hate Batiste if he takes you from me!" exclaimed Gaspeimpetuously.
They stepped back into the shed the puppies had occupied, behind somepacking-cases, where nobody could see them, for the parting words.
"We shall never forget each other, never. Shall we ever meet again?"asked Wilfred despairingly. "We may when we are men."
"We may before," whispered Gaspe, trying to comfort him. "Grandfather'stime is up this Christmas. Then he will take his pension and retire. Hetalks of buying a farm. Why shouldn't it be near your uncle's?"
"Come, Gaspard, what are you about?" shouted Mr. De Brunier from theshop door. "Take Wilfred in, and see that he has a good dinner."
Words failed over the knife and fork. Yula and Kusky had to be fed.
"Will the sled be of any use?" asked Gaspe.
Even Wilfred did not feel sure. They had fallen very low--had no heartfor anything.
Louison was packing the sled--pemmican and tea for three days.
"Put plenty," said Gaspe, as he ran out to see all was right.
Louison and Batiste were talking.
"We'll teach that young dog to haul," Batiste was saying; "and if theboy gets tired of them, we'll take them off his hands altogether."
"With pleasure," added Louison, and they both laughed.
The last moment had come.
"Good-bye, good-bye!" said Wilfred, determined not to break down beforethe men, who were already mounting their horses.
"God bless you!" murmured Gaspe.
Batiste put Wilfred on his horse, and undertook the management of thesled. The unexpected pleasure of a ride helped to soften the pain ofparting.
"I ought to be thankful," thought Wilfred--"I ought to rejoice that thechance I have longed for has come. I ought to be grateful that I have ahome, and such a good home." But it was all too new. No one hadlearned to love him there. Whose hand would clasp his when he reachedAcland's Hut as Gaspe had done?
On, on, over the wide, wild waste of sparkling snow, with his jovialcompanions laughing and talking around him. It was so similar to hisride with Bowkett and Diome, save for the increase in the cold. He didnot mind that.
But there was one thing Wilfred did mind, and that was the hard blowsBatiste was raining down on Kusky and Yula. He sprang down toremonstrate. He wanted to drive them himself. He was laughed at for aself-conceited jackass, and pushed aside.
Dog driving was the hunter's hobby. The whole party were engrossed inwatching Yula's progress, and quiet, affectionate little Kusky'sinfantine endeavours to keep up with him.
Batiste regarded himself as a crack trainer, and when poor Kusky broughtthe whole cavalcade to a standstill by sitting down in the midst of histraces, he announced his intention of curing him of such a trick withhis first taste.
"Send him to Rome," shouted one of the foremost of the hunters. "He'llnot forget that in a hurry."
"He is worth training well," observed another. "See what a chest he has.He will make as good a hauler as the old one by-and-by. Pay him wellfirst start."
What "sending to Rome" might mean Wilfred did not stay to see. Enoughto know it was the uttermost depth of dog disgrace. He saw Batistedouble up his fist and raise his arm. The sprain in his ankle wasforgotten. He flew to the ground, and dashed between Batiste and hisdogs, exclaiming, "They are mine, my own, and they shan't be hurt byanybody!"
He caught the first blow, that was all. He staggered backwards on theslippery ground.
Another of the hunters had alighted. He caught Wilfred by the arm, andpulled him up, observing dryly, "Well done, young 'un. Got a settlerunawares. That just comes of interfering.--Here, Mathurin, take him upbehind ye."
The hunter appealed to wheeled round with a good-natured laugh.
But Wilfred could not stand; the horses, dogs, and snow seemed dancinground him.
"Yula! Kusky!" he called, like one speaking in a dream.
But Yula, dragging the sled behind him, and rolling Kusky over and overin the tangling harness, had sprung at Batiste's arm; but he was toohampered to seize him. Wilfred was only aware of a confused _melee_ ashe was hoisted into Mathurin's strong arms and trotted away from thescene of action.
"Come, you are the sauciest young dog of the three," said Mathurinrather admiringly. "There, lay your head on me. You'll have to sleepthis off a bit," he continued, gently walking his horse, and graduallydropping behind the rest of the party.
Poor Wilfred roused up every now and then with a rather wild andincoherent inquiry for his dogs, to which Mathurin replied with adrawling, sleepy-sounding "All right."
Wilfred's eyes were so swollen over that he hardly knew it was starshinewhen Mathurin laid him down by a new-lit camping-fire.
"There," said the hunter, in the self-congratulatory tone of a man whoknows he has got over an awkward piece of business; "let him have hisdogs, and give him a cup of tea, and he'll be himself again by themorning."
"Ready for the same game?" asked Batiste, who was presiding over thetea-kettle.
The cup which Mathurin recommended was poured out; the sugar was notspared. Wilfred drank it gladly without speaking. When words wereuseless silence seemed golden. Yula was on guard beside him, and poorlittle Kusky, cowed and cringing, was shivering at his feet. Theycovered him up, and all he had seen and heard seemed as unreal as hisdreams.
The now familiar cry of "_Leve! leve!_" made Yula sit upright. Thehunters were astir before the dawn, but Wilfred was left undisturbed foranother hour at least, until the rubeiboo was ready--that is, pemmicanboiled in water until it makes a sort of soup. Pemmican, as Mr. DeBrunier had said, was the hunters' favourite food.
"Now for the best of the breakfast for the lame and tame," laughedBatiste, pulling up Wilfred, and looking at his disfiguring bruises witha whistle.
Wilfred shrank from the prospect before him. Another day of bitterbiting cold, and merciless cruelty to his poor dogs. "Oh, if Gaspeknew!--if Kusky could but have run back home!"
Wilfred could not eat much. He gave his breakfast to his dogs, andfondled them in silence. It was enough to make a fellow's blood boil tobe called Mathurin's babby, _l'enfant endormi_ (sleepy child), andPierre the pretty face.
"Can we be such stoics, Yula," he whispered, "as to stand all thisanother twenty-four hours, and see our poor little Kusky beaten rightand left? Can we bear it till to-morrow morning?"
Yula washed the nervous fingers stroking his hair out of his eyes, andlooked the picture of patient endurance. There was no escape, but itcould not last long. Wilfred set his teeth, and asserted no one buthimself should put the harness on his dogs.
"Gently, my little turkey-cock," put in Mathurin. "The puppy may be yourown, but the stray belongs to a friend of mine, who will be glad enoughto see him back again."
Wilfred was fairly frightened now. "Oh, if he had to give his Yulachummie back to some horrid stranger!" He thought it would be the laststraw which brings the breakdown to boy as well as camel. But heconsoled himself at their journey's end. Bowkett would interfere on hisbehalf. Mathurin's assertion was not true, by the twinkle in his eyeand the laugh to his companions. Louison must have told his cousin thatYula was a stray, or they would never have guessed it. True or false,the danger of losing his dog was a real one. They meant to take it fromhim. One thing Wilfred had the sense to see, getting in a passion wasof no good anyway. "Frederick the Great lost his battle when he losthis temper," he thought. "Keep mine for Yula's sake I will."
But the work was harder than he expected, although the time was shorter.The hardy broncos of the hunters were as untiring as their masters.Ten, twenty, thirty miles were got over without a sign of weariness fromany one but Wilfred and Kusky. If they were dead beat, what did itmatter? The dog was lashed along, and Wilfred was teased, to keep himfrom falling asleep.
"One more push," said the hunters, "and instead of sleeping with ourfeet to a camp-fire, and our beards freezing to the blankets, we shallbe footing it to Bowkett's fiddle."
The moon had risen clear and bright above the sleeping clouds stilldarkening the horizon. A silent planet burned lamp-like in the westernsky. Forest and prairie, ridges and lowland, were sparkling in thesheen of the moonlight and the snow.
Wilfred roused himself. The tinkle of the dog-bells was growing fainterand fainter, as Mathurin galloped into the midst of a score or so ofhuts promiscuously crowded together, while many a high-piled meat-stagegave promise of a winter's plenty. Huge bones and horns, the remnantsof yesterday's feast, were everywhere strewing the ground, and changingits snowy carpet to a dingy drab. There were wolf-skins spread overframework. There were buffalo-skins to be smoked, and buffalo-robes--asthey are called when the hair is left on--stretched out to dry. Men andhorses, dogs and boys, women drawing water or carrying wood, jostledeach other. There was a glow of firelight from many a parchment window,and here and there the sound of a fiddle, scraped by some rough hunter'shand, and the quick thud of the jovial hunter's heel upon the earthenfloor.
It resembled nothing in the old world so much as an Irish fair, with itsshouts of laughter and snatches of song, and that sense of inextricableconfusion, heightened by the all too frequent fight in a mostinconvenient corner. The rule of contrary found a notable example inthe name bestowed upon this charming locality. A French missionary hadonce resided on the spot, so it was still called La Mission.
Mathurin drew up before one of the biggest of the huts, where the soundsof mirth were loudest, and the light streamed brightest on the bank ofsnow beside the door.
"Here we are!" he exclaimed, swinging Wilfred from the saddle to thethreshold.