"But there ain't no _speshul_ reason why no one's been up there this
year," he said with a perceptible hush in his tone; "not the reason you
mean, anyway! Las' year it was the fires that kep' folks out, and this
year I guess--I guess it jest happened so, that's all!" His manner was
clearly meant to be encouraging. Joseph Défago raised his eyes a moment, then dropped them again. A
breath of wind stole out of the forest and stirred the embers into a
passing blaze. Dr. Cathcart again noticed the expression in the guide's
face, and again he did not like it. But this time the nature of the look
betrayed itself. In those eyes, for an instant, he caught the gleam of a
man scared in his very soul. It disquieted him more than he cared to
admit. "Bad Indians up that way?" he asked, with a laugh to ease matters a
little, while Simpson, too sleepy to notice this subtle by-play, moved
off to bed with a prodigious yawn; "or--or anything wrong with the
country?" he added, when his nephew was out of hearing. Hank met his eye with something less than his usual frankness. "He's jest skeered," he replied good-humouredly. "Skeered stiff about
some ole feery tale! That's all, ain't it, ole pard?" And he gave Défago
a friendly kick on the moccasined foot that lay nearest the fire. Défago looked up quickly, as from an interrupted reverie, a reverie,
however, that had not prevented his seeing all that went on about him. "Skeered--_nuthin'!_" he answered, with a flush of defiance. "There's
nuthin' in the Bush that can skeer Joseph Défago, and don't you forget
it!" And the natural energy with which he spoke made it impossible to
know whether he told the whole truth or only a part of it. Hank turned towards the doctor. He was just going to add something when
he stopped abruptly and looked round. A sound close behind them in the
darkness made all three start. It was old Punk, who had moved up from
his lean-to while they talked and now stood there just beyond the circle
of firelight--listening. "'Nother time, Doc!" Hank whispered, with a wink, "when the gallery
ain't stepped down into the stalls!" And, springing to his feet, he
slapped the Indian on the back and cried noisily, "Come up t' the fire
an' warm yer dirty red skin a bit." He dragged him towards the blaze and
threw more wood on. "That was a mighty good feed you give us an hour or
two back," he continued heartily, as though to set the man's thoughts on
another scent, "and it ain't Christian to let you stand out there
freezin' yer ole soul to hell while we're gettin' all good an' toasted!" Punk moved in and warmed his feet, smiling darkly at the other's
volubility which he only half understood, but saying nothing. And
presently Dr. Cathcart, seeing that further conversation was impossible,
followed his nephew's example and moved off to the tent, leaving the
three men smoking over the now blazing fire. It is not easy to undress in a small tent without waking one's
companion, and Cathcart, hardened and warm-blooded as he was in spite of
his fifty odd years, did what Hank would have described as "considerable
of his twilight" in the open. He noticed, during the process, that Punk
had meanwhile gone back to his lean-to, and that Hank and Défago were
at it hammer and tongs, or, rather, hammer and anvil, the little French
Canadian being the anvil. It was all very like the conventional stage
picture of Western melodrama: the fire lighting up their faces with
patches of alternate red and black; Défago, in slouch hat and moccasins
in the part of the "badlands" villain; Hank, open-faced and hatless,
with that reckless fling of his shoulders, the honest and deceived hero;
and old Punk, eavesdropping in the background, supplying the atmosphere
of mystery. The doctor smiled as he noticed the details; but at the same
time something deep within him--he hardly knew what--shrank a little, as
though an almost imperceptible breath of warning had touched the surface
of his soul and was gone again before he could seize it. Probably it was
traceable to that "scared expression" he had seen in the eyes of Défago;
"probably"--for this hint of fugitive emotion otherwise escaped his
usually so keen analysis. Défago, he was vaguely aware, might cause
trouble somehow ...He was not as steady a guide as Hank, for
instance ... Further than that he could not get ... He watched the men a moment longer before diving into the stuffy tent
where Simpson already slept soundly. Hank, he saw, was swearing like a
mad African in a New York nigger saloon; but it was the swearing of
"affection." The ridiculous oaths flew freely now that the cause of
their obstruction was asleep. Presently he put his arm almost tenderly
upon his comrade's shoulder, and they moved off together into the
shadows where their tent stood faintly glimmering. Punk, too, a moment
later followed their example and disappeared between his odorous
blankets in the opposite direction. Dr. Cathcart then likewise turned in, weariness and sleep still fighting
in his mind with an obscure curiosity to know what it was that had
scared Défago about the country up Fifty Island Water way,--wondering,
too, why Punk's presence had prevented the completion of what Hank had
to say. Then sleep overtook him. He would know tomorrow. Hank would tell
him the story while they trudged after the elusive moose. Deep silence fell about the little camp, planted there so audaciously in
the jaws of the wilderness. The lake gleamed like a sheet of black glass
beneath the stars. The cold air pricked. In the draughts of night that
poured their silent tide from the depths of the forest, with messages
from distant ridges and from lakes just beginning to freeze, there lay
already the faint, bleak odors of coming winter. White men, with their
dull scent, might never have divined them; the fragrance of the wood
fire would have concealed from them these almost electrical hints of
moss and bark and hardening swamp a hundred miles away. Even Hank and
Défago, subtly in league with the soul of the woods as they were, would
probably have spread their delicate nostrils in vain.... But an hour later, when all slept like the dead, old Punk crept from his
blankets and went down to the shore of the lake like a shadow--silently,
as only Indian blood can move. He raised his head and looked about him. The thick darkness rendered sight of small avail, but, like the animals,
he possessed other senses that darkness could not mute. He
listened--then sniffed the air. Motionless as a hemlock stem he stood
there. After five minutes again he lifted his head and sniffed, and yet
once again. A tingling of the wonderful nerves that betrayed itself by
no outer sign, ran through him as he tasted the keen air. Then, merging
his figure into the surrounding blackness in a way that only wild men
and animals understand, he turned, still moving like a shadow, and went
stealthily back to his lean-to and his bed.