His appearance on the deck of the Ellen B. caused something like a panic. The man at the wheel abandoned his post, and as he started for the cross-trees let loose a yell which brought up all hands. Blue Blazes charged them with open mouth. Not a man hesitated to jump for the rigging. The schooner's head came up into the wind, the jib-sheet blocks rattled idly and the booms swung lazily across the deck, just grazing the ears of Blue Blazes.
How long the roan might have held the deck had not his thirst been greater than his hate cannot be told. Water was what he needed most, for his throat seemed burning, and just overside was an immensity of water. So he leaped. Probably the crew of the Ellen B. believe to this day that they escaped by a miracle from a devil-possessed horse who, finding them beyond his reach, committed suicide.
But Blue Blazes had no thought of self-destruction. After swallowing as much lake water as was good for him he struck out boldly for the shore, which was not more than half a mile distant, swimming easily in the slight swell. Gaining the log-strewn beach, he found himself at the edge of one of those ghostly, fire-blasted tamarack forests which cover great sections of the upper end of Michigan's southern peninsula. At last he had escaped from the hateful bondage of man. Contentedly he fell to cropping the coarse beach-grass which grew at the forest's edge.
For many long days Blue Blazes revelled in his freedom, sometimes wandering for miles into the woods, sometimes ranging the beach in search of better pasturage. Water there was aplenty, but food was difficult to find. He even browsed bushes and tree-twigs. At first he expected momentarily to see appear one of his enemies, a man. He heard imaginary voices in the beat of the waves, the creaking of wind-tossed tree-tops, the caw of crows, or in the faint whistlings of distant steamers. He began to look suspiciously behind knolls and stumps. But for many miles up and down the coast was no port, and the only evidences he had of man were the sails of passing schooners, or the trailing smoke-plumes of steam-boats.
Not since he could remember had Blue Blazes been so long without feeling a whip laid over his back. Still, he was not wholly content. He felt a strange uneasiness, was conscious of a longing other than a desire for a good feed of oats. Although he knew it not, Blue Blazes, who hated men as few horses have ever hated them, was lonesome. He yearned for human society.
When at last a man did appear on the beach the horse whirled and dashed into the woods. But he ran only a short distance. Soon he picked his way back to the lake shore and gazed curiously at the intruder. The man was making a fire of driftwood. Blue Blazes approached him cautiously. The man was bending over the fire, fanning it with his hat. In a moment he looked up.
A half minute, perhaps more, horse and man gazed at each other. Probably it was a moment of great surprise for them both. Certainly it was for the man. Suddenly Blue Blazes pricked his ears forward and whinnied. It was an unmistakable whinny of friendliness if not of glad recognition. The man on the beach had red hair—hair of the homeliest red you could imagine. Also he had eyes of the color of ripe gooseberries.
"You see," said Lafe, in explaining the matter afterward, "I was hunting for burls. I had seen 'em first when I was about sixteen. It was once when a lot of us went up on the steamer from Saginaw after black bass. We landed somewhere and went up a river into Mullet Lake. Well, one day I got after a deer, and he led me off so far I couldn't find my way back to camp. I walked through the woods for more'n a week before I came out on the lake shore. It was while I was tramping around that I got into a hardwood swamp where I saw them burls, not knowing what they were at the time.
"When I showed up at home my stepfather was tearing mad. He licked me good and had me sent to the reform school. I ran away from there after a while and struck the Perkins farm. That's where I got to know Blue Blazes. After my row with Perkins I drifted about a lot until I got work in this very furniture factory," whereupon Lafe swept a comprehensive hand about, indicating the sumptuously appointed office.