CHAPTER XXII

THE LYCAMAHONING

The sun arose o'er the eastern hills of Lycamahoning, a great disc of flame, fretted with the great solemn pines and oaks of the hilltops, and driving before it the opaline radiance of early twilight. Pine needles lost the sombre hue of night and glistened and gleamed with a richer emerald where the ever-shifting sunbeams touched and gloried them with light. Trees of oak and pine, a hundred and fifty feet in height, enveloped with interlacing branches hill and lowland, except where, oasis-like, the fields and cabin of some squatter dappled the general surface of woodland. A few clouds still remained on the western horizon, dark and threatening, but the day was propitious for fine weather.

Ande and Dick, for the strangers were none other, were aroused by the first, glancing rays of the sun that penetrated the curtains of their little window. Flinging aside the curtain drapery, they gazed forth delighted on the scene. Within a few yards of the house wall rolled the roaring, yellow flood of the Lycamahoning, a mighty torrent, sweeping beyond its natural bounds. Tree trunk and brush and what not tossed hither and thither by its rollicking mood, yet bore ever onward. It was an ambitious stream, for the banks could not hold it. The turnpike, beyond the bridge, was hidden three feet from sight, and tearing through the underbrush on either side of the public way was an ever-widening torrent. The town was on higher ground than the turnpike beyond and so escaped the damage of the flood.

"What a grand country, Dick, old chap," said Ande, surveying the scene with interest. "This is better than hot Louisiana or even the Mississippi prairies."

"Humph!" yawned Dick; "but not better than Brazil." Then as he ceased stretching his great arms over his head; "Just think of it, Ande, if we had not been picked up by that outward bound Brazilian ship, we would not be independent now. Ah! diamonds and gold! That's the country, lad."

"Softly, softly, Dick," said Ande in a lower tone, "we're not going to advertise our circumstances. A month or so here, then home to Merrie England."

"And right glad will I be," said Dick; "but let's down and see what this settlement in the backwoods is like."

Ande followed by Dick went cautiously down the steep stairway, that seemed squeezed between the great chimney and the farther wall and led out at the bottom into the public room. There was no one in the public room when they entered, and so they wended their way across to the door and thence out into the street, if street it could be called. The hotel of Peter Burke was at the head of the main and only street of Burgtown, and one walking straight from the front door of the hotel would pass down an avenue, prolific in stumps, midway between two rows of log houses. Back of the tavern and but a few yards from it rolled and roared the Lycamahoning, and but a few yards from the north end was the covered bridge. It thus stood with the homes stretching from it in parallel lines, like a captain at the head of his soldiers. Several citizens were abroad already with their axes and were busily felling a forest giant that, isolated and ostracised with a few others, waved its branches in the air above the middle of the main thoroughfare of Burgtown. Several raftsmen with Hugh Lark at their head were standing at the end of the broad porch gazing over toward the bridge and the rushing yellow flood, shaking their heads dubiously at it, well knowing that there would be no rafting either that day or the next. The flood was too high.

There was the sound of cracking and rending of wood from the thoroughfare, a swishing and snapping of branches, a cry of warning, then one of terror, and with a resounding blow the mighty, woodland giant sprawled its full length on the ground. With an exclamation Hugh Lark leaped into the roadway followed by the other raftsmen and Ande and Dick. They were soon on the scene. There pinned to the earth under the heavy tree trunk, unconscious, his brow streaked with blood, was a man, evidently the chief chopper.

Women from the neighbouring homes were wringing their hands in dismay, and then from a distant cabin came a woman's scream, a cry full of anguish, and then a flying form burst the crowd and flung herself down near the head of the unconscious chopper. With tender hands she mopped the blood from his forehead and kissed his pale brow again and again, calling by every endearing name to the unconscious one to answer her. Hugh Lark wiped the moisture from his eyes, as did many others. Then with the instinct of the leader of men:

"Run, Jack, and get the rope and tackle and block from the raft. Jim, go get the heaviest crowbar from the tavern, and the rest of you men get crowbars. Peter Burke, get to thy tavern as fast as your legs will carry you and bring a flask of brandy."

"Can nothing be done until the coming of the block and tackle," ventured Ande. "Is it too heavy for a couple of fellows to lift by main strength?"

The raft pilot shook his head. "Three men could not lift the butt of that tree, and more than three couldn't try, without doing more injury to Tom underneath. I only hope he won't die before the rope comes."

Dick had not said a word, but he now hauled off his coat, and placing his big arms around the butt end of the fallen tree began to exert his strength.

"The man is mad," muttered Hugh Lark to one or two bystanders, while they all looked and wondered.

The blood mounted to his face and forehead, crimsoning his features like the sunrise of a rainy day, and then the veins stood out like whipcord upon his brow and arms, but the tree moved not. There was a straining of the eyes of Old Ironsides until they threatened to burst from their sockets, a rigidity of the limbs that though motionless yet indicated that the giant was putting forth every atom of his strength. The spectators scarcely breathed. Then, even before the people were aware of it, the tree began to move, silently, slowly, almost imperceptibly, inch by inch, up from the fallen, injured chopper. There was a suppressed murmur from the crowd, then Hugh with a bound was beside the injured man, and with the assistance of Ande quickly and deftly hauled him from his perilous position. There was a shout from the tavern. The rope and tackle was coming, but there was no need of them. Then Peter Burke, his cross eye glaring at the bystanders, and his other fastened upon Hugh and the succoured one, pushed his rotund, sebaceous body through the crowd, and with one fat, trembling hand extended to Hugh the brandy. A swallow of the fiery liquor and the fellow opened his eyes.

"Hurt much, Tom?" asked Hugh and the chopper's wife in almost one breath.

"Not much. Pretty well shuk up. Yes--pretty well shuk up."

They assisted the fellow to his feet, and then to his cabin home, still muttering in his dazed fashion: "Pretty well shuk up! Yes--pretty well shuk up."

Hugh was relieved. It was evident that whatever injuries he had received, the shock was more than them all, and with rest he would evidently pull through it.

The clang of a breakfast bell sounded on the morning air, and the rafters and travellers trooped to the tavern.

The fame of Dick and his companion speedily spread through the neighbourhood. Dick, according to rough estimates, had lifted a weight of two hundred stone. Hugh Lark was the most affable of all. Tom, the injured chopper, had been a lifelong friend, and this aid to a friend in distress he could not forget.

"Ye'll come down and see my raft," said he after breakfast. "You have never seen a raft and it'll be interesting to see how it's put together, and how we manage it with the great oars; and then I have something to tell you that will be, no doubt, interesting."

Together Hugh and our travellers wended their way around the tavern end, and down the edge of the stream. They rounded a bend in the stream and there, riding in the comparatively quiet water of the eddy, was the raft of the night before. With a bound Hugh was on it, followed by the others.

"Ye'll notice the way it's put together. First we square the timber sticks after they are cut to proper lengths, then tumble them into the water side by side, and bore these holes with the augur three inches apart. Then we get the stoutest ash or hickory poles, green and strong, and lay across the top of them midway between the holes, and bind them to the timber with well seasoned hickory bows and wooden pins. Ah! I see you are trying the oar." This last to Ande, who swung with his weight the great oar blade from its fastenings, and shoved it to and fro. "It's not easy work in a strong flood, and especially in the Rough Water."

"The Rough Water?"

"Aye! That's a section of the stream in the Big Lycamahoning some fifteen miles from here, where in a course of ten miles the water rushes with the speed of a race horse. It's most dangerous because of the rocks and requires a steady head and a ready hand to pilot through. Yet I have done it many a time and had no accidents. I suppose, with the exception of old Pegleg, I'm the only pilot that can say as much," and then seeing the look of inquiry on the faces of his auditors he continued: "Pegleg is a one-legged pilot who feels as much at home on the bobbing raft as he does on the land. But," and Hugh looked at his auditors kindly, "I didn't fetch ye here for the sake alone of showing the raft. I wanted to get you away from the prying eyes and ears of old Peter Burke and the rest. Last night I felt little like saying much about certain knowledge that I have, but men who have favoured our village by saving the life of one of its citizens, and one of my best friends at that, deserve something in return. If you are prospectors, come to my place to-morrow evening and mayhap I can give ye the information that would be of value to you. But not a word to any others, and especially to old Peter."

"We'll be on hand, never fear," said Ande.

There was a crashing in the underbrush of the shore, and two or three of the raftsmen leaped on the raft.

"When do ye think we can safely start, Hugh?" asked one.

"In two days, not before. The flood will take that time to go down to a good rafting stage. In the meantime, boys, we'll go home; but day after to-morrow we start out for down stream."

All returned to the tavern where, after some conversation, the raftsmen betook themselves to their homes and Ande and Dick having mounted their horses, well rested with the night, pushed down stream, toward the west, on a rude, half-cleared mountain trail. The road wound itself in a sinuous line over hills and through deeply wooded glens, but always the roar of the stream was in their ears.

"What boundless forests these are," said Ande, as they rested their horses on the summit of a steep declivity and gazed o'er the rolling mass of treetops. "No wonder Professor Bill was so oratorical. This is the famous country through which Armstrong marched his troops in 1756 against Shingas and Jacobs, the Shawnese chiefs of Kittanning, and near this section, no doubt farther south, poor grandfather lost his life. It was a fatal mistake."

"Perhaps we shall find something in this section that will tell us of your grandfather."

"If we do, it will be in connection with the Indian eldorado, spoken of by my father."

They had pushed on rapidly and were now nearing the mouth of the Little Lycamahoning. The gleam of a great expanse of water between the trees ahead indicated their approach.

"That must be the Big Lycamahoning of which Lark spoke."

"Hist!" said Dick, "there are some wild geese on the big creek. Hear them gabble. There must be fully a score. It's fortunate we have our guns with us."

They were now fairly in the outer shadow of the trees that o'erhung the trail, and the stream, swollen by the flood to three times its natural size, stretched before them three hundred yards in width.

"You take the right of the group, and I'll take the left," whispered Ande.

Simultaneously with the crack of their own guns another sounded from the midst of the willows that fringed the shore. There was a confused "Hank--Hank!" from the frightened birds as they rose in flight. A second later, a light canoe darted swiftly from the willows, and an aged hunter, its only occupant, gathered up the five or six birds that were slain, placed them in his canoe, and rapidly paddled up stream. All happened so quickly that the canoe with its aged occupant shot around a bend in the stream and disappeared from sight before Ande or his friend could say a word.

"Cool robbery! let's after him," said Ande, and suiting his action to the word, he pushed his horse into the stream and swum to the other side, followed by Dick. The trail was struck again on the other side and up the stream they went at as fast a gait as the many stumps and fallen trees would allow. Several times they crossed the stream by swimming their horses. Two miles up stream the creek valley widened and the stream, winding around the base of a hill, formed a loop or peninsula of some fifteen acres or so in extent. Here, in a small, grassy clearing, a rude cabin of unhewn logs greeted their vision. It was a one-storied affair pierced with loopholes, and had a small window in the end facing the stream. The roof of heavy hand-made clapboards, weighted down with poles, was green with age as also were the mossy logs of its walls. The door, a heavy affair of split timber, was ajar and near it on a wooden settle was the figure of the hunter, a man of some seventy years. The hair of his head and beard were snowy white, but his active frame belied his years. He was clad in leathern breeches, heavily fringed along the outer seams, and moccasins of the same tough material. A loose, woollen wamus, the product of the settlements, served in lieu of shirt and coat. His coonskin cap was beside him on the bench and he was busily engaged in plucking the captured birds. The sound of trotting horses aroused him from his work and he cast a keen, scrutinising, blue eye on the approaching invaders of his little domain.

"I say, sir, we'd like to know why you appropriated our birds," said Ande.

"Aye?" inquired the hunter.

Ande repeated the question.

"I shot these birds."

"Well, we shot some too and you seized them all."

"Ye did shoot some?"

"Yes, we did; we were on the road at the fording and fired at them."

The old man gazed at them earnestly, and evidently believing their tale, said:

"I thought that more were killed with my shot than customary, and if ye fired at the same time that I did, that explains my not hearing the report of your guns. Ye are welcome to some of them."

"Oh, no," said Ande, somewhat mollified by the hunter's generosity and explanation. "We thought you were robbing us, but it was clearly a mistake."

"Will ye sit down; it's nigh dinner time and, if ye can eat with a lone old man, you're most welcome. Ye can pasture your horses in that bit of clearing."

The invitation was accepted. The horses were tethered out where they could nibble the grass, and they returned.

"Come from afar?" interrogated the old hunter.

"From Louisiana," said Ande.

"Here hunting?"

"No, prospecting."

The old hunter straightened up as if shot, and gazed at them as if he would pierce them through with those keen, blue orbs of his.

"What for?" suspiciously.

"Metal, either silver or gold," explained Ande, whose suspicions were also aroused.

"Do ye think ye will find it?"

"Yes, somewhere."

"Where?"

"Along this stream."

"And do ye have any aid to help ye in your search?"

"We have little but our own knowledge."

"And your home is in Louisiana?"

"No, we came from there."

The old man arose with the birds which he had finished plucking and cleaning, and was silent for a time while he placed them in a home-made oven for cooking. Returning to the settle he took up the conversation.

"Ye'll find naught here but woods and hills and coal."

"Have you been here long?" asked Ande, in turn becoming the inquirer.

"Nigh sixteen years."

"How does it happen that you, a hunter, should frequent this section, which is rapidly becoming civilised?"

"Well, the country is becoming more peopled the last year or so, but there is still tolerable hunting. There's black bear in plenty, and there's deer, beaver, coon, and wild birds, and then I have other reasons. This is nigh the place where my father was slain."

"Your father was a hunter, too, then?"

"Aye, aye, he hunted some. He hunted some," went on the old hunter, more to himself than his auditors.

"And did Indians kill him?" asked Dick, becoming interested.

"He was captured by Indians and----" The old man shook his head and then: "Dinner is nigh ready and ye are no doubt as hungry as I am myself." The trapper led the way into the little cabin. Everything within was comfortable as the life of the woods could make them. A rough oak table stood near the opened window, a pile of bear and deerskins in one corner near the fireplace indicated the place where the aged hunter took his rest at night, several rifles hung affectionately on the branches of deer antlers o'er the fireplace, and along the wall ran a slab bench cut from a split log, the rounded side down, into which was inserted the legs. The dinner of roast goose was soon placed on the table and the hungry men sat down and did full justice to the fare. The old hunter fell into a stage of taciturnity from which he could not be aroused. Toward the close of the meal the host again became talkative and pressed his guests, if they stayed long in the neighbourhood, to call as often as they liked.

"It's a bit lonely for an old man, and I like company at times," said he, as they were preparing to leave. They promised to come.

The horses were soon untethered and mounting they rode back to Burgtown.

"Dick," said Ande in the privacy of their own room, "I believe that old fellow could tell us something about father, possibly about grandfather. I believe he knows at least something about the eldorado."

"He looked most suspicious when you mentioned that we were prospectors."

"His father was a hunter before him, and surely the one or the other must have met him. We'll see as time goes by. We'll call upon him again and try to worm some knowledge out of him. To-morrow we'll get something, I believe, from Hugh Lark, that will bring us close to the mark at least, I'm a-thinking."