He pondered. “No, I was to be given no
food, drink, shelter, or any weapon. The old
man forgot fire—that’s how I came
to beg some.”
“Fire and brains,” reflected Tish.
“We’ve given you the first and we’ve
plenty of the second to offer. Now, young man,
this is my plan. We’ll give you nothing
but suggestions. If now and then you find a cooked
meal under that tree, that’s accident, not design,
and you’d better eat it. Can you sew?”
“I’m like the Irishman and the fiddle—I
never tried, but I guess I can.” He was
much more cheerful.
“Do you have to be alone?”
“I believe he took that for granted, in this
costume.”
“Will it take you long to move over here?”
“I think I can move without a van,” he
said, grinning. “My sole worldly possessions
are a stone hatchet and a hairpin fishhook.”
“Get them and come over,” commanded Tish.
“When you leave this forest at the end of the
time you are going to be fed and clothed and carry
a tent; you will have with you smoked meat and fish;
you will carry under your arm an Indian clock or sundial;
you will have a lamp—if we can find a clamshell
or a broken bottle—and you will have a fire-making
outfit with your monogram on it.”
“But, my dear friend,” he said, “I
am not supposed to have any assistance and—”
“Assistance!” Tish snapped. “Who
said assistance? I’m providing the brains,
but you’ll do it all yourself.”
He moved over an hour or so later and Tish and I went
into the tent to bed. Somewhat later, when she
limped to the fire to see how the leech was filling
up, he and Aggie were sitting together talking, he
of Dorothea and Aggie of Mr. Wiggins. Tish said
they were both talking at the same time, neither one
listening to the other, and that it sounded like this:—“She’s
so sweet and trusting and honest—well, I’d
believe what she said if she—”
“—fell off a roof on a rainy day
and was picked up by a man with a horse and buggy
quite unconscious.”
The next three weeks were busy times for Percy.
He wore Tish’s blanket for two days, and then,
finding it in the way, he discarded it altogether.
Seen in daylight it was easy to understand why little
Dorothea was in love with him. He was a handsome
young giant, although much bitten by mosquitoes and
scratched with briers.
The arrangement was a good one all round. He
knew of things in the wood we’d never heard
of—wild onions and artichokes, and he had
found a clump of wild cherry trees. He made snares
of the fibers of tree bark, and he brought in turtles
and made plates out of the shells. And all the
time he was working on his outfit, curing rabbit skins
and sewing them together with fibers under my direction.
