The Trail of the Lonesome Pine, Page 3

  III

  On one side he had left the earth yellow with the coming noon, but itwas still morning as he went down on the other side. The laurel andrhododendron still reeked with dew in the deep, ever-shaded ravine.The ferns drenched his stirrups, as he brushed through them, and eachdripping tree-top broke the sunlight and let it drop in tent-like beamsthrough the shimmering undermist. A bird flashed here and there throughthe green gloom, but there was no sound in the air but the footfalls ofhis horse and the easy creaking of leather under him, the drip of dewoverhead and the running of water below. Now and then he could see thesame slender foot-prints in the rich loam and he saw them in the sandwhere the first tiny brook tinkled across the path from a gloomy ravine.There the little creature had taken a flying leap across it and, beyond,he could see the prints no more. He little guessed that while he haltedto let his horse drink, the girl lay on a rock above him, looking down.She was nearer home now and was less afraid; so she had slipped from thetrail and climbed above it there to watch him pass. As he went on, sheslid from her perch and with cat-footed quiet followed him. Whenhe reached the river she saw him pull in his horse and eagerly bendforward, looking into a pool just below the crossing. There was a bassdown there in the clear water--a big one--and the man whistled cheerilyand dismounted, tying his horse to a sassafras bush and unbuckling a tinbucket and a curious looking net from his saddle. With the net in onehand and the bucket in the other, he turned back up the creek and passedso close to where she had slipped aside into the bushes that she camenear shrieking, but his eyes were fixed on a pool of the creek aboveand, to her wonder, he strolled straight into the water, with his bootson, pushing the net in front of him.

  He was a "raider" sure, she thought now, and he was looking for a"moonshine" still, and the wild little thing in the bushes smiledcunningly--there was no still up that creek--and as he had left hishorse below and his gun, she waited for him to come back, which he did,by and by, dripping and soaked to his knees. Then she saw him untie thequeer "gun" on his saddle, pull it out of a case and--her eyes got bigwith wonder--take it to pieces and make it into a long limber rod. In amoment he had cast a minnow into the pool and waded out into the waterup to his hips. She had never seen so queer a fishing-pole--so queera fisherman. How could he get a fish out with that little switch, shethought contemptuously? By and by something hummed queerly, the man gavea slight jerk and a shining fish flopped two feet into the air. It wassurely very queer, for the man didn't put his rod over his shoulder andwalk ashore, as did the mountaineers, but stood still, winding somethingwith one hand, and again the fish would flash into the air and thenthat humming would start again while the fisherman would stand quietand waiting for a while--and then he would begin to wind again. In herwonder, she rose unconsciously to her feet and a stone rolled down tothe ledge below her. The fisherman turned his head and she started torun, but without a word he turned again to the fish he was playing.Moreover, he was too far out in the water to catch her, so she advancedslowly--even to the edge of the stream, watching the fish cut halfcircles about the man. If he saw her, he gave no notice, and it waswell that he did not. He was pulling the bass to and fro now through thewater, tiring him out--drowning him--stepping backward at the same time,and, a moment later, the fish slid easily out of the edge of the water,gasping along the edge of a low sand-bank, and the fisherman reachingdown with one hand caught him in the gills. Then he looked up andsmiled--and she had seen no smile like that before.

  "Howdye, Little Girl?"

  One bare toe went burrowing suddenly into the sand, one finger went toher red mouth--and that was all. She merely stared him straight in theeye and he smiled again.

  "Cat got your tongue?"

  Her eyes fell at the ancient banter, but she lifted them straightway andstared again.

  "You live around here?"

  She stared on.

  "Where?"

  No answer.

  "What's your name, little girl?"

  And still she stared.

  "Oh, well, of course, you can't talk, if the cat's got your tongue."

  The steady eyes leaped angrily, but there was still no answer, and hebent to take the fish off his hook, put on a fresh minnow, turned hisback and tossed it into the pool.

  "Hit hain't!"

  He looked up again. She surely was a pretty little thing--and more, nowthat she was angry.

  "I should say not," he said teasingly. "What did you say your name was?"

  "What's YO' name?"

  The fisherman laughed. He was just becoming accustomed to the mountainetiquette that commands a stranger to divulge himself first.

  "My name's--Jack."

  "An' mine's--Jill." She laughed now, and it was his time forsurprise--where could she have heard of Jack and Jill?

  His line rang suddenly.

  "Jack," she cried, "you got a bite!"

  He pulled, missed the strike, and wound in. The minnow was all right, sohe tossed it back again.

  "That isn't your name," he said.

  "If 'tain't, then that ain't your'n?"

  "Yes 'tis," he said, shaking his head affirmatively.

  A long cry came down the ravine:

  "J-u-n-e! eh--oh--J-u-n-e!" That was a queer name for the mountains, andthe fisherman wondered if he had heard aright--June.

  The little girl gave a shrill answering cry, but she did not move.

  "Thar now!" she said.

  "Who's that--your Mammy?"

  "No, 'tain't--hit's my step-mammy. I'm a goin' to ketch hell now." Herinnocent eyes turned sullen and her baby mouth tightened.

  "Good Lord!" said the fisherman, startled, and then he stopped--thewords were as innocent on her lips as a benediction.

  "Have you got a father?" Like a flash, her whole face changed.

  "I reckon I have."

  "Where is he?"

  "Hyeh he is!" drawled a voice from the bushes, and it had a tone thatmade the fisherman whirl suddenly. A giant mountaineer stood on the bankabove him, with a Winchester in the hollow of his arm.

  "How are you?" The giant's heavy eyes lifted quickly, but he spoke tothe girl.

  "You go on home--what you doin' hyeh gassin' with furriners!"

  The girl shrank to the bushes, but she cried sharply back:

  "Don't you hurt him now, Dad. He ain't even got a pistol. He ain't no--"

  "Shet up!" The little creature vanished and the mountaineer turned tothe fisherman, who had just put on a fresh minnow and tossed it into theriver.

  "Purty well, thank you," he said shortly. "How are you?"

  "Fine!" was the nonchalant answer. For a moment there was silence and apuzzled frown gathered on the mountaineer's face.

  "That's a bright little girl of yours--What did she mean by telling younot to hurt me?"

  "You haven't been long in these mountains, have ye?"

  "No--not in THESE mountains--why?" The fisherman looked around and wasalmost startled by the fierce gaze of his questioner.

  "Stop that, please," he said, with a humourous smile. "You make menervous."

  The mountaineer's bushy brows came together across the bridge of hisnose and his voice rumbled like distant thunder.

  "What's yo' name, stranger, an' what's yo' business over hyeh?"

  "Dear me, there you go! You can see I'm fishing, but why does everybodyin these mountains want to know my name?"

  "You heerd me!"

  "Yes." The fisherman turned again and saw the giant's rugged face sternand pale with open anger now, and he, too, grew suddenly serious.

  "Suppose I don't tell you," he said gravely. "What--"

  "Git!" said the mountaineer, with a move of one huge hairy hand up themountain. "An' git quick!"

  The fisherman never moved and there was the click of a shell throwninto place in the Winchester and a guttural oath from the mountaineer'sbeard.

  "Damn ye," he said hoarsely, raising the rifle. "I'll give ye--"

  "Don't, Dad!" shrieked a voice from the bushes. "I know his
name, hit'sJack--" the rest of the name was unintelligible. The mountaineer droppedthe butt of his gun to the ground and laughed.

  "Don't, Dad!" shrieked a voice from the bushes, 0034]

  "Oh, air YOU the engineer?"

  The fisherman was angry now. He had not moved hand or foot and he saidnothing, but his mouth was set hard and his bewildered blue eyes hada glint in them that the mountaineer did not at the moment see. Hewas leaning with one arm on the muzzle of his Winchester, his face hadsuddenly become suave and shrewd and now he laughed again:

  "So you're Jack Hale, air ye?"

  The fisherman spoke. "JOHN Hale, except to my friends." He looked hardat the old man.

  "Do you know that's a pretty dangerous joke of yours, my friend--I mighthave a gun myself sometimes. Did you think you could scare me?" Themountaineer stared in genuine surprise.

  "Twusn't no joke," he said shortly. "An' I don't waste time skeeringfolks. I reckon you don't know who I be?"

  "I don't care who you are." Again the mountaineer stared.

  "No use gittin' mad, young feller," he said coolly. "I mistaken ye fersomebody else an' I axe yer pardon. When you git through fishin' come upto the house right up the creek thar an' I'll give ye a dram."

  "Thank you," said the fisherman stiffly, and the mountaineer turnedsilently away. At the edge of the bushes, he looked back; the strangerwas still fishing, and the old man went on with a shake of his head.

  "He'll come," he said to himself. "Oh, he'll come!"

  That very point Hale was debating with himself as he unavailingly casthis minnow into the swift water and slowly wound it in again. How didthat old man know his name? And would the old savage really have hurthim had he not found out who he was? The little girl was a wonder:evidently she had muffled his last name on purpose--not knowing itherself--and it was a quick and cunning ruse. He owed her something forthat--why did she try to protect him? Wonderful eyes, too, the littlething had--deep and dark--and how the flame did dart from them when shegot angry! He smiled, remembering--he liked that. And her hair--it wasexactly like the gold-bronze on the wing of a wild turkey that he hadshot the day before. Well, it was noon now, the fish had stopped bitingafter the wayward fashion of bass, he was hungry and thirsty and hewould go up and see the little girl and the giant again and get thatpromised dram. Once more, however, he let his minnow float down into theshadow of a big rock, and while he was winding in, he looked up tosee in the road two people on a gray horse, a man with a woman behindhim--both old and spectacled--all three motionless on the bank andlooking at him: and he wondered if all three had stopped to ask his nameand his business. No, they had just come down to the creek and both theymust know already.

  "Ketching any?" called out the old man, cheerily.

  "Only one," answered Hale with equal cheer. The old woman pushed backher bonnet as he waded through the water towards them and he saw thatshe was puffing a clay pipe. She looked at the fisherman and his tacklewith the naive wonder of a child, and then she said in a commandingundertone.

  "Go on, Billy."

  "Now, ole Hon, I wish ye'd jes' wait a minute." Hale smiled. He lovedold people, and two kinder faces he had never seen--two gentler voiceshe had never heard.

  "I reckon you got the only green pyerch up hyeh," said the old man,chuckling, "but thar's a sight of 'em down thar below my old mill."Quietly the old woman hit the horse with a stripped branch of elm andthe old gray, with a switch of his tail, started.

  "Wait a minute, Hon," he said again, appealingly, "won't ye?" but calmlyshe hit the horse again and the old man called back over his shoulder:

  "You come on down to the mill an' I'll show ye whar you can ketch amess."

  "All right," shouted Hale, holding back his laughter, and on they went,the old man remonstrating in the kindliest way--the old woman silentlypuffing her pipe and making no answer except to flay gently the rump ofthe lazy old gray.

  Hesitating hardly a moment, Hale unjointed his pole, left his minnowbucket where it was, mounted his horse and rode up the path. About him,the beech leaves gave back the gold of the autumn sunlight, and a littleravine, high under the crest of the mottled mountain, was on firewith the scarlet of maple. Not even yet had the morning chill left thedensely shaded path. When he got to the bare crest of a little rise,he could see up the creek a spiral of blue rising swiftly from a stonechimney. Geese and ducks were hunting crawfish in the little creek thatran from a milk-house of logs, half hidden by willows at the edge ofthe forest, and a turn in the path brought into view a log-cabin wellchinked with stones and plaster, and with a well-built porch. A fenceran around the yard and there was a meat house near a little orchardof apple-trees, under which were many hives of bee-gums. This man hadthings "hung up" and was well-to-do. Down the rise and through a thickethe went, and as he approached the creek that came down past the cabinthere was a shrill cry ahead of him.

  "Whoa thar, Buck! Gee-haw, I tell ye!" An ox-wagon evidently was comingon, and the road was so narrow that he turned his horse into the bushesto let it pass.

  "Whoa--Haw!--Gee--Gee--Buck, Gee, I tell ye! I'll knock yo' fool headoff the fust thing you know!"

  Still there was no sound of ox or wagon and the voice sounded like achild's. So he went on at a walk in the thick sand, and when he turnedthe bushes he pulled up again with a low laugh. In the road across thecreek was a chubby, tow-haired boy with a long switch in his right hand,and a pine dagger and a string in his left. Attached to the string andtied by one hind leg was a frog. The boy was using the switch as a goadand driving the frog as an ox, and he was as earnest as though both werereal.

  "I give ye a little rest now, Buck," he said, shaking his headearnestly. "Hit's a purty hard pull hyeh, but I know, by Gum, you canmake hit--if you hain't too durn lazy. Now, git up, Buck!" he yelledsuddenly, flaying the sand with his switch. "Git up--Whoa--Haw--Gee,Gee!" The frog hopped several times.

  "Whoa, now!" said the little fellow, panting in sympathy. "I knowed youcould do it." Then he looked up. For an instant he seemed terrified buthe did not run. Instead he stealthily shifted the pine dagger over tohis right hand and the string to his left.

  "Here, boy," said the fisherman with affected sternness: "What are youdoing with that dagger?"

  The boy's breast heaved and his dirty fingers clenched tight around thewhittled stick.

  "Don't you talk to me that-a-way," he said with an ominous shake of hishead. "I'll gut ye!"

  The fisherman threw back his head, and his peal of laughter did what hissternness failed to do. The little fellow wheeled suddenly, and his feetspurned the sand around the bushes for home--the astonished frog draggedbumping after him. "Well!" said the fisherman.