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Sam Barringford was a backwoodsman of a type that has long since vanished from our midst. He was between fifty and sixty years of age, tall, thin, and as straight as an arrow. He wore his hair and his beard long, and his heavy eyebrows sheltered a pair of small black eyes that were as penetrating as those of any wild beast.
He waited for fully a minute, but no answer came back. His face grew more disturbed than ever. "He is hurt, that's sartin," he muttered. "Like as not he broke his neck." Barringford always carried a bit of rope with him and he now had the same piece used in dragging the elk to the Morris homestead.
"We can go as far as possible by the river; for that will be easier." Barringford carried a sharp hatchet in his belt and with this he cut down a suitable tree branch and fashioned it into such a drag as was desired. Then the elk was lifted upon it and bound fast, and the rope was fastened to the horns.
Not waiting longer, he raised his gun, took hasty aim at the animal and fired. "Did ye git him?" The query came from Sam Barringford, as, bare-headed, he rushed into the little clearing back of the trees. "I give him one in the side but it didn't seem to stop him none." "I don't know if I hit him or not," answered Henry. "He burst upon us so swiftly I hardly knew what to do."
Please let me go!" "Dave can go if he wishes," answered White Buffalo. "The journey will not be pleasant, but if Henry is found we shall be glad. Is not White Buffalo right?" "Take torches with you, or a lantern," said Barringford. Torches were quickly procured and placed in a bit of skin, that they might not get wet.
The horse's saddle was likewise there and the reins and curb, but absolutely nothing which gave either name or address. "This looks as if we were stumped," said Henry, pausing in his labor of digging away the snow. "Right ye are," came from Barringford. "Too bad! I'd like to know who them twins belong to." "Reckon they'll belong to you, Sam," said James Morris, with a faint smile. "Me!
What she said was true, and winter started in earnest the very next day, snowing for the best part of a week, and then turning off bitterly cold. Yet firewood was to be had in plenty and the cabin was kept warm and comfortable for all. "We've had some great times this past season," said Barringford, as he warmed himself by the cheerful kitchen blaze. "Great times, eh, White Buffalo?"
"If only Sam was here," thought the young pioneer dismally. He did not know that a fierce hand-to-hand conflict had taken place near the waterfall, and that Barringford and White Buffalo had barely escaped with their lives, yet such was a fact. The ride was a rough and hard one for Dave, and long before it came to an end he was ready to sink into a faint from exhaustion.
James Morris took the precious bundle, while his brother relieved the old frontiersman of the pack on his back and took the latter's arm. The return to the cabin was made without delay, James Morris getting there some minutes before Joseph managed to arrive with Barringford clinging to his arm.
The Great Spirit of the happy hunting ground rules, but the face of the Great Spirit is hidden from the eyes of the red man and the eyes of the white man as well." With the coming of spring, both James Morris and Dave looked eagerly for the time when Henry and Barringford should return to the trading-post with many articles which were much needed, and with what was better yet, news from home.
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