Left on the Labrador

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"Well, now!" Skipper Zeb announced an hour before midday. "Here's Swile
Island before we knows it! We'll stop for a bit to boil the kettle and
stretch our legs ashore."

Swile Island was a small, nearly round island, containing an area equal
to about that of a city block. Its center rose to a small hill, covered
by a stunted growth of black spruce trees, which somehow clung to its
rocky surface.

Charley was glad to go ashore, and he soon learned that "to boil the
kettle" meant to prepare and eat luncheon. While Toby carried up from
the boat the food and cooking utensils, Skipper Zeb lighted a fire, and
in a little while the kettle was boiling for tea and a pan of salt pork
sizzling over the coals.

Never in his life had Charley eaten fried salt pork, and Skipper Zeb's
pork contained no streak of lean. He would have left the table without
eating had such a meal been served him in his city home. But here he ate
the pork, with his bread sopped into the grease, and tea sweetened with
molasses, hungrily and with a relish, so quickly had exercise in the
pure, clear air of the wilderness had its effect. Indeed, he was always
hungry now, and could scarcely wait for meal time.

"There were lots of things I'd never eat at home," he said as he passed
his plate for a second helping of pork, "but here I like everything."

"As I were sayin' before, hunger's a rare sauce for vittles," remarked
Skipper Zeb.

A light breeze sprang up while they were eating, and when they made
their departure from Swile Island Skipper Zeb hoisted a leg-o'-mutton
sail, and then sat and smoked his pipe and told stories of experiences
and adventures on the trail, while Toby took the rudder.

It was nearly three o'clock when Skipper Zeb pointed out a little log
hut near the mouth of a small river, and announced:

"There's Black River and there's Black River tilt where we bides
to-night."

A few minutes later the prow of the boat grounded upon a gravelly beach,
and while Skipper Zeb unloaded the cargo the boys carried it to the
tilt, laying it upon spruce boughs broken by Toby to protect it from the
snow.

The tilt was built of logs, with a roof thatched with bark. The door was
not more than four feet in height, and when Skipper Zeb opened it the
three were compelled to stoop low to enter. The interior was a room
about eight by ten feet in size. Across the end opposite the door was a
bunk, and, along the right side of the room as they entered, another
bunk extended from that at the far end to the wall behind the door. On
the left side of the room, and midway between the end bunk and the door
was a sheet-iron tent stove, with a pipe dismantled and lying on top of
it. An old pair of snowshoes, and steel traps, pieces of board shaped
for stretching pelts of various sizes and some simple cooking utensils
hung upon wooden pegs against the wall. The floor was of hard-packed
earth.

"Well, now! Here we be safe and sound and ready for work!" boomed
Skipper Zeb. "Everything snug and fine when we gets our beds made and
the stove set up and a fire in she. Whilst you lads gets boughs for the
beds, I'll be puttin' up the stove and stow the cargo inside."

Toby and Charley went to work with a will, and soon had deep springy
beds laid upon the bunks. Upon the bunk at the farther end they spread
Skipper Zeb's sleeping bag, and side by side, upon the other bunk, their
own. Already Skipper Zeb had a crackling fire in the stove and the
cargo carried in and stowed snugly under the berths.

"Now whilst Toby and I tidy up a bit, put over the kettle, Charley lad,
and we'll have a bite to eat," suggested Skipper Zeb.

Charley took the tin pail that served as a kettle, to fill it at the
river. Just as he had dipped it and was about to return, his eye fell
upon a peculiar looking animal perched upon a branch high up in a spruce
tree. With all speed he ran back to the tilt and called excitedly upon
Toby to come and see it.

"'Tis a porcupine!" exclaimed Toby, grabbing his rifle and following
Charley. "I'll shoot he, and we'll have he for supper!"

And so it proved. A shot brought the animal tumbling down. Toby picked
it up gingerly by a leg and carried it back.

"Well, now! Fresh meat the first night!" boomed Skipper Zeb. "Whilst you
lads tidy the tilt, I'll skin he."

In a few minutes Skipper Zeb had the porcupine skinned and dressed, and
after washing the meat in the river and cutting it into convenient
sections he placed it in a kettle of water to stew for supper.

Two Indian flatsleds or toboggans, which were standing on end against
the tilt, were put into repair by Skipper Zeb and made ready for the
journey on the morrow, and before dark all preparations for an early
departure were completed.

It was snug and cozy now in the tilt, with the fire in the little tent
stove cracking and snapping. The air was spicy sweet with the odour of
the spruce and balsam beds, but to the boys a still more delicious and
appealing odour was given out by the kettle of stewing porcupine on the
stove. Presently when supper was served Charley declared that the meal
more than fulfilled his expectations.

"Why, it makes me think of lamb," he said, "only it's a heap better than
any stewed lamb I ever ate. It's just great!"

"'Twere young and fat," said Skipper Zeb. "We likes porcupine wonderful
well. 'Tis a fine treat _we_ thinks."

Before daybreak the following morning loads were lashed upon the two
flatsleds, and all was made ready for the trail. Snow was not deep
enough to require the use of snowshoes, and they were tied securely upon
the tops of the loads.

"All ready!" announced Skipper Zeb, in his big hearty voice, as dawn
was breaking. "I'll be goin' ahead with the heavy flatsled, and you lads
takes turns haulin' the other. Toby b'y, you take the first turn at un."

"Aye," agreed Toby eagerly, "I'll haul un a spell first."

The route for a time followed the course of Black River. Now and again
Skipper Zeb paused and turned aside to set a trap, where the tracks of
martens or minks indicated their presence. At intervals he took bunches
of a dozen or more traps from trees where he had hung them the previous
spring when the trapping season had ended. Charley wondered how it was
possible for him to remember where he had left them, and asked:

"How do you ever find the traps where you left them? The places all look
alike to me."

"Why, 'tis easy enough, lad. This bunch I hangs in the only hackmatack
tree handy about. I just looks up and sees the tree, and there I finds
the traps just where I leaves un."

Even still Charley could not understand how Skipper Zeb could know where
to look for the particular hackmatack tree, standing alone among the
spruces and quaking aspens, for at several points he saw lone
hackmatacks in similar surroundings. Presently he was to learn that the
woodsman by long practice learns to know every tree or bush that is even
slightly out of the ordinary along his trail, and so trained is he in
the art of observation that his subconscious mind records these with no
effort on his part. Thus to the woodsman the trail over which he has
traveled two or three times, and often but once, becomes as familiar to
him as streets to the city dweller.

After two hours on the trail, Skipper Zeb announced that they would
"boil the kettle," and have a "snack" to eat. Already the boys were
ravenously hungry, and Skipper Zeb chuckled merrily as he observed their
keen enjoyment as they ate.

"Settin' up traps makes for hunger," said he. "Fill up now."

"I was just hollow!" confessed Charley.

"And I was hungrier'n a starved wolf!" added Toby.

Their course now left the river valley, and presently came upon a wide
frozen marsh, or "mesh" as Skipper Zeb called it.

"'Tis here on the meshes we finds the best fox footin'," he explained to
Charley.

It was not long until he found tracks that he said were fox tracks, and
in various places on the marsh set three traps, which were considerably
larger than those set for marten or mink, and had two springs instead of
one, and he used much greater care in setting them than in setting those
for marten and mink. With his sheathknife he cut out a square of snow,
and excavated in the snow a place large enough to accommodate the trap.
Over the trap a thin crust of snow was placed, and so carefully fitted
that its location was hardly discernible. In like manner the chain,
which was attached to the root of a scrubby spruce tree, was also
concealed. From a carefully wrapped package on his flatsled Skipper Zeb
produced some ill-smelling meat, and this he scattered upon the snow
over and around the trap.

"They likes meat that smells bad," he explained, "and I'm thinkin' that
smells bad enough for un."

Evening was falling when suddenly through the forest there glinted the
waters of a lake, and here on its shores Skipper Zeb told them they were
to camp for the night. A home-made cotton tent, small but amply large
enough for the three, was quickly pitched and a tent stove set up. Then
while Toby and Charley gathered boughs and laid the bed, Skipper Zeb cut
a supply of wood for the night, and before the boys had finished the bed
he was frying in the pan a delicious supper of partridges, which he and
Toby had shot during the afternoon.

Charley was sure he had never been so tired in his life. It had been a
long day of steady walking, save for the brief stops when Skipper Zeb
halted to set a trap, and the snow and turns at hauling the flatsled had
made it the harder. He lay back upon his sleeping bag chatting with Toby
and watching Skipper Zeb prepare supper. How cozy and luxurious the tent
was! The pleasant fragrance of spruce and balsam would have put him to
sleep at once, had it not been for the pleasanter fragrance of the
frying partridges and a hunger that increased with every minute.

When the meal was eaten Charley's eyes were so heavy that it was little
short of torture to keep them open, and he slipped into his sleeping
bag, and in an instant had fallen into dreamless, restful sleep.

How long he had been sleeping he did not know, when suddenly he found
himself awake and alert. Something had aroused him, and he sat up and
listened. For a time he heard nothing, save the heavy breathing of
Skipper Zeb and Toby, and he was about to lie down again when there came
the sound of footsteps in the slightly crusted snow outside. Some animal
was prowling cautiously about the tent sniffing at its side. The moon
was shining, and suddenly he saw the shadowy outline, against the
canvas, of a great beast that he knew to be a timber wolf.

He was about to reach over to Skipper Zeb to wake him, when all at once
the stillness was broken by a terrifying, heartrending howl, rising and
falling in mournful cadence, and echoing through the forest behind them.
The howling creature was separated from Charley only by the thickness of
the canvas, and Charley's blood ran cold.

XI

THE WORST FIX OF ALL

Skipper Zeb and Toby sat up hurriedly, and without an instant's
hesitation Skipper Zeb slipped on his moccasins, reached for his rifle
and left the tent. A moment later there came the report of his rifle.

The boys awaited eagerly his return, and when presently he reentered the
tent it was to report:

"'Twere an old she wolf, but I misses she. 'Twere just one alone. I'm
thinkin' we may be findin' deer signs up the path. Wolves follow the
deer."

"Will the wolf come back? And is it dangerous?" asked Charley, the
terrifying echo of its howl still in his ears.

"We'll never see _she_ again," said Skipper Zeb, settling in his
sleeping bag to resume his interrupted rest. "That un won't be
dangerous, whatever. If she keeps goin' as smart as she started she'll
be over the height o' land by to-morrow night this time," and he
chuckled with the recollection of the frightened wolf's speed.

Farther and farther into the wilderness they went. It seemed to Charley
that they had left the whole world behind them, and that the forest and
barrens through which they trod had swallowed them up, and he wondered
if they would ever be able to find their way back to Black River tilt
and the boat. Had he been left alone he would not have known in which
direction to turn.

The silence was total. There was never a sound to break it at night, and
during the day none save the harsh voice of the Labrador jay, which came
begging for food whenever they boiled the kettle, and was so fearless it
would almost take crumbs from the hand; or the incessant dee-dee-dee of
the chickadee, a much pleasanter companion of the trail, Charley
thought, than the jay. Once, in the evening, they heard the honk of a
flock of wild geese passing south.

"They're a bit late," observed Skipper Zeb. "They'll be bidin' in a pond
a step to the west'ard from here, and feedin' in the marnin'. I gets
geese there sometimes, and I'm thinkin' I'll take a look at break o' day
and see if I can knock one or two of un over."

Accordingly, the following morning after they had eaten breakfast and
just as dawn was breaking, he left the boys, and a half hour later
returned with three fat geese.

"We'll cache un here," said he, "and when we comes back take un with us,
and you lads can take un home."

On Wednesday night they had the shelter of a tilt, which Skipper Zeb
called "Long Lake tilt," and on Friday evening they reached "Big Lake
tilt" and the end of the trail.

"Here we stops till Monday," Skipper Zeb announced. "'Twill give you
lads a chance to rest up."

"That's great! It's the longest and hardest hike I ever had," said
Charley. "I'll tell Dad about it when I get home, and he'll think I
could have stood the Newfoundland hike he wouldn't take me on. I'll bet
it wasn't half as hard as this one!"

"You'll be gettin' as strong as a young bear, lad, and as toughened up
as a wolvering before you leaves The Labrador," chuckled Skipper Zeb.

"Mother'll be scared when I tell her what I've done here," said Charley,
"but Dad will be proud of it. They never thought I could do _anything_
hard, and never let me do anything much. They'll know now what I can
do!"

"We never knows what we can do till we tries un," commented Skipper Zeb.

The following morning Skipper Zeb did not wake the boys, but left them
to sleep while he slipped away alone to set traps in the forest and
marshes along the lake shore. It was broad day when they awoke, and when
they had eaten Toby suggested:

"We'll be goin' out with my rifle and try shootin' at a mark."

"May I shoot?" asked Charley eagerly. "I never shot a gun in my life and
I'd like to learn!"

"'Tis easy," assured Toby. "I'll be showin' you how, and you'll be
learnin' quick."

Before they left the tilt Toby instructed Charley in how to fill the
magazine and how to manipulate the lever, impressing all the time upon
his pupil the necessity of caution, and telling tales of two or three of
his acquaintances who had been shot through the careless handling of
firearms.

When Charley had learned the rudiments of gun handling to Toby's
satisfaction, they went a little way down the lake shore, and selecting
a bank as a background, in order, Toby told Charley, that bullets that
missed the mark might not go crashing through the forest, but would be
buried in the earth, he fastened a small square of white birchbark upon
a spruce tree, to serve as a target, and retired with Charley to a
distance of about fifty yards from it.

"Now try a shot," Toby directed.

"How do you hold the rifle steady?" asked Charley who found the muzzle
wabbling woefully.

Toby, with much patience, illustrated the method of placing the feet,
the position in which to stand, how to hold the arm, and how to aim
properly.

"Now don't pull un with a jerk. Hold your breath and squeeze the trigger
hand together all at once, so she goes off almost without your knowin'
when she goes."

Charley proved himself an apt pupil, and after a few shots rarely missed
the target.

Skipper Zeb did not return to the tilt for dinner, and after the boys
had eaten Toby suggested that they stroll up the lake shore in the hope
that they might get a shot at some partridges.

"May I carry your rifle and try to shoot them if we see any?" asked
Charley eagerly.

"Aye," agreed Toby, "'twill be fine for you to try un, now you knows how
to shoot."

Charley took the rifle eagerly, and this time took the lead, as the
hunter. They had walked but a short distance when Toby whispered:

"Drop quick!"

"What is it?" whispered Charley, as both dropped to the ground and Toby
crawled up beside him.

"Deer!" whispered Toby. "See un! Right ahead!"

Then for the first time Charley saw a big caribou, nosing in the snow
and feeding leisurely.

"What'll I do?" asked Charley.

"'Tis a fine shot!" answered Toby. "Be wonderful careful o' your aim,
and shoot!"

Charley was all atremble as he brought the rifle to his shoulder for his
first shot at any game. In spite of all he could do, the muzzle of the
rifle would not behave, and before he was aware of it he pulled the
trigger, and the shot went wild.

"Try un again! Try un again before he runs!" plead Toby.

Charley fired again and then again, but with no better success, and the
caribou, now taking alarm, turned and disappeared into the forest.

"You misses that un," said Toby, not in the least perturbed, now that
the caribou had gone. "'Tis hard to hit un the first time you tries."

"Oh, I'm so sorry!" and Charley could scarce control his voice in
excitement and disappointment. "It was nearer than the target we shot
at! How _could_ I miss it?"

"You gets nervous the first time you tries, the way most folks does,"
soothed Toby. "Next time you'll get un."

It was Thursday evening of the following week when they again reached
the tilt at Black River and the boat. Both boys were tired but happy,
and Charley, who had shot his first partridge with Toby's rifle that
morning, told Skipper Zeb that he had had the best time he ever had in
all his life.

"That's the way to talk, lad! That's the way!" and Skipper Zeb slapped
him on the shoulder, his characteristic method of expressing approval.
"You has the makin's in you of a fine trapper and hunter. You fits
yourself to what you has to meet and to do, whether 'tis a bit hard or
whether 'tis easy. 'Twere a long way for young legs that's not used to
un. Bein' on the path settin' up traps is a wonderful sight different
from bein' snug and warm with a good bed o' nights at home. You lads
stands un like old hands at un."

"Thank you, Skipper," and Charley was proud, as was Toby, at the word of
praise. Every one likes to be praised for an act well done, or done to
the best of one's ability, and Skipper Zeb, who in a crude way was a
student of human nature, and carried a gentle, affectionate heart in his
bosom, never failed to speak a word of praise where it was deserved. He
knew that a kindly word of appreciation for a deed well done, often
proved an incentive to greater effort. A little flower handed to the
living is better than a wreath placed upon the casket of the dead.
Skipper Zeb gave his flowers of kindliness to those about him while they
lived and could enjoy them.

"Now, lads," said Skipper Zeb when they had finished their evening meal,
and he was puffing his pipe comfortably by the warm stove, "I has a line
o' traps to set up to the east'ard of the tilt that I weren't settin'
up before we goes in, and two days' work to do about here whatever.
We've been havin' a long spell o' fine weather like we mostly has before
winter sets in hard. The wind is shiftin', and before to-morrow night,
whatever, there'll be snow. Early in the marnin' I thinks you had better
start back with the boat, and be gettin' snug at Double Up Cove before
the snow comes."

"When'll you be gettin' home, Dad?" asked Toby.

"I'll be gettin' home the Saturday or Sunday before Christmas,
whatever," promised Skipper Zeb, "and I'll be stayin' for a fortnight
holiday when I comes."

"Won't you be home before then?" asked Charley in astonishment.

"No, I has to keep tendin' the traps once I sets un," explained Skipper
Zeb. "'Tis the only way to get fur."

"I should think you'd get dreadfully lonesome on the trail alone," said
Charley, "and we'll miss you."

"A busy man's not havin' time to get lonesome. 'Tis only idleness that
makes for lonesomeness."

The sky was heavily clouded the following morning, and a brisk
northeasterly breeze, cold and raw, was blowing. Toby and Charley bade
good-bye to Skipper Zeb, and hoisting the sail departed for Double Up
Cove.

"The breeze'll be helpin' you now," shouted Skipper Zeb from the shore.
"Make the most of un, and don't be takin' too much time to boil the
kettle at Swile Island!"

"Aye," shouted Toby, "we'll be makin' the most of un."

Charley watched Skipper Zeb standing on the shore and looking longingly
after them, and then turn back to his lonely work in the wilderness, and
he, himself, felt suddenly very lonely.

With unexpected suddenness the wind rose to half a gale before they had
spanned two-thirds of the distance to Swile Island. The boat shipped
several seas, and while Charley bailed the water out, all of Toby's
seamanship was required to keep her on her course, until at length, to
their great relief, a landing was made on the lee side of the island.

"I was sure we'd be wrecked again!" exclaimed Charley when he and Toby,
dripping wet, had hauled the prow of the boat upon the sloping rock of
the island shore.

"'Twere a bit rough," admitted Toby. "We'll have to bide here till the
wind goes down, and I'm thinkin' there'll be snow before we gets the
kettle boiled."

"And we haven't any tent!" exclaimed Charley in consternation.

"We'll be makin' a lean-to with the sail," suggested Toby. "We'll not
find un so bad. We'll make un before we boils the kettle."

The boat was unloaded, and under the lee of a big rock, where they were
protected from the wind also by a grove of spruce trees, Toby selected
two trees about seven feet apart, and five feet from the ground and
lashed a pole from tree to tree. He then cut several poles, and arranged
them evenly with one end resting upon the pole which he had lashed to
the tree and the other end sloping back to the ground. To make the
sloping poles secure and hold them in place, he laid another pole
between the trees, and on top of the sloping poles, lashing this also
firmly into place, and then placed a log over the ends of the poles on
the ground to hold them in position.

With Charley's assistance he now spread the boat sail over the poles,
and tied it into place. Then at each end of the lean-to be and Charley
placed a thick barricade of spruce brush. A floor of boughs finished and
made comfortable the shelter, and a fire built against a rock in front
of it, that the rock might serve as a reflector, soon made the lean-to
warm and snug.

There was no abatement of wind, and snow was falling thickly before they
had finished eating, and when they were through, Toby suggested:

"I'm thinkin' we'd better haul the boat up farther and turn she over."

"All right," agreed Charley, "let's do it now. It don't look as though
we'd get off the island to-day."

"Not till the wind stops, whatever," said Toby. "We may have to bide
here two or three days, _I'm_ thinkin'."

This was a new adventure. Charley rather enjoyed the prospect of it, and
Toby perhaps equally as well, and as they walked down to their landing
place they chatted merrily about what they would do, when all at once
both boys stopped and looked at each other aghast. The boat was not
there!

"She's gone!" exclaimed Toby. "The tide were risin' up and floatin' she
off!"

"What shall we do?" asked Charley in dismay. "We can't get off the
island without a boat!"

"'Tis a bad fix," confessed Toby. "They's no way o' gettin' off the
island without the boat. I'm not knowin' rightly what to do. 'Tis the
worst fix I _ever_ were in!"

The snow was now falling heavily, driven in thick, swirling clouds by
the gale. Everywhere they looked along the shore, in the vain hope that
the boat may have drifted in at some other point, and eagerly they
looked out into the drifting clouds of snow in the equally vain hope
that it might be seen floating near enough to the shore to be recovered
by some means. But nowhere was it to be seen, and the two boys,
depressed by a sense of helplessness to extricate themselves from the
small, isolated and nearly barren island that had so suddenly become
their prison, turned back to the partial protection of their improvised
shelter.

Disconsolate, they sat under the lean-to and talked over their dilemma
while the snow beyond the fire grew thicker, and the wind shrieked and
howled dismally through the trees.

"You thinks 'twere bad when the ship leaves you at Pinch-In Tickle,"
said Toby finally, "but we're gettin' in a wonderful sight worse fix!"

"Yes," agreed Charley dejectedly, "of all that's happened, this is the
worst fix of all."

"All we has to eat," continued Toby, "is half a loaf o' bread, a small
bit o' pork and enough tea for one or two days, besides the three geese
Dad were sendin' home to Mother."

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