Camp Venture: A Story of the Virginia Mountains

"What do you mean by 'fruit-house temperature?'" asked Tom.

"Why, don't you know? The houses in which fresh fruits of the summer are preserved for winter use are kept always at a temperature of thirty-three degrees. If the temperature were higher than that, the fruits would ferment and decay. If it were a single degree lower they would freeze – for thirty-two degrees is the freezing point. But at a temperature of thirty-three degrees nothing decays and nothing freezes. So they keep the fruit houses always at that temperature, and they keep fresh strawberries and peaches and all the rest of the fruits all winter in nearly as good condition as when they were picked."

"Well, what do they do with a boy," asked Tom, "who has worked all night and is mightily sleepy, except let him go to bed, even if it is the usual time for going to work, instead? Good morning, and pleasant dreams to all of you."

With that Tom rolled himself up in his blanket and lay down upon the clapboard flooring of his bed, taking a stick of wood with him for a pillow. The rest immediately followed his example and in spite of adverse conditions, they were all presently sound asleep.

CHAPTER XXIII

A Loan Negotiated

"Zero weather, boys, and below," called the Doctor, who was first to wake, about four o'clock that afternoon, and who, before waking the others, had gone out to inspect his weather recording instruments. "The bear hanging here by the door is frozen hard, and so is all the water in the house. So all that want a bath will have to join me in a roll in the snow out there."

With that he shed the scant clothing that he had on him and, rushing out, plunged into a snow bank. The rest, determined not to be out-done in robustness, quickly followed him, and after a vigorous rubbing with their coarse towels, they felt like entirely new persons.

"How glad our friends will be," said Tom, "when they hear that each of us is 'another fellow.'"

"That's an old joke, Tom," responded Ed.

"Yes, to other people, perhaps, but not to this crew of new people, every one of whom has proclaimed himself 'a new man' after that snow bath."

"Now, we can accomplish something," said Jack. "The rain and natural settling have reduced the depth of snow out there where we're chopping to two or three feet, and in this weather the surface of it will be as hard as ice itself. So we'll all drive nails in our heels to-night, as Tom has done with his, and early to-morrow we'll set to work again with the axes."

Ed was already broiling some slices of juicy bear beef, and had a big pot of coffee ready for use. As they ate supper, Harry said:

"This bear beef is delicious, of course, but I would give something pretty if I had an ash cake or a pone of bread to go with it. It may be true that a healthy person can live on meat alone for a good while, but it is a good deal more comfortable to have some bread with it."

"And it is more wholesome, too," said the Doctor. "Man was made to eat a mixed diet, and it isn't well for him to live too long on meat without starchy food, or starchy food without meat. I'm going to observe the effects of this exclusively meat diet on all of us very closely."

"Any how," said Jack, "the Indians, when they go on their big hunting trips or on the war-path, used to live on meat alone for weeks and months at a time. So I don't think we'll starve while our bear lasts, and before it is gone we can depend on Tom to provide something else. Now that the snow is hard, Tom will go prowling about the mountains before many days pass."

"Oh, we shan't starve," said the Doctor. "But it has been a good many days now since we had any bread, and we are all beginning to feel the need of it. The beans we had with our bear giblet stew were a very imperfect substitute for bread, and the quart or so of beans that we have left are not to be used at all so long as we keep fairly well. I'm saving them for hospital diet. How the Doctors in the hospitals would laugh at the suggestion of a bean diet in illness! And yet we may have to come to that for lack of any other starchy food."

"What is it you fear, Doctor?" asked Jack.

"Why, I fear that an exclusive diet of meat may result in some sort of inflammation or other disturbance of the digestive organs. If that happens, even a few beans, boiled without meat, may save a life. At any rate, I am going to keep the beans for such an emergency."

All this while Tom was taking no part in the conversation. Tom was thinking – "looking straight at things and using common sense." Presently, he took his gun and went out to "take a look at the situation," he said. On his return, he reported that "everything is frozen as hard as a brick, and if the moonshiners ever intend to attack us, now is their time. We must put out a sentinel at once. As I want to think a little I'll take the first turn, and the rest of you fellows can arrange as you like for the other turns."

"One thing I want to suggest," broke in the Doctor. "The cold is intense. The thermometer is considerably below zero. It will be cruel to keep any boy on guard outside for any prolonged time. So I propose that while this weather lasts we run the guard duty in half hour shifts. That will give each boy half an hour out there in the cold, and two hours and a half in which to sleep and get warm before he has to go on duty again."

"It's an excellent idea," said Jack, "and we'll arrange it so."

"All right," said Tom, "only as I am taking the first and best turn, I'll stay out for an hour."

The fact was, though Tom did not mention it, that the boy wanted a full hour in which to think out some plans that he had vaguely conceived. It was always Tom's habit to try to better the conditions in which he was placed, instead of accepting them as inevitable. Whenever anything was wrong and uncomfortable, Tom began asking himself if there might not be some way in which he could make it right and comfortable. He could endure hardship with a plucky resolution that often astonished others; but he never endured hardship without giving all his energies to the task of ridding himself of it if that were possible. It was a familiar saying among those who knew him that "Little Tom Ridsdale never will admit that he is beaten, and so at last he never is beaten."

As Tom paced up and down the platform, stamping his feet and clapping his hands against his sides to keep them from freezing, the Doctor came out with a burning brand to consult his weather instruments. When he had done, Tom called to him, saying:

"Would you mind coming up here for a minute or two, Doctor?"

"No, certainly not," answered the Doctor. "Do you want to go in and warm yourself?"

"No; oh, no," answered Tom, quickly. "I only want to consult you a little."

The Doctor mounted the platform, and after some hesitation, Tom asked:

"Do you happen to have any more money in your pockets, Doctor?"

"Yes, of course. I always keep a little money with me."

"Would you mind lending me two dollars in the common interest of the company, I giving you an order on our paymaster down below for that amount, to be paid to you out of my share when we collect?"

"Yes," answered the Doctor. "I would mind that very much. In fact, I positively decline to lend you any money on any such terms, Tom. But if you want some money, be it two dollars, or ten, simply as from one friend to another, and without any 'orders' on paymasters, you can have it."

Tom understood, and he did not contest the point. He pressed the Doctor's hand and said:

"Well, then, let me have two dollars, please?"

"Make it five," said the Doctor.

"No," answered Tom. "Two dollars will be quite enough. Somebody in the mountains might murder me for five dollars. And, besides, nobody up there could change the bill. So, if you will let me have two one dollar bills I shall be grateful."

"What are you going to do, Tom? Nothing rash, I hope."

"I don't know yet what I'm going to do," answered Tom. "And please don't say anything to the other boys about it. I'll be gone from here when they get up in the morning. Maybe I'll bring back some game. You see that bear won't last very long with six hearty men eating three meals a day off it, with no other food to help fill up."

The Doctor saw that Tom did not want to talk of his plans – it was always Tom's way to keep such things to himself – and so he asked no more questions, but went to the doorway for light, selected two one dollar bills, and returning, placed them in Tom's hand. Then Tom said:

"Now, Doctor, you fellows are not to worry about me if I don't turn up when you expect me. I shall probably be away from camp for several days – may be a week, or possibly even more than that. Don't worry, in any case. Remember that I know how to take care of myself."

The Doctor promised, but it was with much of apprehension in his mind. He saw that Tom was looking forward to his projected expedition with a good deal less of confident hope than he usually manifested on such occasions, and he gravely feared that the boy was planning to take some serious, if not even desperate, risk. He knew that Tom was daring to a fault, and that when he had formed a purpose he pursued it to its ultimate accomplishment or failure, with no regard whatever to the risks run, except that prudent forethought and circumspection which might enable him to avoid threatened evils.

CHAPTER XXIV

In the High Mountains

Tom's second tour of guard duty ended at four o'clock in the morning, and he woke the Doctor to succeed him. Then, without attracting the other boys' attention, he rolled his blanket into a compact bundle and strapped it high upon his shoulders. He next loaded his cartridge belt with twenty buckshot cartridges on one side and twenty cartridges that carried turkey shot on the other. He put a box of matches into one pocket and two thick slices of bear beef into another. Finally, he took one of the empty meal bags, carefully folded it up and thrust it into the breast of his hunting shirt.

Thus equipped he sallied out, and bidding the Doctor good morning as he passed the picket post, started off up the mountain. He had to pick his way very carefully till daylight came, and by that time he had passed well over the side of a ridge and was completely out of sight of Camp Venture.

Selecting a suitable spot where the wind had swept a rock clear of snow, he laid aside his gun and blanket, and set to work to build a little fire and cook one slice of his meat for breakfast. The other he reserved for a late dinner.

As he moved on after breakfast, he came upon a flock of quails – or partridges, as they are more properly called in Virginia. They were helplessly huddled under the edge of a stone and were manifestly freezing to death. For when Tom, who was too much of a sportsman to shoot birds in the covey, tried to flush them, meaning to shoot them on wing, they were barely able to flutter about on the ground, and wholly incapable of rising in flight.

"I may as well have them," said the boy, "seeing that they'll be frozen to death in another half hour." So, after a little scrambling, he caught the eleven birds and quickly put them out of their suffering. Drawing some twine from a pocket, he strung the birds together and threw them over his neck for ease of carrying.

The mountain up here was rugged and uneven, scarred and seamed with chasms and deep hollows. Tom devoted all his energies to peering into these as if searching for something. At one time, as he was hunting for a place from which to get a good view of a small but deep ravine, he flushed a flock of wild turkeys, seven or eight in number, and scarcely more than twenty feet distant from him. Curiously enough, he let them scamper away without so much as taking a shot at them.