The First Algernon Blackwood MEGAPACK ®. Algernon Blackwood
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For all that, however, Punk had in him still the instincts of his dying race; his taciturn silence and his endurance survived; also his superstition.
The party round the blazing fire that night were despondent, for a week had passed without a single sign of recent moose discovering itself. Défago had sung his song and plunged into a story, but Hank, in bad humor, reminded him so often that “he kep’ mussing-up the fac’s so, that it was ’most all nothin’ but a petered-out lie,” that the Frenchman had finally subsided into a sulky silence which nothing seemed likely to break. Dr. Cathcart and his nephew were fairly done after an exhausting day. Punk was washing up the dishes, grunting to himself under the lean-to of branches, where he later also slept. No one troubled to stir the slowly dying fire. Overhead the stars were brilliant in a sky quite wintry, and there was so little wind that ice was already forming stealthily along the shores of the still lake behind them. the silence of the vast listening forest stole forward and enveloped them.
Hank broke in suddenly with his nasal voice.
“I’m in favor of breaking new ground tomorrow, Doc,” he observed with energy, looking across at his employer. “We don’t stand a dead Dago’s chance around here.”
“Agreed,” said Cathcart, always a man of few words. “Think the idea’s good.”
“Sure pop, it’s good,” Hank resumed with confidence. “S’pose, now, you and I strike west, up Garden Lake way for a change! None of us ain’t touched that quiet bit o’ land yet—”
“I’m with you.”
“And you, Défago, take Mr. Simpson along in the small canoe, skip across the lake, portage over into Fifty Island Water, and take a good squint down that thar southern shore. the moose ‘yarded’ there like hell last year, and for all we know they may be doin’ it agin this year jest to spite us.”
Défago, keeping his eyes on the fire, said nothing by way of reply. He was still offended, possibly, about his interrupted story.
“No one’s been up that way this year, an’ I’ll lay my bottom dollar on that!” Hank added with emphasis, as though he had a reason for knowing. He looked over at his partner sharply. “Better take the little silk tent and stay away a couple o’ nights,” he concluded, as though the matter were definitely settled. For Hank was recognized as general organizer of the hunt, and in charge of the party.
It was obvious to anyone that Défago did not jump at the plan, but his silence seemed to convey something more than ordinary disapproval, and across his sensitive dark face there passed a curious expression like a flash of firelight—not so quickly, however, that the three men had not time to catch it.
“He funked for some reason, I thought,” Simpson said afterwards in the tent he shared with his uncle. Dr. Cathcart made no immediate reply, although the look had interested him enough at the time for him to make a mental note of it. the expression had caused him a passing uneasiness he could not quite account for at the moment.
But Hank, of course, had been the first to notice it, and the odd thing was that instead of becoming explosive or angry over the other’s reluctance, he at once began to humor him a bit.
“But there ain’t no speshul reason why no one’s been up there this year,” he said with a perceptible hush in his tone; “not the reason you mean, anyway! Las’ year it was the fires that kep’ folks out, and this year I guess—I guess it jest happened so, that’s all!” His manner was clearly meant to be encouraging.
Joseph Défago raised his eyes a moment, then dropped them again. A breath of wind stole out of the forest and stirred the embers into a passing blaze. Dr. Cathcart again noticed the expression in the guide’s face, and again he did not like it. But this time the nature of the look betrayed itself. In those eyes, for an instant, he caught the gleam of a man scared in his very soul. It disquieted him more than he cared to admit.
“Bad Indians up that way?” he asked, with a laugh to ease matters a little, while Simpson, too sleepy to notice this subtle by-play, moved off to bed with a prodigious yawn; “or—or anything wrong with the country?” he added, when his nephew was out of hearing.
Hank met his eye with something less than his usual frankness.
“He’s jest skeered,” he replied good-humoredly. “Skeered stiff about some ole feery tale! That’s all, ain’t it, ole pard?” And he gave Défago a friendly kick on the moccasined foot that lay nearest the fire.
Défago looked up quickly, as from an interrupted reverie, a reverie, however, that had not prevented his seeing all that went on about him.
“Skeered—nuthin’!” he answered, with a flush of defiance. “There’s nuthin’ in the Bush that can skeer Joseph Défago, and don’t you forget it!” And the natural energy with which he spoke made it impossible to know whether he told the whole truth or only a part of it.
Hank turned towards the doctor. He was just going to add something when he stopped abruptly and looked round. A sound close behind them in the darkness made all three start. It was old Punk, who had moved up from his lean-to while they talked and now stood there just beyond the circle of firelight—listening.
“’Nother time, Doc!” Hank whispered, with a wink, “when the gallery ain’t stepped down into the stalls!” And, springing to his feet, he slapped the Indian on the back and cried noisily, “Come up t’ the fire an’ warm yer dirty red skin a bit.” He dragged him towards the blaze and threw more wood on. “That was a mighty good feed you give us an hour or two back,” he continued heartily, as though to set the man’s thoughts on another scent, “and it ain’t Christian to let you stand out there freezin’ yer ole soul to hell while we’re gettin’ all good an’ toasted!” Punk moved in and warmed his feet, smiling darkly at the other’s volubility which he only half understood, but saying nothing. And presently Dr. Cathcart, seeing that further conversation was impossible, followed his nephew’s example and moved off to the tent, leaving the three men smoking over the now blazing fire.
It is not easy to undress in a small tent without waking one’s companion, and Cathcart, hardened and warm-blooded as he was in spite of his fifty odd years, did what Hank would have described as “considerable of his twilight” in the open. He noticed, during the process, that Punk had meanwhile gone back to his lean-to, and that Hank and Défago were at it hammer and tongs, or, rather, hammer and anvil, the little French Canadian being the anvil. It was all very like the conventional stage picture of Western melodrama: the fire lighting up their faces with patches of alternate red and black; Défago, in slouch hat and moccasins in the part of the “badlands” villain; Hank, open-faced and hatless, with that reckless fling of his shoulders, the honest and deceived hero; and old Punk, eavesdropping in the background, supplying the atmosphere of mystery. the doctor smiled as he noticed the details; but at the same time something deep within him—he hardly knew what—shrank a little, as though an almost imperceptible breath of warning had touched the surface of his soul and was gone again before he could seize it. Probably it was traceable to that “scared expression” he had seen in the eyes of Défago; “probably”—for this hint of fugitive emotion otherwise escaped his usually so keen analysis. Défago, he was vaguely aware, might cause trouble somehow… He was not as steady a guide as Hank, for instance… Further than that he could not get…
He watched the men a moment longer before diving into the stuffy tent where Simpson already slept soundly. Hank, he saw, was swearing like a mad African in a New York nigger saloon; but it was the swearing of “affection.” the ridiculous oaths flew freely now that the cause of their obstruction was asleep. Presently he put his arm almost tenderly upon his comrade’s shoulder, and they moved off together into the shadows where their tent stood faintly glimmering. Punk, too, a moment later followed their example and disappeared between his odorous blankets in the opposite direction.
Dr. Cathcart then likewise turned in, weariness and sleep still fighting in his mind with an obscure curiosity to know what it was that had scared Défago about the country up Fifty Island Water way,—wondering, too, why Punk’s presence had prevented the completion of what