Ethel Brill - The Secret Cache - An Adventure and Mystery Story for Boys

Roughly translated:

At first Hugh, though his voice broke and quavered, attempted to join in, but singing took breath and strength. He soon fell silent, content to dip and raise his blade in time to the younger lad’s tune. An easy enough pace it seemed, but the half-breed boy kept it up hour after hour, with only brief periods of rest.

Hugh began to feel the strain sorely. His arms and back ached, his breath came wearily, and the lower part of his body was cramped and numb from his kneeling position. He had eaten breakfast at dawn and, as the sun climbed the sky and started down again, he began to wonder when and where his Indian brother intended to stop for the noon meal. Did Blaise purpose to travel all day without food, Hugh wondered. He opened his lips to ask, then, through pride, closed them again. Blaise, just fourteen, was nearly three years younger than Hugh. What Blaise could endure, the elder lad felt he must endure also. He did not intend to admit hunger or weariness, so long as his companion appeared untouched by either. With empty stomach and aching muscles, the white boy plied his paddle steadily and doggedly in time to the voyageur songs and the droning, monotonous Indian chants, the constantly repeated syllables of which had no meaning for him.

It was the weather that came to Hugh’s rescue at last. After the lifting of the chill, frosty, morning fog, the day was bright. The waters of Thunder Bay were smooth at first, then rippled by a light north breeze. As the day wore on, the breeze came up to a brisk blow. Partly protected by the islands and points of the irregular shore, the two lads kept on their way. The wind increased. It roughened every stretch of open water to waves that broke foaming on the beaches or dashed in spray against the gray-brown rocks. Paddling became more and more difficult. Blaise ceased his songs. As they rounded a low point edged with gravel and sand, and saw before them a stretch of green-blue water swept by the full force of the wind into white-tipped waves, the half-breed boy told Hugh to steer for the beach. A few moments later he gave his elder brother a quick order to cease paddling.

Realizing that Blaise wished to take the canoe in alone, Hugh, breathing a sigh of relief, laid down his paddle. The muscles of his back and shoulders were strained, it seemed to him, almost to the breaking point, and he felt that, in spite of his pride, he must soon have asked for rest. Without disturbing the balance of the wobbly craft, he tried to rub his cramped leg muscles. He feared that in trying to rise and step out, he might overturn the boat, to the mirth and disgust of his Indian brother.

With a few strong and skillful strokes, Blaise shot the canoe into the shallow water off the point. When the bow struck the sand, with a sharp command to Hugh, he rose and stepped out. As quickly as he could, Hugh got to his feet, and managed to step over the opposite side without stumbling or upsetting the canoe. Raising the light bark craft, the two carried it up the shelving shore, to the bushes that edged the woods, well beyond the reach of the waves.

The canoe carefully deposited in a safe spot, Hugh turned to Blaise. “Shall we be delayed long, do you think?” he asked.

Blaise gave his French shrug. “It may be that the wind will go down with the sun.”

“Then, if we are to stay here so long, a little food wouldn’t come amiss.”

The younger boy nodded and began to unlash the packages which, to distribute the weight evenly, were securely tied to two poles lying along the bottom of the canoe. Hugh sought dry wood, kindled it with sparks from his flint and steel, and soon had a small fire on the pebbles. From a tripod of sticks the iron kettle was swung over the blaze, and when the water boiled, Blaise put in corn, a little of the dried venison, which he had pounded to a powder on a flat stone, and a portion of fat. He had made no mention of hunger, but when the stew was ready, Hugh noticed that he ate heartily. Meanwhile the elder boy, tired and sore muscled, watched for some sign of weariness in his companion. If Blaise was weary he had too much Indian pride to admit the fact to his new-found white brother.

The open lake was now rich blue, flecked with foamy whitecaps, the air so clear that the deep color of the water formed a sharp cut line against the paler tint of the sky at the horizon. The May wind was bitterly cold, so the lads rigged a shelter with the poles of the canoe and a blanket. The ground was so hard the poles could not be driven in. Three or four inches down, it was either frozen or composed of solid rock. The boys were obliged to brace each pole with stones and boulders. The blanket, stretched between the supports, kept off the worst of the wind, and between the screen and the fire, the two rested in comfort. Hugh soon fell asleep, and when he woke he was pleased to find that Blaise had dropped off also. Perhaps the latter was wearier than he had chosen to admit.

The wind did not go down with the sun, and the adventurers made camp for the night. Both blankets would be needed for bedding, so the screen was taken down and the canoe propped up on one side. Then a supply of wood was gathered and balsam branches cut for a bed. After a supper of corn porridge and maple sugar, the two turned in. Blaise went to sleep as soon as he was rolled in his blanket, but Hugh was wakeful. He lay there on his fragrant balsam bed in the shelter of the canoe, watching the flickering light of the camp fire and the stars coming out in the dark sky. Listening to the rushing of the wind in the trees and the waves breaking on the pebbles and thundering on a bit of rock shore near at hand, surrounded on every side by the strange wilderness of woods and waters, the boy could not sleep for a time. He kept thinking of his roving, half-wild father, and of the strange legacy he had left his sons. Twice Hugh rose to replenish the fire, when it began to die down, before he grew drowsy and drifted away into the land of dreams.

Hugh woke chilled and stiff, to find Blaise rekindling the fire. The morning was clear and the sun coming up across the water. Winds and waves had subsided enough to permit going on with the journey.

Cutting wood limbered Hugh’s sore muscles somewhat, and a hot breakfast cheered him, but the first few minutes of paddling were difficult and painful. With set teeth he persisted, and gradually the worst of the lameness wore off.

Skirting the shore of Lake Superior in a bark canoe requires no small amount of patience. Delays from unfavorable weather must be frequent and unavoidable. On the whole, Hugh and Blaise were lucky during the first part of their trip, and they reached the Pigeon River in good time. Rounding the long point to the south of the river mouth, they paddled to the north end of Wauswaugoning Bay.

Hugh was gaining experience and his paddling muscles were hardening. He would soon be able, he felt, to hold his own easily at any pace his half-brother set. So far Blaise had proved a good travelling companion, somewhat silent and grave to be sure, but dependable, patient and for the most part even tempered. His lack of talkativeness Hugh laid to his Indian blood, his gravity to his sorrow at the loss of the father he had known so much better than Hugh had known him. Blaise, the older boy decided, was, in spite of his Quebec training and many civilized ways, more Indian than French. Only now and then, in certain gestures and quick little ways, in an unexpected gleam of humor or sudden flash of anger, did the lad show his kinship with Jean Beaupré.