On that triangular forestland of extreme south-western Ontario there was a block of hardwood timber, consisting of something over two thousand acres. This was known as Bushwhackers’ Place. On its left lay a beautiful body of water called Rond Eau, and so close to this natural harbor grew the walnut trees that when the night was old the moon cast their shadows far out across the tranquil waters. From the edge of the bay northward and westward the forest swept in valleys and ridges until the lower lands were reached. Then the hard timber gave way to the rugged softwoods of the swales, where the giant basswood, elms, and ash trees gripped the damp earth with tenacious fingers that ran far underground, forming a network of fiber, which to this day wears down the plow-points of the tillers of the soil.

Why this upland was called Bushwhackers’ Place, or why the people who held possession there were called Bushwhackers, has never been explained. In fact, those simple people were not bushwhackers, but hunters, trappers, and fishermen. True, each landowner had cleared a little land, quite sufficient to raise the vegetables necessary for his table and fodder for his sheep, oxen, and pigs, during the winter months; but the common tendency among the Bushwhackers seemed to be to let the timber stand until it was required for firewood.

All buildings in Bushwhackers’ Place were constructed of logs mortised at the ends. The beams, rafters, and floors of the homes were split or hewn from the finest grained timber procurable. When the walls were raised to a sufficient height doors and windows were cut in them, the rafters of the roof were laid, and the wide slabs, split from straight-grained ash blocks, were placed on the roof, overlapping one another so as to shed the rain. Blue clay was dug from the earth to fill in the chinks between the logs. The Bushwhacker’s home was roomy, warm, and comfortable.

Nineteen years ago Daniel McTavish, or Big McTavish, as he was commonly called on account of his great size, had settled in this spot with the determination of making it a home for himself and wife. The shadowy bushland appealed to him. He set to work with an ax and built a home. Shortly after it was finished a little McTavish was ushered into the world. Meanwhile, two other families had taken up claims near by. These were Jim Peeler and Ander Declute, and they with their wives came over to help name the baby.

Naming a baby in those old days was just as hard as it is in these. Each person had a particular name to fasten upon the new arrival. Peeler wanted to name him Wolfe, after a famous general he had heard of, but his wife protested on the grounds that the Government was offering a bounty for wolves and somebody might get mixed up and “kill him off.”

Mrs. Declute wanted to call the boy after some Bible hero. Moses, she thought, would be a good name. He looked just like Moses must have looked at his age, she said.

“I’ll tell you how we’ll decide,” said Ander Declute, after the debate had lasted some three hours. “We all of us have a different name we want to hitch to the youngster. I move that we let Mac here write out them names on a piece of paper and we’ll pin it to a tree and let the little chap decide for himself.”

“How?” asked the others.

“Well, after we’ve tacked up the paper somebody’ll hold a rifle and we’ll let the baby pull the trigger. The name the ball comes nearest to we’ll choose. What do you say?”

Everybody thought it a capital plan. The names were written on the sheet of paper and it was pinned to a tree. The baby’s mother held the light rifle and pressed the baby’s finger on the trigger. The little Bushwhacker did not so much as blink at the report.

The bullet bored one of the names through the letter O, and the name was B-O-Y.

“That’s the one I picked on,” grinned Declute, “an’ it’s a good one.”

So the baby was called Boy.

Others came to Bushwhackers’ Place and took up homesteads.

One, Bill Paisley, drifted in, from nobody knew where, and started “clearin’ ” near to Declute’s place. He was a tall, angular young man, with blue eyes which laughed all the time, and a firm jaw with muscles that had been toughened by tobacco-chewing. His hair was long and inclined to curl, and altogether he was a hearty, fresh, big piece of manhood. He could swing an ax with any man on Bushwhackers’ Place, and cut a turkey’s comb clean at eighty yards with his smooth-bore. He needed no other recommendations. The neighbors had a “bee” and helped Paisley up with his house. The Bushwhackers loved bees and “changin’ works,” for it brought them together. And although on account of much talking, one man could have accomplished more alone than three could at a bee, there was no hurry, and, as Peeler said, “a good visit beat work all hollow anyway.” Whiskey was plentiful and a jug of it could always be seen adorning a stump when a bee or “raisin’ ” was in progress. But because it was good, cheap, and as welcome as the flowers of the woodland, nobody drank very much of it. Maybe it would be a “horn all ’way ’round” after work was done, or a “night-cap” after the evening dance was over; for, be it known, no bee or raising was considered complete without a dance in the evening. Every Bushwhacker’s home had a jug of whiskey in it—usually under the bed,—a dog on the doorstep, and sheep, pigs, and cattle in the barnyard. These barnyards had tall rail-fences around them. In the winter months the wolves sometimes tried to scale the fences, and bears tried to dig beneath them. Then the dog would bark and the man would come out with his long brown rifle, and besides bear-steak for breakfast next morning there would be a pelt for the Bushwhacker.

And so the years passed, and the Bushwhackers lived their simple, happy lives and found life good. Little Bushwhackers were born, named, and set free to roam and enjoy the Wild as they wished. Sometimes one of them might stray away too far into the big forest, and then there would be a hunt and the little strayaway would be brought safely back.

When the youngsters were old enough to be taught reading and writing, their mothers washed their faces with soft home-made soap and sent them over to “Big Mac’s” for their lessons.

Mrs. McTavish—a self-educated woman—found great pleasure in teaching these children. They were quick to learn and slow to lose what they were taught. As Peeler put it, “every child should know how t’ read and write and do sums,” so the children of the bush were not allowed to grow up in ignorance.

Bill Paisley, also, took a hand in instructing the youngsters of Bushwhackers’ Place. He taught the boys how to shoot and handle a rifle. It was quite necessary for one who shot to shoot well, as ball and powder were costly commodities. He took the lads on long tramps through the woods when the autumn glow was on the trees. He showed them how to watch a deer-run and taught them how to imitate the wild turkey call.

Boy McTavish was his constant companion, and as a result Boy came to know the wild things of bush and water well. He knew the haunts of the brown and black bears, the gray wolves, and the wary deer. He knew just what part of the clear, deep creek the gamey bass or great maskilonge would be lying in wait for some unsuspecting minnow, and he could land the biggest and gamest of them, too. Many a glorious summer morning’s sport did he have drifting down the creek in his canoe and out on the white bosom of Rond Eau Bay, trolling for bass. Boy loved those beautiful mornings of the summer season when the air was all alive with birds and their voices. Through the mist arising from the face of the water he would watch the great bass leap, here and there, a flash of green and gray high in air, and tumble back to glide and sight and dart upon the shiners—wee innocent minnow-fish these, swimming happily upstream like little children just out of school. There would be a shower of little silvery bodies as the minnows in sheer terror leaped from the water before the greedy cannibal’s rush, and Boy’s hook, with a shiner impaled upon it, would alight amid the commotion, and there would come a tug at his line that made the strong sapling rod bend and dip.

Many a string of great, beautiful bass did he catch on this creek close beside his home, sometimes with Paisley, sometimes with Gloss, sometimes alone.

Boy loved those early mornings of his dominion of marsh and wood; for Rond Eau was very beautiful with morning tints upon her face, as up above the pine-studded Point the lights of dawn came bounding. With that dawn, swift-winged almost as its arrows of crimson, the wild, harsh-voiced ducks came dipping and swerving, to settle and feed in the rich rice-beds of the bay.

Along the marshes, blue-winged teal would hiss and whistle in their irregular flight. Earliest of all the wild-ducks, they came when the time was between darkness and daylight. Next came the blacks and grays, quacking their way noisily along the shores. High above them a long, dark line would whistle into view and pass onward with the speed of a cloud-shadow. These were red-heads, newly arrived from the south. Still swift of wing, though weary, they would follow on until their leader called a halt. Now lost against the slate sky, now sweeping into view against a splash of crimson, they would turn and flash along the farther shore, sinking lower with diminished speed as they passed an outstretching point of land. A number of their kind, arrived the night before, would be feeding and resting there. Onward the line would pass, and then turning drop down slowly and the ducks would settle among their fellows with muffled spats and heads facing the wind.

Far over the pines of the Point another dark bunch would grow into space, and, turning, throw a gleam of white upon the watcher’s sight. These were blue-bills, hardiest of all wild-ducks. They were tired and unafraid and ready to make friends with any water-fowl, whether they were of their own kind or a flock of despised coot. Great flocks of peerless canvasbacks, their wings dipping in unison, their white backs gleaming in the morning light, would grow up and fade and grow to life again. They would sweep around and around the bay, craning their long necks suspiciously, settling ever lower, and passing many a flock of dozing ruddy ducks, that were resting, having fed long before the dawn of day.

Boy would watch these wild, free things with all the joy of a wild thing in sympathy with them. As far as the eye could reach were ducks, and beyond the bay was the wild Point, and above all the wild sky with angry darts of light like ragged knives, slashing its breast here and there.

Naturally Boy resented the advance of anything that tended to destroy the pictures of his world.

A big man from Civilization, who owned the strip of timber across the creek, had built a mill thereon, and all day long, now, that mill sang its song of derision, and the swaths in the wood were growing wider. It was his own timber the man was cutting—nobody could gainsay that fact; but he was destroying, each day, the creek, that silver thread that had been for so long a home for duck and mink and water-rat. He was destroying beauty and crippling the usefulness of the best trapping and fishing ground of the Bushwhackers. A discord had been set vibrating throughout that wooded fastness. The sibilant song of Hallibut’s mill was driving the fur-bearing animals to seek more secluded haunts. The wood-ducks that had nested close in along the wooded shore drifted far back to another creek, and the black ducks did not flutter lazily along the marsh throughout the breeding season now, but high in air and remote from the noise and smoke and jar that was a new and fearful thing to them.

Boy McTavish hated that mill; and that schoolhouse of white boards clinging to the hill he hated, too. Hatred was a strange element with him. It sickened his soul, crushed him, and robbed him of all his old-time restfulness of spirit. The discord could not pass him by.

Even in this golden, hazy dawn it was with him, as he stood gazing across the creek. The crimson sun warmed his cheeks and the heavy scent of over-ripe woods-plants stole to his senses like a soothing balm. But that scar upon which his eyes rested had reached his inmost soul, and for him the old gladness of sweet, dewy mornings must hereafter be tempered with a new and strange bitterness.

From the tall smokestack of Hallibut’s mill a thin wreath of blue smoke ascending cut a spiral figure against the fleecy clouds.

Boy turned and walked up the path, his head bowed and his hands deep in his pockets. Behind him trailed the setter, looking neither to the right nor to the left. His moods were always suited to his master’s. For some reason Boy was sad. Therefore, Joe was sad.

Where the path forked Boy turned and, catching sight of the dog’s wistful face, he threw back his head and laughed. Then he turned and, bending, caught the setter about the neck with strong arms.

“Joe,” he whispered, “you’re an old fool.”

The dog submitted to the caress gravely and sat down, looking up into his master’s face with deep sympathetic eyes.

Adown through the woods came a voice in rollicking song:

“That’s Bill, pup,” laughed Boy. “He always sings when he’s washin’ his breakfast dishes. Come on, let’s go over and borrow his pitch-fork. You and me have got to dig taters to-day.”

A few hundred yards further on they found the singer. He was clad in Bushwhacker buckskins from head to foot.

“Hello, Boy, how’s your ma?” he called as he caught sight of the visitors.

“Just about the same, I guess,” Boy answered. “Nobody up when I left, so I can’t just say how ma spent the night. Want to borrow your fork, Bill.”

“Take it and anythin’ else you see as you’d like. Say, won’t you step in the house and have a cup of tea?”

“I ain’t much on tea drinkin’, as you know, Bill, and I must be hittin’ the back trail soon, ’cause we want to get the taters dug before night.”

“All right, as soon as I put these dishes away I’ll get you the fork.”

Boy’s eyes followed his friend sympathetically, and when Paisley rejoined him he asked hesitatingly:

“Say, Bill, why do you live alone here like you do? Ain’t it lonesome for you?”

“Some.” Paisley dried his hands on a towel and sat down on a stump. “It’s some lonesome; yes. But I’ve sort of got used to it, you see.”

Boy seated himself on a log and leaned back, nursing his knee in his hands.

“How about Mary Ann?” he asked.

Bill shook his head.

“Too good and too young for me, Boy. She don’t just think me her style, I guess. That young teacher chap, now, he is just about Mary Ann’s style.”

Boy’s eyes narrowed.

“He’s just about Gloss’s style, too,” he said slowly. “He’s some different from us bush-fellers, is Mr. Simpson.”

“I don’t take to him very well myself,” said Paisley, looking away, “but, of course, Mary Ann’s bound to see him a lot, him boardin’ at her mother’s, and maybe he’ll see as he can’t afford to miss gettin’ a girl like Mary Ann, pervidin’ she’s willin’.”

“How many times have you asked her, Bill?”

“Twice a year—every spring and fall, for the last three years.”

Paisley laughed queerly and stooped down to pat the setter’s shaggy sides.

“Boy,” he said, “don’t ever get carin’ for a woman; it’s some hell.”

Boy leaned back with a deep breath. His eyes were on a tiny wreath of smoke drifting between the tree-tops and the sky.

“I ask her twice a year regular,” went on Paisley. “It’s got to be a custom now. It’ll soon be time to ask her again.”

A yellow-hammer swooped across the open and, alighting on a decayed stub, began to grub out a breakfast. He was a gay, mottle-breasted chap, with a dash of crimson on his head. The drab-colored thrush that had been preening himself on a branch of a nearby tree ruffled his feathers and flew further back into the bush. Boy frowned at the intruder and arose slowly from his log. He glanced up, to find Paisley looking at him.

“Somethin’s wrong with you, Boy,” said the man; “what is it?”

“I was watchin’ them birds,” Boy answered. “You saw what the big greedy chap did to the thrush—he drove him away; and it made me think of what Hallibut and his agents are tryin’ to do with us Bushwhackers.”

“They can’t do it,” cried Paisley. “Just let ’em try it on.”

“Hallibut threatens that he’ll own all this part of the country. He’s too much of a coward to come over and try to get it himself, but he’s tryin’ to get it through others, as you know.”

“Watson?” questioned Paisley.

Boy nodded.

“Watson’s likely comin’ over to-day. Dad got a letter from him.”

Paisley crammed his hands in his pockets and shrugged his shoulders.

“I scented trouble when the Colonel built that mill over on Totherside,” he declared, “but there was no way of stoppin’ him. It was his own land he built on; it’s his own timber he’s been sawin’. I understand he’s layin’ plans to get our timberland, and there ain’t no tellin’ just what a man like him will do to gain his ends. But, Boy, we’re here first—don’t you forget that.”

“I’m not forgettin’ it,” returned Boy grimly.

“Say,” said Bill, abruptly changing the conversation, “when is Gloss’s birthday?”

The shadow left Boy’s face and he looked up with a smile.

“Why, it’ll soon be now,” he answered; “she’s nineteen next month.”

“I didn’t figger on lettin’ you in on this,” grinned Paisley, “but I reckon you need cheerin’ up. You know them silver-fox furs that Smythe offered me my own price for? Well, I’m not goin’ to sell ’em to Smythe nor anybody else. They’re for Gloss.”

“For Gloss?” repeated Boy, “—for Gloss? Say, Bill, you can’t afford to give them furs away—not even to Gloss.”

“Me and Injun Noah are makin’ her coat,” chuckled the man. “Such a coat, Boy! No lady in this land has ever had such a coat before; never will have such a coat again. Silver-fox pelts at three hundred dollars apiece. Think of it, Boy! And there’s six of ’em—four grays and two blacks. And the coat’s to be lined with mink-skin, too—think of that!”

He took his friend by the arm and led him into the house. Boy liked Paisley’s home; it was always so bright, so tidy, and so cheerful. The wide table of heavy oak with solid legs artistically carved, standing in the center of the main room, the carved high-backed chairs fashioned by a master hand, the crude charcoal sketch of marsh and wood and water scenes on the whitewashed walls, gave him a sense of restfulness.

A great iron tea-kettle suspended over the fire of hickory logs was disgorging a cloud of steam that drifted to the rafters. Paisley came forth from an inner room carrying a huge platter piled high with fowl.

“Never seen the pa’tridge in better condition,” he avowed. “I shot six last night and I’ve been feastin’ ever since. Just pull up and devour, Boy, while I give old Joe some of his choice bones. I’ve been savin’ ’em up for him. I’ll get you some of my special brew of tea soon’s I wipe the reproach out of that setter’s brown eyes.”

Boy drew up to the table and fell to with an appetite such as only men of the woods possess.

Having attended to Joe’s wants, Paisley placed a pot of fragrant tea at his guest’s elbow, and, leaning back in his chair with a smile of content, lit his well-seasoned clay pipe and smoked.

His eyes followed those of Boy, who was gazing on the smaller of two rifles hanging above the fireplace.

“You’ve often wondered why I never use that little gun,” he remarked, drawing his chair forward and leaning upon the table, “and I’ve never told you. I’m goin’ to tell you now. I won that rifle from a man down near Sandwich. He was a bad man all round, and up until I met him just about made the laws of his community. I happened along there one night, and bein’ in no hurry, made up my mind to stay around for a time. The feller I speak of owned that rifle. He was a big chap, about five years older than me, and was supposed to be a fisherman. In reality he was a smuggler, and he was a slick one, and no mistake. When he wasn’t smugglin’ he was gamblin’ with the sailors and passengers of the lake boats. A poor little hunchbacked sister kept house for him, and he used to ill-treat her. Once I happened along and stopped him from strikin’ her with a whip. Of course, he always hated me after that. One afternoon there was a shootin’-match in the neighborhood, and he beat me shootin’.”

Paisley sat back and smiled.

“Yes, he beat me shootin’, Boy. Then he got boastin’; but I didn’t say a word. He finally offered to bet his rifle against mine that he could beat me again. I didn’t want more hard feelin’s; but I simply had to be game. A man couldn’t just take a dare in that wild country, so we had the match right there, and I won his rifle. He didn’t say anythin’, but he looked murder. I left the place soon after that, and about a year later I came along that way again. I heard then that the fisherman chap had cleared out to no one knew where, and left his sister sick and in want.

“I went over to their shanty and found the little woman dyin’. She knew me, and she seemed to want to tell me somethin’. But the end came before she could say it.”

Paisley nodded toward the rifle.

“I’ve never shot that gun since, and I won’t. I’d be ashamed to shoot a gun that belonged to a man who’d leave his crippled sister to starve.”

“Did the sister know where her brother had gone?” asked Boy.

“No; or if she did she couldn’t tell me.”

Boy pushed back his chair and arose from the table.

“I don’t understand how any man could do such a thing, Bill. What was the feller’s name?”

“His name was Watts, Jim Watts,” answered Paisley, swinging the kettle off the fire. “I ain’t thinkin’ as I would know him again, now, even if I happened to run across him. This all happened sixteen years ago.”

He followed Boy outside and the two walked over to an out-house standing in a grove of beeches.

“I haven’t had much use for this fork since the wolves got poor old Mooley last winter,” said Paisley. “Guess I’ll be gettin’ another milk-cow soon, ’cause it’s quite a bother havin’ to go to Peeler’s for my butter.”

“I was goin’ to ask you about Peeler,” said Boy. “I wish, Bill, you’d see him and persuade him not to sell one stick of his timber to Hallibut or his agents. Jim’s an easygoin’ sort, who might be led off quite easy, and it’s up to us to see that he isn’t.”

“I’ll see him—leave that to me,” Paisley replied. “And I’ll see the rest of the Bushwhackers, even old man Broadcrook and his sons, who haven’t any particular use for me, somehow.”

“I guess what the Broadcrooks do won’t matter much,” laughed Boy. “They hate everybody and everything it seems. I don’t know why.”

He picked up the fork and turned toward the path. A west wind had piled up a bank of long drab clouds above the wood. The wind was damp, and from the distance came the dull boom of the waters beating upon the mucky shore of the bay.

A few yards down the path Boy halted.

“Say, Bill, dad was tellin’ me about the talk you had with the teacher. I wish you’d get better acquainted with him and make him see that his place isn’t here.”

“If he was half as smart as he thinks he’d see that it isn’t,” replied Paisley.

“And, Bill,” called Boy from the edge of the wood, “I guess Mary Ann knows a real man when she sees one. Keep askin’ her till she says ‘yes,’ Bill.”

As Boy found the creek path a gust of wind, damp with the spray of Rond Eau, smote against his face with biting force.

From across the creek came the jarring notes of the school bell.

Then the wind fell, and the clouds parted to let a misty web of warm sunlight through to the world.

A big man, past middle age, and seated astride a small white horse, came picking his way between the huge beech and maple trees, down through the quiet morning of the woods. He had shaggy red brows and a big mouth that drooped at the corners. The little eyes, flashing sideways in search of the blaze on the trees, were sharp and calculating. Where the ridge sloped to the valley he reined up.

“Must be somewhere about here,” he mused aloud. “Don’t know how I can miss seeing McTavish if he happens to be outside—land knows he’s big enough to see.—Hello, who are you?”

Something animated in the shape of a boy had stirred from a log directly in the path. Leaping out it stood before the rider—a boy with long yellow curls and big brown eyes. The old white horse shied, and the boy rocked backward and forward on the path, voicing low, plaintive sounds. As the rider watched him a small animal crept from the thicket and climbed upon the lad’s shoulder. The horse reared, and the boy, lifting his brown arms, began to wave them to and fro. At the same time he broke into a wild, tuneless chant, the words of which were unintelligible to the wondering observer. It was a shrill, weird note, fluted and varying like the call of a panther. Suddenly boy and animal vanished as though the Wild had reached forward and gathered them into its arms.

“Heavens!” shuddered the man, and struck the horse sharply with his spurs. Where the trail curved off abruptly to the valley he reined up once more, and, turning about, looked back.

“Well, I’ll be shot!” he soliloquized. “No matter where you find the Creator’s handiwork and beauty you’ll find His imperfections, too. Ugh! how those big eyes did probe me! It’s enough to make a saint shiver, let alone a chap who has climbed up as I have—not caring who I have tramped on.”

He shivered again, and felt in his pocket for his pipe. His hand brought forth a leather wallet. A hard smile warped his mouth as he opened the wallet and drew out a small photograph. It was the likeness of a young woman with sweet face and great eyes. He tapped the likeness and a lock of brown hair leaped out like a snake and twined about his finger. He brushed it back with a shudder, and, snapping the case, put it back in his pocket.

“I’ll find that Big McTavish and get this deal closed,” he mused as he rode along.

The horse stumbled and a grouse whizzed along the trail, passing close to the man’s head, with a thundering, nerve-wracking sound. He sat erect and sank his spurs into the old gray’s heaving flank.

“Get epp, you lazy old bag of bones,” he commanded. “Let’s find that big innocent and get hold of his deed. We’ll give him a dollar or so to see us back along that lonesome trail. I wouldn’t go back along that spooky path for all old Hallibut’s money. I’ve seen enough snakes and wolves and bears since two o’clock this morning to last me a lifetime. And that last animal—that crazy boy!—ugh!”

He slashed the old mare into a faster walk and sat huddled up and pondering until a twist in the path brought an open glade into view. The buzz of a saw and the pant of a weary engine came to his ears like welcome music.

“Totherside,” he chuckled. “Let’s see, Bushwhackers’ Place lies just across from it. But there’s the creek. Guess I’ll have to ride down to the narrows.”

Finally, with much grumbling, he reached the farther side of the creek, and, pulling in his horse, he gazed about him.

“Ha, look at that for timber!” he exulted. “And to think that Smythe and I will have control——”

He did not finish the sentence aloud, but sat nodding his head up and down. Very soon he drew up before the long log-house. Big McTavish stepped out and pointed to a log-building in a grove of butternuts.

“Put your horse in there,” he invited.

“I will, and more,” agreed the arrival. “I’ll enjoy a bite of bread and a slice of dried venison or anything else your larder affords. I’m hungry as old Nick.”

“You’re welcome to the best we have,” replied McTavish. “You’re Mr. Watson, I suppose. Am I right?”

“Watson I am—Robert W. O. Watson, that’s me. I’m pretty well known through these parts; that is to say, better maybe a little east of here. This place is kind of off the map, you know. Just give the lazy skate anything that’s handy,” he growled, referring to the patient steed that stood with drooping head and sanctimonious air, “but you needn’t be in any hurry to feed her. She’s Smythe’s horse and used to waiting.”

“I always see that my oxen get their meals same as I do,” said Big McTavish. “I wouldn’t feel just like eatin’ unless they had their fodder, too. We’ll step inside and I’ll have Gloss fix you up a meal. She’s down at the spring now gettin’ the cream ready for the churnin’, but she’ll be back direct.”

As they crossed from the stable a small form flitted by them and vanished among the trees. Watson gasped and he clutched McTavish’s arm.

“That’s him,” he cried; “that’s the crazy boy I met a couple of miles away. How did he get here this soon, do you suppose?”

“Oh, that’s Daft Davie,” smiled McTavish. “Nobody knows exactly when he’ll turn up. He runs like a deer and is as shy as the wild things he plays among.”

“Plays among?” repeated the other. He followed McTavish into the house and sat down heavily on a stool. “What do you mean by ‘plays among’?”

“I mean that he moves among the wild things and they are not scared of him same as they are of you and me or anybody else. They do say that he can fondle the cubs of bears, and wolf-kittens. I’ve seen him playin’ with a big snake, myself,—not a poisonous one, of course. Seems as though Davie can pick out the things that are harmful quick enough. Nobody pays any attention to him much in Bushwhackers’ Place, but leaves him to himself, knowin’ that God’ll protect the soul He didn’t give over-much reasonin’ power to.”

“Humph,” grunted the other, “I see you’re a pious man, McTavish—pious, God-fearing, and honest. Good plan to work along that line. Had a good bringing up myself. Mother’s prayers, early teaching, and that sort of thing have a lot to do with making a big man. My mother is largely—I should say was largely—responsible for my success. She’s dead now, poor old lady. Of course, a fellow who climbs has a right to some credit himself, I suppose. Made up your mind, I can see, to swap this forsaken wilderness for a piece of cultivated land,” he said, abruptly opening the subject nearest his heart and fixing on the big man his little pig-eyes.

“Aha, I thought you would, McTavish. Says I to Smythe this morning: ‘Smythe, it doesn’t seem to me that this is a very good piece of business judgment on our part; but,’ says I, ‘Smythe, we must consider others rather than ourselves in this matter. McTavish now,’ says I, ‘he has a couple of youngsters growing up, and they should secure an education such as the Clearview school can give them, and if that’s the case, we can’t blind our eyes to our duty as Christian men.’ Smythe is a good Christian man and just that soft-hearted that it’s no wonder my words affected him. He says: ‘Mr. Watson, money is not everything. Go forth on an errand of mercy, and offer Mr. McTavish of Bushwhackers’ Place one bright and fertile hundred acres of loam in Clearview in exchange for his bit of wilderness.’—His very words, McTavish. So I wrote you briefly in order to break the good news gently, and now I am before you to perform an act which, believe me, gives me as much pleasure, in a sense, as it does you. I have all the necessary papers, and although the journey has been a trying one, I will not complain. I have been five hours in the saddle and have endured a cowardly nigger as guide as far as the Triple Elms. Seems like, between loneliness and mosquitoes, I’m just about fagged out. They are a d—I mean they are a hanged nuisance, mosquitoes.”

While his guest unburdened himself, Big McTavish steeped strong tea, and fried strips of bacon. Gloss had not yet returned from the spring. The savory smell of the frying meat whetted Watson’s appetite, and he needed no second invitation to “set up and eat hearty.” He ate wolfishly, his little eyes darting from his food to the face of McTavish, his heavy jaws working, and the muscles of his throat contracting with boa-like elasticity, as he gulped down huge mouthfuls of meat and bread. At last he pushed his chair back from the table and wiped his mouth on the back of his hand.

“Now, Mac,” he said affably, “we’ll just have you sign those papers, and I’ll turn you over this deed I hold here in exchange for the one you now have. Says I to Smythe this morning: ‘Smythe, it’s a nice sort of glow a fellow feels after doing a worthy act, anyway. Think what this will mean to the McTavishes.’ And do you know he was that soft-hearted he couldn’t answer me, and stood there swallowing with tears in his eyes.”

“I’m thinkin’ that we won’t make any swap,” said Big McTavish quietly. “Neither me nor Boy nor any of us care to leave this big woods. We’ve been here so long we’ve grown into it somehow. You see we’re not hankerin’ to leave.”

Watson sat up with a jerk, and the pipe he was filling fell to the floor and broke into a dozen pieces.

“What!” he cried, “do you mean to say, McTavish, that you won’t deal?”

“That’s what I mean,” nodded the big man.

“And you won’t exchange this block of tangled brush for one hundred acres of good, cultivated land?” Mr. Watson leaned forward. “Are you sure you realize what you are missing?” he asked impressively.

“All I know is, we’re thankful to God for what we have now,” said Big McTavish fervently. “We don’t feel like insultin’ Him by tradin’ what He’s given us, sight and unseen.”

“Oh, come now, McTavish,” blustered Watson, “you must be crazy. Why, man, you will never get another chance such as the one we offer you. Besides, you can’t stay here very much longer, anyway. Of course, you’ve heard what Colonel Hallibut intends to do with you Bushwhackers?”

A deep line appeared between Big McTavish’s eyes.

“We don’t want any trouble with Colonel Hallibut,” he said. “We hear that he has his eyes on our timber. When he comes after it he’ll find us here. As for you, Mr. Watson, I wouldn’t take your sand farm as a gift, thankin’ you just the same.”

“Then why in hell have you been letting me waste my breath on you for the last hour?” snarled Watson, his face purple.

McTavish stood up.

“That’ll do now,” he warned. “There’s Gloss comin’ up the path, and swearin’ is somethin’ she has never heard in this house, and before I’ll have her hear you usin’ cuss-words I’ll cram this down your throat, and don’t you forget it.”

He lifted a hairy fist, then sat down and resumed his smoking.

Gloss entered the room, singing blithely. Her shapely arms were bare to the elbows. Her big gray eyes, dancing with life and health, swept the room and rested wonderingly on Watson. He in turn gazed at the girl, and an ashy whiteness wiped out the mottled color of his cheeks. He drew back whispering something under his breath.

“This is Mr. Watson, Gloss,” said Big McTavish.

“Good-morning, sir,” saluted the girl. “I didn’t know that we had a visitor. I see uncle has got you your breakfast, but surely you’ll enjoy a glass of fresh buttermilk. I’ll fetch it.”

She slipped from the room, and Watson looked across at Big McTavish.

“That girl,” he asked quickly, “is she your own child?”

The big man looked up, astonishment written on his face.

“No,” he answered, “but she’s just as dear as though she was our own. Her dyin’ mother sent her to us. Why do you ask that?”

Watson was reaching for his cap and rifle. Perhaps he did not hear the question. At any rate he did not reply.

Fifteen minutes later he mounted the weary gray horse and without so much as a word of adieu rode away through the timber.

McTavish stood on the edge of the clearing, his long arms folded, and watched his visitor disappear. Turning, he found the daft child beside him.

“Well, Davie,” he said kindly, “hadn’t you best run home now, lad? You’re all wet with the dew.”

The boy waved his arms above his head and imitated an eagle’s scream. Then he pointed to the white patch that marked the first blaze of the long trail.

“You mean the man on the white horse, Davie?” asked McTavish, smiling. “Yes, lad, I know.”

The boy gazed about him with wide and expressive eyes. Then once more he waved his arms like an ascending eagle, gave a wild call of victory and defiance, and, bending, sped swiftly away and was lost in the heavy shadow.

Big McTavish walked slowly back to the house. In the doorway stood Gloss awaiting him.

“Is he gone?” she asked.

“Yes, Glossie, he’s gone.”

McTavish picked up the ax which was leaning against the ash-block and turned toward the bush.

“You might just keep your eyes on the soap-fire, Gloss. I’m goin’ down to the swale to cut some sassafras for the yearlin’s—they seem ailin’. While I’m down there I might as well mark some basswood saplin’s that’ll make good sap-troughs. Promised myself last sugar-makin’ that I’d have new troughs before another syrup-boilin’.”

“The potatoes must be about ready to dig,” said the girl.

“Yes, Boy’s over to Paisley’s after a fork, and when he gets back we’re goin’ to start in on ’em. There’s this satisfaction about raisin’ taters,” he laughed, “—the squirrels and crows don’t molest the crop any like they do the corn. It does seem we can’t keep them out of the corn, though.”

“It looks fine since you’ve got it cut and shocked up,” declared the girl; “and it does seem so good that we’re gettin’ such a nice piece of land cleared. Granny was tellin’ me what that man who just left wanted you to do, and I had to laugh when I thought how he could be so foolish as to think we’d be willin’ to leave Bushwhackers’ Place. ‘Why, Granny,’ says I, ‘what do we want of a farm in Clearview when we’ve got one right here?’ ”

The big man’s face lit up.

“You’re sure good medicine, Gloss,” he said. “Yes, we are gettin’ quite a nice plot of ground cleared, and I look for quite a nice yield this year, both in corn and taters. Trappin’ don’t seem to promise much for this winter, though. The noise and clatter of Hallibut’s mill seems to be drivin’ the mink and rats across the bay.”

“Can’t we make him take the mill away from Lee Creek?” asked the girl. “I hate the sound of it. Its noise drowns the song of the birds and its smoke hides the blue of the sky between the trees. What right had he to put that mill there, uncle?”

“Well, he owns a strip of bush on Totherside,” explained McTavish. “It comes right up to Lee Creek. So you see the mill is on Hallibut’s own property.”

“Oh, look, uncle,” cried the girl, “there’s some black squirrels crossing the corn-stubble now—five of them. I do believe aunty would relish a bit of stewed squirrel. I meant to tell Boy to shoot one or two for her this mornin’, but he was gone before I was up.”

Joe, the setter, broke from the thicket and loped across the cornfield. All summer he had acted as custodian of the field, and even now the squirrels stood in mortal terror of him, and the crows cursed him in guttural croaks from the tops of tall trees beyond the danger-line.

As the squirrels took to a lone hickory in the center of the field, Boy McTavish came quickly around the corner of the house. He stood the clumsy hand-made fork he carried up against the lean-to, and mopped his face with his sleeve.

“Whew!” he whistled, “but it’s turned out a fine day after all. Never knowed Injun summer to hang on so long. Hope it keeps up, dad, and we’ll get the corn all husked yet before trappin’-time. Suppose we have a bee and a dance at night, same as we did at the wood-bee? Declute is goin’ to have a loggin’-bee soon.

“Hello, Gloss,” he called, catching sight of the girl, “how’s ma this mornin’?”

“Better, and hungry for squirrel,” she answered, her eyes on the treed blacks.

She ran into the house and returned with a rifle. She handed Big McTavish the powder-horn and, bracing her feet, cocked the gun.

“How far?” she asked, throwing it to her shoulder with a practiced hand.

“Sixty yards, anyway,” answered Big McTavish.

“Nigher eighty,” asserted Boy. “Too far, Gloss; you’ll miss sure.”

A gleam of mischief shone in the gray eye sighting along the brown barrel. Then the rifle cracked, and a black ball detached itself from the hickory and went swinging down to earth in tiny circles. The dog gave a low whine and came bounding forward, the squirrel in his mouth, and allowed Boy to take it from him.

“Right between the eyes,” said Boy proudly.

Big McTavish reloaded the rifle and handed it back to Gloss. His face was wrinkled in a grin of mingled surprise and admiration.

“Neither you nor me could do any better, Boy,” he said hesitatingly by way of admission.

“The one on the left next,” motioned the girl, and the rifle spoke once more.

“Missed,” gasped the man. “Can’t always make a bull’s-eye, Glossie.”

“Missed nuthin’,” cried Boy; “there he comes now.”

The second squirrel spun about on the limb a couple of times, then went crashing through the branches.

“As Bill Paisley would say, ‘that’s remarkable shootin’,’ ” chuckled McTavish. “That distance is well over eighty yards, else I don’t know distance.”

“Nearer a hundred, I should judge,” contended Boy. “She’s got all the rest of the McTavishes beat, dad.”

“Try another, Gloss,” suggested McTavish, placing the cap on the nipple of the rifle with clumsy fingers.

“I thought maybe two would be enough,” said the girl.

She took the rifle once again and glanced at Boy.

“Oh, go on, Gloss,” he encouraged, “only one more. Fact is I’m a bit hungry for corn-fed squirrel myself.”

“And I’m thinkin’ I wouldn’t turn up my nose at a plateful of stewed squirrel either,” seconded the father.

“All right, just one shot more, then, hit or miss,” laughed Gloss. “See that chap’s two ears and part of his head stickin’ up above the knot? I’ll take him this time, I guess, though it’s no easy shot.”

She fired, and the squirrel dropped from the limb. Another whine from Joe proclaimed it a clean kill.

Big McTavish, without so much as a word, took the gun inside. Boy held the animals up by their bushy tails and the girl who was watching him said:

“You ain’t carin’ much to see the blacks killed ever since the time you had Tommy for a pet, are you, Boy?”

“Well, I don’t know as I’m carin’ much either one way or t’other,” he answered slowly. “Tommy was a cute little beggar, but he wasn’t really a black. He was a gray squirrel. Grays are gentler and make better pets than blacks. Tom Peeler one time had a black for a pet, and used him mighty good for two years. But one day that black pretended he wanted Tom to play with him and tickle him as he was used to doing, and it gave him a bad bite. No, the blacks are too cross for pets.”

“Boy,” said the girl suddenly, “I meant to tell you before—old Injun Noah was tellin’ me yesterday that there’s a big gray fox who makes his home on the Point. Noah says he’s the biggest silver-gray he ever saw. Says he’s as big as a timber-wolf. But he is so cunnin’ nobody can get a shot at him.”

“Well,” smiled the boy, “I guess we needn’t go after that feller, and you needn’t worry about one little silver-gray. Just you wait a while and you’ll know what I mean.”

He winked mysteriously, and Gloss laughed. Then her face grew grave.

“That man Watson was over here this mornin’, Boy,” she said. “You know what he wanted and you know how he’d get it. Well, I guess him and uncle had words. I was hidin’ in a bunch of willows at the spring when he was goin’ back, and when he passed me he was swearin’ awful.”

“Was he ridin’ toward the trail or goin’ toward Totherside?” asked Boy, his face darkening.

“I watched him cross th’ creek, and when he got across he rode toward the schoolhouse.”

Boy turned away. Then he paused and looked at the girl.

“Boy,” she said wistfully, “I wish we didn’t have no school in this place. I wish Simpson would go away.”

“Why?” he asked quickly.

Slowly her eyes sank and her bosom heaved as her breath came in quick gasps.

He reached out and caught her, and for the first time in their young lives the girl struggled in his arms. He let her go and stood back, wondering. She looked at him and smiled. Her face was pale, and her long lashes did not conceal a look of dumb entreaty.

“Gloss——” he commenced.

“Boy,” she whispered, “we’re built for chums, and chums we’ll always be. But the old rompin’ days are over now. Boy, you mustn’t take me—you mustn’t hold me like that again. We ain’t boy and girl no more.”

He bent and picked up the squirrels. When he stood up again she had gone.

“ ‘We ain’t boy and girl no more,’ ” he repeated.

He walked to the spring repeating the words over and over—“ ‘no more.—Boy and girl no more!’ ”

From Totherside came the clang of the school bell.

“I wonder what she meant. I wonder why she wished that school—I wonder why she wishes Simpson——”

Suddenly he flung the squirrels from him, and, bending forward, gazed with hard eyes toward the white schoolhouse clinging to the hill.

“If he thinks harm to her, then God curse him,” he breathed, “and help me to kill him.”

A wee hedge-sparrow, drunk with the hazy Indian summer sunshine, perched itself on a branch above his head and poured out the simple little song that he had always loved above all other songs of wood-birds, because it was always the first song in new spring; the last in dreary fall. The little singer was about to leave the wood wherein he had nested and enjoyed a season’s happiness. He was about to fly far south, and was trilling a promise to Boy to come back again another springtime. And Boy listened to the simple song and wondered at the gladness in it. Nothing of the deep unrest of his own soul was there,—only the gladness of a heart brimful of God’s deep joy. Boy sat down on a log and watched the bird.

“Little chap,” he murmured, “you’ve got a long ways to fly. I guess I know you about as well as anybody could know you, unless it’s Daft Davie, who’s wild like yourself, and I can’t understand why you should be glad when you’re leavin’ all this——”

He looked about him. “—All this big nestin’-place. The great woods has been mighty good to you, little feller—mighty good. There’s a nest you built here, and you’ve got to leave it behind.”

A shadow floated across the hazy sunlight and a cold wind swept in from the bay. With a last sweet note of good-by the bird sprang to wing, and beating skyward high above the trees, faded, a little darting speck in the somber clouds rolling up in the south. Boy watched it until its tiny gray body was lost against the sky’s gray fringe. Then he sighed, picked up the squirrels, and proceeded to strip them, deftly, of their glossy coats. This done, he washed them carefully and carried them to the house. Gloss was standing by the table in the kitchen and spoke to him as he entered.

He answered her almost rudely and strode outside. The hazy light of morning had vanished. The skies had darkened, and a low wind was shaking the dead leaves from the trees. Boy plunged down the path and into the wood. A shaggy dog, snoozing beside the ash-leach, watched him furtively from half-closed eyes. When Boy’s figure disappeared behind the slope the dog arose, shook himself, and with stiffened muscles trailed his master stealthily.

Deep into the woods, Boy paused before a small grove of baby maples. Beneath their spreading branches stood a playhouse built of rough bark and twigs. He and Gloss had built this house; she, girl-like, to play at mimic life therein; he, boy-like, that she might own her little joy. There stood the table, a basswood block, set for a feast, with broken bits of crockery and glass for dishes. It seemed but yesterday that he and Gloss had sat before that table and eaten an imaginary repast of earth’s luxuries from those broken dishes. It all seemed so poor, so lonely, and deserted now.

In the twig high-chair slept Peggy, the rag doll, her arms dangling, her whole attitude one of peaceful repose.

Boy crept in and shamefacedly swept the cob-webs from her poor little face. Then he sat down on the stump-chair, and, laying his arms on the table, rested his head upon them.

In the open the clouds scudded low above the trees, and it began to snow. Boy arose and walked about the little house, his eyes searching it for the small trinkets the girl had treasured there. A bunch of dead flowers rustled in the cracked cup on the bark shelf. They were tied with a gorgeous bit of red flannel, which, he remembered, Gloss had been careful to explain was watered silk. Boy smiled and pressed the knot between his fingers.

On the floor lay a home-woven straw hat. Its decorations, too, were of woodland flowers faded to ashes and scentless. Boy caught it up and held it at arm’s length; then he threw it from him and sprang out into the darkening wood again.

He hurried on, passing the tree-swing where he and the girl had played so many summers. He passed through the hickory grove where they had garnered the nuts for the winter’s cracking; through this and into the heavier timber and deeper shadow where the light was very dim and forest whispers stirred and vibrated. A fox glided across his path, switching into a clump of hazel-bushes. A cock grouse, drumming upon a decayed log, arose on thundering wing to dip into a clump of trees far to the left. Farther into the wood the cluck of a wild turkey sounded. Boy heeded none of these things. On and on he strode,—his an aimless goal; his one desire, to come up with that something urging and elusive,—something he feared though treasured and could not understand.

Later, he stood in the low-lying wilderness of the Elm Swamp. And there, perhaps, his great Mother pityingly solved for him the problem of a new unrest. There where day’s light wavered faintly like foggy starlight, his soul shook off its brooding, and the old glad fearless light came back to his eyes.

“No, we ain’t girl and boy no more,” he whispered; and lifting his arms high he laughed.

What he had received from the forest soothed his spirit as the starry snowflakes, falling on his upturned face, soothed his burning flesh.

At mid-day the setter crept back to his old place by the ash-leach and lay down. A little later Boy came up the path. He stooped down and patted the dog’s head, and noting his tangled hair, laughed softly.

“Joe, old pup, I thought it was me who had to roam among the briers and the burrs, but I see you’ve been there, too.”

And Joe looked up and yawned sleepily, just as if he had been awakened from his forenoon’s nap.

Boy ate his dinner in silence. When he arose he glanced at Gloss. She was standing before the window, and Boy saw her perfect face, crowned by a mass of heavy chestnut hair, clear-lined against the light of an outer world. Her great eyes were looking into space: she was dreaming. The young man sought the open with surging pulse. The whistle of Hallibut’s mill sounded its challenge, and, squaring his broad shoulders, he laughed. Something new had come to him. Not strength; though strength was of it. Not defiance; though it held the power to defy. Boy did not attempt to define that new thing: it was enough for him to know that he possessed it.