The Young Fur Traders

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"He's a fine fellow that son of yours," said Mr. Grant, "and will
make a first-rate fur-trader."

"Pur-trader!" exclaimed Mr. Kennedy. "Just look at him! I'll be shot
if he isn't thrashing the mare as if she were made of leather." The
old man's ire was rising rapidly as he heard the whip crack every now
and then, and saw the mare bound madly over the snow. "And see!" he
continued, "I declare he _has_ taken the wrong turn after all."

"True," said Mr. Grant: "he'll never reach the stable by that road;
he's much more likely to visit the White-horse Plains. But come,
friend, it's of no use fretting, Charley will soon tire of his ride;
so come with me to my room and have a pipe before dinner."

Old Mr. Kennedy gave a short groan of despair, shook his fist at the
form of his retreating son, and accompanied his friend to the house.

It must not be supposed that Frank Kennedy was very deeply offended
with his son, although he did shower on him a considerable amount of
abuse. On the contrary, he loved him very much. But it was the old
man's nature to give way to little bursts of passion on almost every
occasion in which his feelings were at all excited. These bursts,
however, were like the little puffs that ripple the surface of the
sea on a calm summer's day. They were over in a second, and left his
good-humoured, rough, candid countenance in unruffled serenity.
Charley knew this well, and loved his father tenderly, so that his
conscience frequently smote him for raising his anger so often; and
he over and over again promised his sister Kate to do his best to
refrain from doing anything that was likely to annoy the old man in
future. But, alas! Charley's resolves, like those of many other boys,
were soon forgotten, and his father's equanimity was upset generally
two or three times a day; but after the gust was over, the fur-trader
would kiss his son, call him a "rascal," and send him off to fill and
fetch his pipe.

Mr. Grant, who was in charge of Fort Garry, led the way to his
smoking apartment, where the two were soon seated in front of a
roaring log-fire, emulating each other in the manufacture of smoke.

"Well, Kennedy," said Mr. Grant, throwing himself back in his chair,
elevating his chin, and emitting a long thin stream of white vapour
from his lips, through which he gazed at his friend complacently--
"well, Kennedy, to what fortunate chance am I indebted for this
visit? It is not often that we have the pleasure of seeing you here."

Mr. Kennedy created two large volumes of smoke, which, by means of a
vigorous puff, he sent rolling over towards his friend, and said,
"Charley."

"And what of Charley?" said Mr. Grant with a smile, for he was well
aware of the boy's propensity to fun, and of the father's desire to
curb it.

"The fact is," replied Kennedy, "that Charley must be broke. He's the
wildest colt I ever had to tame, but I'll do it--I will--that's a
fact."

If Charley's subjugation had depended on the rapidity with which the
little white clouds proceeded from his sire's mouth, there is no
doubt that it would have been a "fact" in a very short time, for they
rushed from him with the violence of a high wind. Long habit had made
the old trader and his pipe not only inseparable companions, but part
and parcel of each other--so intimately connected that a change in
the one was sure to produce a sympathetic change in the other. In the
present instance, the little clouds rapidly increased in size and
number as the old gentleman thought on the obstinacy of his "colt."

"Yes," he continued, after a moment's silence, "I've made up my mind
to tame him, and I want _you_, Mr. Grant, to help me."

Mr. Grant looked as if he would rather not undertake to lend his aid
in a work that was evidently difficult; but being a good-natured man,
he said, "And how, friend, can I assist in the operation?"

"Well, you see, Charley's a good fellow at bottom, and a clever
fellow too--at least so says the schoolmaster; though I must confess,
that so far as my experience goes, he's only clever at finding out
excuses for not doing what I want him to. But still I'm told he's
clever, and can use his pen well; and I know for certain that he can
use his tongue well. So I want to get him into the service, and have
him placed in a situation where he shall have to stick to his desk
all day. In fact, I want to have him broken into work; for you've no
notion, sir, how that boy talks about bears and buffaloes and
badgers, and life in the woods among the Indians. I do believe,"
continued the old gentleman, waxing warm, "that he would willingly go
into the woods to-morrow, if I would let him, and never show his nose
in the settlement again. He's quite incorrigible. But I'll tame him
yet--I will!"

Mr. Kennedy followed this up with an indignant grunt, and a puff of
smoke, so thick, and propelled with such vigour, that it rolled and
curled in fantastic evolutions towards the ceiling, as if it were
unable to control itself with delight at the absolute certainty of
Charley being tamed at last.

Mr. Grant, however, shook his head, and remained for five minutes in
profound silence, during which time the two friends puffed in
concert, until they began to grow quite indistinct and ghost-like in
the thick atmosphere.

At last he broke silence.

"My opinion is that you're wrong, Mr. Kennedy. No doubt you know the
disposition of your son better than I do; but even judging of it from
what you have said, I'm quite sure that a sedentary life will ruin
him."

"Ruin him! Humbug!" said Kennedy, who never failed to express his
opinion at the shortest notice and in the plainest language--a fact
so well known by his friends that they had got into the habit of
taking no notice of it. "Humbug!" he repeated, "perfect humbug! You
don't mean to tell me that the way to break him in is to let him run
loose and wild whenever and wherever he pleases?"

"By no means. But you may rest assured that tying him down won't do
it."

"Nonsense!" said Mr. Kennedy testily; "don't tell me. Have I not
broken in young colts by the score? and don't I know that the way to
fix their flints is to clap on a good strong curb?"

"If you had travelled farther south, friend," replied Mr. Grant, "you
would have seen the Spaniards of Mexico break in their wild horses in
a very different way; for after catching one with a lasso, a fellow
gets on his back, and gives it the rein and the whip--ay, and the
spur too; and before that race is over, there is no need for a curb."

"What!" exclaimed Kennedy, "and do you mean to argue from that, that
I should let Charley run--and _help_ him too? Send him off to the
woods with gun and blanket, canoe and tent, all complete?" The old
gentleman puffed a furious puff, and broke into a loud sarcastic
laugh.

"No, no," interrupted Mr. Grant; "I don't exactly mean that, but I
think that you might give him his way for a year or so. He's a fine,
active, generous fellow; and after the novelty wore off, he would be
in a much better frame of mind to listen to your proposals. Besides"
(and Mr. Grant smiled expressively), "Charley is somewhat like his
father. He has got a will of his own; and if you do not give him his
way, I very much fear that he'll--"

"What?" inquired Mr. Kennedy abruptly.

"Take it," said Mr. Grant.

The puff that burst from Mr. Kennedy's lips on hearing this would
have done credit to a thirty-six pounder.

"Take it!" said he; "he'd _better_ not."

The latter part of this speech was not in itself of a nature
calculated to convey much; but the tone of the old trader's voice,
the contraction of his eyebrows, and above all the overwhelming flow
of cloudlets that followed, imparted to it a significance that
induced the belief that Charley's taking his own way would be
productive of more terrific consequences than it was in the power of
the most highly imaginative man to conceive.

"There's his sister Kate, now," continued the old gentleman; "she's
as gentle and biddable as a lamb. I've only to say a word, and she's
off like a shot to do my bidding; and she does it with such a sweet
smile too." There was a touch of pathos in the old trader's voice as
he said this. He was a man of strong feeling, and as impulsive in his
tenderness as in his wrath. "But that rascal Charley," he continued,
"is quite different. He's obstinate as a mule. To be sure, he has a
good temper; and I must say for him he never goes into the sulks,
which is a comfort, for of all things in the world sulking is the
most childish and contemptible. He _generally_ does what I bid him,
too. But he's _always_ getting into scrapes of one kind or other. And
during the last week, notwithstanding all I can say to him, he won't
admit that the best thing for him is to get a place in your counting-
room, with the prospect of rapid promotion in the service. Very odd.
I can't understand it at all;" and Mr. Kennedy heaved a deep sigh.

"Did you ever explain to him the prospects that he would have in the
situation you propose for him?" inquired Mr. Grant.

"Can't say I ever did."

"Did you ever point out the probable end of a life spent in the
woods?"

"No."

"Nor suggest to him that the appointment to the office here would
only be temporary, and to see how he got on in it?"

"Certainly not."

"Then, my dear sir, I'm not surprised that Charley rebels. You have
left him to suppose that, once placed at the desk here, he is a
prisoner for life. But see, there he is," said Mr. Grant, pointing as
he spoke towards the subject of their conversation, who was passing
the window at the moment; "let me call him, and I feel certain that
he will listen to reason in a few minutes."

"Humph!" ejaculated Mr. Kennedy, "you may try."

In another minute Charley had been summoned, and was seated, cap in
hand, near the door.

"Charley, my boy," began Mr. Grant, standing with his back to the
fire, his feet pretty wide apart, and his coat-tails under his arms--
"Charley, my boy, your father has just been speaking of you. He is
very anxious that you should enter the service of the Hudson's Bay
Company; and as you are a clever boy and a good penman, we think that
you would be likely to get on if placed for a year or so in our
office here. I need scarcely point out to you, my boy, that in such a
position you would be sure to obtain more rapid promotion than if you
were placed in one of the distant outposts, where you would have very
little to do, and perhaps little to eat, and no one to converse with
except one or two men. Of course, we would merely place you here on
trial, to see how you suited us; and if you prove steady and
diligent, there is no saying how fast you might get on. Why, you
might even come to fill my place in course of time. Come now,
Charley, what think you of it?"

Charley's eyes had been cast on the ground while Mr. Grant was
speaking. He now raised them, looked at his father, then at his
interrogator, and said,--

"It is very kind of you both to be so anxious about my prospects. I
thank you, indeed, very much; but I--a--"

"Don't like the desk?" said his father, in an angry tone. "Is that
it, eh?"

Charley made no reply, but cast down his eyes again and smiled
(Charley had a sweet smile, a peculiarly sweet, candid smile), as if
he meant to say that his father had hit the nail quite on the top of
the head that time, and no mistake.

"But consider," resumed Mr. Grant, "although you might probably be
pleased with an outpost life at first, you would be sure to grow
weary of it after the novelty wore off, and then you would wish with
all your heart to be back here again. Believe me, child, a trader's
life is a very hard and not often a very satisfactory one--"

"Ay," broke in the father, desirous, if possible, to help the
argument, "and you'll find it a desperately wild, unsettled, roving
sort of life, too, let me tell you! full of dangers both from wild
beast and wild men--"

"Hush!" interrupted Mr. Grant, observing that the boy's eyes kindled
when his father spoke of a wild, roving life, and wild beasts.--"Your
father does not mean that life at an outpost is wild and
_interesting_ or _exciting_. He merely means that--a--it--"

Mr. Grant could not very well explain what it was that Mr. Kennedy
meant if he did not mean that, so he turned to him for help.

"Exactly so," said that gentleman, taking a strong pull at the pipe
for inspiration. "It's no ways interesting or exciting at all. It's
slow, dull, and flat; a miserable sort of Robinson Crusoe life, with
red Indians and starvation constantly staring you in the face--"

"Besides," said Mr. Grant, again interrupting the somewhat
unfortunate efforts of his friend, who seemed to have a happy
facility in sending a brilliant dash of romantic allusion across the
dark side of his picture--"besides, you'll not have opportunity to
amuse yourself, or to read, as you'll have no books, and you'll have
to work hard with your hands oftentimes, like your men--"

"In fact," broke in the impatient father, resolved, apparently, to
carry the point with a grand _coup_--"in fact, you'll have to rough
it, as I did, when I went up the Mackenzie River district, where I
was sent to establish a new post, and had to travel for weeks and
weeks through a wild country, where none of us had ever been before;
where we shot our own meat, caught our own fish, and built our own
house--and were very near being murdered by the Indians; though, to
be sure, afterwards they became the most civil fellows in the
country, and brought us plenty of skins. Ay, lad, you'll repent of
your obstinacy when you come to have to hunt your own dinner, as I've
done many a day up the Saskatchewan, where I've had to fight with
red-skins and grizzly bears and to chase the buffaloes over miles and
miles of prairie on rough-going nags till my bones ached and I scarce
knew whether I sat on--"

"Oh," exclaimed Charley, starting to his feet, while his eyes flashed
and his chest heaved with emotion, "that's the place for me, father!--
Do, please, Mr. Grant send me there, and I'll work for you with all
my might!"

Frank Kennedy was not a man to stand this unexpected miscarriage of
his eloquence with equanimity. His first action was to throw his pipe
at the head of his enthusiastic boy; without worse effect, however,
than smashing it to atoms on the opposite wall. He then started up
and rushed towards his son, who, being near the door, retreated
precipitately and vanished.

"So," said Mr. Grant, not very sure whether to laugh or be angry at
the result of their united efforts, "you've settled the question now,
at all events."

Frank Kennedy said nothing, but filled another pipe, sat doggedly
down in front of the fire, and speedily enveloped himself, and his
friend, and all that the room contained, in thick, impenetrable
clouds of smoke.

Meanwhile his worthy son rushed off in a state of great glee. He had
often heard the voyageurs of Red River dilate on the delights of
roughing it in the woods, and his heart had bounded as they spoke of
dangers encountered and overcome among the rapids of the Far North,
or with the bears and bison-bulls of the prairie, but never till now
had he heard his father corroborate their testimony by a recital of
his own actual experience; and although the old gentleman's intention
was undoubtedly to damp the boy's spirit, his eloquence had exactly
the opposite effect--so that it was with a hop and a shout that he
burst into the counting-room, with the occupants of which Charley was
a special favourite.

CHAPTER III.

The Counting-room.

Everyone knows the general appearance of a counting-room. There are
one or two peculiar features about such apartments that are quite
unmistakable and very characteristic; and the counting-room at Fort
Garry, although many hundred miles distant from other specimens of
its race, and, from the peculiar circumstances of its position, not
therefore likely to bear them much resemblance, possessed one or two
features of similarity, in the shape of two large desks and several
very tall stools, besides sundry ink-bottles, rulers, books, and
sheets of blotting-paper. But there were other implements there,
savouring strongly of the backwoods and savage life, which merit more
particular notice.

The room itself was small, and lighted by two little windows, which
opened into the courtyard. The entire apartment was made of wood. The
floor was of unpainted fir boards. The walls were of the same
material, painted blue from the floor upwards to about three feet,
where the blue was unceremoniously stopped short by a stripe of
bright red, above which the somewhat fanciful decorator had laid on a
coat of pale yellow; and the ceiling, by way of variety, was of a
deep ochre. As the occupants of Red River office were, however,
addicted to the use of tobacco and tallow candles, the original
colour of the ceiling had vanished entirely, and that of the walls
had considerably changed.

There were three doors in the room (besides the door of entrance),
each opening into another apartment, where the three clerks were wont
to court the favour of Morpheus after the labours of the day. No
carpets graced the floors of any of these rooms, and with the
exception of the paint aforementioned, no ornament whatever broke the
pleasing uniformity of the scene. This was compensated, however, to
some extent by several scarlet sashes, bright-coloured shot-belts,
and gay portions of winter costume peculiar to the country, which
depended from sundry nails in the bedroom walls; and as the three
doors always stood open, these objects, together with one or two
fowling-pieces and canoe-paddles, formed quite a brilliant and highly
suggestive background to the otherwise sombre picture. A large open
fireplace stood in one corner of the room, devoid of a grate, and so
constructed that large logs of wood might be piled up on end to any
extent. And really the fires made in this manner, and in this
individual fireplace, were exquisite beyond description. A wood-fire
is a particularly cheerful thing. Those who have never seen one can
form but a faint idea of its splendour; especially on a sharp winter
night in the arctic regions, where the thermometer falls to forty
degrees below zero, without inducing the inhabitants to suppose that
the world has reached its conclusion. The billets are usually piled
up on end, so that the flames rise and twine round them with a fierce
intensity that causes them to crack and sputter cheerfully, sending
innumerable sparks of fire into the room, and throwing out a rich
glow of brilliant light that warms a man even to look at it, and
renders candles quite unnecessary.

The clerks who inhabited this counting-room were, like itself,
peculiar. There were three--corresponding to the bedrooms. The senior
was a tall, broad-shouldered, muscular man--a Scotchman--very good-
humoured, yet a man whose under lip met the upper with that peculiar
degree of precision that indicated the presence of other qualities
besides that of good-humour. He was book-keeper and accountant, and
managed the affairs intrusted to his care with the same dogged
perseverance with which he would have led an expedition of discovery
to the North Pole. He was thirty or thereabouts.

The second was a small man--also a Scotchman. It is curious to note
how numerous Scotchmen are in the wilds of North America. This
specimen was diminutive and sharp. Moreover, he played the flute--an
accomplishment of which he was so proud that he ordered out from
England a flute of ebony, so elaborately enriched with silver keys
that one's fingers ached to behold it. This beautiful instrument,
like most other instruments of a delicate nature, found the climate
too much for its constitution, and, soon after the winter began,
split from top to bottom. Peter Mactavish, however, was a genius by
nature, and a mechanical genius by tendency; so that, instead of
giving way to despair, he laboriously bound the flute together with
waxed thread, which, although it could not restore it to its pristine
elegance, enabled him to play with great effect sundry doleful airs,
whose influence, when performed at night, usually sent his companions
to sleep, or, failing this, drove them to distraction.

The third inhabitant of the office was a ruddy, smooth-chinned youth
of about fourteen, who had left home seven months before, in the hope
of gratifying a desire to lead a wild life, which he had entertained
ever since he read "Jack the Giant Killer," and found himself most
unexpectedly fastened, during the greater part of each day, to a
stool. His name was Harry Somerville, and a fine, cheerful little
fellow he was, full of spirits, and curiously addicted to poking and
arranging the fire at least every ten minutes--a propensity which
tested the forbearance of the senior clerk rather severely, and would
have surprised any one not aware of poor Harry's incurable antipathy
to the desk, and the yearning desire with which he longed for
physical action.

Harry was busily engaged with the refractory fire when Charley, as
stated at the conclusion of the last chapter, burst into the room.

"Hollo!" he exclaimed, suspending his operations for a moment,
"what's up?"

"Nothing," said Charley, "but father's temper, that's all. He gave me
a splendid description of his life in the woods, and then threw his
pipe at me because I admired it too much."

"Ho!" exclaimed Harry, making a vigorous thrust at the fire, "then
you've no chance now."

"No chance! what do you mean?"

"Only that we are to have a wolf-hunt in the plains to-morrow; and if
you've aggravated your father, he'll be taking you home to-night,
that's all."

"Oh! no fear of that," said Charley, with a look that seemed to imply
that there was very great fear of "that"--much more, in fact, than he
was willing to admit even to himself. "My dear old father never keeps
his anger long. I'm sure that he'll be all right again in half-an-
hour."

"Hope so, but doubt it I do," said Harry, making another deadly poke
at the fire, and returning, with a deep sigh, to his stool.

"Would you like to go with us, Charley?" said the senior clerk,
laying down his pen and turning round on his chair (the senior clerk
never sat on a stool) with a benign smile.

"Oh, very, very much indeed," cried Charley; "but even should father
agree to stay all night at the fort, I have no horse, and I'm sure he
would not let me have the mare after what I did to-day."

"Do you think he's not open to persuasion?" said the senior clerk.

"No, I'm sure he's not."

"Well, well, it don't much signify; perhaps we can mount you."
(Charley's face brightened.) "Go," he continued, addressing Harry
Somerville--"go, tell Tom Whyte I wish to speak to him."

Harry sprang from his stool with a suddenness and vigour that might
have justified the belief that he had been fixed to it by means of a
powerful spring, which had been set free with a sharp recoil, and
shot him out at the door, for he disappeared in a trice. In a few
minutes he returned, followed by the groom Tom Whyte.

"Tom," said the senior clerk, "do you think we could manage to mount
Charley to-morrow?"

"Why, sir, I don't think as how we could. There ain't an 'oss in the
stable except them wot's required and them wot's badly."

"Couldn't he have the brown pony?" suggested the senior clerk.

Tom Whyte was a cockney and an old soldier, and stood so bolt upright
that it seemed quite a marvel how the words ever managed to climb up
the steep ascent of his throat, and turn the corner so as to get out
at his mouth. Perhaps this was the cause of his speaking on all
occasions with great deliberation and slowness.

"Why, you see, sir," he replied, "the brown pony's got cut under the
fetlock of the right hind leg; and I 'ad 'im down to L'Esperance the
smith's, sir, to look at 'im, sir; and he says to me, says he 'That
don't look well, that 'oss don't,'--and he's a knowing feller, sir,
is L'Esperance though he _is_ an 'alf-breed--"

"Never mind what he said, Tom," interrupted the senior clerk; "is the
pony fit for use? that's the question."

"No, sir, 'e hain't."

"And the black mare, can he not have that?"

"No, sir; Mr. Grant is to ride 'er to-morrow."

"That's unfortunate," said the senior clerk.--"I fear, Charley, that
you'll need to ride behind Harry on his gray pony. It wouldn't
improve his speed, to be sure, having two on his back; but then he's
so like a pig in his movements at any rate, I don't think it would
spoil his pace much."

"Could he not try the new horse?" he continued, turning to the groom.

"The noo 'oss, sir! he might as well try to ride a mad buffalo bull,
sir. He's quite a young colt, sir, only 'alf broke--kicks like a
windmill, sir, and's got an 'ead like a steam-engine; 'e couldn't
'old 'im in no'ow, sir. I 'ad 'im down to the smith 'tother day, sir,
an' says 'e to me, says 'e, 'That's a screamer, that is.' 'Yes,' says
I, 'that his a fact.' 'Well,' says 'e--"

"Hang the smith!" cried the senior clerk, losing all patience; "can't
you answer me without so much talk? Is the horse too wild to ride?"

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