Sparrer was of just the type to win immediate favor with the rough, big-hearted lumber-jacks, and they made him feel at home at once. They vied with one another in showing him things of interest, and his comments, colored with the slang of the city streets, afforded them no end of amusement. So it was with regret on all sides that at break of the following day the boys put their duffle on the big sled used for hauling in supplies and followed it themselves. Pat went with them to see them off at the train.
With the last glimpse of the lumber camp as the sled entered the forest a silence broken only by the tinkle of the bell on one of the horses, the muffled sound of their feet and the slithering slide of the broad runners over the snow, fell on the little group. None felt in the mood for talking save the driver, and he soon subsided, failing to elicit more than monosyllabic responses. Pat was busy with thoughts of what his share from the sale of the black fox skin would mean to him in the furtherance of his ambitions for an education. But on his three guests the unfathomable mystery of the wilderness had once more fallen and wrapped them in its spell. It was the deeper for the knowledge that they were so soon to break it with no certainty of when they might again surrender their spirits to it. They were going back to another world.
Oddly enough it was Sparrer who finally voiced the feeling of which both Upton and Hal were conscious, yet found no words to express.
"It makes a feller feel little," said he, "like he ain't nothin' at all, and yet dat inside av him is somethin' bigger'n this." He swung one hand around in an all inclusive sweep. "An' it makes him feel clean inside, just like it is outside, an' like he'd got to do big things an' little mean things hadn't got no place. An'—an'"—Sparrer was groping for words to make his meaning clear—"it gives a feller a funny feelin' dat he ain't much and yet dat some way he's bigger'n de mount'ns, an' if dey is a million years old like people say, he's goin' ter last a lot longer. Bein' out here makes me feel just like Oi do when Oi go into de church an' de sun comes trew dem colored winders and de organ plays an' lifts a feller right up 'til he feels like he had wings an' could fly if he only knew how ter use 'em."
Sparrer stopped abruptly and gazed with unseeing eyes off through the forest aisles. Pat looked over at the youngster with the light of understanding in his eyes.
"Right, son," said he. "I know the feeling. This is the great cathedral that God has built for Himself and the littleness we feel is because of His own presence, and the sense of being greater than all this, the mountains, the lakes and the rivers, is, I reckon, because He makes us feel that if He made all these things to last through millions of years He isn't going to let His greatest work, man, perish in the little bit of time that makes a man's lifetime."
The bell on the horse tinkled, the runners slithered over the snow and no further word was spoken until the driver cried, "Yonder's the clearin'. I reckon you fellers hev got just about time enough to look the town over before the train comes."
An hour later farewells were said, and the three boys stood on the rear platform of the Pullman waving to Pat as the train pulled out. For some time after the straight form of the brawny young trapper and the dingy depot of the little village had faded from view the boys stood watching the panorama of frozen wilderness. Then, reluctantly it must be confessed, they turned to the warmth and luxury of the car.
"Say, hasn't it been great?" exclaimed Hal as he dropped into his seat.
"Great doesn't express it at all," declared Upton. "It beats even the hunt for Lost Trail."