Harold MacGrath

“ Jean wasn't respectful; he was only obedient, by force of necessity, for Synde was an extraordinarily powerful man, and performed Herculean tasks about the camp for the mere sport of it.
Once the Professor had heard voices in the night, the tramping of feet somewhere about the house; but his curiosity had been inactive.
Occasionally a man dropped into camp. It was not always the same man, but always one who was burly and sullen. Jean would fill the man's arms with packages of tobacco, and the visitor would vanish into the forest out of which he had come. ”

“ I like honest men. I'm honest myself—occasionally.” Synde's laughter rocked the walls. “The clerk told me all about you. Hang it all, I get lonesome once in a while, and there's no intellectual fodder in my guide's talk. I want a companion, a man not too proud to cook simple food and wash up after, who'll smoke with me at night and talk about books and things. There's a piano, but nobody knows how to play it. Maybe it's in tune; I don't know. A hundred dollars a month and your fare back. Can you cook?”
“Why—” Belfort stupidly rubbed his forehead. ”

“ Life's funny; huh? I went into that store this morning because I had nothing to do. I didn't need a darn thing, but I bought a lot of truck just the same. Man's a fool about some things.” Synde made an imaginary cast, struck and began to reel in. “Nothing like it. Once there, it never gets out of the blood. Like war!”
“You were over there?”
“Yes, I was in that war.” Synde chuckled; and little as he knew of human notes, Belfort sensed a wild and bitter defiance in the chuckle. It gave more life to the nightmare notion. ”

“ Wills took the rod from the case and joined the parts. The big man handled the rod expertly. “The old boy is right. This is a real rod. I don't need it, but I'll take it. What's the use of a little extra coin if you can't fool with it?” He smiled, and his face became winning and boyish. “Who is he?”
“Professor Belfort, a music teacher,” answered Wills. “There's a good yarn there. He knows more about tackle and guns than nine-tenths of the chaps who call themselves sportsmen. ”

“ At the north of the clearing stood a little man, at his hip an automatic.
“Well, that gets me. Never heard of anything like that before.” The big man began to laugh. “I guess I had him up a tree when I asked how I could pack moose in that canoe.”
“I guess you did. He's been planning a vacation for years, but he'll never get enough money to make it. Seems a darn shame, too. When he's in here, he's as happy as a child; and I don't know of any child more guileless.” ”

“ All humor is based upon mishap and misery. Supposing you went gallantly to war and came back to find your job gone and your promised bride married to some one else? Isn't that the funniest thing God ever laid down for a man to laugh at?”
Synde flung down the rod and made off toward camp. Greatly shocked by what he knew to be a revelation, the Professor picked up the rod and disjointed it, mechanically. A woman! But the loss of a job shouldn't have mattered, for there was every indication that Synde was wealthy..... Some woman who hadn't been worthy..... ”

“ There are no trails to the untrained eye; and yet the dried pine-needles suggest trails without number. Attempt to follow one of these imaginary trails, and see what happens to you.
It began this way: The Professor had decided to take the west trail for a couple of miles, where he would be out of hearing, and begin his initial practice with the automatic Synde had given him. If he practiced about camp, Jean might show up and become witness to the fact that Henry Belfort, alias Dolan, shut his eyes when he pulled the trigger and never had the least notion where the bullet went. ”

“ More sinned against than sinning. Ha!”
“Have a chair, sir.” The Professor shut the door, his bewilderment stupefying him. What in the world could this man want?
Synde dropped into a chair and adroitly sailed his cap to the piano-top.
“I see you smoke, so you wont mind if I take a whack at my pipe. I was interested in your knowledge of rods this morning. Couple of years ago I leased a camp in Canada. Good trout-fishing, and plenty of moose in the fall. Eighteen miles from the nearest railway station, but I've blazed a fairish auto trail, if you don't mind a few bumps.” ”

“ AT five minutes after eight that evening, the last trip of the elevator, the Professor entered his studio, turned on the reading lamp, got his new catalogues and sporting magazines and his pipe, and sat down for an orgy; for a man can get drunk by the way of reading quite as easily as by the way of the lips. ”

“ He was Dolan—Dolan—Dolan. He was Irish. If he lagged, he would imperil the life of this indomitable man who had gone to the devil because of a woman's unfaith. What if he had laughed, poked fun at Belfort alias Dolan? He had made a lonely old man's dream come true.
Hours and hours passed, so it seemed. The Professor wondered if he could ever loosen his grip on Synde's coat. Unexpectedly they came upon the lights of the house. Evidently Synde had lighted the lamps before going into the forest.
“We'll make it,” said Synde. “Only a few steps to the car. Plenty of gas!” ”

“ A Simon-pure bluff; and yet he could pick out a rod like that without practical knowledge, without that experience very hard to acquire, merely by some instinct not translatable into words. He wondered if the old boy could lay a fly. Get the old geezer with a lot of elderberries behind him—that would be a scene worthy of a moving-picture camera. No man living could lay a fly by reading about it ”

“ We'll get along. You'll cook, but you'll eat with me. Here's the dough. You'll know what you need. Dont bother about tackle. I've got rafts of the stuff. Can you shoot?”
“No.”
“I'll put you through the mill when we get there. You'll be left alone some. There's a lot of tough customers wandering about. If they knew you couldn't handle a gun, they might loot the camp. You're not afraid, are you?”
“I might be.”
“You're all right, Professor. The yellow-streaker never admits that he might be afraid.”
Synde produced his roll. Never had Belfort seen so much money save behind a teller's cage. ”

“ The thousands and thousands of good musicians who cannot get anywhere! He could have eked out a fair living by playing in a moving-picture theater, but at his age—fifty-six—the hours were too long; he would never have had any time to himself or for his dreams. ”

“ Now, a barbless fly gives you the thrill of a break and a tug, and then Mr. Trout gets off, none the worse for the adventure.”
“Lots of fish-hogs come in here. And duck-hogs, too! Kill 'em, kill 'em; you don't hear anything else. Our job, though, is to sell 'em the murder stuff. We take our hats off to a sportsman like you. No joshing, Professor; I mean it.”
The Professor beamed, but he felt a bit of color in his cheeks. Wills was not making fun of him ”

“ HE rushed upon his man furiously; and before Stony Mike could set himself, his cheek was cut open. Synde knew that in a plain rough-and-tumble, Stony Mike would half kill him; so he fought like a prize-fighter. His blows would equal any his antagonist could offer; but if Mike's arms got their grip!.... It had to be done quickly. He mustn't spend himself utterly ”

“ Synde stiffened in his chair. “Any animal runs away from the thing that hurts it. Men go to hell because of worthless women, never because of good ones. Toddle along to bed; I want to be alone.”
IN the great North Country, the amateur woodsman should stick to the clearings, particularly on gray days, and more particularly still, if he carries no pocket compass. ”

“ Illustration: “No, no!” cried Synde. “Don't yank it. I'll show you how to get the line down.”
Harold MacGrath was one of the first “colyum conductors” in America; and that job makes a man put a lot of himself into his work. ”