The Masters of the Peaks: A Story of the Great North Woods by Joseph A. Altsheler (christmas read aloud TXT) 📗

fire, and, taking their time about it, they broiled bear meat, strips of the deer they had killed and portions of wild pigeon and the rare wild turkey. Varied odors, all appetizing, and the keen, autumnal air gave them an appetite equal to anything. Yet Willet lingered long, seeing that everything was exactly right before he gave the word to partake, and then they remained yet another good while over the feast, getting the utmost relish out of everything. When they finally rose from their seats on the logs, two hours had passed since Willet had awakened Garay and he went back to him.

"Your letter?" he said.

"I have no letter," replied Garay, "but I'm very hungry. Let me have my breakfast."

"Your letter?"

"I've told you again and again that I've no letter."

"It's now about 8:30 o'clock; at half past ten I'll ask you for it again."

He went back to the two lads and helped them to put out the fire. Garay set up a cry for food, and then began to threaten them with the vengeance of the Indians, but they paid no attention to him. At half past ten as indicated by the sun, Willet returned to him.

"The letter?" he said.

"How many times am I to tell you that I have no letter?"

"Very well. At half past twelve I shall ask for it again."

At half past twelve Garay returned the same answer, and then the three ate their noonday meal, which, like the breakfast, was rich and luscious. Once more the savory odors of bear, deer, wild turkey and wild pigeon filled the forest, and Garay, lying in the doorway of the hut, where he could see, and where the splendid aroma reached his nostrils, writhed in his bonds, but still held fast to his resolution.

Robert said nothing, but the sardonic humor of both the Onondaga and the hunter was well to the fore. Holding a juicy bear steak in his hand, Tayoga walked over to the helpless spy and examined him critically.

"Too fat," he said judicially, "much too fat for those who would roam the forest. Woodsmen, scouts and runners should be lean. It burdens them to carry weight. And you, Achille Garay, will be much better off, if you drop twenty pounds."

"Twenty pounds, Tayoga!" exclaimed Willet, who had joined him, a whole roasted pigeon in his hands. "How can you make such an underestimate! Our rotund Monsieur would be far more graceful and far more healthy if he dropped forty pounds! And it behooves us, his trainers and physicians, to see that he drops 'em. Then he will go back to Albany and to his good friend, Mynheer Hendrik Martinus, a far handsomer man than he was when he left. It may be that he'll be so much improved that Mynheer Hendrik will not know him. Truly, Tayoga, this wild pigeon has a most savory taste! When wild pigeon is well cooked and the air of the forest has sharpened your appetite to a knife edge nothing is finer."

"But it is no better than the tender steak of young bear," said Tayoga, with all the inflections of a gourmand. "The people of my nation and of all the Indian nations have always loved bear. It is tenderer even than venison and it contains more juices. For the hungry man nothing is superior to the taste or for the building up of sinews and muscles than the steak of fat young bear."

Garay writhed again in his bonds, and closed his eyes that he might shut away the vision of the two. Robert was forced to smile. At half past two, as he judged it to be by the sun, Willet said to Garay once more:

"The papers, Monsieur Achille."

But Garay, sullen and obstinate, refused to reply. The hunter did not repeat the question then, but went back to the fire, whistling gayly a light tune. The three were spending the day in homely toil, polishing their weapons, cleaning their clothing, and making the numerous little repairs, necessary after a prolonged and arduous campaign. They were very cheerful about it, too. Why shouldn't they be? Both Tayoga and the hunter had scouted in wide circles about the camp, and had seen that there was no danger. For a vast distance they and their prisoner were alone in the forest. So, they luxuriated and with abundance of appetizing food made up for their long period of short commons.

At half past four Willet repeated his question, but the lips of the spy remained tightly closed.

"Remember that I'm not urging you," said the hunter, politely. "I'm a believer in personal independence and I like people to do what they want to do, as long as it doesn't interfere with anybody else. So I tell you to think it over. We've plenty of time. We can stay here a week, two weeks, if need be. We'd rather you felt sure you were right before you made up your mind. Then you wouldn't be remorseful about any mistake."

"A wise man meditates long before he speaks," said Tayoga, "and it follows then that our Achille Garay is very wise. He knows, too, that his figure is improving already. He has lost at least five pounds."

"Nearer eight I sum it up, Tayoga," said Willet. "The improvement is very marked."

"I think you are right, Great Bear. Eight it is and you also speak truly about the improvement. If our Monsieur Garay were able to stand up and walk he would be much more graceful than he was, when he so kindly marched into our guiding hands."

"Don't pay him too many compliments, Tayoga. They'll prove trying to a modest man. Come away, now. Monsieur Garay wishes to spend the next two hours with his own wise thoughts and who are we to break in upon such a communion?"

"The words of wisdom fall like precious beads from your lips, Great Bear. For two hours we will leave our guest to his great thoughts."

At half past six came the question, "Your papers?" once more, and Garay burst forth with an angry refusal, though his voice trembled. Willet shrugged his shoulders, turned away, and helped the lads prepare a most luxurious and abundant evening meal, Tayoga adding wild grapes and Robert nuts to their varied course of meats, the grapes being served on blazing red autumn leaves, the whole very pleasing to the eye as well as to the taste.

"I think," said Willet, in tones heard easily by Garay, "that I have in me just a trace of the epicure. I find, despite my years in the wilderness, that I enjoy a well spread board, and that bits of decoration appeal to me; in truth, give an added savor to the viands."

"In the vale of Onondaga when the fifty old and wise sachems make a banquet," said Tayoga, "the maidens bring fruit and wild flowers to it that the eye also may have its feast. It is not a weakness, but an excellence in Great Bear to like the decorations."

They lingered long over the board, protracting the feast far after the fall of night and interspersing it with pleasant conversation. The ruddy flames shone on their contented faces, and their light laughter came frequently to the ears of Garay. At half past eight the question, grown deadly by repetition, was asked, and, when only a curse came, Willet said:

"As it is night I'll ask you, Achille Garay, for your papers only once every four hours. That is the interval at which we'll change our guard, and we don't wish, either, to disturb you many times in your pleasant slumbers. It would not be right to call a man back too often from the land of Tarenyawagon, who, you may know, is the Iroquois sender of dreams."

Garay, whom they had now laid tenderly upon the floor of the hut, turned his face away, and Willet went back to the fire, humming in a pleased fashion to himself. At half past twelve he awoke Garay from his uneasy sleep and propounded to him his dreadful query, grown terrifying by its continual iteration. At half past four Tayoga asked it, and it was not necessary then to awake Garay. He had not slept since half past twelve. He snarled at the Iroquois, and then sank back on the blanket that they had kindly placed for him. Tayoga, his bronze face expressing nothing, went back to his watch by the fire.

Breakfast was cooked by Robert and Willet, and again it was luscious and varied. Robert had risen early and he caught several of the fine lake trout that he broiled delicately over the coals. He had also gathered grapes fresh with the morning dew, and wonderfully appetizing, and some of the best of the nuts were left over. Bear, deer, venison and turkey they still had in abundance.

The morning itself was the finest they had encountered so far. Much snow had fallen in the high mountains, but winter had not touched the earth here. The deep colors of the leaves, moved by the light wind, shifted and changed like a prism. The glorious haze of Indian summer hung over everything like a veil of finest gauze. The air was surcharged with vitality and life. It was pleasant merely to sit and breathe at such a time.

"I've always claimed," said Robert, as he passed a beautifully broiled trout to Tayoga and another to the hunter, "that I can cook fish better than either of you. Dave, I freely admit, can surpass me in the matter of venison and Tayoga is a finer hand with bear than I am, but I'm a specialist with fish, be it salmon, or trout, or salmon trout, or perch or pickerel or what not."

"Your boast is justified, in very truth, Robert," said Willet. "I've known none other who can prepare a fish with as much tenderness and perfection as you. I suppose 'tis born in you, but you have a way of preserving the juices and savors which defies description and which is beyond praise. 'Tis worth going hungry a long while to put one's tooth into so delicate a morsel as this salmon trout, and 'tis a great pity, too, that our guest, Monsieur Achille Garay, will not join us, when we've an abundance so great and a variety so rich."

The wretched spy and intermediary could hear every word they said, and Robert fell silent, but the hunter and the Onondaga talked freely and with abounding zest.

"'Tis a painful thing," said Willet, "to offer hospitality and to have it refused. Monsieur Garay knows that he would be welcome at our board, and yet he will not come. I fear, Robert, that you have cooked too many of these superlative fish, and that they must even go to waste, which is a sin. They would make an admirable beginning for our guest's breakfast, if he would but consent to join us."

"It is told by the wise old sachems of the great League," said Tayoga, "that warriors have gone many days without food, when plenty of it was ready for their taking, merely to test their strength of body and will. Their sufferings were acute and terrible. Their flesh wasted away, their muscles became limp and weak, their sight failed, pain stabbed them with a thousand needles, but they would not yield and touch sustenance before the time appointed."

"I've heard of many such cases, Tayoga, and I've seen some, but it was always warriors who were doing the fasting. I doubt whether white men could stand it so long, and 'tis quite sure they would suffer more. About the third day 'twould be as bad as being tied to the stake in the middle of the flames."

"Great Bear speaks the truth, as he always does. No white man can stand it. If he tried it his sufferings would be beyond anything of which he might dream."

A groan burst suddenly from the wretched Garay. The hunter and the Onondaga looked at each other and their eyes expressed astonishment.

"Did you hear a sound in the thicket?" asked Willet.

"I think it came from the boughs overhead," said Tayoga.

"I could have sworn 'twas the growl of a bear."

"To me it sounded like the croak of a crow."

"After all, we may have heard nothing. Imagination plays strange tricks with us."

"It is true, Great Bear. We hear queer sounds when there are no sounds at all. The air is full of spirits, and now and then they have sport with us."

A second groan burst from Garay, now more wretched than ever.

"I heard it again!" exclaimed the hunter. "'Tis surely the growl of a bear in the bush! The sound was like that of an angry wild animal! But, we'll let it go. The sun tells meet's half past eight o'clock and I go to ask our guest the usual question."

"Enough!" exclaimed Garay. "I yield! I cannot bear this