A little satisfaction was obtained by this advance move, for when this village was reached, Levi was found waiting.
“I’ve been watchin’ for the gal over eight months now, under pay from Mr. Frisbie,” he assured Old Cy when they met. “I also sent word to Old Tomah late last fall, ’n’ he came out o’ the woods ’n’ stayed here two months, but nothin’s been heard o’ poor Chip by any one, ’n’ I doubt ever will be.”
“Mebbe not yet,” answered Old Cy, “but thar will be some day, an’ here, too. She hadn’t a cent when she left Greenvale–only grit, ’n’ it’s a long ways here fer a gal what’s got to arn her vittles while she’s trampin’. It may be one year, it may be two, but some day Chip’ll show up here, if she lives to do it. I callate I’d best wait here a few weeks tho’, an’ then, if nothin’ turns up, I’ll start ag’in.”
Nothing did, however; but during his stay, Old Cy learned that Chip’s entire history, from the night she left Tim’s Place until she ran away from Greenvale, was known at this village. This fact was of no value whatever, except to prove the universal interest all humanity has in the fate and fortune of one another.
“I never told what happened in the woods,” Levi responded when Old Cy questioned him, “an’ didn’t need to, for it got here ’fore I did. I jest ’lowed it was true, ’n’ that I was hired to wait and watch here for Chip. It’s curis, too, how everybody here feels ’bout it. They’re a poorish sort here, families o’ lumbermen, men that work in the sawmills, some farmin’, an’ all findin’ it hard work to git a livin’. An’ yet they’re so interested in Chip ’n’ so sorry for her, if she shows up now she’d be carried ’round the village like some queen ’ud be, with everybody follerin’. Thar’s ’nother curis thing happened since I’ve been here that I’d never believed o’ these people neither. I told them, of course, who I was, ’n’ what I was here for, ’n’ who was payin’ me, when I come, an’ then as time kinder went slow, I began huntin’ some ’round here. Wal, thar’s a little graveyard up back o’ the village ’n’ all growed up to weeds ’n’ bushes, an’ one day last fall I happened to be lookin’ it over ’n’ somebody come ’long. It was a man that keeps store here, an’ I asked him if ’twas here Chip’s mother was buried. He said ’twas, an’ pointed out the spot ’way up in one corner, ’thout any stone, ’n’ the mound most hid in a tangle. I didn’t say nothin’–jest looked, an’ went on, ’n’ that was all. Wal, the curis part is last spring they sot a couple o’ men to work cleanin’ up the graveyard o’ bushes an’ laid out walks ’n’ built a new fence ’round it. That one unmarked grave got the most attention o’ all, for they turfed it over nice and built a little fence ’round it. I kinder callated how ’n’ why it all come ’bout, ’n’ feelin’ I oughter do suthin, I had a little stun sot up with Chip’s mother’s name on it.”
But time also went “kinder slow” for Old Cy, and as the date for Martin’s probable coming had now passed, he finally yielded to Levi’s suggestion and the call of the wilderness as well, and the two started for Martin’s camp.
It was almost like a pilgrimage to one’s boyhood home; for while scarce a year had elapsed since Old Cy and Martin’s party left it, Nature, always seeking to hide human handiwork, had been busy, and the garden was a tangle of weeds. Amzi’s old cabin was almost hid by bushes, the walks were choked with them, and a colony of squirrels frisked about, and now, alarmed at human presence, added a touch of pathos.
One act of vandalism was in evidence, for some wandering trappers had apparently used the larger cabin the previous season. Its floor was littered with all manner of débris, the bones of a deer mouldered in the woodshed, and a family of porcupines had also found the premises available. The impression conveyed by the entire spot and its surroundings made even Levi gloomy, while Old Cy scarce spoke the entire first day there, except to exclaim at “varmints” who would break locks, use the cabin for months, and then leave a litter of garbage to draw vermin.
“It’s curis how near to hogs ’n’ hyenas a few humans are,” he said as he looked around and saw how these vandals had behaved. “They wa’n’t satisfied with burglin’ the cabin, turnin’ it into a pig-pen, stealin’ all they could carry off, but they was so durned lazy, they smashed up the furniture to burn.”
For a few days only these two fine old backwoodsmen tarried here, and then Old Cy proposed departure.