The Secret Trails

by Sir Charles G. D. Roberts

To the two thirsty oxen the cool smell of the waiting trough was cruelly tantalizing. To one of them it speedily became irresistible. Buck was not, by instinct, any great respecter of bounds or barriers. He began hooking impatiently at the bars, while Star gazed at him in placid wonder. The bars were solid and well set, and Buck seemed to realize almost at once that there was little to be done in that quarter. Feeling for a weak spot, he worked his way along beyond them to the first panel of the fence. It was the ordinary rough "snake" of the backwoods clearing, a zigzag structure of rough poles, supported at the angles by crossed stakes. Never very substantial, it had been broken and somewhat carelessly mended at this particular point. The top rail lifted easily under the thrust of Buck's aimlessly tossing horn. It fell down again at once into its place in the crotch of the crossed stakes, and, in falling, it struck the fumbling experimenter a sharp whack across the nose.

The hot-tempered steer, already irritated, flared up at once, and butted heavily at the fence with his massive forehead. One of the cross-stakes, already half-rotted through, broke at once, and the two top rails went down with a crash. Following up this push, he threw his ponderous weight against the remaining rails, now left unsupported, breasted them down almost without an effort, and went crashing and triumphing through into the yard. His mate, who would never himself have dreamed of such a venture as breaking bounds, stared irresolutely for a few seconds, then followed through the gap. And side by side the two slaked their thirst, plunging their broad muzzles into the cool of the trough and lifting them to blow the drops luxuriously from their nostrils.

The impulse of Star was now to turn back into the familiar pasture, according to custom. But Buck, on the other hand, was used to being driven back and that always more or less under protest. For the first time in his memory, there was now no one to drive him back. He had a strange, new sense of freedom, of restraint removed. He was accustomed to seeing a light in the cabin window about this hour. But there was no light. The whole place seemed empty with a new kind of emptiness. Nothing was further from his fancy than to return to the pasture prison which he had just broken out of. He stood with head uplifted, as if already the galling memory of the yoke had slipped from off his neck.

For a minute or two he stood sniffing with wide nostrils, drinking deep the chill, keen-scented air. It was the same air as he had been breathing on the other side of the pasture-bars, but it smelt very different to him. Something there was in it which called him away irresistibly into the dark, unfenced depths of the forest which surrounded the clearing. He turned his great head and lowed coaxingly to his partner, who was standing beside the gap in the pasture fence and staring after him in placid question. Then he started off with a brisk step down the shadowy, pale ribbon of the road.

Star's natural impulse, after drinking, was to return to the familiar, comfortable pasture; but not without his yoke-mate. The stronger impulse ruled. With some reluctance and a good deal of bovine wonder, he swung around and hastened after Buck. The latter waited for him; and side by side, as if in yoke, though with less labouring steps, they turned off the deeply rutted highway and moved silently down a mossed old wood road into the glimmering dark of the forest.

A sure instinct in Buck's feet was leading them straight away from the Settlements, straight into the heart of the wilderness. After perhaps an hour the wood-road led out of the thick forest across a little wild meadow with a shallow brook babbling softly through it. Here the two grazed for a time, almost belly deep in the thick-flowered grass, while the bats flickered and zigzagged above them, and a couple of whip-poor-wills answered each other monotonously from opposite ends of the glade. Then they lay down side by side to chew the cud and to sleep, surrounded by the pungent smell of the stalks of the wild parsnip which their huge bulks had crushed down.

They lay in a corner of the glade, close to the dense thickets that formed the fringe of the woods. Unaccustomed to vigilance, neither their eyes nor their ears were on the alert. A lynx crept up behind them, within a dozen paces, glared at them vindictively with its pale, malignant moon-eyes, and then ran up a tree to get a better look at these mighty intruders upon his hunting-ground. His claws made a loud rattling on the bark as he climbed, but neither of the oxen paid any attention whatever to the sound. Of course, a lynx could not, under any circumstances, be anything more than an object of mild curiosity to them, but had it been a pair of hungry panthers, they would have been equally unconscious and unwarned. They lay with their backs to the forest, looking out across the open, chewing lazily, and from time to time heaving windy breaths of deep content. Not a score of yards before their noses a trailing weasel ran down and killed a hare. At the cry of the victim Buck opened his half-closed eyes and gave a snort of disapproval. But Star paid no attention whatever to the little tragedy. All his faculties were engrossed upon his comfort and his cud.

A little later a prowling fox came suddenly upon them. He was surprised to find the pair so far from their pasture, where he had several times observed them in the course of his wide wanderings. His shrewd mind jumped to the idea that perhaps the settler, their master, was out with them; and while he had no objection whatever to the oxen—stupid, harmless hulks in his eyes—he had the most profound objection to their master and his gun. He slipped back into cover, encircled the whole glade stealthily till he picked up their trail, and satisfied himself that they had come alone. Then he returned and sat down on his tail deliberately in front of them, cocking his head to one side, as if inviting them to explain their presence.

Star returned his gaze with placid indifference, but Buck was annoyed. In his eyes the fox was a little sharp-nosed dog with a bushy tail and an exasperating smell. He hated all dogs, but especially little ones, because they were so elusive when they yapped at his heels. He heaved himself up with an angry snort, and charged upon the intruder. The fox, without losing his dignity at all, seemed to drift easily out of reach, to this side or that, till the ox grew tired of the futile chase. Moreover, as the fox made no sound and no demonstration of heel-snapping, Buck's anger presently faded out, and he returned to his partner's side and lay down again. And the fox, his curiosity satisfied, trotted away.

A little later there came a stealthy crashing through the darkness of the underbush in the rear. But the two oxen never turned their heads. To them the ominous sound had no significance whatever. A few paces behind them the crashing came to a sudden stop. A bear, lumbering down toward the brook-side, to grub in the soft earth for edible roots, had caught the sound of their breathing and chewing. He knew the sound, for he, too, like the fox, had prowled about the pasture fence at night. As noiselessly as a shadow he crept nearer, till he could make out the contented pair. He knew they belonged to the man, and it made him uneasy to see them there, so far from where they belonged. He sniffed the air cautiously, to see if the man was with them. No, the man was not there, that was soon obvious. He had no thought of attacking them; they were much too formidable to be meddled with. But why were they there? The circumstance was, therefore, dangerous. Perhaps the man was designing some sort of trap for him. He drew back cautiously, and made off by the way he had come. He had a wholesome respect for the man, and for all his works and belongings.