I Love You Ronnie Reagan Nancy download

https://ebookbell.com/product/i-love-you-ronnie-reagan-
nancy-8195064

Explore and download more ebooks at ebookbell.com

I Love You Ronnie The Letters Of Ronald Reagan To Nancy Reagan 1st
Nancy Reagan

https://ebookbell.com/product/i-love-you-ronnie-the-letters-of-ronald-
reagan-to-nancy-reagan-1st-nancy-reagan-2020378

I Love You More How Everyday Problems Can Strengthen Your Marriage Les
And Leslie Parrott

https://ebookbell.com/product/i-love-you-more-how-everyday-problems-
can-strengthen-your-marriage-les-and-leslie-parrott-2020040

I Love You So Much I Hate You Yuni

https://ebookbell.com/product/i-love-you-so-much-i-hate-you-
yuni-32943858

I Love You Swami Chinmayananda

https://ebookbell.com/product/i-love-you-swami-chinmayananda-36132366
I Love You But Ive Chosen Darkness Claire Vaye Watkins

https://ebookbell.com/product/i-love-you-but-ive-chosen-darkness-
claire-vaye-watkins-37193414

I Love You Dad Grumpy Ninja A Rhyming Childrens Book About The Love
Between A Child And Their Father Perfect For Fathers Day Mary Nhin

https://ebookbell.com/product/i-love-you-dad-grumpy-ninja-a-rhyming-
childrens-book-about-the-love-between-a-child-and-their-father-
perfect-for-fathers-day-mary-nhin-42944206

I Love You Mom Earth Ninja A Rhyming Childrens Book About The Love
Between A Child And Their Mother Perfect For Mothers Day And Earth Day
Mary Nhin

https://ebookbell.com/product/i-love-you-mom-earth-ninja-a-rhyming-
childrens-book-about-the-love-between-a-child-and-their-mother-
perfect-for-mothers-day-and-earth-day-mary-nhin-42944228

I Love You I Need Him Second Chance Romance Something Like Love Book 2
Jr Rogue

https://ebookbell.com/product/i-love-you-i-need-him-second-chance-
romance-something-like-love-book-2-jr-rogue-44770796

I Love You Just Enough Robbyn Smith Van Frankenhuyzen Gijsbert Van
Frankenhuyzen

https://ebookbell.com/product/i-love-you-just-enough-robbyn-smith-van-
frankenhuyzen-gijsbert-van-frankenhuyzen-5078126
Discovering Diverse Content Through
Random Scribd Documents
 Much nettled at being called “sonny” by this person so little older
than himself, Hugh merely nodded stiffly, took up his suitcase and
followed Linda Ingmarsson to the door. Jethro, however, stopped
them before they could get outside.
“How about your baggage,” he inquired, “got a trunk or anything
at the station?”
Hugh was not certain whether his trunk had arrived with him or
not, so the clerk volunteered to telephone and find out. While he
was doing so, Hugh stood waiting in the doorway, looking idly down
the street and at the hills beyond. He noticed again the line of white
highway that fascinated him curiously as it slanted upward through
the dense woods. He turned to his companion who stood so silent
beside him and ventured a question.
“What is that road, please?” he asked; “where does it go?”
Linda Ingmarsson looked up quickly toward the hill, while her face
took on a new expression, wistful, sad, but somehow proud as well.
“That is my young brother Oscar’s road,” she said; “now it goes
nowhere but some day—some day it will go far.”
Hugh could not make very much out of this answer, but did not
have time to ponder it long. Jethro announced that all was well with
the baggage, so Hugh and Linda went out together. It was a relief to
him to think that he was with a person who knew at least who he
was and why he had come.
“You are very good,” he began shyly as they came out on the
steps; “you should not—” but the rest of his sentence was never
spoken.
The hot sleepy silence was broken suddenly by a shrill steam
whistle, followed by another and another. A strident siren joined
them; then came a deep blast from some steamer on the lake; then
a loud clanging of bells added their voices to the tumult. For full five
minutes the deafening noise continued until Hugh’s ears beat with it
and his head rang. The street had become alive with people, women
with aprons over their heads, men in overalls, scores of children, as
though each of the little houses had sent forth a dozen inhabitants.
Down at a far corner Hugh saw the two Indians come into view
again, the man with his head up, listening, like a deer, the woman
with a pleading hand laid upon his arm. He brushed her aside
roughly, and disappeared beyond the turn, she following meekly
after. No one noticed them except himself, Hugh felt certain, since
every face was turned northward to the wooded rocky hill that
overhung the town. Puffs of white steam rose here and there among
the trees, showing the mine buildings or the lumber mills from which
the whistling came.
This was no ordinary blowing of signals to mark the noon hour:
the excitement, the anxious faces, the hideous insistence of the
noise all told him that. Just at the instant that he felt he could not
endure the tumult longer, silence fell.
“What is it, what is it?” he gasped his inquiry, and one of the men
standing by the steps, the one who had spoken of Laughing Mary,
began to explain.
“You see—about four days ago—” The words were cut off by a
new outbreak of the clamor. It rose higher this time and lasted
longer, it rolled back from the hills and seemed to echo from the
ground itself. Twice it fell and twice broke out once more, a long
fifteen minutes of unendurable bedlam. The man, undismayed,
called his explanations into Hugh’s ear, sometimes drowned out by
the uproar, sometimes left shouting alone in a moment of throbbing
silence. What Hugh caught came in broken fragments.
“Two fellows—hunting—gone four days now—lost some way—
these hills—blowing all the whistles at once—hoped—might hear—”
The screaming and clanging finally died away, leaving one long-
drawn siren to drop alone, while Hugh’s informant also lowered his
voice to ordinary speech.
“We do that hereabouts when people get lost. Every whistle in
three counties is blowing right now, so if they don’t hear one and
follow it, they may another. Sometimes it brings them back, more
often it doesn’t. It’s an ugly thing to get lost in these hills.”
“How long did you say they had been gone?” asked Hugh.
 “Three—four—no, by George, it’s five days. There’s their pile of
mail that’s been collecting on the window ledge, and those first
letters are five days old.”
The man glanced at a pile of envelopes that lay just inside the
window. The upper one was yellow and caught Hugh’s involuntary
attention as he stood by the door. The people were dispersing and
the excitement evidently was over.
The telegraph envelope was one of those transparent-faced ones,
showing the name and address inside. Half unconsciously Hugh
read, “John Edmonds, Rudolm, Minnesota.” He turned with a gasp
and looked closer. A little of the typewritten line was visible below,
“Thanks for letter, will arrive—”
It was his own message that had never been received. His two
friends, his only two friends within a thousand miles, were the men
who had vanished into the forest.
 CHAPTER II

THE BROWN BEAR’S SKIN

It was not until some hours after his dismaying discovery that
Hugh was able to get any particulars of what had really happened to
John and Dick Edmonds. A dozen people at once tried to tell him of
the affair, putting in much comment on what they themselves
thought and what they had said to friends at the time, with most
confusing results. Although he was so bewildered, he began at least
to understand one thing, that Rudolm was not at all the town he had
believed it to be. He had considered it lonely, empty of friends, dull
and lifeless, and behold, it was quite otherwise! In fifteen minutes—
probably the exact length of time required by little Nels Larson to
travel the whole length of the street and tell every one of the
newcomer who was a friend of the lost Edmonds—words of
kindliness and sympathy began to pour in upon him. Long before the
small, unofficial towncrier had come to the last house, the first
sunburned face had appeared in Linda Ingmarsson’s doorway, and
the first heavy Swedish voice had asked for “that boy that vas
Edmonds friendt.” The shyness and reserve that usually stood firm
between these people and any stranger, melted away at the sight of
some one who was in trouble. It was, at last, by the very greatness
of their proffered kindness that Hugh began to realize how serious
his trouble was.
It was only the last visitor who gave him the actual facts of the
affair, Nels Larson, Senior, a little elderly Swede with a wrinkled skin
and puckered eyes that were mere pin-pricks of blue. He chanced to
be left alone with Hugh and proved so shy and slow of speech that
he was able to answer direct questions and make the truth clear
without complicating it with opinions of his own. He said that the
two Edmonds boys had gone hunting, and expected, so far as any
one knew, to be gone but a day, that they had possibly meant to
meet an Indian guide in the woods but had left Rudolm alone save
for their dog. That one day of their absence had passed, and two,
without causing any anxiety, that search had been made on the third
day and the fourth and fifth, but without result.
“But does no one know which way they went?” asked Hugh
desperately. “Couldn’t they have got to some other town? Couldn’t
they just have taken a wrong road? Aren’t people often lost that
long and still able to get back?”
The other slowly shook his head.
“There’s no town between here and Canada,” he said; “no, indeed,
nor for a hundred miles north of the border either. And there are no
houses in the direction the Edmonds boys went, nor camps—and
roads, bless you, these woods don’t have roads. Just trees—and
trees—and trees—and Heaven help the man who loses his bearings
amongst them!”
“Are people still looking for them?” cried Hugh; “surely they
haven’t given up hope yet!”
“There is no hope,” Nels answered with a sigh; “we would look for
a year if it would be of any use; but why go on searching when we
know they cannot be found?”
He got to his feet to go, leaving Hugh still sitting, stunned, trying
to think what this cruel news must mean to him. At the door Nels
paused and, even without the encouragement of a question, actually
volunteered a remark of his own.
“There is something I must tell you also,” he said, “for others may
say it to you and perhaps not with kindness. It is that John Edmonds
left his accounts in bad shape at the bank, that his books are
confused and there is talk of money missing. So there are some
people, and presently there will be more and more, who say that
even if he is not dead in the woods he will never come back.”
“That is not true,” cried Hugh, springing from his seat, “that
cannot possibly be true.”
“No,” returned Nels, “I do not think it can be. There are many
rascals in this neighborhood, but John Edmonds is not one of them.”
He put on his battered old hat that was so big it came far down
over his ears, took up his thick umbrella, opened the door and went
out. Hugh sat by the table, his chin in his hand, thinking deeply long
after Nels had gone. It was hard to know what to believe, what to
think and above all what to do.
He could hear Linda Ingmarsson talking to her children in the next
room and presently one small boy came in and seated himself,
without saying a word, on a chair by the door. He seemed to think
that politeness demanded his sitting with the guest, although to talk
to him was far beyond his power. Linda’s husband stood at the door
a moment, but went away again. He was a big, quiet man, seeming
much like an overgrown edition of his small son. Hugh, beginning to
look about him, concluded that this room was quite the cleanest
place that he had ever seen. The boards of the floor were worn
smooth with much scrubbing, the copper kettles on the shelves
winked in the firelight. In one corner stood a quaintly carved
cupboard, painted a most brilliant blue, that must surely have come
from Sweden, or have been made by the patient labor of
Ingmarsson’s great rough hands. In the center of the table was
another bit of carving, a really beautiful wooden bowl with a raised
wreath of water lilies fashioned about its edge. It was full of moss
and gay red bunches of partridge berries. The Ingmarsson child saw
Hugh’s eyes resting upon it and, with a mighty effort, managed to
speak.
“My Uncle Oscar, he made it,” the youngster said in his little
Swedish voice; “he brought it to us with the berries in it the last time
he came from the mountain.”
 It was his only attempt at conversation and, although bravely
undertaken, lapsed immediately into frightened silence.
Linda, entering just then, finally broke the quiet of Hugh’s
reflections.
“Supper will soon be ready,” she said. “Carl, take the visitor
upstairs and show him where to put his things.”
The small guide went obediently before Hugh, climbed the narrow
stairs and opened the door of the guest’s room, a tiny place with
sloping ceiling and square dormer windows, everything shining with
the same cleanliness so evident below. Carl opened the cupboard
doors, pulled out the drawers of the press and finally, evidently
thinking that hospitality demanded his speaking again, pointed to a
picture on the wall.
“That is the two Edmonds,” he said; “did you know them?”
Hugh, looking closely at the faded little photograph, managed to
recognize Dick Edmonds, but had no knowledge of the older brother
whom he had never seen. Beside Dick, with his nose in his master’s
hand, stood a big, white dog.
“That is Nicholas,” announced Karl; “he came from Russia. We
Swedes do not like Russians, but we all loved Nicholas. John
Edmonds said he used to belong to a prince in Russia, so he was
different from our dogs. He used to laugh and call him the Grand
Duke. With men and other dogs Nicholas was very proud but he
always would play with us. So we liked him. And how he could run!”
“He is a beauty,” Hugh agreed heartily; “I should like to see him.”
He turned toward the window where the hinged sash stood open
and through which he could look out at the sunset and at the distant
mountain black against a flaming sky. He could see most of the little
town also where the children were running home and men were
coming from their work and gay voices could be heard calling
greetings from one doorway to another. The tiny houses had a
comfortable, cozy look, now that he knew what warm-hearted
people lived within. Carl came to his side, seeming to feel more at
ease, and began to point out one place after another.
 “That is Nels Larson’s house,” he said, “and that is the landing
where the boats come in from the lake and that,” pointing to the
mountain, “is Jasper Peak. My Uncle Oscar lives way out beyond
there.”
“He lives on the mountain?” said Hugh; “that must be very far
away.”
“No, not on the mountain,” corrected Carl, “beyond it. On the
mountain there lives a—a—another man.”
“What sort of a man?” inquired Hugh, caught by the little boy’s
change of tone.
“Oh, a strange man. He is half Indian; people call him a pirate; his
name is Jake.”
“Has he no other name?” asked Hugh; “is every one so afraid of
him as you are?”
“His whole name is Half-Breed Jake, and, yes, every one is afraid
of him except just my mother and her brother Oscar and maybe Dick
Edmonds and the dog Nicholas. Every one else.”
“Does he live out there on the mountain all alone?” Hugh inquired.
“Yes, he will not let any one live near him. He will not let any one
shoot in his woods or fish in his streams or paddle a canoe on his
end of the lake.”
“And are they all his?” In spite of being so absorbed in other
things Hugh was growing interested.
“Not really his, he just says they are,” Carl explained vaguely. “No
one dares go near his place now after—after some things that have
happened. The Indians will do anything he says, they and even
some of the Swedes say that the bullets from his gun can shoot
farther than any other man’s, and that his ill will can find you out no
matter where you hide. Yes, we call him the Pirate of Jasper Peak.”
“But you say your Uncle Oscar lives out there too?”
“Oh, yes,” assented Carl, “but you know with my Uncle Oscar it is
all different.”
 Linda called from below, causing her small son to rush clattering
down the stairs and leave Hugh alone. He stood long by the window
watching the sunset fade and pondering deeply.
“So there can be pirates this far north after all,” he was thinking,
“and father was right.”
With the thought came a sudden pang of homesickness, a longing
for his father, for the comfortable, ordinary life at home, for
everything that was usual and familiar. What would become of him
here, he wondered, what could be the end of this venture “on his
own”? What a strange place it was to which his journey had led him,
what strange people he had met or heard of that day, the clumsy,
friendly Swedes, kind-hearted Linda Ingmarsson, that mysterious
Jake out on the mountain, that brother Oscar whose road it was that
climbed the hill. He ran through the list over and over and found that
his mind, with odd insistence, kept coming back to the road that
“now went nowhere but some day would go far.”
The announcement that supper was ready interrupted his
reflections, after which he received a pressing invitation from Carl to
go with him to get the mail. Rudolm knew no such luxury as a
postman, it went every night to fetch its letters at the general store
where John Benson sold meat and calico and mackinaw coats. The
little postmistress who sorted the mail behind her own official
counter was an expert at her task, for no one besides herself could
make head or tail of some of the Swedish and Finnish scrawls that
came from the Old Country or the French-Canadian flourishes on the
addresses of the picture postcards. No one else could have
remembered that Baptiste Redier liked to have his papers
accumulate for six months while he was away at the lumber camp,
or that Gus Sorenson must not be trusted with the Malmsteads’ mail
if he had been drinking, or that it was a kind act to pretend to look
through the pigeonholes when an Indian asked for mail, even
though it was well known that none of these Chippewas ever got a
letter. “Stamp-stamp,” would go the marking machine behind the
window, “stamp”—a long pause and then another brisk “stamp-
stamp.” No matter in what a hurry were the patrons of the Rudolm
postoffice, they must wait, every man, woman and child of them,
until Miss Christina had read all the postals.
The little place was already crowded when Hugh arrived, mostly
with men and children, for the women did not often come for the
mail, it was their hour for washing dishes. Hugh sat down on a
bench in the corner to listen to the talk going on about him in all
degrees of broken English. It concerned mostly the lost Edmonds
boys, but occasionally drifted back to the universal subject, the war,
for this was the time when the American army was gathering in
France, when Russia was crumbling, when the first pinch of winter
was beginning to be felt abroad and the cry was going up over all
the world to America for bread. By and by the general talk died away
and all began to listen to some one who was airing a grievance very
loudly on the other side of the room. He was a big man with a rough
corduroy coat and a rougher voice which he raised very loud in the
height of his indignation.
“I tell you there wasn’t a better bale of furs in the whole Green
River country. I got some myself, trapping, and bought some from
the Indians, and there wasn’t one pelt but was a beauty, but the
brown bear skin was the best of all. Five hundred dollars I would ’a’
got for them, just that little bale, not a cent less—and when I come
to myself again every hide and hair of them was gone!”
“And you can’t tell who took them?” questioned one of his
audience.
“I can’t tell but I could guess right enough. I didn’t see nobody,
only a billion or two stars when I was hit over the head in the dark,
and that was all. There’s only one man around here who will do that
kind of dirty work and he hails from Jasper Peak. That’s the kind of
fur trading he likes to do, let some other man go through the snow
and the cold, spending his good money, risking his life, tramping
along his line of traps or from one Indian camp to another,
wheedling the red rascals into selling their furs, and just as a fellow’s
nearly home again, dreaming about the profit there’s going to be
this time, here comes some one sneaking behind in the dark and the
whole thing’s gone!”
 “You was lucky he did not shoot you, Ole Peterson,” commented
another friend. “He does not care much who he shoots, that Jake he
doesn’t.”
“I would just like to meet up with him somewhere,” Peterson
returned quickly. “A man can’t do nothing when they sneak up on
him in the dark, but if I ever have the chance, why, I’ll just show him
once. I wouldn’t have sold those furs for less than seven hundred
dollars, I swear. And that bear skin, I tell you, was a prize.”
“Wass it so beeg?” asked an old Swede, sitting in the corner near
Hugh.
“No, sir, it wasn’t big, but it was rare. Just a bear cub it was, but a
cub that had turned out blond by some freak and surprised his old
black mother some, I’ll be bound. Not the brown, even, that grizzly
bears are, but a light, gold, yellow brown. The Indian who had it
vowed he wouldn’t sell it, not for any price, but at last I got it away
from him. And I’d like just to meet the fellow that stole it from me.
Shooting would be too good, I’d—”
Miss Christina opened her window at this point and put an end to
the fearful threats of Ole Peterson. Hugh received his mail almost
the first of all, a short and very hasty note from his father, which did
not say openly that they were about to embark but contained more
than one veiled hint to that effect. He read it through three times,
trying to make the most of the censored information it contained.
Then, his attention caught by the complete silence that had fallen
around him, he looked up to see what had happened.
Nothing, apparently, had really occurred except that a newcomer
had entered abruptly and banged the door behind him. Yet as he
strode over to the middle of the room every person in the crowded
place drew back, the big Swedes elbowing the quick Canadians, the
children standing on tip-toes to peer under the arms or around the
shoulders of their protecting elders. The space that had been filled a
moment before by a chattering, friendly group, became all in an
instant silent and empty with the big man standing quite alone.
 He was very big, as Hugh noticed at first glance, taller than any
other man there, and strong and heavy in proportion. One of his
broad shoulders sagged a little under the strap of a heavy pack
which he presently unbuckled and dropped upon the floor. His hair
was very long and black under his slouch hat and his skin was so
dark that Hugh felt sure he must be an Indian.
“Any mail for me?” he called across to the postmistress without
troubling himself to turn around.
Miss Christina had disappeared somewhere into the protecting
depths of the postoffice department. Her voice rose, trembling, from
behind the partition.
“I think so,” she said, “but it’s been here some time. I will have to
look it out.”
“No hurry,” returned the man with an insolent laugh at the
quavering of her voice; “don’t disturb yourself so much. I can wait.”
He threw himself down upon one of the benches and pushed back
his hat. Hugh felt something like a shudder when he first saw his
eyes; they were blue, a pale unlovely blue that looked terrifyingly
strange, set in his dark face.
“Hello, friends,” the stranger continued genially. “I thought I would
look in and get my mail before I was off down-State to sell my furs.
I’ve got a fine lot this year, the best that’s come out of Canada for a
long while.”
There was no answer, unless one could call little Eva Stromberg’s
frightened squeak a reply, or the uneasy shifting of old Nels Larson’s
big feet.
“Would you like to see what I’ve got?” the man went on,
seemingly quite untroubled by the lack of friendliness. “You won’t
see anything so fine again for quite a month of Sundays, nor
anything that’s worth so much money, you poor penny-pinchers.
Come here, sis,” he added to one of the smaller children; “you would
like to see my furs, now, wouldn’t you?”
The little girl, afraid to disobey, advanced with something of the
air of a charmed bird, and came trembling to his side. He opened
the big pack and spread out its contents on the floor.
“That’s otter,” he said to her; “don’t be frightened, just feel of it.
Isn’t it silky and soft?”
She passed her hand obediently over the silvery brown surface
and then, bursting into terrified sobs, ran to take refuge behind her
father. The stranger, undisturbed, went on spreading out his wares.
“This wolf skin now should bring me something big,” he said. “Of
course wolf isn’t much compared to otter but I’ve never seen finer
fur. Step up, folks, and look, it’s a dead wolf that isn’t going to bite
you.”
It was Hugh alone who felt sufficient curiosity to come nearer. A
wolf skin, an otter skin! He had never seen one before. He came
closer and closer as the man unrolled more and more of the soft,
furry pelts.
“Now this—”
He stopped, for even he must take notice of the gasp that went
through the crowd, a gasp of surprise and indignant protest. Only
Hugh, eager and excited, took no notice of the strange tension in
the air, so astonished was he at the sight of what lay in the man’s
hands.
“Why,” he blurted out, “it’s Ole Peterson’s brown bear skin!”
A quiver seemed to run through the whole of the crowd, while the
silence became so complete that Miss Christina’s clock upon the wall
went tick-tock, tick-tock, tick-tock, three times before any one
seemed to move or before the storm of the stranger’s fury broke
forth.
“Whose did you say?” he snarled, rising suddenly and standing
over Hugh, a threatening, towering figure. “Whose did you say it
was?”
Hugh thought afterwards that never, as long as he lived, would he
forget how terrible were those shifty, pale-blue eyes in that lowering
face. He could never say it was real courage, but only rash, hot
anger that made him answer defiantly,
 “I said it was Ole Peterson’s. He told us it was the only one in the
country and that it was stolen from him.”
The man gave a queer, harsh laugh.
“Ole, come here,” he ordered.
There came out from the corner a very different Peterson from the
reckless, angry person who had voiced his wrongs a few moments
before. This poor creature was fairly sallow with terror, and was
apparently trying to make his large figure as small and
inconspicuous as possible. He swallowed convulsively two or three
times before he was able to speak.
“What is it, Jake?” he questioned meekly.
The man called Jake flung the skin toward him.
“Is that yours?” he asked in a tone that said plainly, “Claim it if
you dare.”
Ole passed his hand lovingly over the lustrous brown gold of the
thick fur. He held it up so that all could see the shape of the chubby
little bear cub whose coat it once had been, and the dark hairy paws
that still dangled from it. He smoothed the dark shadings of the fur
and looked at them with longing.
“Is it yours?” Jake insisted, turning from Hugh to advance a
threatening step toward Ole.
“No,” said Peterson at last in a frightened husky voice. “No, it ain’t
mine, Jake.”
“Then what the—?” The stranger made one stride toward Hugh
and caught his shoulder in a grasp that made the bones grind
together. The boy looked about him desperately, surely some one of
all these men would come forward to his aid. He saw pity in the eyes
of many of them, and one or two making a movement toward him
and then drawing back. It needed only that to prove to him at last
that this was the much-feared Pirate of Jasper Peak.
Yet before either could move further, before Jake could finish his
question, help came from an unexpected quarter. The door beside
them opened and closed quickly, and Linda Ingmarsson came in.
The wind had blown her yellow hair from under her kerchief, her
cheeks were glowing and her eyes bright. She made a single step to
Hugh’s side and laid her strong, firm fingers on Jake’s crushing hand.
He withdrew it as quickly as though something had stung him.
“So you are at your old bullying ways,” she said scornfully; “you
found long ago that there was one woman not afraid of you, now
you find a boy. It is like you to believe that he would fear you as the
rest do, but this time you are wrong. And you know that there is
nothing that can make you so angry as to find some one you cannot
terrify.”
He muttered something but did not speak aloud.
“Come,” she said to Hugh, and, “Come, Carl,” she added as she
held out her hand to her small son and moved toward the door. But
Jake barred the way.
“He tried to tell me that bear skin wasn’t mine,” he blustered. “He
said it was Ole Peterson’s, but Peterson vows it isn’t his. What do
you make of that? Has he any right to call me a thief?”
Linda answered quite undisturbed.
“He is a shrewder boy than are we Swedes,” she said, “and has
been quick to see the truth. Yet he is not the only one to know you
for a thief.”
The man’s blazing eyes narrowed into slits and his grating, harsh
voice was full of suppressed fury.
“There are not many who have dared to call me that, Linda
Ingmarsson,” he said, “and whoever does it, whether man, woman
or boy, will live to be bitterly sorry. John Edmonds did, and where is
he? Out there in the woods, I hear, lost, dead beyond a doubt, he
and his brother, the worthless two of them. I heard the whistles
blowing as I came down the valley, and I thought to myself, ‘You can
blow them until they split, but you will never call him back.’” He
lowered his voice, yet still spoke so that all could hear—“He didn’t
want to be called back.”
“John Edmonds and his brother will come back,” insisted Linda
steadily, “for they have friends who believe in them and will help
them still. Whatever John has left in confusion he will make plain
and straight when he returns.”
“What friends has he?” cried Jake scornfully. “Before another day
has passed every one in Rudolm Valley will know just why they
went, both of them, and then where will their friends be?”
“There is still my brother Oscar,” returned Linda.
“And do you think your brother Oscar can save them? He does not
even know what has happened, and if he did, what help could he
give?” Jake laughed harshly. “He is having all that he can do to save
himself, these days, has Oscar Dansk.”
Hugh could feel Linda’s hand tighten on his arm as though, in
spite of herself, she winced under the last words. He stepped in front
of her to face their common enemy, but she spoke before he could.
“The Edmonds are not friendless,” she declared. “No matter what
all the world may say there will still be some of us who know they
are honest and who will find and save them in the end.”
She moved to the door, and Jake, seeing that he could no longer
block her way, suddenly stepped back and flung it open with a great
flourish.
“I wish you luck,” he said; “it will be a long task, finding and
saving two men who either have fled the country or are already
dead.”
Linda turned back to speak her last word as she and Hugh and
Carl went out together into the dark.
“I know they have not fled the country,” she said, “and I am
certain they are not dead. Had anything happened to them, their
dog would have been here to tell us. So I know they are alive since
Nicholas has not come back.”
 CHAPTER III

LAUGHING MARY

Hugh sat in his little room for a long time that night, reviewing his
adventures of this scant half day in Rudolm. He found it very difficult
to decide what to do, in the light of this unexpected turn of his
affairs, the disappearance of the two Edmonds. Of one thing he was
hotly certain, that John Edmonds had not vanished of his own will.
The very fact of Hugh’s being there, urged to come by both the
brothers, showed that their absence was entirely unplanned. He was
less certain, however, of the chances of their ever coming safe home
again. Linda Ingmarsson was sure they would, but she was only one
woman holding her opinion against a score of men. He wished that
he could make some effort of his own to find his friends, wished it
more and more as he went slowly over the situation and realized
how desperate it was. What could he do, a boy, alone, knowing
nothing of woodcraft and the cruel mysteries of the forest? Nothing,
reason told him plainly, absolutely nothing.
Quite evidently he must go back to that cousin in New York who
was to help him if things went wrong. That things had gone wrong,
from the moment of his getting off the train, onward through his
terrifying interview with Half-Breed Jake, was not to be denied. This
seemed to be one of the few certain facts in the whirling confusion
of his affairs. He recollected now how the friendly porter had felt
misgivings as to the length of his stay in Rudolm and had reminded
him that the train that would carry him back to the world he knew,
would go through at six o’clock in the morning. After long pondering,
he decided to take it.
Just as he was about to go to bed he heard a sound at the
window, a handful of pebbles striking against the glass. He got up to
look out and saw some one standing on the doorstep below.
“It is I, Jethro Brown,” called a cautious voice. “Can you come
down? I want to talk to you.”
Hugh took up his candle and stole on tiptoe down the stairs. All of
the Ingmarssons were sound asleep. He contrived to shoot back the
bolts and open the front door without a sound. The clerk from the
hotel, looking more lank and awkward than ever in the candle light,
stood waiting outside.
“I saw your window was bright and I had some things to tell you,”
he said. “I am sorry to bring you down.”
Hugh blew out the candle and they sat down together on the
doorstep.
“It is all right,” he said; “you wouldn’t have found me to-morrow. I
am going away early in the morning.”
“Going?” echoed the other in a tone of the greatest
disappointment and dismay. Then he heaved a deep sigh.
“Well,” he remarked, “I suppose it is the only thing you can do,
but somehow I had kind of hoped you were going to stay.”
“Why?” Hugh stared in astonishment, for what difference could it
make to any one whether he remained in Rudolm or went away?
Jethro sat staring at the ground between his feet and shuffled
them uneasily several times.
“That Half-Breed Jake has been at the hotel all evening,” he said
at last. “He has been talking a long time about the Edmonds boys
and how they have disappeared because they had to. It is true that
John’s books at the bank were pretty badly mixed and they have had
an expert up to go over them, but nothing has been proved yet, one
way or the other. It seemed to me, at last, that Jake talked rather
too much. He always hated the Edmonds boys, they were too square
and honest and they had blocked him more than once in some of his
devilment. If there is a mean or a cruel or a crooked way of doing a
thing, he will do it. That’s Jake.”
“But why is every one so afraid of him?” inquired Hugh. “He is
only one man against all of you.”
“It is just part of living here to be afraid of him, I suppose, and to
try to keep out of trouble with him,” Jethro answered slowly. “The
Indians fear him so much that they will do anything he says; he
understands them as very few men do and he uses his knowledge to
get what he wants. A man who can control these Chippewas has a
lot of power. There is a white deer that ranges these woods once in
a long time and is supposed to bring bad luck. The Indians have a
saying that whoever sees the white deer or opposes Half-Breed Jake
is sure to die inside a year.”
“But the Swedes have better sense than that!” exclaimed Hugh.
“The Swedes are very superstitious too, and once they are
convinced of a thing it is hard to make them change. And it does
seem that whoever stands in Jake’s way is cursed with bad fortune
until he gives it up. There are only a few that ever dared stand out
against him, such as the Edmonds boys, and where are they?”
Hugh sat quiet, watching the moon come up over the eastern rim
of the valley. He found Jethro as talkative as the Swedes were silent,
but he felt no very great interest in these accounts of Half-Breed
Jake, a man whom he instinctively hated and would, he hoped,
never see again. Only wonder as to why Jethro wished him to stay in
Rudolm and what all these details had to do with himself, held his
lagging attention.
“Do you see that road,” Jethro went on heatedly, “that road
yonder that leads over the hill? That would have meant a lot to the
people here, but it came to nothing. It was to be built through the
woods as far as Jasper Peak and would have opened up the country
at the upper end of the lake. Jake stopped it. He calls all that
country his, and is bound to keep the fishing and the hunting and
trapping for himself. He killed the plan with open threats and secret
lies: at first the men went at it with a rush, but in the end somehow
the whole thing fell through. It was the first time he ever scored a
real victory off Oscar Dansk.”
Hugh turned, his interest caught at last.
“That is one person I want to know about,” he said. “Who is this
Oscar Dansk?”
“He is Linda Ingmarsson’s younger brother,” Jethro answered. “You
know that much and it is hard to tell you a great deal more. Oscar
isn’t like the rest of us. I don’t quite know what to say about him; he
is always dreaming about something big, some way. His father must
have been quite a great person back in Sweden; he was poor to the
end of his life, just as every one in Rudolm is poor, but you can see
that Oscar and Linda are not quite the same kind of people as the
rest.”
“He doesn’t live here in Rudolm?” Hugh said.
“Not now, he lives out beyond Jasper Peak. He is proving up on
some kind of a claim, homesteading, right in the country that Half-
Breed Jake calls his. He was here in April when war was declared
and went down pell-mell to Duluth to enlist, wanted to go into the
Navy, I think, these Swedes all do. But they wouldn’t take him, or for
the army either, I don’t know why. He came back in a few days,
looking grim and set and not saying a word to any one. He went
right off into the woods again and we’ve scarcely seen him since. It
was a cruel disappointment, I think, as bad as when he couldn’t
build his road.”
“But why did he care so much about the road?”
Hugh’s curiosity about that mysterious highway had grown greater
and greater, yet even now it was not to be satisfied.
“He had something big in his mind,” Jethro said vaguely, “so big I
never quite understood it. He was a fellow who could always see
farther than the rest of us, I think. John Edmonds used to say he
did, although even he lost faith in the plan about the road at last,
and that nearly broke Oscar’s heart. Some people even said they had
quarreled, but I don’t believe it. Oscar wasn’t the sort to bear a
grudge.”
Jethro thrust his hands deep into his pockets and turned at last to
face Hugh squarely.
“That is what I am getting at,” he said. “Oscar Dansk can find
John and Dick Edmonds if any man on earth can do it. But some one
would have to go out through the woods to tell him, otherwise it
might be weeks before he hears what has happened. And the only
person to go is you.”
“I?” cried Hugh in amazement, “I? Why, that’s impossible.”
“All right,” said the other briefly, “I was afraid maybe you would
take it that way. Of course, after all, you oughtn’t to try it. Well,
good-night.”
He shambled off into the dark, leaving Hugh still staring in
astonishment. He wished that he had not said quite so decisively
that the plan was impossible, so that at least he might have heard
more of it. How strange it was that, after leading up to the subject
so long, Jethro should have dropped it so quickly. Probably he
himself knew that it was impossible as well as did Hugh.
Very slowly he went up to bed, still wondering. It was in vain that
he tried to compose his mind to sleep: he could not, for thinking of
what Jethro had said. For an hour he tossed and turned and puzzled
and pondered. At last he got up and went to the window, thinking
that he might feel sleepy if he sat there for a while.
The moon was very bright now, so that all the little square houses
showed plainly, as did the white expanse of the empty street.
Nothing stirred in all of the sleeping town; the very quiet and peace
did indeed make him feel drowsy almost at once. He yawned a great
yawn and was just about to turn from the window when a moving
shadow caught his eye. Some one was coming down the deserted
street, some one who walked noiselessly but swiftly and with great
determination. It was a woman, he could see, an Indian squaw, with
broad, bent shoulders and heavy dark hair. Even at that distance and
in the deceiving moonlight he felt certain that it was the woman he
had seen before, Laughing Mary.
She turned in at the gate and came hurrying up the path, but she
did not reach the door. Two men followed her, one lithe and
stooping, the other tall and moving with great strides—there was no
doubt in Hugh’s mind that it was Half-Breed Jake. He seized the
woman by the shoulder and whirled her about just as, very plainly,
she was on the point of mounting the doorstep and knocking at the
door. There followed an altercation, whispered, yet so full of
fierceness and passionate gesture that Hugh, at his window, could
feel the fury of their quarrel even there. It was almost like watching
a dance of shadows, so noiseless did they manage to be, although
now and then he caught a low-voiced sentence, couched in guttural
Chippewa, and once, to his surprise, he heard his own name, spoken
very distinctly by Laughing Mary.
She was not smiling now but speaking volubly, gesticulating,
urging and insisting something, to which Jake slowly and
determinedly shook his head. She kept pointing to the bale of furs
still under his arm and seemed to be voicing her desire with such
violence in the face of his continued refusal that finally, in angry
impatience, he raised his arm as though to strike her. She winced
and cowered, but still persisted, advancing her dark wrinkled face
almost into his to utter her last word. Whatever she said seemed to
have effect, for Jake’s arm dropped to his side and, muttering
angrily, he stooped down to open his pack and give her what she
demanded. What the coveted article was, Hugh could not see, for
the Indian husband, Kaniska, was standing in the way.
Then all three went out quickly through the gate, as silent and as
swift as ghosts. For the first time, Hugh noticed that Jake, who
walked behind, moved with a slight unevenness in his giant stride.
It had grown so late that Hugh in spite of his curiosity and
excitement was sleepy at last. He lay down again, going over and
over once more the puzzles of the day. What ought he to do? What
had these strange people to do with him? Why did Jethro say that
he was the only one to go on that impossible errand, why did the
fellow not go himself? If there were really a chance of his helping
the Edmonds boys, Hugh would have risked anything gladly, but this
plan was such absolute madness! No, thought Hugh, he had made
up his mind, he would not change it again, he would go to-morrow.
He arose at five, packed his belongings and, on hearing Linda
stirring in the kitchen, went down to explain to her. She heard him
through in silence and without protest.
“I suppose you must know best,” was her only comment.
When he made an attempt to thank her for all her kindness, she
refused to listen.
“The Edmonds boys are my friends,” she said, “and for them I
would do much. This was nothing.”
She came to the door to bid him good-by and stood watching him
as he went down the path to the gate. The morning mist lay heavy
in the little valley and stretched upward in wreaths over the hills.
The air was cold, so that he turned up his coat-collar and walked
very briskly. Once he looked back and saw that Linda Ingmarsson
had come out to the gate and stood leaning over it almost as though
she were about to call him back. She made no sign, however, so he
turned once more and walked on toward the station. He found that
he was early, that the little building was still locked and that he must
sit down on the narrow bench at the edge of the platform and wait.
The mist lifted, little by little, until he began to see the miles of blue
water, the hills and the vast unbroken forest sweeping down to the
water’s edge. How would it be, he thought with a shudder, to be lost
in that unending maze of green?
Presently he heard footsteps coming up the stairs and around the
corner of the building. He glanced up quickly and saw that it was
Jethro Brown again, wearing a dingy straw hat on the back of his
head and carrying a suitcase. He loitered at the other end of the
platform and would not have come near, but Hugh arose from his
seat and went straight to him.
“You must tell me,” he said, “why you thought I was the only one
to carry that news to Oscar Dansk. I have thought of nothing else all
night.”
Jethro flushed.
“I shouldn’t ever have spoken of it at all,” he stammered, “I don’t
know what possessed me. I just got to thinking and felt that
something ought to be done, that some one ought to go. But I
should not have come to you, of course you couldn’t do it.”
“If I did go,” Hugh persisted, “how would I ever find the way?”
He did not really know himself why he asked the question.
The other turned and pointed.
“You would follow that road to the top of the hill and where it
ends you would find a trail that runs across the range of forest
beyond. It leads to a little Chippewa village on Two Rivers; there’s an
Indian boy there, Shokatan, who could guide you the rest of the
way. He got to be quite a friend of mine when he came in to the
Indian school near here and he knows English, though he probably
won’t be willing to speak it now. I could give you a letter and I know
he would help you.”
It was plain that Jethro had thought it all out.
Hugh still stood pondering.
“Why don’t any of the Swedes go?” he asked, “aren’t they
willing?”
“They are willing enough,” Jethro returned, “but they have given
up. They say there is no hope. Once they have made up their minds
there is no changing them.”
“And why,” questioned Hugh bluntly, “don’t you go yourself?”
“Oh,” Jethro answered simply, “I forgot to tell you that. Of course
I would go only I am leaving to-day. I’ve enlisted. I’ve got my
orders. I’m going to Fort Snelling.”
“Oh,” cried Hugh, “how did you manage? My father wouldn’t let
me. How old are you?”
“I am a little under age but I made them take me,” replied Jethro.
“There wasn’t much trouble about getting consent, I haven’t any one
that my going would make any difference to.”
Welcome to our website – the perfect destination for book lovers and
knowledge seekers. We believe that every book holds a new world,
offering opportunities for learning, discovery, and personal growth.
That’s why we are dedicated to bringing you a diverse collection of
books, ranging from classic literature and specialized publications to
self-development guides and children's books.

More than just a book-buying platform, we strive to be a bridge

Join us on a journey of knowledge exploration, passion nurturing, and

ebookbell.com