But the boss knew all about him, even to his parentage. He lived about ten miles from the camp, across the mountains, on the Gornish River itself. As for his guilt, there was no room for a shadow of uncertainty.
A misdemeanor of this sort is always severely handled in the lumber camps. But every man, from the boss down, was filled with profound compassion for Gillsey's family. A family so afflicted as to own Gillsey for husband and sire appeared to them deserving of the tenderest pity.
It was the pathetic savagery and haggardness of the young girl that had moved the woodmen to let her off with her booty; and now, the boss declared, if Gillsey were dismissed without his wages—as was customary, in addition to other punishment—the family would surely starve, cut off from the camp pork-barrel. It was decided to give the culprit his wages up to date. Then came the rough-and-ready sentence of the camp-followers. The prisoner was to be "dragged"—the most humiliating punishment on the woodmen's code.
Gillsey's tears of fright were of no avail. He was wrapped in a sort of winding-sheet of canvas, smeared from head to foot with grease to make him slip smoothly, and hitched by the fettered wrists to a pair of horses. The strange team was then driven, at a moderate pace, for about half a mile along the main wood-road, the whole camp following in procession, and jeering at the unhappy thief.
When the man was unhitched, unbound, and set upon his feet,—not physically the worse for his punishment save that, presumably, his wrists ached somewhat,—he was given a bundle containing his scanty belongings, and told to "streak" for home. As he seemed reluctant to obey, he was kicked into something like alacrity.
When he had got well out of sight the woodmen returned to their camp. As for the wretched Gillsey, after the lamentations wherewith he enlivened his tramp had sunk to silence, he began to think his bundle remarkably heavy. He sat down on a stump to examine it. To his blank amazement he found a large lump of pork and a small bag of flour wrapped up in his dilapidated overalls.
The snow was unusually deep in the woods that winter, and toward spring there came a sudden, prolonged, and heavy thaw. The ice broke rapidly and every loosened brook became a torrent. Past the door of the camp, which was set in a valley, the Gornish River went boiling and roaring like a mill-race, all-forgetful of its wonted serene placidity.
From the camp to Gillsey's wretched cabin was only about ten miles across the mountain, but by the stream, which made a great circuit to get around a spur of the hills, it was hardly less than three times as far.
To Gillsey, in his log hut on a lofty knoll by the stream, the winter had gone by rather happily. The degradation of his punishment hardly touched him or his barbarous brood; and his wages had brought him food enough to keep the wolf from the door. He had nothing to do but to sit in his cabin and watch the approach of spring, while his lean boys snared an occasional rabbit.
At last, on a soft moonlight night, when the woods were full of the sounds of melting and settling snow, a far-off, ominous roaring smote his ear and turned his gaze down to the valley. Down the stream, on the still night, came the deadly, rushing sound, momently increasing in volume. The tall girl, she who had carried off the pork, heard the noise, and came to her father's side.