Westy Martin in the Rockies E-Book

Percy Keese Fitzhugh

• Herausgeber: Librorium Editions
• Kategorie: Abenteuer, Thriller, Horror
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2023

Beschreibung

Westy Martin sat speechless in utter consternation. He glanced about him as if dazed. He seemed to be trying to make sure that he was awake, that the whole thing was not a dream. Then a sudden burst of shouting and applause recalled him to the reality of the clamorous scene.
The scene was very real. It was a familiar scene at Temple Camp and real with the savory realities of clam chowder and hunter’s stew and crullers piled high in tin dishpans. And waffles built into miniature skyscrapers and big glass pitchers full of sirup and honey. And Pee-wee Harris shouting, “I’ll go with you, I’ll go with you, I’ll be the one!” And Uncle Jeb Rushmore sitting at the head of the “eats board” with a smile of amusement hovering under his drooping white mustache.

Leseprobe

WESTY MARTIN IN THE ROCKIES

HIS WARM BLOOD SEEMED TO TURN INTO AN ICE-LIKE SUBSTANCE.

WESTY MARTIN

IN THE ROCKIES

BY

PERCY KEESE FITZHUGH

© 2023 Librorium Editions

ISBN : 9782385745073

CONTENTS

I

A Sure Aim

II

The Spirit of the Camp

III

Good Man Friday

IV

The Captive

V

It Shall Not Pass

VI

The Rescuer

VII

Wicked Mr. Temple

VIII

What Might Have Been

IX

Friends

X

Out of the Past

XI

The Lost Agreement

XII

Mr. Martin’s Ultimatum

XIII

Westy Makes a Decision

XIV

Vindication

XV

A Life in the Balance

XVI

They’re Off

XVII

“Hills”

XVIII

“Silent” Ollie Baxter

XIX

Uncle Jeb Sounds a Warning

XX

Westy Makes a Discovery

XXI

The Mysterious Hollow

XXII

Something to Think About

XXIII

The Object on the Cliff

XXIV

Artie as a Modern Daniel

XXV

Taking Chances

XXVI

The Eagles’ Return

XXVII

Help

XXVIII

Between Two Fires

XXIX

Face to Face

XXX

Cries

XXXI

Westy Makes a Sacrifice

XXXII

The Bond Is Sealed

XXXIII

Uncle Jeb Faces a Crisis

XXXIV

Forgotten Footprints

XXXV

Ghosts

XXXVI

Westy Circumvents a Ghost?

XXXVII

Evidence

XXXVIII

Gone

XXXIX

The Man Without a Soul

XL

Ollie Makes His Exit

XLI

Skeletons

XLII

The Lost Is Found

CHAPTER I—A SURE AIM

Westy Martin sat speechless in utter consternation. He glanced about him as if dazed. He seemed to be trying to make sure that he was awake, that the whole thing was not a dream. Then a sudden burst of shouting and applause recalled him to the reality of the clamorous scene.

The scene was very real. It was a familiar scene at Temple Camp and real with the savory realities of clam chowder and hunter’s stew and crullers piled high in tin dishpans. And waffles built into miniature skyscrapers and big glass pitchers full of sirup and honey. And Pee-wee Harris shouting, “I’ll go with you, I’ll go with you, I’ll be the one!” And Uncle Jeb Rushmore sitting at the head of the “eats board” with a smile of amusement hovering under his drooping white mustache.

Uncle Jeb Rushmore was one of those men who looked out of place at a dining table, even at a rustic “eats board.” By all the rules he should have eaten his meals squatting on the ground in proximity to a campfire, in the dense wilderness or on the prairie. He should never have eaten a meal without his trusty rifle by his side and without a keen eye on the lookout for stealthy Indians. He should certainly never have been waited on by a smiling negro connected with the cooking shack of a great modern camp. He should have dined in remote fastnesses, mountain passes, and in sound of the appalling voices of savage beasts. Everything about Uncle Jeb suggested not the covered table, but the covered wagon. He was an old western trapper and guide who had cooked bear’s meat with Buffalo Bill and fried his venison on silent trails while the caravan waited.

That this picturesque old member of a race that has all but passed away should be sitting at the head of a camp “eats board” was the fault of Mr. John Temple, the beneficent founder of Temple Camp in the Catskills. And so Westy Martin, scout, became identified with a series of adventures which I shall chronicle for you; adventures in the wildest region of the Wild West. Such adventures as boys do not even read of in these days of football and baseball and boarding schools and Saturday hikes. It is odd, when you come to think of it, how things happen. That Westy Martin should participate in adventures which in these days are commonly thought too extravagant even for boy’s stories! Yet this thing happened and it should be told. If the worst that can be said about it is that it is a wild-west story I will gladly bear the responsibility of telling it to my young friends.

To go back to where I started—they were having dinner at Temple Camp. It was Labor Day and soon the camp would close for the season. Mr. John Temple was its guest, as he usually was just before the season closed. He was standing at the head of the main “eats board” and it was something which he had just said in the course of his remarks that had set Westy Martin aghast. There were three of these “eats boards” in a vast open pavilion. The middle one was larger than the two that flanked it, and it was at the head of this large, rustic table that the guest of honor had been seated. At the head of Westy’s table sat Uncle Jeb in his accustomed place. And at the head of the other sat Mr. Bronson, resident trustee. Somewhat removed from these three enormous dining boards was another rough table for scoutmasters. In that great scout community some troops cooked their own meals near their cabins, but all were crowded in the “eats” pavilion on this memorable day in honor of the distinguished visitor.

“And now one word more,” said Mr. Temple. “It is both good news and bad news. Those of you who come next summer will not see Uncle Jeb.” Murmurs of surprise and apprehension greeted this announcement. “Uncle Jeb is going home, not to stay, but to visit for a season his beloved Montana and his old cabin, those scenes which I took him from to bring him here. I think you will all agree—our trustees have already agreed—that Uncle Jeb is entitled to visit his old home. He expects to return here next fall or, at the latest, early the following spring. He has said that he will do that, and as you know Uncle Jeb always hits the mark. He aims to be back with you after next summer and I never heard anybody ever say that he missed his aim.” This remark was greeted with laughter and applause.

“There is one thing more,” said Mr. Temple. “It has been thought that Uncle Jeb’s sojourn might afford a couple of our scouts an opportunity to visit the woolly West; I mean the regular West with all its wool on; the West that Uncle Jeb knows and which he once showed me. Uncle Jeb himself seems to like that idea. So I suggested that he be asked to choose one of the boys he knows best to go with him, and that this fortunate boy be permitted to choose a comrade in the great adventure. Uncle Jeb has named Westy Martin of the First Bridgeboro Troop of Bridgeboro, New Jersey. Westy Martin,” Mr. Temple added, glancing about, “wherever you are, I congratulate you.”

“There he is, third from the end, eating a waffle!” thundered the uproarious voice of Pee-wee Harris, “and I’ll be the one to go with him!”

So you see how it was. Uncle Jeb was seven years older than when he had come to cast the glow of pioneer and western romance over Temple Camp. But his eye was just as keen and his aim was just as true as in the days when he had hunted grizzlies and struck terror to Indians in his beloved Rockies. For those keen gray eyes had seen Westy Martin and picked him out and knocked him clean off his feet, in a way of speaking....

CHAPTER II—THE SPIRIT OF THE CAMP

When Mr. John Temple conceived the big scout community which came to be known the country over as Temple Camp, he had an inspiration that showed his fine understanding of the scout idea.

He decided to introduce into the camp something which neither the solemn woods nor the tranquil lake could give it; something which all the projected rustic architecture could not supply. And that was an atmosphere.

He was resolved that the scouts who flocked to the sequestered lakeside resort should live in proximity to a real scout, one who had lived the sort of life that is commemorated by scouting.

He would bring the prairies and the Rockies and the long, winding trails, and all the associations which cluster about Indians and grizzlies and buffaloes to Temple Camp in the romantic person of an old western scout and guide whom he had met while in the Far West on railroad business. Old Jeb Rushmore had guided Mr. Temple and a party of surveyors to a pass in the mountains following what he called a trail which was about as discernible to Mr. Temple as a trail left by an airplane. The founder of the camp had spent a night in Rushmore’s lonely cabin in Montana and had heard the voice of a grizzly in the distance.

A year later when land had been bought for the big camp in the Catskills, Mr. Temple recalled that his old guide had told him that he expected soon to give up his cabin in the Rockies and end his days at Fort Benton in his beloved Montana. “Reckon I’m gettin’ old,” he had told Mr. Temple. “That’s one thing yer can’t shoot,” he had added. Indeed old age was the only foe that had a ghost of a chance of stealing up on him.

So Mr. Temple invited Jeb Rushmore to come and live at Temple Camp and the old scout, after some hesitation, agreed to do so. He spent one night at the magnificent Temple residence in Bridgeboro where he seemed not the least bit embarrassed by the gorgeous surroundings. He smoked his pipe in Mr. Temple’s library and when that gentleman related how he had gone to Washington once to seek an audience with President Roosevelt, Jeb Rushmore casually remarked that he and Roosevelt had hunted together in the Rockies. It developed that Mr. Temple had tried to see Roosevelt and failed and that Roosevelt had gone a couple of hundred miles out of his way to get in touch with Jeb. It was not likely that Uncle Jeb would be dazzled by the formality of Mr. Temple’s household.

Uncle Jeb, as he came to be known at camp, was given the title of manager. But he had no executive duties. He was more than the camp’s manager, he was its spirit. I have seen a scout camp with a statue of an old pioneer on the camp grounds to convey the idea of scouting and outdoor life. But Uncle Jeb was the living embodiment of all these things; he wore a halo of tradition. It was a fine inspiration of Mr. Temple’s, bringing this old scout to camp.

Uncle Jeb built log cabins and made trails and instructed the scouts in pathfinding and stalking. He taught them the Indian trail marks. He would send a boy off to go where he would in the forest, give him half an hour’s head start, then take a party of boys and find him. He did this without the least trouble.

“Why didn’t yer double on yer trail?” he would demand of the astonished fugitive after running him down. “What’d I tell yer ’bout not steppin’ on no twigs ’n’ bustin’ ’em?”

“You can’t run without breaking twigs,” the embarrassed boy would protest. “And anyway, if I doubled on my trail you’d trace me anyway; so what’s the use?”

“Yer don’t hev ter tech no trees, do yer?” the old guide would say, “’n’ leave all yer duds hangin’ on ’em like a ole wash hangin’ out.”

“You can’t run in the woods without touching trees or even stepping on twigs,” the poor victim would protest. “Anyway, it’s no use trying to get away, not from you, Jiminy Christopher!”

What Uncle Jeb meant when he charged an unfortunate scout with leaving his duds hanging on trees “like a ole wash” was that the baffled youngster had left one strand of a fringe from his scout scarf on some obscure bramble bush.

“If yer decorate yer path like if a parade wuz comin’ ’tain’ no chore findin’ yer, now is it?” Uncle Jeb would ask. “Here yer scares away a turtle what was settin’ on a rock and I sees where the spot wuz he was a settin’ on. Yer ain’t reckonin’ I was blind, wuz yer?”

No, they didn’t think he was blind, they thought he had eyes all over him. It was disheartening trying to get away from Uncle Jeb.

“Now, youngster, you try agin,” the old man would say, “’n’ remember you ain’t diggin’ a cut fer a railroad ’n’ yer ain’t layin’ out no line o’ march ’s if yer wuz marchin’ through Georgie. ’N’ don’t make a noise like yer wuz shoutin’ the battle cry of freedom. ’Cause yer jes’ scare the birds ’n’ the turtles ’n’ they goes ’n’ tells on yer. Now you try once more.”

But it would be just the same thing over again.

CHAPTER III—GOOD MAN FRIDAY

The scouts liked to be with Uncle Jeb and help him, but they shared these enjoyments with other diversions, rowing, swimming, and visits to Leeds and Catskills where they conducted masterly assaults upon ice-cream parlors and frankfurter stands, and satiated themselves with movies.

But Westy Martin stuck and became Uncle Jeb’s right-hand man. A score of enthusiastic scouts would help in the starting of a new cabin. But only Westy would remain till it was finished. A clamorous throng would start blazing a trail back into the mountains and for the first mile or two there would be more scouts to do the blazing than there were trees to be blazed. But at the point of destination it often happened that Uncle Jeb and Westy were the only survivors.

During this very summer, of which we have witnessed almost the final scene, Uncle Jeb was engaged in making a continuous trail around the lake. This involved the building of log fords across inlets and a rough bridge at one point. The mountainside across the lake from camp was dense and precipitous and here the making of a real path was laborious. The gang of volunteer workers soon petered out, leaving only Westy and Uncle Jeb to fell the trees and pry up rocks. All the camp idolized Uncle Jeb, but Westy was his good man Friday.

So it was natural enough that Uncle Jeb should select Westy to accompany him on his visit to the old cabin in the Rockies, which had been his home, or rather headquarters, for so many years. And it was natural enough, too, that Westy (being the boy he was) had never dreamed of being chosen for this great adventure. Mr. Temple’s announcement struck him dumb.

It is significant, I think, that the first thought which entered Westy’s mind upon hearing Mr. Temple’s sensational announcement, was the thought of how his father would react to these tidings of great joy. He hoped that Mr. John Temple, who could do all things, would carry his interest to the point of interceding in the Martin stronghold in Bridgeboro. Sunshine had burst upon Westy and dazzled him. And then there was a shadow, a shadow of misgiving and apprehension.

But late as it was in the season something was yet to happen at Temple Camp destined to have an important bearing on Westy’s future adventures. There was one boy in his troop, who occasionally accompanied him and Uncle Jeb in their work of carving out this long-needed and circuitous trail. This was Artie Van Arlen, leader of the Raven Patrol in his own troop. He was tall and likable and intelligent, a real patrol leader. His patrol was more than a group, it was a well-conducted organization. And he had made it so.

Unlike many of the camp group, Artie had not set out to help and then grown tired of it and plunged into other diversions. Sometimes, when he felt like it, he would go across the lake and spend a day on the steep mountainside helping Uncle Jeb and Westy. He never said that he would surely be there the following day. He did not seem to consider his status as that of a helper, though he did help. He frequently rowed or paddled across at noontime with hot lunch for the two steady toilers, and often on such occasions he would remain, clearing away brush and prying rocks out of the projected path. Uncle Jeb liked him and found it pleasant when he took it into his head to hike around or row across.

Artie was rather amused at Westy’s constancy to this arduous labor. But that was the kind of boy Westy was. He worshiped at the shrine of Uncle Jeb and was a model of devotion to his hero. Dogs of certain breeds are said to recognize but one master and companion. Westy was of that exclusive and devoted type. He renounced the camp life to be with this keen-eyed old hickory nut of the plains and the Rockies. Uncle Jeb could hardly have thought of any one else to make the trip to Montana with him.

It was a day or two after Mr. Temple’s bombshell at the big “feed” in his honor that Artie rowed across the lake at noontime with some bean soup and hot muffins for the trail makers. They always took a snack with them and these luscious supplements to their cold lunch came as pleasant surprises.

CHAPTER IV—THE CAPTIVE

If it was natural that Uncle Jeb should have selected Westy to accompany him to Montana, it seemed quite as natural that Westy should select Artie to be his companion on the big adventure. At camp it was taken for granted that he would do this, not only because Artie was in Westy’s troop and the two were pals, but because Artie was often with Uncle Jeb, and was serviceable to him in many ways. He was a frequent if not a steady helper.

Since work on the new trail had progressed to the opposite side of the lake from camp, the toilers saw much of him. They would hear the steady clink of oarlocks as the boat approached the shore and then Artie’s voice calling from below, “Are you hungry up there? Any big rocks that you can’t handle? If so, say the word; now’s your chance.” Then he would come scrambling up, all out of breath, to where the work was going on. They enjoyed his visits. Everybody liked Artie.

On this occasion he tied the boat (it was impossible to draw it up because the shore was so precipitous) and started scrambling up with the pail of soup to where the trail was being cut along the lower reaches of the mountain. A narrow and irregular shelf of land was being utilized to carry the trail through this precipitous area.

“How’s she coming?” Artie asked. “Here’s some soup; I nearly spilled it. There’s a boxful of muffins down in the boat—hot ones.”

“I’ll go down and get them,” Westy said; “you sit down and rest. What you been doing all morning? I thought we’d see you sooner.”