Lost on a Mountain in Maine (6 page)

While I was folding it, I came across a big safety pin—the biggest safety pin I ever saw. I remember I took it in my hands and couldn't believe it was a safety pin. When I tried to snap it shut, though, I found it didn't go hard at all.

That safety pin made me think of the trout again. I could make a fishhook out of it. All I had to do was bend it into shape. I did a lot of thinking about that, but finally gave up the idea. I couldn't eat raw trout.

I folded the blanket into a bundle and took it with me. What a smell! It almost made me sick. Then I went out of the cabin and started down the road. I went about a mile and a half and, boy, I got sleepy! I was so sleepy I just staggered. I spread the blanket out in an open space on some sort of green vine with berries on it. I never smelled anything so bad as that blanket. I almost had to hold my nose, but I went to sleep just the same. The sun was shining and I lay on my stomach with my cheek on my arm and only my blue shirt covering my back.

I H
EAR AN
A
IRPLANE
• S
IXTH
D
AY

A
GENTLE breeze was blowing across that hill and it kept the flies and mosquitoes away from me. For once I was free of them. I'll never forget how warm and comfy that blanket felt. The cuts and bites on my legs seemed to stop hurting. My feet felt warm and safe and even my toes softened a little as I fell asleep. That was early morning.

When I woke up, the sun was way down on the other side. I had slept all day, and boy, did I feel good! I sat up and wondered what to do next, then I noticed something was the matter with the backs of my legs. They smarted and pained as though I had sat down on hot coals. I got up and examined them. The skin was as red as paint and all hot and fiery-looking. Lying there in the sun for so many hours had given me the worst sunburn I ever had. After that, for a long time, I found it more comfortable to keep going than to sit down to rest. I put on my reefer and threw the blanket over my arm. It was awfully heavy but I had to have it. I remember I carried it a long way.

Just as the sun was sinking I came around a bend in the tote road and saw something that made my heart jump with joy. There, right in front of me was a telephone wire nailed to
trees. I shouted and danced and laughed and then I cried some. I was saved at last. All I had to do was follow it. It would lead me straight to some camp. I looked at the wire. It didn't seem
too
old. Since it led into the tote road at that point, I decided to keep going just as I was. Boy, the sight of that wire running along ahead of me gave me a lot of courage and cheered me up a good deal.

That night I crawled under a down tree and curled up in my blanket. I didn't feel so bad. But I was hungry, my head felt hot and I had queer dreams. I dreamed I was in a New York automat with a lot of nickels in my hand.

I'd put in a nickel and down would drop the door on a ham sandwich. Then a hand would reach in over my shoulder and take the sandwich. I'd move on to a big piece of lemon meringue pie and drop in a nickel. Down would drop the door and, before I could reach in, a hand would go across my shoulder and take the pie. Pretty soon I had used up all my nickels and hadn't had a thing to eat. That was pretty tough and I wanted to get mad, but I couldn't. I just went out for some more nickels.

I woke up after that dream and stayed awake a long time. The wind was making noises in the trees—like a storm coming. I didn't like the sound of that wind. It wasn't friendly, like the cheeping of the chipmunk. Pretty soon I knew the dawn was coming. Creatures began to move in the forest. I couldn't see them, but they were all about me. I closed my eyes and wished night would stay forever. I never was glad to have the day come.

Suddenly I heard a chipmunk cheeping over my head. I opened my eyes and there he was, the same chipmunk I had seen the morning before. I knew he was the same one from the way he jerked his tail and bent down and looked at me.

As soon as the road was light enough to travel over, I got up and folded my blanket and started on. First, though, I said my prayers. I prayed hard, too, and I felt that God wanted me to get out—but He wanted me to do it on my own legs. I prayed and cried and hollered for food but nothing happened, so I figured food wasn't so important, after all. I'd find some more strawberries and they would be enough. After a while, the tote road went up on a higher level and I
did
find berries in a little open space—a few—and I spent a long time picking and eating them.

After I had eaten all I could find, I went on for a long way. There were high trees overhead most of the time. I was down on my stomach getting a drink from the stream when I heard a low hum. I listened. It sounded to me like an airplane, but Christmas, no airplane would fly over
that
timber. What
for
? The humming grew into a roar. I tried to find an open spot. Maybe, if I could
see
that plane, the pilot could see
me
. I ran and ran. I stumbled on the logs laid across the road and fell. Then I went lame and could only hop along on one foot.

Pretty soon I knew I couldn't find any place where I could see that plane, so I stopped hopping and listened. That plane just zoomed right over my head and died away across the trees. I knew then that Dad was looking for me. Things must be pretty bad when they had to get planes. I sat down beside a tree and cried.

I must be lost for sure, when even a plane couldn't find me. Maybe it was no use to go on. Maybe there wasn't any camp for miles and miles. Maybe that telephone wire didn't go any place, after all. Maybe I was following it the wrong way, to another abandoned camp. After I'd cried a while, I knelt down and prayed. I wanted the plane to come back. I wanted to hear the noise of its motors—but it didn't come back. I got up and went on,
still a little lame. Now and then I could see the sky. Clouds were piling up and I felt it was going to storm.

I picked up the blanket. It was awfully heavy. It made me stagger. One end slipped down and I stepped on it and it tripped me up. I fell and hurt myself. I left the blanket where it dropped and went on. I had to find a camp that day—I
had
to find it. I
had
to find it. I knew I had to find it because my legs were stiffening up. I walked on like a man on two wooden legs, just one leg out and then the other, one leg and then the other.
²¹
Something was happening in my head—something terrible. I was falling from somewhere into a black pit, between jagged rocks, with millions and millions of blue streaks going past me like shooting stars. I was trying to call someone but couldn't make a sound—just falling and falling.

The next thing I knew I woke up and it was getting dark.

I was sitting on a rock looking at my feet. They didn't seem to belong to me at first. They were the feet of someone else. The toenails were all broken and bleeding and there were thorns in the middle of the soles. I cried a little as I tried to get out those thorns. They were in deep and broken off. I wondered why they didn't hurt more, but when I felt my toes, I knew—those toes were hard and stiff and had scarcely any feeling in them. The part next to the big toe was like leather. I tried to pinch it, but couldn't feel anything.

My head ached and I didn't want to move, but night was falling and I had to go on, at least as far as some big tree. I got to my feet. Was
that
hard! I could scarcely bend my knees, and my head was so dizzy, I staggered. I had to go across an open space to the stream, and as I went along, I saw a big bear, just ahead of me. Christmas, he
was
big—big as a house, I thought—but I wasn't a bit scared—not a single bit. I was glad to see him.

When he got nearer, I knew he didn't see me, so I crouched down a little behind some bushes—but kept my head up so that I could watch
him
. I didn't want him to run right into me. He ate berries as he went along. He'd swing his head and nip one way and then he'd swing his head and nip the other. He kept making grunting noises. I don't see how he ever came so close to me without seeing me, but I kept mighty still. I hardly breathed. I knew I was a goner, if he took after me. I couldn't run or climb a tree—not with those feet and legs. Pretty soon, he dropped down on his front feet and I couldn't see him anymore, but I could hear him, breaking down the bushes as he went away.

E
VER
S
EE A
S
WINK?
• S
EVENTH
D
AY

B
OY, I WAS lonesome when he was gone. I cried some and sat down and ate a few berries, and then I got up. I didn't go very fast now—kind of picking my way from soft spot to soft spot. I had to take care of those feet—and
were they sore
! The flies bothered me, too. I always carried my blue shirt over my arm, so as to protect my head with it if those bugs got too bad, and I was doing it now. That left only my reefer on my back, with the fleece inside.

Those flies, the black ones, crawled up into the fleece and bit me all around my waist and around my neck—every place an edge showed. That was bad, for I couldn't do anything but slap myself, and pretty soon I got so tired slapping, I just quit and let them bite.

I found the road all right and the telephone wire, too. It was cooler but there were more
bugs—mosquitoes as big as flies. I watched one fill up like a balloon and then drop off, too heavy to fly.

Even with my blue shirt tied by the sleeves around my head, those mosquitoes bit me on the forehead and eyelids. I had to peek out to see where I was going. Sometimes my eyelids swelled up, and I was afraid I wouldn't be able to see anymore.

Pretty soon I came to a fork in the road. The telephone wires went off to the left and a trail went off to the right. The stream was on the right, and I was afraid to get away from it for fear I wouldn't have any water to drink. Every time I had left the stream, I had to go without water. I never found any springs or any other water fit to drink—just pools in rocks with green scum on top. I knew better than to drink any of that. I never drank any scumwater all the time I was in the woods.

I stood for a long time thinking what to do about that fork in the trail. I tried to think what Dad or Henry would do about it. Finally, I guessed Henry would keep to the stream, because, if a fellow did
that
, he couldn't help coming out somewhere. Besides, there had been a big storm over that country and hundreds of trees were down. What if the telephone wire ran into one of the “blow-downs”? What would I do, then?

Well, no “blow-down” could plug up a stream and stop it from flowing. I decided to leave the wires and keep to the water. I was getting pretty weak by now, so when I reached the stream I got down on my stomach and took a drink. There were bloodsuckers in that water but I didn't care, I drank a little and rested my head on the moss.

That chipmunk was still following me and he came and chattered on a limb above me. But I didn't pay any attention to him. I was too tired. I rested up a bit there and went on. I remember looking at my arms when I tried to get up. Boy, they were skinny! My arms were always strong, even if they weren't big, but now they were just bony and so weak I could hardly make them work. I knew I had to get some food soon, but I wasn't hungry anymore.

I missed the easygoing on the tote road. The brush was very thick and so I had to wade in the water most of the time. I waded and scrambled and crawled until I couldn't move another leg, then I lay flat on my stomach and rested.

Once, as I went along, a stone turned over under my feet and I fell and hurt my hip. I thought, for a moment, it was broken, but the rush of the cold water around me made me struggle to get up and I found I could move my leg. Just below that spot I came to some rapid water. I was limping and, trying to get closer to the bank, I stumbled and fell head foremost into the stream. I rolled over and over. My fleece-lined reefer filled up and my head went under the water and I had a feeling I was going to drown. Over and over I rolled, striking against rocks and scraping over the rough bottom.

Just below me was a long sandbar on which grass and a few bushes were growing. I got my feet under me as I went past it and reached out for the bushes. I didn't get hold of them but I
did
pitch forward and fall down in shallow water. I was so scared and tired, that it took me a long time to crawl up the sloping bank and stretch myself out on top of it.

The sun was shining and it was warm, there. I don't remember much after that, for a long time. I must have gone to sleep, for when I woke, the sun had gone way down.
²²
I hated to move, but knew I had to. No one could sleep out on that bar. To my surprise, my reefer was almost dry.

I took it off and spread it out on the hot sand. Then I searched along the edges of the
stream for an open space, in the hope of finding a few berries. There weren't any, so I picked up my reefer and went downstream. I made pretty slow time. I was lame and afraid of falling into the water again. It seemed to me I wasn't getting anywhere at all. That evening, I went to sleep early—on some moss under a tree.