Chapter 6

"That's the way to talk, lad! That's the way!" and Skipper Zeb slapped him on the shoulder, his characteristic method of expressing approval. "You has the makin's in you of a fine trapper and hunter. You fits yourself to what you has to meet and to do, whether 'tis a bit hard or whether 'tis easy. 'Twere a long way for young legs that's not used to un. Bein' on the path settin' up traps is a wonderful sight different from bein' snug and warm with a good bed o' nights at home. You lads stands un like old hands at un."

"Thank you, Skipper," and Charley was proud, as was Toby, at the word of praise. Every one likes to be praised for an act well done, or done to the best of one's ability, and Skipper Zeb, who in a crude way was a student of human nature, and carried a gentle, affectionate heart in his bosom, never failed to speak a word of praise where it was deserved. He knew that a kindly word of appreciation for a deed well done, often proved an incentive to greater effort. A little flower handed to the living is better than a wreath placed upon the casket of the dead. Skipper Zeb gave his flowers of kindliness to those about him while they lived and could enjoy them.

"Now, lads," said Skipper Zeb when they had finished their evening meal, and he was puffing his pipe comfortably by the warm stove, "I has a line o' traps to set up to the east'ard of the tilt that I weren't settin' up before we goes in, and two days' work to do about here whatever. We've been havin' a long spell o' fine weather like we mostly has before winter sets in hard. The wind is shiftin', and before to-morrow night, whatever, there'll be snow. Early in the marnin' I thinks you had better start back with the boat, and be gettin' snug at Double Up Cove before the snow comes."

"When'll you be gettin' home, Dad?" asked Toby.

"I'll be gettin' home the Saturday or Sunday before Christmas, whatever," promised Skipper Zeb, "and I'll be stayin' for a fortnight holiday when I comes."

"Won't you be home before then?" asked Charley in astonishment.

"No, I has to keep tendin' the traps once I sets un," explained Skipper Zeb. "'Tis the only way to get fur."

"I should think you'd get dreadfully lonesome on the trail alone," said Charley, "and we'll miss you."

"A busy man's not havin' time to get lonesome. 'Tis only idleness that makes for lonesomeness."

The sky was heavily clouded the following morning, and a brisk northeasterly breeze, cold and raw, was blowing. Toby and Charley bade good-bye to Skipper Zeb, and hoisting the sail departed for Double Up Cove.

"The breeze'll be helpin' you now," shouted Skipper Zeb from the shore. "Make the most of un, and don't be takin' too much time to boil the kettle at Swile Island!"

"Aye," shouted Toby, "we'll be makin' the most of un."

Charley watched Skipper Zeb standing on the shore and looking longingly after them, and then turn back to his lonely work in the wilderness, and he, himself, felt suddenly very lonely.

With unexpected suddenness the wind rose to half a gale before they had spanned two-thirds of the distance to Swile Island. The boat shipped several seas, and while Charley bailed the water out, all of Toby's seamanship was required to keep her on her course, until at length, to their great relief, a landing was made on the lee side of the island.

"I was sure we'd be wrecked again!" exclaimed Charley when he and Toby, dripping wet, had hauled the prow of the boat upon the sloping rock of the island shore.

"'Twere a bit rough," admitted Toby. "We'll have to bide here till the wind goes down, and I'm thinkin' there'll be snow before we gets the kettle boiled."

"And we haven't any tent!" exclaimed Charley in consternation.

"We'll be makin' a lean-to with the sail," suggested Toby. "We'll not find un so bad. We'll make un before we boils the kettle."

The boat was unloaded, and under the lee of a big rock, where they were protected from the wind also by a grove of spruce trees, Toby selected two trees about seven feet apart, and five feet from the ground and lashed a pole from tree to tree. He then cut several poles, and arranged them evenly with one end resting upon the pole which he had lashed to the tree and the other end sloping back to the ground. To make the sloping poles secure and hold them in place, he laid another pole between the trees, and on top of the sloping poles, lashing this also firmly into place, and then placed a log over the ends of the poles on the ground to hold them in position.

With Charley's assistance he now spread the boat sail over the poles, and tied it into place. Then at each end of the lean-to be and Charley placed a thick barricade of spruce brush. A floor of boughs finished and made comfortable the shelter, and a fire built against a rock in front of it, that the rock might serve as a reflector, soon made the lean-to warm and snug.

There was no abatement of wind, and snow was falling thickly before they had finished eating, and when they were through, Toby suggested:

"I'm thinkin' we'd better haul the boat up farther and turn she over."

"All right," agreed Charley, "let's do it now. It don't look as though we'd get off the island to-day."

"Not till the wind stops, whatever," said Toby. "We may have to bide here two or three days, _I'm_ thinkin'."

This was a new adventure. Charley rather enjoyed the prospect of it, and Toby perhaps equally as well, and as they walked down to their landing place they chatted merrily about what they would do, when all at once both boys stopped and looked at each other aghast. The boat was not there!

"She's gone!" exclaimed Toby. "The tide were risin' up and floatin' she off!"

"What shall we do?" asked Charley in dismay. "We can't get off the island without a boat!"

"'Tis a bad fix," confessed Toby. "They's no way o' gettin' off the island without the boat. I'm not knowin' rightly what to do. 'Tis the worst fix I _ever_ were in!"

The snow was now falling heavily, driven in thick, swirling clouds by the gale. Everywhere they looked along the shore, in the vain hope that the boat may have drifted in at some other point, and eagerly they looked out into the drifting clouds of snow in the equally vain hope that it might be seen floating near enough to the shore to be recovered by some means. But nowhere was it to be seen, and the two boys, depressed by a sense of helplessness to extricate themselves from the small, isolated and nearly barren island that had so suddenly become their prison, turned back to the partial protection of their improvised shelter.

Disconsolate, they sat under the lean-to and talked over their dilemma while the snow beyond the fire grew thicker, and the wind shrieked and howled dismally through the trees.

"You thinks 'twere bad when the ship leaves you at Pinch-In Tickle," said Toby finally, "but we're gettin' in a wonderful sight worse fix!"

"Yes," agreed Charley dejectedly, "of all that's happened, this is the worst fix of all."

"All we has to eat," continued Toby, "is half a loaf o' bread, a small bit o' pork and enough tea for one or two days, besides the three geese Dad were sendin' home to Mother."

"Perhaps we can get some game on the island?" suggested Charley.

"No," said Toby, "they's no game here. 'Tis too small an island."

"Is any one likely to come this way in a boat?" asked Charley hopefully.

"No," answered Toby discouragingly. "We're clost to the head o' the bay, and nobody ever comes here except Dad. We're sure in a wonderful bad fix, Charley."

XII

THE PANGS OF STARVATION

When the first shock at the loss of their boat had passed, youthful buoyancy of spirit asserted itself, and the two castaways looked more hopefully upon their position. By eating lightly, Toby declared they could make a goose last them two days, and thus they had six days' rations of goose. The other food they would consider another day's rations. Thus, while they would not have as much to eat by any means as they might wish, they would do fairly well for a week.

"'Tis the comin' o' winter," prognosticated Toby. "'Tis gettin' frostier all the time, and when the storm clears 'twill settle down to steady freezin' day and night. If she does, the bay's like to fasten over soon, and then we'll be walkin' back to Double Up Cove on the ice, and couldn't use a boat if we had un."

"How long will it likely be before the bay freezes?" asked Charley anxiously.

"Soon as the wind stops and she calms down. After she begins freezin' she'll keep freezin' and ice is like to make fast," Toby explained. "The ice'll hold us in one or two days after she fastens, whatever, and there'll be fine footin' then to Double Up Cove."

"Then we're not likely to be here very long, and that's a comfort," said Charley, much relieved.

"Not so long, I'm thinkin'," agreed Toby.

There was a good deal of driftwood on the island shores, and dead wood scattered over the island, and upon Toby's suggestion they carried a quantity of this to the lean-to, and piled it at one side of the big boulder against which the fire was built. A huge pile was collected to serve as a reserve supply of fuel, that they might have a-plenty on hand to serve their needs, should the storm continue for two or three days, as Toby predicted it would, in which case the dead wood scattered over the island might be buried so deeply beneath the snow that they could not reach it.

When Toby deemed the supply of dead wood sufficient, even in case of a greater emergency than he anticipated, he felled some green trees, trimmed the branches from the trunks, and cut the logs into convenient lengths for use upon the fire, and these Charley carried to the lean-to and piled at the opposite side of the boulder, that either dry or green wood might be had as desired.

"The green wood's slow to get started," said Toby, "but 'twill burn longer and keeps a fire longer."

Toby's judgment in collecting a reserve supply of fuel proved sound. Before night came a sudden and decided increase in the fall of snow rendered it unsafe to move a score of feet from the shelter, and the boys were thankful for the foresight that had led them to provide for the emergency.

Comfort and luxury are measured by contrast and comparison. The mail boat had seemed to Charley bleak and uncomfortable as compared to the luxurious home he had just left. The cabin at Pinch-In Tickle had appealed to him as a crude and miserable shelter in contrast to the mail boat, and he had wondered how the Twigs could exist in a place so barren of what he had always looked upon as the most necessary conveniences. But after his experience on the trap boat, and the retreat from the Duck's Head camp, the Twig home, at Double Up Cove, in all its simplicity, was accepted by him as possessing every necessary comfort. Now, in contrast to the buffeting snow and wind which he and Toby had been fighting all day, even the rough lean-to assumed a cozy atmosphere, the fire before it blazing cheerily, and the boulder against which the fire was built reflecting the heat to the farthest corner.

"I never thought a place like this could be so snug," said Charley, when they had plucked and dressed one of the geese, and after disjointing it with his sheathknife Toby had put it over the fire to boil in the kettle, and the two boys lay upon their bough bed basking in the warmth and sniffing the appetizing odour sent forth from the kettle, while beyond the fire the snow drifted and the wind whistled.

"'Tis snug now," agreed Toby. "'Tis an easy way o' makin' a place to bide in when they's no tent."

"Your father always says not to worry," said Charley reflectively. "I know he's right, and it never helps a fellow any to worry. I'm not going to worry again. I'm sure the ice will come in time to get us out of here. When we found the boat was gone I _was_ worried though! I'm almost glad now we got caught here. When I get home and tell Dad about it he'll think it was just great!"

"No, as Dad says, 'twill do no good to worry, because worry unsets the insides of our heads and then that upsets our other insides and we gets sick," commented Toby. "We're about as well off without the boat as we would be with un. 'Tis lookin' to me like the start of winter, and if 'tis, I'm thinkin' the bay'll fasten over by the time the storm's over and before we could be gettin' away with the boat if we had un, and we'd be havin' to walk whatever."

"Do you mean walk on the ice when it comes?" asked Charley anxiously. "Won't that take a good while? We won't starve before then, will we?"

"We may be havin' some hungry days, but we'll not be starvin'," suggested Toby. "Indians has hungry spells when they don't get deer sometimes, and if Indians can stand un we can."

"Yes," Charley boasted, "if the Indians can stand it we can."

It was long after dark, and the evening well advanced, when they ate a most satisfying supper of boiled goose. After they had eaten Toby cut a supply of dry shavings and kindling wood from the hearts of dead sticks, which he split, and stowed the shavings and kindling wood behind their sleeping bags where the snow could not reach them to wet them, and they would be ready for instant use in the morning. Then he piled an extra supply of dry wood upon the fire, and upon this placed two of the green logs, remarking:

"The green wood'll not be goin' out so quick when she gets goin', and the coals are like to keep the fireplace free o' snow longer if she drifts in whilst we sleeps."

Never had Charley experienced such a storm. The weather had suddenly grown intensely cold, as he discovered when he stepped beyond the fire's glow. Now, snuggling down into his sleeping bag, it seemed to him that all the forces of nature had broken loose in their wildest fury. Above the shriek of wind was heard the dull thud of pounding seas upon the rocks, and the hiss of driving snow, combining to fill the air with a tumult little less than terrifying.

Once, in concern, he spoke to Toby, but there was no response, and he knew that Toby was asleep. For a time he lay awake and listened to the roar of the storm and the thunder of the seas, and then, wearied with the day's labours and adventures, the shriek of wind and hiss of snow and roar of pounding seas blended into blissful unconsciousness, and he slept as peacefully as he would have slept in his bed at Double Up Cove.

When the young adventurers awoke the next morning, there was no abatement in the storm. A huge drift covered the boulder and the place where their fire had been, and nearly enclosed the front of the lean-to; and before they could lay a fire, a half hour's hard work was necessary to clear the snow away, each using a snowshoe in lieu of a shovel.

Then Toby lighted a fire, and soon the lean-to was warm again, and the kettle boiling merrily, and they ate a light breakfast of goose, a little of the remaining bread, and one cup each of weak tea sweetened with molasses.

"We'll have to be a bit careful o' the grub," advised Toby, "and not eat all we wants. There's no tellin' how long 'twill be before the bay freezes over. I'm thinkin' if we eats only twice a day 'twill be best."

"That's good sense," agreed Charley. "We'll not be doing anything but waiting here, and we'll have to make two meals do us."

For four days and four nights the blizzard raged without abatement, and when the sky cleared on the fifth day, a new intense cold had settled upon the world. When the boys were able again to venture forth, they discovered that while the smooth rocks of the island had been swept clear of snow by the wind, huge drifts had formed against every obstructing boulder, and among the trees the snow lay a full four feet deep.

"It's a good time for me to learn to use snowshoes," suggested Charley. "I'm going to put them on and try them."

"'Tis, now," agreed Toby. "Get un out, and we'll see how you likes un."

Toby adjusted the slings for Charley, and then donning his own the two set out in the deep snow on the center of the island. At the beginning Charley stumbled, and falling in the snow could not get upon his feet without Toby's assistance; but in a little while he discovered that he could swing along at a good pace, and Toby pronounced him an "easy larner."

"I'm thinkin' Dad's at Black River tilt yet," said Toby when the snowshoe lesson was finished and they had returned to their fire. "He'll be havin' a wonderful bad time settin' up his path again. The marten traps'll be above the snow, settin' on trees, but the mink and fox traps'll be deep enough under."

"Our snares will all be covered up," suggested Charley. "We'll never find them."

"We'll never dig _they_ out, whatever," agreed Toby. "When we gets home we'll be settin' new ones."

"It seems to me it must be cold enough to freeze the bay," said Charley wistfully. "We haven't much goose left, and if it doesn't freeze soon we'll not have any left."

"'_Tis_ cold enough," said Toby, "but the sea'll have to calm down before she freezes. We'll have to bide here three or four days more, _what_ever."

Two days later they ate the last of the goose, and that night went to their sleeping bags with no breakfast in view for the following morning. Still the waters of the bay gave no promise of freezing when they awoke. Heavy seas were breaking in from the eastward, though for three days the sky had been clear.

With scant meals the boys had been hungry for several days, and now with nothing to eat they became ravenous. They could talk of little else than the good things they would have to eat when they were safely back at the cabin at Double Up Cove, and the possibility of the early freezing of the bay. Every little while during the day they wandered out along the shore in the hope that they might discover that the sea was calming, only to return each time with little to encourage them.

"I'm as hollow as a drum," Charley declared when night came and they had settled in their sleeping bags. "I don't see how I can stand it another day. Isn't there something we can find to eat?"

"I'm wonderful hungry too," admitted Toby. "I'm as empty as a flour barrel that's been scraped, and I'm not knowin' anything we could find to eat, with snow on the ground. If the ground were clear we might be findin' berries, though I'm doubtin' there's many on Swile Island. But if there are, they're under the snow and they'll have to bide there, for we never could be findin' they."

"It seems to me I can't sleep without something to eat," Charley complained. "I just can't stand it much longer, that's all."

"Try gettin' asleep," counseled Toby, "and when you gets asleep you'll be forgettin' about bein' hungry."

Charley did get to sleep readily enough, but it was only to dream that he was hungry, and always in his dreams he was about to get food, but something happened to keep it from him.

Two more days passed, and still the boys were without food. No one can know but one who has starved the degree of their hunger and craving for food during this period. Nothing that might have served as food would have been rejected by them or have been repugnant to them, but no morsel could they find. It was on the morning of the third day of their famine, when hunger pangs were the keenest, that Toby announced:

"I been prayin' the Lard to send the ice, and telling He how we wants to get away from here but don't know how until ice comes. Has you been prayin', Charley?"

"No," confessed Charley, "I've been growling around about our hard luck and about being hungry. All I know is the Lord's prayer anyhow. I never was taught to pray out of my head. How do you do it?"

"Just talk to the Lard like you talks to anybody," said Toby in astonishment. "Ask He what you wants He to give you or wants He to do, just like you asks your Dad."

"You pray for both of us," suggested Charley. "Do it aloud so that I can hear it, and I'll say it over to myself, and maybe that will help. Don't forget to tell Him how hungry we are."

"I'm not doubtin' 'twould help," agreed Toby. "We'll be takin' off our caps. 'Twill be more respectful. Mr. Stuart at the Hudson's Bay Post makes us take off our caps when we talks to he and asks he anything."

"Yes, and we'd better get on our knees too," suggested Charley.

"Aye, 'twould be respectful," Toby agreed. "Dad says 'tis fine to kneel when 'tis so we can, though if we can't, to pray standin' up or rowin' a boat, or any way that's handiest."

Taking off their caps and kneeling upon their sleeping bags under the lean-to, and bowing their heads reverently, Toby prayed:

"Charley and I are wonderful hungry, Lard. We been bidin' here on this island, which we calls Swile Island, goin' on ten days. We only has two meals a day till day before yesterday, and since then we has nothin' and to-day we has nothin'. Please, Lard, calm the sea and let the bay fasten over so 'twill be right to walk on, and we'll be goin' to Double Up Cove where our home is. You know all about it, Lard. We been doin' our best, Lard, and we don't know anything more to do. We're in a wonderful bad fix, and we needs help to get out of un. We're wantin' somethin' to eat, Lard, and we'll be wonderful thankful for un. Amen."

The boys sat down and resumed their caps, and in a moment Charley said:

"That was a bang up prayer, Toby. I couldn't have thought of a thing to say, except that I was hungry, but you thought of everything."

That evening Toby announced that the sea was calmer, but still too rough to freeze, and the next morning that the water was much "steadier," though yet not enough to freeze.

"If she keeps on steadyin' down I'm thinkin' by to-morrow marnin' she'll begin to fasten."

"I'm not half so hungry as I was," said Charley, "but I'll be just as glad to get away from here."

"That's the way I hears the Indians say 'tis," said Toby, "and that's the way 'tis with me. I wants to eat, but I'm not hankerin' after un the way I was first."

Another morning brought a calm, though still unfrozen, sea. The boys were early by the shore to scan eagerly the waters.

"She's smokin'!" exclaimed Toby. "She's smokin'! 'Tis a sure sign!"

"What do you mean?" asked Charley excitedly. "Do you mean that haze that hangs over the water?"

"Aye," explained Toby, "'tis what we calls the sea smoke."

But this time the sign failed, and another morning dawned with the sea still free from its wintry shackles. A gentle swell, but quite enough to prevent the hoped for freezing, was rolling in, and the boys, quite discouraged, returned to their fire.

"We can't stand it much longer," declared Charley, making no effort to conceal his discouragement. "I'm getting so weak I don't believe I can ever walk to Double Up Cove, even if it does freeze. I'm weak and I'm sleepy all the time. We've been days without eating, and even when it does freeze you say we'll have to wait a day or two before the ice outside will be strong enough to bear our weight."

"Don't be talkin' that way now," counseled Toby. "We were prayin' the Lard, and He'll fix un for us. Keep a stout heart We'll not be givin' up hopes for another week, _what_ever."

"The Lord don't seem to be answering our prayer," retorted Charley.

And Toby, though he hid his thoughts within his breast, realized, even better than did Charley, that their position was now desperate, and that with another day or two without food they might become too weak to make the journey to Double Up Cove. Even were the bay to freeze that very night, at least two days must elapse before the water at a distance from shore would be hard enough frozen to bear their weight, and permit them to cross to the mainland.

XIII

THE GREAT SNOWY OWL