The Adventures of a Modest Man

He sighed at the last flapjack, decided he did not require it, and settling down with his back against the log blissfully lighted his pipe.

For ten minutes they smoked without speaking, dreamily gazing at the blue sky through the trees. Friendly little forest birds came around, dropping from twig to branch; two chipmunks crept into the case of eggs to fill their pouched chops with the oats that the eggs were packed in. The young men watched them lazily.

"The simpler life is the true existence," commented Ellis, drawing a long, deep breath.

"What the devil is the simpler life?" demanded Jones, with so much energy that the chipmunks raced away in mad abandon, and the flock of black-capped birds scattered to neigbouring branches, remarking in unison, "Chick-a-dee-dee-dee."

"Why, you're leading the simpler life now," said Ellis, laughing, "are you not?"

"Am I? No, I'm not. I'm not leading a simple life; I'm leading a pace-killing, nerve-racking, complex one. I tell you, Ellis, that it has taken just one week in the woods to reveal to me the complexity of simplicity!"

"Oh, you don't like the life?"

"I like it all right, but it's too complex. Listen to me. You asked me why anybody ever let me escape into the woods. I'll tell you… You're a New Yorker, are you not?"

Ellis nodded.

"All right. First look on this picture: I live in the Sixties, near enough to the Park to see it. It's green, and I like it. Besides, there are geraniums and other posies in my back yard, and I can see them when the laundress isn't too busy with the clothes-line. So much for the mise en scène; me in a twenty-by-one-hundred house, perfectly contented; Park a stone's toss west, back yard a few feet north. My habits? Simple enough to draw tears from a lambkin! I breakfast at nine – an egg, fruit, coffee and – I hate to admit it – the Sun. At eleven I go down-town to see if there's anything doing. There never is, so I smoke one cigar with my partner and then we lunch together. I then walk uptown —walk, mind you. At the club I look at the ticker, or out of the window. Later I play cowboy or billiards for an hour. I take one cocktail —one, if you please. I converse." He waved his pipe; Ellis nodded solemnly.

"Then," continued Jones, "what do I do?"

"I don't know," replied Ellis.

"I'll tell you. I call a cab – one taxi, or one hansom, as the state of the weather may suggest – I drive through the Park, pleasantly aware of the verdure, the squirrels, and the babies; I arrive at my home; I mount to the library and there I select from my limited collection some accursed book I've always heard of but have never read – not fiction, but something stupefying and worth while. This I read for exactly one hour. I then need a drink. I then dress; and if I'm dining out, out I go – if not, I dine at home. Twice a week I attend the theatre, but I neutralise that by doing penance at the opera every Monday during the season… There, Ellis, is the story of a simple life! Look on that picture. Now look on this: Me in the backwoods, fly-bitten, smoke-choked, a half-charred flapjack in my fist, a porcupine-gnawed rind of pork on a stick, attempting to broil the same at a fire, the smoke of which blinds me. Me, again, belly down, peering hungrily over the bank of a stream, attempting to snatch a trout with a bare hook, my glasses slipping off repeatedly, the spectre of starvation scourging on me. Me, once more, frantic with indigestion and mosquitoes, lurking under a blanket, the root of a tree bruising my backbone; me in the morning, done up, shaving in icy water and cutting my chin; me, half shaved, searching for a scrap of nourishment, gauntly prowling among cold and greasy fry-pans! Ellis! Which is the simpler life, in Heaven's name?"

Ellis's laughter was the laughter of a woodsman, full, infectious, but almost noiseless. The birds came back and teetered on adjacent twigs, cheeping in friendly unison; a chipmunk, chops distended, popped up from the case of eggs like a striped jack-in-a-box, not at all afraid of a man who laughed that way.

"How did you ever come into the woods?" he asked at length.

"Lunatic friends and fool books persuaded me I was missing something. I read all about how to tell a woodcock from a peacock; how to dig holes in the ground and raise little pea vines, and how to make two blades of grass grow where the laundress had set a devastating shoe. Then I tired of it. But friends urged me on, and one idiot said that I looked like the victim of a rare disease and gave me a shotgun – whether to shoot myself or the dicky birds I'm not perfectly certain yet. Besides, as I have a perfect hatred of taking life, I had no temptation to shoot guides in Maine or niggers in South Carolina, where the quail come from. Still, I was awake to the new idea. I read more books on bats and woodchucks; I smelled every flower I saw; I tried to keep up," he said, earnestly; "by Heaven, I did my best! And now, look at me! Nature hands me the frozen mitt!"

Ellis could only laugh, cradling his knees in his clasped and sun-tanned hands.

"I am fond of Nature; I admire the geraniums in my backyard," continued Jones, excitedly. "I like a simple life, too; but I don't wish to pursue a live thing and eat it for my dinner. The idea is perfectly obnoxious to me. I like flowers on a table or in the Park, but I don't want to know their names, or the names of the creatures that buzz and crawl over them, or the names of the birds that feed on the buzzy things! I don't; I know I don't, and I won't! Nature has strung me; I shall knock Nature hereafter. This is all for mine. I'll lock up and leave the key of the fields to the next Come-on lured into the good green goods by that most accomplished steerer, Mrs. Nature. I've got my gilt brick, Ellis – I'm going home to buy a card to hang over my desk; and on it will be the wisest words ever written:

"'Who's Loony Now?'"

"But, my dear fellow – "

"No, you don't. You're an accomplice of this Nature dame; I can tell by the way you cook and catch trout and keep your matches in bottles. One large and brilliant brick is enough for one New York man. The asphalt for mine – and a Turkish bath."

After a grinning silence, Ellis arose, stretched, tapped his pipe against a tree trunk, and sauntered over to where his rod lay. "Come on; I'll guarantee you a trout in the first reach," he said, affably, slipping ferrule into socket, disentangling the cast and setting the line free.

So they strolled off toward the long amber reach which lay a few yards below the camp, Jones explaining that he didn't wish to take life from anything except a mosquito.

"We've got to eat; we'd better stock up while we can, because it's going to rain," observed Ellis.

"Going to rain? How do you know?"

"I smell it. Besides, look there – yonder above the mountains. Do you see the sky behind the Golden Dome?"

CHAPTER XIV

A STATE OF MIND

Up the narrow valley, over the unbroken sweep of treetops, arose tumbled peaks; and above the Golden Dome, pushing straight upward into the flawless blue of heaven, towered a cloud, its inky convolutions edged with silver.

Jones inspected the thunderhead with disapproval; Ellis offered his rod, and, being refused, began some clever casting, the artistic beauty of which was lost upon Jones.

One trout only investigated the red-and-white fly; and, that fish safely creeled, Ellis turned to his companion:

"Three years ago, when I last came here, this reach was more prolific. But there's a pool above that I'll warrant. Shall we move?"

As they passed on upstream Jones said: "There's no pool above, only a rapid."

"You're in error," said Ellis, confidently. "I've known every pool on the Caranay for years."

"But there is no pool above – unless you mean to trespass."

"Trespass!" repeated Ellis, aghast. "Trespass in the free Caranay forests! You – you don't mean to say that any preserve has been established on the Caranay! I haven't been here for three years… Do you?"

"Look there," said Jones, pointing to a high fence of netted wire which rose above the undergrowth and cut the banks of the stream in two with a barrier eight feet high; "that's what stopped me. There's their home-designed trespass notice hanging to the fence. Read it; it's worth perusal."

Speechless, but still incredulous, Ellis strode to the barrier and looked up. And this is what he read printed in mincing "Art Nouveau" type upon a swinging zinc sign fashioned to imitate something or other which was no doubt very precious:

Oyez!

Ye simple livers of ye simpler life have raised thys barrier against ye World, ye Flesh and ye Devyl. Turn back in Peace and leave us to our Nunnery.

Ye Maids and Dames of Vassar

"What the devil is that nonsense?" demanded Ellis hoarsely.

"Explained on our next tree," remarked Jones, wiping his eyeglasses indifferently.

An ordinary trespass notice printed on white linen was nailed to the flank of a great pine; and, below this, a special warning, done in red on a white board:

Notice!

This property belongs to the Vassar College Summer School. Fishing, shooting, trapping, the felling of trees, the picking of wild flowers, and every form of trespass, being strictly forbidden, all violators of this ordinance under the law will be prosecuted. One hundred dollars reward is offered for evidence leading to the detection and conviction of any trespasser upon this property.

The Directors of the Vassar Summer School

"Well?" inquired Jones, as Ellis stood motionless, staring at the sign. The latter slowly turned an enraged visage toward his companion.

"What are you going to do?" repeated Jones, curiously.

"Do? I'm going to fish the Caranay. Come on."