Tish: The Chronicle of Her Escapades and Excursions Part 21

"I--I think," he said, "if there's nothing wrong I'd better not--"

"Fiddlesticks!" Tish snapped. "Are you ashamed of the body the Lord gave you? Don't you suppose we've all got skins? And didn't I thrash my nephew, Charlie Sands, when he was almost as big as you and had less on, for bathing in the river? Sit down, man, and don't be a fool."

He edged toward the fire, looking rather silly, and Aggie pa.s.sed him a frog's leg on a piece of bark.

"Try this, Percy," she said, smiling.

At the name he looked ready to run. "I guess you've seen the notices,"

he said, "so you'll understand I cannot accept any food or a.s.sistance.

I'm very grateful to you, anyhow."

"You may take what food you find, surely," said Aggie. "If you find a roasted frog's leg on the ground--so--there's nothing to prevent you eating it, is there?"

"Nothing at all," said Percy, and picked it up. "Unless, of course--"

"It's not a trap, young man," said Tish. "Eat it and enjoy it. There are lots more where it came from."

He relaxed at that, and on Tish's bringing out a blanket from the tent to throw over his shoulders he became almost easy. He was much surprised to learn that we knew his story, and when I repeated the "love him"

message, he seemed to grow a foot taller and his eyes glowed.

"I'm holding out all right," he said. "I'm fit physically. But the thing that gets my goat is that I'm to come out clothed. Dorothea's father says that primitive man, with nothing but his hands and perhaps a stone club, fed himself, made himself a shelter, and clothed himself in skins.

Skins! I'm so big that two or three bears would hardly be enough. I did find a hole that I thought a bear or two might fall into, and got almost stung to death robbing a bee tree to bait the thing with honey. But there aren't any bears, and if there were how'd I kill 'em? Wait until they starve to death?"

"Rabbits!" said Tish.

He looked down at himself and he seemed very large in the firelight.

"Dear lady," he said, "there aren't enough rabbits in the county to cover me, and how'd I put 'em together? I was a fool to undertake the thing, that's all."

"But aren't you in love with her?" asked Aggie.

"Well, I guess I am. It isn't that, you know. I'm a good bit worse than crazy about her. A man might be crazy about a mint julep or a power boat, but--he'd hardly go into the woods in his skin and live on fish until he's scaly for either of them. If I don't get her, I don't want to live. That's all."

He looked so gloomy and savage that we saw he meant it, and Aggie was perceptibly thrilled. Trish, however, was thinking hard, her eyes on the leech. "Was there anything in the agreement to prevent your accepting any suggestions?"

He pondered. "No, I was to be given no food, drink, shelter, or any weapon. The old man forgot fire--that's how I came to beg some."

"Fire and brains," reflected Tish. "We've given you the first and we've plenty of the second to offer. Now, young man, this is my plan. We'll give you nothing but suggestions. If now and then you find a cooked meal under that tree, that's accident, not design, and you'd better eat it.

Can you sew?"

"I'm like the Irishman and the fiddle--I never tried, but I guess I can." He was much more cheerful.

"Do you have to be alone?"

"I believe he took that for granted, in this costume."

"Will it take you long to move over here?"

"I think I can move without a van," he said, grinning. "My sole worldly possessions are a stone hatchet and a hairpin fishhook."

"Get them and come over," commanded Tish. "When you leave this forest at the end of the time you are going to be fed and clothed and carry a tent; you will have with you smoked meat and fish; you will carry under your arm an Indian clock or sundial; you will have a lamp--if we can find a clamsh.e.l.l or a broken bottle--and you will have a fire-making outfit with your monogram on it."

"But, my dear friend," he said, "I am not supposed to have any a.s.sistance and--"

"a.s.sistance!" Tish snapped. "Who said a.s.sistance? I'm providing the brains, but you'll do it all yourself."

He moved over an hour or so later and Tish and I went into the tent to bed. Somewhat later, when she limped to the fire to see how the leech was filling up, he and Aggie were sitting together talking, he of Dorothea and Aggie of Mr. Wiggins. Tish said they were both talking at the same time, neither one listening to the other, and that it sounded like this:--"She's so sweet and trusting and honest--well, I'd believe what she said if she--"

"--fell off a roof on a rainy day and was picked up by a man with a horse and buggy quite unconscious."

V

The next three weeks were busy times for Percy. He wore Tish's blanket for two days, and then, finding it in the way, he discarded it altogether. Seen in daylight it was easy to understand why little Dorothea was in love with him. He was a handsome young giant, although much bitten by mosquitoes and scratched with briers.

The arrangement was a good one all round. He knew of things in the wood we'd never heard of--wild onions and artichokes, and he had found a clump of wild cherry trees. He made snares of the fibers of tree bark, and he brought in turtles and made plates out of the sh.e.l.ls. And all the time he was working on his outfit, curing rabbit skins and sewing them together with fibers under my direction.

When he'd made one sleeve of his coat we had a sort of celebration.

He'd found an empty bottle somewhere in the woods, and he had made a wild-cherry decoction that he declared was cherry brandy, keeping it in the sun to ferment. Well, he insisted on opening the brandy that day and pa.s.sing it round. We had cups made of leaves and we drank to his sleeve, although the stuff was villainous. He had put the sleeve on, and it looked rather inadequate. "Here's fun," he said joyously. "If my English tailor could see this sleeve he'd die of envy. A sleeve's not all of a coat, but what's a coat without a sleeve? Look at it--grace, ease of line, and beauty of material."

Aggie lifted her leaf.

"To Dorothea!" she said. "And may the sleeve soon be about her."

Tish thought this toast was not delicate, but Percy was enchanted with it.

It was on the evening of the fourth day of Percy's joining our camp that the Willoughby person appeared. It happened at a most inauspicious time.

We had eaten supper and were gathered round the camp-fire and Tish had put wet leaves on the blaze to make a smudge that would drive the mosquitoes away. We were sitting there, Tish and I coughing and Aggie sneezing in the smoke, when Percy came running through the woods and stopped at the foot of a tree near by.

"Bring a club, somebody," he yelled. "I've treed the back of my coat."

Tish ran with one of the tent poles. A tepee is inconvenient for that reason. Every time any one wants a fis.h.i.+ng-pole or a weapon, the tent loses part of its bony structure and sags like the face of a stout woman who has reduced. And it turned out that Percy had treed a c.o.o.n. He climbed up after it, taking Tish's pole with him to dislodge it, and it was at that moment that a man rode into the clearing and practically fell off his horse. He was dirty and scratched with brambles, and his once immaculate riding-clothes were torn. He was about to take off his hat when he got a good look at us and changed his mind.

"Have you got anything to eat?" he asked. "I've been lost since noon yesterday and I'm about all in."

The leaves caught fire suddenly and sent a glow into Percy's tree. I shall never forget Aggie's agonized look or the way Tish flung on more wet leaves in a hurry.

"I'm sorry," she said, "but supper's over."

"But surely a starving man--"

"You won't starve inside of a week," Tish snapped. "You've got enough flesh on you for a month."

He stared at her incredulously.

"But, my good woman," he said, "I can pay for my food. Even you itinerant folk need money now and then, don't you? Come, now, cook me a fish; I'll pay for it. My name is Willoughby--J.K. Willoughby. Perhaps you've heard of me."