“It’s smoke, master; I’ve see’d it for some time, and mayhap we’ll find some Injins there who can give us news of the traders at Stoney Creek.”
“And, pray, how far do you think we may now be from that place?” inquired Harry.
“Forty miles, more or less.”
As he spoke, the canoe entered the shallow water of the creek, and began to ascend the current of the stream, which at its mouth was so sluggish as to be scarcely perceptible to the eye. Not so, however, to the arms. The light bark, which, while floating on the lake, had glided buoyantly forward as if it were itself consenting to the motion, had now become apparently imbued with a spirit of contradiction, bounding convulsively forward at each stroke of the paddles, and perceptibly losing speed at each interval. Directing their course towards a flat rock on the left bank of the stream, they ran the prow out of the water and leaped ashore. As they did so, the unexpected figure of a man issued from the bushes and sauntered towards the spot. Harry and Hamilton advanced to meet him, while Jacques remained to unload the canoe. The stranger was habited in the usual dress of a hunter, and carried a fowling-piece over his right shoulder. In general appearance he looked like an Indian; but though the face was burned by exposure to a hue that nearly equalled the red skins of the natives, a strong dash of pink in it, and the mass of fair hair which encircled it, proved that, as Harry paradoxically expressed it, its owner was a white man. He was young, considerably above the middle height, and apparently athletic. His address and language on approaching the young men put the question of his being a white man beyond a doubt.
“Good-morning, gentlemen,” he began. “I presume that you are the party we have been expecting for some time past to reinforce our staff at Stoney Creek. Is it not so?”
To this query young Somerville, who stood in advance of his friend, made no reply, but stepping hastily forward, laid a hand on each of the stranger’s shoulders, and gazed earnestly into his face, exclaiming as he did so—
“Do my eyes deceive me? Is Charley Kennedy before me—or his ghost?”
“What! eh,” exclaimed the individual thus addressed, returning Harry’s gripe and stare with interest, “is it possible? No—it cannot—Harry Somerville, my old, dear, unexpected friend!”—and pouring out broken sentences, abrupt ejaculations, and incoherent questions, to which neither vouchsafed replies, the two friends gazed at and walked round each other, shook hands, partially embraced, and committed sundry other extravagances, utterly unconscious of, or indifferent to, the fact that Hamilton was gazing at them, open-mouthed, in a species of stupor, and that Jacques was standing by, regarding them with a look of mingled amusement and satisfaction. The discovery of this latter personage was a source of renewed delight and astonishment to Charley, who was so much upset by the commotion of his spirits, in consequence of this, so to speak, double shot, that he became rambling and incoherent in his speech during the remainder of that day, and gave vent to frequent and sudden bursts of smothered enthusiasm, in which it would appear, from the occasional muttering of the names of Redfeather and Jacques, that he not only felicitated himself on his own good fortune, but also anticipated renewed pleasure in witnessing the joyful meeting of these two worthies ere long. In fact, this meeting did take place on the following day, when Redfeather, returning from a successful hunt, with part of a deer on his shoulders, entered Charley’s tent, in which the travellers had spent the previous day and night, and discovered the guide gravely discussing a venison steak before the fire.
It would be vain to attempt a description of all that the reunited friends said and did during the first twenty-four hours after their meeting: how they talked of old times, as they lay extended round the fire inside of Charley’s tent, and recounted their adventures by flood and field since they last met; how they sometimes diverged into questions of speculative philosophy (as conversations will often diverge, whether we wish it or not), and broke short off to make sudden inquiries after old friends; how this naturally led them to talk of new friends and new scenes, until they began to forecast their eyes a little into the future; and how, on feeling that this was an uncongenial theme under present circumstances, they reverted again to the past, and by a peculiar train of conversation—to retrace which were utterly impossible—they invariably arrived at old times again. Having in course of the evening pretty well exhausted their powers, both mental and physical, they went to sleep on it, and resumed the colloquial mélange in the morning.
“And now tell me, Charley, what you are doing in this uninhabited part of the world, so far from Stoney Creek,” said Harry Somerville, as they assembled round the fire to breakfast.