Northern Diamonds Part 18

Macgregor came in shortly afterward with nothing more valuable than two ducks that he had shot.

The boys were discouraged that evening. After the rain they could find little dry wood. It was nearly dark before Fred began to stir up the usual pan of flapjacks, and "Mac" set himself to the task of cutting up one of the ducks to fry. They were too much depressed to talk, and the camp was quiet, when suddenly a crackling tread sounded in the underbrush.

"What's that?" cried Horace sharply. And as he spoke, a man stepped out of the shadow, and advanced into the firelight.

"_Bo' soir_! h.e.l.lo!" he said, curtly.

"h.e.l.lo! Good evening!" cried Fred and Mac, much startled.

"Sit down. Grub'll be ready in a minute," Horace added. Hospitality comes before everything else in the North.

"Had grub," answered the man; but he sat down on a log beside the fire, and surveyed the whole camp with keen, quick eyes.

All the boys looked at him with much curiosity. He was apparently of middle age, with a tangled beard and black hair that straggled down almost to his shoulders. He wore moccasins, Mackinaw trousers shiny with blood and grease, a buckskin jacket, and a flannel shirt. He was brown as any Ojibwa, and he, carried a repeating rifle and had a belt of cartridges at his waist.

"Hunting?" he asked presently, with a nod at the deerskin that was hanging to dry.

"Now and again," said Horace.

"Well, ye can't hunt here," said the man deliberately, after a pause.

"Don't ye know that this is a Government forest reserve? No hunters allowed. Ye'll have to be out of here by to-morrow."

CHAPTER XI

The boys were thunderstruck at the stranger's a.s.sertion. They knew of several forest reserves in northern Ontario where timber and game are closely protected, but they had never heard of one in this district.

"I guess you're wrong," said Horace. "There isn't any Government reserve north of Timagami."

"Made last fall," the stranger retorted. "I ought to know. I'm one of the rangers. We've got a camp up the river, and we've been here all winter to keep out hunters and lumbermen."

Horace looked at him closely, but said nothing.

"Prospecting's allowed, isn't it?" Fred blurted out.

"Prospect all ye want to, but ye can't stake no claims."

"Where's the limit of this reserve?" asked Mac.

"Ten miles down the river from here. Ye'll have to be down below there by to-morrow night. Or, if ye want to stay, ye'll have to give up your guns. No guns allowed here."

"I suppose you've got papers to show your authority?" Mac inquired.

"'Course I have. They 're back at camp. Oh, ye'll get all ye want.

Why," pointing to the fresh hide, "ye killed that there deer out of season. Ye've got the law agin ye for that."

"It was for our own food. You can kill deer for necessary supplies."

"Not on this ground. Now ye can do as ye like--give up your guns till ye 're ready to leave, or get out right away. I've warned ye."

The "ranger" got up and glanced round threateningly.

"If you can show us that you're really a Government ranger, we'll go,"

Horace said. "But I know the Commissioner of Crown Lands; I saw him before we started, and I didn't hear of any new reserve being made. I don't believe in you or your reserve, and we'll stay where we are till you show us the proof of your authority."

"I'll show you _this_!" exclaimed the man fiercely, slapping the barrel of his rifle.

"You can't bluff us. We've got guns, too, if it comes to that!" cried Fred.

"I've give ye fair warning," repeated the man. "Ye'll find it mighty hard to buck agin the Gover'ment, and ye'll be sorry if ye try it.

Ye'll see me again."

Turning, he stepped into the shadows and was gone. The boys looked at one another.

"What do you make of it?" Peter asked. "Is he a ranger--or a prospector?"

"They don't hire that kind of man for Government rangers," replied Horace. "And I'm certain there's no forest reserve here. Why, there's no timber worth preserving. He's a hunter or a prospector, and from his looks he's evidently been in the woods all winter, as he said.

Perhaps he belongs to a party of prospectors who found a good thing last fall, and got snowed in before they could get out."

"Hunters wouldn't be so anxious to drive us away," said Fred. "They must be prospectors. Suppose they've found the diamond fields!"

They had all thought of that. There was a gloomy silence.

"One thing's certain," said Horace, "we must trail those fellows down, and see what sort of men they are and where they 're camped. We'll scout up the river to-morrow."

They all felt nervous and uneasy that evening. They stayed up late, and when they went to bed they loaded their guns and laid them close at hand.

But the night pa.s.sed without any disturbance, and after breakfast they set out at once to trail the ranger. They followed the river for about four miles, to a point where the stream broke through the hills in a succession of cascades and rapids; but although they searched all the landscape with the field-gla.s.s from the top of the hills, they saw no sign of man. Beyond the ridges, however, the river turned sharply into a wooded valley. They struggled through the undergrowth, found another curve in the river, rounded it--and then stepped hastily back into cover.

About two hundred yards upstream stood a log hut on the sh.o.r.e, at the foot of a steep bluff. A wreath of smoke rose from its chimney, but no one was in sight. Talking in low tones, the boys watched it for some time. Then they made a detour through the woods, and crept round to the top of the bluff. Peering cautiously over the edge, they saw the cabin below them, not fifty yards away.

It looked like a trappers' winter camp. It was built of spruce logs, c.h.i.n.ked with mud and moss. A deep layer of scattered chips beside the remains of a log pile showed that the place had been used all winter.

Presently a man came out of the door, stretched himself lazily, and carried a block of wood into the cabin. It was not the man they had seen, but a slender, dark fellow, dressed in buckskin, who looked like a half-breed. In a moment he came out again, and this time the ranger came with him. There was a third man in the cabin, for they could hear some one speaking from inside the shack.

For some moments the men stood talking; their voices were quite audible, but the boys could not make out what they were saying. The two men examined a pile of steel traps beside the door and a number of pelts that were drying on frames in the open air.

"These aren't rangers. They're just ordinary trappers," Mac whispered to Horace.

"They've certainly been trapping. But why do they want to run us out of the country?"

In a few minutes both men went into the cabin, came out with rifles, and started down the river-bank.

"They may be going down to our camp," Horace said, "and we must be there to meet them. We'd better hurry back."

The boys started at as fast a pace as the rough ground would allow.

Owing to dense thickets, swamps, and piled boulders, they could not make much speed. In about twenty minutes Fred heard a sound of falling water in front, and supposed that they were approaching the river. He was mistaken. Within a few yards they came upon a tiny lake fed by a creek at one end and closed at the other by a pile of logs and brush.