Part 56 (1/2)
Chenault, being a half-breed, was more inclined toward garrulity than his Indian spouse.
”How you come?” he asked with evident interest. Jeanne answered him, speaking rapidly, and at the end of a half-hour the man was in full possession of the details of their plight. He slowly shook his head.
”Moncrossen camp ver' far--feefty--seexty mile,” he said. ”You no mak'.”
Bill looked up suddenly. ”Have you a canoe?” he inquired.
The other looked at him in surprise. ”Canoe, she no good!” he grunted.
”Too mooch ice. Bre'k all to h.e.l.l in one minute!”
With an exclamation he leaped to his feet. ”By gar! De flat boat!” he cried triumphantly.
”She is all build for tak' de fur. De riv', she run ver' swift. In de morning you go--in de evening you come on de camp!”
”I will pay you well for the boat,” said Bill eagerly. ”I have no money here. Give me a pencil; I will write an order on Monsieur Appleton, the man who owns the woods.”
At the words the half-breed shrugged.
”You no got for mak' write,” he said. ”You tell Wa-ha-ta-na-ta you come--by gar! You come! You tell me you pay--you pay. You no got for mak' write.”
Bill smiled.
”That is all right, providing I get through. What if the boat gets tipped over or smashed in the ice?”
Chenault shrugged again. ”You De-Man-Who-Cannot-Die,” he said. ”You got de good heart. In de woods all peoples know. You no mak' write. I got no penzil.”
CHAPTER L
FACE TO FACE
Before daylight next morning the two men dragged the little flat boat to the water's edge. The river had risen to full flood during the night and out of the darkness came the crash and grind of ice, the dull roar and splash of undermined banks, and the purling rumble of swift moving water.
After breakfast Bill and Jeanne, armed with light spruce poles, took their places; Chenault pushed the boat into the current and it shot downstream, whirling in the grip of the flood.
There was no need for oars. Both Bill and the girl had their work cut out warding off from drifting ice cakes and the thras.h.i.+ng branches of uprooted trees.
Time and again they came within a hair's-breadth of destruction. The eddying, seething surface of the swift rus.h.i.+ng river seemed to hurl its debris toward their little craft in fiendish malevolence. Ice cakes crashed together on every hand, water-logged tree-b.u.t.ts snagged them bow and stern, and the low-hanging limbs of ”sweepers” clawed and tore at them like the teeth of a giant rake as they swept beneath, lying flat upon the bottom of the boat.
Bill grinned at the thought of a canoe. In the suck and swirl of the current the odds were heavily against even the stout flat boat's winning through.
He estimated their speed to be about eight miles an hour and devoted his whole attention to preventing the boat from fouling the drift. They were riding the ”run out,” and he knew that Moncrossen would wait for the river to become comparatively free of drift before breaking out his rollways.
The rain ceased, but the sky remained heavily overcast and darkness overtook them while yet some distance above the log camp and skirting the opposite sh.o.r.e.
Eager as he was to meet Moncrossen, Bill decided not to risk crossing the river in the fast gathering darkness. Gradually the boat was worked toward sh.o.r.e and poled into the backwater of submerged beaver meadow.
Landing upon a slope a couple of hundred yards back from the river, they tilted the boat on edge, and, inclining it forward, rested it upon the tops of stakes thrust into the ground. The blanket was spread, and with the roaring fire directly in front the uptilted boat made an excellent shelter.
An awkward constraint, broken only by necessary monosyllables, had settled upon the two. On the river each had been too busy with the workin hand to give the other more than a pa.s.sing thought, but now, in the intimacy of the campfire, each felt uneasily self-conscious.