“I carry you,” he said with determination, and, getting his arms around Tom’s body, he sought to heave him on his shoulders. He really might have carried him, for Charlie was used to carrying tremendous loads over canoe portages, but Tom’s faintly reviving spirit rebelled. He slipped down, clung to a tree for several seconds, and tried to steady his whirling head.
“You come,” said Charlie anxiously. “That red-hair man, he be back quick, mebbe. I wait long time.”
Tom had only a vague notion of what the Ojibway meant. He could not remember what had happened; he knew only that some danger hung over him like a nightmare. He let the tree go and attempted to walk. He reeled, and would have fallen but for Charlie’s quick grasp. Then Charlie got an arm around his body, and, half carrying, half leading him, managed to steer him through the woods.
It seemed an endless way to Tom, but it could have been only a few rods, when the Indian uttered a wearied grunt of satisfaction, and Tom saw the shimmer of moonlight on water. Charlie let him go, to sink on the ground, and vanished. In a minute or two he was back, and helped Tom down to the shore. Tom saw a canoe without surprise. He managed to get into it somehow without upsetting it, and settled down into a crumpled heap amidships. Charlie got into the stern, and without a sound the craft glided down the shore, keeping in the shadows of the trees.
By slow degrees the boy’s wits returned, helped by the fresh lake air. Leaning over, he splashed water on his head, which hurt severely. The douche cooled and refreshed him. Memory struggled back.
Painfully he remembered the knock-out he had received—Harrison’s proposal—his scouting at the raft—groping his way back step by step. Of what had taken place after he had been struck senseless he had no idea, nor how much time had passed. From the feeling of the air, it seemed to him that it must now be late in the night.
“Where are we going, Charlie?” he said thickly, over his shoulder.
“By gar, I think you mebbe dead, Tom!” exclaimed the Indian, in excited, though subdued tones. “We go good place. I fix you up all right. Mos’ there now.”
They were going down Little Coboconk now, taking less care to keep out of the moonlight. Just at the lower end of the lake Charlie ran the canoe ashore beside a great log, got out, and helped Tom to disembark. He lifted the canoe out of the water and stowed it somewhere in the dark undergrowth; and then, with an air of being familiar with the place, he grasped Tom’s arm and conducted him among the spruces by several mazy turnings, and at last indicated by a pressure on his shoulder that he was to sit down.
Tom dropped gratefully, finding himself on a thick pile of spruce twigs. Above him he found a rough shelter of bark and boughs.