The Backwoodsmen Part 6

She had never heard any sound just like that; it was not savage, nor very loud, but somehow it seemed to carry a kind of horror on its floating cadence. It reminded her, very faintly, of the howling of some dogs that she had heard in the Settlement. She was not afraid of dogs. But she knew there were no dogs in the forest.

Just as she was beginning to lose her breath and slacken her pace, that terrible cry came wavering again through the trees, much louder now and nearer. It lent new strength to her tired little feet, and she fled on faster than ever, her red lips open and her eyes wide. Another slight turn of the trail, and it ran once more directly towards the moon, stretching on and on till it narrowed from sight. And nowhere in the s.h.i.+ning track was Dave to be seen. Lidey had now, however, but one thought in her quivering brain, and that was to keep running and get to her father before those dreadful voices could overtake her. She knew they were coming up swiftly. They sounded terribly near. When she had gone about two hundred yards beyond the last bend of the trail, she noticed, a few steps ahead of her, a tiny clearing, and at its farther edge the gable of a little hut rising a couple of feet above the snow. She knew the place. She had played in it that summer, while Dave was cutting the coa.r.s.e hay on the clearing. It was a place that had been occupied by lonely trappers and lumber prospectors. Being a work of men's hands, it gave the child a momentary sense of comfort, of companions.h.i.+p in the dreadful wild. She paused, uncertain whether to continue along the trail or to seek the shelter of the empty hut.

When the crunching of her own little footsteps stopped, however, she was instantly aware of the padding of other feet behind her. Looking back, she saw a pack of grey beasts just coming around the turn. They were something like dogs. But Lidey knew they were not dogs. She had seen pictures of them--awful pictures. She had read stories of them which had frozen her blood as she read. Now, her very bones seemed to melt within her. They were wolves! For a moment her throat could form no sound. Then--"Father!" she screamed despairingly, and rushed for the hut.

As she reached it, the wolves were hardly a dozen paces behind. The door stood half open, but drifted full of snow to within little more than a foot of the top. Into the low opening the child dived head first, like a rabbit, crept behind the door, and fell upon the snow, gasping, too horror-stricken to make any outcry.

A step from the hut door the wolves halted abruptly. The half-buried hut, and the dark hole leading into it--these were things they did not understand, except that they recognized them as belonging to man.

Anything belonging to man was dangerous. In that dark hole they suspected a trap. The leader went up to it, and almost poked his nose into it, sniffing. But he backed away sharply as if he had met with a blow on the snout, and his nostrils wrinkled in savage enmity. The man smell was strong in the hut. It seemed very like a trap.

Lying flat on her stomach behind the door, Lidey stared out through the narrow crack with eyes that seemed starting from her head. Out there in the clear glitter of the moonlight she saw the wolves go prowling savagely to and fro, and heard their steps as they cautiously circled the hut, seeking another entrance. They kept about five or six feet distant from it at first, so suspicious were they of that man smell that had greeted the leader's first attempt at investigation.

When they had prowled about the hut for several minutes, they all sat down on their haunches before the door and seemed to deliberate. The child felt their dreadful eyes piercing her through and through, as they searched her out through the crack and penetrated her vain hiding.

Suddenly, while the eyes of all the pack were flaming upon her, she saw the leader come swiftly forward and thrust his fierce snout right against the crack of the door. In a sort of madness she struck at it with her little, mittened hand. The wolf, apparently still disconcerted by the man smell that greeted his nostrils, sprang back warily. Then the whole pack drew a foot or two closer to the open doorway. Ravenous though they were, they were not yet a.s.sured that the hut was not a trap. They were not yet quite ready to crawl in and secure their prey. But gradually they were edging nearer. A few moments more and the leader, no less crafty than savage, would creep in. Already he had accustomed himself to the menace of that scent. Now, he did creep in, as far as the middle of his body, investigating. His red jaws and long, white teeth appeared around the edge of the door. At the sight Lidey's voice returned to her.

Shrinking back against the farthest wall, she gave shriek after shriek that seemed to tear the dreadful stillness. In the madness of her terror she hardly noticed that the wolf's head was suddenly withdrawn.

III

When Dave Patton set out for the Settlement, he found the snow-shoeing so good, the biting air so bracing, and his own heart so light with hope and health, that he was able to make the journey in something less than a day and a half. Out of this time he had allowed himself four hours for sleep, in an old lumber camp beside the trail. At the Settlement, which boasted several miscellaneous stores, where anything from a baby's rattle to a bag of fertilizer or a bedroom suite could be purchased, he had no difficulty in gathering such gay-coloured trifles, together with more lasting gifts, as he thought would meet Lidey's antic.i.p.ations. When he went to his wife's people, he found that all had something to add to his Santa Claus pack, for Mary as well as for the little one; and he hugged himself with elation at the thought of what a Christmas there was going to be in the lonely wilderness cabin. He had bought two or three things for his wife; and when he shouldered his pack, slinging it high and strapping it close that it might not flop with his rapid stride, he found the burden no light one. But the lightness of his heart made compensation.

That night he took but two hours' sleep in the old lumber camp, aiming to reach home soon after noon. In the morning, however, things began to go wrong. First the pack, as packs sometimes will for no visible reason, developed a kink that galled his shoulders obstinately. Again and again he paused and tried to readjust it. But in vain. Finally he had to stop, undo the bundle, and rearrange every article in it, before he could induce it to "carry" smoothly.

Half an hour later, as he turned a step off the trail to get a drink at a bubbling spring, that kept open all through the bitterest winter, he caught his snowshoe on a buried branch and fell forward, breaking the frame. In his angry impatience he attempted no more than a temporary repair of the damage, such as he thought might see him to the end of his journey. But the poor makes.h.i.+ft broke down before he had gone a mile. There was nothing for him to do but to stop long enough to make a good job of it, which he did by chopping out a piece of ash, whittling down a couple of thin but tough strips, and splicing the break securely with the strong "salmon twine" that he always carried. Even so, he realized that to avoid further delay he would have to go cautiously and humour the mend. And soon he had to acknowledge to himself that it would be long after supper-time, long after Lidey's bed-time, before he could get home.

As the moon rose, he was accompanied by his shadow, a gigantic and grotesque figure that danced fantastically along the snow before him.

As the moon climbed the icy heaven, the shadow shortened and acquired more sobriety of demeanour. Plodding doggedly onward, too tired to think, Dave amused himself with the antics of the shadow, which seemed responsible for a portion of the crisp music that came from his snowshoes.

From this careless reverie Dave was suddenly aroused by a ghost of sound that drifted towards him through the trees. It was a long, wailing cry, which somehow stirred the roots of his hair. He did not recognize it. But he felt that it was nothing human. It came from somewhere between himself and home, however; and he instinctively quickened his steps, thinking with satisfaction of the snug and well-warmed cabin that sheltered his dear ones.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "Where anything from a baby's rattle to a bag of fertilizer could be purchased."]

Presently the long cry sounded again, nearer and clearer now, and tremulous. Dave had heard wolves before, in Labrador and in the West.

Had he not been quite sure that wolves were unknown in this part of the country, he would have sworn that the sound was the hunting cry of a wolf-pack. But the idea was impossible. He had no sooner made up his mind to this, however, than the cry was repeated once more. Thereupon Dave reluctantly changed his mind. That the sound meant wolves was not only possible, but certain. It filled him with resentment to think that those ravening marauders had come into the country.

It was soon manifest to Dave's initiated ears that the wolves were coming directly towards him. But he gathered, too, that they were in pursuit of some quarry. Dave had the eastern woodsman's contempt for wolves, unless in a very large pack; and he soon decided that this pack was a small one. He did not think that it would dare to face him.

Nevertheless, he recognized the remote possibility of their being so hungry as to forget their dread of man. That in such case his axe would be an all-sufficient defence he did not doubt. But he was in a fierce hurry to get home. He did not want to be stopped and forced into any fight. For a moment he thought of turning off through the woods and giving these night foragers a wide berth. Then he remembered his uncertain snowshoes. The snow would be very soft off the trail, and there would be the chance of breaking the shoe again. Who was he, to be turned out of his path by a bunch of wild curs? It was the snow-shoe that settled it. He set his jaws grimly, unslung his axe, and pressed forward. The clamour of the pack was now so near and loud that it quite drowned one single, piercing cry of "Father!" that would otherwise have reached his ears. There was a new note in the howling, too, which Dave's ear interpreted as meaning that the quarry was in sight. Then the noise stopped abruptly, save for an impatient yelp or two.

"Whatever it be they're after, it's took to cover," said Dave to himself. "An' in the old shanty, too!" he added, as he saw the little patch of clearing open before him.

Realizing that the wolves had something to occupy fully their attention, he now crept noiselessly forward just within the edge of the wood. Peering forth from behind the cover of a drooping hemlock branch, he saw the roof of the hut, the half-open doorway nearly choked with snow, and the wolves prowling and sniffing around it, but keeping a couple of yards away.

"Scairt of a trap!" he thought to himself with a grin, and cursed his luck that he had not his rifle with him.

"A couple o' them thick, grey pelts," he thought--"what a coat they'd make for the little one!"

There were six wolves, and big ones--enough to make things look pretty ugly for one man with only an axe. Dave was glad they had something to keep them from turning their attention to him. He watched them for a few moments, then decided to go around by the other side of the clearing and avoid trouble.

He drew back as silently as a lynx. Where the woods overhead were thick, the snow was soft, with no crispness on the surface; and instead of the crunching that his steps made on the trail, here the snow made no sound under his feet but a sort of thick sigh.

Dave had taken several paces in retreat, when an idea flashed up that arrested him. _Why_ were the wolves so wary about entering the hut, when their quarry was certainly inside? Their dread of a trap was not, of itself, quite enough to explain their caution. The thought gave him a qualm of uneasiness. He would return and have another look at them!

Then his impatience got the better of him. Mary and the little one were waiting and watching for him at home. He retreated another pace or two. What should he be doing, wasting his time over a parcel of wolves that had got a fox cornered in the old shanty? Dave felt sure it was a fox. But no! He could not escape the conviction--much as he wished to--that if the fugitive were a fox, or any other animal of the north-eastern woods, it would not take six hungry wolves much more than six seconds to get over their suspicions and go in after him.

What if it should be some half-starved old Indian, working his way into the Settlement after bad luck with his hunting and his trapping!

Whoever it was, he had no gun, or there would have been shooting before this. Dave saw that he must go back and look into the matter.

But he was angry at this new delay. Cursing the wolves, and the Indian who didn't know enough to take care of himself, Dave stole back to his covert behind the hemlock branch, and peered forth once more, no longer interested, but aggrieved.

The wolves were now sitting on their haunches around the hut door.

Their unusual behaviour convinced him that there was a man inside.

Well, there was no getting around the fact that he was in for a fight.

He only hoped that the chap inside was some good, and would have "somethin' to say fer himself, darn him!" Dave gently lowered the bundle from his back, and threw off his thick coat to allow his arms freer play.

It was at this moment that the leader of the pack made up his mind to crawl into the hut.

As the wolf's head entered the low opening, Dave gripped his axe, thrust aside the hemlock branch, and silently darted forth into the clearing. He did not shout, for he wanted to take his enemies, as far as possible, unawares. He had but a score of yards to go. So intent were they upon their leader's movements that Dave was almost upon them ere they heeded the sound of his coming. Then they looked around.

Three shrank back, startled at the tall and threatening shape. But two sprang at his throat with snapping jaws. The first met the full sweep of his axe, in the chest and dropped in a heap. The second dodged a short blow and warily drew back again. Then, from within the darkness of the hut, came those screams of the madness of terror.

For one beat Dave's heart stopped. He knew the voice!

The big wolf was just backing out. He turned, jerking himself around like a loosed spring, as he saw Dave towering over him. But he was not in time. The axe descended, sheering his haunches across, and he stretched out, working his great jaws convulsively. Dave saw that the jaws had no blood upon them, and his own blood returned to his heart.

He had come in time. The screams within the hut died into piteous sobs.

Across Dave's mind flamed a vision of the agony of horror that Lidey had been suffering since first those howlings fell upon his ears. His heart-break transformed itself into a mad rage of vengeance. As he turned, with a hoa.r.s.e shout, upon the rest of the pack, he felt a hot breath on his neck, and bare fangs snapped savagely within an inch of his throat. His a.s.sailant sprang back in time to escape the deadly sweep of the axe, but at the same instant the other three were leaping in. One of these caught a glancing blow, which drove him off, snarling. But the other two were so close that there was no time for Dave to recover. Instinctively he jabbed a short back-stroke with the end of the axe-handle, and caught one of his a.s.sailants in the belly.

Sickened, and daunted by this unexpected form of reprisal, the brute hunched itself with a startled yelp and ran off with its tail between its legs. At the same moment, dropping the axe, Dave caught the other wolf fairly by the throat. The gripping hand was a kind of weapon that the beast had never learned to guard against, and it was taken at a disadvantage. With a grunt of fury and of effort Dave closed his grip inexorably, braced himself, and swung the heavy brute off its feet.

Whirling it clear around his head, he let go. The animal flew sprawling and twisting through the air, and came down on its back ten feet away. When it landed, there was no more fight left in it. Before Dave could reach it with his axe it was up and away in a panic after its two remaining fellows.

Breathing heavily from his effort and from the storm of emotion still surging in his breast, Dave turned to the hut door and called--

"Lidey! Lidey! Are you there?"

"Popsie! Oh, popsie, _dear!_ I thought you weren't goin' to come!"

cried a quivering little voice. And the child crept out into the moonlight.

"Oh, popsie!" she sobbed, hiding her eyes in his neck as he crushed her to his heart, "they were goin' to eat me up, an' I thought you wouldn't ever come!"

IV

With the bundle on his back and Lidey in his arms, Dave strode homeward, his weariness forgotten. His first anxiety about his wife was somewhat eased when he learned that Lidey had left her asleep; for he remembered that a heavy sleep always marked the end of one of her attacks. He only hoped that the sleep would hold her until they got home, for his heart sank at the thought of her terror if she should wake and find Lidey gone. As they came out on the edge of the clearing, and saw that all was quiet in the cabin, Dave said--

"We won't tell mother nothin' about the wolves to-night, sweetie, eh?

It 'ld jest git her all worked up, an' she couldn't stand it when she's sick. We won't say nothin' about that till to-morrow!"

"Yes!" murmured Lidey, "she'd be awful scairt!"

They were then about halfway up the slope, when from the cabin came a frightened cry of "Lidey! Lidey!" The door was flung open, the lamplight streamed out in futile contest with the moonlight, and Mrs.

Patton appeared. Her face was white with fear. As she saw Dave and the little one hurrying towards her, both hands went to her heart in the extremity of her relief, and she sank back into a chair before the door.