CHAPTER XII THE END OF THE RAILROAD

Frank found Mr. Mackworth and Sam Skinner at the dimly lit depot in consultation with the night telegraph operator. Rexford being a town of a thousand or more inhabitants and a railroad junction point with many switch tracks, freight cars and railway buildings, the escape of the thief was not difficult. As the sloping sides of the mountains reached down to the town on two sides, there were avenues for successful flight over the rough and dark trails. Therefore, further pursuit was abandoned.

“Anyway,” remarked Mr. Mackworth, “we haven’t lost anything. And if we could catch the man we wouldn’t care to stay to prosecute him.”

“Why, what’s the matter, Frank?” he exclaimed as he caught sight of the boy’s pale face and saw him tremble.

“I guess it’s where he kicked me,” explained Frank trying to make light of his injury.

Instantly Mr. Mackworth had Frank’s coat and shirt off. On his chest near the left shoulder was a dull red mark, something like a shoe heel in shape and rapidly turning black.

“Why didn’t you tell me of this?” exclaimed Frank’s uncle with concern. “Does it hurt you?”

“Not much,” answered the boy, “except when I touch it.”

Sam Skinner pushed Mr. Mackworth aside and began an examination of the bruise with all the practical skill of an outdoor surgeon. As he ran his hands over the boy’s chest Frank winced and turned paler.

“No bones broken,” reported Sam confidently, as he pressed on Frank’s collar bone and shoulder joint while the boy gritted his teeth.

“Cough!” ordered Sam.

Frank did so, Sam holding his ear to the boy’s chest.

“Spit!” ordered Sam.

Frank laughed and complied as well as he could. Sam nodded his head.

“Only a bruise,” he explained. “Nothin’ hurt inside. A little liniment and he’ll be all right in a day or two.”

“I certainly hope so,” said Mr. Mackworth as he helped Frank to get into his shirt again. “I wouldn’t have you hurt, my boy, for all that’s in the Teton. You certainly saved our shooting outfits and, like as not, our lives as well. We’ve got both to thank you for.”

“There wasn’t anything else to do,” replied Frank. “And say,” he added, “I reckon there ain’t any need to say anything about this is there? I don’t want any hero business.”

“You’ll have to leave that to me,” responded his uncle as they made their way back to the car. Frank got out the medicine kit his mother had given him and Sam rubbed him with liniment. At three o’clock, Frank crawled into his berth again. Lying still his bruise did not pain him, but when Phil awoke him about seven o’clock the boy’s shoulder was black and blue, and his arm was stiff.

The town by daylight was far from being as interesting as the boys had hoped. The altitude was not great—not more than 4,000 feet—but the distant view both east and west revealed mountain ranges, snow crowned in places. North of the town and in a lower valley the Kootenai River wound a bending course. Along this the party was now to make its way into Canada.

Frank had not figured on the need of an explanation to account for Mr. Mackworth’s ruined trunk and, therefore, the adventure of the boy and Sam Skinner was fully known before breakfast. Then the excitement began all over again. The Englishmen made the lad a hero in spite of himself. It was doubtful if one man could have carried away any considerable amount of the plunder that had been heaped up near the door of the car. But each of Mr. Mackworth’s guests had a most elaborate and expensive shooting outfit, and each seemed convinced that Frank had saved his own particular property.

As Frank was a member of the party, the tactful Captain Ludington and Lord Pelton recognized that they could not express their gratitude in money. For that reason their verbal thanks were genuinely profuse.

“I don’t know why you select me for all this fine talk,” Frank said at last. “Mr. Skinner heard the man. He did more than I did—”

“All right,” exclaimed Mr. Mackworth. “We’ll have a special luncheon to-day in honor of both.”

When this event came off it turned out to be a tribute to a third person—Jake Green. Instead of a luncheon it was a banquet and a jolly one. As Frank approached his chair he found by its side—leaning against the table—a Lefever, sixteen gauge, hammerless shotgun, automatic ejector, Damascus steel barrels, English walnut stock and pistol grip.

At his plate was a card inscribed: “For value received,” and signed by all the members of the party, including Phil, whose shotgun had not been overlooked by the intruder.

“I won’t take it,” began Frank, red of face and embarrassed. “Give it to Mr. Skinner.”

“O, I’ve got mine,” exclaimed Sam pointing to several folded bills on his plate. “Better keep it. You’ll need it for grouse up on the Elk.”

Not knowing what else to do Frank sat down in confusion and thus came into possession of the gun, which is yet one of his most prized belongings. As soon as the attention of their friends had been withdrawn Phil leaned over to his chum and whispered:

“I never did have any use for a sleepyhead. This is an awful warning to me.”

From Rexford to Michel—the mountain town in Canada at the southern end of Elk Valley where the Teton was to stop, and from which place Mr. Mackworth and his friends were to enter the goat and sheep country by wagon, horse and airship—was about eighty-five miles. The branch road was a mining line and when, just after four o’clock in the afternoon, the special car was attached to the daily “mixed train,” it was with no great assurance that the hunting party heard the creaking and felt the swaying of the big car on the lighter tracks.

The ride northward gradually lifted the train higher and higher. The road followed the Kootenai’s east bank and, having left the less abrupt region of Rexford behind them, the travelers soon had a panorama rivaling that of the evening before. Immediately east lay the Mission Mountains—the western boundary of the new National Glacier Park—and slowly the laboring engine drew the train on to its higher pine covered flanks. The Kootenai dropped below.

Undimmed by the shadows of night; clear and distinct beneath the sapphire sky the whole world stood out until there seemed no distance. There was not the speed of the transcontinental limited and the train was a half hour in covering ten miles. This brought it to Gateway—the boundary between the United States and Canada.

“The white mark over there on the station platform,” explained Mr. Mackworth as the train came to a stop, “marks the boundary between the two countries.”

Of course the boys had to alight and straddle the line.

“This is an event to me,” exclaimed Frank, “for it’s the first time I’ve ever been out of the United States.”

“Me, too,” said Phil, who was yet standing in his own country. “And that being true I think I’ll go abroad.” With a laugh he jumped across the line. “But,” he added, “the United States is good enough for me. I don’t see much difference. I think I’ll come home,” and he sprang back again.

At seven o’clock the train reached Fernie, a soft coal town and a fitting-out post for hunters in this part of Canada. But there was no time for shopping—much to Phil’s regret—for the $20 he had not given “Old Bill” was looked upon as that much saved. A few minutes before eight o’clock the Teton finished its outward journey at the end of the railway in the little village of Michel.

So long as the train was in motion, revealing new vistas of grand and picturesque scenery, the passengers in the Teton would not leave the observation platform for supper. But, as it came to a stop in a narrow and deep valley through which a cool wind was already drifting and where, cast by the sunlit painted ranges, deep shadows were already on the little hamlet, Jake’s dinner at last received its merited attention.

At Fernie the station agent had handed Mr. Mackworth a packet. As the party had now reached the end of the long journey this first meal in the cool, dark snowbound mountain valley was the liveliest of the trip. Formality was put aside and, with the knowledge that the next morning would see the first of their plans under way, all talked at once. In the midst of this Mr. Mackworth produced his packet, opened it and handed each one at the table—except Sam Skinner—a small but formidable looking bit of paper.

“Now be happy, all of you,” he exclaimed. “Here’s a hunting license for each. With it in your possession you may legally kill and take out of the country five mountain goats. Let one of ’em be Neena and may they all be Billies and big ones. You may also slay three mountain sheep one of which, of course, will be Husha the Black Ram. Incidentally you may capture all the grizzlies you see—if you can. Let us hope for one twelve-foot skin at least. Of deer, shoot no more than six each. The law don’t specify it, but we’ll take none but bucks. And remember, don’t shoot a moose till you land a whopper, for one is all you are allowed. As for elk,” concluded Mr. Mackworth, raising his hand in warning, “none at all.”

“Sam,” whispered Frank aside to the hunter, “what are these licenses worth?”

“They ain’t worth much to most hunters,” answered Sam soberly, “but they cost $50 each.”

“That’s $250,” exclaimed Frank taking a new glance at his license, “and you haven’t one. What’ll you do?”

“O, I ain’t lookin’ for hides nor horns,” answered Sam. “If I shoot anything it’ll be food.”

Michel, although a town of but a few hundred inhabitants, was a mile and a quarter long. It stretched along the winding bottom of the valley as a single street, the mountain slopes on each side rising so quickly as to make a second street impossible. And as all the houses were small and nearly all painted dark red, the new arrivals had not seen much of the village in the fast gathering night. But the single street pointed toward the jack-pine valley to the north through which lies the road to the unsettled wilderness beyond—one of the great game preserves of America—the Elk River Valley where as yet the pot hunter is unknown.

“We’ll take things easy this evening,” said Mr. Mackworth when the excitement over the hunting licenses had subsided, “and to-morrow we’ll leisurely perfect our plans. I suppose the first thing will be to find a suitable ground for assembling the airship.”

“And that don’t look any too easy,” broke in Frank. “This is the narrowest town I’ve ever seen.”

“Then,” continued Mr. Mackworth, “we’ve got to inventory our stuff. You can never be sure you have what you’re going to need. What we’ve missed we’ll have to go back to Fernie and buy.”

“First job for the Loon,” exclaimed Phil. “That’ll be pie. It’s only twenty-three miles away.”

“Not improbable,” went on their host, “since we have only one train a day. We’ll be in Michel all day to-morrow. Early the next morning all our provisions and camping paraphernalia will go by wagons to the only ranch in the valley—Charley Smith’s place up near Sulphur Springs—twenty-five miles distant. We’ll follow on horses.”

“On horses?” cried out Frank. “Here’s two of us who won’t be on horses. Phil and I’ll be in the Loon and two more may as well be with us. We can take Captain Ludington and Lord Pelton. Why not?”

“But we’ve got to have horses. We can’t count on your airship for everything.”

“That’s where you’re mistaken,” added Frank. “You can count on it everywhere and at all times. We’ll take you all anywhere you want to go. And when there are too many we’ll make double trips.”

“We’ll take horses for all,” insisted Mr. Mackworth. “They’re cheap. Then if your aëroplane slips a cog we won’t have to walk home. We’ll reach Smith’s ranch in the late afternoon. I suggest you wait here until four or five o’clock with your flyin’ machine, and then I suppose you can overtake us in an hour.”

“In thirty minutes,” said Phil proudly.

“So be it,” said Mr. Mackworth. “When we are all in camp near Smith’s place we are going to stop two or three days to get acclimated. We’ll also cross the ridge there and have a day’s sport at Josephine Falls on the Fording, where I hope we’ll get enough trout to give Jake a chance to give us a ‘balsam bake.’”

“It’ll be my first trout,” interrupted Lord Pelton.

“But not your last, I’ll bet,” went on Mr. Mackworth. “While we are enjoying ourselves our guides will be sorting over our outfit for the pack horses. The wagons will stop here. When we leave Smith’s we’ll leave trails and civilization behind. We’ll make our way into the real mountains by way of Goat Creek, and then in the Herchmer Range, Bird Mountain and Goat Pass we ought to find our sport. We’ll always camp in the timber and where the horses can climb. But we’ll hunt on foot.”

Captain Ludington smacked his lips and lit a fresh cigar.

“That sounds awfully good to me,” he chuckled.

At that moment Jake announced that Mr. Hosmer was outside.

“It’s one of our guides and teamsters,” explained Mr. Mackworth, “Cal Hosmer, who was to report to me this evening. If the history of the Elk River Valley is ever written Cal’s experiences will have to appear on every page. If any of you want grizzlies, stick to Hosmer; he’s the greatest bear hunter in Western Canada.”