DAN RICE’S NEW YEAR FROLIC
by M.G. McClelland.
Among the mountain fastnesses the snow lay fifteen inches deep in the open, a thing without precedent in the memory of the oldest hunter in the Humpback region. The cowled peaks uplifted themselves, wanly, and lay against a hard distance in mysterious, alien solitude.
In the midst rose Humpback, his indented crest losing outline for days together by reason of the snow clouds that coifed it. In the hollows, where many of the mountaineers lived, the snow was much deeper, wind-drifted in swaths, fit to bury a man to the middle. Many of the trails were blocked and, when the wind changed and a slight thaw set in, followed by a freeze, the snow packed and crusted, which made travel bad for people who had never even heard of snow-shoes. The wild creatures suffered most, and whole covies of game birds perished in the drifts from cold or starvation. On the other hand, minks, otters, foxes, and nature’s other carnivorous children fattened apace, slipping about the white frozen world, like demons of the inner circle, and feasting upon the bodies of the dead.
As the cold increased, big game was driven from inaccessible haunts and wandered afield in search of food, even venturing, by night, close to the cabins and fodder-stacks of the people. Deer trails grew plentiful, and the big cushioned track of bear could be seen in many of the hollows.
When the cold first swooped upon them, the people curled up like touched caterpillars, and devoted every energy not frost-bitten to keeping themselves warm. Their cabins were built on hygienic principles, and the very earth beneath them was unaccustomed to the rigor of a hard chill. After a week of it, finding themselves still living, the men began to take interest and a hunting epidemic broke out and spread.
Dan Rice, the owner of good hunting dogs, became the most popular man in the neighborhood and had his vanity so tickled that he decided to give a party, just to show the folks what a fellow he was and what a figure he could make when he set his mind to it. He had a big buck swung up by its heels in his smoke-house, and nearly two flour barrels full of small game, besides the intimate friendship of a distiller of “moonshine,” so that he felt himself in a position to invite his friends to make merry with him and “damn the expense.”
“’Twill thaw we-all up, an’ start the sap runnin’,” he explained to his wife. “Thar’s plenty to do with, so you an’ the gals buckle on an’ don’t have no sparin’ an’ pinchin’. This here shindig have got to make a record.”
Word of the extent and elegance of the preparations went around with the invitations, and also that Mrs. Rice and her daughters would appear in new calicos made specially for the occasion. Immediately every female invited felt life unendurable without similar decoration, and domestic atmosphere grew fevered with discussions of patterns and styles.
Tom Westley’s pretty little near-sighted wife secured the sweetest thing in rosebuds on a dark red ground, and stitched away at it energetically. Her baby was nearly three months old now and her interest in the outside world was returning. The grooves of her life were well defined and narrow, so that any extraneous happening became an event charged with unbalancing excitement.
There was to be a big deer hunt with Rice’s hounds, as a preliminary to the ball, and every able-bodied man about the district expected to take part in it. Westley proposed to his wife to go over to the Rice’s early in the day and let him join her there after the hunt, but got flouted. Mrs. Rice would be run off her legs with the preparations, her considerate little neighbor declared, and would be justified in regarding premature arrivals with disgust. She—Susan Westley—was a housekeeper herself and knew about these things. Besides, her own dress was unfinished, and she had a making of soap in the lye which must be attended to. Then it was arranged that Tom should meet her at a specified fence corner, a quarter of a mile from their house, just before, or on the edge of dark. The way to the fence was through a cleared field and perfectly open. She knew it as well as she did her own door yard.
“Don’t git so fired up huntin’ that you forgit me,” she admonished, as she gave her husband his breakfast on the important morning. “It’s a mile over to Rice’s an’ woods nigh all the way. The moon won’t be up, time I want to start n’other, so I’d be feared. Aim to be at the fence fust, will you?”
“All right,” Tom acquiesced easily. “I’ll be thar sure as shootin’, so thar aint no call to fluster. Don’t keep me waitin’ no longer ’n you can help for it’s tarnation cold loafin’. Wrop the youngster up tight, or he’ll freeze. He ain’t none too fleshy.”
He had the child on his knee and was feeding it with scraps of his own breakfast, calmly confident that as the boy is father to the man that which is good for him at one point of his development must be beneficial all along the line. The baby was chipper and healthy, but exceedingly small, a fact used to shame his parents by the possessors of more stalwart off-spring.
Breakfast despatched, Westley handed the child to his wife, and invested himself with a shaggy overcoat and coon-skin cap, made with ear-tabs and a droll peak in front which stuck out keenly.
“You want to keep out ’n the bushes,” laughed his wife, as she opened the door for him, “or somebody ’ll be shootin’ you for a b’ar. That thar peak an’ your nose, comin’ together, makes a mighty good snout an’ all the balance looks shaggy. Folks can’t hardly tell no dif’ence, fust look.”
Westley tweaked his cap further forward. “Ev’rybody aint short-ranged like you,” he responded. “Thar’s a chance o’ ’em down out’n the mountains folks say but I aint seed none. Wish I could. ’Twould be somethin’ to brag about to kill a bustin’ big b’ar. Far’well, honey, take keer o’ yo’se’f, an’ don’t keep me loafin’ out yonder ’till ’tother fellows git the fust shot off Dan’s vittles.”
Left alone, the little woman worked busily, trying to crowd into the short daylight hours as much as they would hold. Her soap making required more time than she had allowed for so that twilight had deepened to night-fall before she had everything arranged to her mind and herself and the child made ready for the expedition.
The snow clouds had disappeared, leaving a thin, keen atmosphere through which the starlight could penetrate. This, with the snow-shimmer, made a pallid, mysterious lustre, exciting to the imagination, but insufficient for guidance, except in places where the way was open and familiar. The path across the field was a foot under cover, but a big sycamore grew near the trysting place by which it could be identified. The accustomed aspect of the earth had vanished and in its place was illusion and mystery.
Sue Westley hurried forward, hugging the cocoon which contained her baby close to her breast. She crossed the field hap-hazard, straining her near-sighted eyes for a glimpse of the sycamore, which was her objective point. Ice-coated weeds uplifted themselves above the snow crust on every side, and, when her skirts brushed against them, the ice broke and fell off with a faint metallic tinkle. The crunching of the snow under foot made her nervous, giving her the feeling of being followed, and involuntarily she began to work herself into a panic of fear that Tom would not meet her.
Her relief was proportionately great when, nearing the fence, she dimly discerned something tall and bulky leaning against it. She quickened her pace and became explanatory.
“I’m awful sorry I ke’p you waitin’, Tom, but I couldn’t git through no quicker,” she said eagerly. “That thar soap done meaner ’en any truck ever biled. Look, to me, like jedgment day’d git here afore it thimbled. That threw me late milkin’ an’ feedin’, an’ thar was baby to dress an’ me too. You’re nigh frozen I reckon, but we-all can walk rapid the balance o’ the way. Here, take the baby whilst I unhook my dress. It’s caught on a scrop o’ bresh.”
Scarcely noticing, she rested the child on the top-rail, steadying it there with one hand, while she bent down and freed her skirt. The figure beside the fence made no answer, but reached forward and drew the bundle from under her hand.
Sue turned to the next panel, which was unincumbered by brush, and climbed it with the agility of a monkey. Tom had remembered, and been before her at the tryst. A warm glow of satisfaction was generated in her heart and sent her spirits up to mischief heat. She sped forward, with a laugh, and then turned and began jumping backwards, chattering like a black bird. Tom must carry the baby awhile, she declared, her arms were tired, and besides she wanted to frolic. Then she swooped sideways and tried to grab up a handful of snow, but the hard crust defied her. No matter; snow balling Tom might be fun, but there was the danger of hitting the baby. She steadied herself and called out to him to hurry up and join her. She wanted to hear about the hunt.
In the pause in her own volubility, made for reply, she suddenly became conscious of an absolute silence, as of a vast void wherein nothing moved, or breathed, except herself. She shivered, and her spirits began to fall as rapidly as they had risen. Two explanations of this singular silence, both equally obnoxious, swept into her mind. Tom was trying to play a foolish practical joke; or else he had been drinking too much and leaned on the fence drowsing and unable to move.
She started back at a keen run when the sound of a man’s whistle cleft the stillness, arresting her steps and causing her to face about uncertainly. Tom was crunching over the snow towards her, swinging a lighted lantern and trilling like a mocking-bird.
Whatever shame he may have felt for his tardiness was effectually routed by his wife’s wild demand for her child, and the sight of her excitement when he, in his turn, inquired “what in thunder she meant?”
She threw up her hands with a cry that cut through him.
“You were thar!” she wailed. “Thar by the fence, just now, waitin’ for me. I seed you. An’ you took the baby whilst I turned myse’f loose from the bresh. Whar is he? If you’ve hid him in the snow he’ll catch his death. Quit foolin’, Tom, an’ git him for me! I’m skeered all to pieces anyhow, an’ can’t stan’ no such as that. Git him for me!”
Bewildered to the verge of idiocy, Tom protested his innocence. He had not seen the child since he left home that morning, and had no thought of joking. He had only just gotten there. Luck had been good, which made him late. Then he drew from her as connected an account of the occurrence as her excitement would allow, and suggested that, owing to the imperfect light and her own defective vision, she might have mistaken a brush heap against the fence for a man and laid the baby in it. They went back at once, Tom talking volubly to conceal unreasoning anxiety, and Sue frankly terrified and moaning just above her breath.
At the place where Sue had crossed, the snow-crust was shattered in a large circle; they scarcely looked at it, one swing of the lantern, low to the ground, being sufficient to identify the spot. Midway of the adjoining panel the crust was broken also, but less heavily, and Tom went on his knees and examined the marks with the experienced eye of a hunter. There were faint but plainly perceptible scratches on the snow, as though claws had scraped downward as the crust sagged under weight. Tom examined the fence, holding the lantern close and scanning the rails intently. On several he found hairs, caught under splinters, and collected them until he had quite a number between his forefinger and thumb. They were something over an inch long, brown in color, and very fine and glossy—the hairs of an animal. He laid them together in his palm, and held the light so that his wife could see and realize the significance of the discovery. No sound escaped either; they simply stared at each other, the face of the father stiffening like stone, while that of the mother blanched to the pallor of snow with the draining of blood from her heart.
The horrible truth seemed everywhere, in the earth, in the air, and to shout itself through the spaces of the infinite.
Mistaking it for her husband, the woman had unwittingly given her baby to a bear.
The man was the first to recover himself. His hunting experiences had trained him to be prompt in emergency and ready in resource at all times, but now, under this emotional stress, his brain worked with astonishing quickness. Much time had already been wasted, and every second was precious. The bear might still be at hand, in one of the adjacent hollows. His lair was probably up among the heights, but he might stop somewhere. Tom’s mind shied away from thought of that which might cause delay, and harnessed itself to action. He must follow the trail on the instant, going swiftly, with crest lowered and light to the ground. He was unarmed except for a hunting knife in his belt, but, in his then mood would not have hesitated to attack a grizzly with naked hands.
The first step of course was to rid himself of his wife. She stood as one dazed, her eyes fixed upon him, but unseeingly. She seemed to be taking no notice, but he knew well enough that if he should move she would follow him. What he wanted was to prevent her from seeing, unprepared, that which he might find: to get her away to some sheltered place where there were other women. Knowing instinctively the value of domination to one in her condition he laid his hand on her shoulder and ordered her as if she were a child.
“Listen, Sue,” he said peremptorily; “I’ve got to have help, an’ have it damned quick. You must run like a wild turkey over to Rice’s an’ rouse up men an’ dogs an’ start ’em arter me. They kin ketch up my trail from here. I’ve got to shove on at once. It’s the boy’s best chance.”
Hope and life sprang like a flame to Sue’s face. “Air thar any chance?” she demanded.
“Yes, if you’ll help me,” Tom answered, feeling drearily confident that he was lying, but keeping on all the same. “B’ars have been knowed to play with babies, like cubs, an’ never hurt a ha’r o’ ’em. Now, travel like lightenin’!”
Sue pressed herself close to him and held his lips with a brief kiss. “If the child’s dead ye must kill me,” she muttered, and, before he could answer, fled away from him through the night.
How she got over to Rice’s Sue Westley could never describe. In her mind was a confused jumble of forest and hillside which seemed to cut her off from everywhere, and of a sinuous trail to which she held by instinct, catching her garments on the bushes as she ran, stumbling, falling, cutting her hands and bruising her body against broken ice and unexpected up-juttings of granite. Her sun-bonnet caught on a low-hanging bough and was jerked from her head, but she sped on unheeding; her abundant blond hair shook from its coil and lay along her back like a half-twisted rope. At last she won free of the woods and tumbled, rather than climbed, over the rail fence surrounding Rice’s clearing, and raced in among the revellers with her face white as chalk and her breath coming and going in gasps.
They could make nothing of her story, at first, until Rice, a man gifted with common sense, got her into a chair and made her swallow half a tumbler of hot whiskey toddy. As the liquor got in its work her nerves steadied and she was able to make them understand the situation and the necessity there was for haste. Comment and question circulated like lightning and excitement rose to fever heat. Bears, hunger-driven from the heights, were known to be rambling about, so that the situation held grim possibilities. It seemed probable that this very animal had had the Westley pig-pen for his objective point and that he had just up-reared himself to climb the fence when the woman appeared and thrust her baby under his nose. All thought of jollification vanished like mist and every able-bodied man in the crowd grabbed for his gun and whooped up the hounds.
Tom, meanwhile, followed the dents in the snow-crust, thankful for his own forethought in providing himself with a lantern. The moon would be up after a little, but in the urgent present the necessity for light was overwhelming. The trail led him through a jungly hollow and across a long ridge into another hollow. Here some clearing for firewood had been made and the trees were scattered at long intervals, with stumps and brush heaps between, transformed by a mantling of snow into strange similitudes.
As he entered the place, Tom was conscious of a soft increase of light and glancing backward beheld a three-quarter moon disengaging herself from the tree-tops. In a few moments she had won clear and was sailing upward into unobstructed space, from whence she cast earthward rays which were refracted from millions of snow crystals.
Tom held to the trail like a blood-hound, but near the centre of the clearing he was brought up all standing by the most singular spectacle his eyes ever beheld. Not fifty yards ahead was the bear, erect upon his hind legs and gyrating slowly in a circle as though keeping time to imaginary music. As Tom looked, the beast bent downward and cautiously executed a somersault, grunting with joy in his own performance. Then he moved backward in a straight line, as though to give himself headway, and suddenly bounced toward the pivotal point of the circle, like a trap-ball, landing close beside a small dark object plainly discernible upon the snow. This he caught in his paws and rolled about softly, playing with it as a cat plays with a kitten.
The wind, so far, had been in Tom’s favor, but, as the animal frolicked, he veered about a bit and caught it full-tainted from the hunter’s direction. He threw up his head uneasily and drew the scent into his nostrils. Tom dashed forward at once, conscious that the smallest delay would enable the bear to grab the baby and make off with it. He whipped out his knife as he leapt and howled like a Comanche, hoping to strike terror to the ursine soul. When he got to close quarters he dealt the beast a crashing blow over the muzzle with his lantern, and, in the momentary advantage so gained, contrived, with a strong shove of his foot to send the baby skating along the snow-crust to a considerable distance.
Then the enraged animal rose on his hind legs and gripped him.
Tom lunged with his knife, but failed to strike a vital part and before he could draw out and strike a second time, the bear had a good body grip and was squeezing. Fortunately for Tom the bear was only medium sized, while he, himself, was a big man and a fine wrestler. The breath was being hugged out of him, but his right arm was free so that he was able to match science against brute strength. Thrusting his forearm under his adversary’s chin nearly to the elbow he made a lever of his own body and forced the head up and backward until, to save his neck from dislocation, the bear was compelled to loosen his grip and threw himself on his back, with Tom uppermost. In the fall, Tom freed his other arm and got hold of the hilt of his knife, which he began to saw about in the wound furiously.
How the battle would have ended, had the combatants been left to themselves, is an open question. It was still undecided when the baying of hounds came over the ridge and Dan Rice’s pack swept into the hollow in full cry and threw themselves, en masse, upon the quarry.
After them came the hunters, traveling impetuously and in bunches. They found Tom sitting on the bear’s carcass, with a small bundle hugged to his breast and all the dogs squatting on their haunches about him in a sympathetic semi-circle.
They bore home the bear and the baby in triumph and Sue Westley had to stand some rough joking anent her mistake, which she minded no more than the whistling of the wind. Why should she? Was not the baby alive and crowing in her arms, and Tom the hero of the hour because of his prowess? The fiddlers tuned up their instruments and the women set about restoring to toothsomeness the belated supper, so that, despite the interruption, the frolic came off hilariously and fulfilled Dan’s ambition by making a record.
Two things alone blunted the edge of Tom’s satisfaction. One was that a small iron ring was discovered in the bear’s muzzle, showing that at one portion of his career it must have been accustomed to human dominance. This probably accounted for its gentleness and antics with the baby, but it also took the bloom off of boasting.
The other trouble was the publicity given the affair by the county newspaper, which published the story in detail. This last, Tom regarded narrow-mindedly, and denounced as an outrage.
“Its dog-goned impidence an’ meddlesomeness,” he fumed. “An’ if ’twarn’t for makin’ bad wuss, by givin’ him another tale to yelp over, I’d b’ar-bait that thar outdacious varmint in his own hollow. What sort o’ trick is it to play on a fellow, to set all the state o’ Virginny grinning like a ’possum at him bekase his own wife didn’t have enough gumption to know him from a b’ar?”
At which protest his neighbors howled with derision and unfeelingly reminded him that when certain adventures of theirs had been made public through the same medium he, Tom, had considered the matter vastly amusing.
Drawn by Clinton Peters.