Joan of Arc of the North Woods Part 42

"You'll have to go see the super; I don't dare to let a hoss out of here without orders," said the man who listened to his request.

"Tell me where his house is, and lend me a lantern."

The hostler yawned and mumbled and complained because he had been disturbed, but he fumbled for the lantern, lighted it, and gave it to Latisan, along with directions how to find the super's home.

That minor magnate was hard to wake, but he appeared at an open upper window after a time and listened.

"We can't spare a horse in mud time, with the hauling as heavy as it is.

Who are you, anyway?"

"I'm Ward Latisan."

"Hold that lantern up side of your face and let me see!"

The young man obeyed meekly.

"Excuse me for doubting your word of mouth," said the super, after he had a.s.sured himself, "but we hardly expected to see you back in this region." It was drawled with dry sarcasm.

"I haven't the time to argue on that, sir. I have business north of here. I'll hire a horse or I'll buy a horse."

"And you heard what I said, that I can't spare one. By the way, Latisan, you may as well understand that I won't do business with you, anyway.

You got me in wrong with my folks and with the Three C's, too, when you bribed my men to load that dynamite."

"I can't see why the Comas company----"

"I can. My folks can. If we get saw logs this year we've got to buy 'em through Rufus Craig. When you ran away and let Ech Flagg get dished----"

"His drive is coming through," insisted Latisan, desperately, breaking in on speech in his turn.

"Where are you from, right now?" inquired the super.

"New York."

"And a devil of a lot you must have found out about the prospect of logs from the independents, Flagg or anybody else. Don't come up here and try to tell me my business; I've been here all the time. Good night!" He banged down the window.

And once more Ward was alone in the night, distracted and desolate. This testing of the estimation in which he was held in the north country after the debacle in Adonia made his despondency as black as the darkness which surrounded him.

He wanted to call to the super and ask if at least he could buy the lantern. He decided it would be better to borrow it.

He set away afoot by the road which led to Adonia. Farms were scattered along the highway and he stopped at the first house and banged on the door and entreated. At two houses he was turned away relentlessly. The third farmer was a wrinkled old chap who came down to the door, thumbing his suspenders over his shoulders.

"Ward Latisan, be ye?" He peered at the countenance lighted by the lantern. "Yes, I can see enough of old John in ye to prove what ye claim. I worked for old John when I was young and spry. And one time he speared his pick pole into the back of my coat and saved me from being carried down in the white water. And that's why ye can have a hoss to go where ye want to go, and ye can bring him back when you're done with him."

Therefore, not by any merit of his own, Ward secured a mount and journeyed dismally toward the north. The farm horse was fat and stolid and plodded with slow pace; for saddle there was a folded blanket. With only the lantern to light the way, he did not dare to hurry the beast.

It was not until wan, depressing light filtered from the east through the mists that he ventured to make a detour which would take him outside of Adonia. He realized that Craig would have arranged for tote teams to be waiting at Adonia, as he had had a special waiting at the junction, and was by that time far on his way toward Skulltree dam.

Latisan beat the flanks of the old horse with the extinguished lantern and made what speed he could along the blazed trail that would take him to the tote road of the Noda basin.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

The flare of the Flagg camp fires painted the mists luridly; the vapor rolled sluggishly through the tree tops and faded into the blackness of the night.

Lida was seated apart from the men of the crew, knowing that they mercifully wished to spare her from hearing the plans for the morrow.

The logs were down the deadwater to a point where the supremacy at Skulltree dam must be settled.

She could hear the mumble of the voices of those who were in conference around the fires.

Across a patch of radiance she beheld the swaggering promenade of one of the young cookees; he brandished a hatchet truculently. Old Vittum reached out and swept the weapon from the youngster's grasp.

Lida heard Vittum's rebuke, for it was voiced sharply. "None o' that! We don't fight that way. And I'm believing that there are still enough honest rivermen in the Comas crowd to make it a square fight, like we've always had on the Noda when a fight had to be!"

Unreconciled, all her woman's nature protesting, she had come to a settled realization that the fight must happen; Vittum was putting it in words. Now that the struggle was imminent--on the eve of it--she wanted to go down on her knees and beg them to give up the project; but she did not dare to weaken their determination or wound their pride. She crouched on her cot of spruce boughs in anguished misery.

"n.o.body has got to the point of using hatchets and guns on this river,"

corroborated a man on the other side of the fire from Vittum.

Other men pitched their voices higher then, giving up the cautious monotone of the preceding conference.

"Is any man afeard?" asked Vittum.

They a.s.sured him with confidence and gay courage that no man was afraid.

"I didn't hear any of you Injuns pipe up," said Vittum. "You ain't very strong on talk, anyway. But I'd kind of like to know how you feel in this matter. We all understood--all of us regulars--that we was coming up here to fight when it got to that point. You have grabbed in later and perhaps didn't understand it. We ain't asking you to do anything you don't want to do."

The Indians were silent. Even Felix Lapierre said nothing when Vittum questioned him with a glance. The French Canadian turned to Frank Orono, squatting within arm's reach, and patted him on the shoulder. It became plain that there was an understanding which did not require words.

Orono rose slowly; he grinned. From the breast of his leather jacket he brought forth a cow's horn and shook it over his head, and its contents rattled sharply. The other Indians leaped up. They were grinning, too.

Orono began a slow march around the camp fire, lifting his knees high, stepping slowly, beating the rattling horn into the palm of his hand.

Behind him in single file, imitating his step, marched the other Indians. The smiles faded out of their countenances; their jaws were set, and deep in their throats they growled a weird singsong.

"My Gawd!" yelped Vittum. "It's the old Tarratine war dance and it just fits my notions right now, and I'm in on it!"

He scrambled to his feet and fell into line at the rear of the Indians.

Every man in the Flagg crew followed suit. They imitated the Indian singsong as best they were able, their voices constantly giving forth greater volume until they were yelling their defiance to the Three C's company and all its works.

The men far out on the deadwater, pus.h.i.+ng against the bars of the capstan, heard the tumult on the sh.o.r.e and shouted the chorus of their challenging chantey.

Between Lida and the men who were circling the fire there was a veil of mist, and in the halation her champions loomed with heroic stature. She did not want them to suppose that she was indifferent; courage of her own leaped in her. The campaign which she had waged with them had given her an experience which had fortified the spirit of the Flaggs. She stepped forth from her little tent and walked down and stood in the edge of the light cast by the camp fire. They cheered her, and she put aside her qualms and her fears as best she was able.

When she was back in her tent she did not s.h.i.+eld her ears from the challenging chantey, as she had done before, and she heard with fort.i.tude the vociferous pledges of faith in the morrow.

The dawn came so sullenly and so slowly that the day seemed merely a faded copy of the night.