THE RED FEATHERS
INDIAN AND HUNTING STORIES FOR BOYS
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By THEODORE GOODRIDGE ROBERTS
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THE RED FEATHERS
By THEODORE GOODRIDGE ROBERTS
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A story of remarkable adventures when the world was young.
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THE PAGE COMPANY
53 BEACON STREET, BOSTON, MASS.
[Illustration: “SPED HERE AND THERE THROUGH THE AIR, SWIFT AS A CHASING
HAWK”
(_See page 25_)]
The Red Feathers
A Story of Remarkable Adventures
When the World Was Young
By Theodore Roberts
AUTHOR OF “BROTHERS OF PERIL,” “HEMMING THE ADVENTURER,” ETC.
_ILLUSTRATED AND DECORATED BY_
Charles Livingston Bull
[Illustration]
Boston The Page
Company Publishers
_Copyright, 1907_
BY L. C. PAGE & COMPANY
(INCORPORATED)
_Entered at Stationers’ Hall, London_
_All rights reserved_
Second Impression, June, 1908
Third Impression, January, 1913
Fourth Impression, December, 1915
Fifth Impression, September, 1919
THE COLONIAL PRESS
C. H. SIMONDS CO., BOSTON, U. S. A.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. “RUN-ALL-DAY” 1
II. THE TWO RED FEATHERS 7
III. THE LITTLEST WARRIOR AND HIS SUMMER HOME 15
IV. BRIGHT ROBE TELLS A STORY OF THE RED FEATHERS 20
V. RUN-ALL-DAY’S NEW-FOUND AMBITION 30
VI. RUN-ALL-DAY VISITS WHISPERING GRASS 38
VII. BRIGHT ROBE FINDS HIS ENEMY 47
VIII. THE YOUTH RECOVERS HIS STRENGTH AND VISITS RUN-ALL-DAY 56
IX. THE LITTLE BROWN OWL HUNTS FOR FOOD 73
X. THE LITTLE BROWN OWL HAS MORE TROUBLE 81
XI. THE MAGIC LODGE 90
XII. THE ADVENTURE OF JUMPING WOLF 100
XIII. RUN-ALL-DAY AGAIN MAKES USE OF THE RED FEATHERS 112
XIV. THE GOOD MAGICIAN VISITS RUN-ALL-DAY’S NEW VILLAGE 124
XV. THE LITTLEST WARRIOR’S GREAT PROSPECTS 136
XVI. FURTHER ADVENTURES OF THE LITTLE BROWN OWL 143
XVII. A BRIEF RETURN TO POWER 153
XVIII. THE MAKER OF CHIEFS 168
XIX. THE THEFT OF THE RED FEATHERS 178
XX. A JOURNEY TO THE MAGIC FOREST 189
XXI. THE QUEST OF THE FEATHERS 202
XXII. WISE-AS-A-SHE-WOLF AND CRACK BONE THE GIANT 213
XXIII. HOW CRACK BONE WAS DOUBLY OUTWITTED 220
XXIV. THE MAGICIANS AWAKE 229
XXV. THE UNFINISHED BATTLE 238
XXVI. BRIGHT ROBE’S DISCRETION 249
XXVII. THE DIPLOMACY OF BRIGHT ROBE 257
XXVIII. THE QUEST 269
XXIX. PEACE 278
XXX. THE POISONED DART 288
XXXI. THE FREEZING OF THE NARROW SEA 297
XXXII. THE INVASION OF THE ISLAND 304
XXXIII. THE RESCUE OF STAR FLOWER 315
XXXIV. REST 319
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
“SPED HERE AND THERE THROUGH THE AIR, SWIFT AS
A CHASING HAWK” (_See Page 25_) _Frontispiece_
“A GREAT STAG CARIBOU, AS HIGH AS A PINE, HAUNTED
THE WILDS” 1
“THE ASTONISHED BUNNY HAD DEALT HIM A SHREWD
BLOW WITH ONE OF HIS BIG HIND LEGS” 75
“HERE A GOD STOOD HUGE AND BLACK AGAINST A SUNSET
SKY, LOOKING OUT ACROSS A DARKENING WORLD” 95
“HE SPRANG ASIDE INTO THE SHELTER OF A TREE
TRUNK, AND PEERED BACK ALONG THE WAY HE HAD COME” 105
“RED EYE UNTIED THE OPENING OF HIS WIGWAM, AND
THE OWL FLOATED FROM HIS PERCH” 154
“HE CLIMBED A HIGH TREE AT THE EDGE OF THE WOOD” 199
“THE HEAD AND SHOULDERS OF THE GIANT IMMEDIATELY
APPEARED, AND FROM UNDER A FRINGE OF TANGLED HAIR A
PAIR OF ALERT EYES, GRAY AS ICE, GLARED ABOUT” 213
“THEY PASSED BENEATH HIM, WHITE AS FROST AND DEATH” 272
[Illustration: “A GREAT STAG CARIBOU, AS HIGH AS A PINE, HAUNTED THE
WILDS.”]
THE RED FEATHERS
CHAPTER I
“RUN-ALL-DAY”
In the days of which I write, in the island now known as Newfoundland,
men made prayers to the sun, the winds, the frost and the stars. They
believed that giants lived in the north; that a great stag caribou, as
high as a pine, haunted the wilds beyond the Narrow Sea to the west;
that gods moved about in divers shapes, doing good or evil as their
natures prompted them, and that certain wise and crafty men acquired
a knowledge of magic and thereby became stronger than the greatest
warriors. Fog, to these people, was the breath of an old god who lived
to the eastward, just beneath the rim of the sea; and fire was a
spirit,--the offspring of a god,--that sometimes was content to feed on
the fagots cut for it, cooking food for men and warming their bodies,
and sometimes leaped into the woods and consumed the forest for miles
in an outburst of fury.
A man of the Beothic race named Run-all-day had a lodge on the River of
Three Fires, about half-way between its mouth and Wind Lake. There he
lived only in the warmer months of the year. At the approach of winter
he followed the great herds of caribou farther inland and southward,
to the deeper forest and more sheltered barrens. During the summer he
netted and speared the salmon in the River of Three Fires, feeding
himself and his family on the flesh and smoking what could not be used
then for their winter supply. Early in October, before starting on the
inland journey, his wife and children gathered nuts and berries, while
he hunted the fat caribou, which were already gathering in great herds
preparatory to moving to the more sheltered feeding-grounds. With the
venison and the berries his wife, Red Willow, made a rough sort of
pemmican.
Run-all-day was fleet of foot and strong of wind and leg. It was by
his speed and endurance when a boy that he had won his name. He had
also proved himself a warrior of prowess, when occasion demanded, and
might have followed his father as chief of a clan; but the islanders
happened to be entering on a long term of peace when he grew to
manhood, so he took a wife from another village and journeyed away from
his family. His wits were not as quick as his legs and he entertained
no great ambitions of distinguishing himself. He was quite content to
protect and provide for his family--to sleep warm and eat his fill all
the year round and see them do the same. Of course, sometimes at the
tail-end of a bad season, provisions ran low; but if any man could find
game and bring it to the ground, it was Run-all-day.
On a certain June evening, when the west was red and dusk was settling
along the edges of the woods, Run-all-day withdrew his net of raw-hide
thongs from a big pool four miles above his wigwam and seated himself
on the grassy bank for a few minutes’ rest before walking home.
Nine great silver fish lay beside him--a respectable load even for
Run-all-day. To lessen their weight he had already slit them from
throat to tail, with his flint knife, and tossed the entrails into the
bushes. He was well satisfied with his afternoon’s work, and sighed
with contentment and a pleasant weariness.
“It has been a good summer,” he murmured, “and there will be plenty
of food for all of us.” He smiled at that thought, for his family had
increased by one within the past week.
“You are a fortunate man, Run-all-day,” said a voice at his shoulder.
In the fraction of a second the salmon fisher was turned and on his
feet, with the flint blade with which he had cleaned the fish ready in
his hand. His eyes encountered those of a young man who stood not ten
feet distant, with his back to the dusky forest. The stranger’s tunic
of dressed deer-skin was decorated with strings of polished stones. On
his feet were finely worked moccasins and in his hand a short spear.
His face was very kind. To a keener reader of mankind than Run-all-day
it would have suggested the hope and faith of a child, the wisdom that
comes of experience and the charitable spirit of old age.
“Though I may be a stranger to you,” said the young man, smiling, “I am
not your enemy. You need not threaten me with the knife, oh, tireless
runner.”
Run-all-day tossed his weapon beside the dead fish and looked steadily
at the other.
“You do not belong to this river, chief,” said he, “and yet you call me
by my name. Is my reputation so great in the world?”
“To those who have ears to hear of an honest man,” replied the
stranger, “your reputation has travelled far. How is the little warrior
that came to your lodge but five days ago?”
“He is well and sound,” answered Run-all-day. “But what do you know of
him?” he asked, in wonder. “Are you a god?”
“You put the question honestly,” said the young man with the spear.
He stepped close to the salmon fisher.
“I am not a god,” he said. “I am even of your own clan. I am called
Wise-as-a-she-wolf.”
Run-all-day looked at him in open astonishment, for the name of
the great magician was known far and wide. Some people held that
Wise-as-a-she-wolf was stronger than several of the gods themselves;
that he was the greatest student of magic since the days of the wicked
Bright Robe; that his magic had been learned in the Crimson Wigwam and
in the White Lodge beyond the ramparts of eternal ice; that the secrets
of immortality and everlasting youth were his. And yet ’twas said that
for all his power, his heart was kind as a young girl’s.
“Great chief,” said the salmon fisher, at last, “I had thought to see,
in Wise-as-a-she-wolf, a full-grown man.”
“So be it, friend,” replied the other, and, in the twinkling of an eye,
a warrior of great stature and grim visage stood before Run-all-day.
“Have mercy, great chief,” cried the fisherman of the River of Three
Fires. He was strong and courageous; but he had a dread of big magic.
“Have no fear of your kinsman,” laughed the other; and, in the next
second, the youth with the gentle face laid a reassuring hand on
Run-all-day’s shoulder. The gigantic warrior was gone.
CHAPTER II
THE TWO RED FEATHERS
“I am hungry and weary,” said Wise-as-a-she-wolf.
“My cooking-pot is full,” replied the other, “and I have many soft
skins for bedding; but I fear me, chief, that to sleep in my lodge you
will first have to practise magic on the throat of the new warrior, or
on your own ears.”
“Nay, friend, a couch in the open will suit my taste,” replied the
youth. “So that the young warrior is not in pain, let him yell. ’Tis
the great spirit of him giving voice against the littleness of his body
and the weakness of his legs.”
So they set out for the fisherman’s wigwam, each carrying a load of the
silver fish. The cooking-fire was burning brightly when they stepped
from the woods, and the slender form of Singing Bird, eldest child of
Run-all-day and Red Willow, was seen bending above the tree stump, that
had been hollowed to serve as a pot, which stood near the fire. The
stew in the pot was boiling vigorously, for the girl had dropped stones
into it which she had first heated near to the bursting-point among
the coals of the fire. Two smaller figures--and these of boys--skipped
about in the ruddy glow and shouted that they were quite ready for
their meal; still another was seen dabbling in the shallow water at the
edge of the river; and from the interior of the pointed lodge sounded
the crying of an infant.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf let his string of fish slip to the grass, and looked
at the scene before him with something of amusement and something of
consternation in his face.
“A fine family,” he remarked. “And surely that littlest warrior has the
voice of a great chief.”
Run-all-day was highly delighted at these words, being as foolish in
such matters as are the fathers of our own time. With a self-satisfied
grunt, he led the stranger to a seat by the fire and fetched him a bark
cup full of spring water, that he might quench his thirst before eating.
The magician ate very little for a hungry youth, and yet the stew was
excellent. Before he touched the food, he was seen to cast aside from
his waist a girdle of white leather painted with many wonderful figures
of gods and men and beasts. He slept well that night, on a couch of
bear skins, in the shelter of a spruce which stood midway between the
lodge and the fire. He was awakened, in the early morning, by the
voice of Singing Bird. Opening his eyes, he beheld her busy at the
cooking-fire, singing as she worked.
The breakfast was as good as the evening meal; and the magician,
pointing to the belt which hung loosely above his hips, said, “You are
fortunate, my friend. You have no need, with such a cook, of a magic
Hunger-Belt like this.” His gaze rested kindly on Singing Bird.
“But the meat must first be caught, chief,” replied Run-all-day.
When Wise-as-a-she-wolf was ready to continue his journey, the
fisherman walked from the camp with him, for a short distance.
“I am going northward,” said the magician, “on very urgent business. I
have had dealings with many great people--even with the gods--and so
I have awakened envy in more than one dark heart. For all my magic,
friend, my life is not so good a one as yours. You love and are loved.
You keep your family fed and are at peace with the world. No evil magic
is worked against you and the wrath of the gods is aimed so high that
it goes over your head. I have my days of glory and my victories; but
strange weapons are ever being shaped for my undoing.”
“Yes, chief, I am content with my humble life,” replied Run-all-day.
The young man placed two small red feathers in the other’s hand.
“These are for the littlest warrior,” he said. “They are great
magic--great for good or evil, as the heart prompts. When he is large
enough to run here and there, place one of these feathers in each of
his moccasins, flat on the sole of his foot. Let him cherish them, for
they will help him in his play, and, later, in the chase, and they have
the power to save him even from death.”
At the last word he stepped aside from the trail and was gone, with no
more noise than the slipping away of a shadow.
Run-all-day continued to stare at the spot where Wise-as-a-she-wolf had
so lately stood, for fully a minute. This magic was no light thing.
Courageous though he was, his legs shook under him as if with cold. A
dozen sea-eagles could not have made him flinch; but he trembled at
the touch of the two little feathers in his hand.
“He is a great man,” he said at last, “and possessed of wonderful
magic; but perhaps he was not wise in his gift to the littlest warrior.
Magic is for gods and mighty chieftains; it is too potent a thing for
humble folks like me and mine. Did he not say himself, but a moment
ago, that power breeds powerful enemies and that even the gods bend
their ears to the affairs of magicians?”
He gazed fearfully at the bright feathers in his hand.
“He is a great chief; a kind and a good young man, a cousin of the
gods, I do not doubt,--but I fear he has made a mistake. He has been
too generous.”
He let the feathers fall from his hand to the moss at the side of the
trail, turned quickly and hastened back to the clearing and the lodge.
He found Red Willow lying on a couch of soft skins, well and happy.
Old Blowing Fog, her mother, squatted beside her with the baby in her
wrinkled arms.
“The stranger has gone,” said Run-all-day. “He is a great magician and
his name is Wise-as-a-she-wolf. But he envied me my humble contentment,
for all of that. He gave me two red feathers, for a gift for that
little warrior, and said that they are possessed of magic power; and
then he was gone, like the first whiff of smoke from a newly lighted
fire.”
“Where are the feathers?” inquired Red Willow, her face aglow with
interest.
The brave shook his head and smiled wisely.
“The gift was meant well,” he said; “but a man must judge of some
things for himself, even if he be but a hunter and fisherman. Magic may
be well enough for the great men whose feet are set in high places;
though I think even they would be safer without it. They may hunt with
the gods and the north-lights if they please; but the meat of the
caribou and beaver is better suited to my taste.”
“And what does all this grand talk lead to?” asked old Blowing Fog.
“I dropped the feathers on the ground and let them lie,” said the man.
“Then what do I see in your belt?” asked the old woman, peering between
half-closed lids.
Run-all-day put his hand to his leather girdle--and drew out the two
red feathers. He gasped. His swarthy cheeks turned white as the bark of
the birch. Had one of those little, fat savages from the frozen west
(who sometimes crossed the Narrow Sea and fought with the islanders)
appeared and stuck a spear into his flesh, he could not have looked
more horrified.
“Give them to me. I do not fear their magic,” cried Red Willow.
Run-all-day obeyed her with a sigh of relief. He would face the
magician himself--but those little, slim, red feathers--ah, they made
his blood run cold as ice. Red Willow took them fearlessly and admired
their bright colour; and yet she was in the habit of fleeing, with
covered head, from bats flickering in the twilight. She laughed at her
big, trembling husband.
“It is foolish to throw away a gift,” she said. “And it is even more
foolish to run away from two little feathers that were given you by a
friend.”
Old Blowing Fog laughed, as she rocked the baby in her arms.
“When I was young we saw greater magic than that, almost every day,”
said she. “My father once worked such magic on his bow that it shot
the arrows so high into the air that they never came down.”
“But I’ve heard that he couldn’t shoot a standing caribou, for all
that,” replied the man, recovering something of his assurance. He often
argued with Blowing Fog.
“Give me honest arrows, honest muscles and honest feathers sticking in
the tails of honest birds,” he continued. “I do not need any magic, old
or new, to keep the pot full of meat and fish and the rain out of my
lodge. And I’d feel like a fool shooting my arrows so high in the air
that they’d never come down.”
Both the women laughed at him.
“Oh, I am wiser than you think,” said he, and stalked out of the lodge.
But he left the two magic feathers in Red Willow’s hand.
CHAPTER III
THE LITTLEST WARRIOR AND HIS SUMMER HOME
The home in which the baby had been born was only a hut, built of
poles and sheets of bark. It was a fine house, though, for the time
and country. Its door was the hide of a caribou,--and how fearfully
that great hide flapped and bulged inward at the pressure of the night
winds. Fortunately the season was June, when the air was warm and the
sun shone almost every day.
When the littlest warrior was a few weeks old, he was put into a bag of
furry skins fastened to a light framework of wood. In this he rested
all day, in an upright position, sometimes against one of the poles of
the lodge, and sometimes on the back of his mother, or Blowing Fog, or
little Singing Bird.
He was a good baby, crying only when he was very hungry or when he was
bathed in the cold water of the river. He spent the greater part of his
time in sleep. Even when awake he did not seem to take much interest
in what went on around him; but this indifference to the world was
apparent in him only in his earliest days. At the age of two months
he began to show signs (so said his mother and Blowing Fog) of an
exceptional spirit and intellect; but, to the casual observer, it would
have seemed that he but howled with a more powerful voice and kicked
and struggled with lustier limbs.
It was only during the summer months--from May to October--that
Run-all-day and his family lived in the little clearing beside the
River of Three Fires. There was no other wigwam within ten miles of
them; for at this time the small tribes, or clans, of the north and
south, the east and west, were at peace with one another and so the
people did not have to band together, in villages, in self-defence.
Sometimes, during the summer, people of their own tribe passed up or
down the stream in front of their lodge, in skin-covered canoes of
unwieldy shapes.
Many of Run-all-day’s friends spent the summer months on the coast
of the great sea-bays, where they caught cod-fish to cure for winter
use. Some lived close to the great salt water all the year round, and
slaughtered a few of the hosts of seals that floated down from the
north, on the grinding ice-floes, early in the spring. Others, like
Run-all-day, pitched their summer lodges on the rivers and ponds,
moving southward and further inland, with the great herds of caribou,
at the approach of winter.
The hunting of the caribou began early in September, when the calves
of that year had grown strong enough to live independently of their
mothers. Several of the families returning from the bays, halted for
awhile in their journey and joined Run-all-day in the chase. Now the
youngest baby heard more noise than usual. Strange faces bent above him
and strange arms lifted him to feel his weight. Several cooking-fires
burned before the lodge; canoes of many models were drawn up on the
bank; everybody seemed to be happy and busy. But soon the caribou began
to travel southward, across the great barrens and through the low, dark
timber. Then dried fish and meat, skins and weapons were made into
packs, and canoes were launched and headed up stream.
Now the littlest warrior opened his eyes with more concern for the
everyday affairs of life. He cried less than ever before in his brief
career and smiled more readily. Even when he was placed in a canoe,
still in his fur bag, beside his mother, he did not make any violent
signs of objection. His father and all the family effects were at his
back. Close in front sat his three small brothers, and Singing Bird,
and in the bow old Blowing Fog plied a broad paddle.
Fortunately for all concerned, the canoe was both large and strong and
steady--a masterpiece among canoes. Run-all-day had built it during the
previous winter. He had planned a model for the frame to suit the size
of his family and had constructed it of light, well-seasoned spruce.
Being short of hides at the time, he had covered the frame with great
sheets of tough, white bark from the birch trees of the forest. This
bark was much lighter than caribou hides, and he had felt angry with
himself for never having thought to use it before in boat building.
For years, he had known that it was proof against water, for had it
not sheltered him ever since his birth, from rain and sleet? He had
stitched the seams with root-fibres and daubed them thoroughly with a
mixture of gum and fat.
Run-all-day’s friends had laughed at the new canoe and its builder, and
had advised the brave not to venture on the river in so novel a craft.
The whole world, they said, covered its canoes with skin; then why
should he do otherwise? But Run-all-day had hardened his heart against
their warnings and jeers and gone his own way; and it had proved to be
a right way.
Now a little fleet of six canoes toiled steadily up the river. Though
Run-all-day’s craft was larger and more heavily loaded than any, it
soon outdistanced them all. The brave, standing upright in the stern,
used a long pole and Blowing Fog dug vigorously at the water with her
broad paddle. Sometimes swift rapids churned and snarled in front of
them, defying them to ascend. Then all the bundles of fish and meat and
skins, the weapons and the children, had to be unloaded. Then the canoe
was lifted from the stream and carried along the shore, to the top of
the swift water, by Run-all-day and Blowing Fog. Everyone but the baby
helped to portage the cargo.
Shortly after sunset, Run-all-day’s canoe was run ashore at the edge
of a little meadow, again unloaded and lifted out of the water. Soon a
fire was lighted and the comforting fragrance of broiling venison stole
wide on the air. Dusk had fallen by the time the other voyagers reached
the camp.
CHAPTER IV
BRIGHT ROBE TELLS A STORY OF THE RED FEATHERS
The men of the party sat late around the fire, telling stories of
prowess at the fishing and in the chase. Some of them even talked of
the battlefield, for they were all of one clan. They had been at war
with the people of the south and southwest, not many years before.
Run-all-day was no more backward in story-telling than in other
matters. He was a skilled and tireless hunter, and he did not object
to the fact becoming known to the general public. Simply, he praised
his birch-bark canoe; his speed and endurance in running down a wounded
deer; his summer’s work at the fishing; even his wife and his family
were bragged about--and surely no one had ever before possessed such an
admirable mother-in-law. Some of the braves grunted at that, for they
knew that Run-all-day and old Blowing Fog often disagreed on household
matters.
Suddenly one of the cod-fishers, who was called Lazy Bear, threw a
large piece of drift-wood into the heart of the fire. Sparks and flames
shot upward, and, for a few seconds, the whole camp was lit by the
redoubled radiance.
And there, at one end of the semi-circle of braves, sat a stranger with
a robe of bright fur on his back. A gasp of astonishment arose from the
fishers and hunters. Lazy Bear almost stepped into the fire, in the
first flash of amazement. A dozen hands went to the hafts of clubs and
flint knives.
“Good evening to you, chief,” said Run-all-day, in a voice that was not
altogether steady.
But the stranger made no reply, and the man nearest him edged away to
the left.
“Have you no tongue?” cried Run-all-day, with anger in his voice. Anger
always ate up fear, in the breast of the salmon fisher.
The stranger raised his head and stared at the speaker with dark and
glowing eyes. But he did not open his lips. His piercing, insolent gaze
would have daunted a weaker man than Run-all-day; but it only stirred
the great hunter’s anger to higher flame, even as the drift-wood had
worked upon the smouldering heart of the fire.
“If you have no tongue,” said Run-all-day, “make us a sign. You have
come, unbidden, to our camp. The haft of my club itches in my hand.”
“Brave words,” said the stranger, in a voice cold as a wind off the ice
floe. “Lift your club,--if you can.”
Run-all-day’s weapon lay beside him on the moss of the little clearing.
His right hand closed on the stick and he made a slight effort to
swing the stone head upward, over his shoulder. He turned and applied
both hands and all his strength to the task. But the stone head of the
weapon that was usually like a toy in his hands, would not leave the
ground. A sweat of fear burst out on him and he loosed the haft of the
club as if it were red hot. A thrill of apprehension went through the
semi-circle of braves, at sight of their comrade’s half-seen actions.
The stranger laughed without mirth.
“Great hunter, great slayer and smoker of salmon, when next Bright
Robe comes to your camp and honours you by taking a seat at your fire,
refrain from clamouring for explanations,” he said.
The name of Bright Robe drove the last sparks of courage and anger from
the breasts of Run-all-day’s companions. Run-all-day, however, felt
the sullen rage still alive under the outward chill of fear.
“You have heard of me,” continued the unwelcome guest, “and of this
robe, which is made of the pelt of one wolf--of one of the great, white
wolves that hunt under the north-lights, in the land of eternal ice.”
True, they had all heard of Bright Robe, the master of magicians. Their
mothers had frightened them, when they were children, with tales of his
fearful and wonderful doings; and they, in their turn, had heard the
stories from their mothers and grandmothers. Legend recorded that, in a
fit of anger, he had once defied a god; and many were the versions of
the tale of his punishment. But he had vanished from the island, and
that was the great thing, for he had been the most wicked as well as
the most powerful of all the magicians that had practised their arts
since the beginning of the world. And now, after a hundred summers of
banishment, here he sat by the fire of honest hunters and fishermen,
with the silver robe gleaming on his shoulders. Was he stronger than
the gods themselves?
Even the courage of Run-all-day melted again. What had brought this
awful visitor to their humble fire?
Several members of the party hastened to bring food and water to the
great magician, who ate ravenously.
“I have made a weary journey,” said he, at last. “I have spent eight
days in travelling a distance that, had I not been robbed, I should
have accomplished in a few hours. I, who owned the red feathers but a
moon ago, bruised my feet on rocks and roots like any common fellow.”
Run-all-day stood beyond the smoke of the fire and so Bright Robe did
not notice the sudden alertness of the hunter’s face and body.
“What are these red feathers, mighty chief?” inquired Lazy Bear, who
possessed curiosity to the extent that he lacked energy.
Food had mollified the magician’s spirit. “The red feathers,” said he,
“are articles of great magic. The man who wears them against his feet
can outrace the flying hawk, and only he who wears the moccasins of the
wind can overtake him in the air.”
“I have heard old people talk of the magic moccasins that carry a man
with the speed of a flying teal, but I have heard no stories of the
red feathers,” said Run-all-day.
He spoke in a voice that showed no more than a polite interest in the
subject.
“Many stories are told of the moccasins,” said Bright Robe, “for they
have changed hands many times, but have never left this country, in
hundreds of years, for more than two moons. The red feathers, however,
are not known to the old story-tellers. Maybe they have thought that
all the swift running was done by the moccasins of the wind. It was in
the time of the coldest winter, when the Narrow Sea was bound with ice
from shore to shore, that the red feathers came into the possession
of a chief of this country. Mountaineers from the hills under the
setting sun crossed the Narrow Sea--and with them came many of those
fierce little men of the north--and did battle with the nations of this
island. The leader of the invaders sped here and there in the air,
swift as a chasing hawk, swooping and slaying like a hawk among grouse.
To every man he killed, terror was burned into the hearts of a score.
Our warriors had no strength to bend their bows against him, or hurl
their war-clubs, when they heard the whisper of his flying feet. But
one man kept his courage alive and his eyes ready. His was a strong
bow, and his arrows were long and sharply barbed. Slipping from the
central tumult of the battle, he crouched beneath a spruce tree and
peered about for the flying enemy as a hunter looks out of cover for
homing geese. Suddenly he saw the terrible one flash down upon the
struggling warriors; saw him strike once, and twice, and leap into the
air again. With lessened speed he drew near the spruce tree under which
the Beothic chief crouched ready. The bow bent and sprang straight,
and, with a fearful cry, the man of the flying feet struggled in the
air. Another arrow whined and struck--and another found its mark--and
then the terrible invader fell, like a stone, to the earth. And, in the
moccasins of the warrior from across the Narrow Sea, the chief who slew
him found the red feathers.”
The men around the fire had followed the story with breathless
interest. For the time being, their fear of the narrator was forgotten.
“The coldest winter was many hundreds of seasons ago,” said one, “and
never since then has our country been in such danger. It must have been
a mighty battle.”
“It was a mighty battle,” replied Bright Robe. “I was young then--I am
older than I look--and had learned nothing of magic. I fought in the
battle, for I was born in the tribe that dwells on the coast of the
Narrow Sea.”
“Was it you, great chief, who slew the leader of the enemy?” asked
Run-all-day.
“Nay,” replied the magician, with a low chuckle. “But two days after
the invaders were driven away from our shores, out onto the ice that
was already weakening and breaking, I took the red feathers from the
moccasin of that great chief and put them in my own.”
“Then he must have been sleeping,” said Run-all-day.
“A sound sleep, in truth,” replied Bright Robe, calmly.
“You killed him--a chief of your own tribe--for the magic feathers,”
cried the hunter.
“Verily, oh smoker of fish and flesh,” replied the magician. “And many
another have I killed, for less than those red feathers. To regain
possession of them now I should consider the speeding of an hundred
lives a niggardly payment.”
“We know nothing of the feathers,” cried an old man.
Others confirmed the statement, in broken words and tremulous gestures.
Bright Robe sneered. “You may save your breath,” said he. “No cleaner
of cod stole the prize from the feet of Bright Robe; of that, I need no
assurance. Only the gods, and Wise-as-a-she-wolf, have the hardihood
to strike at me. Even now I am on the trail of my enemy. It will be
a long trail, for he has both the moccasins of the wind and the red
feathers--but when one knows the secret of everlasting life one can
afford to travel slowly.”
He looked about him with his dark, glowing eyes. The braves at the fire
felt their muscles loosen under the awful glance.
“Now bring me thirty days’ food, dried meat and smoked fish enough
to last a man thirty days,” he ordered. “I do not intend to delay my
journey for the purpose of killing caribou,” he added.
Run-all-day and his companions were glad enough that the magician asked
for so little. They hastened to bring the best of their meat and fish
and pemmican. They heaped it near their unwelcome visitor, in the light
of the fire.
“Now bind it securely into one pack,” he ordered.
When this was done he arose from the ground and, bending over the great
pack, laid his hand on it. In a moment it had dwindled to the size of
a crouching wolf--to the size of a man’s head--to the smallness of a
hazel nut. And this tiny object he picked up, between finger and thumb,
and tucked somewhere under his belt.
“You are worthy people,” he said, looking around, well pleased at the
wonder, fear, and admiration written on the faces of the hunters.
“Now I continue my journey,” he added. “See, I draw my robe of white
fur over my head so that not a man of you shall be able to say which
way I went.”
At the last word he drew the robe above his shoulders--and lo, the
fearful magician was nowhere to be seen.
For hours the hunters continued to sit by the fire. They were afraid
that Bright Robe might still be lurking near them, to hear what they
had to say of him. So they praised him warmly to each other, until they
could not keep their eyelids open another minute.
CHAPTER V
RUN-ALL-DAY’S NEW-FOUND AMBITION
Wind Lake was entered early in the evening of the second day of the
journey. The voyagers did not land at sunset, but continued to paddle
up the long, narrow lake until they reached a point on the western
shore where a wooded valley opened on the water, between two wooded
hills. By the time all the canoes were unloaded and the people settled
for sleep, it was long past midnight.
This was the place where Run-all-day had spent the last four winters,
his lodge standing alone in that warm and sheltered valley, with an
outlook on the white lake, and with good hunting country on three
sides; but now the owners of the other canoes and families begged him
to allow them to build their winter lodges beside his.
“Let us stay near you,” said an old man named Green Bow on the morning
after their arrival. “The visit of Bright Robe has filled us with
trembling, and our dreams with black visions. You are brave. You shall
be chief of the village and master of the chase, if only we may camp in
your valley and keep our hearts up with the sight of your courage; for
who can say at what time Bright Robe may visit us again?”
“My heart ran to water in the presence of Bright Robe,” replied
Run-all-day. “My muscles were no more than the muscles of a woman. I
did his bidding like a child and trembled at the sound of his voice.
And yet,” he concluded, wonderingly, “you ask me to inspire you with my
courage.”
“Your eyes remained steady,” replied the old man. “I think there was
still a flame of courage in the bottom of your heart.”
Run-all-day looked from the old man to the others of the party, and
a new and delightful sensation took possession of him. Here was
recognition of his prowess, surely. They looked to him for protection
from the great and wicked magician. Well, he would do what he could, as
he had always done in humbler matters.
“Friends,” said he, “I am willing to be your chief and to let you hunt
and live in this valley. But I am not a magician, and I greatly fear
that the courage of a hunter would prove of no avail against the evil
strength of Bright Robe. But, my friends, I am well liked by one who
does not fear Bright Robe. Wise-as-a-she-wolf has claimed me for a
relative; has partaken of my cooking-pot; has even made a gift to my
littlest warrior.”
Now this was a trifle more than even Lazy Bear could believe. As for
old Green Bow, he frowned at Run-all-day. “This is a new thing to our
ears,” he said. “May I ask, chief, how long it is since you began to
keep such fine company?”
The new-made chief was stung to anger.
“You do not believe my word,” he cried. “Then I will give you proof of
it.”
He put his hand on Green Bow’s shoulder. “Where did you have your
lodge, during the summer?” he asked, sternly.
“At the mouth of the River of Three Fires, on a knoll on the northern
shore, under three great pines,” answered the old man.
“And did you leave any familiar possession behind you?”
The old man nodded.
“I forgot my best skinning-knife,” he replied. “It is somewhere in my
wigwam, chief.”
“Then,” said Run-all-day, gazing proudly around him at the puzzled
faces of his people, “I shall start for the mouth of the river
to-night,--and in the morning the knife will be in your hand.”
“Ah-ha,” cried Green Bow. “Then you are a magician after all. Why did
you not lift your club, two nights ago, and deal Bright Robe a whack on
the head?”
“So you continue to doubt me,” said Run-all-day. “But I do not wonder
at that. I am an honest fisherman and hunter. I have no knowledge of
magic. But if I fail to bring you your knife by sunrise to-morrow, then
you may choose another chief and Run-all-day will take his family from
this valley and seek another home.”
The braves were still incredulous. Though of great endurance and speed,
how could their comrade make a four days’ journey in one night?
“Perhaps you have the moccasins of the wind hidden in your lodge?” said
Lazy Bear.
“Or the red feathers?” suggested a youth named Little Fox.
Green Bow placed his fingers on his lips. “Would you have Bright Robe
back again?” he whispered, sharply. “Keep your thoughts behind your
tongues, if your minds run on such things.”
“The old man is right,” said Run-all-day. “If I make a long journey in
the night-time, to prove to you that I still speak the truth, let not
so much as a hint of it go beyond the warriors of this new village.”
Run-all-day worked busily with the others, at the building of the
lodges. But the furtive glances and whisperings of his companions
kept him in a bad humour; and thought of the awful journey he had so
boastfully undertaken, weighed on his spirit. He did not doubt, for a
moment, the ability of the red feathers to take him to the mouth of
the river and home again; but fear of the terrific speed and the great
magic gripped his heart.
When the evening meal was finished and the warriors began to draw
around the central fire, the new chief entered his lodge and whispered
his trouble in the ear of Red Willow.
“You may not withdraw from your promise,” she said. “If these are truly
the magic feathers they will not fail you. Fly high and straight, tarry
at Green Bow’s camp only long enough to find the knife, and return
without again alighting. It is well that you planned to make the
journey in the night-time; for, doubt not, sharp eyes would mark your
flight by day, eager tongues would carry word of it far and wide, and
the ears of powerful persons would hear of it. Now, since the visit of
Bright Robe, I, too, fear this gift for the littlest warrior. But it is
our duty to keep the feathers safely. Wise-as-a-she-wolf may need them
again. We must never allow them to pass into the hands of one of his
enemies.”
Run-all-day placed one of the slim, red feathers in each of his
moccasins, with shaking fingers. Then, for several hours, he sat in the
lodge, listening to the chatter of his family, and struggling with the
fear that ran like ice in his veins. At last he stepped softly through
the doorway, followed by Red Willow. The night was black, unlit by any
star, and a low wind crawled in the tree-tops.
The woman pointed northward. “That is the road,” she whispered.
Run-all-day drew a deep breath, hesitated for a moment, and then sprang
into the air. He saw the dark mass of the forest under his feet, and
the glow of the camp-fire around which the warriors still sat. The four
quarters of the sky lay black and vast around him, and the prowling
wind blew against his moccasins. Then, with a second desperate
resolve, he ran northward along the currents of the air.
Dawn was breaking along the east when Run-all-day entered his lodge
with Green Bow’s knife in his hand. He was breathless. Snow had
commenced to fall when he had but begun his return journey, and he had
lost his way and been forced to descend twice to earth. He returned the
feathers to Red Willow with a sigh of relief.
When the sun crawled up in a clear sky, he stepped from the lodge and
approached the group of braves already assembled in the centre of the
encampment. The experience of the night had left a pallor on his face;
and every man noticed it.
“You have not slept well,” said old Green Bow, peering up at him with a
secret glance.
“Have you worried about your good hunting-ground?” inquired Little Fox.
For answer, Run-all-day took the knife from his belt and tossed it to
Green Bow.
“Is that your wonderful skinning-knife?” he asked, sharply.
The old man recovered the weapon from the ground, examined it closely
and uttered a hoarse cry of amazement. The others crowded around him;
only the chief held aloof.
“It is the knife,” cried one.
“He left it at the mouth of the river, four days’ journey from here,”
cried another.
“I keep my promises,” said Run-all-day, and stalked back to his lodge.
CHAPTER VI
RUN-ALL-DAY VISITS WHISPERING GRASS
The first winter of Run-all-day’s chieftainship passed quietly in the
wooded valley on Wind Lake. No magicians came to the little village,
and the magic feathers remained safe in Red Willow’s care. Between the
night of the chief’s great journey and the freezing of the lake, many
caribou were killed. Later, bear, and wolf, fox, marten, and wild-cat
fell to the spoil of the hunters. The women and larger children, and
the old men, worked at dressing the skins for robes and clothing, at
making arrows and bows and snow-shoes.
Run-all-day’s youngest child grew steadily, in the shelter of the
big lodge. In fine weather, Singing Bird often carried him about the
clearing and even out on the frozen lake. Old Blowing Fog made him a
coat of fox-skins to wear out-of-doors.
When spring came, and the snow melted on the barrens and dwindled in
the woods, and swollen waters and soft winds gnawed the floor of ice
that hid the lake, the baby in the chief’s lodge began to fret and
lose weight. Red Willow and Blowing Fog were good nurses and knew
something of the use of medicinal herbs; but, day by day, the little
warrior weakened.
Run-all-day hung about the lodge, anxious and helpless. On the morning
of the third day of the baby’s illness old Green Bow caught him by the
sleeve.
“Whispering Grass is a good doctor,” he said. “She lives on the Highest
Hill, beyond this lake and Great Devil’s Lake, westward and southward.
For a warm cloak of marten skins she would give you medicine to cure
the little warrior. Three winters ago, when I was hunting in those
lands, she saved me from a fever that was eating my blood.”
“Three winters ago,” exclaimed the chief. “How do you know that she is
still there?”
“She will live nowhere else.”
“But she may be dead.”
“You will know, when you arrive at her lodge.”
“But it is a long journey, and the baby is very ill,” cried Run-all-day.
“You made a longer journey to bring me my knife,” replied Green Bow.
Run-all-day turned from him and entered the lodge. Hope and resolve
shone in his eyes.
“Give me the feathers,” he whispered to Red Willow. “I must make a long
journey, for medicine for the littlest warrior; and I may not wait for
the darkness to conceal my flight.”
In a few seconds the red feathers were inside his moccasins, against
the soles of his feet. He bent above the sick child, where it lay in
the arms of Blowing Fog, and touched the colourless lips with his
fingers.
“Keep a brave heart, little warrior. The gift of the good magician will
fight for you,” he said.
He was about to step from the lodge when Red Willow detained him with a
gesture of the hand.
“Should Bright Robe, or any friend of his, see you, he must not know
who it is that runs on the wind,” she said, quietly lifting a long
garment of mink skins, almost black in colour, to his shoulders.
“Belt it about you,” she said, “and draw the hood close around your
face.”
Run-all-day obeyed her swiftly, then stepped from the lodge to the
outer brightness.
“I go now in search of Whispering Grass,” he said to Green Bow, who
stood without.
“May good fortune attend you,” replied the old man, staring with an
expression of awe at the chief’s feet.
Without more ado, Run-all-day faced west and south and sprang into the
air. Now the gleaming, sunlit wilderness lay soft and familiar under
his wide vision, and there was no fear in his heart save for the sick
child. With all his strength, he set his feet to the air and sped away
on his journey. The mottled expanse of Wind Lake was passed in a few
seconds. Rushing above the barrens beyond, he overtook and passed a
flying crow. He saw a wooded hollow, a few lodges in a little clearing,
and a boy gazing up at him, with astonished eyes, and it was as if he
had but looked down, for a moment, at a painted picture. He passed over
hills, his speeding feet almost brushing the crowded tree-tops. He saw
caribou, in vast herds, feeding and moving. They seemed no more than
toys made by an old woman.
Soon, Run-all-day saw Great Devil’s Lake in front of him. It was long
and narrow, and split for more than half its length by a slim, wooded
island. In some places the water already shone in dark pools among the
rotting ice. Beyond, stood a range of hills, from which one cone rose
higher than any mountain-top in sight. He did not doubt that this was
the hill of the medicine-woman; but his heart shook at the thought that
he might find there only a deserted lodge. As he approached the hill he
ascended into higher and rarer altitudes of air, eager to read the fate
of his journey in one sweeping glance.
Pausing in his flight, so high above the wilderness that the forests
looked like moss, he beheld a tiny wigwam half-way up the southern
slope of the hill, with a feather of smoke at its roof. Then, in great
circles ever descending, he swooped to the little clearing. Throwing
aside his robe of mink skins, he hastened to the door of the lodge and
peered within. He could only see the glow of a little fire, for his
eyes had narrowed against the vasts of sunlight.
“Enter, chief,” said an aged voice.
But Run-all-day stepped back a pace, still with his eyes on the black
interior of the lodge.
“I seek Whispering Grass, the great doctor,” he said.
“I am Whispering Grass,” replied the voice. “Enter, chief, and tell
your errand.”
By this time Run-all-day could make out the form of the old woman,
crouched above a pot near the fire. Assuring himself that no other
human being lurked in the shadows of the lodge he obeyed her summons. A
strange, bitter-sweet odour filled the wigwam, and all around, from the
sloping sides of bark, hung wisps of herbs and leaves.
Run-all-day told his name to the old woman, and that he had heard
of her from Green Bow. Then he asked for medicine for his baby, and
described the infant’s sickness as best he could.
“And what will you pay, chief?” she asked.
The question reminded him that he had forgotten to bring a gift of
furs, as Green Bow had suggested; but he bethought himself of the great
robe of mink skins which he had worn in the flight.
“Get the medicine ready,” he said, “and I will fetch the gift. I left
it at the edge of the clearing.”
“And what is it?” she asked, fixing her bright eyes on his face.
“It is a great robe, made of fifty mink skins,” he replied.
“Good,” she cried. “Bring it quickly, so that the virtue of my
gratitude may enter into the medicine.”
Run-all-day crossed the clearing in one step, having forgotten the
feathers in his moccasins. He returned more cautiously, with the robe
in his arms.
Whispering Grass was delighted with the gift. She spread it wide on the
ground and felt every inch of the fur with her wrinkled hands, crooning
all the while.
“I am in a hurry,” the chief reminded her. “The child is near death.”
At that the old woman set to work. She placed a small vessel of clay
near the fire, filled it with the liquor from the pot and added a few
crimson berries, some thread-like golden roots and a pinch of white
powder. She stirred the mixture with a stick. Her movements were very
deliberate.
“Hurry! Hurry!” exclaimed Run-all-day.
Whispering Grass did not so much as turn her head.
“You should have the medicines already prepared,” cried the brave.
At that, the old woman snorted defiantly, but continued stirring the
brew as slowly as ever. At last she set the vessel away from the fire.
“Nobody but old Whispering Grass can make such fine medicine as that,”
she mumbled. “It is worth a hundred robes of mink skins.”
“If it cures the little warrior of his illness, then shall I give you a
hundred more robes like this,” said Run-all-day.
“Nay, chief,” she replied. “One will more than outlast my remaining
season of life. It is a rich gift. I have steeped my precious herbs,
before now, for no more than a few dried fish.”
“Is the medicine ready?” inquired the chief.
“Yes, but how will you carry it on so long a journey?” asked the woman.
“As it is,” he replied, lifting the vessel of clay from the ground
and striding from the lodge. A hundred yards or so from the clearing,
he placed the precious medicine on a rock from which the snow had
melted. Then he tore a quantity of small, well-feathered branches from
the spruce trees within reach and fastened them about his body, for a
disguise. He bound them tightly with his leather belt. The branches
hung along his legs and stood above his shoulders.
“Should any one see me on the homeward flight,” he said, “he will think
I am the father of all the eagles.”
None of the precious liquor was spilled on the trip from the Highest
Hill to Wind Lake; in fact, it was scarcely yet cool when Run-all-day
stepped into his lodge.
“Here is the great medicine,” he said, and gave the clay vessel into
Blowing Fog’s hands. Red Willow was holding the baby, who was lying
very still in her arms. The old woman seemed to know the medicine for,
after tasting it, she grunted with satisfaction. She dipped out some
of the liquid in a mussel shell and poured it between the infant’s
colourless lips.
“My mother often made this same medicine,” she mumbled. “Had I but the
proper roots and herbs, I could brew it myself.”
It pleased her, poor old soul, to treat every blessing as if it were
not quite as good as she was accustomed to. But her words fell on
heedless ears. Everyone was intent on the littlest warrior.
Close on the time of sunset, Run-all-day joined his people about the
fires. “The colour has come back to his face,” he said.
“She is a good doctor, that old woman,” said Green Bow, nodding. “I am
glad you found her alive, chief.”
CHAPTER VII
BRIGHT ROBE FINDS HIS ENEMY
Now it happened that Bright Robe, having wandered to the vicinity
of Great Devil’s Lake after months of fruitless searching for
Wise-as-a-she-wolf, saw Run-all-day, in his waving spruce-branches,
flying eastward from the hillside. Of course he thought it was his
rival, Wise-as-a-she-wolf.
“He flies with the feathers, not the moccasins,” he muttered, gazing
after the grotesque and fast-vanishing figure. “Has he not enough magic
to make himself invisible? Or has he forgotten that I have returned to
my country?” he added, viciously.
Knowing that it would be useless for him to try to follow the speeding
figure, even to keep it in sight, he bent his steps toward that part of
the hillside from which he had seen his supposed enemy rise into the
air. After a hard climb through the half-melted drifts, he arrived at
the lodge of Whispering Grass and found the old woman still crouched
by the fire.
“Why have you come back?” she asked, without looking up. “Have you
spilled the medicine?”
“It is not Wise-as-a-she-wolf, to whom you speak,” said the visitor.
“It is Bright Robe.”
She raised her head and stared at him intently. “And does the great
Bright Robe, the defier of the gods, come to poor Whispering Grass for
medicine?” she asked.
“Nay, I want none of your mixtures, old woman,” he replied, slipping
into the lodge. “But I would know where Wise-as-a-she-wolf set out for,
a little while ago.”
The woman smiled secretly, and stirred the pot by the fire. She knew
something of the history of both the magicians.
“If that was Wise-as-a-she-wolf, he goes northward,” she said.
“I saw him flying eastward, old woman,” cried the magician. “It is
breath wasted that is employed in lying to Bright Robe,” he added
sternly.
“Flying?” she queried.
“You need not pretend to doubt it,” answered the man. “He flew like a
hawk--for the red feathers were in his moccasins. And he flew eastward,
across the lake. Had I seen him sooner, an arrow would have caught up
with him, I think.”
“Why did you not fly after him, great chief?” she asked. His face
darkened with anger and his eyes glowed like coals in the dusk of the
wigwam.
“He has both the moccasins of the wind and the red feathers,” he
replied, harshly. “He travels like a bird while I toil along the
ground; and yet, let me but stand within fifty strides of him and I
shall crush him as a child crushes a nut,” he added, furiously.
“Is not your power great enough to wing your own feet with magic?”
asked Whispering Grass, shrewdly.
Bright Robe stepped forward, overturned the pot of medicine with his
foot, and then hurried from the lodge. He did not take the trouble
to draw his robe above his head and vanish, but stalked across the
clearing, slowly and disdainfully.
Whispering Grass snatched a bow and an arrow from the corner and
hobbled after the magician, muttering between tears and curses. She
caught the gleam of his robe between the dark trees; but, even as
she drew the bow, he turned and saw her. Quick as thought, he pulled
the magic robe high and stepped aside. In the next instant, the arrow
struck the trunk of a fir-tree, and stood quivering in the wood.
“In truth, it was the great magician,” cried the old woman, trembling
with fear, and peering anxiously about. He had vanished quicker than
the shifting of a sunbeam. She knew that her doom was sealed. A hundred
stories of the cruelty of Bright Robe, told to her when she was a
child, awoke in her mind. Not once, during his age-long life, had he
been known to forgive an injury.
Next moment, with awful suddenness the magician reappeared, close
beside her. His face was that of a devil. He let his silver robe fall
from his shoulders and raised his club high.
There sounded a swishing in the air, close above them. Then, with a
fierce, shrill cry, Bright Robe sprang aside, whirling his club around
him so swiftly that it drew gray circles in the sunlight. At the same
moment, he snatched for the silver fur which lay on the ground. Twice
he lifted a corner of it, and twice it was pulled away from him by
some invisible hand. Rage shone in his face like a fire, and horrible
sounds escaped from his lips.
The old woman managed to crawl to the edge of the wood; and there
she crouched, sobbing with terror and yet unable to remove her gaze
from the frantic scene. She realized that the cruel magician had been
attacked by some invisible power even while his club was raised to kill
her and that now he fought a terrific battle, handicapped by not being
able to see his antagonist. Her eyes and brain were keen, but her body
was numb; and so she continued to crouch, with the bow still held in
one withered hand.
At last the robe of white fur skin vanished from the ground. Its
owner dashed here and there in the sunlit clearing, roaring like a
wounded animal and slashing the air with his club. Suddenly he halted,
listening, then, with a shrill scream, he dashed toward the tree in
which stood the arrow Whispering Grass had shot at him. But before he
had crossed half the intervening space, the arrow vanished from the
tree trunk. Turning short, with a movement so powerful and quick as
to seem scarcely human, he sprang toward the old woman. Almost in the
same instant of time the bow was snatched from her hand, apparently
into empty air. At sight of that, Bright Robe threw himself flat on the
sodden snow, his great body shook and dwindled,--and behold, a slim,
white hare darted from the empty clearing into the forest.
An hour passed. The old woman crawled to her wigwam and squatted in the
doorway. Several times she heard a strange noise in the air, as of a
swift small wind. But the tree-tops were not stirred by it. The flames
of the little fire behind her sank and the coals faded to black and
gray. The sun stood midway in the southern sky, and cast a straight
shaft of light through the smoke-hole in the roof of the lodge. But
Whispering Grass gave no heed to either the fire or the sun, but gazed
out, eager yet fearful, for more wonders to be enacted in the quiet
clearing.
The sun slid a hand’s-breadth to the westward and the shaft of light
ran crooked in the dusk of the lodge. A tumult of crashing branches
arose on the upper slopes of the hill and descended toward the
clearing. Out of the shelter broke Bright Robe, now in his human form,
but many times increased in stature, struggling with and clinging to
some unseen body in his arms. His club was gone and blood ran down his
great breast from a gash in the shoulder. He put his gigantic muscles
to every trick of wrestling, showing no fatigue, and yet he was forced
backward and downward, and sometimes swung almost clear of the ground.
Sweat streamed from his great face, and stood like dew on his body,
from which his shirt of dressed leather had been torn.
The desperate battle wrenched and twisted half-way down the clearing.
There, for a dozen seconds, it paused, as if the strength of the
invisible one had slackened. Then, with redoubled violence, Bright
Robe was forced backward again, flung from side to side, battered,
staggered, and overborne. Now his face, for the first time, shone with
the pitiful, inner illumination of fear. He screamed in his anguish
of spirit and bent all his strength to clear himself from the grasp
of the invisible enemy. He hurled his gigantic body this way and
that, dragging backwards and sideways. Half-grown trees were snapped
off by the straining feet of the wrestlers. Blood dyed the trampled
snow,--more blood than that which ran from Bright Robe’s wound. At
last, beyond the fringe of trees at the lower edge of the clearing,
the evil magician fell, crashing, to the ground. A scream of fear and
baffled passion clanged across the wilderness, ringing from wood to
wood and waking terrific echoes against every hillside. For a little
while there continued a sound of gigantic struggling.
Whispering Grass was still squatting on the threshold of her lodge,
when a young man issued from the woods where the fight had so lately
ended, and limped toward her. His clothing of fine white leather, set
out with bright stones, was torn and blood-stained. Blood streamed
down across his face and breast from a gash on his forehead. Even the
moccasins on his feet were torn and dyed with blood. The sight of his
pitiful condition drove the numbness of fear from the old woman and she
hobbled forward and helped him into the lodge and onto her own couch of
spruce-branches and furs.
“I am in sore need of your healing, Whispering Grass,” said the youth,
faintly.
“Lie quiet,” she replied. “In a few days you will be able to tell me
how you came by these grievous hurts.”
But her curiosity pricked her shrewdly to know if this young man had
been mixed in the terrific battle, part of which she had so lately
witnessed. And did he know anything of the Unseen One who had
vanquished Bright Robe? She washed the wounds on the stranger’s head
and breast, and bound them with dried leaves of medicinal virtue. She
gave him a draught that was both vivifying and soothing. He was already
nodding when she removed the torn coverings from his feet, to attend to
the cuts and bruises thereon that puzzled her even more than the hurts
on his body. His eyes flashed open.
“Give me the moccasins,” he cried, eagerly, extending a hand.
“I will make you a new pair,” she said. “These are past mending.”
“Not so,” he replied. “Give them to me, I pray you. Place them under my
head.”
She humoured him, smiling the while at his foolishness. Within a
minute, his eyes were closed in slumber.
CHAPTER VIII
THE YOUTH RECOVERS HIS STRENGTH AND VISITS RUN-ALL-DAY
When the young man awoke after a sleep of sixteen hours’ duration, he
begged for food. Whispering Grass held a small vessel of broth to his
lips. He drained it at a gulp, and demanded meat and fish.
“I am hungry,” he said, “for I have spilled blood and the strength of
an hundred men. Do you expect me to recover my lost energy by means of
a mouthful of hot water?”
Much against her convictions as a physician, the old woman cut a meagre
slice of dried caribou meat, broiled it and gave it to the invalid. He
devoured it ravenously, making no more than two mouthfuls of it.
“You will heat your blood. You will have a fever,” she exclaimed.
“My friend,” he replied, “this is no time for half-measures. Even my
good hunger-belt would be useless now. Though you behold but a small
man lying here, sorely cut and bruised, yet the strength of a giant
must be recuperated.”
“Of a giant?” she queried, wondering if the fever had already found him.
He nodded. “Of the giant who mastered Bright Robe,” he said.
“Of the great, invisible one?” she asked, in an awe-stricken whisper.
“Even so. Was it not a great battle?”
“And you--? Why must you eat, young man, to feed his body?”
“We have but the one mouth, old woman,” he replied, smiling gently.
“Who are you, chief?” she cried.
“They call me Wise-as-a-she-wolf,” he said.
Whispering Grass was amazed and disconcerted. For a long time she could
do nothing but gaze at the slight, mild-featured youth reclining on her
couch. Could this be the furious, invisible fighter who had hunted the
mighty Bright Robe from one form to another before her eyes; who had
done battle with him, struck fear into his heart, and overthrown him?
At last she found the use of her tongue again. “You saved me from his
wrath, chief; but who is to protect me when you go again about your
great affairs?” she asked.
“The heart of Bright Robe is known over all the world,” she continued,
“and his black soul is never deaf to the cry of vengeance. When the
winds forget to blow we may expect that terrible one to forget those
who have angered him.”
“We shall be warmed by five summers before Bright Robe regains his
power to harm,” replied the youth. “For five summers and five aching
winters, he must make his home in the trees, in the shape of a little
brown owl.”
“Why did you not kill him, chief?” asked Whispering Grass. “He is your
enemy, and the enemy of the whole world.”
“I did what was in my power,” replied Wise-as-a-she-wolf. “Only the
gods can take his life. He and I have drunk of the same river, that
flows around and around at the very top of the world. But I took his
magic robe from him, and broke his giant’s body, and spilled his magic
for five winters. He could have done no more to me had he defeated me
in the battle.”
“And when the five winters are sped?” queried the old woman.
“I shall be waiting for him,” replied the youth.
The wounds of the good magician healed with a wonderful rapidity, that
was not entirely due to the skill of Whispering Grass. And his appetite
for food, for a few days, was a thing to strike consternation to the
heart of a housekeeper. He ate dried fish and dried meat like a pack
of wolves, for a giant as tall as a pine and as broad as a hill lurked
within his slender frame. He promised that he would refill the larder
as soon as he was on his feet.
On the third day after the battle, he was able to sit up and repair
his moccasins, which had been torn on rocks and timber in the heroic
combat. They had not been made for such rough usage, for they were
the moccasins of the wind. While he worked, patching and stitching
with skill and patience, Whispering Grass told him of the visit of
the chief who had come for medicine for his child, and of how Bright
Robe had seen him flying from the hillside and had mistaken him for
Wise-as-a-she-wolf. She described the chief; and the magician knew that
Run-all-day had made use of the red feathers.
On the morning of the fifth day after the fight with Bright Robe, the
youth arranged his garments of dressed leather, which had been cleaned
and mended, and assured the old woman that his injuries were entirely
cured and that he must go about his business again.
“It was a speedy cure,” replied Whispering Grass. “I can find the wish,
in my selfish old heart, that your magic and my poor washes had not
healed the wounds so quickly, for now I shall spend my lonely days in
fear of that little brown owl.”
At that the youth laughed. “Only the mice and the sparrows need fear
him, for many moons,” said he.
“But the heart within his little breast is still the heart of Bright
Robe,” argued the old woman, dismally wagging her head.
“I tell you that he is harmless, save to the smallest creatures of the
wood,” replied the magician, with a note of sternness in his voice. He
stepped to the door of the lodge.
“I shall return in a few minutes with meat and fish and pemmican,” he
said.
Then, for a second, she heard the swishing rush of his flight. She
hobbled to the doorway and looked out; but the sky was empty. So
she turned back and busied herself with setting the lodge in order,
muttering and shaking her gray head over the wonders that had crowded,
of late, into her secluded life. She was spreading the skins on the
couches when a shadow fell across the floor. Turning, she beheld
Wise-as-a-she-wolf. His smooth face was flushed and he breathed as one
after a sharp run. “Your store-house is full,” he said. “I went to my
own village and got food for you; enough of the best to last you three
moons. And here is a little whistle, made of willow. Blow upon it if
you happen to be in need of my help, and I shall hear, and make speed
to you, no matter in what part of the world I may be. But remember,
should you blow upon this whistle without real need, the note of it
will not reach my ears.”
The old woman accepted the gift gratefully and immediately set about
fastening it around her neck by a leathern thong. And when she raised
her eyes from the task the good magician was gone.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf, invisible by the potency of his own magic and with
the silver robe of his rival under his arm, sped eastward in search of
Run-all-day’s village. The afternoon was well spent before he found it,
for it was a new village.
Alighting nearby, under a clump of crowded pines, he hid the white robe
and walked, in his usual form, through the woods to the clustered
lodges. Half a dozen women, and a few old men, were seated outside the
wigwams, some weaving rough baskets and others laboriously shaping
canoe paddles by means of flint wedges and knives. They looked at
the strange young man with undisguised wonder. He greeted them
good-naturedly and walked straight to the big lodge, feeling sure
that, in so small a village, Run-all-day would be chief. Singing Bird
caught sight of him before he reached the open doorway and whispered to
Red Willow that the young man who had spent a night with them, during
the previous summer, was approaching. Then Red Willow and old Blowing
Fog knew that it was the great magician. Run-all-day and the other
able-bodied men and boys of the village were away, hunting the beaver
and musquash along the breaking streams.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf, great in magic, fearless in battle, peeped into the
lodge. On seeing only women and children there, he stepped shyly to one
side and looked vaguely around, as if uncertain what to do next. The
chatter of women could not be answered by magic and his valour was no
shield against the big eyes of Singing Bird. But before he could plan
a dignified escape Red Willow looked out and invited him to enter. He
stepped cautiously within; whereupon she sent all the children save the
baby to play outside, thus making room for him to sit on one of the
skin-covered couches. He inquired the whereabouts of Run-all-day, and
then asked if the baby was quite recovered from its recent illness.
“He is cured, chief, thanks to your gift of red feathers,” replied Red
Willow.
The magician expressed his pleasure at this and smiled bashfully at
the baby. Then followed a silence that lasted for several minutes. It
was broken by old Blowing Fog who had been blinking curiously at the
visitor ever since his arrival.
“Great magicians were bigger men, in my young days,” said she.
Red Willow and Singing Bird were horrified at that remark; but the
young man laughed good-naturedly.
“There was Highest Star, who slew the great moose that swam across the
Narrow Sea,” continued the old woman, complacently. “He killed the
fearful beast with one blow of his closed hand. Many a time did he
visit my father’s lodge. He was ten feet high and broad as a bear is
long.”
“And where is he now?” asked the youth.
Blowing Fog could not tell him, for certain, but she had her
suspicions. One was that the gods had grown jealous of his greatness
and had buried him under a mountain. Another was that he himself had
become a divinity and now sat in some gorgeous lodge beyond the sunset,
superior to the affairs of the island in which he had been born.
“Nay, do not mourn him,” said the youth, “for he still lives on the
earth and is even now in this island.”
“Then I would I might see him again,” cried Blowing Fog, “for he was as
beautiful and good as he was big.”
“Highest Star was one of the names men called me by,” said the
magician, modestly.
“But he was double the size of you, chief,” expostulated Blowing Fog.
“With one blow of his hand he killed the great moose that swam across
the Narrow Sea to overthrow our lodges.”
She eyed him skeptically.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf nodded his head. “Yes, yes, I remember,” he said.
“The great moose was thrice the size of his kind and his antlers
spread more than the width of this fine lodge. He was king of all
the moose of the western lands. But I was more than ten feet high
when I slew him. Large as I was then, I doubled my stature before I
encountered that gigantic beast. As he drew himself out of the water, I
smote him on the forehead, for the safety of my people.”
“Then why do you go about in so humble a shape to-day?” asked Blowing
Fog, cunningly.
“You do not believe me,” he said, eyeing her steadily.
The old woman was silent for a moment.
“Even Bright Robe stood in fear of Highest Star,” she said, “but
Wise-as-a-she-wolf went softly about the world, studying magic. He was
not a great warrior.”
“Highest Star was one of the names men called me by,” replied the
youth, quietly. He looked at Red Willow.
“Do you doubt what I tell?” he asked her.
“I do not doubt you, chief,” she replied.
At that moment the voice of Run-all-day was heard without, speaking
to Singing Bird. As he entered, the women turned their eyes from the
magician to the door.
“Where is the great and good Wise-as-a-she-wolf?” asked the hunter,
peering about him. Sure enough, there was not a sign of the young man
in the lodge.
“He is here,” whispered Red Willow. “He was seated there, but a moment
ago.”
Blowing Fog gazed wildly around, but said nothing. She trembled
with fear, and wished that she had not voiced her doubts nor spoken
slightingly of the gentle ways of Wise-as-a-she-wolf.
“I do not see him,” said the hunter. “Surely he slipped outside when
you were not watching.”
He gazed all around, and up and down. “Was he angry?” he asked. “Was he
displeased with me for having used the red feathers?”
“You used them in a good cause, my friend,” said a gruff but kindly
voice from up near the peak of the high lodge. The three stared upward,
awe-stricken. The old woman clung desperately to Red Willow. At last
Run-all-day found his voice.
“Are you displeased with me, chief?” he asked.
“Nay, friend,” replied the voice of the unseen, from the dusky peak of
the lodge, “’tis Blowing Fog who has displeased me with her talk.”
“But she is old, chief,” said the hunter, apologetically. “Her wits are
dull, but her tongue wags. I am sure that, whatever she said, she meant
nothing disrespectful by it.”
At that, Blowing Fog loosed her hold of Red Willow’s hand, and,
forgetting her fear, glared in rage and amazement at her tactless
son-in-law. So she wagged her tongue, did she? And she was old? And
her wits were dull,--the impudent rascal. She drew a deep breath,
preparatory to loosing her wrath upon the hunter, when the voice from
the roof spoke again.
“I, too, am old,” said the voice. “I was old before this woman was
born; and yet I do not doubt a person’s word until I have proved him a
liar.”
The hunter looked sternly at the old woman. “You doubted this great
chief’s word,” he cried. “And yet you know that it was by his magic
gift that I was able to fly to Whispering Grass, and home again, swift
as a hawk, and so save the life of the little warrior.”
Blowing Fog was now too angry and mortified to fear anything.
“Silence, blockhead!” she cried. “What do you know of magic and
magicians? ’Tis but a little while since you were afraid to touch
the red feathers. And Bright Robe turned your heart to water, with a
glance.”
She looked upward. “Chief,” she said, “have you but made yourself
invisible and thrown your voice into the peak of the roof, or do
you really stand with your feet on the ground and your head in the
smoke-hole?”
Poor Red Willow was horrified at her mother’s temerity and uncalled-for
rudeness. With a sobbing cry, she tried to place her hand over the old
woman’s mouth. But she did not succeed, and received a shrewd blow on
the cheek for her pains.
“Old woman, you shall see, with your own eyes, whether or not
Wise-as-a-she-wolf speaks the truth,” cried the angry voice from above.
“Forgive her, chief. Do not hurt her,” cried Red Willow and the hunter.
Then they fell back, against the bark walls of the lodge, speechless;
for there bulked a great figure, its feet in the middle of the floor,
its knees bent, and its head against the very top of the roof.
“These quarters cramp me,” said the giant, and he immediately
straightened his knees and his back and expanded his chest. The great
lodge was ripped and torn, and with the top of it on his head, the
incensed magician strode away into the woods.
Then there was panic and tumult in the village. Women screamed and men
shouted and old Blowing Fog fell down in a fit. Red Willow clutched her
littlest baby tightly in her arms and her other children scampered to
her protection and clung to her garments.
“Silence!” cried Run-all-day to the villagers. “I do not blame the
great magician for getting angry and showing his power. And see, he has
hurt no one. Throw some cold water on the old woman. She insulted my
friend and master in my own lodge--and yet we must not let her die in
the grip of fear.” He was very angry with his mother-in-law.
Liberal sousings of icy water soon caused the old woman to open her
eyes, spring to her feet and attack the people who had carried the
water and poured it upon her with such gusto. She dealt old Green Bow a
slap on the side of the head that shook the few teeth in his jaws, and
was about to assault another ancient warrior when Wise-as-a-she-wolf,
once more in the shape of a mild young man, again appeared. At sight
of him she slipped quietly behind the fattest person present. The
magician went straight to Red Willow.
“I am sorry that I lost my temper,” he said, sincerely. “I acted like
a braggart; and I have ruined your fine lodge. But I will set to work
immediately to rebuild it.”
The poles and bark of which the big wigwam had been constructed were
uninjured. Wise-as-a-she-wolf and Run-all-day set to work like beavers
and their example was soon followed by all the villagers save Green
Bow. He, poor old man, went home and nursed his jaw. By the fall of
dusk the big lodge was as good as new again, and the entire family and
their guest sat comfortably within. Blowing Fog busied herself with
cooking the evening meal, and had not a word to say. But the sight of
Wise-as-a-she-wolf’s stature and strength had impressed her tough old
heart more than a dozen less spectacular demonstrations of his magical
powers would have done.
The good magician, his conscience still pricking him for his recent
violence, made himself very agreeable. He cut several of the bright
stones from his shirt of leather and gave one to each of the children,
including the girl, Singing Bird, and the littlest baby. “They are
jewels of courage,” he said, “and impart their virtue to the wearer.
They were dug from great mountains, by a fierce red-skinned people who
live far to the south and west, in a great land beyond the seas.”
He told them some of the adventures that had befallen him since their
last meeting. He gave a modest account of his battle with Bright Robe,
near the lodge of Whispering Grass. The heart of Run-all-day was glad
within him when he heard that the cruel magician had been overthrown
and shorn of his powers for five long summers. Even Blowing Fog forgot
her disgrace for a moment and cackled. “Ho! ho! Think of that little
brown owl with the heart of that great magician under his ribs. He will
be a mighty slayer of wood mice. Ho! ho!”
Everybody laughed at that,--even the little children who did not know
what it meant.
Early next morning the magician drew Run-all-day aside and charged him
to be careful of the red feathers.
“Make use of them only in worthy adventures, for the saving of your own
life or the lives of others,” he said. “And do not let them become a
matter of common report, for even though Bright Robe is harmless for a
long time, there are many others who know their virtue and would risk
much to possess them. Remember that you have them in charge for the
littlest warrior, of whom I expect great things.”
Then he went into the woods and took the white robe from its
hiding-place, and flew northward and westward.
CHAPTER IX
THE LITTLE BROWN OWL HUNTS FOR FOOD
Wise-as-a-she-wolf had not been gone from the clearing of Whispering
Grass more than ten minutes before the little brown owl that had once
been Bright Robe made his appearance from the gloom of the woods and
perched on one of the poles at the peak of the lodge. The old woman
looked up and saw the round, yellow eyes staring down at her with such
a hateful glare that she knew them for the orbs of the cruel magician.
Her heart weakened within her. She could not remove her eyes from
the threatening, baleful regard. But as the owl did not come nearer,
courage returned to her by slow degrees. She remembered that, no matter
how murderous the bird’s designs upon her, he was but a bird after all,
with no power to change his shape until five long summers were passed.
So, suddenly, she turned away, snatched a fagot from the ground and
hurled it upward through the smoke-hole in the peak of the wigwam. But
the owl was already in the air, floating back to the dense shades of
the forest.
The owl did not move again from his retreat in a thicket of pines,
until night. He was hungry; and as soon as darkness fell he ventured
from his perch to look for food. The thought of raw flesh was not
repulsive to him, for he had even eaten it in his human form; but he
had grave misgivings as to his present ability to kill. He knew that he
must fly very quietly, peering about for mice and birds, and, at the
first movement in the moss or foliage, pounce down and strike with his
claws. So shrewdly did hunger gnaw him that he quite forgot, for the
time being, the indignity of his position.
He moved through the forest ways like a drifting shadow, sometimes
close to the ground, sometimes among the pointed tree-tops. For several
hours he hunted high and low, far and wide, without detecting so much
as a sign of life in woodland or barren. At last he lit on the tip of a
little spruce tree and peered sharply about on all sides and listened
intently. He heard a slight rustle at the foot of the tree but could
see nothing. Again the rustling sound came to his alert ears and
he saw something moving on the ground, beyond the lowest branch of
the tree. It must be a mouse he thought, and the idea fairly made his
little beak water with anticipation of the feast.
[Illustration: “THE ASTONISHED BUNNY HAD DEALT HIM A SHREWD BLOW WITH
ONE OF HIS BIG HIND LEGS.”]
He marked the spot, and pounced. His claws hooked into a hairy mass.
Something snarled and sprang. With a terrified squawk he bounced to one
side, just out of reach of a pair of snapping jaws, and flew swiftly
into the top of a pine. He had mistaken the tail of a fox for a mouse.
The owl learned several more useful lessons that night; but he made no
kill. He was knocked about by a white hare, on which he had pitched
with a magician’s scorn of the powers of a hare; but he was only a
very small owl after all, and the astonished bunny had dealt him a
shrewd blow with one of his big hind legs. The only mouse that he had
discovered had escaped him with ease; and, most bitter of all his
experiences, he had been hunted himself by a great white bird whose
wings were as silent as his own. Just before dawn, he returned to the
lodge of Whispering Grass and found a few scraps of frozen fish near
the store-house of bark and logs.
He ate these ravenously, tearing them with beak and claws. When his
hunger was satisfied, he examined the store-house carefully. It was
a very small building, raised on four stumps to a height of several
feet from the ground. The walls were made of logs, fitted tightly and
strongly together, but it seemed to him that the roof was composed of
nothing more substantial than a few sheets of birch bark. He scratched
at the bark with his claws and jabbed at it with his beak. He got quite
beside himself with rage; but his desperate attempts to tear the roof
of the old woman’s store-house, so that he could carry away her meat
and fish, proved futile.
At last, weary from his exertions, he flew to a near-by tree to think
the matter over. He did not care greatly about the food, for its own
sake, for a very little of it would keep him in plenty; but he wanted
to steal and destroy it so that Whispering Grass would starve. A bright
idea occurred to him. He would go to a lynx, or a bear, and tell him
that much good food lay close at hand, with only a roof of bark to
cover it. And perhaps he could even persuade some big animal to destroy
old Whispering Grass herself. Surely the mention of his true name would
be enough to induce the fiercest beast in the forest to do his bidding.
The little owl lurked in a tree-top all day, planning his revenge on
the old woman. As soon as dusk fell, he flew to the clearing and beheld
Whispering Grass squatted in the doorway of her lodge, eating her
evening meal. A dish of meat lay on the ground beside her and the smell
of it awoke a man’s appetite in the stomach of the fluffy little bird.
He perched on the top of the lodge and stared down at his enemy and her
repast. He made no sound, and she did not look up. Suddenly he dropped
upon the dish, sank his claws into the largest slice of meat, flew
swiftly back to his tree and swallowed it to the last tough shred.
The old woman knew, in a moment, that the thief was Bright Robe, for
no other owl would have sufficient courage to take food from so near a
human being.
“He might even attack me,” she mumbled, “and claw my eyes out.”
So she carried her supper into the lodge, fastened the flap across the
doorway and put more wood on the fire. Terror of the evil magician was
like a cold wind upon her back.
After finishing his meal, the owl set out in search of a lynx or a
bear. The little victory over Whispering Grass made him feel quite
like his old self; but he did not forget the lessons that he had
learned the night before. He flew cautiously, avoiding the open spaces
for fear of the big white bird. He investigated every thicket, entering
from above as a matter of discretion. Though he was looking for a lynx,
he did not want to find one unexpectedly, and he suspected the lower
branches of every tree of sheltering a crouching fox.
After several hours of searching, the little brown owl happened upon
an old she bear. She was hunting mice and seemed to be in a cranky
humour; and when the owl accosted her politely, in the language of the
woods-people with which he had become familiar during his long life as
a magician, she did not so much as look up at him. The owl was nettled.
“Do you hear me speak?” he asked.
The bear grunted and began to amble away.
“Hold, hold,” cried the owl. “If you are hungry, I can tell you where
to get food in plenty.”
At that the bear halted and turned.
“Hungry,” she grumbled. “Would I be grabbing at little mice if I were
not hungry, you miserable, fleshless bunch of feathers?”
“If you talk like that,” replied the owl, “you may go fill your paunch
with moss and twigs.”
The bear grumbled more than ever. She did not like owls, for they had
the reputation of pretending to know a great deal, and, in reality, of
knowing very little. Also, she had once tried to make a meal off one of
these scrawny birds, in a time of famine. On the other hand, she was
far too hungry to turn her back on any chance of obtaining a full meal.
“You must excuse my rudeness,” she grumbled, “but I’m really so worried
about the scarcity of fish and soft roots and the activity of the
hares, that I scarcely know what I say. I believe you mentioned food.
What kind of food?”
“Pemmican and smoked salmon and dried caribou meat,” said the owl.
The old bear sat up and pressed her paws to her stomach.
“If I could only believe it. But you owls are all liars,” she mumbled.
“I only appear to be an owl,” said the little bird. “I am, in reality,
the great magician Bright Robe.”
The bear paid no attention to this remark.
“Where is the food?” she asked.
“In the clearing of that old woman called Whispering Grass,” the owl
informed her.
“In her store-house?”
“Yes.”
“And is the old woman dead?”
“No,” replied the owl. “She is not dead yet.”
“Perhaps you mean that you intend to kill her,” sneered the bear.
“If you carry away her food, then she’ll die of starvation,” said the
wicked little owl.
The bear was quite inarticulate with fury and disgust. She ran to the
tree on which the bird was perched and clawed at and shook it.
“You feather-head,” she managed to growl, at last, “do you want me to
get my hair all eaten off again by that old woman’s red fire? I know
her store-house, you rascal. It is as strong as a rock. I tried to
break into it once, when I was younger, and she came out with a stick
of fire and hit me a hundred times.”
Before the owl could recover himself from the unexpected outburst of
wrath, the old she bear had ambled swiftly into the depths of the
forest.
CHAPTER X
THE LITTLE BROWN OWL HAS MORE TROUBLE
The little brown owl was both astonished and enraged at the bear’s
behaviour. He wanted to cry threats and derision after her; but he had
already learned that it is not wise for a small owl to make itself too
conspicuous in the wilderness, especially at night. So he contented
himself with planning, for a full half-hour, the fate of that she
bear, should she oblige him by living until the five long summers and
winters of his enchantment were passed. Even in his pitiful bird-shape
he enjoyed nothing so much as the scheming of awful revenges on his
enemies. So for awhile, the matter of the old woman was driven from
his thoughts; but it was recalled to his mind by the sight of a lynx
moving noiselessly past the foot of the tree upon which he was perched.
Without hesitation, he requested the big cat to stop and hear what he
had to say. The lynx obeyed like a flash, leaping into the air and
alighting with his head toward the tree, crouched, his green eyes
sinister and steady.
“Who speaks?” he snarled.
His round head was close to the ground, much lower than his
hind-quarters, under which his great hind legs were doubled like
springs. He was ready to launch himself upward or forward, as the case
might require. His white teeth gleamed in the starlight.
“It is I, Bright Robe, who speaks,” replied the owl. The name seemed to
convey no particular meaning to the lynx.
“Hah, it is nothing but a little owl,” he snarled, and turned about as
if to continue on his interrupted business.
“Not so fast,” cried the other. “I am Bright Robe, the great magician,
the greatest magician in the world.”
“I have no time to sit and listen to the lies of an owl. I am hungry
and must hunt,” replied the big cat.
“I tell you, I am Bright Robe, the master of magic,” cried the bird.
“Then turn yourself into a nice fat hare, and jump down here, and I’ll
turn you into a lynx,” said the beast, grinning wickedly over his
shoulder. “I am something of a magician myself,” he added.
“Why do you not believe me?” asked the owl.
“Who ever believed an owl?” replied the other, “or, for that matter,
who ever believed the word of Bright Robe? So you are a liar, whoever
you are.”
The owl changed the subject immediately.
“If you are looking for food,” he said, “I know where there is plenty
of it.”
“What kind of food?” inquired the lynx.
“Pemmican, and smoked fish, and dried meat,” replied the bird, in his
most seductive voice.
“Nothing fresh?” asked the other.
“Well, not fresh, exactly, but all sweet and in prime condition.”
“Where is it?”
“In the store-house of old Whispering Grass.”
“Miserable bird,” cried the lynx, “why have you wasted my time with
this idle tale? That old woman’s store-house is as strong as a
pine-tree.”
“The walls may be strong,” replied the owl, “but the roof is of bark.
One stroke of your great claws would tear it to strips.”
“It was of poles, laid snug together, when I last clawed at it,” said
the lynx.
“I tried it last night,” answered the owl, “and it was of bark.”
The lynx came close to the tree and glared up at the bird. His eyes
were round and green, and made the owl feel quite uncomfortable. He was
glad that Wise-as-a-she-wolf had not let him loose in the wilderness in
the form of a hare.
“Why are you so anxious that I should have plenty of food?” inquired
the lynx, suspiciously. “I did not know that we were such good friends.”
“To be honest with you,” replied the owl, “I want you to eat and carry
away the old woman’s food so that she shall starve. My suggestion is
not prompted by friendship for you so much as by my enmity toward her.”
“How is that? I never knew the old woman to have an enemy before,” said
the lynx.
Then the owl told the story of how the old woman had shot the arrow at
him, when he was in his proper form of Bright Robe.
“Why did you not slay her then, oh mighty one?” sneered the lynx, who
did not believe a word of the story.
“It--it was not convenient for me to do so, just then,” answered the
bird.
“Then why not do it now?” asked the lynx. “If you are a great magician
’twould be a simple matter for you to turn yourself into a bear and
go tear the old woman’s store-house to fragments, or even eat the old
woman.”
“To do so now would disturb my plans,” cried the bird, petulantly. “I
do not wish the old woman to see my hand in the matter,” he added, more
quietly.
The big cat snarled disgustedly.
“Why do you tell me such a foolish story?” he asked. “I have never
heard so many lies in all my life before.”
“It is the truth,” said the bird.
“I don’t know why a miserable little owl should want an old woman to
starve (which she wouldn’t, anyway, because she can catch plenty of
fish in the lake), but I’ll just go along and see if what you say about
the roof of the store-house is true or not,” said the lynx, turning and
walking away.
The owl flew after him and floated above his head.
“I did not think of that,” he said. “I forgot that she could catch
fish in the lake. You had better go right into her lodge and kill her.”
That was too much for the lynx. Without any warning, he sprang into the
air and struck at the bird with unsheathed claws. He missed his mark by
an inch.
The terrified owl flew into the nearest tree and sat there quietly
for half an hour. He was thoroughly disheartened, and could not help
wondering what would have happened to him if the lynx had struck him.
Of course he would have suffered the pangs of a violent death; but
would his spirit--his immortal life--have remained in the body of the
great cat, after it had crunched and swallowed his meagre flesh and
bones, or would he have been fated to wander, formless, until the awful
five summers were passed? The idea was a terrible one, however he
considered it. As a man, even as a magician, he had always feared pain;
and, surely, it was better to be a bird than have no body at all.
At last the little owl roused himself from his unpleasant reflections
and winged silently away in the direction of the lodge of Whispering
Grass. He soon reached the little clearing, and floated across it,
close to the ground. He alit on a small tree in the shadow of the
woods, from which he had a good view of the lodge and the store-house.
He had not been perched there long before he saw the lynx steal into
the starlit clearing from the black edge of the forest. He was not
surprised at the sight.
The lynx advanced cautiously, slowly, often halting and looking
suspiciously about him. He circled the lodge twice, then crept to the
store-house and glided around and around it. He evidently suspected
the owl of trying to tempt him into a trap. At last he stood up on his
hind legs and clawed the walls of the little store-house inquiringly.
He sniffed at the cracks between the poles, at first with distrust but
soon with evident relish. He reached up a paw and felt the roof of
bark. He examined it, in this way, from all sides, and failed to detect
any manner of trap. At last he dropped back, squatted for a moment,
and then sprang lightly to the roof and straightway began ripping the
bark. At first he did it gently, inquiringly, but soon, finding a stout
protection of poles everywhere under the bark, he became violent. The
fragrance of the pemmican and fish and flesh stole up to his hungry
nostrils and he forgot all caution in his mad efforts to tear the
well-pinned roof into fragments.
The owl, watching from his perch, was at first surprised at the other’s
failure, then amused. The roof was more substantial than he had
thought, after all. Well, it did not matter (except to the lynx), since
the old woman could live by catching fish in the lake.
The great hide which hung in front of the doorway of the lodge was
drawn noiselessly aside; and neither the owl nor the toiling lynx
noticed it. Then, suddenly, there sounded the sharp twang of a released
bow-string, and, with a snarling scream, the lynx sprang from the
roof of the store-house and fled into the woods. Again the bow-string
twanged and a second arrow sped from the black interior of the wigwam.
It struck a glancing blow on the roof where the lynx had so lately
stood, flew upwards and sideways and hit the unsuspecting owl a hard
blow across the breast with its shaft.
The owl found himself on the ground, feeling very sore and ill. He
tried to fly, but could only flutter a foot or two at a time, so
bruised were his muscles. He knew that the ground was not a safe place
for him and immediately began to make violent efforts to get into a
tree. Again and again he hopped and fluttered, only to fall back each
time as if the boughs of the little spruce had pushed him away. It
was not only discouraging, but it hurt; and, worst of all, he still
remained on the ground, at the mercy of prowling animals. He rested for
awhile, and then continued his painful efforts to get into the tree.
Failure followed failure, and he was steadily losing strength. He had
about decided to give up the attempt and look for some sort of hole in
which to hide when he heard a soft foot-fall behind him. In a frenzy of
terror he hopped upward again, flapped his wings desperately, touched
the end of a branch about six feet from the ground and clung with beak
and claws. He felt himself slipping back. He clawed; he threshed the
air and branches with his sore wings; and, at last, he reached a solid
perch. At the same moment a big red fox glided, like a shadow, under
the tree. That was a close shave for the little owl.
CHAPTER XI
THE MAGIC LODGE
Of all the great magicians in the north, Wise-as-a-she-wolf alone
worked solely for the welfare of mankind; and, as his reputation for
virtue grew, so did his enemies multiply. But, with the exception of
Bright Robe, not one of them could compare with him for cleverness, or
courage, or knowledge of the secret arts. Few of them possessed either
brain or determination enough to master more than the simplest lessons
in magic! Having attained so far, they were content to practise their
little arts covertly, to serve their own ambitions. They overthrew
their enemies by provoking stronger people against them, working slyly,
with many false tales and foolish antics. They had been at the bottom
of most of the wars in the big island, and, though they seldom fought
in the front of the battle (not possessing the mastery over death, as
did Bright Robe and Wise-as-a-she-wolf), yet they usually gained power
and wealth at the cost of the warriors’ lives.
These people hated Wise-as-a-she-wolf, because he had always worked
against them. When he was at home, the island was at peace; but no
sooner was it known that he had gone to some distant land than a dozen
little wars sprang up, every village was turned against its neighbour
and battle and starvation ravaged the country. But, of late years,
the island had been quiet and prosperous. Bright Robe had been so
long in exile that he had become little more than a figure of legend,
and Wise-as-a-she-wolf had spent enough of his time in the island to
keep the designers of evil in constant fear. Then the news of Bright
Robe’s return, in all his old power and wickedness, reached the
little magicians. They heard that he was intent on the overthrow of
Wise-as-a-she-wolf, and at that their black hearts rejoiced, and they
began to plan murders and battles and thefts on their enemies. A few of
them had even seen Bright Robe and offered him their services; and he
was as great and terrible as their fathers had told them. And then, of
a sudden, he had disappeared and they feared that their wicked master
had deserted them, and had offended the gods afresh.
Now, with Bright Robe again reduced to a term of inactivity, the good
magician had time to devote himself to an important task of a rather
more private nature than that of keeping his countrymen in order; and
this was the building of a stronghold in a forest in the very heart
of the island. This forest was fenced, on the south and west, by a
bend of the Purple Hills. Northward and eastward of it lay trackless
marshes and naked barrens. The forest was of pine-trees for the most
part, standing tall and thick over miles of gently rolling country;
and in the centre of it lay a pond, fed by hidden springs of pure,
ice-cold water. The good magician’s lodge stood beside this pond.
He had commenced it when he first began to learn magic, and year by
year he had worked at it; and still it was not entirely finished.
There was ever some new beauty to be added to roof or walls. Only the
Crimson Wigwam, beyond the western edge of the world, and other homes
of the gods beyond the walls of ice, surpassed this magic lodge which
Wise-as-a-she-wolf had built with his own brains and hands. To begin
with, one might stare straight at it for hours, or for a hundred
years, and see nothing but pine-trees. There was not so much as a sign
of a clearing to lead one to think that a great lodge stood there.
And yet, if one were able to reach that particular portion of forest
where the lodge was, and pass the walls, he would find that he could
walk straight through the tree-trunks, as if they were as immaterial
as shafts of sunlight. And so they were. For the sturdy pines that
seemed to crowd so close in the compass of the lodge were but images of
the trees that had stood there before the magician had cut them down,
spellbound there to deceive the common eye. Nothing but the greatest
magic could have accomplished such a miracle. But the builder had
guarded against the chance of any one blundering against the invisible
walls and thereby discovering their magic quality, by encircling the
immediate vicinity with enchantment so potent that it would lead a
traveller ever to one side or the other and yet let him believe that he
was walking straight ahead.
This forest was occasionally visited by wandering hunters, and
more than one party of adventurous braves had camped, for a night
or two, beside the crystal pond; but none had ever suspected that
Wise-as-a-she-wolf’s home was so near at hand.
To eyes that could see it, the lodge was a fascinating and beautiful
place. Every stone, and log and sheet of bark that had been used in the
building of it, had been converted, inside or out, into something rare
and wonderful. Bark had been taken from a thousand birch trees and half
as many fir trees to cover the roof, which was higher than the top of
the tallest pine and painted like the roof of the world; painted so
cunningly, with magic pigments, that it changed in colour, hour by hour
through the days and the nights and the seasons, with all the colours
of the sky. It was as beautiful as the sky; and yet neither rain nor
snow could pierce it, and clouds could not hide its charms from the
dweller beneath it. At night it shone with stars, made of rare jewels
which the builder had brought from a distant land. They flashed an
hundred colours in the light which shone from the big lamps in golden
vessels that gave forth no smoke in the burning.
[Illustration: “HERE A GOD STOOD HUGE AND BLACK AGAINST A SUNSET SKY,
LOOKING OUT ACROSS A DARKENING WORLD.”]
The outer walls (invisible to the eyes of every one but
Wise-as-a-she-wolf) were dull and plain, save for the windows of
crystal as clear as ice. They were built of great fragments of
granite, and pine logs, set skilfully and firmly together. But within,
the rough materials had been smoothed to fine surfaces whereon the
master had painted hunters and beasts, warriors, lovers and battles,
spring and summer and winter, children and gods, in living colours.
Never had there been such a picture before; and never, I fear, will
there be such an one again. He had wrought on it for years. To stand
in the midst of those four walls was to have life, and all the men
and wonders of the world, within the glance of your eye. Here stood
two young lovers in a sunlit glade; and there sat a group of old
story-tellers around a cooking-fire. Here a hunter stooped above a
fallen stag, his red knife in one hand, his slackened bow in the other;
and there a young mother washed her babe in a clear stream. Here a
god stood huge and black against a sunset sky, looking out across
a darkening world of pigmy villages and wide forests; here a naked
child sat in the sunlight and played with toys of carved wood; here
were fields of ice, and a gray sea, and innumerable seals; and there
ran a great wolf with his thin red tongue hanging from his jaws. Here
was a girl weaving a basket of split willows, her face bent demurely
above her work; and you had but to turn your head to behold five-score
warriors in battle, dealing blows and shedding blood.
As these pictures grew under the hand of the good magician, it seemed
to him a pity--great work selfishly done--if no one but himself should
be allowed to enjoy them. So he went out from his magic house, and
travelled among his people with this thought in his mind. And, first of
all, he found a man called Wounded Hawk, who was crippled and sick and
a burden to the village in which he lived. The man was tired of life,
for he had always been active and adventurous, and now his hunting days
were over because of an injury he had received in a fight with a bear.
So the magician took him from his poor wigwam, in the dead of night,
and carried him to his own magic lodge.
For twenty days, Wounded Hawk lived in that house of wonder; and not
once, in that time, did he see his unknown host, though food and drink
were always at his hand. He lived as one in a dream, and was happy from
dawn till dark in the contemplation of the pictures, all valour and
romance and tenderness and adventure and sheer delight; and yet he
knew that they were but drawings of a real world and common things. So
his old zest in life returned to him, and his face grew rosier and his
eyes brighter. Stories of the battles and the huntings and the homelier
incidents, stirred in his brain. On the night of the twentieth day, as
he lay in a sound sleep, Wise-as-a-she-wolf lifted him in his arms and
carried him back to his poor wigwam. When he awoke, he looked about
him at the sloping walls of bark and rubbed his eyes. Then he laughed,
thinking of the wonderful dream he had enjoyed and of the pleasure he
would have in telling it to his friends. Though he was still lame in
one leg, he felt vigorous and happy, and left his lodge and greeted his
friends with a merry face.
Of course they stared at him in amazement. “Where have you been?” they
cried. “You look as if you had found a good hunting-ground.”
“I have had a good sleep, and a fine dream,” replied Wounded Hawk.
“Have you been sleeping ever since you went away?” they asked. “Have
you been dreaming for twenty days?”
“Twenty days?” queried Wounded Hawk, opening his eyes wide.
“Did you think that we would not look inside your wigwam, when we
missed you?” asked the chief of the village. “Come, now, tell us what
mischief you were about?”
Wounded Hawk shouted with joy. “Then it must be true,” he cried, “and
not a dream after all.”
They continued to question him, and he told them a little part of the
wonder of the magic lodge and magic pictures. At first they thought he
was deceiving them; then they crowded about him to hear his stories.
They built him a comfortable lodge and gave him furs and food; and
his fame went abroad as the master of story-tellers, the maddest of
dreamers.
And from then, to the day of his death, life seemed a fine thing to
him and the world a delightful place. The wonders of the pictures
and the magic lodge were always green in his memory and his stories
carried the fame of the Pictures of Life far and wide. Warriors and
children came to his lodge and begged him to talk, and he told them
great stories. He even painted pictures, with coloured earths and dyes,
on bark and dressed hide, making them as much like the pictures in his
mind as he was able. And he was always striving to make them better,
and to tell finer stories. Love and honour were his; and when he died,
people mourned him as the mightiest warrior is not mourned. And his
soul (which was not crippled) went gladly out on an eternal quest of
valorous and beautiful things.
Another had seen the magic lodge. An old woman, whom the good magician
had found in a deserted camp, had ended her days there, thinking
herself beyond the black river of death.
CHAPTER XII
THE ADVENTURE OF JUMPING WOLF
Jumping Wolf was a young man of twenty years of age, who belonged to
a big village in the south. His father had been chief of the village
until an enemy--a coward who knew a little magic--had first worked his
downfall by secret methods, and then killed him with his own hand. Then
Jumping Wolf killed the murderer with a blow of his club, knocked three
of the false villagers senseless, and ran for his life. That happened
in March, when the snow still lay deep, but with a crust over it in
most places.
Twenty men, old and young and of middle-age, gave hot chase to Jumping
Wolf. They filled the woods with their cries of anger; but the fugitive
ran quietly, saving his breath and his strength. He was a good runner,
and had been named for his agility. Within a half-hour of the fight
in the village, five of the oldest men gave up the pursuit and leaned
heavily against the trunks of trees, gasping for breath. They felt so
many pains in their insides from the unwonted exertions, that they were
sorry they had left the village. It was not long before more of the
pursuers stopped running; and they were so spent that they simply fell
flat on the snow, in agonies of exhaustion. They were very fat, and
wondered why they had been such fools as to join the chase.
Within an hour of the commencement of the flight, only four men
continued to run on the trail of Jumping Wolf. These were strong men,
tireless and courageous. Two of them were seasoned warriors and two
were youths of the fugitive’s age. At last the chase led to an open
barren which, after a mile of level, sloped up to a bleak hill. Here
and there on the barren were ponds and great boulders, and clumps of
spruce-tuck.
Jumping Wolf headed straight across the barren, running evenly and
steadily; and, as he ran, he slipped his bow from his shoulder and
pulled an arrow from the quiver at his belt. He had done nothing but
slay the murderer of his good father, and there was neither relenting
nor fear in his heart. His had been the hand of justice; and if he
must die for it he would die fighting. Death was nothing for a man to
fear--but, life?--ah, it was surely a pleasant state. So he fitted the
notch of an arrow on the string of his bow, and ran on until he reached
a little clump of spruce-tuck. Here he turned, breathing deep. One of
his pursuers was already half-way across the intervening open and the
other three were clear of the woods.
“Go back,” shouted Jumping Wolf.
But the warrior who led the chase paid no heed to the warning. Then
Jumping Wolf raised his bow, pulled the notch of the arrow back to
his ear and let the shaft fly. It struck at the feet of the leading
pursuer, piercing the crust and bringing the warrior to a standstill.
“Go back,” shouted Jumping Wolf, again. This time the enemy obeyed.
Turning quickly, he ran back and joined his companions.
At that they all halted and looked uncertainly toward their quarry,
across the white expanse of snow. One of them carried a spear and the
others clubs or knives; but none of them had bows or arrows. They did
not know what to do next, and stood there, panting and staring. They
had not counted on finding the young man so formidably armed, for his
club had been knocked from his hand during the fight in the village
and they had not seen, during the long run through the woods, the bow
on his back.
Jumping Wolf stepped forward six paces.
“There is no mercy in my heart,” he cried, and again raised his bow,
with an arrow fitted to the string. “You have hunted me like a lone
wolf, now feel how long and sharp are the fangs of Jumping Wolf,” he
shouted, and loosed the shaft. They dodged this way and that; but one
of them stumbled, leaped up again and scooted into the forest with a
flake of sharpened flint sunk in the muscles of his shoulder. Next
moment, another felt the pang of a wound in the flesh of his leg; and
the young man laughed fiercely to see the barren so suddenly cleared of
his enemies.
As only four arrows remained in his quiver, he retraced his steps
to where the first arrow stood upright in the crust and returned it
among its fellows. Then, after a keen scrutiny of the forest woods
into which his enemies had retired, he turned again and continued his
journey across the barren and up the side of the bleak hill. He looked
back, from the ridge of the hill, but could detect no sign of his late
pursuers. Before him lay more barren ground, and beyond that the black
forests stretching on every side. He looked up at the sun, a silver
ball in a sky of March blue.
“I shall go east and south,” he said, and went forward bravely. He
felt no ill effect from the desperate run he had been forced to make.
But grief and anger, and hate for the village that had been his home,
glowed in his heart.
So he travelled for days; and, for a time, he spent his nights without
the cheerful company of fire, not sure that his enemies had left his
trail. He killed enough small game to supply himself with food, and
suffered from nothing except loneliness, and sorrow for his father’s
death. He had known no other care save a father’s since his earliest
years. On the tenth day after his escape from the village, he wounded a
young stag with his arrows and then ran it down in the melting snow. So
he built a small shelter where the stag was killed, and paused in his
journey to make a pair of snow-shoes, and smoke some of the meat.
In this manner he spent more than a week very comfortably. When the
snow-shoes were made, and the best parts of the meat were cured, and a
dozen blunt-headed arrows shaped, for the killing of partridges and
hares, he set out again on his journey.
[Illustration: “HE SPRANG ASIDE INTO THE SHELTER OF A TREE TRUNK, AND
PEERED BACK ALONG THE WAY HE HAD COME.”]
By this time, the soft voices of spring were awake in the
wilderness,--the murmur of streams gnawing at rotten ice, the dull
creakings of subsiding snows, the swish of thawing winds across the
miles of forest. The snow was wet and heavy, where it still lay deep in
drifted places, and Jumping Wolf was glad that he had halted to make
the snow-shoes, rough as they were.
The spring advanced swiftly. Soon the streams were roaring free and
the great rivers were swinging the pans of broken ice in mid-current;
boiling over them, and driving them together, mass upon mass, in
tumbled barriers of white and gray. The lakes and ponds moved in their
depths at the sure call, split the roofs of their prisons, and sent the
sullen fragments adrift.
The shades of night were gathering through the forest, and Jumping Wolf
was beginning to look about him for a suitable place to camp when an
arrow whistled past him, close to his head. He sprang aside, into the
shelter of a tree trunk, and peered back along the way he had come. His
keen sight detected a movement, as of a shadow, slipping among shadows.
He unslung his bow from his shoulder, and in so doing was reminded of
the fact that his snow-shoes, crude, heavy affairs, still hung over his
back, where he had been carrying them since the previous day. He was
about to free himself from their weight, the better to flee or fight,
as the case might be, but he stayed his hand. He might need them.
Anyway, he was pressed for time, now.
He still possessed five barbed arrows. He drew one of these, placed the
notch on the string, and slipped the blunted arrows on the ground. Then
he stood motionless, watching and listening. A small stream, swollen
with snow-water, ran somewhere near at hand, and he could hear no sound
save its gurgling and booming. After a long suspense he saw, by the
faint light, the figure of a man stealing toward him. He waited, alert
and breathless, until it came so near that he knew it for the warrior
at whose feet he had shot the arrow into the crust, on the first day of
his flight. Then, without a word of warning, with the rage of a hunted
beast in his heart, he drew the bow and loosed the shaft. The warrior
uttered a piercing scream, sprang forward and fell on his face.
Jumping Wolf ran, keeping straight to his course through the twilight
forest. He had heard cries of rage in answer to the scream of the
wounded pursuer, and another arrow had passed near him; but now, save
for an occasional swish of underbrush on his track, the hunters made no
sound. He ran steadily, but with care, for the ground was treacherous.
Beyond the bow and four remaining arrows, he was unarmed. He had not
even the flint blade with which he was in the habit of preparing his
meat for cooking. The knife had dropped from his belt, unnoticed, early
in the day. He had not so much as a well-balanced stick, with which to
fight at close quarters.
Presently the ground began to slant before him. He slackened his pace
a little and ran more cautiously; and the pursuit drew nearer. Now the
slope became very marked, and twice, in the thickening darkness, he
stumbled heavily. But friendly underbrush saved him from falling. His
face and body were switched painfully by branches and he bruised his
feet on roots and rocks.
Suddenly, through the dark wood in front, he saw a glimmer of open
spaces, a gray glimmer dotted with lighter spots, and in another second
he stood at the edge of a great lake whose farther shores were hidden
in the night. Pans of ice dotted the grim water for as far as he could
see, and one, of good proportions, swung within sixteen feet of the
shore.
He had been well named when the chief, his father, had called him
Jumping Wolf. Without a moment’s hesitation he retreated a few paces,
then ran forward to the lip of the cold tide and leaped into the air.
And even as he alighted on the raft of ice, on feet and hands, with
bent knees under him, he felt something strike and glance from the
snow-shoes on his back. He had been saved from the flinthead of an
arrow.
The shock of contact drove the ice-pan, sullenly rocking, farther away
from shore. Jumping Wolf steadied himself for a second, crouched low.
An arrow struck the ice close to his hand; another zipped into the
water a few feet beyond. He turned, still crouched low, and loosed his
remaining arrows, in quick succession, at the black shadows. A sharp
cry and more arrows answered him. Two of the shafts struck ringing on
the ice, and glanced across into the water. He removed his snow-shoes
from his back, bound them firmly together, face to face, lay flat as
near one edge of the pan as he dared, and used them for a paddle.
The unwieldy craft answered to the strokes, circling and wallowing,
but drawing steadily away from the dangerous shore. He paddled with
all his strength, and once narrowly escaped pulling himself into the
water. Now the arrows flew wider, and he knew that his enemies were
judging his position, and the distance, without the help of their eyes.
He was already congratulating himself on his temporary escape, when a
shock and pang numbed his wrist. With a groan, he lost his hold on the
improvised paddle. One of the chance arrows had found him out.
The jagged flint had torn an ugly wound in his wrist, which bled
freely; and the pain of it, for a time, was bewildering. His belt was
of soft leather, and with this he bound the wound securely, tying the
bandage with a spare bow-string. After a while he began feeling about,
in the darkness, for his snow-shoes. He probed here and there, on
every side, with his bow; but they had either sunk, with the weight of
raw-hide thongs, or drifted out of reach.
It was cold out on the swollen, ice-drifted lake; and it grew colder
and colder as the hours passed. The night was black and clouded,
without so much as the glint of a star in the sky. A chill wind was
afoot, driving the ice-pans down the lake.
Poor Jumping Wolf found himself in a very discouraging situation. His
right arm from finger tips to shoulder throbbed steadily with the pain
of his hurt. Cold bit every bone and hunger gnawed at his stomach;
and the desolation of this strange, black lake, the extent and name
of which were both unknown to him, got into his soul. But he would
not give up the fight, or even so much as contemplate despair. He had
travelled so far, and made three such brave escapes from his enemies,
that he could not believe the end of his career was at hand. So he
kept on his feet, constantly shifting backward and forward a few steps
each way, and waving his uninjured arm about to keep his blood in
circulation. His great hope was that the pan on which he stood would
be driven to the shore by daylight, or that the ice would be massed
sufficiently close to allow him to gain the shore by leaping from cake
to cake. He knew that, in his condition, weakened from cold and loss of
blood, it would be sure death to attempt a swim of any distance in that
icy water.
The night dragged out its black length. The wind fell; and by the time
a lift of gray dawn showed in the east, Jumping Wolf was crouching on
the ice, fighting an awful weariness and craving for sleep that weighed
on brain, eyes, and limbs. But as the light strengthened, he raised
his head and looked about him. He saw, with a dull disgust (for he was
almost past caring) that the shores were far away and the ice-pans
drifting wide apart. He staggered to his feet and gazed around. Was
that a trail of smoke above the dark trees? If so, perhaps it was from
the camp-fire of his enemies. But smoke meant fire, and fire seemed the
very spirit of life to his chilled brain. He should like to see that
fire, to get close to it, even if death were the price. He could not
persuade himself that death was to be escaped, in any case; so he sent
a shrill cry ringing across the water. Next instant he tottered, and
fell within a finger’s-breadth of the edge of the pan. Horror of the
icy colourless flood sickened him, and he crawled back to safety and
lay quiet.
CHAPTER XIII
RUN-ALL-DAY AGAIN MAKES USE OF THE RED FEATHERS
The cry from the lake was heard by Run-all-day and other early risers
in the little village. It was also heard by Jumping Wolf’s enemies,
who had camped, for the night, on the other side of the lake. But they
could not answer it, for they had no canoes.
Run-all-day looked in the direction of the cry and detected the human
figure on the distant ice-pan. He saw it fall, move slightly, and then
lie quiet. He lifted his great canoe of bark, which, fortunately, he
had repaired with resin the day before, in preparation for the spring
journey, and carried it to the shore. He shouted for his paddle; and,
in a moment, Singing Bird came running from the lodge, with two paddles
on her shoulder. She, too, had seen and heard the sufferer out on the
drifting ice.
“Let me go with you, and paddle in the bow,” she begged.
As the water was smooth and the ice scattered, the chief nodded his
permission. In another second the great canoe was in the water and the
white paddles were plying and flashing.
At last the canoe slid softly alongside the pan of ice on which the
stranger lay, face-downward.
“Come, friend. We will give you a softer bed than that,” cried
Run-all-day.
The young man stirred slightly, but did not raise his head. The bow of
the canoe was within a few feet of him; so the girl leaned forward and
prodded him sharply with her paddle.
“Harder! Harder!” cried the chief. “If we do not wake him now, perhaps
he may never wake. Look, there is blood on the ice.”
Singing Bird reached out again and jabbed the stranger’s ribs with
determination but inconsiderable force. At the third jab, he drew
himself up on his knees and looked at them with a wide but dim glance.
He gazed at the chief and then at the girl.
“I do not know you,” he said, slowly. “You are not from my village. Why
did you hunt me so?”
“We are your friends, lad, and we did not hunt you,” replied
Run-all-day. “Crawl over here and get into the canoe.”
The young man did as he was told, but in a dazed, half-hearted manner.
“Steady,” cried the chief. “Don’t step on the gunwale. There now, lie
down.”
Then Singing Bird pushed the bow of the canoe away from the flat
ice-pan with its great, red stain of blood. She wondered what the
stranger’s story would be, and her young heart fluttered at the
adventure; but she paddled none the less diligently for all that.
Silently crouched in the cover of the woods, the men who had so
recently been in murderous pursuit of Jumping Wolf beheld the rescue of
their quarry. They were six in number; for, after Jumping Wolf’s first
stand against them on the barren, they had returned to the village for
reinforcements, carrying their wounded. They had taken up the chase
again, with a strong party, urged to the deed by the brother of the
dabbler in magic who had slain the old chief and who had been slain, in
turn, by Jumping Wolf. But this worthy brother had not joined in the
long chase himself. It was wiser and more comfortable to sit at home
and plan new campaigns. Now the pursuers were tired of the hunting.
They had lost their bravest man by Jumping Wolf’s arrow, the night
before. Another had been wounded. They were in a strange country and
longed for their own lodges and cooking-fires. So, when they saw the
great canoe put out from the opposite shore, and the rescue of their
intended victim from the ice, they retreated cautiously and then faced
southward and westward for their own country.
Jumping Wolf lay in a raging fever for days. More than once his feet
were at the very edge of the long, dark trail which leads, at last, to
the hunting grounds beyond the setting sun. But he was well nursed, in
a quiet lodge, by old Blowing Fog and Singing Bird. Red Willow brewed
herb-waters for him, when she could spare the time from her babies; and
all the old men and women in the village gave medical advice, which
Blowing Fog told them to keep for their own ailments. The commencement
of the northward journey was delayed for two weeks by the stranger’s
illness, for Run-all-day would not risk the life he had saved for so
small a matter as an early settlement in their summer lodges. But some
of the cod-fishers grumbled, and even talked of parting from the other
villagers and going about their affairs without the sanction of their
chief.
“Go, if you wish,” said Run-all-day. “But if you do, you need not
return to this snug village when the frost comes. You will have to find
another chief then, and another hunting-ground, and build new lodges.”
After all, they reflected, Run-all-day was a mighty warrior, a friend
of magicians. Also, the valley was warm for a winter camp, and the
surrounding forests were rich with game. So they agreed that it was
better to lose a few cod-fish than their membership in the village and
the protection of their big chief.
When the fever had burned itself out of Jumping Wolf’s brain and the
awful weights and pains had passed from his chest, he told his story to
his new friends. No one doubted a word of the tale. Run-all-day was so
moved to anger against the distant villagers, that, had his awe of the
red feathers been less, he would have put them within his moccasins and
flown southward, to strike terror into those treacherous hearts. But,
as it was, he vowed that Jumping Wolf had his love and protection for
as long as he wanted them.
“Let me be one of your people, chief,” said the young man. “You waked
me from the awful sleep, gave me care and medicine, and turned my feet
from the long trail. Only my own father and my mother, when I was a
small baby, ever showed me such love as you and your people have shown
me. When I am strong again I will hunt and fight for you and your
house.”
So Jumping Wolf, the fugitive from the south, became a warrior of
Run-all-day’s little clan.
The water was still high in the lakes and rivers, but clear of ice,
when Run-all-day and his people at last set out on the northward
journey. Now the days were warm, and the willows were bursting their
silver buds. The alders were fragrant with yellow blossoms. The snow
had faded away, save from the darkest recesses of the forest, and
many furtive blooms shone from the moss that floored the woodland
valleys. Geese and duck and brant had returned to their northern
breeding-places; plover and snipe piped and flew, and the burnished
kingfisher flashed along the river, from point to point, grinding out
discordant warnings, at the approach of the canoes.
They travelled swiftly, though forced to make many portages by the
strength of the swollen water. It was Run-all-day’s intention to
go all the way to the great bay of salt water into which the River
of Three Fires runs, making his summer camp there so as to keep his
village intact. He was proud of his chieftainship. A greater and not
less honest ambition than to kill salmon was astir in his manly heart.
He dreamed of a strong clan, mighty in peace and in battle, with
himself as its head and the friendship of Wise-as-a-she-wolf for its
protection. He knew that the future held great adventures; that a day
of reckoning must come between the evil and the honest in every part
of the island. He knew that Wise-as-a-she-wolf was the enemy of every
worker of evil, and he knew that this meant that every other magician
in the land, great or small, was the secret enemy of his friend and
master. Never before had Run-all-day called a man his master, even in
his thoughts; but his brave and steadfast heart had gone out to the
good magician. He would fight his master’s battles, when need came, and
he would see that his people did not shirk the fray.
He told his ambition to Red Willow, who was not in the least displeased
with it. She did not think her husband uncommonly clever, but she was
sure that he was wise; and wisdom is a finer thing than nimbleness of
wit.
“I shall not be the least of my family,” said Run-all-day. “The world
shall hear of me as a warrior and chief. I will care for my people as
I care for my family; and there will be talk of my name around the
cooking-fires long after my bones have been covered with the heavy
stones.”
“You plan too far ahead, chief,” cried Red Willow, tenderly. “Let us
not contemplate the talk of the villages, an hundred summers hence.”
On the third evening the whole party camped about a mile above the
great falls. There would be a long carry, next morning, around that
roaring, smoking tumult of black rocks and white waters. By the clear,
early light they would drop down, keeping close to the shore, to a
point as near the top of the falls as they dared. But now, with the
twilight deepening every moment, it was safer to land well out of reach
of the torn currents. The chief’s canoe had leaked slightly during the
day; so, while the others made camp, he unloaded it and repaired it
with the mixture of melted fat and gum which he had invented for the
purpose.
Very early next morning, before the elders were astir, two of the
chief’s little boys, one of eight years of age and the other of six,
stole from their beds to play. No day was long enough for playtime,
so they must begin at the breaking of dawn. They ran over to their
father’s big canoe. It lay with its bow at the edge of the water,
empty. They played about it for a few minutes, jumping in and out,
and sometimes pretending to paddle, each with a little stick. It was
not long, however, before the elder of the two began shoving at the
stern of the canoe. The six-year-old joined him in the good work. What
was the fun of playing ashore when the river lay so near? Now was the
time to put pretence away and voyage forth like full-fledged warriors.
The canoe touched the water--advanced into the current inch by inch.
Now half its length was afloat and the black water tugging at it. The
children pushed and heaved, strong with the fire of adventure. They
were helped by a current that slanted outward from the shore at this
point, turned toward mid-stream by an eddy just below. At last the
canoe slipped free, and the children scrambled aboard with a shout of
delight; and the slanting current laid hold of the bark and swung it
gaily away.
Old Green Bow, attracted by their shout of glee, was the first to
discover the children’s danger. He saw the great canoe, riding high on
the water, swing in mid-stream and speed down the racing river. He saw
the little heads above the gunwale, and the little arms dipping the
sticks over-side, as if they would hasten the canoe on her course to
the churning falls below. Green Bow’s wits were hopelessly muddled at
the sight. He stared, open-mouthed and blank with horror. Then he ran
to the edge of the shore and waved his arms frantically and foolishly
after the speeding craft. At last a shrill cry broke from him.
When Run-all-day saw what the matter was, his tanned face went pale as
the bark of the distant canoe. Uttering a low cry, he sprang for one
of the heavy skin-covered boats of his followers, and began unloading
it with desperate energy. Even as he worked, the canoe bearing the
children rounded a wooded bend and flashed from sight. He was about to
hurl the skin-covered craft into the current, still half loaded, when
Red Willow touched his arm.
“Quick! Here are the red feathers,” she cried.
He slipped them into his moccasins, snatched a paddle from the ground,
and leaped into the air; and the clustered villagers shouted as he
rushed through space and beyond their sight, like a great bird. He did
not follow the river, but slanted upward and passed over the wooded
bluff ’round which the canoe, with its precious freight, had so lately
disappeared. He marked it again in an instant, in a sweep of his
vision, still unwrecked, but dashing, unsteered, where the water flung
itself into white crests against a thousand scattered boulders. The
roar of the falls was in his ears, and he saw its crown of spray not
half a mile beyond the racing canoe.
He swooped downward and forward, with all the speed of the magic
feathers. It was plain to see that no human skill and strength could
save the good canoe from that mad tumult, so he loosed hold of the
paddle. It fell in the water and swirled away. Next moment he was low
above the canoe. His flying feet touched the trembling structure. Close
ahead spouted a fountain of white water. The children were lying flat
on their faces, sobbing in an agony of fear. He snatched one, then the
other, to his breast and let the doomed canoe go from under his feet.
He rose a little distance, clasping his children firmly, and watched
the canoe fling itself into the white water, emerge bottom-up and
swing on, a battered wreck, toward the hungry falls. He had not been
a second too soon. He uttered a loud cry of thanksgiving, turned, and
set his feet strongly to the currents of the morning air. And when the
villagers saw him top the wooded point, with his double burden, they
shouted again, and danced wildly with up-flung arms.
CHAPTER XIV
THE GOOD MAGICIAN VISITS RUN-ALL-DAY’S NEW VILLAGE
The “carry” around the falls was accomplished by noon. Fifteen miles
farther down stream was another dangerous place, not a fall, but a long
rapid that no canoe could get through at high water. That passed, it
would be quiet voyaging down to the great bay.
Run-all-day did not utter a regret at the loss of his fine, birch-bark
canoe, though it caused quite a disturbance and delay in the
arrangements of the party. Well below the falls, in a grove of pines
that stood close to the river, the men set to work to cut logs for a
raft. They used fire and their axes to fell the trees. It was a slow
job and a hard one. When the trees came down (which they did not seem
in any hurry to do) the branches were hacked off, and then the trunks
were divided into as many logs of the required length and girth as they
contained.
Everybody worked willingly, for even the laziest of the young men
realized that the favour of a great chief like Run-all-day was
well worth sweating for. He was a friend of the good magician; he
possessed the power of flight like a bird; he was able to snatch his
children--then why not his warriors?--from the very jaws of death. So
they hacked and burned with a will.
At last ten logs were ready and rolled down to a quiet eddy against the
shore. Six were floated side by side, close together, and bound firmly
with thongs of hide. The other four, slightly smaller in size, were
bound on top of the six, making a sort of upper deck which stood clear
of the water. But by the time the raft was completed, the sun was so
low in the west that it was hardly worth while to embark again that day.
Next morning the raft was loaded with the provisions and household
goods that had begun the journey in the lost canoe. Some other freight
was added, and Run-all-day’s family found seats, here and there, in
the other canoes. Then the chief and one of the young men manned the
raft, one standing at each end, and pushed it out of the eddy with long
poles. The raft proved almost as swift, or, rather, not much slower
than the canoes of hide, and it was certainly a great deal steadier and
as easily managed. And so they continued their journey, but little the
worse for the accident.
When the rapid was reached the raft, with its freight securely
fastened, was lowered from eddy to eddy, by means of a tow-line of
twisted hide.
Salt water was reached about mid-afternoon of the next day, and the
cod-fishers led the party straight to the site of their last year’s
camp. Temporary shelters were pitched before dark. Then Run-all-day
examined the ground on every side, deciding the positions of the lodges
and other weighty matters. So, in a week’s time, Run-all-day’s summer
village was built; and the cod-fishing prospered amazingly.
Jumping Wolf won back his strength and was soon able to work at the
fishing, to handle the cranky canoes, and to compete with the other men
at all manner of sports. At shooting an arrow far and straight, only
the chief himself was the new clansman’s superior. When he was fully
recovered from his illness, he could out-leap them all, jumping either
high or wide. Also, he was the swiftest runner in the village; and even
in the long races of five miles or more, only the chief could pass
him. So Jumping Wolf stood high among the warriors of the little clan.
During the summer, six more families joined Run-all-day’s band. They
were all of his own people, of the same great tribe into which he had
been born. They had been without a leader for several seasons, moving
as the whim suggested, hunting or fishing when need drove them to
it, and constantly being bullied or robbed by more united families.
So, when they heard of the new chief and the new clan, and distorted
versions of his flights through the air, they came to him, group by
group, and begged to be taken under his protection.
Now Run-all-day, so short a time before content to be only a good
provider for his family, found his hands full of other people’s
duties and his steady head fairly buzzing with affairs. But he worked
cheerfully, turning aside from nothing; but when a matter seemed too
deep for him he sought the counsel of Red Willow, and usually got wise
advice. He fished as diligently as the most energetic of his followers.
He trained them in the uses of all manner of weapons, both for the
chase and war. He made them practise archery, and spear-throwing, and
the art of attack and defence with clubs and knives. He set the old
people to making shields of hide and wood; and on rainy days every
warrior had to make arrows and bows, spears and paddles. And if any man
sulked or idled, the chief took him aside and talked to him, and one
such conversation proved enough, in every case.
One August evening, the good magician, Wise-as-a-she-wolf, stepped into
the village and greeted the people pleasantly. They had neither seen
nor heard of him since early spring. He was in his customary form,
that of a gentle, rather undersized youth. The chief welcomed him with
respectful warmth and led him straightway to the evening meal. When all
had eaten, a great fire was built at the seaward edge of the village,
and around this gathered the warriors and old men. The magician and
Run-all-day sat side by side, on a bear-skin, separated a little on
either hand from the others.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf spoke first. He had read the story of the chief’s
ambition at a glance, and praised the village, the clean lodges, and
the store of fish. He warned the company against greed, false pride,
and deceit, and told them that their hope for future happiness and
ever-increasing strength lay in their loyalty to their leader.
“I have seen many a clan torn and scattered from within,” he said.
“Harbour no traitors or cowards among you, and give ear to no talk that
you would not repeat openly to your chief and the whole village.”
Then Run-all-day told him, quietly, of how he had used the red feathers
again, to save the lives of two of his children from the fierce hunger
of the river.
“You did well, friend,” replied the youth. “By every noble and merciful
deed in which they are employed their virtue is increased.”
He bent close to the chief. “They would scarce lift me above the
ground, when I last took them from Bright Robe,” he whispered.
The story of Jumping Wolf’s flight from the south was told by
Run-all-day. The magician listened intently, and then questioned the
young warrior closely.
“I know those people,” he said. “They listen to evil counsellors, to
weaklings and cowards who play with magic and work it to their evil
desires.”
“There is one such coward the less, now,” said Jumping Wolf.
“Do not boast of the spilling of blood,” replied the magician, gravely.
At that the young warrior hung his head, for the eyes of the great one
were upon him.
“But some blood is better on the ground than in the heart,” added
Wise-as-a-she-wolf, gently. “And of such was the blood of the traitor
who died at your hand.”
Then Jumping Wolf lifted his head again and looked fearlessly at his
companions. His heart was warm with courage, though it had quaked but a
moment ago.
As the night advanced, the warriors felt more at their ease. Stories
of the day’s work were told, and nods and laughter went ’round the
circle. More wood was heaped on the fire and old Green Bow, warmed to
the marrow, told boastful stories of his deeds in the chase, of what
a mighty fellow he was before the years stiffened his limbs. Other
old men raised their voices, some to cast discredit on Green Bow’s
tales and some to sing the glories of their own past. There was talk
of battles, and of cod-fishing, and of the killing of seals on the
ice-floes from the north.
The magician listened, smiling often, sometimes laughing outright, like
a boy; and, thus encouraged, the old men spurred their imaginations to
the uttermost.
At last the fire was allowed to subside, the company dispersed, and the
chief led his guest to a wigwam that stood in the centre of the village.
“This lodge is yours,” said the chief. “It has been in readiness for
you since spring. And in our winter village we shall build another for
your use, chief.”
“You treat me well, friend,” said the other, touched by the attention.
“Your red feathers have already saved the lives of three of my
children,” replied Run-all-day. “They brought medicine to the littlest
warrior and snatched two others from the river. Also, you have taught
me that, with but little more work and courage, a man may care for a
whole village as easily as for his own family.”
He drew back the flap of caribou skin that covered the doorway of the
lodge, and held a torch high with the other hand, so as to cast the
light within.
“Enter with me, brother. I would speak on a private matter,” said
Wise-as-a-she-wolf.
Brother! The chief’s heart swelled at the word. The greatest man in
the country, perhaps in the whole, wide world, the good magician,
the master of men and magic, called him brother. Ah, he could scarce
believe that such honour had come to him.
Within the lodge, the visitor laid his hand on the chief’s arm and
smiled kindly with his wonderful eyes.
“You have done well, Run-all-day,” he said. “I would trust you far,
for no foolish pride has come to you with new power, and your honesty
remains undimmed. The same cannot be said of many warriors of this
island, for evil counsellors are ever at work.”
“The woman, Red Willow, is cleverer than I, and gives me light on many
questions,” replied the chief, modestly.
The other smiled and nodded his head. He had suspected as much, knowing
that the woman possessed a keener mind than her husband, and he liked
him the better for telling it. But, in a moment, his face was grave
again.
“I have come to you on an important errand,” he said. “I want you and
Red Willow to promise to give me the littlest warrior.”
The chief’s breath caught in his throat and it seemed that his heart
stood still, for he loved each of his children as if it were the
only one. A low cry escaped him, and he stared at the magician with a
flicker of fear in his wide eyes.
“Is it too great a sacrifice to make for the good of the world, and for
your friend?” asked the other, sadly.
“But he is so little,” cried Run-all-day. “I do not understand. What
have I done to displease you, chief?”
“You have pleased me in everything,” replied the magician. “Had you
not pleased me so well, I would not ask you for the child. A time of
warfare and disturbance, open and hidden, is coming. I have read the
future, and I know. True, I could not see clearly, but I saw far. For a
few seasons there shall be quiet, a seeming quiet, then the smouldering
of the evil fires, in a score of places at first, and suddenly in an
hundred places. Then my enemies--our enemies--will gather, and the
flames of hate and lust will burst forth. The powers of the warrior and
the powers of magic will struggle on both sides, many magicians on the
one side and I alone on the other, and many warriors against a few.”
“And what of the child?” asked Run-all-day, presently, in a voice low
with awe.
“He is of honest and courageous parents,” replied the other. “I would
teach him what I know, so that when the struggle is upon us, we shall
be doubly strong. I would take him to my lodge, where he would learn
the great secrets, day by day, growing up with a knowledge of them.”
“And shall he have no playtime?” asked the bewildered father.
“His very lessons will be play for him,” replied the magician, “and he
will be safe and happy.”
“But would it not be better to wait until he is a few years older?”
asked Run-all-day. “This is but his second summer. Surely he is too
little to learn the wonders of magic.”
“It cannot be later,” replied the other. “I must take him into my care
now, before he has learned to speak a word, or never at all.”
“He will fret for his mother,” said the chief.
“Nay, for he will remember nothing,” said the magician. “He will not
know that he ever lived elsewhere than in my magic house, until he is
grown to boyhood. He will be nourished and protected as if he were my
own son. And you may come to him as often as you desire, and he will
know you for his father; but when you are gone again he will not fret
for you, for there is no such thing as heart-ache in my house. Also,
his mother may visit him, but only twice in a season. When he is large
and wise enough to do the great work for which I would fit him, then
shall he be free as I am, to go and come at his pleasure.”
“It is wonderful,” said Run-all-day. “He would be safe and happy, and
great; but what will Red Willow say about it?”
“We shall take her to the lodge to-night, and show her the littlest
warrior’s play-room,” replied Wise-as-a-she-wolf. “And then, when she
is there, I shall tell her; then it will be easy for her to understand.”
“How will you take her to the magic lodge?” asked the chief.
“You will carry her,” replied Wise-as-a-she-wolf.
CHAPTER XV
THE LITTLEST WARRIOR’S GREAT PROSPECTS
Red Willow was slim as a girl, and so her weight was but an
inconsiderable matter to the arms of the chief. Also, the red feathers
seemed to increase the strength of his body as well as give him the
power of flight. The magician, with the moccasins of the wind on his
feet, ran ahead along the still tides of the air. The chief followed
close, bearing his sleeping wife in his arms. Far behind the village
lay wrapped in slumber, dreaming of cod-fishing, most likely.
The night was mild, and the flight not far as birds and magicians
fly. They alit in the pine forest; and Wise-as-a-she-wolf immediately
touched the chief’s eyes with his fingers. Then, to the bewildered
vision of Run-all-day, a great mass of builded walls loomed from the
blackness of the forest, and from it flowed a light that was as sunrise
and red evening and moonshine, all in one.
“Hold her gently,” whispered the magician, “and follow me close. We
shall awake her within, where no sudden fear, nor tremor of strangeness
shall touch her.”
They walked forward, for a few paces, and a great door swung open in
front of them. The chief stepped across the shining threshold, on the
heels of his master, without a twinge of distrust or fear; and once
inside, he uttered a cry of wonder and delight. At that glad sound, Red
Willow awoke, slipped her feet to the floor and gazed about her with
joy in her face. The Pictures of Life marched and glowed on the walls;
the smokeless lamps burned softly, here and there; and above spread the
mimic sky, with silver stars a-twinkle.
But ’twas not alone the beauty of the place that gladdened the hearts
of Run-all-day and Red Willow. Joy and peace were in the air, as
well as wonder and delight. Here could be no dread of sickness or
sharp foreboding of death; here no thought of hunger, or weariness,
or heart-ache; here could lurk no anger; here could arise no
unfriendliness or despair.
“I could sit before these pictures for an hundred years,” said the
chief. “Surely, though I behold drawings of men and things that I have
seen, they are more true and wonderful than life. Or are they so bright
and clear that they pierce the dimness of my eyes and spirit? Here
are the warriors fighting; and though I have seen battles, and spears
thrown in anger, never have I seen clearly enough to so behold the good
in one man’s face and the evil in another’s. And surely the honest
warriors are about to win a victory. My heart leaps to help them; my
hand is ready for the neck of that great fellow with the evil face.
Oh, chief, you have wrought marvellously! Never before have I seen so
clearly the difference between the good and the wicked among mankind.”
“True, true,” cried Red Willow. “And see, here are a pair of lovers,
beside a little river. How beautiful a thing it is--this love--and
how bright it shines in their eyes. And here is an old man mending a
snow-shoe, and even that is beautiful.”
The magician smiled. “If the old man’s face were not a good face, if
his eyes were sly and his expression cruel, there would be no beauty in
the picture. So these pictures are like the life of the world; but in
the battles I have turned most of the evil faces aside. For the picture
is clearer than the real battle, for it is compassed in a glance of
the eye. A fight in an honest cause is a noble and courageous thing;
but to picture it one must pass over much of the lust and pain, or the
sight of it would chill the heart of the bravest warrior.”
The good magician gave them food to eat and a bright liquor to drink,
and the tastes of these were pleasant and strange to their tongues.
Then he told Red Willow of what he had dimly seen of the future and of
his wishes concerning her baby, even as he had told these things, a few
hours before, to the chief.
“He will be happy, I know, in this beautiful place,” she said; “but how
can I live without him, great chief?”
He talked long with the father and mother, gently and kindly,
explaining the great reward that would be theirs, for giving the infant
into his care for a few seasons. They knew he would be safe and happy;
and that virtue and wisdom would be taught to him, and knowledge of
magic that would make him strong to save his people from destruction.
The three returned to the village before dawn. They carried with them
some of the wonderful liquor from the magic house, that Red Willow
might feed it to the baby, to ascertain whether or no it would agree
with him. Wise-as-a-she-wolf had smiled at this precaution, but kindly;
and he had made no objection. He remained in the village for seven
days, always gentle and helpful and friendly. He worked no deeds of
magic and, in outward seeming, was but a modest young man of small
stature; and yet he won the hearts of the whole village, even of old
Blowing Fog, and the unfaltering trust of Red Willow. And the littlest
warrior thrived on the magic drink.
On the seventh night, when all was quiet in the village and the great
fire was banked deep with its ashes, the three again set out for the
lodge in the pine forest; and this time, Wise-as-a-she-wolf carried the
littlest warrior in his arms. The baby slept soundly in that firm and
gentle embrace, soaring over hill and river and barren, forest and lake
as secure as if he lay on the couch of skins in his father’s lodge.
Again the chief ran hard on the magician’s heels, with Red Willow in
his arms. The house of delight was reached without mishap, and again
the wooden door swung open and let them in. The smokeless lamps still
burned; hunters and lovers and warriors still marched and shone on the
walls and in the wide roof the stars continued to glint like splinters
of ice. And again the joy of the place lifted the hearts of the parents
and gave them courage.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf placed the baby in its mother’s arms, gazed down on
it with infinite tenderness in his eyes, and softly took it back to his
own embrace.
“If I should awake him from his sleep, at this unaccustomed time?” he
asked, looking at the mother with a boyish smile.
“He would cry lustily,” replied Red Willow. “Oh, chief, it would take
me many minutes to quiet him.”
“Nay, of what profit is the wisdom I have learned in all my long life,
if I cannot shield one little baby from the grief of the night-time?”
replied the other.
“Magic and wisdom! Ah, the littlest warrior has not yet learned their
power, chief,” said Run-all-day. “He would surely lift his voice in
protest if the very gods awakened him at this hour.”
“Nay,” replied the magician, “I think you are wrong. The night-cry of
an infant is a cry of dread for the dark hours and the vague fears of
danger that lurk about the black places of the world. He feels, when
only half-awake, the insecurity of his little life, and cries out for
the protection of his parents.” He touched the child’s face with his
finger, shook him gently, and at last disturbed the sweet slumber. And
the baby opened its round eyes, stared up at the face above it, and
laughed.
“Behold,” cried the magician. “Am I not a nurse to be trusted?”
Still carrying the baby, he led the way to the far end of the lodge.
Here was a small apartment, dimly lit and hung about with curtains of
leather dyed in many soft and beautiful colours. He laid the child
gently in a little bed of soft stuffs that were of neither fur nor
dressed hide. It stood beside a couch on which was spread the white
wolf-skin, that had once belonged to Bright Robe. The three bent above
it, listening to the soft breathing of the littlest warrior.
“He sleeps safe,” said Wise-as-a-she-wolf. “He has no fear of the
night-time, now.”
CHAPTER XVI
FURTHER ADVENTURES OF THE LITTLE BROWN OWL
Now what of the little brown owl? We last heard of him, foiled in his
sneaking enterprise against Whispering Grass, escaping from the fox
with the most desperate and painful efforts. For the whole of the
following day he remained hidden among the branches of the little
tree; and by nightfall he was able to fly again, though slowly and not
without pain. He found hunting a difficult matter for days after the
blow from the old woman’s arrow, so stiff and sore were his muscles;
but a worse matter than this was the enmity of the big lynx, whom
he had enticed to the store-house of the herb-doctor. For the lynx,
having found a roof of strong poles where he had been told to expect
nothing but bark, and having received a painful wound in the side from
a flint-headed arrow, now proclaimed the treachery of the little brown
owl to every bird and beast of that part of the wilderness.
So the owl that had once been Bright Robe, that great and evil
magician, lived in fear of his life, in the very country over which he
had so often cast the shadow of his evil deeds. None feared him now
save the smallest creatures of the wood; and even they found him to be
the least dangerous of all the birds of prey. To hide his identity as
that particular owl so widely condemned by the lynx, he was compelled
to cease his efforts against Whispering Grass and refrain entirely from
telling the story of his great past to the forest creatures. For the
word had gone abroad that the _small, brown owl that says it is a great
magician, and has no modesty of speech, has been proved a traitor by
No-Tail, the lynx, whom it led into a dangerous trap_. _So beware of
the owl that talks overmuch, and lies more than is usual even among
such birds. Kill him, if you can, for the credit of the forest._
With every claw, and tooth, and beak in the country ready to rend
him, ’tis small wonder that the little owl was utterly discouraged.
It was not safe for him even to exchange a word with another owl, so
bitter against him were the birds of his kind for the discredit he
had brought upon them. Their reputation for wordiness and untruth
was so bad already that they lusted for the blood of the stranger who
had made it worse. But, for several days, he escaped the anger of the
creatures around him by keeping out of their sight. One twilight-time,
however, he was attacked suddenly by an owl of his own size; and, for
all the fierce heart in his body, he was knocked about disgracefully.
He sought safety in flight, at the first opportunity, and travelled
many miles, at his best speed, before his antagonist gave up the chase.
He pitched into the top of a bushy tree, to recover his breath and his
wits. In his cowardly heart he vowed that every bird and beast within
ten miles of that mountain should be slain when he recovered his power.
He continued his flight, heading southward, and at last had out-flown
the lynx’s story; and he found a splendid hunting-ground, and fairly
stuffed himself with mice. His evil little brain began to plot and
plan again, now that he had the comfortable sensation of food inside
him. He remembered people who had been his followers, men after his
own heart, scattered about the country. They had often been his tools
in past troubles; why should they not serve him again as instruments
of destruction and revenge? And now the need of them was greater than
ever, for he realized how impotent he was, in his miserable owl-body.
These men whom the enchanted magician remembered, were all small
workers of magic, sly, greedy folk without courage or principles, and
with but sufficient knowledge of the secret science to enable them to
destroy their simpler fellows and pass as great warriors. They could
increase, by a little, the strength and deadliness of weapons; blind a
man’s vision, for a short time, by the flashing of bright stones and
mumbling of words, and many such pretty tricks as these. But they were
all evil, in various degrees, and looked upon Bright Robe as their
master.
The strongest of these, the one most advanced in magic, wickedness, and
wealth, was Fang. Fang lived in a big village in the south, and was
second in power to the chief. The chief was an honest man, ignorant
of any hidden arts, but a wise and a mighty warrior. Bright Robe,
the little owl, knew that Fang had been plotting that good chief’s
destruction for many years. Why should he not join in the wickedness?
It would be a beginning, and quite amusing, much more amusing than
being beaten and chased by owls. He would whisper cunning advice into
Fang’s ears, and encourage him with his mighty presence, and there
would soon be one honest man the less in the world; and that meant one
enemy the less.
The little brown owl spent several days in finding the village in
which lived his old friend Fang; and when he came to it, at last, and
perched on a near-by tree, he was surprised to find all the inhabitants
clustered together, every man talking at the top of his voice and no
man listening. He saw Red Eye, Fang’s brother, in the middle of the
crowd; but Fang and the chief, and the chief’s son were not there. He
listened to the angry voices and soon learned that the people were
trying to divide the chief’s and Fang’s properties among them,--the
lodges and furs, the wampum and weapons and stores of food.
Ah, so the chief had already been settled with. And Fang, too, it
would seem. But what of Jumping Wolf, that upright young warrior who
had never shown fear or respect? But the matter in hand drove these
questions out of his mind, for the time. He listened to Red Eye, whose
voice outshrieked all the others.
“My brother’s goods are now mine,” screamed Red Eye, “and as the
chief’s goods became Fang’s when he struck the blow, so did they pass
to me when he was killed.”
The air was filled with shouts of rage and derision. Hands (most of
them containing clubs and knives) were brandished on all sides.
“We chased the young man, and were wounded by his arrows,” cried a
warrior at the edge of the crowd. “Are we to have nothing for our blood
and weariness?”
“While you sat at home,” bawled another.
“We feared Fang, for we thought him full of magic power, and yet
Jumping Wolf killed him with one blow,” cried a third.
Then they all surged about Red Eye, shouting like mad men.
“No one fears you,” they roared. “The old chief used to treat you like
dirt under his moccasins.”
Now the little owl saw that Red Eye was inwardly quaking. All his false
courage was quenched by the angry faces, as a little fire is quenched
by a dash of water.
“Share the goods as you will,” he cried, “for I am weary of such
ingratitude;” and with that, he made his way quickly from the crowd
and entered a lodge. Jeering shouts were hurled after him; even the
women were not silent in their scorn, and children capered after him
with impertinent whoops and gestures.
The owl did not like the state of affairs in the village at all. Fang
had been an apt pupil, and a sure man in an evil enterprise. And
behold! he was now less than a shadow among his people. Listen! They
reviled his name even while they fought over the division of his goods.
One warrior, snatching a skin of pemmican from the store-house of the
departed Fang, proclaimed his satisfaction at Jumping Wolf’s escape.
The sentiment was favourably received, and repeated on all sides.
“Truly, he did us a good turn,” cried one, “when he broke Fang’s skull
with his club; for Fang would have been a cruel master, for all his
fine promises. Now we are free and rich, with two fortunes to share
among us. Ah, I am glad that we did not catch the boy while Fang’s evil
spell was on our hearts and brains.”
“And he did but avenge the old chief’s death,” said another.
“You are full of fair words now,” cried an old hag; “but you hunted him
out, with clubs and spears. I know the breed; and I think that cub may
return, to strike another blow at the murderers of the old wolf.”
Men and women ceased their wrangling and looked at the old woman who
had spoken, with various emotions depicted on their faces. Some looked
ashamed, some afraid, some angry; but all showed uneasiness.
A young woman with a child in her arms laughed shrilly.
“You are for ever trying to frighten us,” she cried.
“Jumping Wolf is a warrior,” said the old woman, gazing fixedly at
one of the men. “He and the chief were the only warriors in this
village,--two warriors among a crowd of cowards and traitors.”
Her voice became higher and shriller. “You listened to Fang, and
thought him a great magician; and you watched him slay your chief with
his hidden knife. But, ah! In a second Fang, too, lay dead. Then you
hunted the lad; and he turned you back. Again your picked men went on
his trail; and again he outwitted you. You saw him taken from the pan
of ice, alive, by a strong man and a young girl, in a canoe that was
not like your canoes. Then sleep light, oh, warriors, for Jumping Wolf
has you in his mind. Sleep light, with your spears and your clubs at
your side, for you may taste the heat of his arrows again.”
It was quite evident to the owl that the old woman’s remarks struck
home. Some men scowled; some shook their fists at her; and one
commanded her to keep silent. She laughed, long and harshly.
“You should thank me for the warning,” she cried. “If you but heed it,
it may save you your lives. I warned Fang, for he was my daughter’s
child, against the evil temptings of that blustering Bright Robe; but
his heart was wicked and greedy. And now he is dead. So I warn you to
choose an honest chief, though you should have to make a three-days’
journey to find one. I warn you to deafen your ears against the wiles
of the treacherous Bright Robe, for he is less dangerous as an enemy
than as a seeming friend. And, again, I warn you against the son of the
chief whom you murdered.”
The people were now thoroughly frightened by the woman’s free and
disrespectful use of the name of Bright Robe. They gazed fearfully
about them, as if expecting that awful magician to leap upon
them from the woods or the sky. He had visited them several times
during the period between his return from exile and his fight with
Wise-as-a-she-wolf, and of that fight, and its result, they knew
nothing. The children gazed around also, but with curiosity rather
than fear, for they did not understand the gravity of the situation.
And in so doing, a small boy with a bow in his hand espied the owl in
the tree. With a cry of delight, he fitted an arrow to the string and
let fly. The shaft rattled among the branches within a few inches of
the bird’s head; and the villagers, looking in that direction, saw
something like a tiny shadow drift away into the forest.
The owl was furious at what he had heard from the old woman. It seemed
that every old woman was his enemy. If she continued to preach in that
vein, and with Fang dead, the entire village would be lost to him in
but a short time.
CHAPTER XVII
A BRIEF RETURN TO POWER
The little brown owl waited in the woods, near the village, until close
upon midnight. All was quiet when he at last flew to the lodge to which
he had seen Red Eye retire, hours before. He perched on the peak of the
lodge, and, cocking his head, brought one yellow eye to bear on the
dark interior. Pitch black though it was, he could see dimly.
“Red Eye,” he called, guardedly. The words were man-words, but the
voice was thin and rasping. He heard a sound of stealthy movements
below, within the lodge. Then a voice whispered, “Who speaks my name?”
“It is Bright Robe,” replied the owl, still in his owlish voice. But he
could not remedy the tone of his voice, no matter how he tried.
“Nay, ’tis not the voice of Bright Robe,” returned the man in the lodge.
“I have changed my voice and also my form,” said the owl, with
wonderful patience for him. “I am sitting here on the peak of your
lodge, waiting to be let in. I am not used to waiting. Listen, and you
will not doubt that I am Bright Robe.” And he whispered some facts
concerning the past life of Red Eye and of his dead brother, Fang.
Red Eye immediately untied the opening of his wigwam, and the owl
floated from his perch and drifted inside with a soft murmur of wings.
Red Eye closed and fastened the doorway again and then welcomed his
visitor with much humility and many great names. He could see nothing
but the yellow eyes in the darkness.
“I know all that has happened in the village,” said the owl, making
good use of his wits and of what he had heard before the boy fired the
arrow at him. “I have but just arrived, from the frozen ends of the
world,” he lied, “and I want food. Give me some raw meat.”
Red Eye had the carcass of a hare in the lodge, already skinned, and
this he placed on a dish of bark and held toward the yellow eyes,
muttering apologies all the while for the unfortunate state of his
larder. He explained that his fellow-villagers had threatened him so,
that very day, that he was afraid to leave his lodge.
[Illustration: “RED EYE UNTIED THE OPENING OF HIS WIGWAM, AND THE OWL
FLOATED FROM HIS PERCH.”]
“You need not tell me about it,” lied the owl, “for I know as much as
you do of the matter, though I was an hundred miles away, at the time.”
Then he fell upon the raw carcass, holding it with his claws and
tearing with his beak. Red Eye trembled at the sound of the awful
feeding.
At last, when he had eaten his fill, the owl spoke again. “Fang is
dead,” he said. “He struck too soon. I told him to wait until I came
again.”
There was not a grain of truth in this statement; but Red Eye believed
it.
“He thought himself strong enough to overthrow the chief, without my
help,” continued the owl. “And now? Well, you know what came of it. Let
it be a lesson to you, Red Eye.”
“I hear you, chief,” whined the brother of Fang.
The owl snapped his upper and lower bills together, for the flavour of
the meal was still with him. He blinked his yellow eyes and stared at
the man more fiercely and roundly than ever. He could see quite well
now; but the man could see nothing but the yellow eyes.
“I have been on a long journey,” said the owl, “even to the land which
lies beyond the last mountain of ice. I travelled with the moccasins
of the wind on my feet. Wise-as-a-she-wolf had possession of those
wonderful moccasins; but I met that weakling in battle, not long ago,
and took them away from him. Also, I turned him into a mouse.”
Was there ever such a teller of false tales as the little brown owl?
And yet Red Eye believed every word he said, for he was stupid as well
as evil. He bowed his head before the yellow eyes and chanted, low in
his throat, a song of praise. The owl listened with pleasure, for it
was a long time since he had heard anything of the kind addressed to
him.
“I talked with my friends, the gods,” he continued, presently, “and
they were glad of my victory over Wise-as-a-she-wolf. They told me to
go about quietly, in the form and manner of an owl, and take note of
such as are my friends and still more particularly of such as are my
enemies. And in three moons’ times, I openly proclaim myself master of
this whole island, my enemies shall fall, to the last man, and to the
last old woman.”
“Hah,” gasped Red Eye. “You mean Hot Tongue, great chief?”
“Yes, Hot Tongue, among many,” replied the owl. He supposed that Hot
Tongue was the old woman whom he had in his mind, at the moment,--the
old woman who had spoken so freely of him, that day,--but, however that
might be, he must appear to be quite certain of everything.
“Those who prove themselves my friends shall have villages under them,
and great stores of furs and food and wampum,” he said.
By this time Red Eye was prostrate on the floor of the lodge.
“I have always been faithful to you, great chief,” he cried. The owl
snapped his beak again. He was sure of Red Eye’s stupidity, at any rate.
“Whatever you have been in the past,” he said, “I want you to prove
your devotion now. This lodge suits me well. You may move into another.
And in the morning you may bring me food and water, and later, the
warriors of the village. I wish to speak with them.”
“I fear that no other lodge will receive me, great chief,” whined Red
Eye. “Should I stir from here to-night, ’twould be at peril of my life,
for the hearts of the warriors are turned against me without cause.”
The owl was angry at the fellow’s disobedience; but he realized that
it would not be politic for him to show his anger. He was only an owl,
after all, and a very small one at that. Suppose he again ordered Red
Eye from the lodge, and Red Eye, for fear of the villagers, again
refused to obey? He had no power of magic, as he had no power of body,
to enforce the command. He would simply have to flutter, and snap his
beak, and even the dull-witted Red Eye would wonder at that. No, he
must be magnanimous.
“Nay, I did not mean to turn you from your lodge to-night, good
friend,” said the owl, in a voice that sounded like the utterance of
neither man nor bird in its attempt at soft and gentle tones. “Sleep
here, faithful Red Eye, here on your own couch. In the morning, after I
have spoken to these hot-headed warriors, you may take up your abode in
Fang’s lodge and I shall inhabit that of the dead chief.”
Red Eye grovelled in his gratitude, and stammered many words of thanks
and praise; and at the end of it all he added, artlessly, “Never before
did I hear of such a thing, great chief, of such a thing as Bright
Robe’s mercy.”
The owl had to close his eyes, for a few seconds, fearing that the hate
and rage within him might flash visibly in those yellow orbs. Oh,
for but a shade of his old power! Oh, for but the strength of a man,
and the spirit of that blundering, grovelling Red Eye should soon be
footing the dark trail.
“Peace,” exclaimed the owl, in a voice that trembled. “Do not put my
mercy to any further test. Go to your couch, and sleep.”
Red Eye awoke at a very early hour in the morning, and began to wonder
what strange dream had possessed him in the night. Fragments of it
shook about in his poor skull.
“Something about an owl,” he muttered. “Something about a miserable
little owl, and I thought it was Bright Robe, the wicked one. Ho, ho,
what a foolish dream. And I fed it with--with--” but his soliloquy
ended in a gasping cry. From the shadows beyond the foot of his couch
glared two yellow eyes, full upon him.
“Silence, crack-brain,” snapped the owl, “and bring me some good fresh
meat. Bring me the best in the village, fellow, or I will turn you into
a mouse and devour you.”
“I thought it was a dream, great chief. I thought it was only a dream,
oh master of magicians,” babbled Red Eye.
The owl ruffled his feathers, fluttered his wings, and snapped his
beak; and Red Eye, taking the hint, tore open the flap that covered the
doorway and fled from the lodge. He was instantly captured by two or
three of his fellow-villagers, and handled none too gently.
“No more of your nonsense, Red Eye,” cried one. “We’ve divided the
goods, and set aside a share for you, and if you raise any more
disturbances we’ll break your empty skull.”
They shook him violently, and jerked him this way and that between
them, as if he were an article of value which each was eager to
possess, until he bawled for mercy. At that, they redoubled their
efforts.
“We heard enough from you, yesterday,” they cried; and the louder
he howled against their treatment the more lustily did they knock
him about, informing him all the while that he was no longer of any
importance in their estimation.
“My lodge! My lodge! Bright Robe is in my lodge,” yelled Red Eye, at
last. The voicing of this information proved a fortunate move for him.
“What do you mean, you punk-head?” cried the tormentors, pulling and
hauling at him with less vigour.
“He is there--the great magician,” gasped Red Eye. “He came last night
in the form of an owl.”
“You’ve been dreaming, feather-wit,” said one of the warriors, shaking
him back and forth as if in hopes of curing his mental infirmities.
“Look for yourselves,” groaned Red Eye. “He wants meat. He wants the
best meat in the village, and raw, at that.”
They released him and dashed for the lodge. They crowded and jostled
one another in the entrance, each eager to have first look at whatever
had put that crazy idea in Red Eye’s head. Sure enough, there perched
a little brown owl on a heap of Red Eye’s spears. They stared,
open-mouthed, at the bird, amazed to find even this much of Red Eye’s
story to be true.
“When you have done with looking at me,” said the owl, in a horrible,
rusty voice, “go and get me some fresh meat.”
In their efforts to escape from the baleful glare of those yellow eyes,
they trod on each other’s toes, tripped and sprawled and very nearly
overturned the lodge. But they got away at last and dashed toward Red
Eye, whom they saw approaching with a slice of raw caribou meat and
a vessel of water. Strong Hunter, one of the flying group, knew that
the meat must have been cut from the carcass of an animal which he had
killed on the previous day; but he did not give it a thought. He halted
in front of Red Eye, and the others gathered around. They were joined
by a dozen more of the villagers, old Hot Tongue among them.
“What is it? Who is it?” gasped Strong Hunter. “He spoke to us--he, the
little owl--and his eyes were enough to crack one’s bones.”
“It is as I have already told you,” said Red Eye, with an assumption of
dignity. “He is Bright Robe. He came to my lodge, last night, of all
the fine lodges in the village. He talked with me of many things. Stand
aside now, I carry food and drink to the great magician.”
All except Hot Tongue were deeply impressed. Red Eye strode on, and
just as he was about to enter the lodge the old woman cried after him,
“There is a dead beaver, ten days dead, down by the river. Would not
your master like a piece of that; he seems such a dainty feeder?”
Red Eye stepped from sight, and the warriors and women and old men
turned upon Hot Tongue and vented their wrath loudly and violently.
They wanted to be heard by the inmate of the lodge, for they knew that
he was a magician of some sort. No true owl ever talked the human
language, or had such terrifying eyes. They shouted at Hot Tongue,
calling her wicked, and rash, and many other things. And Hot Tongue’s
spirit was shaken, not by the anger of the people (for she knew what
that was worth), but by her own words. She had seen magicians and their
workings, and feared them. Cursing her foolish tongue, she turned and
ran into the forest.
When the little brown owl had eaten the caribou meat, and dipped his
beak into the vessel of water a few times, and cleaned the feathers
of his breast, he told Red Eye to bring three of the chief men of the
village into the lodge. So Red Eye went out and called for the three
chief men to come to the lodge and hear the words of the great Bright
Robe; and the modesty of the warriors and the old men was wonderful to
behold.
Everyone urged his own unimportance. By their own account, there
was not a person of any consequence in the village. Strong Hunter,
who had spent hours the night before in explaining his fitness for
the position of chief, was now entirely of another mind; and Seven
Knives, who had then been loudest of all in denying his argument, now
proclaimed Strong Hunter as the perfection of manhood. Strong Hunter
protested.
“I am only a poor hunter,” he cried. “But you are a man of brains,
Seven Knives, as you told us last night. The great Bright Robe would
find wisdom in your talk.”
“This is foolishness,” said a woman. “Your talk is all turned backward
in your mouths, for fear of the owl. Here are two old men, who have
lived long enough to be of great importance, and are too weak to resist
the honour. As for a third,--why, surely Red Eye is one of our chief
men.”
The warriors were delighted with the woman’s wit, and in a moment the
two poor old great-grandfathers, both deaf and more than half blind,
were being pushed gently toward the owl’s lodge, close on the heels
of Red Eye. Every villager,--man, woman, and child--joined in the
procession; but they moved cautiously, and no voice was raised save
that of one of the old men. He, poor ancient, having heard nothing
of his election to a belated honour, protested shrilly against the
indignity of being hustled through the village.
The crowd halted at a distance of about five paces from the lodge in
which the bird was waiting to hold audience. Red Eye took charge of his
fellow dignitaries, at this point, and dragged them into the lodge in
short order.
“What is the meaning of this?” cried the owl.
“I have done your bidding, Mighty One,” stammered Red Eye. “Here are
the three chief men of the village, as chosen by all the people but a
minute ago.”
“And you are one of the leaders of the village?” asked the owl.
“It is even so, great chief, now that you abide in my poor lodge,”
replied Red Eye, who had guessed the reason of his sudden rise in the
estimation of the village, despite his dullness of wit, and yet was too
stupid to keep it to himself.
“And why these old cripples?” asked the owl.
“Because of their exceeding age were they chosen, great chief; for it
was thought that they would be wise enough to understand your wisdom,
having lived so many years,” replied Red Eye.
“You are too simple, Red Eye,” said the owl. “Shake your dry brain and
find me another reason.”
“The warriors are afraid to enter this lodge,” cried Red Eye, delighted
at his penetration into the matter. “Yes, great chief, they are afraid,
for they know that they deserve no mercy. Only the innocent are without
fear.”
“You have a wonderful mind. I shall certainly make you chief of this
village,” said the owl. “Now you may let these old cripples depart,” he
added.
Red Eye pushed the old men from the lodge; and off they hobbled,
muttering angrily. They had not seen the owl, because of their
blindness, and they had not heard his voice, because of their deafness;
so they were still at a loss to know what all the trouble was about.
“Now tell me the names of some of the most cunning and strong warriors
in this village,” said the owl.
“Seven Knives is a powerful man,” replied Red Eye. “And so is Strong
Hunter. Yellow Fox is also loud at the council fire, and Mighty Hand
thinks himself as great as any.”
“Yes,” said the owl. “I know them all. I have watched them, even when
they thought me a thousand miles away. They are not as great as
they appear to be; and they will be even of less importance before
many days. But, for a little while, we must let them think they are
deserving of honour, so that we may read every design in their hearts.”
Red Eye was deeply impressed.
“I am your servant, mighty magician,” he replied. “I live but to obey
your commands.”
“’Tis well,” said the owl. “Go cautiously, and repeat nothing of what
I say to you in private concerning the greatness to which I intend to
raise you so soon. Now order Strong Hunter to come to me, alone. I
would read his very soul.”
Red Eye backed from the lodge, and found the people clustered outside,
eagerly waiting for him. He approached them, and pointed a finger at
Strong Hunter.
“The mighty Bright Robe has sent for you,” he said.
CHAPTER XVIII
THE MAKER OF CHIEFS
When Strong Hunter, after a lengthy stay within the lodge, appeared
again among his fellows, he looked both elated and impressed and would
answer none of their questions. But he told them that the little brown
owl was Bright Robe, without a doubt; also, that no chief would be
appointed for the village until the end of two moons’ time, and that
the magician himself would act as their chief until then. There was
some grumbling at that, among the warriors, but no open objection. The
owl had told Strong Hunter the same story that he had told Red Eye, and
had made him the same promises of reward. Also, he had not forgotten to
charge him to keep those promises secret.
He had made a great deal of fun of poor Red Eye to the hunter. And he
had told him to have a huge fire built that night, and to tell the
villagers the story of his fight with Wise-as-a-she-wolf and of his
victory.
When night fell, a heap of wood as high as a lodge was lit in a
dozen places, and the whole village clustered around it. The men
wore battle-feathers in their hair and carried their spears and
war-clubs, for Strong Hunter had promised them that it was to be a
great occasion. As Strong Hunter began the story of the great battle
between the magicians, the owl’s version of it, Red Eye took his seat
quietly among the warriors, and looked at the orator with a covert and
supercilious smile. He had but just come from the owl’s lodge; and the
owl had explained to him, in the most friendly manner, that the seeming
consideration with which he had treated Strong Hunter was but a sly
step toward that warrior’s undoing. He had looked so wise, and sly, and
friendly, that Red Eye had felt quite satisfied.
“We will play with the vain fellows, for the space of two moons,” the
owl had concluded.
Strong Hunter stood upright and waved his arms above his head, shaking
a spear in one hand and a club in the other.
“This is the story of the battle between two magicians,” he cried,
“between Bright Robe, the master of magic, and Wise-as-a-she-wolf, the
child of vanity.”
He pranced forward a few steps, and back again, and twirled about
on his toes. The black battle-feathers flashed in his long braid
of tow-coloured hair. These islanders were not red men, like the
inhabitants of the great lands to the south and west.
“Before Bright Robe could strike a blow,” he continued, “the other
turned and fled, speeding like a flying brant, for the moccasins of
the wind were on his feet. But Bright Robe sprang after him through
the air, reached him and hurled him to earth. Unable to escape,
Wise-as-a-she-wolf fought with all his strength and cunning; and Bright
Robe returned him two blows for every one received.”
Here Strong Hunter swung his club, smiting an imaginary foe, and thrust
with his spear so violently that his audience shrank away from him. He
skipped and pranced, struck desperate attitudes, and shouted like a
madman.
“Blood flies,” he continued. “Trees bend, and crash to the ground. The
hills shake and great rocks roll into the valleys. The strength of
Wise-as-a-she-wolf dwindles and his courage runs out with his blood. He
strikes wide. He strikes feebly. But Bright Robe feels no weariness.
His blows redouble their speed and weight. He beats his enemy to the
ground. He bends, takes the limp body in his hands, and hurls it over
the mountain-top.”
Ceasing the narrative suddenly, Strong Hunter once more put his
body and limbs in motion. He staggered, and reeled, in the person
of Wise-as-a-she-wolf. He sprang high in air, and delivered heroic
strokes, in the person of Bright Robe. At last he stooped to the earth,
set his hands on an imaginary body and hurled it far over the heads of
the enraptured villagers. Then, drawing himself to his full height, he
folded his arms on his breast and stood silent and motionless.
The applause was quick and loud. Even Seven Knives and Red Eye joined
in it. Old men, who had long since forgotten their days of prowess,
flung their arms about as if in desperate conflict. Young men sprang
from their seats and danced around the fire, brandishing their weapons.
The graver warriors shouted, and beat their clubs on the ground. All
were affected by the orator’s efforts as if they had drunk deeply of
the strong wine of crushed and fermented berries.
Elated by his success, Strong Hunter went straight to the owl’s lodge.
The bird received him with gracious words, for the roars of applause
had reached his ears.
“You have done well,” he said. “I see that you are already powerful
among the people, that my good-will toward you is already giving you
new power. This will be the greatest village in the land, when you are
its chief. Go now, Strong Hunter, and send my servant Red Eye to me.”
Strong Hunter bowed, and left the lodge. He found Red Eye still seated
by the fire, smiling a twisted, evil smile. Without ceremony, he
ordered him to go to the magician. Red Eye glanced up at him, with a
glow under his lids.
“Go to your master,” said Strong Hunter again, and still more roughly.
Red Eye went, without a word; but there was rage in his heart. He
wondered what had passed in the lodge, to so soon change the warrior’s
manner with him. He vowed that Strong Hunter should be the first to
feel his wrath, when the village was in his power. He felt a dim
distrust of the magician.
The little brown owl read what was in Red Eye’s mind.
“Strong Hunter is a conceited fellow,” he said. “His vanity amuses me.”
“It does not amuse me, great chief,” replied Red Eye.
“You are of too serious a nature, my friend,” said the owl. “But I
think the bursting of that rascal’s vanity will amuse even you.”
“Oh, mightily,” cried the other. “I would give ten hides to see him
brought low this very night. I would gladly give a beaver skin for
every cry of pain he would utter if I could but stick my knife into his
big body.”
“Have patience,” said the owl. “It is my pleasure to sit inactive for
a little while, and study the natures of these people, their hopes and
vanities and foolish affairs. When I am tired of it, then ’twill be
time enough for you to break the pride, yea, even the neck, of Strong
Hunter.”
Red Eye went away from the lodge and meditated. Though he was a coward,
he had none of that fear which is a foretaste of remorse. Let him but
get an enemy in his power, with no chance to strike back, and he would
show no mercy. Pity was a sensation unknown to him; and if he sometimes
appeared to speak honestly, it was entirely due to his dulness of wit.
Now he retired to an empty lodge and gave his poor mind to this matter
of Strong Hunter’s arrogance of manner. Why had Strong Hunter been
chosen to tell the story of the battle to the villagers? Why had Strong
Hunter walked so proudly from the owl’s lodge? He thought and thought
and thought, until his head felt as if it would fly into a dozen
fragments, so great was the effort of concentration. He saw a glimmer
of the truth; but no, all was darkness again.
Sometime during the next day, the owl managed to have a secret talk
with Seven Knives; and to him he told the same tales, and made the same
promises, as to Strong Hunter and Red Eye. Also, he charged him to
secrecy.
Three days passed without incident; but on the morning of the fourth
day Red Eye lay with an ear at the edge of the lodge while Strong
Hunter and the owl talked within. He crawled away, before Strong Hunter
left the lodge. An hour later, he sprang upon the big warrior, from
behind, struck a blow and shouted the treachery of the owl. The blow
glanced from the great muscles of Strong Hunter’s neck, but sent him
reeling, for all that. Then Red Eye turned to flee, still shouting of
the owl’s treachery. The wounded man staggered after him and hurled
his stone axe, blindly but with terrific force. It struck Red Eye on
the back of the skull.
In a second, the whole village was in an uproar. Red Eye lay dead on
the ground; but his last words were alive in men’s ears. Seven Knives
stood face to face with Strong Hunter and asked if there was truth in
what Red Eye had shouted.
“’Tis true that the owl has promised that I am to be chief of this
village,” replied Strong Hunter.
“He promised the same to me,” said Seven Knives.
“And there is another chief,” said Yellow Fox, pointing at the body of
Red Eye.
“I think if that little owl were really Bright Robe, he would have
shown himself in his true form before this,” said Old Hot Tongue.
“Bright Robe would have killed me, for what I said about the beaver
meat,” she added.
“He is Bright Robe, and none other. He knows things that only Bright
Robe or Wise-as-a-she-wolf could know,” said Strong Hunter.
“Then why does he sit in the lodge all day, and eat raw flesh?” asked
an old man. “Bright Robe never lets a day pass without some violence or
theft.”
“He is Bright Robe, for all that,” said Seven Knives. “And I think he
is still as wicked as he ever was.”
“I once beheld the eyes of the devil that lives deep in the salt
water,” said Strong Hunter, “and though they were green and big, they
were not more wicked than the eyes of that little owl.”
“I do not fear any bird that flies,” said a young man, and before they
could lay hands upon him, he was running swiftly toward the lodge in
which sat the owl.
“I have a good bow here, and a sharp arrow,” he cried, as he ran.
At that the owl shot from the lodge and flew swiftly away across the
river.
“There goes your mighty magician, your maker of chiefs,” said the young
man.
The villagers stared in wonder after the departing bird, and continued
to stand and stare long after it had vanished.
A few hours after the owl’s hurried departure, a party of men who
belonged farther up the river arrived at the village. They were on
their way to the southern coast of the island, to kill the seals that
came down on the ice through the Narrow Sea. When they had heard the
story of the owl, one of them told of how he had been sick early in
the spring, and had gone to the lodge of Old Whispering Grass, the
doctor, far inland near the great lake. And he told them of the fight
between the magicians, as the old woman had told it to him; of Bright
Robe’s defeat and of the spell upon him which would keep him in the
shape of a little owl until five summers were gone.
The people of the village were amazed and disgusted at the memory of
the fear in which they had stood of the harmless bird. “But Bright Robe
never forgets an injury,” said one of the old men, “and I hope that I
may have died peacefully before those five seasons are passed.”
CHAPTER XIX
THE THEFT OF THE RED FEATHERS
All went well with the baby in the good magician’s lodge. He remembered
nothing of the world and the people that were without the magic walls;
and yet, when Run-all-day visited him, he knew him and ran to him. His
days were full of quiet play and happy, childish fancies. The wonderful
pictures on the walls were his playmates; and he learned their
meanings, gradually but without effort. He felt no loneliness or fear,
even when Wise-as-a-she-wolf was away from the lodge. But he was seldom
alone, for the magician was so happy in the company of his adopted baby
that he forgot many of his great affairs in the world. He would lie
awake all night, planning games, wonderful, magic games, to play with
the little fellow next day. And he painted some more pictures on the
walls, thus expanding the great lesson-book. He painted the flight of
Jumping Wolf through the wilderness, and the young warrior’s rescue
from the ice, all in the magic pigments that made them true as real
earth and real water and clear as sunlight. So the baby, toddling from
picture to picture, absorbed knowledge of men and beasts, of battles
and the chase, of gentleness and honesty, and of the ugliness of evil.
In August, a stranger arrived at Run-all-day’s village and asked to be
allowed to remain and become a member of the new clan. He was of darker
complexion than was usual among the islanders and his hair was black
and straight. He gave his name as Spotted Seal. He said that he had
been born far in the west, close to the shore of the Narrow Sea, and
had been a lonely warrior all his life. Run-all-day did not accept him
at once, but allowed him to fish and hunt with the villagers, so that
he might prove himself a safe and worthy man. Spotted Seal soon won the
respect of the clansmen, in spite of his black, shifting eyes; for he
was a good worker and a strong man with all manner of weapons. He was a
cunning and tireless hunter, and skilled in the management of canoes.
Spotted Seal had not been an inmate of the village many days, when he
heard some gossip of the red feathers, from old Green Bow. He showed
no interest in the subject, indifferently mending a fishing-line while
Green Bow told of the wonderful power of the feathers; of how he had
seen the chief slip them into his moccasins; of how it was rumoured
that Red Willow took care of them and kept them in a leathern bag,
along with other of her precious possessions. Spotted Seal looked
indifferent, all the while the old man talked, but his heart was
thumping madly. He had a slight knowledge of magic, and a great desire
to enlarge that knowledge. He was ambitious of power; and this talk of
the magic feathers, which carried a man through the air like the wings
of a hawk, filled him with a fever of covetousness. But he did not
show his emotions by so much as the flicker of an eyelash; and yet it
was for this very thing that he had come to the village. He had heard
something of Run-all-day’s power of flight, in a vague, roundabout way,
and so had travelled many days to investigate the secret of the matter.
He had never heard of the chief of the distant village as a magician,
and he could not believe that he was possessed of the famous moccasins
of the wind. Now he was glad to hear that the wonder lay in two small
feathers and not in the chief’s own person, for it would be an easier
matter to steal feathers from a man than wisdom out of his brain.
So Spotted Seal began to spy on the chief’s lodge, creeping and
peering about at all hours of the night. At last he was rewarded
for his exertions by seeing Red Willow take the feathers from the
bag, smooth them tenderly between her fingers, and return them to
their hiding-place. Then he saw her place the bag under the skins on
Run-all-day’s couch. His eager glance took note of the exact spot
where she hid the bag. It was a small bag, of white leather, decorated
with designs worked in dyed porcupine quills. As the night was still
young, he stole away and joined some other men at the fire, and calmly
listened to their stories and took part in their talk.
In that darkest hour before the first glimmer of dawn, Spotted Seal
crawled to the closed entrance of the chief’s lodge, and lay, for
nearly a minute, with his ear at the bottom of the great flap of hide.
He heard no sound from within, save the gentle and regular breathing of
the sleepers. He raised the flap a little, very cautiously, and thrust
his head under it. Inch by inch, and without the slightest sound, he
wormed himself beneath the edge of the hide and into the lodge. Then
again he lay still for some time, listening, straining his eyes against
the blackness, and drawing his breath guardedly. Again he advanced,
crawling almost flat, with one hand held in front of him so lightly
that, should it touch a sleeper, it would give no shock of contact. At
last he felt that he was beside the couch on which lay the chief. He
could hear that warrior’s breath, close in his ears, and he trembled.
Now his hand touched the furs, and slipped beneath them and encountered
the precious bag that contained the red feathers. At that, his heart
thumped so heavily that it deafened his ears against the sound of the
chief’s breathing. For what seemed a long time to him, he crouched,
motionless, beside the couch, with one hand on the bag of leather. But
at last he gathered courage to draw it forth. He heard the chief stir
uneasily; then lie quiet again. Some one, evidently a child, whimpered
in its dreams. He turned and crawled back toward the entrance of the
lodge, lifted the flap of hide again and wriggled under it and out to
the wider blackness of the open. After moving away from the lodge
for a short distance, he seated himself on a boulder, opened the bag
and thrust his hand within. He soon discovered the red feathers among
needles of bone, trinkets of shell and jasper, and other such trifles.
He placed one in the sole of each of his moccasins, and tied them
securely to his feet.
Spotted Seal stood up and looked about him. The sky, the forests, and
the earth at his feet, were all massed in a vast blackness. A little
stirring of wind, but newly arisen, moved around him. He shivered,
though the air was mild. Thought of the potent magic against the soles
of his feet, and of the terrific flight which he had the power to take,
up and across the blackness, shook his heart and unstrung his muscles.
For a moment he wished that he had not taken the feathers, and even
thought of returning them to the chief’s lodge. But no, he would not
again face the danger of entering that lodge and crawling about so near
to that strong warrior. And the feathers were a great prize, surely one
of the greatest possessions in the world. And now they were his.
“I am a coward,” he whispered, huskily. “I have run the risk of my life
in stealing the feathers from the chief’s couch, from under his body;
and now I have not the courage to use them. It is so dark; but when
daylight comes I shall fly into the air like a bird.”
But he knew that it would not be safe for him to wait, so near the
village, for morning. The chief might awake at any moment and discover
the absence of the precious feathers; and if that should happen--well,
Spotted Seal had been long enough in Run-all-day’s village to learn to
fear that big warrior’s displeasure. So he turned his face from the
quiet lodges and set out through the darkness. After having travelled
for more than a mile, he halted suddenly and uttered an exclamation of
disgust. He had come away from the village with no weapons except the
short flint knife in his belt. The great undertaking of stealing the
bag from the chief’s lodge had driven all thought of bow, spear, and
arrows from his mind. The day was breaking now, in a clear, colourless
streak along the east. Would he return to the village, and to his own
lodge, and arm himself? The people would still be asleep, and the magic
feathers were on his feet. Yes, he would go back, for he had left many
trusty weapons in his lodge, and fish-hooks of bone, and some good
fish-lines. Even if a man can fly like a bird, he reflected, still he
must hunt and fish, if he would live.
So Spotted Seal turned back toward the village, from which he had
stolen so fearfully but a little while before. The light of day
increased swiftly, flooding the eastern sky with crimson and bright
gold. Spotted Seal quickened his pace, afraid that the village might
be astir by the time he should reach it. Soon he was able to see
the lodges in front, between the ranks of the forests, the sunlight
gleaming on their peaks. Now he advanced more cautiously, and was about
to issue from the trees when a loud cry caused him to halt and crouch
like a startled animal.
The cry was from the lips of Run-all-day, who had discovered that the
bag in which the magic feathers were kept was gone from beneath the
skins on his couch. Next moment, he ran from his lodge, and shouted for
the men of the village, old and young, to gather in all haste. They
were before him within the minute, wondering but ready. He glanced over
them quickly.
“Where is Spotted Seal?” he asked. “Go to his lodge and find him.”
The warriors rushed to the lodge of the stranger, tore it open, and
shouted that it was empty; and at the same moment Spotted Seal turned
from his contemplation of the scene and started to run. But he had
forgotten the feathers in his moccasins. The first stride lifted him
from the ground and dashed him among the tree-tops. He uttered a
loud scream of amazement and fear, which was answered angrily from
the village. The voices of the warriors, lifted in fierce and eager
hunting-cries, steadied his wits. He sprang clear of the trees and
soared away to the southward. The people of Run-all-day’s village
beheld him thus mount into their view and then fly swiftly beyond it;
and they sent a howl of rage and a few harmless arrows after him.
Spotted Seal felt like a man in the clutches of an awful dream, during
the first few minutes of his flight. The world--river, forest, and
hill--sped backward beneath him with sickening velocity. The air
sang in his ears, and his breath seemed beaten back against mouth
and nostrils. The glory of the morning and the rushing air upon his
eyeballs, almost blinded him, and the fear of falling to earth was so
strong in him that he continued, for some time, to exert every muscle,
like a runner in a race.
But, in time, he slackened his pace, for very weariness, and then he
found that he could continue in the air with but little effort and no
discomfort. He scarcely moved his feet, and yet sailed pleasantly and
safely above the forests. His eyes cleared and his breath came back to
him. He swooped gently toward the earth and swerved easily up again,
finding this manner of flight to be as pleasant as it was amazing. He
circled high; he flew this way and that; he ran across the tops of the
forest trees, just touching them with his feet. But he continued to
increase the distance between himself and the village.
It was not until noon that Spotted Seal felt the gnawings of hunger,
and realized that the knife in his belt was the only weapon in his
possession. But now he felt no fear of starving, and cared no more for
the loss of his bow and arrow than if meat was to be picked from the
ground, like berries. He would hunt as hawks hunt, with the advantage
that no cover of brush or branches could cheat him of his quarry. So
he flew low, and kept a sharp watch. A covey of grouse flew up from a
barren and lit in a thicket of small spruces. He swooped down and beat
the tops of the trees with a short stick, hovering above them all the
while. Out flew the grouse, in all directions; and in a moment one
had received a sharp blow from the stick and lay dead on the ground.
Another was soon killed by the same means. Then Spotted Seal chose a
nook that suited him, lit a fire, and set to work to cook his belated
breakfast.
CHAPTER XX
A JOURNEY TO THE MAGIC FOREST
Run-all-day was very much ashamed, and very angry, at the loss of the
magic feathers which the good Wise-as-a-she-wolf had trusted to his
care. So hot was his anger at first, that it clouded his wits, and he
set out in pursuit of the thief and ran for fully six miles before he
realized that he might just as well chase a hawk as Spotted Seal. When
that thought came to him, he immediately leaned against a tree, to
recover his breath and plan some other means of regaining possession of
the red feathers. He had not filled his lungs more than a dozen times
before Jumping Wolf, who had followed close on his heels, halted before
him. The chief eyed the youth mournfully.
“We are mighty runners, lad,” he said, “but only the moccasins of the
wind can overtake the feet that are shod with the red feathers.”
“He flew southward,” replied Jumping Wolf, “and if I follow, day and
night, I may come upon him while he sleeps, or see him in the air and
bring him down with an arrow. All I need is a wallet of pemmican and a
quiver of arrows, and then I am ready for the journey. I have hit hawks
and eagles while they flew above the tree-tops, so surely I can put an
arrow into Spotted Seal.”
The chief shook his head dejectedly.
“Let us go home. I must ask Red Willow what is to be done,” he said.
So the two swift runners returned to the village, meeting the other
warriors breathless and still staggering forward, scattered along the
way. So they returned to the lodge, together, all depressed by the
loss of the feathers and ill tempered from having run so far on empty
stomachs.
The chief went straight to Red Willow, and confessed to her that he
could think of no way of recovering the precious feathers.
“Wise-as-a-she-wolf must be told about it,” said she, after a moment’s
reflection. “He will be able to get them back again; and I do not think
he will be angry with us when he knows how Spotted Seal crept into our
lodge, in the night-time, and stole them.”
“But even if he is not angry, he will not trust me with the feathers
again,” said the chief.
“’Twill be better so, I believe,” replied the woman, “for now that
people know about them, and of the great virtue they possess, they will
be a dangerous possession for any man save a magician.”
“But how am I to tell him about it?” asked Run-all-day. “’Tis a long
journey to his lodge, and even when the journey is made a man cannot
see the lodge until the master charms his eyes. This is the truth, for
he told us so. And I cannot leave the village, for the warriors would
soon begin to argue about this and that, and all my good work would be
blown away as the ashes of a dead fire are scattered by the wind.”
“And still must the good magician be told the whole story, or his
enemies may use the feathers against him while he thinks them safe in
your keeping,” said Red Willow.
At that moment Jumping Wolf looked in at the door of the lodge.
“Here is a messenger for you to send,” said Red Willow. “He is swift
and strong, and worthy of trust. Come in,” she added, to the young
man, “and hear what the chief has to ask you.”
Jumping Wolf entered immediately and looked at Run-all-day with eager
inquiry in his glance.
“Will you go a long journey for me?” asked the chief. “I think it is
a three-days’ journey, for one who walks, from here to the lodge of
Wise-as-a-she-wolf.”
“Tell me the road and I will go,” replied the young man.
So the chief told him the way, as well as he could from the memory
of what he had seen in his flights. He told him that the magician’s
lodge lay to the westward, beyond two large rivers and many streams, a
great barren and many wooded hills. He told him of the pine wood and
the high mountains, and how he must search the pine wood for a little
pond and then shout that he had a message for Wise-as-a-she-wolf from
Run-all-day.
“And the message?” asked Jumping Wolf.
“Tell him that the red feathers have been stolen from my lodge, and
describe to him the face and figure of the thief,” replied Run-all-day.
“And beg him to tell you of my baby. Even ask him to let you see him,”
said the woman.
After supplying himself with a small bag of food, and arming himself
with a knife, a bow and a dozen of his best arrows, Jumping Wolf set
out on his long journey. He was proud that he, a man from the south,
had been chosen, from all the warriors of the village, for the task of
finding the magic lodge and giving the chief’s message. He had no fear
of the hardships of the journey, for he loved adventure as duller men
love soft couches and the warmth of the cooking-fire. So swiftly did he
travel that he came to the shore of the first of the big rivers that
lay in his path at just about the time of sunset. Heavy forests clothed
both banks of the stream, which was fully a mile in width. He could
see no smoke of fires, or any sign of human life, in any direction.
After eating a little of the pemmican from his bag, he made a couch of
spruce-branches and lay down to sleep, without building a fire.
Jumping Wolf slept soundly until midnight, when he was awakened by the
noise of something moving close beside him. He did not spring to his
feet, or even sit up; but he put his hand on his knife and waited, with
every sense on the alert. Again he heard the sounds that had awakened
him, and he knew that a bear was close by but moving slowly away. He
strained his eyes in the dim starlight, and managed, at last, to detect
the vague shape of the animal against the surrounding shadows. Well, a
bear was nothing to be afraid of. Now it had ceased to move; but by the
sounds it made it was evidently engaged in devouring something, with
ponderous relish.
“I wonder what the black glutton has found?” muttered Jumping Wolf, at
the same time feeling about, with his right hand, in the moss beside
his couch. On finding a good-sized stone, he threw it at the disturber
of his slumbers. It was well aimed; and the bear uttered a protesting
grunt and shambled into the woods. The young man listened to the sounds
of the beast’s retreat until they faded away in the distance; then he
closed his eyes and returned to his slumbers.
When Jumping Wolf opened his eyes again, with the first flush of
morning light, he discovered that the bag of pemmican was gone from
where he had placed it close beside his couch, the evening before.
Then he remembered the visit of the bear, and sprang to his feet, and
ran to where he had seen the animal during the night. There lay the
bag, ripped open and empty; but a few scraps of the pemmican remained,
scattered about on the ground. At first the young man was angry and
somewhat dismayed. But presently he laughed aloud.
“If I had known what you were eating, old glutton,” he said, “I would
have disturbed your meal with an arrow instead of with a harmless
little stone. But I am glad to see that you were so polite as to leave
me enough for my breakfast.”
And with that he stooped down, gathered the fragments of pemmican in
his hands, and ate them with relish; after which he slaked his thirst
at a little spring which trickled from the mossy rocks close beside
him. Then he fastened his bow and quiver of arrows securely together,
tied them high across his shoulders, and stepped down the shore and
into the river. The water felt chilly at first; but the sun was shining
brightly and the mists were quickly dispersing from the wide current.
He waded in, deeper and deeper at every stride, and when the water was
half-way up his breast he leaned forward and struck out with hands
and feet. The strokes of his swimming were long, slow, and powerful,
propelling him easily and steadily across the current. Now his blood
was in a glow, for he was strong and young. The surface of the river
was bright as gold with the level rays of the sun, and the swimmer
rejoiced in the freshness and glory of the morning. Sometimes he
lowered his head so that the bright refreshing water might wash over it.
When Jumping Wolf landed on the farther shore, he felt no fatigue from
his long swim, but began immediately to leap about, and swing his arms,
so as to shake some of the weight of water from his leather clothing.
He unfastened his bow and arrows from his shoulders, returned the
quiver to the left side of his girdle, and replaced the wet bow-string
with a dry one from a water-tight wallet which was attached to his
belt. The restringing of the bow was no more than completed when he
heard the whistle of wings, and on looking up saw three ducks hurtling
toward him with outstretched necks. They saw him, and swerved to one
side; but the bow-string twanged, an arrow swished in the air, and one
of the ducks quacked loudly and fell into the shallow water at the edge
of the river.
“Here is my dinner; and it is better than musty pemmican,” said the
young man, as he drew forth the arrow and fastened the dead bird to
his belt. Then, very well satisfied with himself, and the world in
general, he continued on the second stage of his westward journey.
Jumping Wolf travelled steadily until noon, then lit a fire by means of
friction--a laborious method of grinding one stick into another--and
broiled the fat duck. He was now at the edge of a great barren, a vast
plain of rocky hummocks, mellow, berry-swarded levels and occasional
clumps of stunted spruces.
The season of the wild harvest was over the land, the days of ripe
berries and falling seeds, and the flocking birds. Snipe and plover
from the farther north, and coveys of ptarmigan, and flocks of snow
birds, fed along the ground and started up on quick wings, on every
side. The sun, wheeling high in the blue, touched that wide, treeless
place with a mellow enchantment that stole into the heart of Jumping
Wolf with pleasant languor--a suggestion of idleness and dreams.
The berry-starred moss on which he reclined was warm as a couch of
fox-skins, and the soft bird-calls, sounding indolently from hummock
and hollow, made music in his ears. A sweet, elusive fragrance, that
was the breath of the warmth and ripeness of the barren, stole into his
brain. Millions of red berries, millions of little, tinted leaves,
innumerable pockets of warm, brown loam, loosed that fragrance on
the air at the soft entreaty of the sun. And the warmth of the sun
penetrated also to the very bones of the young hunter, until he lay at
full length on the moss and sighed with the comfort of it. His eyelids
fluttered down. He had travelled far and swiftly, and crossed a river
full of chilly water; then why should he not lie here for a little
while, basking in the sun, and dream a little of Singing Bird, the
daughter of the chief?
The temptation to rest and dream was strong; but not strong enough to
deaden for long Jumping Wolf’s sense of duty. Had not his benefactor,
Run-all-day, trusted him to carry an important message with all speed?
Then how could he throw away good hours of daylight in idle dreaming?
So he forced himself to arise from the warm moss and harden his heart
against the drowsiness of the noon.
[Illustration: “HE CLIMBED A HIGH TREE AT THE EDGE OF THE WOOD.”]
By nightfall the youth had reached the western margin of the barren,
and made his resting-place for the night beside a brook that ran
through groves of pines and spruces. He had killed two grouse on the
way, and had halted several times to refresh himself with handfuls
of the tart, juicy partridge berries. Again he gathered little
fragments of wood, dry as tinder, laboriously created the speck of red
flame and enlarged it to a cooking-fire. He cooked both the birds, so
that he would not lose time in the morning in preparing his breakfast.
Jumping Wolf reached the great forest of pine, in which stood the
lodge of Wise-as-a-she-wolf, early in the afternoon of the third day
of his journey. He climbed a high tree at the edge of the wood, and
from its top looked far and wide on all sides, studying the features
of the landscape. After a short survey he felt satisfied that this was
the place which the chief had described to him; so, without further
hesitation, he descended to the ground and struck into the wood in
search of the pond of crystal water.
The sun had dipped below the tree-tops, and the western sky was red as
fire, when Jumping Wolf issued from the ranks of straight pine boles
and halted on the margin of the little lake. The oval surface of water
was red with the reflection of the sky, and lay there like a warrior’s
shield of painted hide. On every side towered the pines, ancient,
gigantic, brooding above the secrets of their still hearts. They were
robed in dusk, and their wide branches were heavy with massed shadows;
but their tops were aflame with the light of the hidden sun. Jumping
Wolf breathed softly. He could hear nothing; there was no sound in all
that enchanted forest save the beating of his own heart. The red faded
from the sky and slipped from the spires of the trees. The lake shone
duskily, lost its glow, clouded and lay like dead ice.
Then the spirit of Jumping Wolf shook itself from the spell that had
stolen about it. He raised his head and shouted the name of the great
magician. The echoes rang quickly back to him, just beyond the narrow
water, in among the pines. The name he had cried clanged about him,
clanged and leaped, shattering the brooding silence of the place with
a note of menace, then dropped to silence again. The young man’s heart
was shaken. He glanced backward, over his shoulder, and his muscles
grew tense, as if for a great effort. But what had he to fear in the
wood of the kind magician? His courage returned at that thought, and
again he lifted his voice.
“I am Jumping Wolf,” he cried, “and I bring word from Run-all-day.”
His voice rang clear across the little water. But he drew back, as if
threatened by a blow, when the silence closed instantly over the words
he had shouted so bravely. There was no echo. The sound of his voice
had rung high, and fallen dead. And yet the place had clashed with
echo at his first cry. He trembled with a horror of something vague,
gigantic, imminent. He would have turned and fled, dashed blindly away
from this power that loosed and choked the echoes at its will, but he
had no strength to lift his feet from the ground.
A voice spoke to him, by name, from the other side of the dark pond. It
was the voice of the good magician, calm and gentle, as he remembered
having heard it in the village of Run-all-day.
“Have no fear, Jumping Wolf. My friends are safe in this forest. Bring
me the message,” said the voice.
The young man fought down the terror that still shook him, and with a
great effort of will forced his craven feet to the master’s bidding.
CHAPTER XXI
THE QUEST OF THE FEATHERS
Jumping Wolf stumbled around the margin of the lake, felt the touch of
a guiding hand on his arm, and saw, suddenly, the glowing windows of
the magic lodge. Next moment, as the thing would happen in a dream, he
stood within the bright room, staring at the living pictures on the
walls and the lamps that burned so steadily and yet exhaled no smoke.
He uttered an exclamation of wonder, happiness. Surely he had entered
the lodge of the gods! Then he felt a light touch against his knee, and
looking down beheld Run-all-day’s littlest baby smiling up at him.
“What is the message, friend, that you bring from the honest
Run-all-day?” inquired the magician, who stood close at his elbow.
“I had forgotten it,” whispered the youth. “It seems a small matter,
a thing to snap one’s fingers over, in this beautiful place,” and
straightway his eyes began to wander along the walls again and up at
the starlit roof.
“You have come a long journey,” said Wise-as-a-she-wolf, gently.
The young man sighed and withdrew his gaze from the picture of a battle.
“The red feathers are gone from the chief’s lodge, O mighty one,” he
said. “They were stolen in the night, from the robes of the chief’s
couch, by a stranger named Spotted Seal. We gave chase to the thief,
for a matter of several miles, but he flew like a hawk. And Run-all-day
could not leave the village, so he trusted me to bring you the word,
mighty chief.”
The magician looked thoughtful, but not greatly disturbed. With Bright
Robe reduced to harmlessness, he did not foresee any serious difficulty
in recovering possession of the feathers.
“In which direction did Spotted Seal fly?” he asked.
“He started southward, master,” replied the youth.
“It is well that you arrived to-night,” said the magician, “for I
intended to set out on a journey early in the morning.”
Jumping Wolf thought of how nearly he had given himself to slumber one
noontime, and of how a few hours’ rest then would have delayed him so
that he would not have reached the pine wood until after the magician’s
departure, and so would not have found the magic lodge at all. But he
said nothing of this.
“You go on a journey? Then what of the child?” he said.
“He will be safe and happy,” replied Wise-as-a-she-wolf. “Everything
that he may require is at his hand, and he will not know that I am gone
from him. But he will know well when I return, and will be glad of it.”
“I can believe that readily, great chief, for I myself could spend
an hundred years in the contemplation of these wonderful pictures,”
replied the young man.
“And yet,” said the other, thoughtfully, “this lodge was never so
wonderful to me as it has become since I brought the baby to it. Now
I find it hard to cross the threshold and go about my business in the
world.”
But this was all lost upon Jumping Wolf, who was again intent on the
contemplation of the pictures of life. There was a girl that reminded
him of Singing Bird; and at last he caught sight of the newest picture,
and beheld, with pride and wonder, himself on the sodden ice-cake, and
the big canoe paddled by Run-all-day, and Singing Bird in the bow,
slim and glowing as in her living flesh. Before that picture he stood
fascinated, forgetful of the magician and his surroundings.
“Nowhere in the whole world is there such another as little Singing
Bird,” he cried, very low, but with a quaver in his voice.
“And nowhere, north, east, south, or west, is there so great a magician
as Youth,” said Wise-as-a-she-wolf, smiling somewhat pathetically.
The other looked at him swiftly; and though he did not understand, he
felt a vague stirring of pity for the mighty one.
Early in the morning, the magician guided Jumping Wolf out of the
forest of pines and faced him on his way. He gave him a store of food
to last him three days.
“Tell the mother that all is well with the littlest warrior,” he said,
“and say to the chief that I do not hold the loss of the feathers
against him; but that, with the knowledge of them abroad among the
people, I must keep them myself should I win them back, until such time
as the child is ready to use them. Be guarded in your talk about this
lodge of mine, and the way to it,” he added.
“May I not speak of its wonders to any one?” asked the young man.
“You need not sit with a silent tongue before the maid,” replied
Wise-as-a-she-wolf. “I have been young, also,” he added, and turned
upon the other a face as boyish as the warrior’s own.
Then they parted, one going southward and one eastward, and the silence
of the wilderness fell again upon wood and barren. The magician walked
like any common traveller, for a mile or more, pondering deeply. His
thoughts were not of the red feathers, but of the little child playing
by itself in the magic house. “Wonderful! Wonderful!” he murmured.
“How he grows, day by day. And he loves me. My eyes require no magic
keenness to see that he loves me.” He sat down on a mossy stone, and
his mind was not on his affairs as the guardian of a nation. He thought
of the child whom he had taken into his care; and he thought how happy
a man might be, a chief of a little village, or even a fisher of cod,
with a woman and children in his lodge. “I must not lead him too far in
the knowledge of hidden things,” he reflected, “or else, in his power,
he will miss the happiness that is his birthright.”
At last he got to his feet. “I must find those red feathers,” he said.
“I must hasten in the search of Spotted Seal; and perhaps I can return
to the littlest warrior before night.”
Then he hid himself in his magic and sprang into the air on the
moccasins of the wind.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf flew fast and far, scanning the woods and hills
and open places beneath his feet. He flashed, invisible, southward,
eastward, and westward, and descended into many camps and villages, to
look closely at their unsuspecting inhabitants. But nowhere did he find
a man answering to Jumping Wolf’s description of Spotted Seal. Just
before the time of sunset, he turned his face toward home, and flew
with more eagerness than he had as yet exhibited during the day. He
would continue his search for Spotted Seal in the morning; but now it
was time for him to tell the story of one or other of the pictures to
the littlest warrior. He felt no great anxiety concerning the feathers.
He was sure to find them in a day or two, before the thief could
accomplish much harm with them, even if he were so minded.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf spent the next day in a fruitless search for the red
feathers. He sought far and wide, and made inquiries for Spotted Seal
at several widely separated villages; but all this without any success.
It was not until the fifth day of his search that an old fisherman, who
lived on the coast of the Narrow Sea, told of how days before, he had
been amazed to see a man running in the air, high above the salt water,
running westward toward the hazy line of that distant shore.
The magician crossed the water without delay, flying unseen from under
the very eyes of the astonished fisherman. He descended to the ground
and took on his visible form, near the camp of a party of Mountain
People. He walked into the camp, a modest, undersized youth, and in
a second a dozen great wolf-dogs had sprung toward him, followed by
several warriors. The dogs were huge beasts, more savage and fearless
than their brothers, the timber wolves, and as strong of jaw and limb.
But under the mild regard of the stranger’s clear eyes, they halted
in their rush, turned and slunk away. The warriors were also savage
in appearance, and long of limb and hair. They were dark of skin, and
black of eye, like Spotted Seal. The truth is, Spotted Seal had the
blood of these Mountain People strong in his veins; but how this thing
had come about is apart from our story. The warriors, more courageous
than the dogs, continued their advance upon the helpless-looking
stranger.
“I would speak with Black Eagle,” said the magician, for these people
were well known to him. At that they halted, eyeing him distrustfully.
“Black Eagle is our chief,” said one, an angular fellow, with sinister
eyes, a scar on his chin, and a spear in his hand. He seemed to be
watching, hungrily, for something to serve as an excuse for an attack
on the visitor.
“Yes, he is your chief. I want to speak with him,” said the stranger,
quietly.
“He is a mighty chief,” said the fellow with the scar on his chin. “He
does not come to every one’s bidding. I will call an old woman to take
your message.”
“Tell him that Wise-as-a-she-wolf is waiting to talk to him,” said the
magician.
At that name the warriors were visibly disturbed, and several of them
slunk away in much the same manner as the dogs had done a few minutes
before.
But he of the scarred chin was of tougher courage. “It is not a
difficult thing to mention a great name,” he said, sneering and alert.
“I must teach you caution,” said the magician, who, despite the
goodness of his heart, could not bring himself to love these dark and
bloodthirsty people. So, in a flash, he vanished from their sight. They
uttered a shout of consternation, and the warrior with the sinister
eyes and disfigured chin hurled his spear at the place where the
stranger had stood. In the same instant of time he received a buffet on
the head that laid him flat on the moss.
Black Eagle was soon brought to the magician, who now stood quietly, in
his mild and visible form, calm as if nothing unusual had taken place.
The chief greeted his visitor respectfully, for he knew him of old.
“Have you seen a man running on the air, as if he had the moccasins of
the wind on his feet?” asked Wise-as-a-she-wolf.
“I saw such an one but two days ago. He was flying northward and
westward, toward the Land of Giants,” replied the chief of the
mountaineers.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf continued his journey immediately, and soon came to
the borders of that desolate region known as the Land of Giants. Its
inhabitants were people of tremendous stature and physical strength.
They were stupidly savage, and so dull of wit that no argument,
save that of heavier clubs than their own, could move them. And as
they had never met with heavier clubs than their own, no man could
remember that their darkened opinions had ever been changed by outside
influence. The biggest and strongest man was always their chief; and he
remained their chief for just so long as he continued to be bigger and
stronger than any of his people. When illness or old age weakened him
then his chieftainship ended, and perhaps his life, into the bargain.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf knew these people well, though not favourably; so he
paused in his flight and descended to the ground at some distance from
the first of the great lodges. Still invisible, he advanced cautiously
on foot toward the untidy and tremendous structure of tree-trunks in
which dwelt the giant who had been chief of the people at the time of
his last visit to the country. He had not gone more than a dozen paces
before he was halted by the sight of a human body, a lifeless body,
lying face-downward on the moss and stones. At first he thought it was
the body of one of the Mountain People; but, upon drawing nearer, he
saw that the garments of dressed leather, blood-stained and wrinkled
on that stiffened form, were of the pattern common among the warriors
of his own country beyond the Narrow Sea. The feet were bare, but one
of the moccasins lay close by. Very gently he turned the body over; and
the face of the dead man was that of Spotted Seal, as Jumping Wolf had
described it to him.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf turned away from the pitiful thing and went on in
the direction of the great lodge, the shapeless roof of which loomed
above a grove of spruces on the summit of a hill. At last he issued
from the grove and stood in front of, and at a safe distance away from,
the entrance to the giant’s abode. This entrance was nearly half the
height of the structure and wide in proportion. It looked more like the
mouth of a den than the doorway of a human retreat. Bones of caribou
and moose lay white on the trampled ground; but there was no sign of a
cooking-fire to be seen. The giants ate their meat raw, and were never
known to use fire even in winter, for the sake of its warmth. In the
dusky interior, Wise-as-a-she-wolf detected the outline of a bulky
figure.
CHAPTER XXII
WISE-AS-A-SHE-WOLF AND CRACK BONE THE GIANT
“Awake, chief, and come out from your den. Wise-as-a-she-wolf is here
to talk to you,” cried the magician, in a formidable voice.
The head and shoulders of the giant immediately appeared, and from
under a fringe of tangled hair a pair of alert eyes, gray as ice,
glared about on every side and up in the air. The giant’s face was
covered with untidy, yellow whiskers. His forehead sloped back sharply
from his eyebrows, and his nose was flat. He crouched on all-fours, and
in one massive hand, which rested on the ground, he grasped the smaller
end of a trimmed pine-tree. The magician thought of the littlest
warrior, far away and alone in the magic lodge, and decided to act with
discretion.
[Illustration: “THE HEAD AND SHOULDERS OF THE GIANT IMMEDIATELY
APPEARED, AND FROM UNDER A FRINGE OF TANGLED HAIR A PAIR OF ALERT EYES,
GRAY AS ICE, GLARED ABOUT.”]
“Is it you, little great-man?” said the giant, in a voice that was not
unlike the growling of a beast. “I don’t see you,” he continued. “Show
yourself and come nearer. Old Crack Bone is ready to talk to you.”
“I can talk to you very well from where I am,” replied
Wise-as-a-she-wolf. “All I want to know is, have you seen anything of
two little red feathers?”
“I was afraid you had come to slay us all, mighty powerful one,” said
the giant, with a thunderous chuckle. “We might wade across to that
little island of yours some day, and eat all your caribou and kill all
your people,” he added.
“And that will be time enough for me to slay you. Now I want you to
give me the two red feathers which you took from the feet of the dead
man,” replied the magician.
“Was he one of your warriors?” asked the giant. “When I saw him flying
along, like a bird, I thought it was the great Wise-as-a-she-wolf
himself. So I just threw a little bone into the air, to attract his
attention, and down he came, so hard that his life was knocked right
out of him.” Then he shook with horrible laughter at the remembrance.
“Wise-as-a-she-wolf would never fly near you, without first making
himself invisible. He knows you too well to trust you,” replied the
magician, sternly.
“The poor fellow whom you killed was not one of my people,” he
continued, “but the feathers are mine, for all that, and I must ask you
to give them to me immediately.”
“How can I give them to you, when I can’t see you?” inquired the giant,
with a grin.
“If you will kindly lay them on the top of your lodge,” replied the
other.
“Little great-one,” said Crack Bone, “I am not afraid of you, or any
magician, or anything alive under the sun. You can hide from my eye;
but that does me no harm. As for the feathers, my brave warrior, why,
I intend to keep them for my own use. They are of such virtue that,
when I put them in my moccasins I can jump twice as high as my head.
With a little more practice, I shall be able to fly as well as that
unfortunate young man was flying before I tossed the shank-bone of a
moose at him.”
The magician was very angry at that, and felt a strong desire to
increase his size and close in deadly combat with the giant. But he
remembered the battle with Bright Robe, and the injuries then received,
and thought of what might happen to the baby in the distant lodge if
he should be disabled by the giant. So he changed his position, took a
small stone from the ground, breathed upon it, and threw it into the
roof of the giant’s lodge. Next moment the whole structure was a mass
of flames, and the giant, with a howl of rage, had scrambled from the
dangerous place and hurled his club at where he thought the magician
was standing. The huge weapon struck a clump of young spruce trees and
broke them as if they were twigs; but the magician stood safe.
“Will you play any more of your magic on Crack Bone?” roared the giant,
as he jumped again and again upon the fallen timber and threshed about
with his club. Wise-as-a-she-wolf made no sound. Before Crack Bone had
desisted from his violent dance, half a dozen of his people arrived on
the scene, shouting questions and staring with amazement at the great
pile of blazing timber that had so lately been the chief’s lodge. At
last Crack Bone leaned on his club, and, between gasps for breath (for
the smoke from his burning den blew about him), answered some of their
questions.
“It was that little magician, Wise-as-a-she-wolf, from across the salt
water,” he said. “He came for the red feathers. He told me to give him
back those fine red feathers. But he won’t need them now.”
Crack Bone laughed victoriously, and drew the tiny feathers from some
safe hiding-place about his person. He held them up, between his great
fingers, so that all might see. Then, bending down, he slipped one into
each of his moccasins. The magician sprang high into the air, at sign
of these preparations, and hung at a safe distance above the savage
group, watchful but invisible.
“Stand aside, friends,” roared Crack Bone. “Now I have the magic
feathers under my feet and I intend to jump about, so don’t stand too
close.”
The other giants fell back the distance of a few of their own great
strides. Then Crack Bone gathered himself together and leaped upward
with all the strength of his massive legs. Up he shot, high above the
surrounding tree-tops, struggled in the air for a few seconds and sank
back to earth. The magic of the feathers was not strong enough to keep
his mountain-like body afloat. His friends were greatly impressed by
this display of agility, and shouted until the earth rang. But the
magician, high and unseen, only smiled.
“I fear nothing,” cried the giant, to his people. “Wise-as-a-she-wolf
angered me, and now where is he? He set the red fire to eat my house
to dust, but he was not strong enough to save his own life. Oh, I am
strong and mighty, and have flying magic under my feet.” At that he
began to jump here and there, so recklessly that the other giants moved
sullenly away.
“I think the feathers are safe in his keeping,” said the magician. “He
cannot harm my people with them, for they cannot lift so great a weight
across the Narrow Sea. Some other time, when the littlest warrior is
older and stronger, I shall return and win the feathers back. I shall
always know where to find them.”
With that, he set his face again in the direction of his own country
and his own lodge, and flashed through the air with all the speed of
the moccasins of the wind; and far behind and below, Crack Bone, the
chief of the giants, continued to caper and shout before his blazing
house.
Within a hundred yards of the giant, in the top of a fir-tree, perched
a little brown owl. He sat very still; but his yellow eyes were full
of light and eagerness and cunning. He watched the stupid giant
leaping and skipping on the magic feathers, and was glad that he had
visited this desolate country.
CHAPTER XXIII
HOW CRACK BONE WAS DOUBLY OUTWITTED
This little brown owl that had been a spectator of the whole of
Wise-as-a-she-wolf’s interview with Crack Bone, and that now sat and
watched the giant prancing victoriously, was none other than Bright
Robe. He, too, believed that his enemy had been disabled by the giant’s
club and trodden to helplessness by the giant’s feet. Otherwise, the
magician would surely have replied to the giant’s attack. One who could
throw magic fire onto the roof of a lodge could as easily throw it
against a man’s body. But he knew that his enemy was not dead, however
his body might be crushed and broken. He was aware that no mortal hand,
either of giant or magician, could kill Wise-as-a-she-wolf.
The owl had crossed the Narrow Sea some time before Crack Bone’s
capture of the red feathers. He had visited the camps of the
mountaineers, and the lodges of several magicians, and the caves of
a fierce people still farther to the westward, and the lodges of the
fat, blubber-eating people far to the northward; but, remembering his
experiences in his own country, he had not made himself known to any
one. He had practised the same discretion with the giants.
After the house was burned to the ground, Crack Bone strode up the
hill and took possession of a lodge belonging to one of his people.
The rightful owner was very angry, but he made no objections. He knew
that he was no match for the chief, especially now that the chief was
so light on his feet. The little owl followed Crack Bone, at a safe
distance, watched him remove the feathers from his moccasins and tuck
them under his belt, and then flew away to where some of the giants had
thrown a number of fresh bones that were not entirely devoid of flesh.
He ate his fill, keeping a sharp look-out all the while for foxes, and
then returned to spy on the giant and the magic feathers.
* * * * *
Day after day the little brown owl kept watch over the actions of
the chief of the giants. He followed the great savage on his hunting
expeditions, watching him strike down moose and caribou and bear. In
that desolate country summer was already past, and the owl was cold,
for he had not yet made himself a winter retreat. The rivers and ponds
froze and snow fell thick out of the gray skies; and still the owl
followed Crack Bone or perched near his lodge, cold but determined. At
last his alertness and watchfulness were rewarded. Crack Bone had been
hunting and had used the red feathers, and the bird had followed him
close, drifting from tree to tree. On reaching his lodge, Crack Bone
immediately drew his moccasins from his feet and removed the feathers
from them. It was now evening, and falling snow added to the gloom.
The giant had killed three caribou; and just when in the act of hiding
the feathers under his belt, he heard a sound of furtive movements
near the spot where he had thrown the dead animals. He listened for
a moment, then placed the feathers on a stone in the doorway of his
lodge and sprang in the direction of the sound that had disturbed him.
The owl fluttered to the ground, picked up the feathers in his beak,
and flew away. He flew at his best speed, straight ahead through the
gloom and the whirling snow. At last he alit in a great pine-tree and
hid the feathers in a crevice in the bark. They would be safe there
until morning. Then he snapped his beak and fluttered his wings. The
red feathers were his, all ready to be placed in his moccasins when the
enchantment was removed from him.
“I have done what Wise-as-a-she-wolf failed to do,” he chuckled.
Crack Bone did not reach the place where he had left the carcasses of
the caribou a moment too soon. Stone Hand, the giant whose house he had
so unceremoniously taken, was turning away with all three of the bodies
in his arms. Crack Bone struck at him with his fist; but Stone Hand
avoided the blow by leaping to one side; and letting two of the frozen
carcasses fall to the ground, he swung the other by the hind legs and
smote the chief across the head with it. The blow staggered Crack Bone
for a moment; but only for a moment. His skull was far too thick to be
injured by any weapon so light and yielding as the body of a stag. He
reeled a little, bellowed with anger, and clutched at Stone Hand. But
he missed his mark in the swirling gloom, and the thief dashed away.
Crack Bone stooped, lifted a great stone from the ground, and hurled
it blindly after the mutinous one. Then, yanking a small tree from
the frozen ground, to serve him as a club, he dashed into the storm
and darkness in mad pursuit. Stone Hand turned sharply, and headed for
the unpeopled wilds; but Crack Bone ran straight on, until he stumbled
among the lodges of his people. They were upon him in a moment,
striking blindly with all manner of weapons. Logs flew from the tops of
the houses, and everybody hit at whatever was within reach. Crack Bone
received some painful blows while he scrambled on all-fours. He got
to his feet, and swung his improvised club recklessly but with great
execution. Lodges and giants were overturned, in a horrible uproar that
frightened the wild animals for miles around. Everyone fought; but none
knew what the fight was about or whom he fought with. All were fighting
mad.
Stone Hand sat down and listened to the roars of combat from afar.
“Since that old Crack Bone killed the magician and got hold of the
jumping feathers,” he said, “he thinks he is the master of the world.
He took my fine, warm house away from me; and now I believe he has
attacked the whole tribe.”
He grunted and fell to devouring the one caribou that remained in his
possession. He was hungry, for most of the game had moved southward
since the coming of winter; and of late only Crack Bone, with the red
feathers on his feet, had been able to overtake the herds. After eating
the last bit of raw meat, Stone Hand lay down between two small hills
and fell asleep. The snow span about him, and covered him from head to
foot, as if he were a mountain. But he was full of food--that is, he
had just enjoyed a moderate meal--so he slumbered soundly. For a long
time the tumult of the distant battle continued to sift vaguely into
his dreams.
The sun was above the horizon when Stone Hand opened his eyes. For
a little while he wondered why he was not under cover, and stared
stupidly at the hills on either side. He felt stiff and cold; but
soon got to his feet and shook the snow from his limbs and body, and
brushed it from his hair and face with his hands. Now he remembered
how he had stolen the three caribou from the chief. He chuckled at the
recollections of his escape and of the sounds of furious combat behind
him. Now all was quiet, as if there had never been a shout, or the
thump of a descending club, since the beginning of the world. He armed
himself with a great piece of green timber and set out cautiously for
the village, crawling on hands and knees. Now, in broad daylight, the
familiar fear of the chief had returned to him. So he advanced slowly,
and kept as close to the ground as he could. At last, peering over
the top of a wooded hill, he obtained a clear view of the place which
he had left so hurriedly the previous night. He gazed at the scene in
amazement, for scarcely one of the lodges stood entire. Many were flat
on the ground and the massive timbers and rocks of which they had been
constructed lay scattered on all sides. Many others were unroofed. The
surrounding trees were uprooted and broken, and the snow was trampled
and stained with blood for hundreds of yards in every direction. And as
for the inhabitants of this demolished village,--why, they seemed to be
even in a worse way than their lodges. Some lay motionless on the snow,
and others sat or reclined about their fallen homes, awkwardly dressing
their wounds and groaning with pain. Not a giant of all that terrible
company was able to stand on his feet.
As soon as an understanding of the true state of affairs got into Stone
Hand’s thick head, he stood upright and advanced fearlessly. He walked
among his fallen tribesmen and grinned at them heartlessly. His glances
rested on old Crack Bone, who sat with his head in his hands, and he
looked both savage and jovial.
“I am your chief now,” he said. “Does any one dispute my right?”
Groans were his only answer. Crack Bone did not so much as remove his
hands from his head, which, I believe, he was doing his best to hold
together.
“I am your chief,” continued Stone Hand, “so I will go and hunt. If I
kill more than I can eat myself I will give you some. But I must have
the magic feathers on my feet, for the herds are far to the southward.
Where are the feathers?” he asked, turning to Crack Bone.
The ex-chief groaned, and mumbled something to the effect that he
neither knew nor cared.
“Give them to me,” roared Stone Hand, angrily. “I am the chief now.”
Then Crack Bone tried to explain, with many grunts and moans, that the
feathers were not to be found; that he had laid them down on a stone in
front of his lodge and that some one had stolen them during the fight.
But, of course, the new and self-elected chief did not believe a word
of it.
“Give them to me,” he bellowed, swinging his club around the other’s
head. But Crack Bone sullenly persisted in his story of the loss of
the magic feathers. So Stone Hand searched him, despite his cries and
bellowings at the pain of it; and he did not find them.
The little owl, in the meantime, had discovered a deep hole, high up
in a great birch tree. It was the deserted nest of a woodpecker. He
dropped the feathers into the hole; and down they fell, quite out of
his reach.
“They will be safe there,” he said. “When I am ready to use them I will
break the tree to splinters and take them out.”
CHAPTER XXIV
THE MAGICIANS AWAKE
The seasons passed, with melting snow, waning summers and scattering
seeds. Many moons were born, each to grow and dwindle, and leave behind
it in the blackness the germ of another moon. The herds of caribou
moved southward and northward again, hunted by men and wolves, yet ever
multiplying. The tribes grew; warriors did deeds of valour; death and
pride and love moved among the lodges. Children were born; old people
and strong hunters and little children set their feet on the Longest
Trail. The north loosed its fields of ice in spring-time, freighted
with cold and fogs and millions of seals; and so it had been since the
beginning of things.
Run-all-day’s village grew like the herds, and like the forests in the
sheltered valleys, until it became a great clan. Run-all-day had lost
nothing of his authority with the loss of the magic feathers, for his
people loved him. He was the head-chief of the clan, and under him
were four lesser chiefs, among whom was Jumping Wolf, the young warrior
from the south. And Jumping Wolf had a lodge of his own, and Singing
Bird was his wife.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf kept close to his magic house, for it seemed that
his whole heart was with the littlest warrior. He named the child
Featherfoot, for the magic feathers were to be his, and his alone, as
soon as they were won back from Crack Bone, the giant. But the magician
seemed to be in no haste to make that long journey again. There would
be plenty of time for it later; and now he had so many things to teach
the child. Little Featherfoot learned readily, for he grew, both in
brain and body, at twice the rate of an ordinary child. And so, when he
was in his sixth summer, he was as large as a boy of twelve summers,
and knew magic that was beyond the understanding of any save the great
magicians. He could make fire in a moment, even as Wise-as-a-she-wolf
had done to burn the lodge of Crack Bone. His bow would send an arrow
the distance of six flights of an ordinary arrow, and no weapon,
unless it were tipped with magic, could break or pierce his shield of
thin leather. He could take upon himself the semblance of a wolf, a
caribou, or a bear, and at such times his speed was as the speed of
the former animals and his strength as that of the latter. Also, he
could make light objects heavy, and heavy objects as light as birch
bark.
While Bright Robe hid in desolate places, harmless but expectant, and
the good magician sat in his lodge, and Run-all-day’s people prospered
and grew, men were blowing on red coals in almost every camp and
village in the island. And the coals they blew upon were the memories
of old battles, and they were red with the fires of old hatreds. The
fires leaped up and touched their flames to the hearts of the warriors.
The tribes had been too long at peace with one another. In the south,
and the east, and the west, they made their war-arrows; and the lonely
hunters and fishers of the north heard of it and returned to their
villages, with the lust of fighting in their hearts. And Run-all-day
felt the stirring of the trouble in the air, and armed his men, and
sent swift and cunning messengers to spy upon the other clans.
“I was once a peaceful hunter and fisher,” said he, to Red Willow, “but
now I am the chief of a people. If the men of other villages come
against me, then must I do battle with them, to the best of my ability.
It is stupid to fight without cause; but it is better to fight, and
give back blows for every one received, than to crouch in one’s lodge
and die like a frightened hare.”
Being but a man, after all, he prayed in his heart that his master,
the good magician, would not pacify the tribes until he had proved his
little army. There was fighting blood in him; and a flame of that red
coal that had lain ash-hidden for so long a time, had got into his
honest heart.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf told Featherfoot the story of the red feathers; and
about two months before the time that Bright Robe would return to his
old form and power, he set out for the land of the giants, armed with
magic weapons, to bring Crack Bone to terms. But Crack Bone was dead
and Stone Hand ruled in his place. When the magician asked word of the
feathers, the true story of the fight and of their sudden disappearance
was told to him, first by Stone Hand and afterward by several others of
the giants. Wise-as-a-she-wolf was disturbed at the news, and blamed
himself for not having taken the feathers from Crack Bone long ago.
Also, he knew nothing of the whereabouts of Bright Robe, and this,
too, disturbed the peace of his mind. He set to work immediately to
find the red feathers. He hunted far and wide, questioning the people
of many tribes. He went north, to the farthest village, and southward
to the great wooded countries, where are thousands of red-skinned
people, and fields of corn, and trees bearing fruits. But nowhere did
he hear any word of the red feathers. For the space of two moons he
sought the lost treasures; but at last he turned homeward, and ran
upon the air, with all the speed of the moccasins of the wind, for a
day and a night and a day. When he came to the western coast of his
own country, he saw below him, lying black and lifeless, the ruins of
a village. Then he knew that the tribes were at war again; and again
he blamed himself for having neglected his duties toward his people.
He descended to the ground and saw the bodies of men, with wounds upon
them, and broken weapons.
Bright Robe, in the meantime, was tasting the joy of his old ways
again. The moment he had returned to his old shape, he had increased
his man-strength an hundred times and splintered the pine-tree. Then
he had placed the feathers in his moccasins and crossed the Narrow
Sea. Again he was the master of his magic; and though he had lost the
silver robe that had turned him invisible at will, the newly acquired
feathers more than made up for the loss. But he had learned discretion
during his five summers spent in the shape of an owl, and so was
content to go quietly among the islanders for a little while, making no
demonstrations of his power. He even concealed his identity and avoided
the lodges of people who knew him. He made himself agreeable by many
fires, talked modestly, and listened attentively to the words of old
men and warriors. And so he learned that his enemy, Wise-as-a-she-wolf,
had been very quiet of late, and that all the clans were uneasy with
war-lust. He knew that the power of Wise-as-a-she-wolf would suffer
if the people fought, for those who suffered would feel that he had
withdrawn his protection from them, and those who conquered would
know that they had done so without any help from him. Therefore he
was anxious to see the islanders battling among themselves, and after
considering the matter, and investigating the relative strengths of the
larger clans and their leaders, he disclosed himself to the chief of
the people of a great district in the south. This chief was a veritable
king, with four villages and hundreds of miles of hunting country
under his rule. His name was Cold Wind, and his heart was harder than
the ice-fields of the north. So to him Bright Robe made himself known,
and offered to give him assistance in the battle and at the council
fire.
Cold Wind dared not refuse Bright Robe’s offer; but he was not pleased
at having a greater person than himself on the scene. The warriors were
called together, armed for battle, and the campaign was begun with the
destruction of that village in which lived the old woman called Hot
Tongue, and those great warriors, Yellow Fox, Seven Knives, Strong
Hunter, and Mighty Hand. Bright Robe had no pleasant memories of that
village; so the people were slain, and the lodges robbed of their
treasures of fur and food and then burned to the ground. The victorious
fighting-parties travelled westward then and destroyed many little
villages. But the clans rose on every side to stem the course of Cold
Wind’s people; so Bright Robe retired from the scene of action, knowing
that the mischief was well begun.
Bright Robe did not want to attract Wise-as-a-she-wolf’s attention
again, for he knew that he was neither strong nor cunning enough to
withstand that great magician. So he left Cold Wind and the warriors,
and crossed the island, to continue quietly in his evil ways. And at
every village and every camp he questioned the people concerning his
enemy’s whereabouts and affairs. The people had heard nothing of the
great magician for several seasons, so Bright Robe learned nothing by
his questionings. He began to believe and hope that Wise-as-a-she-wolf
had left the country.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf returned to his lodge and told Featherfoot of his
journey, and of its fruitlessness. Of this matter, and of the signs of
warfare which he had beheld in the west, he spoke at length. The child
was eager to go in search of the feathers, but of that the magician
would not hear.
“May I help my people in the fighting?” he asked. “With my magic, I am
already stronger than any warrior, and with my shield I can turn aside
the heaviest and swiftest arrow. I have no fear, master, and yet I know
the value of caution. With the knowledge that you have taught me, even
now I would be a help to my people.”
“Nay,” cried the good magician, sorely troubled. “Nay, you are still
but a child at heart, for all your size and strength. Your hand would
stay in the stroke, for very pity, even when your life was at risk.
Keep the protection of this lodge, and I am your friend. Your people
shall be under my special protection until such time as I can show the
clans the foolishness of this strife among themselves.”
It was for love of this child that Wise-as-a-she-wolf had postponed the
contest with the giant, and by that had lost the magic feathers; and
now, for the father-love in his heart, he wanted to keep the child in
the safety of the lodge, where the very powers that he had given him
were of no use to mankind.
CHAPTER XXV
THE UNFINISHED BATTLE
Run-all-day’s fighting force consisted of about one hundred and
forty warriors, well armed and trained. Every man of them could
shoot straight and strong with the bow, and throw his club and
spear with accuracy and force. All had strong shields with which to
guard their bodies, and blades of flint in their belts for use in
hand-to-hand grapplings. There were scouts lurking afar, to the south
and west,--swift runners to bring word to the village of the trend
and progress of the different battles and war-parties. The village
was enclosed in a breast-high fence of brush and tree-trunks, and the
warriors kept within easy reach of the lodges, ready to answer a call
to arms at any time of the day or night.
It was early of a June morning when two runners entered the village
gasping for breath, and told the chief that they had seen several
war-parties at a distance of about four hours’ journey to the
southward. They had found them at night, asleep around small fires, and
were not certain of their numbers. They were lying on the ground close
as the stones in the bed of a river, each rolled in his sleeping-robe
and looking very long and broad in the uncertain light. Run-all-day
called the lesser chiefs and most experienced warriors into his lodge,
and a council of war was held without delay. Jumping Wolf volunteered
to set out immediately, with a small party of the swiftest among the
young men, to spy upon the approaching enemy and return with word of
their strength.
“It is a good plan,” said Run-all-day; and the others nodded their
heads. So Jumping Wolf selected six youths to accompany him, and left
the village. They carried no arms save the knives in their belts; but
their shields, spears, and clubs were to be held in readiness against
their return.
When Jumping Wolf had been gone an hour, the council’s plans were
settled. A chief named Tall Pine advanced into the hilly, wooded
country to the southward, close along the eastern shore of the stream,
with thirty men. His orders were to halt and take cover a mile from the
village, throwing his men in a thin line across the probable course of
the enemy. This line was to let the leading body of the enemy pass
through it, and then close in, on the flanks of the invaders, with fire
of arrows and spears. Another force of thirty warriors, with a chief
named Red Sky in command, took position a few hundred yards in rear of
the other, where the river begins to widen into the bay, and spread
from the rocks of the coast across the front of the village. This party
was to strike the enemy in front, at the first sounds of conflict. Both
these parties were to fall back upon the main body, after loosing a
few volleys and striking a few swift blows. The main body, consisting
of over seventy men, and led by Run-all-day and several other chiefs,
lay in close ranks in front of the village, well hidden among rocks and
brush.
It was about three hours before noon when Jumping Wolf’s party returned
from the scouting and joined the advance line, where their arms and
shields were awaiting them. They had run far and fast, had seen the
enemy advancing in three lines, and had returned at top speed. Jumping
Wolf reported the number of the enemy as close upon three hundred.
A fresh runner was sent back with the information, and the scouts
remained with Tall Pine.
An hour passed--two hours passed--and still the wilderness lay quiet
under the warm and high-wheeling sun. Jumping Wolf crawled away from
the line of impatient warriors and slipped into the rugged places. He
was soon back again, and crouched beside Tall Pine.
“They are within bow-shot’s distance,” he whispered. “The leading party
will touch that open hillside,” and he pointed with his finger.
The word went along the line, and every concealed warrior fixed his
gaze on the rocky slope indicated, and set the notches of arrows to
the taut strings. The figure of a man appeared suddenly from the
scrubby growth above the clearing. He stood upright and gazed ahead,
and on every side, under a shading hand. At last, evidently satisfied
with the result of his survey, he waved his arm and advanced further
into the open. He stooped, and took advantage of every bit of cover,
moving swiftly forward all the while. They came after him quickly and
noiselessly, every man following the tactics of the leader in crossing
the open space. The party numbered more than seventy warriors. Upon
reaching the foot of the slope, where the ground was rough and lightly
wooded, they closed in an irregular formation and increased their
speed. They seemed to be in a great hurry to add one more smoking
village to the list of their military achievements. They hastened
along, four and five abreast, close-ranked, lulled to carelessness by
the ease of former victories.
The twanging of bow-strings opened the battle-music, and the arrows
swished and struck. The invaders scattered, and sprang to right and
left in search of Tall Pine’s hidden warriors; and from either side the
arrows continued to leap from rock and bush and tree. The long shafts
rattled across the shields and stood deep in flesh and muscle; and even
while the invaders dashed here and there, Red Sky appeared in front
of them, with his thirty men, and advanced swiftly behind a shower of
arrows. The leader of the enemy rallied his scattered fighters and led
them against the new arrivals; but only forty of his seventy were able
to join the charge. Red Sky met them with a flight of spears; and at
the same moment the bow-men under Tall Pine and Jumping Wolf sprang
into sight and closed upon their rear.
Soon the victors were busy collecting arrows, drawing them from dead
bodies and gathering them up from the ground. A few had wounds to
bind, but only a few. It had been a swift and easy victory for the
skirmishers of Run-all-day’s army, and not more than a dozen of the
invaders had escaped death by flight.
Suddenly more of the enemy issued from the woods above the open
hillside, and rushed down the slope, score after score. It was the main
body, numbering more than two hundred fighting-men. They came at their
best pace, wondering, no doubt, why the sounds of combat had ceased;
perhaps believing that Run-all-day was already overthrown, and in haste
to join in the looting of the village. By the time the scene of the
fight was reached, only the dead awaited them.
The sixty victors fell noiselessly back and joined the double line of
defenders in front of the village. Word of the brief fight and of the
approach of the main body of the enemy passed from mouth to mouth.
Then all lay still, close to the ground, and breathlessly awaited the
arrival of the invaders. They had a fairly clear view of the land for
several hundred yards in front of their coverts. At last the vanguard
of the enemy appeared among the little hummocks and clumps of trees,
and a great shout went up from them at the sight of what appeared to
them an unprotected village. Of what account is a barrier of brush if
there are no warriors to strengthen it?
Then, standing upright between the hidden defenders and the invaders
swiftly forming line for attack, appeared the figure of a young man in
garments of dressed leather, richly decorated. The advance was halted,
and the warriors of Run-all-day held their arrows.
“Go back to your villages,” cried the young man to the southerners.
“You have shed too much blood of your own countrymen. Turn on your
trail of blood and ashes, and go back to your deserted lodges.”
“It is the good magician. It is Wise-as-a-she-wolf,” whispered
Run-all-day’s warriors.
“Who speaks so mightily?” cried a young chief from the ranks in front.
“Are we to be turned back by a voice, who have scattered the people of
ten encampments?” and he bent his bow.
“Yes! Though the voice has been silent over-long,” replied the
magician. “Unstring your bows, and return to your own lands, and mourn
the ruin you have done.”
At that the young chief raised his bow.
“Loose the arrow, fool,” cried the other; and the arrow flew. And he
extended his hand and plucked it from the air and dropped it, harmless,
to the ground.
“I am Wise-as-a-she-wolf, whom men once called Highest Star,” said the
magician. “Is this your gratitude for a hundred seasons of protection?”
“Let us at them, master,” cried Run-all-day, springing to his feet.
The magician halted and silenced the great chief with a gesture of his
hand. Then he advanced upon the wavering southerners who lusted for
blood and the treasures of the village in spite of the fear in their
hearts.
“All the people of this island are my people, else would I strike you
for your sins of greed and blood-thirstiness,” said Wise-as-a-she-wolf,
walking steadily forward.
“The master is angry. I hear it in his voice. He will strike them in
his wrath,” whispered Run-all-day to a man beside him.
True, the magician was angry, for all the gentleness of him; and the
anger shone in his eyes, and scattered the men of the south before him.
They ran to right and left, but they did not turn back toward their own
villages. And the young chief who had loosed the arrow, called the
more daring of his followers to stand firm. So wicked was his heart,
and so full was it of vanity, that he knew nothing of discretion. He
hurled two spears, in quick succession, at the good magician.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf snatched the spears from the air, stood for a second
with one in either hand, and then vanished from the sight of friend
and foe. Next moment the arrogant young chief lay dead on the ground,
struck down by an invisible weapon. At that, the invaders turned and
ran southward, frantic with terror, each warrior expecting immediate
death from the unseen hand. Wise-as-a-she-wolf knew that their hearts
were hard, and that their lesson was not yet learned, so he ordered
Run-all-day and his warriors to follow the fugitives and deliver six
flights of arrows.
Not more than half of the three hundred southern warriors got safely
back to their own country; and they were spent and sore, and full
of regret for their misdeeds. Also, they were none the richer for
their great campaign, for they had retreated so whole-heartedly from
Run-all-day’s village, that they had thrown away their spoils of former
victories to lighten their flight. The women and children and old men
jeered the survivors and mourned the dead with a great and depressing
noise. All the villages of that region suffered hunger, for the fishing
and hunting had been long neglected.
Scarcely had they settled in their lodges again, humbled and sad,
before Wise-as-a-she-wolf appeared among them, and unseated the
remaining chiefs and set others in authority. After which, seeing that
their vanity was broken, he drove a herd of caribou close to their
village, that they might have food with which to support their lives
while they mended their ways. He made medicines for the sick among the
women and children and old men, and gave healing salves to some of the
wounded warriors. Then he left them, and flew upon his magic moccasins
to quell other clans and still the fighting in every quarter of the
island. In some cases he punished and in others he showed mercy, always
reading the hearts of the people. So, in a few days, he had brought the
island to peace again and struck all the evil counsellors, save Bright
Robe, with his wrath.
But Bright Robe he could not find, though he heard from many that
he had been in the country, urging the clans to warfare and flying
through the air like a bird.
So he knew that the red feathers were in the possession of his rival
again, and vowed to his heart that he would seek him over the length
and breadth of the world.
CHAPTER XXVI
BRIGHT ROBE’S DISCRETION
While Bright Robe was yet a little brown owl, watching the pine-tree in
which he had hidden the red feathers, far away in the Land of Giants,
old Whispering Grass had gathered her herbs and roots together, and
gone down into a valley where some families of her own kin had built
themselves a village. Little Heron, the chief of this village, was
her grandson. He was a quiet man, of a good heart and contented mind,
and he received the old medicine-woman with warmth and respect, and
gave her a fine lodge in which to brew her doses and dream her ancient
dreams.
“I am an old woman now,” Whispering Grass had told him, on the day of
her arrival, “and my blood has so little of glow in it that the winds
on the mountain shake me with the fear of death. Also, it is hard for
me to travel in the forests and gather the leaves and roots, and the
very cooking of food has become a weariness. So I have crawled from my
lonely house, with much labour and pain, to this warm valley, that I
may teach my knowledge of curing human ills to some one who will live
many years. And I want to die warm, with women of my own clan beside
me, and a bright fire before the doorway of the lodge.”
Little Heron and his people treated the old woman with kindness and
respect. Her lodge was warm with the pelts of animals, and all her
food was cooked for her by the wife of the chief. Little children came
about her, to hear the wonderful stories that were half of memory and
half of invention. And to several of the young women of the village she
taught all that she knew of the science of medicine. One day she told
Little Heron the story of the battle between Wise-as-a-she-wolf and
Bright Robe, and of how Bright Robe had been stripped of his powers for
five seasons, and turned into the shape of a little owl, by the good
magician. She told of Bright Robe’s hate of her, and of her fear that
he should seek her and kill her when his evil power was returned to him.
For a winter and a summer she lived in peace and comfort with her
kinsfolk; and before she died she warned Little Heron once more
against Bright Robe, and gave to Star Flower, the chief’s little
daughter, a whistle made of willow, small and wrinkled; and with her
last breath she told the child the virtue of the whistle.
When the clans were rising on every side, the strong to raid, and the
weaker to defend their homes, Little Heron remained quietly in his
valley and told his people that warfare was more dangerous than any
form of labour and utterly without profit to the greatest warriors. His
people listened and nodded their heads, for they believed Little Heron
to be one of the wisest men in the world. Later, when a fugitive from
some distant battle staggered into their valley and told them of the
bloodshed and ruin, and of the evil advice of Bright Robe, they were
doubly convinced of their chief’s wisdom. And the women who had learned
the science of medicine from Whispering Grass, cured the stranger of
his hurts; and he, poor warrior, was so charmed with the treatment and
the quiet, that he married one of his doctors and became a member of
Little Heron’s village. That was wise of him, for even while he lay
sick of his wounds the lodges of his own people were blazing like a
hundred torches.
Though the horrors of war passed by the village in the secluded
valley, Bright Robe found his way to it. And this was the manner of
his coming and his going. As soon as the fighting was well commenced
and every man slaying or being slain, robbing or being robbed, in a
satisfactory manner, the evil magician retired to secluded places, and
desisted from flying above the tree-tops, except at night, for fear
of Wise-as-a-she-wolf, of whose whereabouts he knew nothing. While he
skulked about, trying to decide upon some plan of action, he remembered
his old grudge against Whispering Grass. So he made his way straight to
the little clearing on the mountain, the scene of his ignoble defeat
five seasons before. But he found nothing but an empty lodge with
tattered sides and rotted poles. Moss was creeping over the floor of
beaten earth, and the thousand little fires at which the old woman had
brewed her medicines were covered with forest growth.
“Death has cheated me of my revenge,” reflected Bright Robe.
Wandering aimlessly about, he happened upon the valley in which dwelt
the peace-loving Little Heron and his contented people. Here, perhaps,
he could rest for awhile in safety and make trouble before stealing
away. It looked, to his wicked eye, like a place sadly in need of
trouble. He descended into the valley and the cluster of lodges, and
was met by the chief.
“I am a poor hunter, who lived alone beside the River of the Beavers,”
he said. “Six nights ago I was attacked by a party of fighting-men, and
fled for my life. Ever since then I have wandered, homeless. My lodge
is flat on the ground and my stores and furs are stolen.”
Little Heron gazed at the evil black eyes of the stranger, and,
remembering Whispering Grass’s descriptions of Bright Robe, knew him
for the evil magician. He showed nothing of this in face or manner, but
invited the stranger into his lodge and called for food of the best to
be brought, and a little of the liquor of crushed berries. Bright Robe
ate and drank with zest, and in his heart chuckled at the simplicity
of Little Heron. He glanced about him with his keen eyes, noting every
sign of peace and prosperity with delight.
“What a change shall be here, in the space of a few days,” he thought,
and forcing a smile, congratulated the chief on his good food and
comfortable condition.
“The war has not touched you,” he said. “You are fortunate, chief; for
here am I, a lover of peace and honesty, ruined and a fugitive. The
gods are blind when the strong clans go forth with their war-shields.
If one does not kill, then must he be killed, or else run away.”
“You speak truth,” replied Little Heron, as he removed a broiled snipe
from the fire and placed it before his guest. “When the clans go to
war, urged on by the lust in their blood and the evil tongues of wicked
magicians, then ’tis a sad time for the peaceful and honest. But this
is a small village, well hidden, and far from the great chief’s, and my
people are a quiet, home-staying folk. And having escaped for so long,
I have nothing to fear, for Wise-as-a-she-wolf, the good magician, who
visited me seven nights ago, and promised to come again in eight days’
time, which will be to-morrow, will soon quiet the fighting. He is also
in quest of a magician called Bright Robe.”
The stranger glanced furtively at his imaginative host; but in the
face of Little Heron there was nothing to be read but simplicity and
contentment.
“I have heard of that great magician, Wise-as-a-she-wolf, and shall
remain with you, if you will keep me, to enjoy the honour of seeing
him,” replied Bright Robe. But his appetite was gone, and he ate
very little of the snipe. In spite of his power of dissembling, he
showed considerable uneasiness during the afternoon; and Little Heron
was quick to note it. When the men gathered together, in the evening,
to tell stories of past adventures, Bright Robe had little to say.
Pleading weariness, he retired early to a lodge courteously placed at
his disposal by the chief. In the morning, much to the wonder of the
villagers, the lodge was empty. But when they ran to Little Heron with
the news, that great chief smiled knowingly.
“The stranger was Bright Robe, the evil magician,” he said, calmly. “I
knew him; so I had to warn him to pass on.”
Bright Robe flew from the village in the secluded valley as soon as
every one had retired and the lodges were quiet, and raced westward
at his best speed. The island of his birth was no place for him while
Wise-as-a-she-wolf was stirring about. He knew that another meeting
with his powerful rival could mean nothing but five seasons more of
undignified retirement for him, to say nothing of the painful wounds
which he would be sure to receive before he was reduced to submission.
Without his silver robe, he knew that he could not hide for long from
the keen-eyed, invisible Wise-as-a-she-wolf. So he flew westward across
the darkness, determined to remain in the far places of the earth until
he had acquired sufficient strength to return and overthrow his rival.
He crossed the Narrow Sea, and before dawn was at the edge of a village
of the mountaineers.
CHAPTER XXVII
THE DIPLOMACY OF BRIGHT ROBE
Bright Robe was well aware that, until his power should be as great
as his rival’s, or the quest of the red feathers should be forgotten,
he must practise every precaution to avoid attracting that magician’s
attention afresh, must move artfully, and play a part in life for
which, by nature, he was but ill-suited. His old, arrogant tactics
must be forsworn, or at least amended, for with Wise-as-a-she-wolf on
his trail he must needs have a following of loyal men who would give
no information concerning him. He knew that his enemy would seek him
everywhere; so he sat down in the woods, at the edge of the village of
mountaineers, and devoted several hours to thought. He decided that
the mountaineers, a strong, clannish nation, should be honoured by his
patronage and used like tools, to his purpose. He had never had much
to do with these people, and if they knew anything of his true nature,
it was only by hearsay. He would use all his magic to the advancement
of their prosperity, even as his enemy did for the islanders. And
he dreamed that the time was not far off (as time is calculated by
magicians) when he should use these mountaineers as a weapon against
his enemy.
He did not appear immediately to the people whom he had chosen to
shape to the fulfilment of his plans, but waited until nightfall, and
then flew northward, hundreds of miles beyond the knowledge of the
mountaineers, and descended upon a village of the fat folk who eat raw
flesh. He increased his stature to seven times that of the human body,
and thus struck terror into the hearts of the blubber-eaters. They
offered him their wealth of ivory and furs if he would but leave them
in peace.
“My name is Bright Robe,” said he, in reply to their abject cries. “I
do not want your ivory or walrus tusks, nor yet all your furs. But
bring me your best robes, for I am going to my great lodge of ice,
seven suns’ journey to the northward, where the cold is so sharp that
no animal can live save the great white wolves.”
From their stores he selected a score of robes of the finest black
fox-skins, and a few great pelts of musk-ox, and white bear. Then,
having the furs which he had chosen placed in a heap, he reduced
them to within a portable compass with his magic, lifted them to the
hollow of his arm, and sprang into the air. He flew due north; and
the blubber-eaters stared after him, in silence and sorrow, until he
vanished from their sight.
Beyond the range of vision of the blubber-eaters, Bright Robe altered
his course. This talk of his lodge of ice, and this northward flight,
were but moves in his new game. By sunrise of the next morning he was
in the largest village of the mountaineers, standing before the tent
of the head-chief. This chief was no other than Black Eagle, from whom
Wise-as-a-she-wolf had once asked for information concerning the flight
of Spotted Seal, the warrior who had stolen the red feathers from the
lodge of Run-all-day. The dogs advanced upon Bright Robe even as they
had upon his rival, on a former occasion; but they soon fell back, and
slunk away, before the glance of his eyes. He threw the little bundle,
which he had brought from the north, to the ground in front of Black
Eagle’s lodge. He passed his hand above it, and muttered a few swift
words, and there lay the twenty robes of fox skin and the other pelts.
Then he called upon the chief, by name.
Black Eagle looked cautiously from his lodge, and stared in wonder at
the stranger and the great pile of furs.
“I am Bright Robe,” said the magician, “and behold I have brought you a
gift of great price, to show my friendship for you and your people.”
At that, Black Eagle eyed him suspiciously.
“Why do you make me such a gift?” he asked. “I have done you no
service. What is it you want of me? For I know that it is not for
nothing that you lay all these skins of the black fox in front of my
door.”
“I shall be honest with you, chief,” replied Bright Robe. “I could not
deceive so shrewd a man as you, even if it were in my heart to do so. I
bring you this gift of furs, all stitched into broad robes, and shall
make you other gifts, hoping that you will do me a favour. Let me enter
your lodge and talk with you, and you will be glad of my coming.”
“That may be as it proves,” replied Black Eagle, drily. “The proof of
the good hunt is in the cooking-pot. The best magician who honoured me
with a visit, nearly broke the head of one of my strongest warriors.
And he--he was known, far and wide, as a gentle magician.”
“And what was his name?” inquired Bright Robe.
“Wise-as-a-she-wolf,” replied the chief. He noted the look of surprise
on the other’s face, and added the information that the warrior had
angered the magician by hurling a spear at him. But by then Bright Robe
was shaking his head mournfully.
“He is bloodthirsty at heart,” he said. “I have known it for a long
time. But let me into your lodge, chief, for I have a long story to
tell you.”
Black Eagle hesitated, and eyed his visitor uneasily, for he did not
relish the thought of a private interview with him.
“My chiefs will be offended if they are not called to hear your talk.
They are like children, in such matters,” he said.
“You do not trust me,” said Bright Robe, sadly. “But I trust you,” he
added, “so you may call your leading warriors to hear what I have to
say.”
Black Eagle lost no time in summoning the more important men of the
village to his lodge. They gathered swiftly, armed with spears and
clubs and looking even more savage than their dogs.
Bright Robe, pretending to be quite unnerved by the sight of their
weapons, pointed to the heap of furs, and then, very modestly, told
the story of his fear of Wise-as-a-she-wolf, and of his wish to take
shelter with the strong warriors of the mountains. He explained
that he did not ask them to defend him with their weapons, or run
any risk on his behalf, but only to hide all knowledge of him from
Wise-as-a-she-wolf, or any stranger; and in return for this service
he promised to supply their chief village with all the food and fur
required by its people.
The mountaineers considered the matter with wise and lengthy
deliberation. They examined the furs which lay before the lodge, and
questioned the magician as to where he had obtained them. He told them
how he had robbed the blubber-eaters, miles and miles to the northward,
only a few hours before.
“I tell you the truth because I trust you, because you are my friends,”
he said. “But the day will surely come, and perhaps it will be very
soon, when Wise-as-a-she-wolf will see these skins and ask you the
same question which you have asked me. Then you must say that they are
of your own killing.”
“But he would not believe us,” said Black Eagle, “for the great white
bear and the musk-ox are not of this country. In the old days we
sometimes obtained such skins, in small numbers, from the fat people.
But now we have no dealings with them. And Wise-as-a-she-wolf knows all
these things as I know the taste of deer-meat.”
“Say you so,” cried Bright Robe. “Then behold, they are all the skins
of little foxes.” And so they were, in the flash of an eye.
“We hear you, and we see,” said an old warrior. “The ears of
questioners shall be filled with lies, according to your wish. But why
do you fear this other magician, you who are such a great magic-maker,
and can travel so fast and so far? Could you not change him into a fox
skin, as you have just done to these pelts of bear and musk-ox?”
“He is stronger than I, and his speed is even greater than mine. Also,
he can make himself invisible as the wind,” replied Bright Robe,
truthfully.
“We know that. He did it before our eyes,” said Black Eagle. And all
the others nodded their heads in agreement. At last it was decided
that Bright Robe should be given a home in the tribe, and such
protection as lies and pretended ignorance could furnish, in return for
a generous supply of food and furs. They led him up the mountain-side,
and showed him a cave, the mouth of which was hidden by climbing
bushes. The magician examined it, and thankfully accepted it as his
home, until such time as he should be in a position to choose a better.
The chief was about to order a man to bring robes and food to the cave,
but the magician laughed and shook his head.
“I mean to fly abroad to-night, to gather six days’ food for the
village, so I shall furnish this place at the same time,” he explained.
“Now I must rest,” he added, anxious to get the warriors away from the
mouth of the cave; for a chilling fear that his great enemy might be
somewhere near, alert to note anything unusual, was on his heart. So
Black Eagle returned to the village with his followers, and Bright Robe
crawled deep into his cave and began a minute examination of it. He was
not entirely satisfied with the result of the investigation, for the
cave was nothing but a tunnel, nowhere of more than half the height
of a man, and of a width scarcely more generous. It sloped gently
downward, and ended in a natural wall of the mountain’s rib.
“A very fine trap,” remarked the magician, “and I am playing
too unproved a part to risk living in a trap. There might be
disagreements,” he continued. “Then a good fire at the mouth of the
cave would make it very uncomfortable, even for me--if I happened to be
at home.”
He found bones scattered about, and decided that many wolves had denned
there in the past. He lay down on his back, placed his feet against
the end of the tunnel, and anchored himself to the rocky sides, by
the grip of his hands. Then, with a word, his strength was increased
twenty-fold, though his stature remained normal. He thrust tentatively
with his feet. He pushed harder; and harder yet; and at the third
effort he felt the rock shift a little. At that, he rested from his
work long enough to test the roof and walls, to make sure that they,
also, were not giving way. Lying flat again, he applied his feet to
what he now knew to be an unattached mass of rock, and pushed slowly
but steadily, and a shower of earth and small stones rattled down upon
his feet and legs. He drew himself forward, took a fresh grip with
his hands on the sides of the tunnel, and unbent all his strength in
a last, sudden thrust. Outward flew the mass of earth-bound rock,
bigger than the lodge of Black Eagle, and rolled downward for a short
distance, leaving behind it a jagged hole through which entered a glow
of shaded daylight.
Bright Robe cleared the earth from his person and looked cautiously
out from the hole which he had just kicked in the mountain. Already
his magic strength had faded out of his muscles and bones, for he had
not the power to command it for long at a time. He saw before him a
deep, narrow valley of the mountains, and steep, wooded slopes rising
on all sides. A few yards below him lay the great mass of rock which he
had dislodged from its resting-place of centuries. No living thing was
in sight, except a hawk perched in a tree-top half-way up the western
slope of the valley. Black Eagle’s village lay to the eastward, on the
other side of the ridge through which Bright Robe had crawled, by way
of the cave. The magician viewed the result of his labour with grim
satisfaction.
“I like a lodge with two doorways,” he said. “But it is as well that
my friends should have a knowledge of one only.”
He saw that the rock which he had rolled into the valley might attract
attention of any chance wanderer on the mountain sides, or, worse
still, of any one flying in the air. Fresh earth still clung to it,
in patches, and it had cut a deep gash in the moss and soil of the
valley. It was altogether too evident for his liking. So he crawled
from the back-door of the cave, worked such magic on the great boulder
as to reduce it to the dimensions of a pebble, and hurled it over the
western wall. Then he repaired the damages suffered by the moss and
young trees, bent a few spruces from their places so that they hid the
unnatural hole in the mountain, and retired.
Bright Robe spent the early part of the night in spying upon his
allies. He lay hidden in a clump of bushes close to their evening fire,
and listened to their talk; but, though he heard many things that
made his ears tingle, they were planning no treachery against him.
At last he crawled away, and flew westward and northward, beyond the
giant’s country, and robbed a camp of fishermen of all the fruits of
their toil. He found some pemmican and a few furs, which he kept for
himself. When the mountaineers awoke next morning and discovered the
great store of fish, they were well pleased with the bargain they had
made.
CHAPTER XXVIII
THE QUEST
Having restored peace to his beloved islanders, Wise-as-a-she-wolf
allowed Featherfoot to return to his father, and devoted himself to the
search for the red feathers. He questioned every inhabitant of every
village in the island, and beat every grove for his cunning enemy. He
investigated the mountains and the rocky coasts, and scanned every
foot of the barrens; but not a sign of Bright Robe rewarded him. But
from Little Heron, he learned of the fugitive’s visit to the secluded
valley, and of his furtive departure in the night. Assured that he
was no longer in the island, he crossed the Narrow Sea, and repeated
the question which he had put to Black Eagle once before, when on the
trail of Spotted Seal. And Black Eagle made the same answer. “I saw a
man flying over the mountains, ten days ago, toward the land of the
giants,” he said. “Have you not yet caught the warrior who stole the
magic feathers?” he asked.
But the good magician had no time to spend in replying to foolish and
impertinent questions. In a second he was high above the village again,
speeding toward the black places where the giants lived their sullen
and stupid lives. He found Stone Hand squatting before the entrance
of his mound-like lodge, and questioned him from a distance. But it
happened that the chief of the giants was in even a worse temper than
usual, for he had but just eaten too largely of bear meat that was not
very fresh.
“Who asks me questions,” he cried, “disturbing me when I am in pain?
Show yourself, whoever you are.”
The good magician showed himself at a safe distance from the
disgruntled giant. “I am Wise-as-a-she-wolf,” he said, and again asked
if anything had been seen of Bright Robe, or of a man flying in the air.
“I know nothing of such things, save that Crack Bone once thought he
could fly like a little bird,” growled the giant. “And it did him no
good,” he added, with a grunt of laughter.
The magician could read nothing in that hairy, dirty, lowering face.
The skull was too thick to allow the workings of the little brain to
affect the glassy eyes. But his suspicions were aroused. “You are
encased in stupidity like a seal in blubber,” said he, and vanished
from the giant’s indifferent sight. But he did not go away. For three
days he continued in the vicinity of the giants’ village, listened
to their infrequent talk without learning anything, and examined
at one time or another, the interior of every lodge. This led to
nothing, however, and he was forced to confess to himself that he had
mistaken the giant’s stupidity and ill-temper for an intelligent and
preconceived attempt to evade his questions.
So he left the giants and travelled northward. In the Land of Little
Sticks he searched the camps of lonely hunters, but found no trace of
Bright Robe. Passing on, he reached the land of the blubber-eaters,
where the streams and lakes were already frozen. At last he happened
upon the village which his enemy had so recently visited, and from
which he had taken the furs. On learning what these people had to tell
him, he set out for the land of eternal winter, and for Bright Robe’s
lodge of ice.
For the time of two days and nights (though the sky changed not)
Wise-as-a-she-wolf ran straight on the frozen air, between the white
fields and the ruddy north-lights. He was clothed in many garments of
fur, for well did he know the cold of those regions, where only the
great white wolves, that are the care of the northern gods, can live.
He had brought food, and he ate as he ran. The north-lights shook and
clashed before him and above him, blew like flame to right and left
and came crackling back again. He heard the hunting-cries of the white
wolves, as they ran on a mad, age-old trail, the scent of which was
nowhere but in their own blind souls. And when they passed beneath him,
white as frost and death, he sprang upward between the curtains of the
north-lights.
[Illustration: “THEY PASSED BENEATH HIM, WHITE AS FROST AND DEATH.”]
He came to the wall of ice, beyond which live the four gods of the
north; and yet he had seen nothing of Bright Robe or his lodge. He did
not cross the wall, for he felt that his enemy was in no position to
court the attention of the gods; and the cold gnawed him, and was like
the hand of death against his heart, so he turned and sped southward.
Again he hunted through the lands of the little fat men with smoky
faces, and among the lonely hunters, and westward even to the tribes
who wear crests of feathers that hang down their backs as far as
their belts, and whose numbers are as a thousand times the numbers of
the islanders. Then his suspicions of the giants awoke again, and he
returned to their country and watched them narrowly. For three days he
studied them, and though he learned much of their savage natures and
huge appetites, he saw no signs of Bright Robe and nothing to indicate
that they knew anything of that vanished magician.
Again Wise-as-a-she-wolf visited Black Eagle; and now he sat in the
big lodge, and had the warriors brought together, to hear his talk.
And while he sat among the great men of the tribe, a lad stole up to
the cave and warned Bright Robe that his enemy was in the village. So
Bright Robe, from well within the cave, lightened a great rock that
lay without with his magic, and then told the lad to place it in the
entrance, so that the cave would be hidden. The boy did as he was
told, and lifted the great stone into the mouth of the cave, much to
his own amazement. Then he went back to the village, thinking himself
a great magician. From within, Bright Robe returned its weight to the
stone, and it filled the mouth of the cave as if it were a part of the
everlasting foundation of the mountain. Then he retired by the back
way, flew over the western cliff, and hid himself among tumbled granite
boulders and clumps of spruce-tuck.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf, seated at his ease in the chief’s lodge, with the
savage warriors around him, took note of many things.
“Those are fine robes of fox-skins,” said he, with his glance on one of
the articles of the fugitive magician’s gift.
“My people are great hunters,” replied Black Eagle, calmly.
“And how is it that you are not hunting to-day?” he asked, having seen
all the warriors lolling about the village.
“The mighty Wise One is interested in his humble servants,” remarked
Black Eagle, staring haughtily at his unwelcome visitor.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf nodded, and met the other’s gaze with severe eyes.
“Then it will grieve the Wise One to hear that our storehouses are well
supplied with food of other people’s killing and curing,” said the
chief. “The good magician is a lover of peace; but we are fighting-men.
And we make war when we please, and when the hunting is poor we take
what we want from lesser tribes.”
He spoke threateningly, and all his warriors glared at the quiet
youth in their midst, and laid their hands on their weapons. But
Wise-as-a-she-wolf lost nothing of his habitual composure.
“As you are not of my people,” he said, “it is no affair of mine how
you fight, or how you fill your storehouses, so long as you do not slay
or rob the clans of the island. In this matter of answering harmless
questions, however, I must beg you to assume a gentler manner. Though I
am a hater of bloodshed and quick to forgive injury, yet I am sometimes
moved to sudden wrath.”
“My manners were never of the best, great chief,” replied Black Eagle,
cowed by the other’s hinted threat. “I am sorry that you are displeased
with me and my people, for I am ignorant of neither your power nor
virtue.”
“You speak fairly,” replied the good magician; “and I ask no more of
the chief of a savage and deceitful race. I have given my life’s work
to my own people, and still the blood-thirst and greed are strong
in many of their hearts. I could do nothing inside the space of an
hundred seasons to mend your ways save by slaying you, and I am not a
god, to judge if you are worthy to live or not.”
“You speak rashly, even for a mighty magician,” said one of the
warriors. “Here we sit around you, with our hands on our weapons, and
yet you insult us at your pleasure.”
“I fear your weapons no more than twigs in the hands of children,”
replied Wise-as-a-she-wolf, calmly. “But throw a club, or draw a knife,
and your doom is upon you.”
The warriors glanced at one another, impressed by their visitor’s
manner and voice, and yet doubtful of the truth of his words. Magic was
a great thing, but muscles and clubs and weight of numbers were also
great things. Black Eagle looked at them, and shook his head.
“He speaks the truth,” he murmured. Then, turning to the magician,
“What do you want of us, great chief?” he asked.
“I want you to tell me if you have seen anything of Bright Robe, who
runs upon the air,” said Wise-as-a-she-wolf.
“We saw the figure of a warrior flying northward, many days ago, as I
told you before,” replied the chief. “Did you hear nothing of him,
among the blubber-eaters?”
“I heard of him from a village which he robbed,” answered the magician.
Then he arose, passed out of the lodge, and vanished in the sunlight.
CHAPTER XXIX
PEACE
The brief but sanguinary uprising of the clans was followed by nine
years of peace. Featherfoot spent a great deal of his time with his
own people, and the rest of it in Wise-as-a-she-wolf’s service. He
travelled about the island, visiting the camps and villages, watchful
for any signs of uneasiness among the people. He continued to grow,
both mentally and physically, as he had begun in the magic lodge; and
though he was still without the red feathers, he had the silver robe
which had once belonged to the evil magician, which his master had
given him. He was of a kind and merry disposition, and wonderfully
modest for one so young and yet so powerful. The good magician had
purged him of the selfish vanity of youth, without despoiling him of
anything of the glory, romance, and faith of that brave season. So
his wisdom sat easily upon him, and he made friends at every fire.
He perfected himself in wood-craft and all manly sports, entering
in friendly contest in the same, with the young men, on an equal
footing with them; for he considered his magic a thing to use only on
needful occasions, and not to display boastfully in the eyes of his
friends. His natural strength, and size of limb and bone, were already
equal to those of a hardened and well-grown youth of sixteen years.
He was a great story-teller, a weaver of narratives that held his
listeners entranced; and he had learned a great deal of the master’s
skill in painting, and could mix pigments as bright as sunshine. With
these pigments he drew the portraits of his friends, and pictures of
their deeds in the chase, on the dressed skins of caribou and seal.
His pleasant fame grew throughout the island until it came near to
rivalling that of the good magician, Wise-as-a-she-wolf.
During the nine years that followed the fighting among the clans,
Run-all-day grew steadily in power, thanks to his honesty and
energy, his wife’s sane counsel, and the especial friendship of
Wise-as-a-she-wolf. People gathered to him from the smaller villages,
and strong chiefs and warriors took service with him, until his clan
was the largest and strongest in the island. His people were soon so
numerous that he had to establish a dozen villages, scattered over
a great region; and these villages were strongly situated, and each
commanded by a chief whom he trusted. He made laws, by which thieves
and murderers were to be dealt with, and these were proclaimed in every
village of his clan, after they had received the sanction of the good
magician. The chief of each village was judge of petty offences among
his own people; and if one man stole from another, the chief saw that
he either made good the amount of the theft by double its value, either
in skins, provisions, or service, or left the village in disgrace. In
cases of murder, Run-all-day delivered judgment, after hearing what the
prisoner, and every one else concerned, had to say. There had been laws
before, in the history of the island; but never before the same laws in
force over so large a territory, nor half the conscientiousness shown
in their observance.
There were many who objected to this new order of things, maintaining
that every warrior had a right to settle his private affairs (even if
they included the braining of a fellow-villager or the stealing of
a few robes) without the interference of the chiefs. It was for the
injured parties themselves to retaliate, in the second case, and for
their relatives, in the first, they said. What business the village
chiefs, and Run-all-day, had to thrust their hands in such small
matters they could not see, at least for some time. But after a few of
these exponents of the Rights of Man had suffered death for slaying
people against whom they nursed private grudges, the complaints ceased,
and the laws were respected.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf during this time was much abroad, searching the far
places of the earth for his old enemy. Sometimes he felt that he was
close upon the flying heels of his quarry; for Bright Robe had made a
long journey southward, travelling always under cover of darkness, and
had proclaimed himself among many foreign people. Then he had returned
to his friends the mountaineers, and continued quietly about his
affairs.
The very nearness of Black Eagle’s village to Wise-as-a-she-wolf’s
own country was in its favour as a hiding-place. And now he did less
plundering than of old, in spite of the complaints of the mountaineers,
for he wanted the tales of his depredations to fade from men’s talk.
When he did hunt, it was always far a-field, distant many nights’
flight from Black Eagle’s village. And thus, by taking toll of the
distant tribes, flashing his name here and there in far countries, and
letting the nearer people rest in peace and security, he set false
trails for his enemy to follow. His longest journey had extended even
to the sea islands where it is always summer, and where tribes of
strange little people, with long tails and furred bodies, and the faces
of old men, chatter in the tree-tops. There, also, are men of duskier
complexions than the blubber-eaters, and hair as straight and black as
the mountaineers, who shape canoes out of great tree-trunks and make
voyages of several days’ duration between island and island. To these
people he showed his magic, and told his name and a fine tale of how he
intended to build a great lodge in some southern forest; and then he
returned, under cover of night, to his cave above Black Eagle’s village.
While the silent struggle of cunning went on between the two magicians,
with the whole world for their battleground, and in the ninth summer
of peace among the islanders, young Featherfoot came to the village
of Little Heron, in the secluded valley. When he told his name, he
was welcomed as a great chief, for his fame had travelled before him.
Little Heron led him to his own lodge, set the best of food before
him, and afterward begged him to tell one of his delightful stories. So
the youth told the story of the Crimson Wigwam, as he had heard it in
his own heart, and it sang with the adventures and happy emotions of
a young warrior and a maiden. As he talked, he felt the grave, bright
eyes of Star Flower, the chief’s daughter, upon him, and his glance met
hers, and lo, they both looked downward and the trend of Featherfoot’s
narrative wavered for the space of a heart-beat.
The tale was well received by the chief and his wife and his old
mother. Star Flower alone of the company did not lift her voice in
praise; but her eyes again met those of the young chief, and were
hidden again as swiftly by the dark lashes. After the evening meal, the
entire village gathered about a great fire, and Featherfoot told the
stories of the Wallet of Plenty, and the Magic of the Red Arrow; and
though he was but vaguely conscious of the acclamations of the hunters,
his eyes glanced frequently, yet furtively, toward Star Flower, reading
the shy signs of her approval with inward delight.
Featherfoot spent ten days in the village of Little Heron, and told
stories, and painted wonderful pictures, and dreamed a glorious dream
in his heart. Star Flower told him the magic of the whistle that had
been given her by old Whispering Grass; how Wise-as-a-she-wolf had
given it to the medicine-maker, and how its possessor, if in peril, had
but to sound a note on it and the good magician would hear, though he
were at the world’s end, and would hasten to the rescue.
“I, too, would hear the sound, if you were in danger,” replied the
youth.
He knew this was so, for his heart said it and his heart was never
mistaken; but he believed that it was so because of his love for the
girl, and that it had nothing to do with the magic he had been taught
by Wise-as-a-she-wolf. He told her how old Whispering Grass had saved
his life with her medicines, when he was a very little baby; and how
his father, Run-all-day, had made the journey to the old woman’s lodge
and home again on the red feathers,--all of which he had heard from his
mother. In return, she told him of her childhood; and the old people
were quick to remark all this whispering, and meeting and beaming of
eyes, and nodded their heads wisely at one another. On the tenth day
after his arrival, Featherfoot left the village, to continue the work
that the master had given him to do.
“I shall return, when I have proved myself a strong warrior,” he said
to Little Heron.
But to Star Flower he whispered that he would return before the coming
of another summer, whether men called him a strong warrior or no.
And she blushed, and replied that indeed it would matter little what
men said of him who was already the greatest chief, and warrior, and
magician in the world.
The summer waned, and again the berries ripened on the barrens, the
birds took wing and the caribou moved to sheltered pastures; and
Wise-as-a-she-wolf, in whose heart a restless aching for new sights
and adventures was ever present, left the island again and flew on the
long trails of the plover and snipe and honking geese. He had no fear
for Featherfoot’s safety or for the welfare of the people in general,
for he knew that Run-all-day’s clans would maintain order while he was
away, and he did not think that Bright Robe was within thousands of
miles of his native place. In truth, he was beginning to hope that his
enemy had either given up all thought of revenge, or suffered some new
reverse of fortune. And yet, if such were the case, what had become
of the red feathers? Perhaps he had met and been vanquished by some
foreign magician. If so, the feathers should be easily found, for
the new owner would make use of them openly; and if he were not too
strong--but the good magician would follow the vague suppositions no
further. The world held what he desired to know, and he was keen to
read; and when the secret was disclosed would be the time to act.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf visited the islands of the southern seas, where
frosts and seasons of unfruitlessness are unknown, and there, for
the second time, found the false trail of Bright Robe. He journeyed
westward and southward, into a land of vast and tangled forests. In
those dark and stagnant places, lit only by the blooms of poisoned
vines, and inscrutable as the heart of a god, a fugitive might well
find a secret dwelling. So thought the good magician; and after a day’s
flight above those millions and millions of crowded tree-tops, he felt
that here, if anywhere, was his enemy hidden. He descended through the
roof of vivid, tangled green, and looked about him, somewhat daunted at
the gloom, the netted vegetation on all sides, and the strange noises
overhead. “A thousand thieves might hide securely for a thousand years
in this jungle,” he exclaimed, and felt a pang of hopelessness. He
stood motionless for a little while, staring about him. Then, drawing
his axe of magic workmanship, he began to cut his way through the vines
and creepers and smaller growth that surrounded him. Intent on his
labour, he relaxed that effort of will by which he made and maintained
his invisibility. He struck lustily, to right and left, advancing
steadily after every stroke. Already he felt in better spirits,
reflecting that here would be found some great, new things to learn and
unfamiliar aspects of truth, even if Bright Robe should continue to
slip through his fingers. The fire of the explorer burned within him.
For never before, in all his wanderings, had he descended into these
forests. He would pierce to the heart of this vivid, inscrutable
country, and lay bare all its secrets.
CHAPTER XXX
THE POISONED DART
“He felt a sudden pang, as of the touch of flame, in his arm. He reeled
backward, and at a glance discovered a tiny arrow of strange form,
and no longer than a man’s finger, embedded in the muscles below his
shoulder. He plucked it out; and in the same instant of time made
himself invisible. Already a horrible madness was upon him, tearing at
limbs, and brain, and heart. The walls of living green billowed and
span around him.
“I am struck by magic,” he cried; “but I, too, am a magician.”
His voice sounded like the voice of a stranger. He saw grinning faces
on every side--green, grinning masks that mouthed and vanished and
returned. He sprang at them, striking with his magic axe, wrenching
them apart with hands that contained the strength of giants and the
madness of the poison in his blood. Something strangely familiar
got within his reach, something human of body, and armed with a long
stick, and he snatched it, and broke it, and hurled it away among the
reeling masks of green. Here was another. And here they ran like ants
in a forest of moss, darting this way and that. He leaped upon them in
his madness, and crushed them. Again the faces swayed in upon him, and
he tore at them with all the strength of his magic and the blindness
of his agony. He beat them back. He tore them, and struck them down.
Then he turned and ran through a tide of leaping, bubbling green that
washed about him, and over him, with a pleasant music of waves. And so
he drowned, and yet resolved to fight on. And he looked up through the
fathoms of green tide and had not the strength, nor the thought, to
close his eyelids. But his brave spirit, armed with all the magic he
had ever known, fought on, unbidden, to save the quiet body against the
poison of the dart.
Of a sudden, after what may have been an age of death or only a night
of sleep, he sobbed his lungs full of air again like one who wins to
the surface of the water after a long dive. The blackness that had
weighed upon him rolled away; and behold, the green tide was gone, and
he saw the open sky and felt a ruffling of wind on his face. “I have
tasted death,” he murmured, “and found it bitter in my soul, for all my
power of magic.”
He moved a little, turning on his left side, and his body was full of
darting pain. The dew of sweat broke out on him, streaming on brow and
limbs and breast. He saw that he had struggled from the jungle and now
lay on a grassy hummock; but on all sides stood the hideous, green
forest, as if waiting to engulf him again. He glanced at his right
arm, and saw a tiny ring of purple, hot and puckered, on the sunburned
skin. Then he knew that it was poison, and not magic, that had leaped
upon him, and filled him with madness and the pangs of death. Yet is
not poison a kind of magic, after all, compounded by the gods of hate,
in the beginning of the world, such hidden death as Bright Robe would
make, if he were wise enough?
Wise-as-a-she-wolf touched the grass near him in a dozen places, with
his left hand, starting a dozen little fires that weaved a tent of
smoke for protection from the sun. He took a leather bottle from his
belt and drank his fill of cool water; and no sooner had he withdrawn
the vessel from his lips than it was full again. But as he did not
possess the Wallet of Plenty, he drew his magic hunger-belt tight.
So he lay until night, with the little fires burning around him, yet
consuming nothing, and the smoke of them shutting him in as with walls
and roof. Strange and terrible sounds rang from the forest, but he gave
small heed to them, knowing that neither weapon nor living body could
pass the thin boundaries of his circle of fires. His body ached and his
brain felt like a withered leaf in his skull. At last he sank into a
troubled sleep. Again the green faces mouthed at him; and he struggled
with sleep--or was it death?--and threw the monster off. After that he
lay awake until sunrise, drinking frequently of the cool water.
When the sun came up, throwing level shafts of gold across the walls of
the forest, a cool wind arose with it, bending the frailer tree-tops
and washing the stagnant night from where he lay. There was a tang of
salt in the wind, and the good magician breathed it with thankfulness.
“I must get down to the sea,” he murmured, “and wash in the strong,
salt waters, and forget these tides of poisoned leaves.” But when he
tried to raise himself on his elbow, the pain of every bone and muscle
was so keen that he had to sink flat again. All that day, and for
two days afterward, he fasted. But he drank the water from the magic
bottle, without denying his thirst, and felt the poison weakening. On
the fourth morning he stood upright and sniffed the wind that swooped
and baffled over the eastern wall of the forest. Though his head span
dizzily, and horrible pains gripped him, he fastened the magic bottle
to his belt, took up his weapons, and jumped feebly into the air. He
arose like a wounded bird, struggled crookedly and at last topped the
barrier of living, threatening green. In front, beyond miles of jungle,
he saw a thin line of crested, wind-bent palms, and further out, the
haze and glint of the sea. The clean, salt wind blew against him, and
he set his feet upon it and staggered forward. Sometimes he dropped so
low that his moccasins touched the massed foliage of the forest, that
seemed to look upward, with smeared, uncertain faces, waiting for him;
but he arose again and again, with desperate efforts, and held on his
course. At last he won to the fringe of palms, and fell to the white
sand beside the crystal lip of the tide.
The good magician dwelt in the shade of the wind-bent palms for many
days, at first lying inactive, but soon going down to the water each
morning and evening to bathe. It was not a great while before he was
strong enough to kill a few of the fish that swam in those clear
waters, using one of his magic arrows for a spear. Between the beach
of white sand and the outer sea-ways, lay a still lagoon, fenced by a
reef that stood gleaming in the sun at the time of low water, and broke
white and green with surf when the tide was high. In this sheltered
water Wise-as-a-she-wolf bathed without fear of treacherous currents
and prowling monsters of the deep. Day by day the poison left him, the
pains became milder and less frequent in their attacks, and muscle and
flesh regained a little of their old strength.
“It is midwinter in my island now, and Featherfoot is telling stories
at his father’s fire, and my lodge is empty,” said the good magician,
one morning. His heart was sore with homesickness; and his eyes were
weary of the everlasting sunshine, the white surf and the green water;
his ears were tired of the continual rattling of the wind in the harsh
leaves of the palms and his body was tired of its feebleness. Far to
seaward, like a shadow of cloud on the horizon, lay an island, and
he resolved to fly to it, as soon as the heat of the day was spent,
thereby to test his strength. By this time his head was steady, and he
could use all the joints of his body without more pain than a man would
wince at. Also, he could walk quite briskly, for a short distance,
without the aid of the magic moccasins.
When the sun was touching the westward forests, Wise-as-a-she-wolf
tightened the thongs of the moccasins of the wind, ran forward for a
few steps and sprang into the air. He crossed the lagoon, and the naked
reef where the crabs scuttled heavily in the red light, and rose a
little when he saw the outer waters heaving beneath him.
“It is a long flight,” he said. “I must save my strength.” And so he
ran cautiously, measuring every well-considered stride. Sometimes he
touched the smooth back of a billow, and not until then would he put
forth fresh effort and rise a few yards in the air. He flew visibly, so
as to have all his mind and energy in the flight. The island grew on
the darkling sea-rim. He glanced backward and saw the long coast of the
mainland flat under the red sky. Beneath him swam a great shark, like
a shadow in the deep. He looked down on the dim shape of the fish, and
knew why it cruised there, patient yet expectant.
“It is but a short flight after all,” he said, and laughed a little
to feel so much of the old strength in his heart and legs. So he ran
faster, and saw that the wavering shape below also gathered speed. “We
are all hunters or hunted,” he mused. “The shark follows me, because
of the poor flesh on my bones; and I follow Bright Robe because of the
red feathers on his feet. Yes, and because he has injured my people
and struck at my power. But if it were not for the feathers, I think I
should forsake this dreary quest.”
He reached the island safely, just at the fall of the sudden night.
Here, too, he found a white beach, the sand of which was still
pleasantly warm from the day-long heat of the sun. He was tired, so lit
his circle of magic fires immediately, and lay down. For three nights
he dreamed that his people needed him. “It is foolishness,” he assured
himself. “What can they want of me, now that they are at peace with
each other, and ruled by wise heads and strong hands? The poison is
filling my brain with ugly dreams, in its last efforts to injure me.”
And on the second morning he told himself the same thing; but on the
third, his argument rang falsely to his heart. He went down to the
sea, just at the rising of the sun, and splashed about in the crystal
water; but he could not clear his mind of his dream. He fished, cooked,
and ate his breakfast, and retired into his tent of smoke; but still
the dream whispered within him. When the heat of the day was spent, he
started northward, over the rocking sea.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf’s homeward journey proved to be both slow and
painful. He was forced to rest many times, in many strange lands.
CHAPTER XXXI
THE FREEZING OF THE NARROW SEA
Events had moved swiftly in the great northern island during
Wise-as-a-she-wolf’s absence.
As autumn stole over the forests and barrens, ripening, searing, and
slaying, old men predicted a winter of more than usual severity. They
read the signs in the moss, in the flight of certain fowl, in the fur
and intestines of animals. Then came the frost, and gripped the island
in an aching, relentless vise for ten days before the sky thickened to
snow. The snow fell steadily, for two days and two nights; and with
the passing of the frozen clouds came pitiless winds from the north,
sweeping between the blue and the white. The snow, dry as dust, was
blown into long ridges, and beaten to the firmness of packed sand, and
banked high against the lodges of men and the lairs of beasts.
Beyond the Narrow Sea the mountaineers were called together, from their
several villages, by Black Eagle. Bright Robe was summoned from his
hiding-place, and took his seat on the chief’s right hand.
“This will be a hungry winter,” said the chief. “Hunting will be
difficult, for the caribou have travelled far. Bright Robe will not be
able to feed us all, for his heart has so softened of late, that he
will rob no village unless it be distant a three-days’ journey.”
The warriors grunted agreement to the chief’s words, but the magician
held his peace and wondered what was in the other’s mind.
“The Narrow Sea is frozen,” continued Black Eagle. “A safe way leads
to the island, where the warriors are feeble as old women and the
storehouses are full. We shall march across the frozen water and take
the richness of that old island.”
The warriors shouted approval, for they loved easy fighting and full
meals.
“I do not advise it,” said Bright Robe. “Wise-as-a-she-wolf would
scatter and slay you with his magic.”
Black Eagle looked at him with an evil smile.
“With you on our side, why need we fear the magic of
Wise-as-a-she-wolf?” he said. “You are the greatest magician in the
world. You are too modest, my friend, and have hidden so long in the
mountains that you have forgotten your strength.”
“I will not fight the men of the great island,” said Bright Robe.
“You have the heart of a mouse,” returned Black Eagle, with a smile
on his lips, but a gleam of rage in his eyes. “If you do not help us
against the people of the island, then shall we sit peacefully here,
while our swiftest runner carries word of you to Wise-as-a-she-wolf.”
“Unless he is fleeter than the red feathers, he will not run very far,”
said Bright Robe, dangerously calm.
The chief glanced at him again. “So you have a little courage, after
all,” he cried, in feigned amazement. “No messenger will be sent,” he
added, “but when next Wise-as-a-she-wolf comes to the village, he will
be told of how you have made such a fool of him.”
Bright Robe moved uneasily, and his sinister eyes flashed over the
company of squatting warriors. They were all armed with bows, clubs,
and spears; but he knew that, by the help of his magic, he could
scatter and slay them at but small risk to himself. What would the
routing of these people avail him, however? Word of the fight would
travel swiftly to the ears of his powerful enemy; and who would then
hide him from that awful meeting with lies and cunning? He realized
that the time was not yet ripe for him to disagree too violently with
Black Eagle and his people.
“Let us not talk any longer like enemies and fools,” he said. “It would
be useless for me to deny my fear of Wise-as-a-she-wolf, for you know
what is in my heart concerning that bloodthirsty magician. But I will
first cross to the island, to spy upon my enemy. It may be that he is
far away, hunting for me at the other end of the earth.”
Black Eagle did not answer for a long time. At last he said, “A swift
runner can go, and inquire of the villages on the coast as to the
whereabouts of the one you fear. Each way is but a half-day’s journey
for a seasoned runner.”
“I think, chief, that the villagers are more likely to kill your
messenger than to answer his questions,” replied Bright Robe,
sneeringly.
Black Eagle realized that it was now his turn to practise diplomacy. He
knew that his only hold on the other was that evil magician’s fear of
Wise-as-a-she-wolf. He did not think that Bright Robe would desert him,
and all claim on future services, except in an extreme case; and he was
sure that he would not try to make peace with his enemy by carrying
word to him of the intended invasion, for Wise-as-a-she-wolf would not
forget past injuries for so small a favour.
“Go, then,” said the chief. “We will await your return.”
“It will be dark in a few hours, and then I will go,” replied Bright
Robe, with dignity.
When he set out, through the starlight, for the land of his enemy,
his heart was torn with uncertainty as to how he should act in this
unforeseen dilemma which the freezing of the Narrow Sea had forced upon
him. To openly assist the mountaineers against Wise-as-a-she-wolf’s own
people, would be madness; to desert the men who had helped him deceive
his enemy for the past nine years would be as fatal in the end. His
only hope lay in the chance that the good magician might be far from
home, in which case he would help the mountaineers, unobtrusively,
until they had fully committed themselves, and then flee under cover of
night. He reflected that, while Wise-as-a-she-wolf was busily engaged
in punishing the men from beyond the Narrow Sea, he would have ample
time to find a new hiding-place, far, far away from the scenes of his
failures. Then he would get rid of the feathers in some way, and live
quietly, relinquishing all hope of future greatness.
When Bright Robe reached the coast of the island, he was still
struggling with the problem. The temptation to turn southward
and continue his flight was almost too strong to resist; but the
thought of how the mountaineers would explain to his enemy all his
nine-year scheme of evasion, making similar practices useless in the
future, daunted him afresh. For a moment his brain turned, in brief
consideration, on surrender. He would seek the just and angry magician
(whose people he had so often despoiled and slain) and give him the
feathers, and confess his sins, and--and? Neither brain nor heart had
courage to answer the unasked question. His enemy was just--and what
was he to gain by surrendering himself to justice?
Bright Robe went dully about his work. He discovered a cluster of
lodges, drifted deep in snow. He approached them, and raised a feeble
voice. “I am cold, I am hungry,” he cried. “I have been lost in a
storm.”
A figure crawled from the nearest lodge. Bright Robe staggered forward
and fell. Strong arms lifted him and carried him to warmth and shelter.
He was fed, and soft furs were laid over him, and all the while he
played the part of one brought close to death by cold and exhaustion.
He spent several hours in the lodge, and learned from the honest fellow
whom he questioned that Wise-as-a-she-wolf had not been seen in the
western villages since autumn. After learning this, he pretended to
sleep; but he soon crawled from the lodge, leaving the hospitable,
unsuspecting hunter snoring peacefully. He flew eastward and inland,
now with some assurance of spirit. The night had clouded, though it was
still bitterly cold. He found several villages in the darkness and, by
using the same tactics as before, learned again that the good magician
had not been seen for two moons. Then he faced westward again and ran
at his best speed.
CHAPTER XXXII
THE INVASION OF THE ISLAND
The westward villages made but slight resistance to the mountaineers.
They were taken unawares, scattered blindly and many were slain. Some
of the fugitives hid, and others ran to warn the nearer settlements.
The invaders travelled slowly, in spite of Bright Robe’s efforts to
hurry them, stopping to rest and feast in every village and encumbering
themselves with booty and prisoners. Their only prisoners were women.
Bright Robe did his share of the fighting, but was careful to make it
no more than a man’s share. He fought on the ground, like his fellows,
and though he served as guide to the hidden encampments, he played an
inconspicuous part. And so they raided, fought and feasted for three
days, hearing nothing in all that time of Wise-as-a-she-wolf. The main
body held straight to the eastward, and small companies branched off to
the north and south.
On the fourth day of the invasion the mountaineers reached a large
village of deserted lodges. Even the storehouses were empty. The
disappointment angered them, and they pushed forward with more haste.
For three days they travelled, without finding anything of the
islanders except tracks of their snow-shoes and their empty lodges. By
this time, Bright Robe had decided that he had mixed as deeply in the
invasion as was wise, and that nightfall should be the signal for his
southward flight; for his old enemy, wherever he was wandering, would
surely take a hand in the game before long. But he said no word of this
to Black Eagle.
“Let the fool suffer for his foolishness,” he muttered.
The mountaineers were careless soldiers, and sent no scouts ahead of
their army. “What have we to fear from these men with the hearts of
mice and the muscles of women?” sneered Black Eagle. “They run before
us, even before they see our spears. In a few days we will drive them
into the great salt water in the east.”
Shortly after noon they reached another empty village. They rushed
into the lodges, shouted angrily, and fought among themselves for
what little the departed inhabitants had left behind. The five hundred
warriors crowded into the open space, overturning the lodges, and
reviling the islanders. Arrows leaped from the woods on every side. Two
flights sprang forth and tasted blood before the mountaineers realized
what had happened. Then they rallied and dashed for the hidden enemy.
Black Eagle turned furiously upon Bright Robe.
“You have brought us to this trap,” he cried, and struck at him with
his club. The blow fell harmlessly on the magician’s shield; and in a
second in the crush and tumult of the battle they were separated.
Many of the mountaineers who advanced into the woods, to close with
the surrounding enemy, were swiftly forced back to the clearing. Blood
melted the snow, and contending warriors, with their racquets slipped
or broken from their feet, struggled deep in the drifts, stabbing
blindly. Shouts and cries of dismay rang up to the frozen sky. Men
fought hand to hand, even breast to breast,--yes, and tooth to flesh.
The lodges were torn and overturned, and as more men continued to pour
into the clearing the snow was trampled hard as earth and crusted with
frozen blood.
Bright Robe dared not fly openly from the scene and yet he was eager
to get away, fearing always the arrival of Wise-as-a-she-wolf. At last
he broke from the thick of the fight, hurling friend and foe alike
from his path by means of his magic strength. Many sturdy strokes were
aimed at him, but his magic turned them all aside, and he won to the
shelter of the forest without hurt. It was his intention to run to a
safe distance from the battle, hide until dark, and then take flight.
He ran straight through the woods, beating down the occasional warriors
who tried to bar his way. He had travelled nearly a mile, and was clear
of the outskirts of the battle, when, in pausing for breath, he heard
the springing of parted branches close behind him. He turned with ready
club, but saw nothing.
* * * * *
I must turn back a little, and look at the fight from the islanders’
side of it.
From the fugitives from the western villages word of the invasion
travelled quickly to the ears of Run-all-day. Swift runners were
sent in every direction, to warn the clans of the danger and bid
them prepare to fight. The people of the villages which lay in Black
Eagle’s course were told to fall back, with all their possessions,
upon Run-all-day’s country. Then Run-all-day divided his own warriors
and the men who joined him from the other clans, into three bodies of
about four hundred men each. One of these armies, under Jumping Wolf,
was sent forward immediately to encounter the mountaineers on their
probable course. Another was hurried forward in the same direction, but
several miles to the southward. The third was held in readiness near
the villages where the women and children and stores of the fugitives
were sheltered.
Jumping Wolf sent scouts in advance of the little army, to scour the
country for miles. These scouts were not long in finding the invaders,
and for a whole day before the attack the commander was constantly in
receipt of information concerning the approach of the enemy. He did not
rush his men, but advanced at an easy pace, ever on the look-out for a
suitable position in which to stand and strike. When night fell, his
men ate the cooked food that they had brought, dug great trenches in
the snow, and slept without fires. Shortly before noon he arrived at a
large, deserted village, and halted his men. A scout came running to
him.
“They are close at hand,” he said, “and one who guides them is pointing
the way to this village.”
So Jumping Wolf placed his eager warriors in the edge of the woods that
surrounded the clearing in which stood the empty lodges.
“Now is the time for you to put your magic to good use,” he said, to
Featherfoot.
But the youth shook his head. “Unless they have a magician among them,
I shall not use my magic,” he replied, placing a common arrow on the
string of his bow.
The islanders waited patiently, crouching on their thong-woven
racquets, peering eagerly into the clearing. Their bows were strung and
the arrows were loose in their belts, and their hearts were hot for
the battle. At last the invaders appeared, dashing into the clearing
and among the lodges in noisy disorder; and at the sight a thrill of
joy and rage ran through the waiting islanders. The notches of arrows
met the taut strings; and still the chiefs crouched motionless, giving
no sign. The place fairly squirmed with the shouting, dark-skinned
mountaineers. Jumping Wolf raised his hand above his head; up went the
hands of the other chiefs; out leaped the arrows upon the crowding,
struggling invaders. Again the bows were bent and released; and then
the islanders sprang to meet the rallying mountaineers, and struck with
clubs and spears.
It was soon quite evident to Featherfoot that the Beothics had the
upper hand in the engagement, though the invaders were the more
numerous. So he fell back from the struggle for a moment’s rest.
In surveying the struggle from a vantage point at the edge of the
clearing, his attention was attracted by a big stranger who fought
for the mountaineers and yet was lighter of skin. He saw this warrior
suddenly make his way out of the thick of the fight, dashing friend and
foe from his way with a strength that was more than human. He saw him
win, unhurt, to the edge of the clearing, and dart from sight among the
trees. “He fights with strong magic, and shields himself with magic,”
said Featherfoot, and immediately gave chase. As he ran among the
snatching, buffeting branches, he drew his most powerful arrow from his
belt, and pulled the silver robe above his head.
Featherfoot soon came in sight of the stranger. At the sound of
his approach the other turned; but the youth, knowing himself to be
invisible by virtue of the silver robe, halted and unhurriedly set the
magic arrow to the string of the magic bow. So great was the magic of
that arrow, that its weight became as the weight of a small mountain
the moment it hit its mark. There was no pity in Featherfoot’s heart,
for he had seen the strange magician slay both friend and foe, with
weapons from which they had no chance of escape; so he drew the bow
calmly and loosed the shaft. The stranger fell, staggered to his feet,
struck the arrow from his breast and leaped high above the tree-tops.
There he hung for a little, struggling desperately; but when another
arrow found him he dropped back to earth, turning over and over in
his fall. Featherfoot was upon him as soon as he touched the snow.
Knowing now that the stranger was Bright Robe, he bound the nerveless
limbs with magic thongs that no giant could break. Then, undoing the
moccasins from the unresisting feet, he found the red feathers. Quick
as thinking, they were transferred to his own moccasins, and his
snow-shoes were cast aside.
No sooner were the magic feathers in place against the soles of his
feet, than the shrill note of the whistle which old Whispering
Grass had given to Star Flower sounded faintly but terrifically in
Featherfoot’s ears. He sprang into the air and ran swiftly in the
direction of Little Heron’s village, leaving the evil magician bound
and unconscious on the snow.
He caught a blurred glimpse of the battle below, now scattered
and abating in fury, but so dazed and breathless was he with the
frightful speed at which he rushed through the air, his eyes could not
distinguish friend from foe. But whatever the outcome of the battle, he
had heard the whistle and must answer the call. So he ran on, though
his brain reeled, and his eyes ached, and his breath was like ice and
smoke in his throat. Presently, as he became accustomed to the new
manner and rate of travelling, the sensations grew less painful. Soon
he was able to see clearly, and run steadily, and draw his breath with
comparative ease.
Suddenly, as he raced along between the fading sky and the dimming
wastes of the earth, he heard the whispering of flight beside him.
Then he found that the silver robe had slipped from his head, and he
snatched at it with his left hand, to draw it into place.
“Hold,” cried the voice of Wise-as-a-she-wolf, close at his elbow.
“It is I, Featherfoot,” cried the youth in answer, desisting from his
efforts to hide himself beneath the robe and at the same time returning
his club to his belt. At that, the good magician appeared close beside,
and threw his arm about his neck.
“I had my axe raised to strike you, lad,” he whispered. “I thought my
old enemy was in my power at last.”
“I have wounded him and bound him, master,” replied Featherfoot,
breathlessly. “He lies near Diving Beaver’s village, where the warriors
are still fighting. But I have heard the call of the whistle, master,
and must hasten to answer it. Star Flower is in need of me.”
“Go, my son. I, too, have heard the whistle. But now I will hasten
to my warriors,” said the good magician. And so they parted, between
the shadowy wilderness and the darkling sky, with no questions of the
months of separation. Wise-as-a-she-wolf turned in the direction of
Diving Beaver’s encampment, and ran slowly on the icy currents of the
wind. He was still weak with the poison of the little arrow, and felt
the weariness of the long flight which he had just made. He wondered
to feel so little elation of spirit at the knowledge of Bright Robe’s
capture. His thoughts were all of Featherfoot, who was as dear as a son
to him. “Star Flower, Star Flower,” he repeated, and smiled pensively.
“Whoever this Star Flower is, and however she came to possess the
whistle, I think she will teach the lad a magic of which I have no
mastery,” he reflected. “He will build a lodge of bark and skins, and
it will be more beautiful to his eyes than my great house in the pine
wood, with its smokeless lamps and magic walls. He is young, and Youth
is the greatest magician. He loves a woman, and that is the strongest
magic.” Thus, with mingled tenderness and distress, he considered the
case of Featherfoot as he flew to the succour of his warriors.
CHAPTER XXXIII
THE RESCUE OF STAR FLOWER
The note of the whistle was not repeated; but Featherfoot ran straight
toward the village of Little Heron. The last red light of the short
winter day was fading below the west, when he reached the valley that
he knew and loved so well. He descended among the lodges. All was
quiet. There was no light of cooking-fires, or sound of contented
voices. He glanced at the trampled snow under his feet, and beheld
a war-club with a splintered haft. And there, a step beyond, lay an
arrow, and there a dark stain melted into the snow. With a low cry of
consternation, he ran to the chief’s lodge and peered within. It was
empty, and even the furs were gone from the couches. He started to
run to the next lodge, but the dusk of night was deepening, and his
foot tripped in something and he fell heavily. He recovered himself
quickly, and found that the thing over which he had stumbled was the
lifeless body of Little Heron. Then he knew that it would be useless
to look in the other lodges. He arose on the magic feathers and circled
close about the village. He found the corpses of warriors and old
men and boys, and even of old women. He flew in a wider circle, and
yet a wider, swooping low to every open glade. Here and there lay
the cold bodies, now of a mountaineer, now of a villager whom he had
known, showing how in the unequal struggle they had scattered and how
the fugitives had been overtaken. Still he widened the circle of his
flight. At last, away to the westward, he caught the glint of fire at
the base of a dark hill, and even as he swerved in his course, the
little fire spark leaped to the flame of a comfortable fire. He swooped
nearer, and peered out upon the scene from the cover of the tree-tops.
There were more than a dozen mountaineers, a few busy preparing food at
the newly kindled fire, the others lolling nearby on out-spread furs.
In the background a group of women were huddled, and their half-stifled
sobbing came piteously to his ears. Featherfoot drew his club from his
belt, pulled the hood of the silver robe over his head, and soared
noiselessly from the tree-tops.
“Have no fear, Star Flower,” he cried, and descended, like a hawk upon
its prey. The first mountaineer to receive a blow of the club fell
across the fire, and lay there. Two more went down, with broken skulls,
before any of them realized the danger. Ten of them reached the cover
of the woods, which proved no protection at all. Six gained a distance
of several hundred yards from the fire, before the invisible death
overtook them. Three won half-way up the hill, but none reached the
top. Then Featherfoot returned to the camping-place, plucked the body
from the fire and threw it into the bushes, loosed the thongs that
bound the women and clasped Star Flower in his arms. She made frantic
efforts to free herself from his embrace, and the other women and girls
screamed and gazed wildly around.
“It is I, Featherfoot,” whispered the bewildered youth, still holding
her firmly.
“I cannot see you,” she cried. “It is the voice of Featherfoot, but--”
The youth dropped his arms from her slender body, tore the silver robe
from his head and shoulders and tossed it on the snow. Then he turned
back to Star Flower, smiling. The other women drew nearer, and ceased
their screaming.
“Yes, it is the young chief who drew the beautiful pictures,” said one.
“It is the great story-teller,” said another.
Star Flower stepped close to him, clasped her little hands behind his
neck and hid her face in the furs on his breast.
“Oh, I was not sure,” she whispered. “It was your voice; but I heard
the rushing of winged feet, and saw the savage warriors run and fall
before no visible danger. I thought the good magician had answered the
call of the whistle.”
Then Featherfoot laughed softly, and held her close, and in his heart
he pitied his friend and master, the greatest magician in the world.
And as for the good red feathers, he forgot all about them.
“Fear nothing,” he said, tenderly and joyfully. “Your lover answered
the call, and love winged his feet.”
Hail, Youth, speaking such truth through very inexactness and the
vagueness of dreams. Hail, Love, who sees so far and so clearly through
glory-blinded eyes.
CHAPTER XXXIV
REST
The good magician found his old enemy bleeding in the snow, and bound
by thongs magic-strengthened, which he was powerless to break in
his weakened condition. Having seen that the enemy was broken and
scattered, and that every mountaineer ran, inspired by no purpose
except the saving of his own life, he lifted Bright Robe in his arms
and carried him into one of the few lodges that remained standing. He
loosened the thongs and poured water between the swollen lips.
“What now?” asked Bright Robe, with the courage of despair.
For a little while the good magician sat silent, in the darkness, as if
he had not heard.
“Though I defeated you before, and loosed you in the wilderness in the
shape of a little owl,” he said, at last, “yet you outwitted me at the
end of the five years. And though your magic possessed but half its
former strength when you regained your old shape, yet you managed to
hide from me for nine years and have led invaders into my country. Now,
even were I to let you go away without punishment, your strength would
be no more than that of the least of the magicians, for magic is a
thing that weakens under defeat. It is a vanity, failing in adversity,
but growing ever stronger and more vain with success. By it, one may
win fear, and if he uses it for the protection of his people, it brings
him respect and friendship; but the greatest magician cannot win love
by his magic.”
Bright Robe lay very still, listening and wondering. “I have no fear of
you,” continued Wise-as-a-she-wolf, “and, seeing you bleeding there,
overthrown in your evil doing by a lad whom I love, I find but little
hate of you in my heart. You must live for ever, in weakness or in
strength, in wickedness or in virtue, even as I, and that is punishment
beyond any man’s deserving.”
“Yes, chief. If the water of everlasting life were held to my lips
again, how gladly would I spill it on the ground,” said Bright Robe.
“And yet we fought and bled, suffered weariness and cold and
loneliness, to win that drink,” replied the good magician.
“I left a woman and child--a child of my blood--to starve in an empty
lodge, that I might drink of that accursed water,” whispered Bright
Robe. “Strike me, old enemy,” he cried. “Beat me to nothingness. I
would go, even now, and make my peace with those two.”
“Your spirit would still be bound to this old earth,” replied
Wise-as-a-she-wolf, “though I should strike with all my magic and
scatter your body to the winds.”
For a long time they sat silent in the darkness of the lodges. It was
Bright Robe who spoke first.
“I, too, have lost fear,” he said, “though I have been a coward at
heart since my mother bore me. For nine years I have been no better
than a slave of Black Eagle’s, because of fear. Fear of you, and fear
of the shadow in my heart, have driven me so hard that even the thirst
for blood is dead in me and I have no more desire for evil power. I
care not what you do with me.”
“When you recover from your wounds,” said Wise-as-a-she-wolf, “I fear
you will thirst again for power and blood and mischief. But I pity you,
Bright Robe, for the age of sleeping and waking and remembrance that
are before you. So I will deal with you as mercifully as I may.”
“There is no more lust of life in me. You cannot give me death. Then
what do I care how you deal with me?” said Bright Robe.
For two days the hunting and slaying of the mountaineers by the
islanders continued, and not one of those savage invaders returned to
his own country. But as the cold continued as intense as ever, and it
was thought that the ice would remain in the Narrow Sea until spring,
Jumping Wolf marched his men westward and encamped them on the coast.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf took word of the victory to Run-all-day, and was so
cordially received by that honest chief and his family that his heart
lightened. He had brought the wounded Bright Robe with him, and he told
Run-all-day of Featherfoot’s encounter with, and overthrow of, that
magician. Also, he narrated his own adventures in the south; and the
chief growled with rage when he heard of the little arrow tipped with
poison.
“Now you may rest, master, since your enemy is delivered into your
hands,” said Run-all-day. “Our people are strong now, and live under
the laws, and even the southward clans are at peace with their
neighbours. So surely the time has come for you to rest, master.”
“I have one more journey to make,” replied the good magician. “One more
long journey to the southward, and then I will lay aside the moccasins
of the wind, and sit at home and help you in your wise government of
the people.”
The chief looked at him in wonder.
“Help me!” he exclaimed. “Why, master, I am your servant, though the
strongest chief in the island. Whatever I have done for the good of
the people has been through your friendship and guidance. Yes, and in
little matters, Red Willow has given good counsel.”
Wise-as-a-she-wolf looked at the woman, who sat nearby, with downcast
eyes.
“Your magic is greater than mine,” he said.
She raised her eyes and looked at him--at the strongest of magicians,
with something of motherly tenderness.
“To fill a heart, even one heart, with love and trust, is a greater
matter than flying through the air,” he said.
“You are loved. You are called the good magician,” replied Red Willow.
“And I am feared,” said Wise-as-a-she-wolf. “Yes, I am feared, even by
those who think of me most kindly. But the time was when--”
They waited, gazing upon their guest.
“We are listening, master,” said the chief.
“I have forgotten it,” answered the other. “It was nothing. But I, too,
was once young and the chief of a village.”
When Bright Robe had nearly recovered from his wounds,
Wise-as-a-she-wolf bound him with thongs, lifted him in his arms, and
flew southward. Night and day, the good magician ran above the sea,
and many lands glimmered into his vision and faded again. At last he
descended to the beach of an island, where mountains towered high,
robed in green to their summits. Between the white beaches and the
climbing slopes stood hundreds of cocoanut trees, their long stems
bent and their crests for ever shaken by the wind. The music of the
surf drummed around the island, day and night, night and day. Birds of
bright plumage and harsh voices flew above the hillside forests. No
other land was to be seen from any point of this island, but everywhere
the uneasy ocean and the straight horizon.
Wise-as-a-she-wolf broke the thongs from Bright Robe’s limbs. “Here you
will find food and drink and shelter,” he said, “and somewhere on the
mountain is a small stream that flows with the water of forgetfulness.”
“Have you drunk of that stream?” asked Bright Robe.
“No. There are things that I do not wish to forget,” replied the other.
Bright Robe looked at the sea, and the windy palms, and the towering
mountains. A shadow stole across his keen eyes.
“And this--for ever,” he whispered.
“If you drink often enough of the water of forgetfulness,” said the
good magician, “then life will stretch no farther than from day to day.”
He turned, hesitated, then faced the motionless Bright Robe again.
“There is a village beyond the mountain. Be wise, for I do not forget.”
Then he sprang high into the blustering wind.
THE END.
Selections from
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THE GIRLS OF FRIENDLY TERRACE SERIES
By HARRIET LUMMIS SMITH
_Each large 12mo, cloth decorative, illustrated, per volume_ $1.50
THE GIRLS OF FRIENDLY TERRACE
“A book sure to please girl readers, for the author seems to understand
perfectly the girl character.”--_Boston Globe._
PEGGY RAYMOND’S VACATION
“It is a wholesome, hearty story.”--_Utica Observer._
PEGGY RAYMOND’S SCHOOL DAYS
The book is delightfully written, and contains lots of exciting
incidents.
FAMOUS LEADERS SERIES
By CHARLES H. L. JOHNSTON
_Each large 12mo, cloth decorative, illustrated, per volume_ $1.50
FAMOUS CAVALRY LEADERS
“More of such books should be written, books that acquaint young
readers with historical personages in a pleasant, informal way.”--_New
York Sun._
“It is a book that will stir the heart of every boy and will prove
interesting as well to the adults.”--_Lawrence Daily World._
FAMOUS INDIAN CHIEFS
“Mr. Johnston has done faithful work in this volume, and his relation
of battles, sieges and struggles of these famous Indians with the
whites for the possession of America is a worthy addition to United
States History.”--_New York Marine Journal._
FAMOUS SCOUTS
“It is the kind of a book that will have a great fascination for boys
and young men, and while it entertains them it will also present
valuable information in regard to those who have left their impress
upon the history of the country.”--_The New London Day._
FAMOUS PRIVATEERSMEN AND ADVENTURERS OF THE SEA
“The tales are more than merely interesting; they are entrancing,
stirring the blood with thrilling force and bringing new zest to the
never-ending interest in the dramas of the sea.”--_The Pittsburgh Post._
FAMOUS FRONTIERSMEN AND HEROES OF THE BORDER
“The accounts are not only authentic, but distinctly readable,
making a book of wide appeal to all who love the history of actual
adventure.”--_Cleveland Leader._
FAMOUS DISCOVERERS AND EXPLORERS OF AMERICA
“The book is an epitome of some of the wildest and bravest adventures
of which the world has known and of discoveries which have changed the
face of the old world as well as of the new.”--_Brooklyn Daily Eagle._
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:
Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_.
Perceived typographical errors have been corrected.
Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized.
Archaic or variant spelling has been retained.
New original cover art included with this eBook is granted to the
public domain.Project Gutenberg
The red feathers : $b A story of remarkable adventures when the world was young
Roberts, Theodore Goodridge
Chimera40
High School