CHAPTER V
THE ROOT HUNTER
“Well,” remarked Teddy, softly, “what you’re telling me doesn’tflabbergast me one little bit. I just guessed that much from looking atthe fellow, and hearing him talk. We’ll keep an eye on him, all right;and if he steals anything from _our_ camp this night, why, he’s welcometo it, that’s all. But we’d better act like we had only come over hereto examine this boat, and see how bad a mark that snag made in thevarnished side. He’s got his eye on us all the while; I can feel it.”
“Righto!” replied the woods boy, cheerfully, his mind relieved, sincehe had given his friend and employer proper warning, so that the burdenwas no longer on his shoulders.
A few minutes later they walked back to the fire, engaged in discussingwhether the snag “bite” would prove serious at some future time; and ifso, should they cover the spot with a piece of canvas, brought alongfor mending purposes.
Hackett watched them suspiciously, and seemed to strain his hearing inthe endeavor to make out what they were saying. He seemed relieved uponcatching the burden of their talk, as though it proved that they hadnot been discussing him while away.
By the time he finished eating, there was nothing more in sight. Dolphwas of the opinion that the giant’s capacity was of such an unlimitednature, that if given an opportunity he could have lessened their stockof provisions alarmingly, before calling a halt.
“Must say that I never seed such a dandy outfit as ye boys kerry,” Gabewas pleased to remark, as he looked enviously around him; “canoes thatjest take me eye; guns sech as I never handled in all my life; and thercutest cookin’ things as was ever got up. Must take a heap o’ hard cashter buy sech things. An’ thet coffee, say, will I ever forgit it? Likeas not the taste’ll stick with me forever. Ain’t nawthin’ hardly Iwouldn’t do, if so be I could aim the money ter buy sich coffee. P’rapsye wouldn’t mind leavin’ me the name, an’ fust dollar I find rollin’ uphill, hang me if I don’t invest the same in it. I could do with littleelse, if I got a drink like that. It beats any old pizen whiskey Iever swallered.”
“That’s where you’re right, Gabe!” remarked Teddy, quickly; “and if alot of our men only thought the same, and carried it out, they’d bebetter off for it. Perhaps you’ve guessed it before, but I might aswell tell you that I’m Teddy Overton, the only son of the president ofthe lumber company that’s a rival of the one you used to work for.”
“Yep, I guessed it, an’ why—’cause in the fust place ye’re the imageo’ yer daddy; and then agin, I see ye onct at the store,” the visitorwent on to say.
Then, although he had known this fact from the start, was there somehidden reason why Gabe had not said a word about it?
They went on talking for a while, the man evidently in no hurry toleave his comfortable seat in order to once more take up his walkingthrough the pine forest.
Teddy could not but notice how often those greedy eyes rested on hisgun; or it might be something else belonging to the outfit. PlainlyGabe Hackett was wishing some great good fortune might throw a chancein his way to gain possession of some of these things.
And Amos thought he saw more than that, as he continued to watch theburly former logger out of the tail of his eye. He had just mentionedto Teddy a suspicion that was creeping through his mind; and sittingthere, the boy kept following it up, trying to make ends meet, yetnever seeming quite able to do so.
He wondered why Gabe should look toward Dolph so many times, and alwayswith a sudden little tightening of the lips. If it had been Teddy now,Amos could understand, and believe that the unprincipled man might beplotting some harm to the son of the lumberman who defied the Trust;but Dolph was a stranger in these Michigan woods, his home being infaraway Cincinnati.
Could it be barely possible, Amos wondered, that this rough man knewabout the father of Dolph being a man of almost unlimited money, oneof the big millionaire manufacturers of the thriving city on the bankof the Ohio; and was he even daring to lay some bold plan, looking tokidnaping the boy, to hold him for a ransom?
Lots of people would say that such things, while being done frequentlyin Italy, Greece, and such Old World countries, were just impossiblein up-to-date free America. Why even Amos knew it was just to thecontrary. He read the papers every chance he could get; and many atime had he discovered where Italians, or others, had taken to thesemethods, with the idea of forcing people with money to divide with them.
There was that case of the Cudahy boy, for instance; and numerousothers of like boldness. Oh! no, such things are not at all confined toEurope. They are being planned and executed right in our own country,every week. The only question that staggered Amos was how such asmall-minded fellow as this giant, could ever engineer a scheme likethis. But perhaps he may have backing they knew nothing of; and thatthere were wheels within wheels. Dolph might be made to disappear,just to make it look as though Teddy Overton’s abduction were in theordinary nature of things; when in truth it was all being done to forcethe lumber company to seek new fields, and leave this region to theopposition.
So Amos was wrestling with a pretty big proposition as he sat there bythe fire, listening to the man talk, and hoping to pick up a few littleclues from what he said, that might lead to disclosures.
It all came back to Amos later on, under entirely different conditions;to give him new chances for anxiety.
The hour was getting rather late, and still Hackett lingered on, lothto once more continue his lonely tramp. He said he was waiting forthe moon to rise; but even after the battered remnant of the heavenlyluminary put in an appearance over the trees across the river, he madeno movement looking to immediate departure.
“Why do you suppose he keeps hanging on so?” Teddy managed to ask Amos,aside, as they chanced to enter the tent together for some purpose.
“P’raps he wants you to ask him to have another little snack?”suggested the woods boy, with a chuckle.
“Well, he’ll wait a long time, then, I tell you,” complained Teddy.“Why, that fellow could eat us out of house and home in three days, andthen not half try. Did you ever see such a mouth? He takes a bite thatwould be three to me.”
“Huh! I cooked for him one winter,” remarked Amos, as though thatcircumstance ought to tell how much he knew concerning the capacity ofBig Gabe to stow away provisions. “Kept us busy, right along, too, I’mpromising you. But we’d better get outside again; he’s that slick hemight pull the wool over Dolph’s eyes, and make away with a package ofour coffee.”
When they came out, greatly to their delight they found that Gabe wason his feet, stretching his six feet three.
“Hate ter do hit the wust kind, boys,” he was remarking. “You all hevbeen so kind to me, I’d like ter stop over jest till mawnin’, so’ds terhev another drink o’ that fine coffee. Don’t s’pose now, he could sparea feller one leetle cupful o’ the same? I’d take it handsome now, sureI would. An’ it’d help me git over the miles I gotter go afore mawnin’;jest ter smell it every little while’d help right sum.”
Teddy jumped over to the mess chest. There was a can full of the groundcoffee in this; and besides, he calculated that they had an abundance,and to spare. Even if they had to go on short rations, if the giving ofa cup of the pulverized berry from the South Seas could help hurry Gabeoff, he was willing to endure the privation.
And so he found a paper bag to pour the fragrant stuff in. When hehanded this over to Gabe the big ex-logger sniffed at it with what wasintended to be an expression of bliss on his bearded face, rolling hiseyes at the same time heavenward to signify his thanks.
“That’s the stuff, young fellers! Never seed the like, give ye my wordfor hit. I’m glad ye writ me the name o’ the brand, an’ tells me whar Ikin git the same. I’m a-goin’ ter hev that coffee arter this, or knowthe reason why.”
He folded the paper bag, and thrust it in the outer pocket of his coat;though Amos afterwards remembered seeing the corner of the packetsticking out.
Shortly after
wards Gabe took his departure. He gave one last lookaround ere doing so. It might be to impress the appearance of all thosefine outing arrangements in his memory, so that he could recall them atsome future time, when sitting at his lone camp fire; or on the otherhand, possibly he wanted to know just how the camp was laid out, forsome other purpose, not so honorable.
But the boys were glad to be rid of him.
“Hope we never set eyes on Gabe again,” remarked Teddy, after they hadseen him pass out of sight, up the river.
“Well, since he seems to be heading in the same direction we’re bound,we might run across the man again,” remarked Dolph. “But honest now,between us, Teddy, I couldn’t swallow all he said about hunting roots.You see, the man doesn’t even have an idea what wild ginseng lookslike; and as for golden seal, he would pass it by every time, judgingfrom some remarks he made. Now, what would such an ignorant man want,hunting valuable medicinal roots up here?”
“But if not that, what is he after then?” queried Teddy with a frown onhis young face, as though a faint suspicion had even begun to troublehim.
“He knows you are the son of Mr. Overton, the president of the lumbercompany; and he admits that he used to work for the opposition. Perhapshe’s still in their employ, Teddy; perhaps he means to do somethingto you, something that will give his company the whiphand over yourfather.”
It was Amos who said this; but Teddy laughed at such an idea. Hedeclared that the most they had to fear from Big Gabe was his thievishpropensity. Possibly he might be sorely tempted to come back, and tryto loot the camp. His actions had shown them that he was envious ofthe fine guns they carried, as well as all those other things, the likeof which the man had never seen before.
“I’m going to put in a couple of shells of the finest bird shot I’vegot,” he went on to say, grimly; “and whichever one is on duty mustcarry my Marlin. Then, if our friend does come creeping around, we’llpretend that we think it a bear or a cat, and blaze away. He’ll get hisjacket dusted, and limp a little, maybe; but he won’t try that dodgeagain, I reckon.”
“A good idea,” declared Dolph; and even Amos grinned; for inimagination he could see that ill-natured giant, who had always beenthe bully of the logging camp, going limping away, grunting with thepain of the fine shot that Teddy kept for summer woodcock shooting inthe brush, where close shots were the rule.
They sat down to talk a little before making arrangements for thenight; because both Teddy and Dolph were curious to hear what the woodsboy knew concerning the past tempestuous life of Big Gabe.
And Amos, on his part, was quite willing to tell. His recollections ofthe giant were not at all pleasing, for doubtless the boy must havemore than a few times felt the heavy hand of the man who, for someyears, had been reckoned the biggest bully among the Woodstock loggers.
As they chatted, they kept their eyes constantly on the alert; just asthough Hackett would ever think of creeping back while the camp mateswere on the alert, rather than wait until they had entered the tent torest.