Part 8 (1/2)
”What was that!” Jean exclaimed. ”It was almost like a bullet.”
”Nay, nay,” said Jack, indulging in a very sorry joke. ”It is a ducklet.”
”A ducklet? What ducklet?”
”That, my dear sister, was the whistle from the wing of a wild duck, darting into the darkness at a couple of hundred miles an hour. He had just got his eye on you.”
”More likely on the gun,” said Jean, for we had included a cheap shot-gun among the articles considered indispensable. ”Wait until Frank gets after him.”
I was greatly flattered by Jean's wholly unwarranted confidence in my marksmans.h.i.+p and eager to justify it at the earliest moment.
”No time like the present,” said I, picking up the gun and filling my pocket with cartridges. ”Besides, we have a surprise to show you.”
So we started out in the gathering darkness, I going first, as became the bearer of the gun; Jean at my heels; Jack and Marjorie a little in the rear. Down the steep edge of the gully we worked, and then along by the marge of the brown snow-water which rippled happily over beds of bending gra.s.s. It was quite dark in the little valley, and I had to hold Jean's hand to guard against the possibility of her slipping into the stream.
At a short distance we came to the spot where the valley broadened out and the little grove of trees had found its place of shelter from Chinook winds in winter and prairie fires in spring and fall. The air was full of the sweet scent of bursting willow buds and balm-o'-Gilead, and as we picked our steps as noiselessly as we could the slightly stirring limbs above us wrought their dark tracery against the blue and starry heaven.
”Oh, Frank! You never told me of this! How wonderful!”
”Wait until you see the pond,” I whispered, as one who keeps the best to the last. ”We did not select Fourteen and Twenty-two without a reason.”
There was no path between the slim, close-growing trunks of poplar and balm, and we had to make progress as best we could. . . . Jack and Marjorie had fallen considerably behind.
Then, suddenly, the still waters of the pond burst upon our view, and at the same moment, as though the very heavens conspired to set the stage to the best advantage, a blood-red moon sent its first pinion of light sweeping down from the north-east and splas.h.i.+ng burnt-orange and ochre across the slightly ruffled surface of the pond. We stood for a time as mortals transfixed, watching the great red globe drawing swiftly into the blue above, until its light painted Jean's face and mine. In the moonlight her fine features were wonderful, irresistible . . . . .
We were brought to earth by a flutter and splas.h.i.+ng in the water. Two ducks, sweeping swiftly down out of the darkness, alighted not a dozen yards in front of us, and directly in the line of light. I drew my gun to my shoulder, and even as I did so their murmured grumblings, sibilant almost as the lisp of water on a gravelly sh.o.r.e, came to our ears, and they began to swim slowly about in graceful little circles. There was even a motion about the head of the male, as he brought it close to that of his mate, that was surely nothing short of a caress.
”Don't, Frank, don't; you mustn't!” Jean exclaimed suddenly.
Her arm darted out in front of me, seized the barrel of the gun and drew it swiftly to one side. I had been taking a most deliberate aim, to justify the high opinion already referred to, but at Jean's sudden interference I pressed the trigger, or, as I always claimed, it pulled itself against my finger, and went off. There was a loud report, and the sound of shot harmlessly las.h.i.+ng the water.
”Did you get him--did you get him?” shouted Marjorie and Jack, rus.h.i.+ng down upon us.
”No, I didn't get him,” I explained. ”I didn't even try to get him. I just wanted to see how far the gun would carry.”
”I wouldn't let him,” said Jean. ”It would have been a--just a horrible thing to shoot one of those poor creatures, the very first night we were here! How beautiful they were, and how--how loving!” She said the last word with a bashful, falling inflection that was wonderful to hear.
”It's much more horrible to have no wild duck--ducklet I mean--for to-morrow's dinner,” said Jack.
”And those cartridges cost ever so much; what is it?--three or four cents each,” Marjorie remonstrated. ”Well, let's go back.”
We returned to our camp and started to make ready for the night. But Jack, true to his promise, gathered up his blankets, waded the cold stream, and slept under the stars of Twenty-two. We had begun our ”period of residence.”
CHAPTER VII.
The morning was another gorgeous burst of suns.h.i.+ne. There had been an early dew, and as the sunlight swept along the prairies every blade of gra.s.s was hung with diamonds. When I was able to shed my blankets--I have always had a way of getting into intricate entanglements with the bed clothes--I filled my lungs with the fresh oxygen, thumped my chest with my fists, and, looking out over the sparkling prairie, breathed a sort of prayer of possession--”It's mine; it's mine!” Then I found my soap and towel and hustled down to the stream for my morning wash.
The girls, too, were early about. As I came up from the stream I met Jean going down, wearing a blanket, Indian fas.h.i.+on, for lack of a bathrobe. A week on a dusty trail had made the presence of snow water, as deep as one wanted it, a peculiar luxury.
”Gee, but it's good to be alive!” she exclaimed, swinging her arms, to the peril of her costume. ”Does one always feel like this on the prairies?”