A Boy of the Dominion: A Tale of Canadian Immigration

by F. S. Brereton

That was the utmost that one could say of this mystery. After all, what difference did it make who these strangers might be? It could not help Joe and his friends to be sure of their names, not in the slightest. But still Joe puzzled. Could it be Hurley?

"Nonsense!" he told himself. "Hank must be right. The man would never risk his neck just on the offchance of killing a couple of the men who helped to arrest him. All the same, I wish he'd never escaped, and in any case, I am awfully sorry about that envelope he took from me. I've bothered about it a whole heap; for though I feel sure that the contents were of no actual monetary value, yet there was some message of great importance which Father wished me to have once I had made some sort of a place in the world. What could it have been?"

What, indeed? Of what use to worry, seeing that Hurley had relieved our hero of the missive, and then, when that rascal had been captured, though his dollar bills were forthcoming, there was no trace of the letter? It was gone. Perhaps even Hurley was already captured, while the men following at that moment, and still out of sight, had undoubtedly no connection with the outlaw who had so nearly ended Joe's attempts at settling in this vast dominion.

"Guess they've been bothered by the trees, and has had to climb out of the sledges and walk quiet," chuckled Hank, when a quarter of an hour had passed without a sight of the enemy. "Now see here, mates, our game aer as clear as daylight. With this here snow all around we can't hope to smother our tracks and get clear off. Ef it war springtime, or summer, a babe could do it. There's fifty ways more or less. We could climb a tree, sneak along from branch to branch in a wood same as this and then drop into a river, takin' care to land somewhere whar there was rock. In course, ef it snowed jest now that'd help us. But then it ain't goin' to snow. There's nary a cloud in the sky, so it simply comes to holding them off as long as we're able, and this here aer jest the spot to work it. Guess me and Joe'll have a bite while Jack watches. When we've done, he can have a turn."

It was an excellent proposal on the hunter's part, and Joe seized upon the opportunity, for the brisk air and the excitement of the day had given him a keen appetite, and our hero had become somewhat notorious for that since he came to this glorious country. He and Hank sat down, therefore, and, pulling some of their ready-cooked food from their pack bags, made a hearty meal. Then Beaver Jack was relieved, while Joe took his place.

"Jest keep yer eyes skinned, and follow every inch of the line of the wood 'way across the open," said Hank. "I'm goin' to take a look round on either hand and in front. It wouldn't do to sit tight here waitin' and waitin', and have them skunks round us up and come along towards us from the opposite direction. You kin never say what sort o' tricks a half-breed will be up to, so jest look lively."

He went off through the trees for all the world as if he were a ghost, his snowshoes making not so much as a sound. Joe lay flat on his face in the snow, taking the same position that Beaver Jack had selected. Placing his rifle a little to one side and somewhat in front, he stared steadily across the open, watching the edge of the wood from which they had themselves lately emerged, and then gazing to right and to left. But not yet could he detect the presence of the enemy, and since they were not there, he fell again to wondering who they were, from whence they had come, and for what purpose they had attacked a party of hunters who could by no possibility have done them harm, and who, in any case, could not be the possessors of great wealth. As to his own feelings on the question of personal danger, he had not so much as a qualm. Perhaps, if he had been warned that an attack was to be made, he would have been thrown into that curious condition which is neither caused by fear nor by anxiety, but merely by that natural agitation of spirit which comes to the average man when danger threatens. But here Joe had been, as it were, suddenly pitchforked into the midst of turmoil. At one moment he had been facing a charging moose, a situation requiring nerve, and the next he had found himself the object of bullets sent by an enemy from behind. Ah, there they were! The irregular line of the forest was of a sudden broken; Joe had been gazing in that direction but a second earlier and had seen nothing. Now, when his eyes swung once more to that quarter, two sleighs stood out prominently, their dog teams sprawling out ahead of them. The dark figures of five men moved about the sleighs, and it was clear from their movements that they had been marching through the forest, and were now about to mount their vehicles again.

"Slipping off their snowshoes and getting ready for a burst of speed across the open," said Joe to himself. "That'll be the time to read 'em a lesson, and seems to me they deserve one."

He turned his head for a moment and beckoned to Beaver Jack; then, picking up his rifle, he laid the sights on one of the sledges and waited for a forward move on the part of the enemy. Nor could it be said that our hero had the smallest doubt as to what his action should be, or the slightest compunction at the thought of firing on these strangers.

"It's they or us," he told himself, "and they have a bigger party. Ah! what's that? More of them!"