Part 11
The trail is marvelously interesting now; it tells of things that happen in the night, things that few human eyes have ever seen. Some of the pack are racing on either side of the buck, while a single big wolf follows jump for jump at his heels. Here the buck is thrown fairly when the following wolf catches a flying foot; but he is up and away with the same motion that rolls him completely over. There is the story in the snow, as plain as English when you know how to read it. Though a few red drops mark the trail, the buck is hardly scratched; the big wolf has not yet had the chance for which he is watching. Again the buck is thrown, and this time he stays down. There he lies, just as he fell! He was not quick enough on his feet the second time, and the big wolf closed his jaws on the small of the back. That is one way of killing, but not the common way when the approach is from behind. The wolf was looking for a different chance, I think, but took this like a flash when he saw it.
We examine the wound carefully, cutting away the skin so as to see more clearly. Only the deep fang-marks show; the flesh is not eaten here, or even torn; yet under the muscles the bones grate like a broken hinge. The wolves eat a little from the hind quarters, and two of them lap a bit at the throat without tearing it. There is only a slight puncture, under which a few red drops are frozen in a hollow lapped by a wolf’s tongue. So far as we can discover, the only serious wound on the body is that broken back, with its mute testimony to the power of a timber wolf’s snap. The trail shows no sign of quarreling when the wolves feed or when they go off, their hunger satisfied, to roam the woods like lazy dogs.
There is a different kind of hunting ahead now, a hunt to save the deer by shooting their enemies; but the short winter day is almost done, and we must wait for the morrow. You will be told that it is vain to follow a wolf in this densely wooded region; that his senses are so much keener than yours that you will never find him by trailing; that your only chance of killing him is to go abroad at all hours and trust to a chance meeting. One can understand such counsel, born of repeated failure, without quite agreeing with it. Only yesterday I found the fresh kill of a wolf pack in the early morning, and before noon I had trailed the brutes to where they were resting for the day under a ledge. The fascinating thing was that they had no notion I was anywhere near them when the first massive gray head rose above the bushes to sniff suspiciously. Such a chase is out of the question to-day; the light fades, and camp is calling.
The snowshoe trail stretches far behind, giving a sense of comfort in these strange woods, because one cannot well be lost with his own snowshoe slots to guide him. But the back trail is weary miles long, and, judging by our course since morning (which was first southerly, you remember, then northeast), the home lake can hardly be more than an hour or so to westward. No need to look at your compass; there’s the sunset. So into the sunset we go, and after the sunset is the twilight, with one great star like a lamp hung over it.
It is dusk, and numberless stars are glittering in the frosty air, when we break out of the gloomy woods near the foot of the lake. As we move campward, more swiftly now over level going, a long howl rolls down from the hills over which our trail has just been drawn. There is a moment of quiet on nature’s part, of tense listening on ours; then the rally cry of the wolves goes shivering through the night.
That pack, or another one, must have been nearer than we thought. Perhaps they saw us as we hurried down the last slope through deepening shadows. No doubt they will soon be sniffing our trail. In the early evening a young wolf is apt to raise a great howl when he runs across the fresh trail of a man; not because he knows what it is, but for precisely the opposite reason. “Will they follow or chase us?” you ask; which shows that you have been reading wolf stories. “No, these big timber wolves never hunt a man,” I answer, and that answer is true. Nevertheless, your stride lengthens; there is a feeling of lightness in your heels; you are a little nervous, and your scalp is tight; wait a bit.
A fallen pine stub offers an inviting seat under the shore, where we sit down to “rest a pipe,” listening alertly to the wolves, trying to gauge their course for the next hunting,--their hunting and mine, for I shall surely follow them at daybreak. Aha! hear that.
An awful row, wailing, ululating, breaks out from the hill above us, where young wolves of the pack are clamoring over our trail. They have found it, all right. One can easily fancy now that they are coming on the jump; but they are not even headed this way, never fear. They are merely puzzled or excited over a new thing. Later, when they grow quiet, some of them may steal down to have a look at us; but they will take good care that we do not have a look at them. Their howling, especially when heard by a solitary man at night, has a strangely disturbing quality, rasping our civilized nerves like sandpaper. If you are not accustomed to the cry, panic and imaginary terrors are bred of it, and all the foolish stories of wolf ferocity you ever heard come crowding back to demand, “Now will you listen to us? Now will you believe?” No, not a bit. Every ferocious wolf story I ever heard (every American story, at least) is an invention absurdly at variance with the wolf’s character. So we finish the pipe, slowly for discipline, and move campward through the witchery of the wilderness night. The wolves have ceased their howling; the world is intensely still.
A ruddy gleam breaks suddenly from the dark bulk of trees; and Bob, hearing the click of snowshoes, comes out from the fire where he has been keeping supper warm for the greater pleasure of sharing it. “Welcome home, b’y! What luck?” he calls; and something in his voice tells me that he, too, has good news, which waits only an occasion for telling. The occasion comes as we eat leisurely, thankfully, before the glowing birch logs; while night gathers close about our little “Commoosie,” and our fire makes the wilderness home.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
TWO ENDS OF A BEAR STORY
In my “Benacadie,” or home camp, one summer was a cow, very much out of focus, that had been led far through the woods, and then, in a lunatic moment, had been rolled into a bateau and rowed across the big lake. That last was a brave adventure, especially when the cow, not knowing why she should be bundled up like a sack, kicked free of the straps, heaved up on wobbly legs, and tried to climb out of the boat; but that is not the comedy.
Not far from “Benacadie,” on the other side of a wooded ridge, was a beaver meadow sparsely overgrown with ash and alder, where the cow was tied out every morning in blue-joint grass up to her eyes. It was fine pasturage, and the cow, being a sensible creature when she was not in a boat, proceeded to make cream of it. Before the season was over she became a pet and, like most pets, something also of a nuisance. She had a genius for freedom and diet; no sooner had she slipped her halter than she would come begging for cake at the kitchen. She would poke her head into open doors at unseemly hours of the night, or _moo_ into open windows at cockcrow in the morning. When she had eaten all she wanted of grass or browse, then her thoughts turned to pastures new, and she would follow any foot-loose man wherever he might be going.
In camp that summer was a cookee and handy man, who had been hired to do whatever anybody else or the cook shied at. It was a loose kind of contract, but Cookee kept his part of it admirably, stopping his whistle to answer our lumberman’s hail of “Cookee here!” and tackling any job with unfailing good humor. Though he got the burnt end of every stick, he believed he was born lucky until the bear chased him; after that he was sure of it. One of his jobs was to mog over to the beaver meadow before sundown, and lead the cow home to her shack for the night. She was a precious old beast, the only one of her kind in the whole region, and because there were bear signs in the woods we were taking no chances. Her owner said she would be worth a hundred dollars if we did not bring her back; and that is a lot of money to put into a bear bait.
Now Cookee, though he had spent a good part of his days in the lumber woods, had never met a bear, and said he never wanted to. After hearing plenty of bear stories, he was mortally afraid of the brutes. One afternoon, just as he approached the tethered cow, he ran head-on to a bear, and had the shock of his life. His first bulgy-eyed glance told him that it was a big bear, a black bear, a ferocious bear with red eyes; his next, that the fearsome beast was creeping over a windfall in his direction. With a yell he turned and streaked for camp. At his first jump he lost his hat, and he maintains that it was no bush but his own rising hair that lifted it off. A few more jumps and he had ripped off most of his buttons, with some of his clothes, as he tore his way through fir or moosewood thickets.
The lucky man had compelling reason for his haste. Even as he turned he heard a loud, unearthly bawling; which sent him up in the air in a convulsive way, as if thrown by a spring. Then came a terrifying _woof-woof!_ a cry with teeth and claws in it. On the heels of that sounded a furious crashing of brush, coming nearer and nearer.
Cookee never turned to look; he had no time. He had started to run, being light shod with moccasins; but now he flew. Great pine logs lay across his trail, with rows of little spruces growing out of their mossy tops; he sailed over them without touching a thing. Till that moment he had not dreamed how he could jump. Where the trail corkscrewed to avoid a thicket, he drove straight through with the directness of a startled grouse, leaving here a bit of skin or there a shred of raiment to mark his course. Every time he broke into open traveling he loosed another yell.
At first he felt himself going like the wind, and no deer ever took the jumps as he took them; but presently, though he was moving faster than ever, his heart sank, his spirit groaned, his legs became leaden legs, and his pace a snail’s pace. With all his striving, which was supermannish, he was not gaining an inch. However he jumped or however he ran, he could not shake off that ferocious thing at his heels. It stuck to him like a leech. No sooner did he hit the ground after one of his kangaroo springs than he heard behind him a thump and a grunt as the creature cleared the same log. Hardly was he out of a thicket with a despairing, “Save me, O Lord, from this bear!” on his lips, than there would follow a nerve-shattering crash as the pursuing beast plunged through the same bushes.
So, wild-eyed and hatless, but thrilling with a new hope, Cookee burst out of the woods, and just below him lay the camp, smoke curling out of its chimney most peacefully. Down the rough trail he came, hurdling stumps like a grasshopper, and almost scared the life out of the cook as he dove with a final yell of “Bear! Bear!” into the kitchen. Clear across the floor he slid, upsetting everything but the stove, and bringing a big dishpan down on the wreck with a mighty clatter. The scared cook had mind enough left to slam the door on the instant. Grabbing one the poker, the other a butcher knife, they rushed to the window to meet the enemy like men. And there, wheezing, stood the old cow with her nose against the door, trying to follow Cookee the rest of the way to safety. He had made that heart-bursting run with the notion that it was the bear making all the noise behind him.
So much of the story we heard from Cookee when we tumbled hastily out of tent or cabin at his wild yelling. The remainder I read from the trail or pieced together from my imagination.
That bear was a young bear, as the trail showed, and he had probably never seen a cow nor a man in his life before. Roaming with him were two others, a yearling and big she-bear; but they were luckily on the farther side of the beaver meadow, where Cookee could not see them. Had he met three bears, no one knows what miracle of jumping might have followed. He says that he would not have run any faster had he met a whole flock of bears, because no man could.
As Mooween came shuffling along, nosing about for grubs and other kickshaws that bears like, a new odor poured suddenly into his nostrils, a startling odor, rich and strong, which made him halt and sniff for possible trouble. Rising on his hind legs to peek over a windfall, he saw a strange beast, big and red and very smelly. Though its head was out of sight in the grass, two pointed horns were thrust about in alarming fashion; though its legs and most of its body were hidden, there was still bulk enough in sight to shame any bear, and it flirted a tail such as no bear ever dreamed of. A most astonishing beast, surely; but was it dangerous? Very cautiously, like any other suspicious bear, Mooween crept over the windfall for a better look and sniff at the monster.
It was at this psychological moment that Cookee appeared and fled. Startled by his yell, the cow threw up her head; and before her was a strange black beast, such as _she_ had never encountered. It was a day of surprises for everybody. The cow was staring in heavy, bovine wonder when a wisp of wind eddied round the meadow; it brought to her nose the rank bear smell, which electrified her like a yelping dog and a swarm of hornets all at once. Though that powerful, wet-doggy odor had never before entered her nostrils, there were ages of memory behind it, dead but not lost ages, during which countless of her ancestors had always curled their tails and fled from unseen bears. Her nerves first and then her heels flew off in a panic. With a bawl that shocked even herself she surged away on her rope, heading straight for camp, giving no heed to obstacles. Suddenly she had the legs of deer, the strength of giants.
The rope was tied to an overturned stump, to which clung a tangle of weathered roots; and it proved light anchorage for heavy weather. For a dozen yards the crazy thing whirled through grass or bushes, waving all its crooked arms like a devilfish. Then it caught fast; the rope snapped, and the cow went tearing up the trail on the heels of Cookee, following her protector jump for jump, as close as she could get without stepping on him.
Meanwhile the bear was running for his life, going twice as fast as any cow or cookee ever went, in the opposite direction. The first human yell had scared him stiff; but the bovine bawl galvanized him into action. Then came the bounding root, whirling mad arms, tearing up the grass, and that petrified him once more. With a _woof-woof!_ which sounded like an explosion, but which only said, “I’m a goner if I don’t light out of here!” he plunged headlong into the windfall over which he had just crept like a shadow, cracking a deal of dead branches as he went through. No more cat-footing for him; the world was too full of strange monsters. Across the meadow and into the big woods he rushed with great smashing of brush, making so much racket himself that he scarcely heard the sound of another flight. Behind him lay an amazing trail: here a hole in a wet spot with mud spattered all about; there a bunch of moss or a sliver of bark ripped from the top of a log; yonder, where the bear struck rising ground, a volley of dirt or chips flung out as he dug his toes into the hillside in frantic haste to get over the horizon.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
WHEN BEAVER MEETS OTTER
One rainy day, while crossing a northern lake, I saw a commotion in the water and drove my canoe up to it, so quietly that I was alongside a pair of fighting beasts before they noticed me. And then, to my astonishment, they went on with their fighting.
They were a beaver and an otter, both uncommonly large, and therefore uncommonly shy by all familiar standards. Not by carelessness does any creature come to unwonted size or years in the wilderness. Ordinarily these alert beasts would have vanished before I had even a glimpse of them. Now they were intent on the business in hand, at times locked jowl to throat, again circling for an opening and watching each other so warily that they had eyes for nothing else.
The otter did most of the sparring; at times he made the water boil as he whirled with nervous strokes about his enemy or dove like a flash to get beneath him. The beaver, larger but more clumsy, seemed content with defensive tactics, turning within his own length so as to face the attack. His beady eyes showed a gleam of red; his great cutting teeth were bared in a ferocious grin. Every time the otter flashed under like a dipper duck, the beaver would go down with the oily roll of a porpoise to meet him under water. A violent swirling, a stream of bubbles gurgling and plopping; then the two animals would wabble up to the surface, their teeth fastened in each other’s neck. Down or up, they paid no attention to the huge object floating near them; if they were aware of the canoe, it was but vaguely, their senses being blunted by their battle fury.
As they went down for the third or fourth time I noticed the water reddening around them, showing that it was time for some blessed peacemaker to interfere. Not knowing who started the fight, I pushed the canoe over them impartially. When they came up I splashed them with the paddle, and they seemed to realize for the first time that a stranger, an enemy, was watching them. In a wink they were themselves once more; their native alertness returned; their lunacy was shed like a garment. The beaver sounded on the instant, giving the alarm signal of his tribe as he went down. He is a sociable creature, living by choice with a colony of his fellows, and in him the thought of his own safety is always associated with the safety of others. But the otter, accustomed to roaming alone, whirled without a sound and forged away on the surface, heading for the nearest shore. There I watched him twisting about uneasily, mewing over his wounds, dressing his rumpled fur like a sick cat.
That was the first time I ever learned of the grudge which seems to stand unsettled between beaver and otter. Had it been the last, I would have thought no more of it than of any other odd incident; but several times in later years I found signs of the same incomprehensible feud. Once the evidence took the form of two dead bodies, beaver and otter, floating together in a cove at the mouth of a brook, where the water circled aimlessly round and round. They had killed each other, I judged, since both were badly bitten about the neck. In a grip that neither had the will to break they sank to the bottom and died. There they rested awhile, till with lightened bodies they rose to the surface and went bumping each other around the eddy, as if their quarrel were still on.
Whether the feud were general among all otters and beavers of that region, or whether it was a private animosity kindled by a personal grievance, I had no means of knowing. Occasionally I would hear of a similar quarrel in other places, and every new indication of it puzzled me afresh. Fights being rarely exceptional between animals of different species, I could imagine no reason why a beaver, most inoffensive of the wood folk, should go out of his way to force a quarrel on an animal with whom he has no dealing from one year’s end to another. The two are not what we call natural enemies, meaning by the thoughtless expression that one does not eat the other as food. They belong to different tribes that have nothing in common, not even a cause of enmity. They cannot interfere with each other in the matter of food, since the otter lives on fish, the beaver on bark or water plants, according to season. Moreover, every wild animal avoids meddling with creatures that do not appeal to him momentarily when he is looking for something to eat, and the beaver is exemplary in minding his own business. He lives a secluded kind of life, wandering up or down the wilderness streams with his family all summer, shutting himself up in a narrow prison all winter; and, aside from wolves or lynxes, which gladly eat beaver meat when they have a rare chance, he has not an enemy in his quiet world so long as man keeps out of it.