“It is quite a long way to the lake, and the trail is very rough,” she said.
“It is,” admitted Weston, who was glad to find a point on which he could agree with her. “In fact it’s a particularly wretched trail. Still, you have managed it several times, and we have generally left the canoe here.”
“This time,” said Ida, “we will take it down to the lake. I may want it to-morrow. You will have a difficult portage unless you go down the fall.”
Weston recognized that this was correct enough, for the river was shut in by low crags for the next half-mile at least, and he remembered the trouble he had had dragging the canoe when he brought it up. He had also had Grenfell with him then.
“Well,” he said, “if you would rather not walk back, it must be managed.”
“I told you I wanted the canoe on the lake tomorrow,” said the girl.
Weston was quite aware that there was another canoe which would serve any reasonable purpose already on the beach, but he merely made a little sign of comprehension and waited for her to go. Somewhat to his annoyance, however, she stood still, and he proceeded to drag out the canoe. The craft was not particularly heavy, but it was long, and he had trouble when he endeavored to get it upon his back. He had more than once carried the Siwash river-canoes over a portage in this fashion, but there is a trick in it, and the birch craft was larger and of a different shape. He felt that he could have managed it had there been nobody to watch him, but to do it while the girl noticed every movement with a kind of sardonic amusement was quite a different matter. He was very hot when, after a struggle of several minutes, he got the craft upon his shoulders; and then, after staggering a few paces, he rammed the bow of it into a tree. The shock was too much for him, and he went down head-foremost, with the canoe upon him, and it felt quite heavy enough then. As the man who attempts the feat has his hands spread out above him, that fall is, as a rule, a very awkward one. It was a moment or two before he crawled out from under the craft, gasping, red in face, and somewhat out of temper, and he was not consoled by his companion’s laugh.
“I am sorry you fell down, but you looked absurdly like a tortoise,” she observed.
Weston glanced at the canoe disgustedly.
“Miss Stirling,” he said, “I can’t carry this thing while you stand there watching me. Do you mind walking on into the bush?”