CHAPTER V

Peter did not know when he fell asleep. He was buried in the sweet-scented cedar and balsam when his father awakened him. He sat up and rubbed his eyes, and it came to him quickly where he was. The fire was out and dawn was breaking up the gloom of the forest. He missed the fire, and the bacon frying over it, and the pot of coffee steaming in the coals. Those were the usual things that greeted him when he woke up in camp. And this morning he was hungry.

They headed straight into the heart of the unexplored timberlands south and west, and with empty hands and no pack on his back Donald McRae talked as cheerfully as though they had a week's rations with them. But his eyes were constantly questing for something to eat, and it occurred to him as a sort of tragedy that he had not tied his rifle to the log. He did not explain to Peter just why he had left it where the police would easily find it.

By midday their hunt for food had become a thrilling adventure to Peter. It stirred his blood even more than thought of their enemies, for the police seemed an interminable distance away now, shut out by miles of wilderness. There was something fascinating about it,[61] too. There were birds about them and rabbit runways in every dip and swamp they came to, and deer and moose and caribou tracks so plentiful in places that they made trails like the hoof-beaten paths of cattle.

But there was nothing they could get at, except porcupines. During the morning they could have killed half a dozen of these animals with clubs, but each time porcupine flesh was suggested for dinner Peter made a grimace of revulsion. Twice they had tried it experimentally on their camping trips and both times it had nauseated him. He insisted he would rather starve than eat any more of that ill-smelling, fatty stuff the porcupine was made of. He would chew spruce gum instead. There was plenty of it on the trees they passed.

"If you get too hungry we'll roast some lily roots," said Donald, "but if you can hold out until night we'll have the feast of our lives."

Peter held out. The sun was still up when they came from heavy timber into a long, narrow meadow running into a swamp on the other side. This was the sort of place Donald McRae had been looking for. In the edge of the swamp were rabbit runways beaten fresh and hard. They chose the site for their camp in the rim of the high timber, and while Peter brought in firewood Donald made snares from another section of boot top. These he set in the runways. It was scarcely more than dusk when the first big snowshoe ran his head through a noose and found himself swinging at[62] the end of a sapling. An hour later he was roasted, and in the light of their fire they divided the feast between them. Peter didn't mind the absence of salt and bread and potatoes. Nothing he could remember had ever tasted quite so good to him as the unseasoned rabbit.

Food and the warmth of the fire made him drowsy, and very soon after they had finished their supper Donald tucked him snugly into the bed of evergreens they had made and covered him with his coat. Peter fell asleep instantly, and for several minutes the man remained on his knees at his side, the smile of tenderness in his face changing slowly into a look of haggard grief. When he rose to his feet the luster had died out of his eyes and years had fallen upon his shoulders. He caught his breath sobbingly as he stared into the wall of chaotic darkness beyond the firelight. It was only Peter who counted now, and this night was the last Peter would be with him. Tomorrow he would be alone, an outlaw, a hunted man running away to save his life. And Peter....

A moan came to his lips, a dry and broken cry of hopelessness, and his eyes fixed themselves in their anguish upon the heart of the fire. Without Peter, would God give him strength to live? What would the days be like—and the nights—and the months and years to come without Peter? For Peter was not only Peter. In taking the mother, God had given her soul back to him in the body of her boy. She was a part of[63] him, speaking with his voice, looking out of his eyes, loving with his love, a comrade and pal to the man in spirit even as she had been in her own sweet life. And now—tomorrow—he would lose them both. The law was after him. Its hounds would follow him from hole to hole, like foxes after a rabbit, and probably in the end they would get him.

He closed his eyes to shut out the thing that was hurting him. When he opened them a face seemed to have taken form in the glow of the fire like a soul come to give him courage and resolution, sweetly sad in its inspiration, glorious in its consolation and cheer. Every day through the years this visioning of his wife had come to him; through those years she had walked hand in hand with him, she had been with him in the upgrowing of Peter, had helped to teach him the love of God and the glory of nature, and had laughed and cried and sung with them as sunshine and shadow came. And always, in the darkest hours, Donald McRae saw her face, sweet and strong and never afraid. And so it was tonight.

"This is your last great fight for our Peter," her eyes seemed to say to him. "You must be strong."

And then she was gone. Slowly the fire died out, and he put no more wood upon it, but sat motionless and silent until it was only a red glow of ember and ash.

He did not sleep. The moon rose and the clear sky above was filled with stars. In their light he walked[64] back and forth in the open, a solitary figure with a thousand still shadows about him. It was the sort of night he loved, a spring night breathing and whispering of summer and sweet with the perfumes of balsam and spruce and growing things under his feet. These things were a part of his God, and of Peter's God. Just as the woman had built up his faith in him, pointing out its truth and beauty and glory, so had he built up in Peter an illimitable faith in this God which was nature. It strengthened him now. The glow of the moon, the softness of the stars, the gentle whisperings of the wind, the low music of running water and the thrill and tremble of inanimate and voiceless life about him were a part of his religion.

"Love a tree and you love God," had been his text for Peter. And as long as there remained trees and flowers and the songs of birds and eyes and ears with which to see and hear, hope could never die. His brain cleared and his heart grew stronger as he paced more swiftly through the moonlight. The world was gloriously big, he told himself again and again. Somewhere in it was a place for him and Peter, and when he found it, far away from the menace of the law, Peter would not fail to come when he called. But tomorrow he must be strong enough to lie and strong enough to leave Peter at Five Fingers with Simon McQuarrie.

Toward dawn he built up the fire and cooked another rabbit which he caught in one of the snares. It was ready when Peter crawled out of his balsam bed. He[65] did not know his father had not slept during the night. Donald McRae began to whistle when he saw the boy was awake, and though an uncomfortable thickening, persisted in his throat he fought to make the whistling cheerful just the same.

He announced his plan to Peter as if it were born of sudden inspiration and happily solved a temporary problem for them. He told him about Five Fingers and their old friend, Simon McQuarrie. Peter could just remember the Scotchman and Simon's fat Dutch partner and friend, Herman Vogelaar. Donald McRae seemed to recall them now with great pleasure, and he was sure Peter would enjoy his little visit with them, especially as there were several boys and girls of his own age to play with at Five Fingers. Of course he would come back soon, and maybe they would live at Five Fingers, if Peter liked it there. He continued to build up the lie, but something of trouble remained deep back in the boy's eyes. Donald tried not to see it too much, for it was the look he would have seen in the woman's eyes, if she had been in Peter's place.

They traveled until noon and ate their lunch. The afternoon was well gone when they heard the striking of an axe ahead of them. A quarter of an hour later they could hear several axes, and the distant crash of a falling tree. Donald McRae steeled his heart, and stopped. Yet in this moment he was smiling.

"That is Five Fingers," he said. "Can you go on alone, Peter?"

[66]

Peter nodded. "But I don't want to," he said. "I want to go with you, dad."

"You must go to Five Fingers, Peter. I'll come back soon. I promise that. I'll come back—soon."

A gulp came in Peter's throat.

"I'm not tired. I can go a long ways yet, dad. I'd rather go with you."

The man drew him into his arms.

"I'll come back tomorrow," he lied, fighting to speak the words calmly. "And you must get the paper in the bottle to Simon McQuarrie as soon as you can. You aren't afraid to go alone, are you, Peter?"

"No, I'm not afraid."

"Then—you must go." He hugged him close for a moment, and rested his cheek on Peter's disheveled hair. "Maybe I'll come back tonight," he whispered desperately. "Good-by, little pal. Hurry—and give Simon the paper—and—good-by!"

His lips burned against Peter's forehead. It was that kiss which startled Peter, and when his father turned away, and then looked back, smiling and waving a hand, a suffocating feeling remained in Peter's heart as if he could not get all the air he wanted to breathe. He tried to wave his hand in response, but in a moment it fell limply to his side. Donald McRae saw the gesture and a sob came in his breath. He disappeared behind a windfall, stopped and looked back. Peter was slowly turning toward Five Fingers. The small figure was pathetic in its aloneness. Twice it paused[67] and turned, and then went on, and was hidden at last by a screen of evergreens.

"God be with you and care for you, Peter, and give me strength to bear this parting," sobbed Donald McRae.

With white and haggard face he turned into the North.