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Page 16
"And where you heered him callin' an' caught the stench, an' all the
rest of the wicked entertainment," cried Hank, with a volubility that
betrayed his keen distress.
"And where your excitement overcame you to the point of producing
illusions," added Dr. Cathcart under his breath, yet not so low that his
nephew did not hear it.
* * * * *
It was early in the afternoon, for they had traveled quickly, and there
were still a good two hours of daylight left. Dr. Cathcart and Hank lost
no time in beginning the search, but Simpson was too exhausted to
accompany them. They would follow the blazed marks on the trees, and
where possible, his footsteps. Meanwhile the best thing he could do was
to keep a good fire going, and rest.
But after something like three hours' search, the darkness already down,
the two men returned to camp with nothing to report. Fresh snow had
covered all signs, and though they had followed the blazed trees to the
spot where Simpson had turned back, they had not discovered the smallest
indication of a human being--or for that matter, of an animal. There
were no fresh tracks of any kind; the snow lay undisturbed.
It was difficult to know what was best to do, though in reality there
was nothing more they _could_ do. They might stay and search for weeks
without much chance of success. The fresh snow destroyed their only
hope, and they gathered round the fire for supper, a gloomy and
despondent party. The facts, indeed, were sad enough, for D�fago had a
wife at Rat Portage, and his earnings were the family's sole means of
support.
Now that the whole truth in all its ugliness was out, it seemed useless
to deal in further disguise or pretense. They talked openly of the facts
and probabilities. It was not the first time, even in the experience of
Dr. Cathcart, that a man had yielded to the singular seduction of the
Solitudes and gone out of his mind; D�fago, moreover, was predisposed to
something of the sort, for he already had a touch of melancholia in his
blood, and his fiber was weakened by bouts of drinking that often lasted
for weeks at a time. Something on this trip--one might never know
precisely what--had sufficed to push him over the line, that was all.
And he had gone, gone off into the great wilderness of trees and lakes
to die by starvation and exhaustion. The chances against his finding
camp again were overwhelming; the delirium that was upon him would also
doubtless have increased, and it was quite likely he might do violence
to himself and so hasten his cruel fate. Even while they talked, indeed,
the end had probably come. On the suggestion of Hank, his old pal,
however, they proposed to wait a little longer and devote the whole of
the following day, from dawn to darkness, to the most systematic search
they could devise. They would divide the territory between them. They
discussed their plan in great detail. All that men could do they would
do. And, meanwhile, they talked about the particular form in which the
singular Panic of the Wilderness had made its attack upon the mind of
the unfortunate guide. Hank, though familiar with the legend in its
general outline, obviously did not welcome the turn the conversation had
taken. He contributed little, though that little was illuminating. For
he admitted that a story ran over all this section of country to the
effect that several Indians had "seen the Wendigo" along the shores of
Fifty Island Water in the "fall" of last year, and that this was the
true reason of D�fago's disinclination to hunt there. Hank doubtless
felt that he had in a sense helped his old pal to death by
overpersuading him. "When an Indian goes crazy," he explained, talking
to himself more than to the others, it seemed, "it's always put that
he's 'seen the Wendigo.' An' pore old D�faygo was superstitious down to
he very heels ...!"
And then Simpson, feeling the atmosphere more sympathetic, told over
again the full story of his astonishing tale; he left out no details
this time; he mentioned his own sensations and gripping fears. He only
omitted the strange language used.
"But D�fago surely had already told you all these details of the Wendigo
legend, my dear fellow," insisted the doctor. "I mean, he had talked
about it, and thus put into your mind the ideas which your own
excitement afterwards developed?"
Whereupon Simpson again repeated the facts. D�fago, he declared, had
barely mentioned the beast. He, Simpson, knew nothing of the story, and,
so far as he remembered, had never even read about it. Even the word was
unfamiliar.
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