The Young Mountaineers Part 19

"These hyar chips air so wet they won't burn," said his mother. "I'll take my tur-r-key whing an' fan the fire."

"Law!" he exclaimed. "Thar, now! Ethan Tynes never gimme that thar wild tur-r-key's whings like he promised."

"Whar did ye happen ter see Ethan?" asked Pete, interested in his friend.

"Seen him in the woods, an' he promised me the tur-r-key whings."

"What fur?" inquired Pete, a little surprised by this uncalled-for generosity.

"Waal,"--there was an expression of embarra.s.sment on the important freckled face, and the small red head nodded forward in an explanatory manner,--"he fell off'n the bluffs arter the tur-r-key whings--I mean, he went down to the ledge arter the tur-r-key, and the vines bruk an' he couldn't git up no more. An' he tole me that ef I'd tell ye ter fotch him a rope ter pull up by, he would gimme the whings. That happened a--leetle--while--arter dinner-time."

"Who got him a rope ter pull up by?" demanded Pete.

There was again on the important face that indescribable shade of embarra.s.sment. "Waal,"--the youngster balanced this word judicially,--"I forgot 'bout'n the tur-r-key whings till this minute. I reckon he's thar yit."

"Mebbe this hyar wind an' rain hev beat him off'n the ledge!" exclaimed Pete, appalled, and rising hastily. "I tell ye now," he added, turning to his mother, "the best use ye kin make o' that thar boy is ter put him on the fire fur a back-log."

Pete made his preparations in great haste. He took the rope from the well, asked the crestfallen and browbeaten junior a question or two relative to locality, mounted old Sorrel without a saddle, and in a few minutes was galloping at headlong speed through the night.

The rain was over by the time he had reached the sulphur spring to which George had directed him, but the wind was still high, and the broken clouds were driving fast across the face of the moon.

When he had hitched his horse to a tree, and set out on foot to find the cliff, the moonbeams, though brilliant, were so intermittent that his progress was fitful and necessarily cautious. When the disk shone out full and clear, he made his way rapidly enough, but when the clouds intervened, he stood still and waited.

"I ain't goin' ter fall off'n the bluff 'thout knowin' it," he said to himself, in one of these eclipses, "ef I hev ter stand hyar all night."

The moonlight was brilliant and steady when he reached the verge of the crag. He identified the spot by the ma.s.s of broken vines, and more indubitably by Ethan's rifle lying upon the ground just at his feet. He called, but received no response.

"Hev Ethan fell off, sure enough?" he asked himself, in great dismay and alarm. Then he shouted again and again. At last there came an answer, as though the speaker had just awaked.

"Pretty nigh beat out, I'm a-thinkin'!" commented Pete. He tied one end of the cord around the trunk of a tree, knotted it at intervals, and flung it over the bluff.

At first Ethan was almost afraid to stir. He slowly put forth his hand and grasped the rope. Then, his heart beating tumultuously, he rose to his feet.

He stood still for an instant to steady himself and get his breath.

Nerving himself for a strong effort, he began the ascent, hand over hand, up, and up, and up, till once more he stood upon the crest of the crag.

And, now that all danger was over, Pete was disposed to scold. "I'm a-thinkin'," said Pete severely, "ez thar ain't a critter on this hyar mounting, from a b'ar ter a copper-head, that could hev got in sech a fix, 'ceptin' ye, Ethan Tynes."

And Ethan was silent.

"What's this hyar thing at the e-end o' the rope?" asked Pete, as he began to draw the cord up, and felt a weight still suspended.

"It air the tur-r-key," said Ethan meekly.

"I tied her ter the e-end o' the rope afore I kem up."

"Waal, sir!" exclaimed Pete, in indignant surprise.

And George, for duty performed, was remunerated with the two "whings,"

although it still remains a question in the mind of Ethan whether or not he deserved them.

IN THE "c.h.i.n.kING"

Not far from an abrupt precipice on a certain great mountain spur there stands in the midst of the red and yellow autumn woods a little log "church-house." The nuts rattle noisily down on its roof; sometimes during "evenin' preachin'"--which takes place in the afternoon--a flying-squirrel frisks near the window; the hymns echo softly, softly, from the hazy sunlit heights across the valley.

"That air the doxol'gy," said Tom Brent, one day, pausing to listen among the wagons and horses. .h.i.tched outside. He was about to follow home his father's mare, that had broken loose and galloped off through the woods, but as he glanced back at the church, a sudden thought struck him. He caught sight of the end of little Jim Coggin's comforter flaunting out through the "c.h.i.n.king,"--as the mountaineers call the series of short slats which are set diagonally in the s.p.a.ces between the logs of the walls, and on which the clay is thickly daubed. This work had been badly done, and in many places the daubing had fallen away.

Thus it was that as Jim Coggin sat within the church, the end of his plaid comforter had slipped through the c.h.i.n.king and was waving in the wind outside.

Now Jim had found the weather still too warm for his heavy jeans jacket, but he was too cool without it, and he had ingeniously compromised the difficulty by wearing his comforter in this unique manner,--laying it on his shoulders, crossing it over the chest, pa.s.sing it under the arms, and tying it in a knot between the shoulder-blades. Tom remembered this with a grin as he slyly crept up to the house, and it was only the work of a moment to draw that knot through the c.h.i.n.king and secure it firmly to a sumach bush that grew near at hand.

It never occurred to him that the resounding doxology could fail to rouse that small, tow-headed, freckle-faced boy, or that the congregation might slowly disperse without noticing him as he sat motionless and asleep in the dark shadow.

The sun slipped down into the red west; the blue mountains turned purple; heavy clouds gathered, and within three miles there was no other human creature when Jim suddenly woke to the darkness and the storm and the terrible loneliness.

Where was he? He tried to rise: he could not move. Bewildered, he struggled and tugged at his harness,--all in vain. As he realized the situation, he burst into tears.

"Them home-folks o' mine won't kem hyar ter s'arch fur me," he cried desperately, "kase I tole my mother ez how I war a-goin' ter dust down the mounting ter Aunt Jerushy's house ez soon ez meet'n' war out an'

stay all night along o' her boys."

Still he tried to comfort himself by reflecting that it was not so bad as it might have been. There was no danger that he would have to starve and pine here till next Sunday, for a "protracted meeting" was in progress, service was held every day, and the congregation would return to-morrow, which was Thursday.

His philosophy, however, was short-lived, for the sudden lightning rent the clouds, and a terrific peal of thunder echoed among the cliffs.

"The storm air a-comin' up the mounting!" he exclaimed, in vivacious protest. "An' ef this brief wind war ter whurl the old church-house off'n the bluff an' down inter the valley whar-r--would--I--be?"

All at once the porch creaked beneath a heavy tread. A clumsy hand was fumbling at the door. "Strike a light," said a gruff voice without.

As a lantern was thrust in, Jim was about to speak, but the words froze upon his lips for fear when a man strode heavily over the threshold and he caught the expression of his face.

It was an evil face, red and bloated and brutish. He had small, malicious, twinkling eyes, and a shock of sandy hair. A suit of copper-colored jeans hung loosely on his tall, lank frame, and when he placed the lantern on a bench and stretched out both arms as if he were tired, he showed that his left hand was maimed,--the thumb had been cut off at the first joint.

A thickset, short, swaggering man tramped in after him.

"Waal, Amos Brierwood," he said, "it's safes' fur us ter part. We oughter be fur enough from hyar by daybreak. Divide that thar traveler's money--hey?"

They carefully closed the rude shutters, barred the door, and sat down on the "mourners' bench," neither having noticed the small boy at the other end of the room.

Poor Jim, his arms akimbo and half-covered by his comforter, stuck to the wall like a plaid bat,--if such a natural curiosity is imaginable,--feverishly hoping that the men might go without seeing him at all.

For surely no human creature could be more abhorrent, more incredibly odious of aspect, than Amos Brierwood as he sat there, his red, brutish face redder still with a malign pleasure, his malicious eyes gloating over the rolls of money which he drew from a pocket-book stolen from some waylaid traveler, snapping his fingers in exultation when the amount of the bills exceeded his expectation.

The leaves without were fitfully astir, and once the porch creaked suddenly. Brierwood glanced at the door sharply,--even fearfully,--his hand motionless on the rolls of money.

"Only the wind, Amos, only the wind!" said the short, stout man impatiently.