Part 20 (1/2)

”I'll tell you after supper,” Norris promised them.

Pedro had been out with his trout rod. Descending to the river, which here circled around a huge bowlder from which he thought he could cast, he had a string in no time.

Now Pedro was thoroughly well liked, with his Castilian courtesy and his ever ready song. The lack of physical courage had been his greatest drawback. Always had the fear been secret within him that at some crucial moment he might show the white feather. His experience with the Mexicans had removed that, but he was still mortally afraid of three things,--bears, rattlesnakes, and thunder storms,--that is, real wild bears, not the half tame kind that haunt the Parks.

Still, he had not noticed the furry form that stood neck-deep in the riffles, fis.h.i.+ng with his great, barbed paw,--so perfectly did he blend into the background.

The shadow of the canyon wall had made twilight while yet the sun sent orange shafts through the trees on the canyon rim. Suddenly around the turn of the trail rose a huge brown form that gave a startled grunt, rising inquiringly on its s.h.a.ggy hind legs and swinging its long head from side to side. Pedro's heart began beating like a trip-hammer. (He wondered if the bear could hear it).

He wanted to run, to scream,--a course that would have been most ill-advised, for the bear might then have given chase. As it was, the boy remembered that the animal was probably more afraid than he,--or more likely merely curious at this biped invasion of his wilderness,--and would not harm him if no hostile move were made. The cinnamon bear of the Sierras, like his blood brother, the New England black bear, is a good-natured fellow.

With an iron grip on his nerves, he forced himself to stand stock-still, then back--ever so amenably--off the trail. The bear, finding no hostility intended, turned and lumbered up the mountainside.

”'Minds me of one time,' said Long Lester, when he heard the story, 'I was down to the crick once when I was a shaver, and along came a big brown bear. The bear, he stood up on his haunches, surprised like, and just gave one 'woof.' About that time I decided to take to the tall timber.” (At this, Pedro looked singularly gratified.) ”Well, that bear, he took to the same tree I did, and I kept right on a-climbin' so high that I get clear to the top,--it were a slim kind of a tree,--and the top bends and draps me off in the water!”

[Ill.u.s.tration: Around the turn of the trail rose a huge brown form.]

”What became of the bear?” Pedro demanded.

”I dunno. I didn't wait to see. But Mr. Norris here were a-sayin' there's nothin' in the back country a-goin' to hurt you unless'n it's rattlesnakes. Now when I was a-prospectin' I allus used to carry a hair rope along, and make a good big circle around my bed with it. The rattler won't crawl over the hair rope.”

The boys thought he was jos.h.i.+ng them, but Long Lester was telling the literal truth. ”Once I was just a-crawlin' into bed,” he went on, ”when I heard a rattle,” and with the aid of a dry leaf he gave a faint imitation of the buzzing ”chick-chick-chick-chick-chick” that sounds so ominous when you know it and so harmless when you don't. ”I flung back the covers with one jerk, and jumped back myself out of the way. There was a snake down at the foot of my blankets. They are always trying to crawl into a warm place.”

”Then what?” breathed three round eyed boys.

”First I put on my shoes and made up a fire so's I could see, 'n' then I take a forked stick and get him by the neck, and smash his head with a stone.”

”And yet I've heard of making pets of them,” said Norris.

”They do. Some do. But I wouldn't,” stated Long Lester emphatically. ”Ner I wouldn't advise any one to trust 'em too fur, neither.”

”They say a rattler has one rattle on his tail for every year of his age,” ventured Pedro.

”A young snake,” spoke up Ted, ”has a soft b.u.t.ton on its tail. And then the rattle grows at the rate of three joints a year, and you can't tell a thing about its age, because by the time there are about ten of them, it snaps off when it rattles.”

”Down in San Antonio,” said Ace, ”we had an hour between trains once, and we went into a billiard parlor where they had a collection of rattlesnakes, stuffed. And they showed some rattles with 30 or 40 joints to them.”

”Huh!” laughed Ted. ”That's easy! You can snap the rattles of several snakes together any time you want to give some tourist a thrill.”

”You seem to know all about it,” gibed Ace. ”They had 13 species of rattlesnakes down in this--it used to be a saloon. And ten of them Western. They had a huge seven foot diamond back, and they had yellow ones and gray ones and black ones and some that were almost pink. I mean, they had their skins. All colors----”

”To match their habitat,” supplemented Norris. ”Our California rattler is a gray or pale brown where it's dry summers, and in the Oregon woods where it's moist, and the foliage deeper colored, it's green-black all but the spots. _I've_ seen them tamed. There was one guide up there who kept one in a cage, and it would take a mouse from his fingers.”

”I wouldn't chance it,” s.h.i.+vered Ted.

”Oh, this one would glide up flat on the floor of the cage. They can't strike unless they're coiled.”

”I suppose he caught it before it was old enough to be poison,” said Pedro.

”A rattlesnake can strike from the moment it's born. It's perfectly independent a few hours after birth.”