Throughout the long, sunny afternoon, I watched the interesting pastime with keen enjoyment. Had not my exchequer been so pitifully low, I should have staked a dime or so myself upon Salina Ann. She won three races in succession and finally retired, giddy, but triumphant.
When the last race was over, as much as four dollars had changed hands, and there were loud protests against the system of bookmaking employed. As an outsider, I was appealed to, but I declined to interfere, and, remembering the long fourteen-mile walk which lay between me and my cabin, I loosened up for the home stretch, noting, as I started, that the peculiar, pointed rock had disappeared from the opposite hill.
During the ninth mile from the Porcupine track, I was acutely conscious of observation. Little Brothers of the Woods can always feel the bright eyes that are turned upon them from the thickets. I paused several times, but heard nothing and saw nothing, though I put on my glasses and thus gained a sort of second sight.
Afterward, I meditated. Perhaps the ban upon me had been removed and the forest folk no longer feared to look at me. I made one maltese cross in my note-book, drawing a red circle about it to indicate possibilities, and entered a full account of the Porcupine race, which so far, according to my knowledge, has been described by only one other writer.
My sleep was more nearly normal that night than it had been since the lamentable occurrences chronicled in the previous chapter.
For a time, my life was as usual. I arose in the morning, just before sunrise, and took a cold bath in the lake. Then I built a fire and made coffee. I had postponed my trips to town until afternoon in order to attend the Porcupine races, and this condemned me to drink my own coffee, but many sacrifices must be made by the earnest student. I would wash the dishes, swishing them back and forth in the lake, sweep and dust the cabin, and, by nine o’clock, be ready to devote myself to literature.
I worked until twelve, when I prepared luncheon, cleared up again, cut wood if I needed it, and started for town. I had timed myself and learned that it took me just forty minutes to walk the fourteen miles. I thus had ample time to go to the post-office, and usually reached Porcupine Hill a few minutes before the entertainment began.
It must have been two weeks later that, in the same section of the homeward trail, I again felt myself keenly observed. It was disquieting, more especially as I beat about among the bushes for a long time without finding anything. I meditated that night in two separate meditations of one hour each, but came to no conclusions.
By the pitiless light of high noon and the baldly truthful report of my grandmother’s cracked mirror, opportunely left in the cabin, I discovered that I was moulting at the top, and cast about for some means to remedy the condition, not caring to be a front row observer at the noble drama of Unnatural History. While in town that day, I purchased a small flask of whiskey, as I had seen in the beauty columns, more than once, that it was a good hair tonic, but I did not know whether to apply it internally or externally.
I attended the Porcupine race that afternoon, and lost forty-three cents on Salina Ann, who flunked miserably every time. Much depressed, I started homeward, just at sunset, and, in a quiet place, I attempted to improve my spirits by taking a teaspoonful of the hair tonic. I learned immediately that the remedy was not meant to be used internally, and I did not doubt that external application would produce a crop of tresses which might well be the envy of a professional musician.