Grace Harlowe's Overland Riders in the Great North Woods Part 5

"Yer lookin' at Joe Shafto. If ye don't like the looks of me look t'other way!" she fairly flung at him.

"You don't understand, Madam. We engaged Joe Shafto, a man, to guide us through the North Woods and--"

"I tell ye I'm the party, and I'm man enough for any bunch of rough-necks in the timber," retorted the woman.

"A woman guide! Good night!" muttered Hippy Wingate under his breath.

CHAPTER IV

A HUMAN TALKING MACHINE

"Of course, of course. I--I--well, I'll talk to my friends about it,"

answered Tom lamely. He was fl.u.s.trated and flushed, greatly to the enjoyment of the Overland girls.

"That's all right, Tom," soothed Grace. "I am positive that Miss Shafto--"

"Mrs. Shafto," corrected the woman. "Mrs. Joe Shafto. Git the handle right."

"I am positive that Mrs. Shafto will answer our purpose very nicely,"

finished Grace.

"Yes, yes. I--I agree with you," mumbled Tom. "If you have time, or when you do have time, we shall have to talk over our plans with you and--"

"Ain't got no time for nothin' to-day. Had yer dinners?"

"We had luncheon on the way," replied Grace.

"Lucky for ye. I'll go work at the ironin'; then I've got to clean house. Mebby then I'll talk to ye."

Joe stamped back into the house, slamming the door behind her, and the Overland Riders lost themselves in gales of laughter, galloping their horses on beyond the house so that Joe might not hear. Tom followed along slowly, considerably crestfallen.

"Tom Gray, you surely have distinguished yourself," declared Anne Nesbit.

"My Hippy couldn't have done worse," added Nora.

"It gives me a pain in my back just to look at her," averred Elfroda.

"Listening to her is worse."

"I shan't listen at all. Thank goodness I have the voices of nature to listen to," observed Emma.

"Girls, I admit that I have made a mess of it. I suppose we can go on without a guide, but really it is not wise for you girls, inexperienced as you are in woodcraft, to venture into the Big Woods."

"I do not agree with you folks," interjected Grace. "That woman is sharp-tongued, but she is a st.u.r.dy and dependable character. It is my opinion that we might have done a great deal worse in selecting a guide. Let's go back to the house, make camp nearby, and wait until the st.u.r.dy warrior is ready for us. She will be out again to talk to us soon enough, if I am a judge of human nature."

The Overlanders acted upon the suggestion and pitched their little tents among the trees across the trail from Joe Shafto's home. While they were thus engaged Joe came over and watched the operations, but without uttering a word until the camp was made and a little cook fire started for a cup of afternoon tea.

"What's that for?" she demanded, pointing to the fire.

"Afternoon tea now, and to cook our supper on later," answered Grace.

"Yer all goin' to eat supper with me."

The girls protested, but Joe, when once she had made an a.s.sertion, would brook no opposition.

"Six o'clock; no earlier, no later. To-morrow mornin' we start at four o'clock. I've got all yer fodder, which-all I'll carry on June and July.

Them's my pack mules. Work singly or in pairs. Kin kick like all possessed. No great scratch whether there's anythin' to kick at or not, but they know better'n to kick me, though they ain't no love for Henry, and he gives them heels plenty of room, 'cept one time when he forgot hisself and got kicked clear out into the road, and nigh into kingdom come, and I'll bet the pair of 'em that ye folks ain't got a hoss in the outfit, not even that bronco with the gla.s.sy eye, that kin kick once to June or July's twenty kicks, and, if you don't believe it, just heave a tin can at one or t'other of 'em and see if ye can count the kicks, but keep the road between ye and the kicks or I shan't be responsible for what happens to ye, because I know them mules and I know what they can do, and then agin--"

"Oh, help!" wailed Emma.

"The voice of nature," chuckled Hippy. "And to think we've got to listen to it for weeks to come."

"What's that ye say?" demanded Joe.

"I--I think I was thinking out loud. I didn't mean to say anything.

Honest to goodness I didn't," apologized Hippy lamely.

Joe fixed him with threatening eyes, then launched into another monologue on mules, which wound up with some remarks on lumberjacks, and a leaf from her family history.

The Overland Riders learned that Joe's husband, who was a timber cruiser, had been killed by lumberjacks, and that she was the sworn enemy of every man who wore a Mackinaw coat and worked in the woods.

"Since my man's death I've been livin' up here in the woods, guidin'

huntin' parties, makin' an honest livin' and layin' for the men who killed my man. I'll find 'em yet. Now who be ye all? I hain't had no interduction except as Mister Gray interduced himself to me, and--"

"This is my wife, Grace Harlowe Gray," said Tom.

The forest woman shook hands and glared into Grace's smiling eyes.

"Glad to meet ye, Miss Gray. Ye look like one of them boudwarriors that I seen pictures of in the high saciety papers."

"Miss Emma Dean," announced Tom, pointing to Emma.

"Glad to meet ye." Joe gave Emma a searching look. "Pert as a bird, ain't ye?"

"Some of my ancestors, I have reason to believe, were birds, and it is quite possible that I have inherited some of their traits," answered Emma airily.

"Sparrows! No good. Don't git swelled up over some of yer folks wearin'

feathers. The kind ye belong to they shoot on sight. And now who be _ye_?" demanded the woman, stepping up to the dignified J. Elfreda Briggs.

Elfreda introduced herself.

"Glad to meet ye. Yer quite set up, but I guess ye might come down a peg after ye git acquainted."

Nora Wingate and Anne Nesbit then introduced themselves, and Joe was "glad to meet" them, but she forgot to address personal remarks to them, for her eyes, glaring through the big spectacles, were fixed on Hippy Wingate's grinning face. All this was "a powerful good joke to him," as Emma confided to Grace in a loud whisper.