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Page 26
One afternoon, when the toboggan was particularly wet and slippery from
recent use, Baree went up the beaver path to the top of the bank, and
began investigating. Nowhere had he found the beaver smell so strong as
on the slide. He began sniffing and incautiously went too far. In an
instant his feet shot out from under him, and with a single wild yelp
he went shooting down the toboggan. For the second time in his life he
found himself struggling under water, and when a minute or two later he
dragged himself up through the soft mud to the firmer footing of the
shore, he had at last a very well-defined opinion of beaver play.
It may be that Umisk saw him. It may be that very soon the story of his
adventure was known by all the inhabitants of Beaver Town. For when
Baree came upon Umisk eating his supper of alder bark that evening,
Umisk stood his ground to the last inch, and for the first time they
smelled noses. At least Baree sniffed audibly, and plucky little Umisk
sat like a rolled-up sphinx. That was the final cementing of their
friendship--on Baree's part. He capered about extravagantly for a few
moments, telling Umisk how much he liked him, and that they'd be great
chums. Umisk didn't talk. He didn't make a move until he resumed his
supper. But he was a companionable-looking little fellow, for all that,
and Baree was happier than he had been since the day he left the old
windfall.
This friendship, even though it outwardly appeared to be quite
one-sided, was decidedly fortunate for Umisk. When Baree was at the
pond, he always kept as near to Umisk as possible, when he could find
him. One day he was lying in a patch of grass, half asleep, while Umisk
busied himself in a clump of alder shoots a few yards away. It was the
warning crack of a beaver tail that fully roused Baree; and then
another and another, like pistol shots. He jumped up. Everywhere
beavers were scurrying for the pond.
Just then Umisk came out of the alders and hurried as fast as his
short, fat legs would carry him toward the water. He had almost reached
the mud when a lightning flash of red passed before Baree's eyes in the
afternoon sun, and in another instant Napakasew--the he-fox--had
fastened his sharp fangs in Umisk's throat. Baree heard his little
friend's agonized cry; he heard the frenzied flap-flap-flap of many
tails--and his blood pounded suddenly with the thrill of excitement and
rage.
As swiftly as the red fox himself, Baree darted to the rescue. He was
as big and as heavy as the fox, and when he struck Napakasew, it was
with a ferocious snarl that Pierrot might have heard on the farther
side of the pond, and his teeth sank like knives into the shoulder of
Umisk's assailant. The fox was of a breed of forest highwaymen which
kills from behind. He was not a fighter when it came fang-to-fang,
unless cornered--and so fierce and sudden was Baree's assault that
Napakasew took to flight almost as quickly as he had begun his attack
on Umisk.
Baree did not follow him, but went to Umisk, who lay half in the mud,
whimpering and snuffling in a curious sort of way. Gently Baree nosed
him, and after a moment or two Umisk got up on his webbed feet, while
fully twenty or thirty beavers were making a tremendous fuss in the
water near the shore.
After this the beaver pond seemed more than ever like home to Baree.
CHAPTER 11
While lovely Nepeese was still shuddering over her thrilling experience
under the rock--while Pierrot still offered grateful thanks in his
prayers for her deliverance and Baree was becoming more and more a
fixture at the beaver pond--Bush McTaggart was perfecting a little
scheme of his own up at Post Lac Bain, about forty miles north and
west. McTaggart had been factor at Lac Bain for seven years. In the
company's books down in Winnipeg he was counted a remarkably successful
man. The expense of his post was below the average, and his semiannual
report of furs always ranked among the first. After his name, kept on
file in the main office, was one notation which said: "Gets more out of
a dollar than any other man north of God's Lake."
The Indians knew why this was so. They called him Napao Wetikoo--the
man-devil. This was under their breath--a name whispered sinisterly in
the glow of tepee fires, or spoken softly where not even the winds
might carry it to the ears of Bush McTaggart. They feared him; they
hated him. They died of starvation and sickness, and the tighter Bush
McTaggart clenched the fingers of his iron rule, the more meekly, it
seemed to him, did they respond to his mastery. His was a small soul,
hidden in the hulk of a brute, which rejoiced in power. And here--with
the raw wilderness on four sides of him--his power knew no end. The big
company was behind him. It had made him king of a domain in which there
was little law except his own. And in return he gave back to the
company bales and bundles of furs beyond their expectation. It was not
for them to have suspicions. They were a thousand or more miles
away--and dollars were what counted.
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