A Cry in the Wilderness Part 43

"There 's no use, I 'm 'full up'," said Jamie with a sigh of exhaustion; he dropped into the sofa corner.

"I kept tally for you, Boy," said the Doctor.

"How many?"

"Eighteen! Apply to me if you 're in trouble at one-thirty to-night."

He looked at his watch.

"You scored seventeen fully ten minutes ago, mon vieux," said Mr. Ewart laughing.

"Slander, Marcia! Don't believe it. Three of mine would make only one of yours, Gordon Ewart;--I 've camped enough with you to know your 'capacity', as the freight cars have it. Marcia Farrell, your last 'batch' has been 'petering out', as we say at home. You dropped only one small spoonful for each of the last twenty cakes; the ones you made for Ewart had a complement of two big spoonfuls--they were corkers, no mistake. Hold up your head, Boy!" he admonished the collapsed object on the sofa. "Never say die--here are just four more for us four, amen."

A dismal groan was his only answer. Mr. Ewart, taking turner and bowl from me, declared a truce. The Doctor set the plates on the table.

When all was clear about the hearth, on which Cale laid a pine log for a treat, Mr. Ewart announced that he had a surprise in his pocket.

"Jamie, your birthday falls on the twelfth of August, does n't it?"

"Yes; how did you remember that, Gordon?"

"You had a birthday when I was in Crieff with you seventeen years ago--and we celebrated. Have you forgotten?"

"Forgotten!" Jamie came bolt upright, the cakes were as naught, the remembrance of them faded. "Do you think I could ever forget that?

You took, or rather trotted me for a long walk over the moors--oh, the pink and the purple heather of them, the black blackness of their bogs, the green greenery of their bracken higher than my head!--to the 'Keltie'; and you held me over the pool to see the whirl and dash of the plunging torrent. I remember the spray made me catch my breath.

Then you took me down to the bank of the 'burnie', and found a place to camp--my first camp with you--under a big elm; and there you discovered a flat stone, and two crooked branches for crotches. You took from your mysterious game-basket a gypsy kettle and, filling it at the 'burnie' with the water that tastes like no other in the world, you hung it from the crotch over the flat stone that was our hearth. You made heaven on that spot for a seven-year-old boy, because you let him touch off the f.a.gots. You boiled the water, made tea--such tea!--and brought out of that same basket bannocks and fresh gooseberry jam-- Oh, don't, don't mention that birthday! You make me homesick for it; even Marcia's griddlecakes can't help me!"

"We 'll celebrate again this year in the wilds of the Upper Saguenay."

Mr. Ewart took from his pocket a paper and, unfolding it, read the terms of a lease of a fish and game preserve in the northern wilderness.

"And the Andres, father and son, shall be our guides, our cooks, our factotums. The son is half Montagnais; his mother was of that tribe."

"Oh, Ewart!" Jamie's eyes glistened, but his volubility was checked; he felt his friend's thought of him too deeply.

"I secured it while I was away; I have wanted it for the last five years. The Doctor has promised us six weeks, and the camp will be more attractive"--he looked at Mrs. Macleod--"and keep us longer, if you and Miss Farrell will be my guests, and make a home for us in the wilderness. Will you?"

For once in her life Mrs. Macleod did not balk at this direct question involving a decision. I record it to her credit.

"And you?" He turned to me without apparent eagerness, but I caught the flash of pleasure in his eyes when I answered promptly, with enthusiasm:

"It will be something to dream of till it is a reality. I 'll begin making my camp outfit to-morrow; and Andre pere shall teach me to fish and paddle a canoe; his son shall teach me woodcraft, and some Montagnais squaw shall show me how to weave baskets. In those same baskets I will gather the mountain berries for such of the family as may crave them, and--and that wilderness shall be made to blossom like the rose and prove to us, at least, a land flowing with milk and honey."

Mr. Ewart's question about a "home in the wilderness" was the motor power for my flight.

"Amen and amen," cried the Doctor, approving of my soaring. "We 'll return to the Arcadia of the woodsman's simple life."

"Humph!" said Cale. "You'd better add all them contraptions of veils, an' nettin's, and smudge kettles, an' ointments, an' forty kinds of made-up bait--so made-up thet I 've seen a trout, a three pounder, wink at me when he see some of it and wag away up stream as sa.s.sy as you please--an' a gross of joss sticks. By George, I 've seen mosquitoes as big as mice--"

"Cale," I made protest; "you spoil all."

"Better wait till you are there, Marcia, before you rhapsodize any more; you did it well, though, I 'll admit," said Jamie, with his most patronizing air.

"So did you rhapsodize over Scotland," I retorted; "and I 'll rhapsodize if I never go; and you 're not to quench my enthusiasm with any of your Scotch mist that I am told is nothing less than a downpour."

"By the way, when is your birthday, Marcia?" said the Doctor, carefully, oh, so carefully, knocking the ash from his cigar into the fireplace. The act was so very cautious that it betrayed to me his restrained expectancy of my answer! "I have an idea it's the last of June."

How light I was of heart in answering him, in giving him the clew he was seeking as I would have made him a gift, fully, freely--for what was it to me now, whether he knew or not?

"Next December, when the north wind blows over the Canada snows, you may remember me, if you will."

"What date?"

I waited intentionally for him to ask that question. I felt that Cale was holding his breath; but I did n't care, and replied without hesitation:

"The third--twenty-seven years. What an age!"

They laughed at me, one and all, the Doctor perhaps a little more heartily than the others. After that he sat, with one exception, silent; but Jamie spoke half impatiently:

"Why did n't you give us a chance to celebrate last December?"

"n.o.body asked me about it."

The Doctor spoke for the only time then. "I 'll make a mem of it," he said gayly, taking out his notebook and writing in it. And I saw through his every move--the dear man!

"You might have given us the pleasure of remembering it," said Mrs.

Macleod reproachfully.

"Oh, I celebrated it in my own way--and for the first time in my life,"

I replied, treasuring in my heart that hour in the office with Mr.

Ewart when he took my gift of service "gratis".

"Might a common mortal, who has both eyes and ears and generally can see through a barn door if it is wide open, ask in what manner you celebrated that you escaped notice of every member of this household?"

Jamie spoke ironically.

"Jamie, I outwitted even you that time. Of course I 'll tell you: I made a gift to some one, which was a good deal more satisfactory than to receive one myself."

"The deuce you did! Perhaps you 'll tell me what it was and who was the man? I was n't aware of any extra purchases in the village."

"Not now." I spoke decidedly. "Let's talk about the camp. I can't wait for the spring. When can we go?" I asked Mr. Ewart.

"Not before the first of July, but we can remain until into September."

The words were commonplace enough; but the tone in which they were spoken belonged to another day, another hour, to that moment when he accepted my gift of service "gratis". He, at least, knew how I celebrated that third of December!

Content, satisfied, I began to jest with Jamie. We made and enlarged upon the most ideal plans it ever befell mortals to make. The others listened to our chaffing and found amus.e.m.e.nt in it, for we tried to outdo each other in camp-hyperbole. The Doctor, Mr. Ewart and Cale, whose presence Mr. Ewart insisted upon having the entire evening, smoked in silence. I knew where the Doctor's thoughts were. I would have given a half-hour of that evening's enjoyment--at least I think I would--to have read Mr. Ewart's.

Late, very late, Cale rose, put a chunk into the soapstone, and said good night. I followed him into the kitchen. I wanted to speak with him, for I saw something was out of gear.

"What's the matter, Cale?" I whispered, as he fumbled about for the candle somewhere on the kitchen dresser.