The Huntress Part 41

Musq'oosis filled his pipe, and puffed at it meditatively for a while.

"You could get him," he said at last.

Bela looked at him with a new hope.

"But you got do w'at I tell you. Crying' won't get him. A man hates a cryin' woman. Mak' a dry face and let on you don' care 'bout him at all. All tam laugh at him. You can't do that, I guess. Too moch fool!"

Bela frowned resentfully. "I can do it," she declared.

"All right," said Musq'oosis, "Let him go now. Keep away from him a while. Let him forget his mad."

"All right," agreed Bela.

"Now go see your mot'er," commanded Musq'oosis. "She sicken for you.

She is white, too."

Bela, however, made no move to go. She was painstakingly plucking blades of gra.s.s.

"Well, wa't you waitin' for?" demanded Musq'oosis.

"Sam walkin' this way," she said with an inscrutable face. "Got no blanket. Be cold to-night, I think."

"Wa! More foolishness!" he cried. "Let him shake a little. Cure his hot mad maybe."

"White man get sick with cold," persisted Bela. "Not lak us. What good my waitin', if he get sick?"

Musq'oosis held up both his hands. "There is not'ing lak a woman!" he cried. "Go to your mot'er. I will paddle by the lake and give him a rabbit robe."

Bela's eyes flashed a warm look on him. She got up without speaking, and hastened away.

About half-past nine, while it was still light, Sam found himself walked out. He built a fire on the pine needles above the stony beach and sat down with his back against a tree. The goose provided him with another meal. He was two hours' journey beyond the mouth of Hah-wah-sepi.

Wading across the bar of that stream, he had guessed his proximity to the Indian village as described by Bela, but his pride would not allow him to apply there for shelter.

He had no reason to suppose that Bela had already got home, but he feared she might arrive before he could get away. Anyhow, he had plenty to eat, he told himself; it would be strange if he couldn't last a night or two without a covering.

He lay down by his fire, but, tired as he was, he could get no rest.

Whichever way he lay, a cold chill from the earth struck to his marrow. He fell into a wretched, half-waking condition, tormented by images he could not control.

When he edged close enough to the fire to feel its warmth it was only to be brought leaping to his feet by sparks burning through his clothes. He finally gave it up and sat against the tree, hardening himself like an Indian to wait for dawn. His f.a.gged nerves cried for tobacco. He had lost his pipe with his coat.

The lake stretched before him still and steely in the twilight.

To-night the sun had withdrawn himself modestly and expeditiously, and the clear, cold face of the sky had an ominous look. The world was terribly empty. Sam received a new conception of solitude, and a heavy hand of discouragement was laid on his heart.

Suddenly he perceived that he was not alone. Close under the pine-walled sh.o.r.e a dugout was swimming toward him with infinite grace and smoothness. At the first sight his breast contracted, for it seemed to have sprung out of nothingness--then his heart joyfully leaped up. At such a moment anything human was welcome. A squat little figure was huddled amidships, swinging a paddle from side to side with long, stringy arms.

Sam perceived that the paddler was the aged hunchback who had once visited the camp at Nine-Mile Point across the lake. "Old Man of the Lake" they had called him. They had not learned his name.

A certain air of mystery enveloped him. When he stepped out on the stones with his long hair, his bent back, and his dingy blanket capote he looked like a mediaeval grotesque--yet he had a dignity of his own, too.

"How?" he said, extending his hand.

Sam, dreading the inevitable questions, received him a little nervously.

"Glad to see you. Sit down by the fire. You travel late."

"I old," observed Musq'oosis calmly. "I go when men sleep."

He made himself comfortable by the fire. To Sam's thankfulness he did not appear to notice the white man's impoverished condition. He had excellent manners.

"Are you going far?" asked Sam.

The old man shrugged. "Jus' up and down," he replied. "I lak look about."

He drew out his pipe. To save himself Sam could not help glancing enviously toward it.

"You got no pipe?" asked the Indian.

"Lost it," admitted Sam ruefully.

"I got 'not'er pipe," said Musq'oosis. From the "fire-bag" hanging from his waist he produced a red-clay bowl such as the natives use, and a bundle of new reed stems. He fitted a reed to the bowl, and pa.s.sed it to Sam. A bag of tobacco followed.

"A gift," he stated courteously.

"I say," objected Sam, blushing, "I haven't anything to give in return."

The old man waved his hand. "Plaintee tam mak' Musq'oosis a gift some day," he said.

Sam looked up at the name. "So you're Musq'oosis?" he asked, hardening a little.

"W'at you know about me?" queried the other mildly.

"Oh, nothing!" returned Sam. "Somebody told me about you."

"I guess it was Bela," said Musq'oosis. With kindly guile he added: "Where is she?"

"You can search me!" muttered Sam.

The tobacco was unexpectedly fragrant. "Ah, good!" exclaimed Sam with a glance of surprise.

"'Imperial Mixture,'" said Musq'oosis complacently. "I old. Not want moch. So I buy the best tobacco."

They settled down for a good talk by the fire. Musq'oosis continued to surprise Sam. On his visit to Nine-Mile Point the old man had been received with good-natured banter, which he returned in kind. Alone with Sam, he came out in quite a different character.

Sam made the discovery that a man may have dark skin yet be a philosopher and a gentleman. Musq'oosis talked of all things from tobacco to the differences in men.