XIX LE FORGERON TORDU AGAIN

The stretch of water proved to be a long bay, with continuous shore on its northwest side, and a chain of wooded islands sheltering it from the southeast. The gold-seekers paddled steadily until nightfall compelled them to make a landing in a little cove beyond a point. Navigation through unknown waters, where reefs and shoals might be encountered, was perilous in the darkness. Though sharp and cold, the night was clear, so the three did not crawl under the canoe, but lay down in the open with their feet to the fire. When they woke at dawn, the fire had gone out, and ground and trees around them were silvered with white frost. The boys were stiff and chilled, but the exercise of cutting wood, and a breakfast of hot caribou broth, made from the dried meat boiled in the birch bark basket, soon warmed them.

Paddling out from the cove, their blades keeping time to

they continued to the northeast along a rock coast, now rising in steep cliffs, again sloping gradually to the water, but broken, eaten out, riven and piled up into all sorts of shapes. The protecting islands, a half mile or more away, became smaller, farther apart and more barren. Soon the rock shore terminated in a point, and the travelers turned to the north, ran past the end of the point, and found themselves crossing another bay. To left and to right were wooded islands, while ahead stretched a long, forest-crowned ridge, which appeared to be several hundred feet high.

“That must be part of the same ridge we climbed,” said Ronald eyeing it with interest.

The Indian grunted an assent. “Runs through whole of Minong,” he replied.

The rising wind, penetrating between the islands, made paddling hard work, until the voyageurs reached the shelter of the high ridge. There, turning to the northeast again, they followed a narrow passage between ridge and islands, where the water was scarcely disturbed by a ripple. But when they came out from shelter, near the end of a long, high point, the full force of the wind struck them, and they were glad to turn back and make a landing on a bit of pebble beach.

Before they turned, however, they saw, as they looked out over the heaving waves of the lake, a bit of land to the northeast. When they had carried the canoe up on the beach, the two boys with one accord started to make their way to the end of the point, in the hope of getting a better view of the speck of land across the water. They estimated that it was four or five miles away. It was exactly in the direction they intended to take in their search for the Island of Yellow Sands. Was it the long-sought-for island, lying now in plain view?

Nangotook, who had followed the lads, did not think so. “Island we came from,” he said briefly, pointing to it.

“You mean the place where we were wind-bound so long?” Jean asked. “I cannot think it. That must be farther away. Think how long we traveled in the fog!”

“May have been going round and round part of the time. No way to tell after fog got thick. Over there,” and Nangotook pointed across the water to the west of the bit of land, “Nanabozho.”

The Sleeping Giant was faintly but unmistakably discernible lying on the water. When the boys considered his position, and the view they had had of him from the island, they began to be afraid that Nangotook was right, that the land to the northeast was only the place where they had been delayed so long, and not the Island of Golden Sands. They were loath to give up their new-born hope, however. As Ronald said, the only way to find out was to go and see. To cross those heaving waves in the teeth of the strong north wind was out of the question. Once more they must wait for favorable weather.

They went back to the more sheltered spot where they had landed. There they came upon something that put their disappointment, at not being able to cross to the island, out of their heads for the time being. Farther along the pebble beach they found the ashes of a fire and the bones and uneatable remains of a hare. Near by was the pole skeleton of a shelter, resting against the face of a rock. The Indian, after examining the place closely, concluded that the fire had been burning and the hare had been dressed and cooked since the rain of two nights before, but he doubted if the shelter had been occupied the past night. Probably the campers had not been away from the place over thirty-six hours at the farthest.

The boys were greatly excited over the find. Was this the camp of Le Forgeron Tordu and his Indian companion, and were the two still on their trail? The only way to answer the first question was to find their tracks. The pebble beach retained no clear traces of moccasined feet, and the men had doubtless departed by canoe, but back from the beach, part way up the slope, where the trees stood thick and the rock was covered with a layer of leaf mold, Jean came upon tracks. Unhesitatingly Nangotook pronounced the prints those of a man whose right foot turned out and who threw his weight more heavily upon that foot than upon the left. Not far away the Ojibwa found other tracks, made by another man. This trail he succeeded in following through the woods to the top of the ridge, where, in a narrow rock opening, a hare runway, he discovered the remains of a snare. The noose had been taken away, but the fence of twigs, leading to the spot where it had been set, remained.

It now seemed perfectly clear that the Frenchman and his Indian companion had been camping on the beach not longer ago than the morning before. Apparently Le Forgeron was still in pursuit of the gold-seekers. Had he seen them set out from the island before dawn, and had he followed? Nangotook thought that very unlikely. He did not believe Le Forgeron had been where he could observe their departure. If he had been hiding anywhere on the island, it must have been in one of the caves on the north shore. Yet it did not seem likely that he had crossed from the island after the lifting of the fog, for the winds had been strong ever since. Nangotook doubted if the Blacksmith could have made his way across the stretch of open lake at any time during the past five days. He came to the conclusion that Le Forgeron must have crossed before the others left the island, perhaps immediately after he or his companion had hurled Ronald from the cliff. Ronald, however, pointed out that the wind and waves had been very unfavorable at that time, and the Indian was forced to admit that the boy was right. Unable to solve the problem, he shook his head doubtfully. “Awishtoya evil man,” he said, “very evil. Maybe he can put spell on waters and go when he pleases.”

“I have heard it said that he has sold himself to the devil,” Jean replied seriously, “so it may be indeed as you say. He may have seen us go, though, and if he followed he was caught in the fog too, and may have reached this place by accident. One thing is certain. He has been here. Surely it is not so important to know just when he came, as to discover where he has gone and whether he will return.”

“You are right,” Ronald agreed. “We must be tracking this enemy of ours. Unless he’s in league with the evil one, he has not crossed to that island over there within the last two days, that is sure. The wind and waves have been too high. And if that’s the island we came from, he would have no reason for going back. We had best be searching for him in the other direction.”

“We go in canoe up this water then,” and Nangotook pointed along the channel to the southwest, “and we take all the meat with us. Awishtoya has taken the apakwas from his wigwam. Yet he may come back. If we leave anything he will find it.”

“That is true,” cried Jean. “We must take everything with us, and leave no trace behind. This is no place for us to camp, if there’s a chance that Le Forgeron may return.”

Carefully the Indian erased all signs of their visit to the beach and to the woods and rocks near by. Stepping backwards, his body bent almost double, he smoothed out with his hands the tracks he and the boys had made in the adjacent forest. When he had completed his task, he was sure no traces remained that might not have been made by some passing animal.

Then the three embarked and paddled back through the quiet channel between point and islands. They penetrated to the head of a long narrow bay, that lay parallel to the one they had come through that morning and the evening before. There were many islands, and the shores were forested to the water’s edge. Though the searchers scanned the rocks and woods closely, they found no clear signs that a canoe had ever run in anywhere along either shore or on any of the islands. Several times they examined likely looking places, but always without definite result. Not one sure trace of Le Forgeron Tordu or of any human being did they find, though they made the complete circuit of the shore, reaching at last the rocky point they had passed that morning. So thorough was their search that it occupied most of the day.

Though they discovered no more clear signs of their enemy, the trip was not altogether fruitless, for, as they went along, they caught several fish, lake trout of smaller size than those they had taken out in the lake. Near the head of the bay Jean hooked a pickerel, and, at the mouth of a small stream, several brook trout. The explorers landed on a small, well wooded island, that lay across a narrow stretch of water from the inner side of the point to the east of the bay, and cooked their fish and made camp.

Etienne had almost convinced the boys that the island to the northwest was the one where they had been wind-bound. Nevertheless they were anxious to reach it, for they had resolved to strike out from there to east and north, in one more effort to find the land of golden sands. But the spirits of the lake were still against them, and four days longer they were held prisoner on the end of Minong. During most of the time the open lake was very rough. Traveling several miles across it, against a head or side wind, was far too perilous to be attempted in so frail a craft as a bark canoe. Only once for a few hours did the wind swing to a more favorable quarter, the south, and then it brought thick mist followed by fine, cold rain, almost as blinding as the fog. A strong west wind dispersed rain and mist and blew away the clouds, but made crossing as dangerous as ever.

Impatient as the treasure-seekers were during all that time, they could do nothing but make the best of the delay. They camped on the small island, where no enemy could approach under cover, and continued their search for Le Forgeron Tordu. Climbing to the top of the high ridge, they looked down another long bay, parallel with the two they were familiar with, and to wooded land and other stretches of water beyond. They were determined to explore that bay, but the strong wind and dangerous, outlying reefs made rounding the long point out of the question. So they were obliged to carry the canoe up the ridge, a hard and laborious portage, and with much difficulty take it down the steep north side. They caught a good supply of fish in that third bay, and found slight signs on two of the islands that human beings might have been there not many days before. But there were no clear tracks they could identify as those of the lame Frenchman. On the farther shore of the bay, near its head, they thought they had come upon a trail, but soon made up their minds that it was only the old track of some wild animal.

Wishing to save their dried meat for emergencies, they made every effort to obtain enough fresh meat and fish to sustain them. As only three rounds of ammunition remained for the one gun, Nangotook spent part of his time making bows and arrows for himself and Jean, leaving the gun to Ronald, who could be trusted not to waste his powder. The Ojibwa strung his bow with twisted caribou sinew, braided at the ends. The arrow shafts he made of serviceberry wood, straightening them by drawing them through a hole he had bored in a piece of bone. Some of the arrows, with points of wood hardened in the fire, were intended for shooting birds and squirrels. Others had heads of bone or chipped stone, let into a slit or groove in the end of the shaft and bound tight with soaked sinew, which contracted when dry. Nangotook insisted that the feathers used must be those of a bird of prey, or else the arrows would not be sufficiently deadly. Coming one day upon several hawks, which circled within easy range, as they prepared to dart down on a flock of migrating small birds that had paused to rest and feed among the alders, Ronald sacrificed one of his precious charges of ammunition to bring down one of the marauders. With hawk feathers, carefully cut and placed to give just the right weight and balance, Nangotook feathered his arrows. When he had constructed two bark quivers, the primitive hunting equipment was ready.

The Ojibwa demonstrated the use of the new weapon by shooting a squirrel and a gull in quick succession, and the boys, admiring his skill, at once set to work to practice with the other bow. Ronald, who was proud of his marksmanship, was chagrined to find that not only Nangotook but Jean could easily outshoot him both in range and accuracy. In his childhood the French lad had played with bows and arrows made by Nangotook, who had taught him how to use them, while to Ronald the weapon was entirely new.

The hide of the caribou was cured and dressed, and part of it made into new moccasins to replace the wanderers’ worn and ragged ones. From a bone that he had saved for the purpose, Nangotook also made, with much labor, a knife such as his ancestors must have used before the white men brought them steel and iron. Ronald’s knife had been lost or taken from him when he fell over the cliff, and the Indian insisted that the lad take his. He could use the bone one just as well, he said, and when Ronald hesitated to accept the gift, showed such plain signs of offense, that the boy hastened to take it to make amends. He guessed that this was Nangotook’s way of expressing gratitude for his rescue from drowning.