The Young Woodsman Part 2

Mr. Stewart took much pride in his turn-out, and with good reason; for there was not a finer pair of horses in Calumet than those that were now trotting along before him, as if the well-filled waggon to which they were attached was no impediment whatever. His work required him to be much upon the road in all seasons, and he considered it well worth his while to make the business of driving about as pleasant as possible. The horses were iron-grays, beautifully matched in size, shape, and speed; the harness sparkled with bright bra.s.s mountings; and the waggon, a kind of express, with specially strong springs and comfortable seat, had abundant room for pa.s.sengers and luggage.

As they rattled along the village street there were many shouts of "Good-bye, Frank," and "Good luck to you," from shop and sidewalk; for everybody knew Frank's destination, and there were none that did not wish him well, whatever might be their opinion of the wisdom of his action. In responding to these expressions of good-will, Frank found timely relief for the feelings stirred by the parting with his mother, and before the impatient grays had breasted the hill which began where the village ended he had quite regained his customary good spirits, and was ready to reply brightly enough to Mr. Stewart's remarks.

"Well, Frank, you've put your hand to the plough now, as the Scripture says, and you mustn't turn back on any account, or all the village will be laughing at you," he said, scanning his companion closely.

"Not much fear of that, Mr. Stewart," answered Frank firmly. "Calumet won't see me again until next spring. Whether I like the lumbering or not, I'm going to stick out the winter, anyway; you see if I don't."

"I haven't much fear of you, my boy," returned Mr. Stewart, "even if you do find shanty life a good deal rougher than you may have imagined.

You'll have to fight your own way, you know. I shan't be around much, and the other men will all be strangers at first; but just you do what you know and feel to be right without minding the others, and they won't bother you long, but will respect you for having a conscience and the pluck to obey it. As for your work, it'll seem pretty heavy and hard at the start; but you've got lots of grit, and it won't take you long to get used to it."

Frank listened attentively to Mr. Stewart's kindly, sensible advice, and had many questions to ask him as the speedy horses bore them further and further away from Calumet. The farms, which at first had followed one another in close succession, grew more widely apart, and finally ended altogether before many miles of the dusty road had been covered, and thenceforward their way ran through unbroken woods, not the stately "forest primeval" but the scrubby "second growth," from which those who have never been into the heart of the leafy wilderness can form but a poor conception of the grandeur to which trees can attain.

About mid-day they halted at a lonely log-house which served as a sort of inn or resting-place, the proprietor finding compensation for the dreariness of his situation in the large profit derived from an illegal but thriving traffic in liquor. A more unkempt, unattractive establishment could hardly be imagined, and if rumour was to be relied upon, it had good reason to be haunted by more than one untimely ghost.

"A wretched den!" said Mr. Stewart, as he drew up before the door. "I wouldn't think of stopping here for a moment but for the horses. But we may as well go in and see if old Pierre can get us a decent bite to eat."

The horses having been attended to, the travellers entered the house, where they found Pierre, the proprietor, dozing on his bar; a bloated, blear-eyed creature, who evidently would have much preferred making them drunk with his vile whisky to preparing them any pretence for a dinner.

But they firmly declined his liquor, so muttering unintelligibly to himself he shambled off to obey their behests. After some delay they succeeded in getting a miserable meal of some kind; and then, the horses being sufficiently rested, they set off once more at a good pace, not halting again until, just before sundown, they arrived at the depot, where the first stage of their journey ended.

This depot was simply a large farm set in the midst of a wilderness of trees, and forming a centre from which some half-dozen shanties, or lumber camps, placed at different distances in the depths of the forest that stretched away interminably north, south, east, and west, were supplied with all that was necessary for their maintenance. Besides the ordinary farm buildings, there was another which served as a sort of a shop or warehouse, being filled with a stock of axes, saws, blankets, boots, beef, pork, tea, sugar, mola.s.ses, flour, and so forth, for the use of the lumbermen. This was Mr. Stewart's headquarters, and as the tired horses drew up before the door he tossed the reins over their backs, saying,--

"Here we are, Frank. You'll stay here until your gang is made up.

To-morrow morning I'll introduce you to some of your mates."

CHAPTER IV.

THE BUILDING OF THE SHANTY.

Frank looked about him with quick curiosity, expecting to see some of the men in whose society he was to spend the jointer. But there were only the farm-hands lounging listlessly about, their days work being over, and they had nothing to do except to smoke their pipes and wait for nightfall, when they would lounge off to bed.

The shantymen had not yet arrived, Mr. Stewart always making a point of being at the depot some days in advance of them, in order to have plenty of time to prepare his plans for the winter campaign. Noting Frank's inquiring look, he laughed, and said,--

"Oh, there are none of them here yet--we're the first on the field-but by the end of the week there'll be more than a hundred men here."

A day or two later the first batch made their appearance, coming up by the heavy teams that they would take with them into the woods; and each day brought a fresh contingent, until by the time Mr. Stewart had mentioned the farm fairly swarmed with them, and it became necessary for this human hive to imitate the bees and send off its superfluous inhabitants without delay.

They were a rough, noisy, strange-looking lot of men, and Frank, whose acquaintance with the shantymen had been limited to seeing them in small groups as they pa.s.sed through Calumet in the autumn and spring, on their way to and from the camps, meeting them now for the first time in such large numbers, could not help some inward shrinking of soul as he noted their uncouth ways and listened to their oath-besprinkled talk. They were "all sorts and conditions of men"--habitants who could not speak a word of English, and Irishmen who could not speak a word of French; shrewd Scotchmen, chary of tongue and reserved of manner, and loquacious half-breeds, ready for song, or story, or fight, according to the humour of the moment. Here and there were dusky skins and prominent features that betrayed a close connection with the aboriginal owners of this continent. Almost all bad come from the big saw-mills away down the river, or from some other equally arduous employment, and were glad of the chance of a few days' respite from work while Mr. Stewart was dividing them up and making the necessary arrangements for the winter's work.

Frank mingled freely with them, sc.r.a.ping acquaintance with those who seemed disposed to be friendly, and whenever he came across one with an honest, pleasant, prepossessing face, hoping very much that he would be a member of his gang. He was much impressed by the fact that he was evidently the youngest member of the gathering, and did not fail to notice the sometimes curious, sometimes contemptuous, looks with which he was regarded by the fresh arrivals.

In the course of a few days matters were pretty well straightened out at the depot, and the gangs of men began to leave for the different camps.

Mr. Stewart had promised Frank that he would take care to put him under a foreman who would treat him well; and when one evening he was called into the office and introduced to a tall, powerful, grave-looking man, with heavy brown beard and deep voice, Mr. Stewart said,--

"Here is Frank Kingston, Dan; Jack's only son, you know. He's set his heart on lumbering, and I'm going to let him try it for a winter."

Frank scrutinized the man called Dan very closely as. Mr. Stewart continued,--

"I'm going to send him up to the Kippewa camp with you, Dan. There's n.o.body'll look after him better than you will, for I know you thought a big sight of his father, and for his sake as well as mine you'll see that nothing happens to the lad."

Dan Johnston's face relaxed into a smile that showed there were rich depths of good nature beneath his rather stern exterior, for he was pleased at the compliment implied in the superintendent's words, and stretching out a mighty hand to Frank, he laid it on his shoulder in a kindly way, saying,--

"He seems a likely lad, Mr. Stewart, and a chip of the old block, if I'm not mistaken. I'll be right glad to have him with me. But what kind of work is he to go at? He seems rather light for chopping, doesn't he?"

Mr. Stewart gave a quizzical sort of glance at Frank as he replied,--

"Well, you see, Dan, I think myself he is too light for chopping, so I told him he'd have to be ch.o.r.e-boy for this winter, anyway."

A look of surprise came over Johnston's face, and, more to himself than the others, he muttered in a low tone,--

"Ch.o.r.e-boy, eh? Jack Kingston's son a ch.o.r.e-boy!" Then turning to Frank, he said aloud, "All right, my boy. There's nothing like beginning at the bottom if you want to learn the whole business. You must make up your mind to put in a pretty hard time, but I'll see you have fair play, anyway."

As Frank looked at the rugged, honest, determined face, and the stalwart frame, he felt thoroughly satisfied that in Dan Johnston he had a friend in whom he could place perfect confidence, and that Mr. Stewart's promise had been fully kept. The foreman then became quite sociable, and asked him many questions about his mother, and his life in Calumet, and his plans for the future, so that before they parted for the night Frank felt as if they were quite old friends instead of recent acquaintances.

The following morning Johnston was bestirring himself bright and early getting his men and stores together, and before noon a start was made for the Kippewa River, on whose southern bank a site had already been selected for the lumber camp which would be the centre of his operations for the winter. Johnston's gang numbered fifty men all told, himself included, and they were in high spirits as they set out for their destination. The stores and tools were, of course, transported by waggon; but the men had to go on foot, and with fifteen miles of a rough forest road to cover before sundown, they struck a brisk pace as, in twos and threes and quartettes, they marched noisily along the dusty road.

"You stay by me, Frank," said the foreman, "and if your young legs happen to go back on you, you can have a lift on one of the teams until you're rested."

Frank felt in such fine trim that although he fully appreciated his big friend's thoughtfulness, he was rash enough to think he would not require to avail himself of it; but the next five miles showed him his mistake, and at the end of them he was very glad to jump upon one of the teams that happened to be pa.s.sing, and in this way hastened over a good part of the remainder of the tramp.

As the odd-looking gang pushed forward steadily, if not in exactly martial order, Frank had a good opportunity of inspecting its members, and making in his own mind an estimate of their probable good of bad qualities as companions. In this he was much a.s.sisted by the foreman, who, in reply to his questions, gave him helpful bits of information about the different ones that attracted his attention. Fully one-half of the gang were French Canadians, dark-complexioned, black-haired, bright-eyed men, full of life and talk, their tongues going unceasingly as they plodded along in sociable groups. Of the remainder, some were Scotch, others Irish, the rest English. Upon the whole, they were quite a promising-looking lot of men; indeed, Johnston took very good care to have as little "poor stuff" as possible in his gang; for he had long held the reputation of turning out more logs at his camp than were cut at any other on the same "limits;" and this well-deserved fame he cherished very dearly.

Darkness was coming on apace, when at last a glad shout from the foremost group announced that the end of the journey was near; and in a few minutes more the whole band of tired men were resting their wearied limbs on the bank of the river near which the shanty was to be erected at once.

The teams had arrived some time before them, and two large tents had been put up as temporary-shelter; while brightly-burning fires and the appetizing fizzle of frying bacon joined with the wholesome aroma of hot tea to make glad the hearts of the dusty, hungry pedestrians.

Frank enjoyed his open-air tea immensely. It was his first taste of real lumberman's life, and was undoubtedly a pleasant introduction to it; for the hard work would not begin until the morrow, and in the meantime everybody was still a-holidaying. So refreshing was the evening meal that, tired as all no doubt felt from their long tramp, they soon forgot it sufficiently to spend an hour or more in song and chorus that made the vast forest aisles re-echo with rough melody before they sank into the silence of slumber for the night.

At daybreak next morning Dan Johnston's stentorian voice aroused the sleepers, and Frank could hardly believe that he had taken more than twice forty winks at the most before the stirring shout of "Turn out!

turn out! The work's waiting!" broke into his dreams and recalled him to life's realities. The morning was gray and chilly, the men looked sleepy and out of humour, and Johnston himself had it a stern distant manner, or seemed to have, as after a wash at the river bank Frank approached him and reported himself for duty.

"Will you please to tell me what is to be my work, Mr. Johnston?" said he, in quite a timid tone; for somehow or other there seemed to be a change in the atmosphere.

The foreman's face relaxed a little as he turned to answer him.

"You want to be set to work, eh? Well, that won't take long." And looking around among the moving men until he found the one he wanted, he raised his voice and called,--

"Hi, there, Baptiste! Come here a moment."

In response to the summons a short, stout, smooth-faced, and decidedly good-natured looking Frenchman, who had been busy at one of the fires, came over to the foreman.

"See here, Baptiste; this lad's to be your ch.o.r.e-boy this winter, and I don't want you to be too hard on him--_savez?_ Let him have plenty of work, but not more than his share."

Baptiste examined Frank's st.u.r.dy figure with much the same smile of approval that he might bestow upon a fine capon that he was preparing for the pot, and murmured out something like,--

"_Bien, m'sieur_. I sall be easy wid him if ee's a good boy."