THE CHINOOK
By Frank Richardson Pierce
All’s fair in love and timber war, thought the powerful and unscrupulous Ludwig—but he badly underestimated young Dan Todd, of the Forest Service
CHAPTER I.
THE GOLDEN SLIPPER
The rain was falling in torrents. The moss and rot of the forest floor was like a sponge, into which the hoofs of the horse disappeared silently, but from which they emerged with a sucking sound. The rider sat humped up while water cascaded down the back of his yellow slicker and dripped from the stiff brim of his Forest Service hat. “Stay with it, Chinook, old hoss,” the rider said cheerfully; “we’ll soon be at Black Lake cabin!”
Chinook had already quickened his pace after the manner of horses knowing the day’s labor was nearly done. This day’s labor had extended far into the night. It was dark in the great fir and cedar forest even at midday, but now, at midnight, even Dan Todd’s accustomed eyes saw little. He left progress entirely to his horse.
Once Chinook trembled and snorted, Todd knew they had just passed the draw through which cougars frequently descended from mountain to valley. This part of the trail ran along a timbered bench approximately halfway between the mountain tops and the blue waters of Puget Sound. Cougars dearly love horse flesh and horses know it.
This was but one of many thoughts running through Todd’s mind. Other thoughts dwelled on the past with bitterness and on the future with hope.
They had warned him no Forest Service man could buck Sim Ludwig and remain in the service. Ludwig’s influence was too far-reaching. The Service, proper, might be back of a man, but sooner or later he was removed. Todd had bucked Ludwig and now he was on his way to some other occupation. Just what, he did not know. One thing was certain, he would no longer wear the uniform of the Forest Service.
Come to think of it, he was on Ludwig property at the present moment. Or was it the Lowe holdings? It made little difference, one outfit was as bad as the other. “Get it while the getting’s good,” was Ludwig’s motto. “To hell with conservation,” was another. These were mottos to which the Lowes said “Amen!!”
The trail narrowed, and when the shod hoofs struck fire on sloping rocks Todd dismounted. The trail followed a ledge for several rods, and a slip meant death. Dan led the way and Chinook followed. The man’s feet, sensitive to the contour of the ground, could “feel” a trail in the dark, but here he used a flashlight as a matter of precaution. As the light picked up objects ahead, a flash of gold struck his eyes and vanished.
“Now what!!” he exclaimed. “I saw gold as sure as—” The finger of light moved nervously back and forth, then came to a stop.
Todd reached down and picked up the last thing he expected to find on Flaming Falls Trail—a girl’s golden slipper. It was a beautifully fashioned bit of footwear, and a pair might have cost anywhere from twenty-five to one hundred dollars. “Wonder who it belongs to?” he mused.
There was a streak of romance in Dan Todd that responded to the situation. Forester finds golden slipper; seeks girl who can wear the slipper; falls in love, marries and lives happily ever after. The old Cinderella story with a different setting. He dismissed the thought with a growl.
“Any girl that’d wear a slipper like that couldn’t mean a thing in the life of a scrub timber cruiser out of a job!” But he tucked the slipper away in his pocket, nevertheless. Ludwig’s hunting lodge was located on Black Lake, a few rods from the Forest Service cabin, and it was known among the rangers that wild parties occasionally took place there. In fact more than one tired ranger had had a good night’s sleep ruined.
He was recalling various stories when the sound of hurrying water burst upon him. Todd had covered the distance between the ledge and the bridge in less time than he realized.
“No need of climbing aboard again, Chinook; might as well walk the rest of the way. Hello, here’s a track in the mud, several of ’em. That girl was along here a few minutes ago, the water hasn’t seeped into the heel holes yet. Now that’s queer. She had one slipper on and the other off. Oh, well—probably they’re all lit at the lodge and some girl lost a bet and had to run to the ledge and back; probably scared stiff, too, of cougars and bobcats.”
Forty or fifty years previous a mighty cedar had fallen across the stream. Converting this into a bridge had been a mere matter of building an approach and hewing off the top of the trunk. The bridge was from three to four feet in width. A quarter of a mile beyond, the timber ended as abruptly as though cut with a scythe, as indeed it had—the scythe of the modern logger; electric logging engines, high leads and standard gauge railways.
* * * * *
Half expecting to see the lodge ablaze with lights, Todd was surprised to find the entire clearing in utter darkness. Not so much as a flickering candle broke the gloom. Chinook sniffed at something off to the left, and the man, who was still afoot, pulled him back. “You’re always getting curious over something; come on, it’s raining harder than ever.”
Obeying the woodsman’s instinct to glance at all cabins he might pass during the day, Todd flashed the light on the lodge. The door stood open, the rain beating in. “Now that’s queer. Ludwig’s usually sober enough to close up the place when he leaves. I’ll have to take a look at that.” He did not stop, but continued on to the Forest Service cabin, snug, dry, fueled and well stocked with grub.
He pulled the pack off his horse, dropped it on the cabin floor, slapped the horse on the neck, signaling he could go to the shed, and then entered and built a fire. A click of hoof against stone was Dan’s first warning Chinook had not gone to the shed, but was back-trailing.
He hurried out and whistled. The horse stopped, then continued.
“Best horse that ever leaped a log,” the man growled, “but stubborn as they make ’em. Once he makes up his mind to investigate something you might as well let him do it. Now I’ve got to drag him out of the rain.”
Flashing the light, Dan Todd trailed the horse to a point on the edge of the clearing. Chinook was sniffing—sniffing at something pink, lovely, and seemingly lifeless. In the half light it appeared to be the partly dressed body of a beautiful girl, but closer inspection disclosed the fact she was dressed in an evening frock of a delicate pink shade, and that her feet were bare and cut, her stockings in shreds. Dan remembered the golden slipper, then picked her up. She was cold, but it was not the chill of death.
She was not heavy for a man of his strength, even as a dead weight. Dan guessed she weighed a hundred and ten pounds, clothes and all. “And they wear so little clothes,” he added, “you can hardly count them as weight.”
Dan turned up the gasoline pressure lamp, hung a blanket over the stove, which by this time was red hot, then proceeded to remove the torn, sodden frock. It dropped to the floor, a crumpled, pitiful heap, that somehow reminded the man of the girl.
She seemed crushed and broken. Her face was beautiful, the rain had added to the curl of her light brown hair, her face held plenty of character of the sort that can be directed for either good or bad purpose, depending on the mode of life the owner wishes to follow. The ears were small, and of sufficient beauty to expose—so many are not.
He wrapped the blanket about her and put the girl to bed. Then he piled on more blankets, filled up all of the empty bottles in the place with hot water, which he wrapped in towels and placed about her body and legs. Then, as an afterthought, he wondered if there might not be a little whisky in the lodge. Stern measures were necessary if he were to ward off pneumonia.
She stirred uneasily and he delayed a moment. His hand dropping to his coat pocket, touched the slipper. He drew it out, examined it a moment, then reaching beneath the blankets, tried it on. If one made allowance for dampness, the slipper went on easily enough.
“Hers,” he muttered; “guess I’d better find something before she gets in a bad way. Wonder what it’s all about?”
In the excitement he had forgotten that it had been nearly twenty-four hours since he had rested. With flashlight picking up the trail he legged it down to the lodge only to stop, as though transfixed. “Good God!” he exclaimed, and it was a prayer.
The body of a man in evening dress lay sprawled on the floor; a bullet hole in almost the exact center of his forehead. It needed but the briefest examination to determine that he was dead.
This was a case for the authorities and Dan did not step beyond the body. The flashlight picked up many objects of interest, however. The table had been set, a meal prepared for several people and partly eaten. The heavy odor of moonshine lingered; the room was still warm and there were footprints on the floor—small, incomplete footprints, somewhat damp, showing only the heel and the ball of the foot.
Again Dan took the golden slipper from his pocket and did a little comparing. “Made with this very slipper,” was his verdict. “Now isn’t that the deuce?”