THE YOUNG GAME-WARDEN

BY

HARRY CASTLEMON

AUTHOR OF "THE HOUSE-BOAT BOYS," "GUNBOAT SERIES," "ROCKY MOUNTAIN SERIES," ETC.

THE JOHN C. WINSTON CO. PHILADELPHIA CHICAGO TORONTO

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Copyright, 1896, BY HENRY T. COATES & CO.

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CONTENTS.

[Pg 5]

THE

YOUNG GAME-WARDEN.

CHAPTER I. SILAS MORGAN.

"I do think in my soul that of all the mean things a white man has to do, hauling wood on a hot day like this is the very meanest."

The speaker was Silas Morgan—a tall, broad-shouldered man, whose tattered garments and snail-like movements proclaimed him to be the very personification of indolence and shiftlessness.

As he spoke, he took off his hat and drew his shirt-sleeve across his dripping forehead, while the lazy old horse, which had pulled[Pg 6] the rickety wood-rack up the long, steep hill from the beach, lowered his head, dropped his ears, and fell fast asleep.

The man had two alert and wide-awake companions, and they were a brace of finely-bred Gordon setters, which, after beating the bushes on both sides of the road in the vain effort to put up a grouse or start a hare, now came in, and lay down near the wagon.

They were a sight for a sportsman's eye, and that same sportsman would very naturally ask himself how it came that this poverty-stricken fellow could afford to own dogs that would have won honors at any bench-show in the land.

"Yes, I reckon them dog-brutes air just about nice," Silas said, whenever any inquisitive person propounded this inquiry to him, "and they were given to me for a present by a couple of city shooters who once hired me for a guide. You see, birds of all sorts, and 'specially woodcock, was mighty skeerce that year, but I took 'em where there was a little bunch that I was a saving for my own shooting, and they had the biggest kind of sport.[Pg 7] They give me them dogs in consequence of my perliteness to 'em."

There was no one in the neighborhood who could dispute this story, but there were those who took note of the fact that at certain times the dogs disappeared as completely as though they had never existed, and that they were never seen when there were any strange sportsmen in the vicinity.

"The luck that comes to different folks in this world is just a trifle the beatenest thing that I ever heared tell on," continued Silas, leaning heavily upon the wood-rack and fanning his flushed face with his brimless straw hat. "I can think and plan, but it don't bring in no money, like it does for some folks that ain't got nigh as much sense as I have. Now, there's them two setter dogs that was accidentally left on my hands last year! I thought sure that I'd make my everlasting fortune out of them; but if there's been a reward offered for their safe return to their master, I never seen or heared of it. I've tried every way I can think of to make something, so't things in and around my house[Pg 8] won't look so sorter peaked and poor, but I'm as fur from hitting the mark now as I was ten year ago. I wish I could think up some way to make a strike, but I can't; and so here goes for that wood-pile. It won't always be as hot as it is to-day. Winter will be here before long, the roads will be blocked with drifts, and if this wood ain't

down to the beach directly, me and the ole woman will have to shiver over a bare hearth."

With this reflection to put life and energy into him, Silas straightened up and turned toward the wood-pile with slow and reluctant steps, all unconscious of the fact that every move he made was closely watched by two recumbent figures, who, snugly concealed by a thicket of evergreens, a short distance away, had distinctly caught every word of his soliloquy.

The dogs knew they were there, for they had run upon their hiding-place, but as the recumbent figures were neither birds nor hares, they did not even bark at them, but gave a friendly wag with their tails, as if to say that it was all right, and returned to their[Pg 9] master, to whom they gave no sign to indicate that they had discovered anything.

Silas went about his work in that indescribably lazy way that a boy or man generally assumes when he is laboring under protest. Every stick he lifted from the pile to the wagon seemed to tax his strength to the very utmost, and he was often obliged to stop and rest; but still he made a little headway, and when the rack was about half-loaded he concluded that he could do no more until he had refreshed himself with a smoke.

"I have always heared," said Silas, aloud (whenever he thought himself safely out of hearing, he invariably gave utterance to the thoughts that were in his mind)—"I have always heared 'em say that all this country around here is historical, and that if these mountings could speak, they'd tell tales that would make your eyes stick out as big as your fist.

"They do say that there's been a heap of stealing and plundering going on about here in the days gone by"—as Silas said this he glanced around him a little apprehensively—"and [Pg 10]that there's heaps and stacks of gold and silver hid away where nobody won't ever think of looking for 'em. If I thought that was so, wouldn't I try my level best to find some of it? I'd leave Joe and Dan to run the ferry, and then I'd put a shovel on to my shoulder and come up here, and never leave off digging till I'd turned some of these mountings t'other side up. But I guess I won't smoke. I was fool enough to come away and leave my matches to home."

Silas held his pipe in his hand, and ran his eye along the wood-pile as if he were looking for a light.

As he did so, he gave a sudden start, his eyes opened to their widest extent, his under jaw dropped down, and the hand in which he held the pipe fell to his side.

The object that riveted his gaze was a letter. It had been thrust into a crack in the end of a stick of wood, and looked as though it might have been placed there on purpose to attract his attention.

"Now, don't that beat you?" exclaimed Silas, who was greatly astonished. "Who in[Pg 11] the world has been using my wood-pile for a post-office, I'd like to know?"

If the truth must be told, Silas was frightened as well as surprised. Like all ignorant men, he was superstitious, and whenever he saw or heard anything for which he could not account on the instant, he was sure to be overcome with terror.

His first thought was to take to his heels, make the best of his way to the cabin, and send his boys back after the wagon; but if he did that, they would be sure to see the letter—they couldn't help it, if they kept their eyes open—and might they not read it and make themselves masters of some information that he alone ought to possess?

"It's mighty comical how that thing come there, and who writ it," said Silas, "and somehow I can't get my consent to tech it."

And he didn't touch it, either, until he had viewed it from all sides. First, he bent down, with his hands upon his knees, and twisted his body into all sorts of shapes in the vain effort to see the other side of the letter. Then he straightened up and made a wide circle[Pg 12] around it; and finally, he climbed upon the wood-pile and looked at it from another direction. At last, he must have satisfied himself that it was a letter and nothing else, for he reached out his hand and took possession of it.

"It's mighty comical," repeated Silas, looking first at the letter, and then turning suspicious glances upon the surrounding woods, "and I can't for the life of me think who put it there. Now, who'll I get to read it for me? I can spell out printing with the best of them, but I can't say that I know much about them turkey-tracks they call writing."

As Silas was walking around the wood-pile toward his wagon, he turned the letter over in his hands, and then he saw that there was something inscribed upon the envelope. The characters were printed, too, and the man had little difficulty in deciphering the following:

"Notis "to the luckey person in to whose hans this dockyment may happen to fall. thare is a big fortune for you in this mounting if you have got the pluck to[Pg 13] do what I have writ on the inside. thare is danger in it, but mebbe that hant won't bother you as it has bothered me ever since I pushed him in to the gorge."

Silas was in another profuse perspiration long before he spelled out the last word in the "notis," but now the cold chills began creeping all over him. His breath came in short, quick gasps, and his hand trembled visibly, as he thrust the letter into his pocket. Then he cast frightened glances on all sides of him, glided back to his wagon with long noiseless footsteps and reached for the reins.

The commands which he usually shouted at his aged and infirm beast, were uttered in a whisper, and the horse, not being accustomed to that style of driving, had to be severely admonished with a hickory switch before he would settle into the collar and start the very light load behind him.

Silas never could have told how he got down the hill without breaking his crazy old wagon all to pieces, for his mind was so completely taken up with other matters that he never thought to look out for the rough places[Pg 14] in the road, or to give a wide berth to the stumps. He seemed to be treading on air. He hoped and believed that he was on the point of making a most important discovery; but, great as was his desire to make himself the possessor of the fortune that was hidden somewhere in the mountain he had just left, he could not screw up courage enough to stop and read the letter. He wanted to put the woods far behind him before he did that. The "notis" he had read contained some words that he did not like to recall to mind.

"Didn't I say that there had been a heap of plundering and stealing a going on in this country in bygone days?" said Silas to himself. "This letter proves it, and the words that's printed onto the envelope tells me some things that I don't like to hear tell of. There's likewise been some killing a going on up there. A feller has been shoved into one of the gorges, and his hant (some folks calls it a ghost or spirit) has come back, and keeps a bothering of the feller that pushed him in. I don't know whether or not I can get my[Pg 15] consent to go up there and dig for that fortune, even if I knew where to look for it, which I don't."

At the end of half an hour, Silas Morgan drew a long breath of relief, and stopped looking behind him.

He was safely out of the woods, and moving quietly along the river road, within shouting distance of his cabin.

Then his courage all came back to him, and he was ready for any undertaking, no matter how dangerous it might be, so long as there was money behind it.

"Now, Silas, let's look at this thing kind o' sensible like," said he to himself. "There must be as much as a thousand dollars up there in the mounting. If there wasn't, it wouldn't be a fortune, would it? And what's to hender you from getting it for you own? If you go up there in the daytime, that hant can't bother you none, 'cause I've heard folks say that they never show themselves except on dark and stormy nights; but if this one comes out and tells you to leave off digging for that fortune, you can fill him so full of[Pg 16] bird shot that he won't be of no use as a hant any more, can't you? Get along with you!" he shouted, bringing the heavy switch down upon the horse's back with no gentle hand. "I ain't got much more wood hauling for you to do, 'cause I'm going after them thousand dollars."

A few minutes later Silas reached his home. Dropping the reins and whip to the ground, he bolted into the cabin, closing the door behind him.

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CHAPTER II. THE BROTHERS.

"Toot! toot! t-o-ot!"

This was the third time the horn had been blown—first warningly, then persuasively, and at last angrily.

The hunters on the other side of the river, who had been trying for more than twenty minutes to bring the ferryman over to them, were beginning to get impatient. So was Joe Morgan, the ferryman's youngest son—a sturdy, sun-browned boy of fifteen, who stood in the flat, holding one of the heavy sweeps in his hand, all ready to shove off.

He looked toward the men on the opposite shore, and then he looked at his brother, who sat on the bank, with his elbows on his knees and his chin resting on his hands.

"There's eighty cents in that load," said Joe, who was in a great hurry to respond to[Pg 18] the angry blasts of the horn. "If they get tired of waiting, and go down to the bridge, we shall be just that much out of pocket."

"Let 'em go, if they want to," replied the boy on the bank, in a lazy, indifferent tone. "There's no law to hinder 'em that I know of. Pap don't seem to be in no great hurry, and neither be I. I'm sick and tired of pulling that heavy flat over the river every time anybody takes a fool notion into his head to toot that horn. Some day I'll get mad and sink it so deep that it can't never be found again—I will so!"

"Now, Dan, what's the use of talking that way?" exclaimed Joe, impatiently. "You know well enough that as long as we run the ferry, we must hold ourselves in readiness to serve any one who may call upon us; and if you should destroy the flat, we would have to get another or give up the business."

"And that's just what I want to do," answered Dan.

"Then how would we make a living?"

"Easy enough. Can't we all shoot birds and rabbits when the season's open, and snare[Pg 19] 'em when it's shut? And can't mother earn a dollar every day by washing for them rich—"

"Dan, I'm ashamed of you," interrupted Joe. "What mother wants is rest, and not more work. Come on; what's the use of being so lazy? You've got to make a start some time or other."

But Dan made no move, and Joe, who was very much disgusted with his brother's obstinacy, threw down the sweep, sprang ashore and ran up the bank toward the little board cabin that stood at the top.

Finding that the door would not open for him, Joe ran around the corner of the building, and looked in at a convenient window, just in time to catch his father in the act of thrusting a letter into his pocket. The ferryman's face was flushed, and his movements were nervous and hurried. The boy saw at a glance that he was greatly excited about something.

"As long as I have been acquainted with him, I never knew him to get a letter before," said Joe to himself. "He has heard some[Pg 20] very good or some very bad news, for he is so upset that he doesn't seem to know what he is about."

"I heard 'em blowing, Joey," said Silas, without waiting for the boy to speak, "and now we'll go and bring 'em over. Thank goodness, I won't have to follow this mean business much longer. I don't like it, Joey. I wasn't born to wait on other folks, and I'm going to quit it."

"Then you will have to quit ferrying," said Joe, as he followed his father down the bank.

"That's just what I intend to do," answered Silas, and then the boy noticed that there was a triumphant smile on his face, and that he rubbed his hands together as if he were thinking about something that afforded him the greatest satisfaction. "I've got an idee into my head, and if I don't make the folks around here look wild some of these days, I'm a goat," added the ferryman.

And then he raised a yell to let the men on the other side of the river know that he had at last made up his mind to respond to their[Pg 21] signals. But before he did so, he shaded his eyes with his hand, and took a good look at the group on the opposite bank, after which he walked around the cabin, snapping his fingers as he went. This was a signal to the dogs that it was time for them to retire from public gaze for a short season; in other words, to go into a miserable lean-to behind the cabin, which Silas called a wood-shed, and stay there until the hunters, who were now on the other side of the river, should have passed out of sight. They went in in obedience to a sign from the ferryman, and the latter closed the door and put a stick of cord-wood against it to hold it in place.

"If them setter brutes was a present to pap, like he says they was, it's mighty comical to me why he takes so much trouble to hide 'em every time some of them city shooters comes along and toot that horn," soliloquized Dan, as he slowly, almost painfully, arose from the ground, and, after much stretching and yawning, followed his father and brother down the bank toward the flat. "He says he's scared that somebody will take a notion[Pg 22] to 'em and steal 'em; but that's all in my one eye, 'cording to my way of thinking. Now, I'll just tell him this for a fact. If he don't quit being so stingy with the money I help him earn with this ferry, I'll bust up the plans he's got into his head about them dogs—I will so. I wonder what's come over him all of a sudden? Here he's been clear up the mounting and come back with only an armful of wood on his wagon, and he don't generally whoop in that there good-natured way, less'n he's got something on his mind."

That was true enough. The ferryman's replies to the hails that came to him from over the river, usually sounded more like the complaints of a surly bear than anything else to which we can compare them. The tone in which they were uttered seemed to say, "I'll come because I can't help myself," and he was so long about it, and made himself so very disagreeable in the presence of his passengers, that those who knew him would often go ten miles out of their way to reach a bridge rather than put a dime into his pocket. But on this particular morning, his voice rang out so[Pg 23] cheerily that it attracted Joe's attention as well as Dan's.

Silas was always good-natured when he had something besides his poverty to think about, and Joe would have known that his father had some new idea in his head, even if he had not said a word about it.

"Lively, Dannie!" exclaimed Silas, seizing the steering-oar and pushing the flat away from the bank. "Put in your very best licks, 'cause there won't none of us have to follow this miserable business much longer. There'll be a day when we won't have to go and come at everybody's beck and call, and that day ain't so very far away neither."

The two boys took their places at the sweeps, and the flat moved out into the river. Joe did his best to make a quick passage, as he always did, while the lazy Dan, who had the current in his favor, merely put his oar into the water and took it out again, without exerting himself in the least. His father's hopeful and encouraging words did not infuse a particle of energy into him. He had heard him talk that way too often.

[Pg 24]

"It ain't right that we should be so poor, while other folks, who never did a hand's turn in their lives, have got more than they know what to do with," continued Silas, as he dropped the steering-oar into the water. "I've got just as much right to have money, and the fine things that money'll buy, as anybody has, and I'm going to have 'em, too. I ain't going to live like the pigs in the gutter no longer. Just think of the hundreds and thousands of dollars that's spent down to the Beach every summer by the city chaps who come there to loaf! I can't lay around under the shade of the trees or swing in a hammock just 'cause the weather's hot. I've got to work. I've got to cut cord-wood in winter and run this ferry during the summer, in order to make a living; but other fellows can stay around and do nothing, just 'cause they've got money. I say again, that such things ain't right."

"It makes me savage every time I go down to the Beach," chimed in Dan, "when I see them city folks, who ain't a cent's worth better than I be, wearing their good clothes, and[Pg 25] walking around with their fine guns and fish-poles on their shoulders—"

"Like them over there," said his father, nodding his head toward the bank, which was now but a short distance away.

Dan faced about on his seat, and took a good look at the party in question.