The falls of the river offered, as Rolf had foreseen, a noble chance for power. Very early he had started a store and traded for fur. Now, with the careful savings, he was able to build his sawmill; and about it grew a village with a post-office that had Rolf's name on the signboard.
Quonab had come, of course, with Rolf, but he shunned the house, and the more so as it grew in size. In a remote and sheltered place he built a wigwam of his own.
Skookum was divided in his allegiance, but he solved the puzzle by dividing his time between them. He did not change much, but he did rise in a measure to the fundamental zoological fact that hens are not partridges; and so acquired a haughty toleration of the cackle-party throng that assembled in the morning at Annette's call. Yes, he made even another step of progress, for on one occasion he valiantly routed the unenlightened dog of a neighbour, a “cur of low degree,” whose ideas of ornithology were as crude as his own had been in the beginning.
All of which was greatly to his credit, for he found it hard to learn now; he was no longer young, and before he had seen eight springs dissolve the snow, he was called to the Land of Happy Hunting, where the porcupine is not, but where hens abound on every side, and there is no man near to meddle with his joy.
Yet, when he died, he lived. His memory was kept ever green, for Skookum Number 2 was there to fill his room, and he gave place to Skookum 3, and so they keep their line on to this very day.
Quonab Goes Home
The public has a kind of crawlin' common-sense, that is always right and fair in the end, only it's slow—Sayings of Si Sylvanne.
Twenty years went by. Rolf grew and prospered. He was a man of substance and of family now; for store and mill were making money fast, and the little tow-tops came at regular intervals.
And when the years had added ripeness to his thought, and the kind gods of gold had filled his scrip, it was that his ampler life began to bloom. His was a mind of the best begetting, born and bred of ancient, clean-blooded stock; inflexibly principled, trained by a God-fearing mother, nurtured in a cradle of adversity, schooled in a school of hardship, developed in the big outdoors, wise in the ways of the woods, burnt in the fire of affliction, forced into self-reliance, inspired with the lofty inspiration of sacrificial patriotism—the good stuff of his make-up shone, as shines the gold in the fervent heat; the hard blows that prove or crush, had proved; the metal had rung true; and in the great valley, Rolf Kittering was a man of mark.