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MY curiosity had been not a little raised with regard to the description of country we should meet on the other side of the mountains; and I had supposed, with Toby, that immediately on gaining the heights we should be enabled to view the large bays of Happar and Typee reposing at our feet on one side, in the same way that Nukuheva lay spread out below on the other. But here we were disappointed.
He was a young fellow about my own age, for whom I had all along entertained a great regard; and Toby, such was the name by which he went among us, for his real name he would never tell us, was every way worthy of it. He was active, ready and obliging, of dauntless courage, and singularly open and fearless in the expression of his feelings.
For some time, indeed ever since they left Caen, the dog had walked on a little ahead of his party, with his tail drooping, his whole attitude one of utter despondency. Once or twice he had looked back reproachfully at Cecile; once or twice he had relieved his feelings with a short bark of utter discomfort. The state of the atmosphere was hateful to Toby.
"That's why you're so cheerful, I suppose," retorted Sally "At the Works, I mean." Toby gave her a quick, angry look in which there was an admixture of fear and suspicion. "There's nothing the matter," he said, in a tyrannic voice. "Have you got the sack?" Sally was merciless. She replied to his tyrannic voice with one as hard and stabbing as a gimlet. "Ah, I thought that was it.
The days were long now, and with the coming of May the sun began to assert his strength. The snow softened at midday, and sealskin boots again took the place of buckskin moccasins. Toby and Charley, with dogs and komatik, hauled wood that Toby had cut in the fall, and more wood that Skipper Zeb felled each day, in preparation for another winter.
At the beginning Charley stumbled, and falling in the snow could not get upon his feet without Toby's assistance; but in a little while he discovered that he could swing along at a good pace, and Toby pronounced him an "easy larner." "I'm thinkin' Dad's at Black River tilt yet," said Toby when the snowshoe lesson was finished and they had returned to their fire.
He was, however, good-natured, knew by rule how to put the ship in stays, and sometimes, by misrule, how to put her in irons, which generally brought the captain on deck, who both boxhauled the ship and him by praying most heartily, although indirectly, for blessings on all lubberly actions, and would then turn to the quarter-master and threaten him with a flogging for letting the ship get in irons, poor Toby looking the whole time very sheepish, knowing the harangue was intended for him.
Wal, show us you ain't none o' them things, show us you got some sort of a man inside your hide, an' tell us straight why you're out on this doggone trail when you're yearnin' fer your blankets." The attack was so unexpected that for once Sunny had no reply ready. And Sandy positively beamed upon the challenger. And so they rode on for a few moments. Then Toby broke the silence impatiently.
"I'll give you four hundred cash for it," said Marks without taking his eyes from the fur. "No," Toby declined, "I'm not wantin' to sell un." "That's a good offer," persisted Marks. "It's about what they'll give you at the post in trade. I'll pay cash." "I'll not sell un. I'll keep un till Dad comes home, and let he sell un."
Toby sat in the stern of a boat with a single rower in front of her, and trailed her fingers through the magic water. She was bare-headed, and the breeze of the summer night stirred tenderly the golden ringlets that clustered about her bow. Her face, seen now and then in the flare of the rockets, had a strange look, almost a look of dread.
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