Part 16 (1/2)

”I'll come!” cried Hinpoha and Jo and Agony and Katherine all in a breath. Cramped from lying still so long, they welcomed the prospect of exercise, even in the early morning rain.

Leaving Migwan and Gladys to keep Miss Amesbury company, the five set out into the streaming woods, and Katherine and Hinpoha and Sahwah came back half an hour later to report that they had found a cave and Jo and Agony had stayed there to build a fire.

”Fire, that sounds good to me,” remarked Gladys, s.h.i.+vering a little as she got into her damp bathing suit and drew her heavy sweater over it.

Carrying the beds, still wrapped up in the ponchos, the little procession wound through the woods under the guidance of the returned scouts. The guides were not needed long, however, for soon a heart warming odor of frying bacon came to meet them, and with a world-old instinct each one followed her nose toward it.

”Did anything ever smell so good?” exclaimed Hinpoha, breathing in the fragrant air in long drawn sniffs.

”Those blessed angels!” was all Miss Amesbury could say.

A moment later they stepped out of the wet woods into the cheeriest scene imaginable. In the side of a steep hill which rose not far from the river there opened a good sized cave, and just inside its doorway burned a bright fire, lighting up the interior with its ruddy glow. On a smaller fire beside it a pan of bacon was sizzling merrily, and over another hung a pot of steaming coffee. To the eyes of the wet, chilly campers, it was the most beautiful scene they had ever looked upon. They sprang to the large fire and toasted themselves in its grateful warmth while they held up their clothes to dry before putting them on.

”Thoughtful people, to build us an extra fire,” said Miss Amesbury, stretching out luxuriously on the blanket Migwan had spread for her.

”We knew you'd want to warm up a bit,” replied Agony, removing the coffee pot from the blaze and beginning to pour the steaming liquid into the cups.

”How did you ever make a fire at all?” inquired Miss Amesbury. ”Every bit of wood must be soaked through.”

”We dug down into a big pine stump,” replied Agony, ”or rather, Sahwah did, for I didn't know enough to, and got us some dry chips to start the fire with, and then we kept drying other pieces until they could burn.

Once we got that big log started we were all right. It's as hot as a furnace.”

”What a difference fire does make!” said Miss Amesbury. ”What dreary, dispirited people we'd be by this time if it were not for this cheering blaze. I'd be perfectly content to stay here all day if I had to.”

Miss Amesbury had ample opportunity to test the depth of her content, for the rain showed no sign of abating. Hour after hour it poured down steadily as though it had forgotten how to stop. A dense mist rose on the river which gradually spread through the woods until the trees loomed up like dim spectres standing in menacing att.i.tudes before the door of their little rocky chamber. Warm and dry inside, the Winnebagos made the best of their unexpected situation and whiled away the hours with games, stories, and ”improving conversation,” as Jo Severance recounted later.

”I've just invented a new game,” announced Migwan, when the talk had run for some time on famous women of various times.

”What is it?” asked Hinpoha, pausing with a half washed potato in her hand. Hinpoha and Gladys were putting the potatoes into the hot ashes to bake them for dinner.

”Why, it's this,” said Migwan. ”Let each one of us in turn tell some incident that took place in the girlhood of a famous woman, the one we admire the most, and see if the others can guess who she is.”

”All right, you begin, Migwan,” said Sahwah.

”No, you begin, Sahwah. It's my game, so I'll be last.”

Sahwah sat chin in hand for a moment, and then she began: ”I see a long, low house built of bark and branches, thickly covered with snow.

It is one of the 'long houses', or winter quarters of the Algonquins, and none other than the Chief's own house. Inside is a council chamber and in it a pow-wow of chiefs is going on. The other half of the house, which is not used as a council chamber, is used as the living room by the family, and here a number of children are playing a lively game. In the midst of the racket the door opens and in comes one of the chief's runners. As he advances toward the council chamber a young girl comes whirling down the room turning handsprings. Her feet strike him full in the chest, and send him flat on his back on the floor. A great roar of laughter goes up from the braves and squaws sitting around the room, for the girl who has knocked the runner down is none other than the chief's own daughter. But the old chief says sadly, 'Why will you be such a tomboy, my child?'”

”Tomboy, tomboy!” cry all the others, using the Algonquin word for that nickname. ”Who is my girl, and what is her nickname?”

”That's easy,” laughed Migwan, ”Who but Pocahontas?”

”Was 'Pocahantas' just a nickname?” asked Hinpoha curiously.

”Yes,” replied Migwan. ”'Pocahontas', or 'pocahuntas', is the Algonquin word for 'tomboy'. The real name of Powhatan's daughter was Ma-ta-oka, but she was known ever after the incident Sahwah just related as 'Pocahontas.'”

”I never heard of that incident,” said Hinpoha, ”but I might have guessed that Sahwah would take Pocahontas for hers.”

”Now you, Agony,” said Migwan.

”I see a young girl,” began Agony, ”tending her flocks in the valley of the Meuse. She is sitting under a large beech, which the children of the village have named the 'Fairy Tree.' As she sits there her face takes on a rapt look; she sits very still, like one in a trance, for her eyes are looking upon a remarkable sight. She seems to see a s.h.i.+ning figure standing before her; an angel with a flaming sword. She falls upon her knees and covers her face with her hands, and when she looks up again the vision is gone and only the tree is left, with the church beyond it.”