"All right, if you like," the student agreed, and Miss Covert quickly added her assent. The twins admired the stone house, the fireplaces, and the piano, but with rather an abstracted manner. Soon the cause of their absent-mindedness transpired. Mr. Merrithew had met some Indians that afternoon, when they were out paddling, and had bought a salmon from them. This had led to a conversation about salmon-spearing, and the Indians had promised to come the following night, and show them how it was done. They could take one person in each canoe, and Mr. Merrithew had said that Carl and Hugh should be the ones. Of course they were greatly excited over this prospect, and chattered about it all the way back to the tents.
"A GREAT BONFIRE WAS BUILT"
That evening, when dusk had settled down, a great bonfire was built, and they all sat around it on rugs and shawls, in genuine camp-fashion. First, some of the favourite games were played,—proverbs, "coffee-pot," characters, and then rigmarole, most fascinating of all. Rigmarole, be it known, is a tale told "from mouth to mouth," one beginning it and telling till his invention begins to flag or he thinks his time is up, then stopping suddenly and handing it on to his next neighbour. The result is generally a very funny, and sometimes quite exciting, medley. To-night Mr. Merrithew began the story, and his contribution (wherein figured a dragon, an enchanted princess, and a deaf-and-dumb knight) was so absorbing that there was a general protest when he stopped. But the romancer was quite relentless, and his next neighbour had to continue as best he could. Even Jackie contributed some startling incidents to the narrative, and when at last Mrs. Grey ended it with the time-honoured (and just at present, most unfortunately, out-of-fashion!) assurance that they all, even the dragon, "lived happy ever after," there was a burst of laughter and applause. Then some one began to sing, and one after another the dear old songs rose through the balmy night. Sometimes there were solos, but every now and then a chorus in which all could join. Dora sang every French song she knew,—"A la Claire Fontaine" ("At the Clear Fountain"), "Malbrouck," and "Entre Paris et Saint-Denis" ("Between Paris and St. Denis") proving the favourites. Mrs. Grey, who declared she had not sung for years, ventured on "The Canadian Boat-Song" and "Her bright smile haunts me still." At last, when voices began to grow drowsy and the fire burned low, they sang, "The Maple-Leaf For Ever" and "Our Own Canadian Home," then rose and joined in the camp-hymn,—"For ever with the Lord," with its:
"And nightly pitch our moving tents
A day's march nearer home."
The next day seemed to fly, to every one, at least, but Carl and Hugh. Their hearts were so set on the salmon-spearing that for them the time went slowly enough till night brought the four Indians with their torches and spears. Doctor Grey and Mr. Merrithew walked along the shore to see what they could of the proceedings, but the rest—and even Will—were content to sit around the fire as before. Carl sat in the middle of one canoe, and Hugh in the other, both greatly excited and both trying to think themselves quite cool. Only the steersmen paddled,—the bowmen kneeling erect and watchful, with their spears in readiness. (The salmon-spear is a long ash shaft, with two wooden prongs and a metal barb between them. The spearing of salmon, by the way, is restricted by law to the Indians, and any white man who undertakes it is liable to a fine.) Sticking up in the bow of each canoe was a torch, made of a roll of birch-bark fastened in the end of a split stick. The red-gold flare of these torches threw a crimson reflection on the dark water, and shone on the yellow sides of the birches, and the intent, dusky faces of the fishermen watching for their prey. Slowly, silently, they paddled up the stream, till at last the silvery sides of a magnificent fish gleamed in the red light. Then, like a flash, a spear struck down, there was a brief struggle, and the captive lay gasping in the foremost canoe. It was too much for Hugh. He had enjoyed with all his boyish heart the beauty and the weirdness of the scene, but the beautiful great fish, with the spear-wound in his back,—well, that was different. He was not sorry that the Indians met with no more luck, and was very silent when the others questioned them, on their return, as to the joys of salmon-spearing. When he confided to Carl his hatred of the "sport," the latter shook his head doubtfully.
"But you will help eat that salmon to-morrow," he said.
"Well,—perhaps," Hugh answered, "but, all the same, it's no fun to see things killed, and I'm not going to if I can help it!"
The fortnight of camp life passed like a dream, and it is hard to tell who was most sorry when the day of departure came. Dora, who had written a regular diary-letter to her father and mother, and begun one of the stories that were to be like Mrs. Ewing's, said that never in all her life had she had such a beautiful time. Katherine Covert, with life-long friends to "remember camp by," and all sorts of happy possibilities in her once gray life, bore the same testimony with more, if more quiet, fervour. Mr. Merrithew said that he was ten years younger, and Jackie opined that, in that case, they must have been living on an enchanted island,—but added, that he was very glad he had not been made ten years younger, like Daddy!
Brown and plump and strong of arm, the campers brought back with them hearty appetites, delightful recollections, and inexhaustible material for dream and plan and castles in the air.