PAGE 17
The Simple Lifers
by
“Get them and come over,” commanded Tish. “When you leave this forest at the end of the time you are going to be fed and clothed and carry a tent; you will have with you smoked meat and fish; you will carry under your arm an Indian clock or sundial; you will have a lamp–if we can find a clamshell or a broken bottle–and you will have a fire-making outfit with your monogram on it.”
“But, my dear friend,” he said, “I am not supposed to have any assistance and–“
“Assistance!” Tish snapped. “Who said assistance? I’m providing the brains, but you’ll do it all yourself.”
He moved over an hour or so later and Tish and I went into the tent to bed. Somewhat later, when she limped to the fire to see how the leech was filling up, he and Aggie were sitting together talking, he of Dorothea and Aggie of Mr. Wiggins. Tish said they were both talking at the same time, neither one listening to the other, and that it sounded like this:–“She’s so sweet and trusting and honest–well, I’d believe what she said if she–“
“–fell off a roof on a rainy day and was picked up by a man with a horse and buggy quite unconscious.”
V
The next three weeks were busy times for Percy. He wore Tish’s blanket for two days, and then, finding it in the way, he discarded it altogether. Seen in daylight it was easy to understand why little Dorothea was in love with him. He was a handsome young giant, although much bitten by mosquitoes and scratched with briers.
The arrangement was a good one all round. He knew of things in the wood we’d never heard of–wild onions and artichokes, and he had found a clump of wild cherry trees. He made snares of the fibers of tree bark, and he brought in turtles and made plates out of the shells. And all the time he was working on his outfit, curing rabbit skins and sewing them together with fibers under my direction.
When he’d made one sleeve of his coat we had a sort of celebration. He’d found an empty bottle somewhere in the woods, and he had made a wild-cherry decoction that he declared was cherry brandy, keeping it in the sun to ferment. Well, he insisted on opening the brandy that day and passing it round. We had cups made of leaves and we drank to his sleeve, although the stuff was villainous. He had put the sleeve on, and it looked rather inadequate. “Here’s fun,” he said joyously. “If my English tailor could see this sleeve he’d die of envy. A sleeve’s not all of a coat, but what’s a coat without a sleeve? Look at it–grace, ease of line, and beauty of material.”
Aggie lifted her leaf.
“To Dorothea!” she said. “And may the sleeve soon be about her.”
Tish thought this toast was not delicate, but Percy was enchanted with it.
It was on the evening of the fourth day of Percy’s joining our camp that the Willoughby person appeared. It happened at a most inauspicious time. We had eaten supper and were gathered round the camp-fire and Tish had put wet leaves on the blaze to make a smudge that would drive the mosquitoes away. We were sitting there, Tish and I coughing and Aggie sneezing in the smoke, when Percy came running through the woods and stopped at the foot of a tree near by.
“Bring a club, somebody,” he yelled. “I’ve treed the back of my coat.”
Tish ran with one of the tent poles. A tepee is inconvenient for that reason. Every time any one wants a fishing-pole or a weapon, the tent loses part of its bony structure and sags like the face of a stout woman who has reduced. And it turned out that Percy had treed a coon. He climbed up after it, taking Tish’s pole with him to dislodge it, and it was at that moment that a man rode into the clearing and practically fell off his horse. He was dirty and scratched with brambles, and his once immaculate riding-clothes were torn. He was about to take off his hat when he got a good look at us and changed his mind.