Chapter VIII: Mysterious Youth

Early next day, Florence and Jeanne rowed across the bay to a small dock marked, “Monument Rock Trail.”

After tying up their boat they took up the trail that, now winding beneath sweet smelling cedar and balsam, and now passing over a swamp spanned by shaky logs, at last brought them to the foot of a ridge. Here they started climbing toward the crest.

Some half-way up they made an abrupt turn, to find themselves facing a mass of towering rock that, like the tall chimney of some burned building, rose to the very tree tops.

“Monument Rock,” Jeanne whispered. Something of that spell cast over her by the “Dean of the Island” recurred now. “It’s like a headless man, that rock,” she said in awed voice. “A man with hands folded across his knees.”

“That’s just like the legend!” Florence exclaimed.

“Oh, do you know it?” Jeanne was pleased.

“It goes like this,” Florence began. “In the early days Indians seldom came to live here. It was, they said, the home of all island gods. If men came here to live they would meet with disaster.”

“Did any of them ever try it?” Jeanne asked.

“Yes,” Florence smiled and nodded. “This one! ‘Sitting Cloud’ they called him. He’s still sitting, you see.”

“Sitting Cloud,” Jeanne said in a small voice.

“Yes. You see, like lots of other people, he didn’t believe in gods, so he came here to live. The hunting was good. There were caribou, lynx and beaver in those days. He traded lumps of copper to others of his tribe and got on very well indeed.”

“And then?” Jeanne breathed.

“Then he began to believe in the gods. Sometimes, in a night of fog, he thought he saw them creeping upon him. So he took to hiding in a small cave that opened out right at this place.”

“And then?” Jeanne repeated.

“Then he hunted very little. He did not crack away rock to get copper. Indians who came to visit the island found him shuddering in his cave. You see, Jeanne,” Florence said soberly, “that’s what comes of believing in island gods, fairies, gnomes, and all such.”

“Or, in not believing.” Jeanne was quite serious. “Perhaps the island was _not_ meant to be lived upon,” she went on. “Perhaps it will all be burned over. Then no one can live here.”

“Oh, but no!” She sprang to her feet. “It is so beautiful! It is always so cool! The air is so delightful! It must not be destroyed! It truly must not be!

“But this Indian, Sitting Cloud?” Her voice changed. “What happened?”

Florence looked toward the great rock towering to the sky. “Just what you see. Sitting Cloud was a giant. Perhaps he had grown since coming to the island. Anyway, so the story goes, one spring his friends came to look for him and all they found was this rock. Even his cave was gone. The gods had turned him to stone.”

“The gods had turned him to stone.” Jeanne whispered.

“Perhaps,” said Florence.

“I am sure it was so!” Jeanne declared. “But come!” She seized Florence by the hand. “Let us go to the very top.”

Once again they took the upward trail. They came at last to the crest of the ridge. There, standing on a platform of rock known as “Lookout Louise,” they stood in silence, while their eyes took in the glorious view.

It was a clear day. At their feet lay Duncan’s Bay. On the little camping spot at its entrance, more than once in the days that had gone they had pitched their tent.

“Happy days,” Jeanne whispered.

If Florence heard, she made no reply. She was looking away toward the Canadian shores where Sleeping Giant, Pie Island, and Thunder Bay seemed to call to her.

At that Jeanne broke in with three magic words: “The Phantom Fisherman.”

“Oh, no!” Florence exclaimed. “You only see him in a fog.” The fact is, the big girl scarcely believed in this phantom at all.

“See for yourself!” Seizing her arm, Jeanne pointed away over the shimmering water to a spot well beyond the last jagged end of the island.

“There!” she exclaimed, “there he is!”

“Sure enough. Let’s have a look.” Florence dragged a pair of heavy field glasses to her eyes.

“Seems real enough,” she murmured. “White boat with a red gunwale, sort of short and chubby. I’d know that boat anywhere. What a powerful motor he must have! How he does dart about!”

“If we were there he would vanish,” Jeanne insisted.

“Jeanne, you’re a dreamer.” Florence let the glasses drop to her side. “But then, what is one to expect from a gypsy, you—”

At that instant a cry escaped her lips. “Look! Only look, Jeanne!” She had turned half-about. “Smoke everywhere! The whole island is on fire!”

This seemed indeed true. To judge distances was difficult but it looked as though the nearest fire must not be more than ten miles away. Beyond that the whole island was hidden by smoke.

Even as Jeanne looked, Florence exclaimed again, “Look!”

Once again, dragging the heavy fieldglasses to her eyes, she studied a mass of rocks that at some distance rose above the treetops.

“A man,” she murmured, “A man in a bright red sweater. Must be five miles away, where no one lives.”

The man had been leaping from rock to rock. Now he paused to turn and look away. Did Florence see a fresh column of smoke rise from the evergreen forest? She thought so. She could not be sure.

“He’s young,” she thought. “Perhaps only a boy. Not even a middle-aged person could go over the rocks like that. Can he be a firebug? Are these fires being set by him?”

To these questions there could be no answer for the present. One thing was certain. If she saw him again close by and he wore that sweater, she would know him, for surely there was but one such flash of red on the island.

Two hours later the girls were having lunch with Edith Mateland, the wife of one of the fishermen. She was a small person, and Florence thought rather frail for such a life.

“Edith,” Florence said, “do people ever set forest fires?”

“Oh, yes. Many times!” was the startling reply.

“But why?”

“Perhaps they do not like the people who own the timber.”

“Revenge?”

“Yes. And perhaps they just want work.”

“Work?” Florence stared.

“Oh, yes,” Edith explained. “These days there are many who have no work. If there is a very terrible fire men will be hired to fight it. Thousands of men.”

“Oh! but these wouldn’t do that!”

“It has been done many times.” There was a ring of truth in Edith’s voice. She was of the North. She knew.

Florence thought of the hundreds of men being brought to the island to fight this fire. One thing was certain. If there was a firebug on this island he must be caught. She would ask questions of people here and there about the mysterious youth in the crimson sweater. She would search far and wide for him. If he seemed to avoid her she would hunt him down. He should not escape. So, fired by a new resolution, she rowed back to the _Wanderer_.