CHAPTER II
NOVEMBER JOE
Along the borders of Beauce and Maine, between the United States and Canada, lies a land of spruce forest and of hardwood ridges. Here little farms stand on the edge of the big timber, and far beyond them, in the depths of the woodlands, lie lumber-camps and the wide-flung paths of trappers and pelt-hunters.
I left the cars at Silent Water and rode off at once to Harding's, the house of the Beauce farmer where I meant to put up for the night. Mrs. Harding received me genially and placed an excellent supper before me. While I was eating it a squall blew up with the fall of darkness, and I was glad enough to find myself in safe shelter.
Outside the wind was swishing among the pines which enclosed the farmhouse, when, inside, the bell of the telephone, which connected us with St. George, forty miles distant, rang suddenly and incongruously, high above the clamour of the forest noises.
Mrs. Harding took up the receiver, and this is what I heard.
"My husband won't be home to-night; he's gone into St. George. . . . No, I've no one to send. . . . But how can I? There is no one here but me and the children. . . . Well, there's Mr. Quaritch, a sport, staying the night. No, I could n't ask him."
I came forward.
"Why not?" I inquired.
Mrs. Harding shook her head as she stood still holding the receiver. She was a matron of distinct comeliness, and she cooked amazingly well.
"You can ask me anything," I urged.
"They want some one to carry a message to November Joe," she explained. "It's the Provincial Police on the 'phone."
"I'll go."
"Joe made me promise not to send any sports after him," she said doubtfully. "They all want him now he's famous."
"But November Joe is rather a friend of mine. I hunted with him years ago when he lived on the Montmorency."
"Is that so?" Her face relaxed a little. "Well, perhaps . . ." she conceded.
"Of course, I'll carry the message."
"It's quite a way to his place. November does n't care about strangers; he's a solitary man. You must follow the tote-road you were on to-day fifteen miles, turn west at the deserted lumber-camp, cross Charley's Brook, Joe lives about two acres up the far bank." She lifted the receiver. "Shall I say you'll go?"
"By all means."
A few seconds later I was at the 'phone taking my instructions.
It appeared that the speaker was the Chief of Police in Quebec, who was, of course, well known to me. I will let you have his own words.
"Very good of you, I'm sure, Mr. Quaritch. Yes, we want November Joe to be told that a man named Henry Lyon has been shot in his camp down at Big Tree Portage, on Depot River. The news came in just now, telephoned through by a lumber-jack who found the body. Tell Joe, please, success means fifty dollars to him. Yes, that's all. Much obliged. Yes, the sooner he hears about it, the better. Good-night."
I hung up the receiver, turned to Mrs. Harding, and told her the facts. That capable woman nodded decisively.
"You won't have much time to lose, then. I'll put you up a bite to eat."
As I hastily got my things together, I began asking questions about Joe.
"So November is connected with police work now?"
Mrs. Harding answered me with another question.
"Did n't you read in the newspapers about the 'Long Island Murder'?"
I remembered the case at once; it had been a nine days' wonder of headline and comment, and now I wondered how it was that I had missed the mention of Joe's name.
"November was the man who put together that puzzle for them down in New York," Mrs. Harding went on. "Ever since they have been wanting him to work for them. They offered him a hundred dollars a month to go to New York and take on detective jobs there."
"Ah, and what had he to say to that?"
"Said he would n't leave the woods for a thousand."
"Well?"
"They offered him the thousand."
"With what result?"
"He started out in the night for his shack. Came in here as he passed, and told my husband he would rather be tied to a tree in the woods for the rest of his life than live on Fifth Avenue. The lumber-jacks and the guides hereabouts think a lot of him. Now you'd best saddle Laura—that's the big grey mare you'll find in the near stall of the stable—and go right off. There'll be a moon when the storm blows itself out."
By the help of the lantern I saddled Laura and stumbled away into the dark and the wind. For the chief part of the way I had to lead the mare, and the dawn was grey in the open places before I reached the deserted lumber-camp, and all the time my mind was busy with memories of November. Boy though he had been when I knew him, his personality had impressed itself upon me by reason of a certain adequate quietness with which he fulfilled the duties, many and disagreeable, which bearded old Tom Todd took a delight in laying upon his young shoulders.
I remembered, too, the expression of humour and mocking tolerance which used to invade the boy's face whenever old Tom was overtaken by one of his habitual fits of talking big. Once when Tom spoke by the camp-fire of some lake to which he desired to guide me, and of which he stated that the shores had never been trodden by white man's foot, Joe had to cover his mouth with his hand. When we were alone, Todd having departed to make some necessary repairs to the canoe, I asked Joe what he meant by laughing at his elders.
"I suppose a boy's foot ain't a man's anyways," remarked Joe innocently, and more he would not say.
In fact, it was with such memories as these that I amused myself as I tramped forward over the rough paths.
And now Joe was grown up into a man who had been heard of, not only within the little ring of miles that composed his home district, but a little also out in the great world beyond.
The sun was showing over the tree-tops when I drew rein by the door of the shack, and at the same moment came in view of the slim but powerful figure of a young man who was busy rolling some gear into a pack. He raised himself and, just as I was about to speak, drawled out,—
"My! Mr. Quaritch, you! Who'd a' thought it?"
The young woodsman came forward with a lazy stride and gave me welcome with a curious gentleness that was one of his characteristics, but which left me in no doubt as to its geniality.
I feel that I shall never be able to describe November. Suffice it to say that the loose-knit boy I remembered had developed into one of the finest specimens of manhood that ever grew up among the balsam trees; near six feet tall, lithe and powerful, with a neck like a column, and a straight-featured face, the sheer good looks of this son of the woods were disturbing. He was clearly also not only the product but the master of his environment.
"Well, well, Mr. Quaritch, many's the time I've been thinking of the days we had with old Tom way up on the Roustik."
"They were good days, Joe, were n't they?"
"Sure, sure, they were!"
"I hope we shall have some more together."
"If it's hunting you want, I'm glad you're here, Mr. Quaritch. There's a fine buck using around by Widdeney Pond. Maybe we will get a look at him come sunset, for he 'most always moves out of the thick bush about dark." Then humour lit a spark in his splendid grey eyes as he looked up at me. "But we'll have a cup o' tea first."
November Joe's (by the way, I ought to mention that his birth in the month of November had given him his name), as I say, November Joe's weakness for tea had in the old days been a target upon which I had often exercised my faculty for irony and banter. The weakness was evidently still alive. I smiled; perhaps it was a relief to find a weak point in this alarmingly adequate young man.
"I had hoped to have a hunt with you, November," said I. "Indeed, that is what I came for, and there's nothing I'd like better than to try for your red-deer buck to-night, but while I was at Harding's there was a ring-up on the 'phone, and the Provincial Police sent through a message for you. It appears that a man named Henry Lyon has been shot in his camp at Big Tree Portage. A lumberman found him, and 'phoned the news into Quebec. The Chief of Police wants you to take on the case. He told me to say that success would mean fifty dollars."
"That's too bad," said Joe. "I'd sooner hunt a deer than a man any day. Makes a fellow feel less bad-like when he comes up with him. Well, Mr. Quaritch, I must be getting off, but you'll be wanting another guide. There's Charley Paul down to St. Amiel."
"Look here, November, I don't want Charley Paul or any other guide but you. The fact of the matter is, that Sir Andrew McLerrick, the great doctor who was out with you last fall, has told me that I have been overdoing it and must come into the woods for rest. I've three months to put in, and from all I hear of you, you won't take three months finding out who murdered Lyon."
Joe looked grave. "I may take more than that," said he, "for maybe I'll never find out at all. But I'm right pleased, Mr. Quaritch, to hear you can stay so long. There's plenty of grub in my shack, and I dare say that I shan't be many days gone."
"How far is it to Big Tree Portage?"
"Five miles to the river and eight up it."
"I'd like to go with you."
He gave me one of his quick smiles. "Then I guess you'll have to wait for your breakfast till we are in the canoe. Turn the mare loose. She'll make Harding's by afternoon."
Joe entered the shack and came out again with one or two articles. In five minutes he had put together a tent, my sleeping-things, food, ammunition, and all necessaries. The whole bundle he secured with his packing-strap, lifted it and set out through the woods.