The Backwoodsmen Part 15

Mrs. Gammit and the Porcupines

"I hain't come to borry yer gun, Mr. Barron, but to ax yer advice."

Mrs. Gammit's rare appearances were always abrupt, like her speech; and it was without surprise--though he had not seen her for a month or more--that Joe Barron turned to greet her.

"It's at yer sarvice, jest as the gun would be ef ye wanted it, Mrs.

Gammit--_an'_ welcome! But come in an' set down an' git cooled off a mite. 'Tain't no place to talk, out here in the bilin' sun."

Mrs. Gammit seated herself on the end of the bench, just inside the kitchen door, twitched off her limp, pink cotton sunbonnet, and wiped her flushed face with the sleeve of her calico waist. Quite unsubdued by the heat and moisture of the noonday sun, under which she had tramped nine miles through the forest, her short, stiff, grey hair stood up in irregular tufts above her weather-beaten forehead. Her host, sitting sidewise on the edge of the table so that he could swing one leg freely and spit cleanly through the open window, bit off a contemplative quid of "blackjack" tobacco, and waited for her to unfold the problems that troubled her.

Mrs. Gammit's rugged features were modelled to fit an expression of vigorous, if not belligerent, self-confidence. She knew her capabilities, well-tried in some sixty odd years of unprotected spinsterhood. Merit alone, not matrimony, it was, that had crowned this unsullied spinsterhood with the honorary t.i.tle of "Mrs." Her ma.s.sive and energetic nose was usually carried somewhat high, in a not unjustifiable scorn of such foolish circ.u.mstance as might seek to thwart her will.

But to-day these strenuous features found themselves surprised by an expression of doubt, of bewilderment, almost one might say of humility. At her little clearing in the heart of the great wilderness things had been happening which, to her amazement, she could not understand. Hitherto she had found an explanation, clear at least to herself, for everything that befell her in these silent backwoods which other folks seemed to find so absurdly mysterious. Armed with her self-confidence she had been able, hitherto, to deal with every situation that had challenged her, and in a manner quite satisfactory to herself, however the eternal verities may have smiled at it. But now, at last, she was finding herself baffled.

Joe Barron waited with the patience of the backwoodsman and the Indian, to whom, as to Nature herself, time seems no object, though they always somehow manage to be on time. Mrs. Gammit continued to fan her hot face with her sunbonnet, and to ponder her problems, while the lines deepened between her eyes. A big black and yellow wasp buzzed angrily against the window-pane, bewildered because it could not get through the transparent barrier. A little grey hen, with large, drooping comb vividly scarlet, hopped on to the doorsill, eyed Mrs.

Gammit with surprise and disapprobation, and ran away to warn the rest of the flock that there was a woman round the place. That, as they all knew by inheritance from the "shooings" which their forefathers had suffered, meant that they would no longer be allowed in the kitchen to pick up crumbs.

At last Mrs. Gammit spoke--but with difficulty, for it came hard to her to ask advice of any one.

"I sp'ose now, mebbe, Mr. Barron, you know more about the woods critters'n what I do?" she inquired, hopefully but doubtfully.

The woodsman lifted his eyebrows in some surprise at the question.

"Well, now, if I don't I'd _oughter_," said he, "seein' as how I've kinder lived round amongst 'em all my life. If I know _anything_, it's the backwoods an' all what pertains to that same!"

"Yes, you'd _oughter_ know more about them than I do!" a.s.sented Mrs.

Gammit, with a touch of severity which seemed to add "and see that you do!" Then she shut her mouth firmly and fell to fanning herself again, her thoughts apparently far away.

"I hope 'tain't no _serious_ trouble ye're in!" ventured her host presently, with the amiable intention of helping her to deliver her soul of its burden.

But, manlike, he struck the wrong note.

"Do you suppose," snapped Mrs. Gammit, "I'd be traipsin' over here nine mile thro' the hot woods to ax yer advice, Mr. Barron, if _'twarn't_ serious?" And she began to regret that she had come. Men never did understand anything, anyway.

At this sudden acerbity the woodsman stroked his chin with his hand, to hide the ghost of a smile which flickered over his lean mouth.

"Jest like a woman, to git riled over nawthin'!" he thought. "Sounds kinder nice an' homey, too!" But aloud, being always patient with the s.e.x, he said coaxingly--

"Then it's right proud I am that ye should come to me about it, Mrs.

Gammit. I reckon I kin help you out, mebbe. What's wrong?"

With a burst of relief Mrs. Gammit declared her sorrow.

"It's the aigs," said she, pa.s.sionately. "Fer nigh on to a month, now, I've been alosin' of 'em as fast as the hens kin git 'em laid.

An' all I kin do, I cain't find out what's atakin' 'em."

Having reached the point of asking advice, an expression of pathetic hopefulness came into her weather-beaten face. Under quite other conditions it might almost have been possible for Mrs. Gammit to learn to lean on a man, if he were careful not to disagree with her.

"Oh! Aigs!" said the woodsman, relaxing slightly the tension of his sympathy. "Well, now, let's try an' git right to the root of the trouble. Air ye plumb sure, in the first place, that the hens is really _layin'_ them aigs what ye don't git?"

Mrs. Gammit stiffened.

"Do I look like an eejut?" she demanded.

"Not one leetle mite, you don't!" a.s.sented her host, promptly and cordially.

"I was beginning to think mebbe I did!" persisted the injured lady.

"Everybody knows," protested the woodsman, "as how what you don't know, Mrs. Gammit, ain't hardly wuth knowin'."

"O' course, that's puttin' it a leetle too strong, Mr. Barron," she answered, much mollified. "But I do reckon as how I've got _some_ horse sense. Well, I _thought_ as how them 'ere hens _might_ 'ave stopped layin' on the suddint; so I up an' watched 'em. Land's sakes, but they was alayin' fine. Whenever I kin take time to stan' right by an' _watch_ 'em lay, I git all the aigs I know what to do with. But when I _don't_ watch 'em, _clost_--nary an aig. Ye ain't agoin' to persuade me a hen kin jest quit layin' when she's a mind ter, waitin'

tell ye pa.s.s her the compliment o' holdin' out yer hand fer the aig!"

"There's lots o' hens that pervarted they'll turn round an' _eat_ their own aigs!" suggested the woodsman, spitting thoughtfully through the open window. The cat, coiled in the sun on a log outside, sprang up angrily, glared with green eyes at the offending window, and scurried away to cleanse her defiled coat.

"Them's not _my_ poultry!" said Mrs. Gammit with decision. "I thought o' that, too. An' I watched 'em on the sly. But they hain't a one of 'em got no sech onnateral tricks. When they're through layin', they jest hop off an' run away acacklin', as they should." And she shook her head heavily, as one almost despairing of enlightenment. "No, ef ye ain't got no more idees to suggest than that, I might as well be goin'."

"Oh, I was jest kinder clearin' out the underbrush, so's to git a square good look at the situation," explained Barron. "Now, I kin till ye somethin' about it. Firstly, it's a weasel, bein' so sly, an'

quick, an' audashus! Ten to one, it's a weasel; an' ye've got to trap it. Secondly, if 'tain't a weasel, it's a fox, an' a _mighty_ cute fox, as ye're goin' to have some trouble in aketchin'. An'

thirdly--an' lastly--if 'tain't neither weasel nor fox, it's jest bound to be an extra cunnin' skunk, what's takin' the trouble to be keerful. Generally speakin', skunks ain't keerful, because they don't have to be, n.o.body wantin' much to fool with 'em. But onc't in a while ye'll come across't one that's as sly as a weasel."

"Oh, 'tain't none o' them!" said Mrs. Gammit, in a tone which conveyed a poor opinion of her host's sagacity and woodcraft. "I've suspicioned the weasels, an' the foxes, an' the woodchucks, but hain't found a sign o' any one of 'em round the place. An' _as_ fer _skunks_--well, I reckon, I've got a nose on my face." And to emphasize the fact, she sniffed scornfully.

"To be sure! An' a fine, handsome nose it is, Mrs. Gammit!" replied the woodsman, diplomatically. "But what you _don't_ appear to know about skunks is that when they're up to mischief is jest the time when you don't smell 'em. Ye got to bear that in mind!"

Mrs. Gammit looked at him with suspicion.

"Be that reelly so?" demanded she, sternly.

"True's gospel!" answered Barron. "A skunk ain't got no smell unless he's a mind to."

"Well," said she, "I guess it ain't no skunk, anyhow. I kind o' feel it in my bones 'tain't no skunk, smell or no smell."

The woodsman looked puzzled. He had not imagined her capable of such unreasoning obstinacy. He began to wonder if he had overrated her intelligence.

"Then I give it up, Mrs. Gammit," said he, with an air of having lost all interest in the problem.

But that did not suit his visitor at all. Her manner became more conciliatory. Leaning forward, with an almost coaxing look on her face, she murmured--

"I've had an _idee_ as how it _might_ be--mind, I don't say it is, but jest it _might_ be----" and she paused dramatically.

"Might be what?" inquired Barron, with reviving interest.

"Porkypines!" propounded Mrs. Gammit, with a sudden smile of triumph.

Joe Barron neither spoke nor smiled. But in his silence there was something that made Mrs. Gammit uneasy.