Chapter XVII: Baffled

We had chopped down a number of trees to open a better wagon trail to camp and the stumps of these stood at intervals along this improved approach. Tom had hit on the idea of using some off-length strips of board for rustic seats along this connecting trail between the camp and the public road. Wherever two wayside stumps were near enough together a board was nailed across them with another board as a rough back. Charlie Rivers was doing this work.

Never at a loss for ideas where camping is concerned, Tom had conceived the notion of naming these seats after scout notables and heroes, and Heinie Sheffler, our artist, was decorating the backs of the seats with such designations as TEMPLE REST, DAN BEARD REST, GOOD TURN REST, and so on.

On the morning after our talk in the lodge, Tom drove into Harkness to mail the letters and I strolled along the wagon trail where Heinie and Charlie were working. I thought the opportunity was good to speak with Rivers. I came upon Heinie first squatted on a box before one of the benches, brush in hand, and presenting a ludicrous spectacle of an artist.

“That’s pretty nice lettering you do, Heinie,” I said, pausing to watch him.

“Och, I don’t got no good light,” he complained, intent on his work.

“I don’t see how you can hold your brush steady, reaching so far,” I observed.

“Dot I got no troubles mitt. On life-boats I could paint names when der oashun iss big mitt wafes all rough. But diss, no. I don’t got no good light.”

“_Tenderfoot Rest_” I read aloud. “Tom’s full of ideas, isn’t he?”

“Ideas, yess,” said Heinie as he worked: “but efficiency, _not_.”

“Oh, I don’t know about that,” I said, rather resentfully.

“I know about it; diss he didn’t got. Nice boy, good scout--sure. But----”

And Heinie shook his head.

“Why, look what he’s done here,” I said. “He’s inspired us all to hustle--even me. Look at the camp--all these cabins. I don’t think you ought to speak like that, Heinie. Tom likes you; he says you’re a wonder.”

“Nice boy, yess,” said Heinie, smiling. “But he don’t got no efficiency. Look down the trail--Charlie, making benches--_toys_. He can chop down four trees aready, while me unt you chops down one. Look at shingles, how he nail them on. Look at Burke, quartering logs for chinking. In an hour aready Charlie would make such a pile big enuff for all day. Och, dot feller could work, I would say dot. Sure--but down the trail you find him--see? Making bench toys! He ask Tom for diss job--easy!”

“No, no, Charlie isn’t lazy,” I said.

“Sure not. I wouldn’t deny he got us all beat for work--sure. Dot’s it! Why don’t he got work wot counts mitt getting cabins up? Sure, nice boy, Tom. Laugh, play pinocle, work like ten devils! But for boss--och, he got no efficiency.... Neider I got no good light mitt diss,” he added, intent on his work. Tom’s deficiencies seemed neither to trouble nor prejudice him.

I strolled up the trail toward where Rivers was working. It did seem odd, I reflected, that Tom had set our best worker to this odd job just after the planking had come and the more important labor had been resumed. As for Heinie, his lettering occupied but an hour or so every now and then. But I wondered not only that Tom had set Rivers to this task, but that Rivers (a competent and rapid worker if ever there was one) should have asked for the job.

You will understand that this wagon trail through the woods led to the public road. It was up that way, where the trail reached this public road, that Rivers was working. I did not go straight along the trail, but cut into the woods, for I thought that Brent was gathering sphagnum moss for chinking the storehouse cabin and I wanted to speak with him. He was nowhere to be seen and I went on through the woods, reaching the public road at a point perhaps a hundred yards from the wagon trail. Thus, approaching along the road, I could see Rivers working a few yards from it on the trail. He heard me approaching, and arose suddenly as if startled. I was astonished at this, for I was still some distance from him. He seemed relieved as soon as he had identified me.

“H’lo Charlie,” I greeted. “How’s the work coming on? May I sit down on this bench? Did I startle you?”

“Not many folks come along the road,” he said.

“You’re all by your lonesome up here, huh? I was looking for Brent in the woods.”

He did not pause to entertain me, proceeding with his task as if I were not there. He was the hardest man to talk to I ever knew. It takes two to make a conversation and I could not seduce him into responsiveness. So I made a bold plunge. “Charlie,” I said, “I wonder if I didn’t meet you before I ever came here?”

He paused in his work, looking not at me, but straight ahead of him. “I don’t reckon I did,” he said; “not unless you’re more a man of the woods than I take yer ter be.”

“In Bridgeboro? You don’t remember? How you spoke to me in the street? Last fall--no?”

“Reckon I was in Canada then,” he said. “That’s where Slade lives, huh? No, I ain’t never been there.”

I paused, baffled. And meanwhile, he resumed his work, ignoring me. I felt, as I always felt when speaking with Rivers, that I had been put at a disadvantage. I had tried to verify a conviction, and had only been reminded that I was not a man of the woods. It was a sneer, ever so skilfully conveyed.