Part 11 (1/2)

”Because Hoolool will make _you_ one to-day, and then flocks and flocks of tenas poles for the men with the silver coins. I cannot sell them our great one, but I can make many small ones like it. Oh! they will buy the little totems, and the great one will stand as the pride of your manhood and the honor of your old age.” Her voice rang with the hope of the future, the confidence of years of difficulty overcome.

Before many hours had pa.s.sed, she and the child had scoured the nearby edges of the forest for woods that were dried, seasoned, and yet solid.

They had carried armfuls back to the fir shack, and the work of carving had begun. The woman sat by the fire hour after hour--the fire that burned in primitive fas.h.i.+on in the centre of the shack, stoveless and hearthless, its ascending smoke curling up through an aperture in the roof, its red flames flickering and fading, leaping and lighting the work that even her unaccustomed fingers developed with wonderful accuracy in miniature of the Totem Pole at the north-west corner outside. By nightfall it was completed, and by the fitful firelight Tenas painted and stained its huddled figures in the black, orange, crimson and green that tribal custom made law. The warmth of the burning cedar knots dried the paints and pigments, until their acrid fragrance filled the little room, and the child's eyelids drooped sleepily, and in a delightful happiness he once more snuggled into his blanket bed, the baby Totem Pole hugged to his little heart. But his mother sat far into the night, her busy fingers at work on the realization of her child's dream. She was determined to fas.h.i.+on his dream-flock of ”young” totems which would bring to them both more of fat eating than many bands of grey geese flying southward. The night wore on, and she left her task only to rebuild the fire and to cover with an extra blanket the little form of her sleeping boy. Finally she, too, slept, but briefly, for daybreak found her again at her quaint occupation, and the following nightfall brought no change. A week drifted by, and one morning, far down the Sound, the whistle of a coming steamer startled both boy and woman into brisk action. The little flock of Totem Poles now numbered nine, and hastily gathering them together in one of her cherished cedar-root baskets she clasped the child's hand, and they made their way to the landing-stage.

When she returned an hour later, her basket was empty, and her kerchief filled with silver coins.

On the deck of the steamer one of the s.h.i.+p's officers was talking to a little group of delighted tourists who were comparing their miniature purchases with the giant Totem Pole in the distance.

”You _are_ lucky,” said the officer. ”I know people who have tried for years to buy the big Pole from her, but it was always 'No' with her--just a shake of her head, and you might as well try to buy the moon. It's for that little boy of hers she's keeping it, though she could have sold it for hundreds of good dollars twenty times over.”

That all happened eleven years ago, and last summer when I journeyed far north of Queen Charlotte Sound, as the steamer reached a certain landing I saw a giant Totem Pole with a well-built frame house at its base.

It was standing considerably away from the sh.o.r.e, but its newness was apparent, for on its roof, busily engaged at s.h.i.+ngling, was an agile Indian youth of some seventeen years.

”That youngster built that house all by himself,” volunteered one of the s.h.i.+p's officers at my elbow. ”He is a born carpenter, and gets all the work he can do. He has supported his mother in comfort for two years, and he isn't full grown yet.”

”Who is he?” I asked, with keen interest.

”His name is Tenas,” replied the officer. ”His mother is a splendid woman. 'Hoolool,' they call her. She is quite the best carver of Totem Poles on the North Coast.”

The Wolf-Brothers

Leloo's father and mother were both of the great Lillooet tribe of British Columbia Indians, splendid people of a stalwart race of red men, who had named the boy Leloo because, from the time he could toddle about on his little, brown, bare feet, he had always listened with delight to the wolves howling across the canyons and down the steeps of the wonderful mountain country where he was born. In the Chinook language Leloo means wolf, and before the little fellow could talk he would stand nightly at the lodge door and imitate the long, weird barking and calling of his namesakes, while his father would smile knowingly and say, ”He will some day make a great hunter, will our little Leloo,” and his mother would answer proudly, ”Yes, he has no fear of wild things.

No wolf in the mountains will be mighty enough to scare him--our little Leloo.”

So he grew from babyhood into boyhood with a love for the furry-coated wild creatures that prowled along the timber line, and their voices were to him the voices of friends who had sung him to sleep ever since he could remember anything.

But the night of his famous ride up the Cariboo Trail where it skirts the Bonaparte Hills proved to him how wise a thing it was that he had long ago made friends, instead of foes, of the wolves, for if he had feared them, it would have been a ride of terror instead of triumph, as it was his love for them that helped him to do a great, heroic thing which made the very name ”Leloo” beloved by every man, both white and Indian, in all the Lillooet country.

It was one day early in the autumn that Leloo's father sent him down the trail some ten or fifteen miles with a message to the ”boss” of the great railway construction camp that the Lillooet Indians would supply fifty men to work on the Company's roadway. So the boy mounted his pet cayuse and started off early, swinging down the mountain trails into the canyons, then climbing again across the summit, with its dense growth of timber. His little legs were almost too short to grip his horse's middle as his father could have done, so he went more slowly and carefully over the dangerous places, marking every one in his mind, in case he was late in returning. When he reached the camp the ”boss” was absent, and, Indian-like, he would deliver his message to no one else except the man it was intended for, and when the ”boss” returned at supper time from far down the grade, he insisted upon Leloo sharing his pork and beans and drinking great quant.i.ties of tea.

”Better stay all night, youngster,” said the boss kindly; ”It's a long ride back, and it's going to be dark.”

”No stay to-night,” answered Leloo. ”Maybe some time I stay, but no to-night.”

”Well, you know best, kid,” replied the boss. ”There's one thing--no harm will ever come to an Indian boy on a mountain trail. But be careful; the canyons are deep, and the trail is bad in spots.”

”Me know, me careful,” smiled Leloo, and mounting his cayuse, trotted off gayly, just as the sun was lost behind a grim, rocky peak in the west. But the ”boss” was right: night comes quickly in the mountains, and this night was unusually dark. Leloo had to ride very slowly, for the narrow trail was a mere ledge carved out from the perpendicular walls of the cliffs, which arose on the left, a sheer precipice hundreds of feet above him, and fell away to the right in a yawning chasm, black, and deep and unexplored. But the sure-footed cayuse stepped gingerly and knowingly, neither halting nor stumbling, and his wise little rider let the animal pick its own way, knowing well that a horse's senses in the dark are more acute than a human's. Presently from far across the canyon arose a weird, prolonged howl. Then from the heights above came an answering one.

”Ah, my brothers!” called Leloo aloud. ”You have come to greet me through the night,” and his eyes lighted like twin black fires, for he loved these wolves that made their dens and lairs along the Cariboo Trail, and to-night they were to serve him in the oddest fas.h.i.+on that a wild animal was ever called upon to do. As he rode on, he would--just for company's sake--call back to the wolves, answering their cries with such a perfect imitation of their wild voices that they would reply to him, from far below, then again from far above, and Leloo would smile to himself and say, ”That is right, O great and fierce Leloos; answer me, for you are my kin and my cousins.”

But the trail was growing steeper, narrower every moment, and after a time Leloo forgot to reply to his forest friends, and just rode on, peering through the shadows to avoid the dangers on all sides. Presently a sound that belonged to neither crag nor canyon fell across his quick, Indian ears. It was a man's voice, hushed, subdued, speaking very low, and speaking in English. It said:

”I hear a horse coming.”

”Shut up! Don't talk so loud,” replied another voice.

”I tell you I hear horses,” answered the first voice irritably. ”It must be the stage coming. Get ready!”

”You're clean crazy,” said the other voice. ”The stage makes more noise than that, and I know for sure there's no horseman up the trail to-night. It's some wild animal you hear.”