“‘The first thing necessary,’ said I, ‘is to have an examination, and make a diagnosis of its injuries.’
“This we forthwith proceeded to do, and found the matter pretty serious. After spending an hour in tinkering at the machine we had to give up the job. Then we set forth on a visit to the village blacksmith who, after being regaled with a full account of Caldwell’s misadventure, addressed himself to his task with vast good-will.
“He was a skilful man, and before nightfall the wheel was in better travelling shape than its unlucky owner. But Caldwell was good stuff, and of a merry heart; so that when, on the following day, he became our travelling companion, we found that his scars and his lugubrious countenance only heightened the effect of his good-fellowship.”
“I think,” said I, “that after a cheerful narrative like Ranolf’s you can stand a somewhat bloody one from me.”
“All right, O. M.,” answered Queerman; “pile on as much gore as you like.”
“Don’t expect too much,” said I. “It’s only another wolf story. The name thereof is—
‘THE DEN OF THE GRAY WOLF.’
“Not long ago I was doing the Tobique with Joe Maxim, an old hunter whom I think none of you have met. We were dropping smoothly down with the current, approaching the Narrows.
“Maxim was a curious and interesting character. Of good old Colonial stock, and equipped in youth with an excellent education, he had found himself, in early manhood, at odds with society and the requirements of civilized life. Perhaps through some remote ancestor there had crept into his veins a streak of Indian or other wandering blood. At any rate, the wilderness had drawn him with a spell that overcame all counter attractions. He drifted to the remotest backwoods, and there devoted himself to hunting and trapping. Never entering the settlements except to purchase supplies or sell his furs, he had spent the best years of his life in an almost unbroken solitude. Yet the few sportsmen who penetrated to his haunts and sought his skilful services found that seclusion had failed to make him morose. He was kindly, and not uncompanionable; and though in appearance one of the roughest of his adopted class, he preserved to a marked degree the speech and accent of his earlier days.
“‘You were speaking just now,’ said he, ‘of the wolves coming back to New Brunswick. Well, they’re here, off and on, most of the time, I reckon. It was not far from here that I had a scrimmage with them about twenty years back.’