Part 32 (1/2)

Feel of it, Joe--ain't it soft?”

”I move we name this shack of ours Camp Kent,” said Joe.

”Carried!” Tom cried. ”Camp Kent it is--and I guess we won't forget whom it's named for in a hurry, either.”

”Thanks, boys,” the doctor laughed. ”And I won't forget you. I wish I were going to stay here a month, and use the rope with you. But I've got to get back to the sick people who can't come to the Park for a tonic.

Good-bye--and good luck. Joe, keep up the good work--live out-of-doors, keep dry, don't worry, and you'll live to be ninety-nine. Tom--don't forget to test your anchor stone! I'll be out in the morning early, and get my grub at the hotel. Good-bye.”

”Good-bye,” the boys said.

And when he was gone they looked at each other, at the coil of soft, strong, beautifully braided Alpine rope, and Tom exclaimed:

”Well, by gos.h.!.+ you never can tell. When he blew in, with those funny old blue socks on, and the spectacles, and his talk about the Matterhorn, I thought he was a freak or hot air artist, and so did Mr.

Mills. Instead of that he's a prince--that's what he is, a prince!”

”I never said anything at the time,” Joe answered. ”But I liked him all along. Gee, I bet he's a good doc, all right.”

”I bet he is, too--and he says you're all right now!” Tom cried, giving Joe a punch and a hug. ”We can go climbing with this old rope together pretty soon. By jiminy, we _got_ to carry our cameras up a cliff and get some goat pictures. Say, that's the sport! And I'm going to see Mr.

Mills about staying on with him, and write home about school, and we'll just stay here and see the snow come, and get our skis sent on, and, gee, it'll be wonderful!”

”If we do that, I got to get busy and earn money,” Joe replied. ”I'm going over to the Saddle Company offices at the hotel to-morrow and see about another cooking job.”

”Go to it,” said Spider. ”I'm willing, now the doc says it's O.K.”

But he didn't have to go over to the hotel. That very evening a bell-boy from the hotel came for him, and he set out the next morning with a party on a four day trip. They went over Piegan Pa.s.s again, then up into the Red Eagle country south of St. Mary Lake, then up on to the top of the Divide over Triple Divide Peak, where the water from the snow-fields flows in three directions--to the Pacific, to the Missouri River, and so to the Gulf of Mexico, and to the St. Mary River, then the Saskatchewan River and so to Hudson Bay and the Arctic Ocean.

They descended to the headwaters of the Cut Bank River (so called because of its steep banks) and camped in a lovely canon. Then, for the next stage, they climbed practically over the old war trail of the Blackfeet Indians, who went across the Divide over Cut Bank Pa.s.s to attack their foes, the Flathead Indians, on the west side. Then, for their final stage, they took the so-called Dry Fork Trail, to Two Medicine Lake. This was a thrilling trip, over a portion of the Divide that truly deserved the Indian name of the backbone of the world. At one point the knife-blade ridge was only thirty feet wide, with yawning precipices on either side. The chief guide said, ”This is the place where they say you can spit down into the lake three thousand feet on the east, and throw a stone more than that on the west.” Joe didn't have to get off his horse and try, in order to believe him. And he was glad enough there was not a gale blowing, too!

The trail finally led down around the base of old Rising Wolf Mountain to the Two Medicine chalets, on the lake, where the party spent the night.

Early the next morning, the party left for the railroad by bus, and Joe went with them to Glacier Park Hotel, where he caught the Many Glacier morning bus back to his own camp. It was a fine trip, with splendid scenery, but he missed Mills as the chief guide, and still more he missed the friendly companions.h.i.+p of Bob, Alice and Lucy, who had made his first trip so much like a family party. On this second trip he was just the cook for a group of three men and their wives. But it meant twelve more precious dollars for his fund--or, rather, it meant six dollars for his fund, and six to send home to his mother.

When he got back ”home,” as he called it, he found Tom had carved a sign, ”Camp Kent,” on a piece of board, and nailed it to a tree by their tent. He also found Tom full of an exciting piece of news.

”There's going to be a Blackfeet Indian pow-wow here at Many Glacier to-morrow,” he said, ”and it's going to end with a barbecue, which Big Bertha says is almost as good as a Hi-yu-Mulligan-potlatch.”

”As a _what_?” Joe demanded.

”No, not a _what_, a Hi-yu-Mulligan-potlatch,” Tom laughed. ”Big Bertha says out in Was.h.i.+ngton, where he comes from, when they want to give the Indians a good time they give 'em a potlatch, which means a free feed, and a Mulligan potlatch is one where the free feed is Mulligan stew, and a Hi-yu-Mulligan-potlatch is just a jim-swizzler of a potlatch that makes an Indian yell, Hi-yu! Get it now?”

”I get it,” Joe laughed. ”But what's a pow-wow, and why's it being held here?”

”I guess a pow-wow is short for an Indian good time, and it's being held here to give the folks at the hotel something to look at--as if the mountains weren't enough. The hotel is crammed full, and so are the chalets, and I had three people in every tepee last night. I've been doing nothing since you left but chop wood, and haul water, and air blankets.”

”Poor old Tom,” said Joe. ”Well, I got twelve cartwheels in my jeans--feels like a ton o' coal, too. That'll help toward the autumn.

Now I'll help you get the camp ready for the hikers that are coming in to-night.”