Captain Sam Part 2
We now come back to the drift-pile. When Jake had carefully hidden Sam's boots, as he supposed, deep within the recesses of the great pile of logs and brush and roots, he began groping his way back toward the entrance. It was pitch dark of course, but by walking slowly and feeling his way carefully, he managed to follow the pa.s.sage way. Just as he began to think that he must be pretty nearly out of the den, however, he came suddenly upon an obstruction. Feeling about carefully he found that the pa.s.sage in which he stood had come to an abrupt termination. We know, of course what had happened, but Jake did not.
He had come to the end of the log which Sam had thrown down to stop up the pa.s.sage way, and there was really no way for him to go. He supposed, of course, that he had somehow wandered out of his way, leaving the main alley and following a side one to its end. He therefore retraced his steps, feeling, as he went, for an opening upon one side or the other. He found several, but none of them did him any good. Following each a little way he came to its end in the matted logs, and had to try again. Presently he began to get nervous and frightened. He imagined all sorts of things and so lost his presence of mind that he forgot the outer appearance and size of the drift pile, and frightened himself still further by imagining that it must extend for miles in every direction, and that he might be hopelessly lost within its dark mazes. When he became frightened, he hurried his footsteps, as nervous people always do, and the result was that he blacked one of his eyes very badly by running against a projecting piece of timber. He was weary as well as frightened, but he dared not give up his effort to get out. Hour after hour--and the hours seemed weeks to him,--he wandered back and forth, afraid to call for a.s.sistance, and afraid above everything else that morning would come and that he would be forced to remain there in the drift pile while the boys marched away, or to call aloud for a.s.sistance and be caught in his own meanness without the power to deny it. Finally morning broke, and he could hear the boys as they began preparing for breakfast. It was his morning, according to agreement, to cut wood for the fire and bring water, and so a search was made for him at once. He heard several of the boys calling at the top of their lungs.
"Jake Elliott! Jake! Ja-a-a-ke!!" He knew then that his time had come.
What had Sam been doing all this time? Sleeping, I believe, for the most part, but he had not gone to sleep without making up his mind precisely what course to pursue. When he threw the log down, he meant merely to shut Jake Elliott and his own boots up for safe keeping, and it was his purpose, when morning should come, to "have it out" with the boot thief, in one way or another, as circ.u.mstances, and Jake's temper after his night's adventure, might determine.
He walked back, therefore, to his place of rest, after he had blocked up the entrance of the drift-pile, and threw himself down again under the bushes. Ten or fifteen minutes later he heard a slight noise at the root of the great tree near him, and, looking, saw something which looked surprisingly like a pair of boots, trying to force themselves out between two of the exposed roots. Then he heard retreating footsteps within the s.p.a.ce enclosed by the circle of roots, and began to suspect the precise state of affairs. Examining the boots he discovered that they were his own, and he quickly guessed the truth that Jake had pushed them out from the inside, under the impression that he was driving them into a hole in the centre of the tangled drift.
Sam was a brave boy, too brave to be vindictive, and so he quickly decided that as he had recovered his boots he would subject his enemy only to so much punishment as he thought was necessary to secure his good behavior afterward. He knew that the boys would torment Jake unmercifully if the true story of the night's exploits should become known to them, and while he knew that the culprit deserved the severest lesson, he was too magnanimous to subject him to so sore a trial. He went to sleep, therefore, resolved to release his enemy quietly in the morning, before the other boys should be astir.
Unluckily he overslept himself, and so the first hint of the dawn he received was from the loud calling of the boys for Jake Elliott.
Fortunately Jake had not yet nerved himself up to the point of answering and calling for a.s.sistance, and so Sam had still a chance to execute his plan.
"Never mind calling Jake," he cried, as he rose from his couch of bushes, "but run down to the spring and bring some water. I have Jake engaged elsewhere."
The boys suspected at once that Sam and Jake had arranged a private battle to be fought somewhere in the woods beyond camp lines, a battle with fists for the mastery, and they were strongly disposed to follow their captain as he started up the river.
"Stop," cried Sam. "I have business with Jake, which will not interest you. Besides, I think it best that you shall remain here. Go to the spring, as I tell you, and then go back to the fire, and get breakfast. Jake and I will be there in time to help you eat it. If one of you follows me a foot of the way, I--never mind; I tell you you must not follow me, and you shall not."
There were some symptoms of a turbulent, but good-natured revolt, but Sam's earnestness quieted it, and the boys reluctantly drew back.
Pa.s.sing around to the further side of the drift-pile, more than a hundred yards away from the nearest point of the camp, Sam called in a low tone:--
"Jake! Jake!"
"What is it?" asked Jake presently, trembling in voice as he trembled in limb, for he was now thoroughly broken and frightened. He dreaded the meeting with Sam nearly as much as he dreaded the terrible fate which seemed to him the only alternative, namely, that of remaining in the drift-pile to starve.
"Come down this way," said Sam.
"Well," answered Jake when he had moved a little way toward Sam.
"Do you see a hole in the top, just above your head?" asked Sam.
"Yes, but I can't see the sky through it."
"Never mind, get a stick to boost you, and climb up into it."
Jake did as he was told to do, and upon climbing up found that there was a sort of pa.s.sage way running laterally through the upper part of the timber, crooked and so narrow that he could scarcely force his way through it. Whither it led, he had no idea, but he obeyed Sam's injunction to follow it, though he did so with great difficulty, as in many places sticks were in the way, which it required his utmost strength to remove. The pa.s.sage through which he was crawling so painfully, was one which Sam and his companions had made by dint of great labor, during their residence in the tree root cavern a year before. It led from the main alley way to their post of observation on top of the pile, their look-out, from which they had been accustomed to examine the country around, to see if there were Indians about, when they had occasion to expose themselves outside of their place of refuge. As the only way into this pa.s.sage was through a "blind" hole in the roof of the main alley way, no one would ever have suspected its existence.
After awhile Jake's head emerged from the very top of the drift pile, and he saw Sam lying flat down, just before him. He instinctively shrank back.
"Come on," said Sam; "but don't rise up or the boys will see us. Crawl out of the hole and then follow me on your hands and knees."
Jake obeyed, and the two presently jumped down to the ground on the side of the hummock furthest from camp.
Jake's first glance revealed Sam fully dressed, and standing firmly _in his boots_. There could be no mistake about it, and yet a moment before he would have made oath that those very boots were hidden hopelessly within the deepest recesses of the drift-pile. He could not restrain the exclamation which rose to his lips:--
"_Where_ DID _you get them boots_?"
"Never mind where, or how. I have a word or two to say to you. You took my boots and were on the point of throwing them into the river.
If you think such an act by way of revenge was manly and worthy of a soldier, I will not dispute the point. You must determine that for yourself."
"Let me tell you about it, Sam," began Jake in an apologetic voice.
"No, it isn't necessary," replied Sam. "I know all about it, and it will not help the matter to lie about it. Listen to me. You were about to throw the boots into the river; but you changed your mind. You know why, of course, while I can only guess; but it doesn't matter. You took them into the drift pile and put them into a hole there. The next thing you know of them I have them on my feet, and I a.s.sure you I haven't been inside the drift pile since you entered it. Solve that riddle in any way you choose. I blocked up the entrance, and this morning I have let you out. Not one of the boys knows anything about this affair, and not one of them shall know, unless you choose to tell them, which you won't, of course. Now come on to camp and get ready for breakfast."
With that Sam led the way. Presently Jake halted.
"Sam," he said.
"Well."
"My eye's all bunged up. What'll the boys say?"
"I don't know."
"What must I tell 'em?"
"Anything you choose. It is not my affair."
"They'll think you've whipped me?" exclaimed Jake in alarm.
"Well, I have, haven't I?"
"No, we hain't fit at all."
"Yes we have,--not with our fists, but with our characters, and I have whipped you fairly. Never mind that. You can say you did it by accident in the dark, which will be true."
"But Sam!" said Jake, again halting.
"Well, what is it now?"
"What made you let me out an' keep the secret from the boys?"
"Because I thought it would be mean, unmanly and wrong in me to take such a revenge."
"Is that the only reason?"
"Yes, that is the only reason."
"You didn't do it 'cause you was afraid?" he asked, incredulously.
"No, of course not. I'm not in the least afraid of you, Jake."
"Why not? I'm bigger'n you."
"Yes, but you're an awful coward, Jake, and n.o.body knows it better than I do, except you. You wouldn't dare to lay a finger on me. I could make you lie down before me and--Pshaw! you know you're a coward and that's enough about it."
"Why didn't you leave me for the boys to find, then, and tell the whole story?"