Book: The Shagganappi

E >> E. Pauline Johnson >> The Shagganappi




Maurice took in the situation at once. With the instinct of a veteran
mail carrier, his first care was to roll his mail bags in a rubber
sheet, while the registered sack, doubly protected, he never allowed for
a moment to leave its station beneath his knees under the seat. These
simple precautions were barely completed before the storm was upon
him. A blinding flash set his horses on edge, their sensitive nerves
quivering in every flank. Maurice gathered the lines firmly, seized his
"blacksnake," and, with a low whistle, urged his animals, that bounded
forward, snorting with fear as a crack of thunder followed, booming down
the gorges with deafening echoes. In another moment the whole forest
seemed alive. The giant pines whipped and swayed together, their supple
tips bending and beaten with the fury of the tempest. Above the wild
voices of the hurricane came the frequent crash of falling timber;
but, through it all, the boy drove on without thought of himself or
of shelter, and through it all the splendid animals kept the trail,
responding as only the horse can respond to the touch of a guiding rein
or the sound of the mountaineer's whistle. But the end came for Maurice,
when, upon rounding an abrupt steep, his four animals reared in terror,
then seemed to crouch back upon their haunches. The rude log bridge they
should have dashed across was gone--in its place gaped a huge fissure,
its throat choked with wreckage of trestle and planking.

The unexpected halt nearly pitched Maurice from the wagon, but he
steadied first his nerve, then his hands, then his eyes. Why had the
bridge gone down, was his first thought. The storm was of far too brief
duration to have done the mischief. Then those keen young eyes of his
saw beyond the tempest and the ruined bridge. They saw about the useless
supports and wooden props fresh chips from a recent axe. In a second his
brain grasped the fact that the bridge had been cut away on purpose. His
thoughts flew forward--for what purpose was it destroyed? Like a dream
seemed to come the captain's voice in his ears: "Better take a gun with
you, boy, and keep a sharp lookout for that registered stuff--mind!" And
he heard himself reply, "I'll land the mail at the mines all right."

"And I'll do it, too!" he said, aloud. Then, above the hoarse voices of
the storm, he heard a low, long, penetrating whistle. Quick as a flash
the boy realized his position. He snatched the registered mail bag from
between his knees. "Royal! Royal! Good dog!" he called, softly, and the
poor, wet, storm-beaten creature came instantly, reaching pathetically
toward his young master, his forefeet pawing the wagon wheels, his fine,
keen nose sniffing at the mail sack outheld by Maurice.

"Royal, you must watch!" said the boy. "Watch, Royal, watch!" Then,
with a strengthy fling of his arm, he hurled the precious bag of
registered mail over the rim of the precipice, far down into the canyon,
two hundred feet below. For an instant the dog stood rigid. Then, like
the needle to the north, he turned, held his sensitive head high in the
air for a moment, sniffed audibly and was gone. Then again came that
low, long whistle. The horses' ears went erect, and Maurice sat silent,
grasping the reins and peering ahead through the now lessening rain.
But, with all his young courage, his heart weakened when a voice spoke
directly behind him. It said:

"Who are you?"

He turned and faced three men, and, looking directly into the eyes of
the roughest-seeming one of the trio, he replied, quietly:

"I think you know who I am."

"Humph! Cool, I must say!" answered the first speaker. "Well, perhaps we
can warm you up a bit; but maybe you can save us some trouble by telling
us where old Delorme is."

"At home," said Maurice.

"And you've brought the mall in place of Delorme, I suppose? Well, so
much the better for us. I'll trouble you to hand me out that bag of
registered stuff."

The man ceased speaking, his hand on the rim of the front wheel.

"I have no registered stuff," the boy answered, truthfully. "Just six
common mail bags. Do you wish them? As I am only one boy against three
men, I suppose there is not much use resisting." Maurice's lip curled in
a half sneer, and his eyes never left the big bully's face.

"A lie won't work this time, young fellow!" the man threatened. "Boys,
go through that wagon! go over every inch of it now; you'll find the
stuff all right."

The other two men emptied the entire load into the trail, then turned
and stared at their leader.

"This is a bluff! Rip open those bags!" he growled. And the next moment
the contents of the six bags were sprawling in the mud. They contained
nothing but ordinary letters and newspapers.

"Sold!" blurted out the man. "We might have known that any yarn
'Saturday Jim' told us would be a lie. He couldn't give a man a straight
tip to save his life! Come on, boys! There's nothing doing this trip!"
And, swinging about, he turned up an unbroken trail that opened on some
hidden pass to the "front." His two pals followed at his heels,
muttering sullenly over their ill success.

"No," said Maurice to himself. "You're quite right, gentlemen! There's
nothing doing this trip!" But, aloud, he only spoke gently to his
wearied horses as he unhitched and secured them to the rear of the
wagon, gathered the scattered mail, and then scanned the sky narrowly.
The storm was over, but the firs still thrashed their tops in the wind,
the clouds still trailed and circled about the mountain summit. For a
full hour Maurice sat quietly and thought things. What was to be done?
The bridge was gone, the registered mail at the bottom of the canyon,
and the day growing shorter every moment. Only one course lay before
him. (He would not consider, even for a second, that any way lay open
to him behind.) He must get that mail to the mines, or he could never
look his father in the face again. He walked cautiously to the brink of
the precipice and looked over. It was very steep. Nothing was visible
but broken rock, boulders and bracken. No sign of either Royal or the
mail bag; but he knew that somewhere, far below, the dog was keeping
watch; that his four wise, steady feet had unerringly taken him where
his animal instinct had dictated; and Maurice argued that, where his
four feet could go, his two could follow. He must recover the bag,
select his fleetest horse, and ride bareback on to the mines.

The descent was a long, rough, dangerous business, but Maurice had
learned many a climbing trick from the habits of the mountain goat, and
at last he stood at the canyon's bottom, a tired, lonely but courageous
bit of boyhood, ready to suffer and dare anything so long as he could
prove himself worthy of the trust that his father had placed in his
strong young hands.

He stood for a moment, awed by the wonder of the granite walls that rose
like a vast fortress, towering above him, silent and motionless. Then he
gave one clear whistle, then listened. Almost within stone's throw came
the response the half-sad, wholly eager whine of a dog. Maurice was
beside him in a twinkling, patting and hugging the beautiful animal, who
lay, with shining eyes and wagging tail, his forepaws resting on the
coarse canvas which bore, woven redly into its warp and woof, the two
words: "Canada Mail."

What a meeting it was! Boy and dog, each with a worthy trust, worthily
kept. But it was one, two, three hours before Maurice, footsore,
exhausted, and with bleeding fingers, followed by Royal, panting and
thirsty, regained the trail where the horses stood, ready for the onward
gallop, three of them failing to understand why they were to be left in
the lonely forest, while the fourth was quickly bridled, packed with the
mail sacks and Maurice, and told to "be careful now!" as he picked his
way down and around the bridgeless gorge and "hit the trail" on the
opposite side.

It was very late that night when the men at the mines heard the even
gallop of an approaching horse. Many of the miners had gone to bed
grumbling and threatening when no mail had arrived and no wages were
paid. The manager and his assistants were still up, however, perplexed
and worried that, for the first time, old Maurice Delorme had failed to
reach the camp with the company's money bags. But up the rough makeshift
of a road came those galloping hoofs, halting before the primitive
post office, while the crowd gathered and welcomed a strange trio. The
manager himself lifted poor, stiff, tired "Little" Maurice from the
back of an equally stiff, tired mountain pony, while a hot, hungry
hound whined about, trying to tell the whole story in his wonderful dog
fashion; but, when they did hear the real story from Maurice, there was
a momentary silence, then a rough old miner fairly shouted, "Well, by
the Great Horn Spoon, he's old Maurice Delorme's son all right!" Then
came--cheers!



The Whistling Swans


For several evenings early in October the North Street boys had been
gathering at Benson's to try and organize a club, but the difficulty
seemed to be to decide upon what kind of a club would be most
interesting. The ball season would soon be over, the long winter would
soon be on them, and things wore a pretty flat outlook, unless they
could arrange some interesting diversion for that string of dull days,
only broken by Christmas holidays. The West Ward fellows had a Checker
Club, the Third Form fellows had a Puzzle Club, the Collegiates had a
Canadian Literature Club; even the Mill boys down on the Flats had a
Captain Kidd Club, proving themselves at times bandits quite worthy the
club's name. Only the North Street boys seemed "out of it," but from the
way they talked and shouted and wrangled at these preliminary meetings
it looked as if they certainly intended to "come in" out of their
isolation. But there had been five meetings without any decision having
been arrived at. Every boy of the ten present seemed to want a different
sort of club. The things that were suggested would have amazed the
members of the various other clubs could they have heard them.

Then, one night when the din and confusion were at fever heat, the door
suddenly opened and in walked Benson's father.

"Why, what's all this babel?" he exclaimed, as silence fell on the
crowd and the boys got to their feet meekly to greet him with polite
"good-evenings." "I never heard such a parrot-and-monkey, Kilkenny-cat
outfit in all my life! What's up, fellows?"

Benson's father was generally acknowledged to be a "comedian." No one
ever saw him in a temper, or heard him speak a sharp word. He had a
droll, woebegone face that never smiled, but a face everybody--from the
mayor to the poorest mill hand--loved and respected. How often Benson
had come in from school, ill-tempered and sour-visaged at something that
had gone wrong in the class-room, only to have that droll face of his
father's and some equally droll remark upset all his dignity and
indignation into laughter and consequent good nature.

"One at a time, boys, just one at a time, or I shall have bustificated
eardrums! What is it all about?"

Then they told him, but, it must be confessed, not one at a time.

"A club, eh?" he questioned, straddling a chair and leaning his arms on
the back. "What kind of a club, pleasure club, improvement club,
sporting club, what?"

"That's the trouble; we can't hit on it!" they chorused.

For a moment he sat silent, his round, childish eyes surveying the world
that hung on his very first words.

"I saw a queer thing as I came up the street to-night", he began,
seemingly having forgotten the subject in hand. "A dray-horse was
standing before the mill gates, and frisking about its heels was a dandy
little cocker spaniel, prettiest little dog you ever saw. The horse got
tired leaning on one leg, I guess, for he shifted his position, and, in
bringing down his left hind leg, he just pinned the little cocker's foot
to the ground with his big hoof. Cocker yelled. Worst row I ever
heard--until I came into this room. But what do you suppose Mr. Horse
did? Just lifted gently his left fore-hoof, but the squealing did not
stop. Then he lifted his right fore-hoof; still the squealing went on.
'Thinks I,' said the horse to himself, 'it must be my right hind-hoof,'
so he lifted that. 'No, sir,' he told himself; 'sure, it's my
left-hinder'; and lifting that, he released the poor dog, who dashed
around to the horse's head, leaping up to his nose, and saying, 'Thank
you!' over and over.* And the big, clumsy dray-horse just drew his
long face a little longer, and said: 'Never mind, old chap! I didn't
mean to hurt you; I'm sorry.' Then came the drayman out of the mill--a
nice, considerate, heart-warm, intelligent human being. Oh, yes! we
humans know so much more than animals, don't we, fellows? And because
the big, patient, kindly dray-horse had, in its restlessness, moved
twenty feet from the spot the driver left him at, that creature that is
supposed to have known better, just took his whip and licked and lashed
that glorious animal, yelling in a frenzy of temper, 'I'll teach you to
move, when I leave you! You--' Well, boys, you nor I don't care to hear
all he did say."

[*Fact observed by the writer's brother.]


"The brute!" "The big human hulk!" "The sneak!" "And he called himself a
man!" were some of the phrases growled out by the indignant boys.

"Yes, a man," continued Benson's father, "_so_ much better than the
dray-horse, that knew enough to lift his feet until he lifted the right
one. I believe if that horse had the feet of a centipede, he would have
gone on lifting them until the dog was released. I tell you, boys, if I
could get anyone to help me, I'd start an Animal Rescue Club, to--"

But the good gentleman never finished that sentence. The boys were on
top of him, round him, under him, clamoring and shouting for him to
organize their club for them, to help them study the habits and ways
and "thoughts" of animals, to prevent abuse and cruelty towards them.
They voted him in as honorary president, and went home that night the
happiest-hearted lot of boys in the country. Just before they dispersed,
however, a shy little chap named Jimmy Duffy, who had not much
opportunity to speak amid the noise of stronger voices, said:

"But, Mr. Benson, you _do_ think the dray-horse thought and reasoned,
don't you?"

"Surely he did, boy! And he spoke, too, in his own simple
horse-language, though we cannot understand his tongue; but we should,"
answered Benson's father.

It was not very long before the "Animal Rescue Club" of North Street
became known far and wide, and its influence began to be felt in all
quarters. The unfeeling drayman whose act of cruelty first gave rise
to the organization was watched, then reported to police headquarters,
from where he received a sound lecture because of various other
ill-treatments of his horse, and after a time he began to see his own
unkindness through the same spectacles as the "Animal Rescuers" viewed
it, and within two months he became a considerate, gentle driver.

"If the club never does another thing but reform that one man, and make
him kinder to that big, good-hearted horse of his, it has been organized
for some purpose," commented Mr. Benson, one evening, when he "dropped
in" to one of the meetings. "Keep it up, fellows. Our little four-footed
animals serve us well, and deserve consideration in return." And the
boys worked hard and faithfully to follow his advice. Homeless cats,
stray, mangy dogs, ill-fed horses, neglected cows, street sparrows,
pigeons, bluejays, were watched and protected and relieved of their
sufferings all that winter through. Finally Benson's father arranged his
evenings so that he could spend an hour with the club at each meeting,
which time he devoted to "lecturing" on the habits and haunts of
animals and birds. Those lectures were the delight of all, for this
happy-hearted, boyish man would, in some marvellous fashion, discover
all the humorous habits and comical dispositions and actions of every
living thing. The little wiry-haired Irish terrier was a comedian, he
declared. The bull-moose was a tragedian, the black bear cub was a
clown, the lynx a villain, and the migrating birds a sweet, invisible
chorus. Then to each and all he would attach some fascinating story,
explaining why they resembled these characters. Often the entire club
would be roaring with laughter over animal antics and bird capers,
then the young faces would be very serious the next minute over some
pathetic, heartbreaking tale of hunted deer-mothers trying to protect
their pretty fawns, or some father fox lying dead because a swift bullet
had caught him as he raided the poultry yard in the endeavor to seize
food for the pretty litter of sharp-nosed little cubs, curled up with
their mother in a distant cave.

So the boys listened and learned and laughed, and, as spring crept up
the calendar, their only regret at the return of the ball season was
that the club meetings would be over until next autumn.

* * * * * * * *

It was late in April when little Jimmy Duffy's father was called to
Buffalo on business. The night before leaving, he said: "It's most
annoying! Here I have to go all that way for just about one hour's talk
with a man; an entire day wasted for the sake of one hour, or--hold on,
let's see, Jimmy. You have never seen Niagara Falls, have you?"

"No, dad," answered Jimmy, his face eager with hope.

"Then you be ready to come with me to-morrow. I'll get through my
business by noon, and you and I will just 'do' the Falls until dark,
and get home on the late train. How does that strike you?"

But Jimmy was speechless with delight. For years he had longed to see
Niagara, but there was a number of older brothers and sisters, and
Jimmy's turn never seemed to have come until to-day. But the treat was
here at last. A whole day along with his big dad, prowling about Niagara
Falls, feasting his eyes upon its wonders, listening to its everlasting
roar as it plunges over the heights! Jimmy did not sleep very much that
night, and, long before train time, he was up, dressed in his best
suit, even got himself a fresh pocket-handkerchief, scrambled through
breakfast, then sat fidgeting on the front doorstep, while his father
took a leisurely meal, glanced calmly at his watch occasionally, then,
pushing back his chair, stepped briskly into the hall, glanced at the
weather, got his light coat and hat, said good-bye to Mrs. Duffy, and
called out "Now, then, Jimmy!" But Jimmy was already at the gate, having
kissed his mother good-bye almost an hour before, and presently they
were swinging up to the station at a good gait, Mr. Duffy silent,
thoughtful, engrossed in his coming business engagement, Jimmy dancing,
whistling, strung up with excitement that bade fair to continue
throughout the day.

It took three hours to reach Buffalo. Then poor Jimmy had to sit in a
stuffy outer office while his father and "the man" talked on the other
side of a glass door. Jimmy thought they would never stop, but in
exactly one hour the door opened, and he heard "the man" say:

"Now, Mr. Duffy, will you come to my club and we will have luncheon
together?"

"Not to-day, thanks, Mr. Brown. I have my small boy with me, and we're
off for the Falls. Jimmy's never seen them yet."

"Well, well!" answered Mr. Brown. "That's nice! Going to be a boy again
yourself, eh, Duffy? Well, have a good time, and good luck to you both!"
And the glass door closed.

His business ended, Jimmy's father seemed another person. He chatted and
talked and laughed with his son, ordered a splendid luncheon for them
both, swung aboard the train, and by two o'clock they were standing
on the very edge of the precipice, with the glorious Falls of Niagara
thundering into the basin at their feet. The column of filmy mist, the
gorgeous rainbows, the stupendous cataract, leaping and snarling like a
million wolves--it whirled about Jimmy's brain like a wild dream of No
Man's Land, and he walked beside his father in a daze of delight. They
prowled through the islands, crossed the cobwebby bridges from rock to
rock above the Falls, and finally sprawled on a bald ledge of stone that
jutted far out into the turbulent river.

"We'll just rest here a few minutes, James," said his father, playfully.
"Then we must go below the Falls and explore the ice-bridge. I see it
is yet in perfect condition. You are fortunate, my boy, to be able to
see it. There are some winters that never bring an ice-bridge. Then
sometimes it thaws in March, so we are lucky to-day."

About them tossed and tumbled the angry rapids, wrangling and brawling
around their granite shores, but, above their conflicting noises arose a
far, clear, musical sound, like a hundred throats and lips that whistled
in unison.

"What's that?" exclaimed Mr. Duffy, sitting erect suddenly.

"I don't know," said the boy, scanning the tangled waters with his
unpractised young eyes.

"There it is again, dad!" he cried. "It is whistling. A great company,
somewhere, whistling!" Then, looking quickly skyward, he pointed
excitedly upstream, "Look, look! Birds! They are birds! Great white
ones, dad! What are they? There's the whistle again!"

Mr. Duffy shaded his eyes from the sun, and watched; for there, in the
smooth waters above the rapids, were settling, one by one, a magnificent
host of snow-white swans, their wearied bodies almost drooping into the
river, their exhausted pinions dropping, nerveless and trailing, into
the dark, deceptive stream, which lured them like a snare to its breast.

"Jimmy, Jimmy!" shouted Mr. Duffy, "they're swans, and they're dead
played out! They're migrating north for the summer! I bet they've flown
a thousand miles! See, boy, they're spent, dead beat!"

Jimmy fairly held his breath. The magnificent band of birds were slowly
floating towards them. Now they could distinguish each regal body,
feathered in dazzling white, each bill, scarlet as a July poppy, each
gracefully lifted throat. But the majestic creatures floated swiftly and
silently on, on, on!

"Father!" The boy's voice trembled huskily. "Oh, father, you don't think
they are in any danger of going over, do you?" His begging, pleading
tones revealed his own childish fears.

"Oh, _surely_ not!" answered Mr. Duffy, but his tone lacked confidence.
Then, after a brief silence, he almost groaned: "Jimmy, they're done
for! They don't see their danger, and they're too tired to rise if they
do. Oh, boy, if we could save them!"

But Jimmy stood rigid, staring, his heart slowly breaking, breaking.
Anyone could see now that the stately battalion was doomed. With utter
unconsciousness they drifted on, exhausted with their far journey from
the lagoons and marshes of Chesapeake Bay, where the torrid suns had
driven them from their winter haunts, to wing their way to their summer
home in the far, white North.

"Oh, Jimmy, the pity of it!" murmured Mr. Duffy. But the boy stood
wordless, as the irresistible giant current caught the trusting birds
and swept them, with a hideous, overpowering force, to the very brink
of the Horseshoe Fall. The boy, thrilling with the horror of it, shut
his eyes, and flung himself, face downward, on the rocks. A strange,
inarticulate moan left the man's lips. The boy lifted his head, lifted
his eyes, but the river was empty.

They ran breathlessly across the cobwebby bridges, around Goat Island,
then to the shore, then to the elevator, and descended to the
ice-bridge; but, above the angry battle of Niagara, arose the plaintive,
dying cries of scores of snow-white birds, the shouts of gathering
sightseers. Against the ruthless edges of ice lay, bleeding and broken,
what was left of that superb company homeward bound. Their poor, twisted
legs, their crushed heads, their flattened bodies, their pitiful, dying
struggles, would melt a heart of stone. No more those graceful throats
would whistle through the April airs, beneath the early suns and the
late morning stars. The sweet, wild chorus was stilled forever.

By the time Jimmy and his father arrived, crowds of people had descended
with stones and sticks anything they could lay their hands on--and were
beating the remaining spark of life out of the helpless birds, then
seizing and quarrelling over the bodies, without one word of pity or
regret for the dreadful catastrophe, so long as they could secure the
coveted specimens of this rare migratory bird. Then Jimmy noticed that
some few had actually escaped injury, but, before he could reach them,
older and stronger people had rushed upon the terrified and weakened
creatures, and were clubbing them to death.

"Stop it! stop it!" he shouted. "Those birds are not injured! Save them!
Let them go!"

"Not if _I_ know it!" yelled back a huge fellow with the face of a
greedy demon. "Why, these birds are worth twenty dollars apiece!"
he blurted, "and I'm going to have every one of them."

Down, down, down, went one after another as they tried to rise and
spread their magnificent wings, until only one remained. With the
quickness of a cat, Jimmy flung his thin little body between the
flopping victim and the upraised club.

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