“Now, fellows, don’t you think we’d better get a move on us?” added the leader. “We’ve half a dozen miles to do yet; but the trail begins right here, and is clearly blazed all the way to our camp. Let’s keep a stiff upper lip, and the journey will soon be over.”
It was very delightful to sit there in the crisp October air, with the brook seemingly humming tender legends of the woods, which witless men could not translate, with an uncertain breeze playing through the newly fallen maple-leaves, now turning them one by one in lazy curiosity, then of a sudden making them caper and swirl in a scarlet merry-go-round. Still, the young Farrars were not loath to move on. Now that they were nearing the climax of their journey, their minds were full of Herb Heal. Their longing to meet this lucky hunter grew with each mile which drew them nearer to him.
They pressed hard after their leader, looking neither right nor left, while he carefully followed the trail; and one hour’s tramping brought them to the shores of Millinokett Lake.
Here, despite their eagerness to reach their new camp, they were forced to stop and admire the great sheet of forest-bound water, smiling back the sky in tints of turquoise and pearl, dotted with apparently countless islets, like specks upon the face of a mirror.
The irregular shores of the lake were broken by “logons,” narrow little bays curving into the land, shining arms of water, sometimes bordered by evergreens, sometimes by graceful poplars and birches. From the opposite bank the woods stretched away in undulating waves of ridge and valley to the foot of Mount Katahdin, which still showed grandly to the northward.
“Millinokett Lake,” said Cyrus, prolonging the syllables with a soft, liquid sound. “It’s an Indian name, boys; it signifies ‘Lake of Islands.’ Whatever else the red men can boast of, the music of their names is unequalled. I don’t know exactly how many of those islets there are, but I believe Millinokett has over two hundred of them anyhow. Our camp is on the western shore. Shall we be moving?”
After skirting the water for another mile or two, the travellers reached a broad, open tract, bare of timber. At the farther end of this clearing were two log cabins, low, but very roomy, situated at a distance of a few hundred yards from the lake, with a background of splendid firs and spruces, the lively green of the latter making the former look black in contrast.
“Is that our camp? How perfectly glorious!” boomed Neal and Dol together.
“It’s our camp, sure enough,” answered Garst, with no less enthusiasm. “At least the first cabin will be ours. I don’t know whether there are any hunters in the other one just now.”
The log shanties had been put up by an enterprising settler to accommodate sportsmen who might penetrate to this far part of the wilds in search of moose or caribou. Cyrus had arranged for the use of one during the months of October and November. Here it was that Herb Heal had engaged to await him. And as he had commissioned this famous guide to stock the camp with all such provisions as could be procured from neighboring settlements, such as flour, potatoes, pork, etc., he expected to slide into the lap of luxury.