The Oakley herald. [volume] (Oakley, Idaho) 1908-1961, 1920-11-19
CHAPTER I-contlnued.


Her eyes opened: she looked up at
him with feverish quickness.
"Tve lived twenty years without the
world. I'll not 60 back to 1t now"
But mother, II we just keep on this
way, you'll-you'lp'-he hesitated at
the next word; finally let 1t fall--"die."
"Diew she seemed to fondle the
word. "A small thing-to del"
She sat musing as II she found
melancholy comfort in the thought.
But l shan't die" she continued,
with hasty glance up at his face.
my cough Is worse today because my
medicine Is gone"
The young man started.
"Your elecampane gonel"
II took the last of 1t yesterday"
Mother! p
He went to the cook stove and lifted
the saucer from small jar In which
the roots were usually stepped. 1t was
empty and dry. There was great ten
derness In his voice as he came back
and bent over her chair
lyon shall have your elecampane
tea" he said, III the roots are to be
found in the + iatwoods; and you shall
sleep tonight In the old cabin up there
under the cool trees"
A ripple Of pleased expectation, Of
half-awakened interest. broke the
drear surface of the weary face--like
a faint glow back Of curtain that
never raises.
He retilled the cup with cool water,
rummaged a spade out of the locker
under the forward deck, and was Just
on the point of leaping to the bank
when he heard her speaking He
poked his head back inside the cur
tains, and she repeated what she had
just said:
isn't the Flatwoods where the Wild
Man lives? Seems to me once heard
that there is such a man In these
woods"
He felt carelessly along the rusty bit
Of the spade with his thumb.
II believe this Is the woods"
Maybe he's-I mean--he's not dan
gerous?"
Dangerous A gray ghost of
man with pitiful face. They say he
goes through the woods as still as
smoke. and leaves as little trail"
A minute later he had leaped ashore,
climbed the bluffs and plunged into
the deep woods.
The root of the elecampane was
much esteemed as remedy for
coughs, but 1t was by no means abun-
dant. No one knew this fact better
than the Pearlhunter.
The small stream that feeds the wa
terfall at Fallen Rock is known as
Wolf run. Following up along its
course the Pearlhunter presently came
to tiny thread Of water that joined 1t
from the west-probably the outlet of
some small pond tucked away among
the hills. 1t is along the open margins
Of swamps and ponds, and never in
the thick woods, that the elecampane
grows Believing from the warmth
and dullness of its water that the tiny
stream came from pond, rather than
from a spring, the Pearlhunter fol-
lowed it.
1t had grown SO small that the
Pearlhunter began to fear 1t would
disappear altogether, when there came
break in the forest line Just ahead.
A scramble through dense fringe of
hazel, and there 1t lay--a little pond
in the midst of narrow glade In a
pocket OF the hills, delicate inlay in
the forest.
The man glanced at the sun
turned, and hurriedly looked about for
the elecampane. Along the east edge
Of the glade, not far out from the
fringe of hazel, he found it--a clump
Of some dozen stalks, three or four of
them ready to bloom. The rusty spade
was soon at their roots-probably the
6rst ground ever broken on the mar
gin Of that pond. Three plants he
digged, cut their stems close to the
ground, shook the dirt from their clus-
tiers OF fleshy roots, and hurried down
the tiny outlet back to Wolf run.
1t was upon the gravelly margin of
pool that the Pearlhunter stopped to
wash the elecampane roots, and cut
them loose from the clusters In which
he had been carrying them. He had
finished the task and was storing
them away in the pockets Of his blouse
when the song Of thrush from some
where up the stream gradually worked
Itself across his consciousness.
The song puzzled him. There were
notes-certain little foreign flights: a
deeper witchery-that he could not
have believed possible to thrush's
throat. The Pearihunter had q nice
ear fx III sounds of the woods. He
stol. sau,.ously up the bank. The
so,,s' r'hen he had draw quite near,