Chapter VII: A Strange Battle

Shortly after noon of that same day a slim, bright-eyed man in a huge beaver overcoat drove up to the Lawson cabin. Johnny and Lawrence, who were about to go back to their wood cutting, stared at him.

“Hello, boys,” was his surprising greeting. “I hear you bring ’em back alive.”

“Why, yes, we—Sometimes we do,” Johnny replied in confusion.

“Blackie Dawson told me about you.”

“Oh, Blackie.” Johnny’s face brightened.

“I am in the animal business,” the man explained, alighting from his hired sled and allowing Lawrence to lead his horse away. “I thought you boys might help me a little.”

“Help you? Oh, sure!” Things were looking better and better. “Here’s where we get a start,” Johnny was thinking.

“What have you?” the man asked.

“Well, er—mister—”

“They call me Professor Ormsby,” said the stranger. “You may call me what you please.”

“Well, then, Professor,” Johnny went on, “we have a silver fox, a perfectly keen fox.”

“Caught in a trap, I suppose?”

“No. By hand.”

“By hand!” The Professor stared. “How do you do it?”

Johnny told him in as few words as possible and with no dramatics at all, just how it was done.

“Oh, I say!” the Professor exclaimed. “That’s great! You took a chance with that fox. But, let me see—No-o, I can’t use a silver fox. How about beavers?”

“We haven’t taken any beaver. We—well, we were afraid it might be against the law even to catch them alive.”

“I have a government permit,” said the Professor. “But if you haven’t any beaver—”

“Catching beaver would be easy. We have a grand colony not three miles away,” Lawrence put in. “We might—”

“How about mink?” Johnny asked. “We have some fine ones. Or snow-shoe rabbits?”

“I suggest that you eat the rabbits,” the Professor laughed. “I’ll have a look at your mink. But beaver! There’s your main chance. Can’t you get me some? Big ones, the bigger the better.

“You see,” he smiled, “we think we’re really doing good through this work. In the big cities, hot in summer and cold in winter and crowded always, there are hundreds of thousands of children who would never know what a woodchuck, a monkey, a beaver or a bear looked like if they didn’t see them in a zoo. Brings real joy to them, I’m sure. Many’s the fellow who dates his first real interest in the wide out-of-doors to his visit at the zoo.”

“Yes, I—” Johnny had scarcely heard him. “Could we do it?” he was asking himself. He was thinking of beaver. “Why not? Thousands and thousands of city children.” His head was in a whirl.

“I think,” he tried to make his voice seem very cheerful, “I think we can supply the beaver. Can’t we, Lawrence?”

“What? Yes. Oh, yes,” Lawrence replied.

“One of them must be a big one, a real boss of the village,” warned the Professor.

“We’ve got him,” Johnny laughed uncertainly. “Napoleon himself.”

“Yes. Oh, yes. We’ve got him, all right,” Lawrence did not laugh.

Strangely enough, as a short time later the boys went away on one more “Bring ’em back alive hunt” there was no spring in their step. Their faces were sober. If they succeeded this one more time, the coveted tractor would be within their grasp, and yet they appeared anything but happy.

“Might even get the Titan,” Lawrence tried to tell himself. This boy loved fine machinery and that Titan tractor was a beauty. It had power, plenty of it. With it they could not only pull stumps and plow fields for themselves, but do work for other settlers on shares and, in quiet times, they could work on the road. “Four live beavers,” he thought. “That’s all it takes.” Yes, that was all it took, and yet—

Up a small stream that flows into the Matanuska River early in the year the boys had discovered a beaver colony. Many an hour they had spent watching these busy beavers. Never in all their lives had they seen such feats of engineering done by creatures of the wild.

There were at least sixty beavers in the group. One big fellow, weighing sixty pounds or more, was the leader. He was the boss contractor. And such a boss as he was!

“Napoleon,” they had named him. He stood for hours, as the great little general is pictured, straight, stiff and soldier-like. To him came the others. Were there trees to be felled? Two lieutenants came marching soberly up to him. They talked earnestly, nodding their heads, like real people, then off they rushed to start a dozen beavers doing the work.

It was so in everything. Most interesting of all had been the building of the big dam. This work, the boys understood, must be rushed. Winter would come. Ice would freeze two feet thick. The level of the stream must be raised to six feet so the beaver tribe could use the water beneath as a highway all winter long. The water must be dammed up.

This dam building, done under the wise direction of old Napoleon, had progressed rapidly for a time, then a sudden freshet of water loosened some of the beams and the whole affair threatened to go down stream.

“What’ll they do now?” Lawrence had asked.

“Wait and see,” was Johnny’s answer.

Old Napoleon sent his men, like sub-engineers, all over the dam, making a study of conditions. Then, apparently abandoning all this work, he ordered a new dam built a hundred feet farther down stream.

But did he truly abandon his first work? Not a bit of it. He and his crew built just enough of a dam below to raise the water and relieve the pressure from the original dam. Then, with an air of professional pride, Napoleon returned to his old post and the work was well completed before frost.

“He,” Johnny thought to himself, “is the friend we mean to capture and sell into slavery, Old Napoleon.” Little wonder that his heart was heavy. “Old Napoleon,” he whispered once again.

But what was this? As they neared the beaver colony where they were sure to find Napoleon out sunning himself, they caught sight of some creature skulking through the brush.

“It’s a wolf,” Johnny whispered. “Let’s follow him.”

Follow him they did, and to their consternation saw that he was headed for the beaver colony.

“We’d better frighten him away,” Lawrence whispered. “He’ll drive all the beavers beneath the ice. Then we won’t be able to lasso a single one.”

This, Johnny knew, was good advice, but for some reason scarcely known to himself, he said, “Let’s wait.”

When at last they caught sight of the beaver village, they saw old Napoleon standing stiff and straight as ever in his place. He was having a sun bath.

After sneaking along through the brush, the wolf made a dash at the beaver.

“He’ll kill him,” Lawrence whispered.

Did he? Strange to say, as the wolf came near, the beaver did not stir from his place. This appeared to surprise the wolf, who did not at once rush in for the kill. Sneaking up close, he made a dash at the beaver, but stopped just short of his goal. Still the beaver did not move. To the boys this seemed strange. Their respect for the old fellow grew by leaps and bounds. He appeared to be saying, “What’s a wolf that one should fear him?”

“He—he’s great!” Johnny shrilled.

“Magnificent,” Lawrence agreed.

Snarling low, the wolf began dashing and snapping at the beaver. Each snap made him bolder. Now his ugly jaws were three feet from the apparently defenseless hero of wild life, who had decided to give his life for his home and his people. Now he was only two feet away. And now only a foot.

“We—we’d better step in,” came from Lawrence.

“Wait,” Johnny gripped his arm hard. Perhaps he should stop the wolf, but he waited, fascinated.

“Now!” Lawrence caught his breath. The end, he was sure, had come.

And then, of a sudden, things did happen, but not in accord with expectations. Old Napoleon had chisel-shaped teeth that cut wood like a hatchet. Without a sound, as the wolf, having grown bold, snapped in his very face, he shot forward to close those murderous teeth over the wolf’s closed jaws.

“Great Scott!” Johnny muttered.

The struggle that followed was fast and furious. Kicking and scratching, the wolf rolled over and over, but not once did Napoleon’s locked grip loosen. It was only when his opponent, completely exhausted and all but smothered, lay limp at his side, that he at last pried his own jaws apart to climb awkwardly to his place in the sun. Instantly the wolf dragged himself to his feet, to go slinking away into the brush.

For one full minute the boys stood there motionless. When Lawrence spoke his voice was husky. “Johnny, I’ve often suspected old Napoleon of being a tyrant. He’s lazy, too. I’ve never seen him do a lick of work. But he is one swell engineer and a grand boss.”

“What’s more, he’s no coward,” Johnny added.

“Johnny, I can’t do it,” Lawrence dangled his lasso.

“Neither can I,” said Johnny. “Let’s go.”

Turning, they made their way in silence down the narrow stream to its mouth. There they dropped down upon the snow to put on their skates.

“Johnny,” said Lawrence, “we’re a pair of old softies.”

“That’s right,” said Johnny. “But I don’t mind, do you?”

“Not a bit. Let’s go.”

“Get ’em?” the Professor asked as they came stamping into the cabin.

“No—er, well, no we didn’t,” Johnny stammered.

“How come?” the man’s face sobered. “That was your big moment.”

Sensing the tenseness of the situation, Mrs. Lawson said, “The coffee’s hot. I have some spice cookies, just out of the oven. How would you like a bite to eat?”

“That—that would be splendid!” said the Professor.

When, over their cups of coffee, the boys had told the whole story, there was a strange look on the Professor’s face as he said, “Can’t say that I blame you. Under the circumstances I should have done the same thing. We shall be obliged to get our beaver some other way. And as for your tractor—”

“We—we’ll manage,” Lawrence replied slowly. Then, “By the way, Professor. You must know about bears. Are there any light blue bears?”

“Blue bears? Let me think! Oh, certainly! They belong up this way, too. Very rare they are, though.”

“Blue bears!” Lawrence became greatly excited. “Small blue bears, no larger than a good-sized dog, with woolly hair? They—they live on fish?”

“What?” It was the Professor’s turn to become excited. “You haven’t seen one? You—you couldn’t catch one for me, could you?”

“Sure—sure,” Lawrence stammered. “No, I mean we haven’t. That is, we could, I—I’m sure we could.”

“If you were to bring me one of those bears alive and in good condition,” the Professor spoke in a deeply solemn voice, “you might name your own price. Glacier bears, they are called. There is a stuffed specimen in the United States National Museum, but not a single living specimen in captivity anywhere.”

“We—we’ll hunt up Smokey Joe tomorrow,” Johnny said. “He’s seen them. He can tell us where they are. In fact, he told us all about them, only I thought it was all hooey.”

“Smokey Joe? Who is that?” the Professor asked.

“An old prospector,” Johnny explained. “He’s been all over this country.”

“In that case,” said the Professor, “much as I should like a glacier bear, I suggest that you postpone your search until late spring. Those rare creatures inhabit the wildest sort of country, rocks, cliffs and glaciers. They are worse than mountain goats. You would almost certainly perish. And besides, it is fairly certain that they, like most others of their kind, hibernate. And so—”

“So another bubble bursts,” Johnny groaned.

“Don’t be too pessimistic,” the Professor smiled. “I shall hope to hear from you sometime in June or early July. A single specimen will do.

“And, by the way,” he added as he rose, “I’ve decided to offer you a hundred dollars for your silver fox. That may not seem such a good price, but is really above the market.”

“Sold! Sold!” the boys exclaimed in unison. And so it was that the boys collected their first real money. They were, however, still a long way from their goal.