Tarcan of the Hoboes

Damon Knight

Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction

October, 1982

In the spring of the year 19—, John Clayton and his pregnant young wife set out on a journey by railroad from Boston to Los Angeles, where Clayton had been offered a post as manager of an orange plantation. Clayton’s father, the banker Cyrus T. Clayton, was a millionaire many times over, but it was his wish that his son earn his own way in the world rather than become a playboy or ne’er-do-well; therefore Clayton and his bride were poor, but their hopes were high. On the third day, as Clayton was taking the air in the vestibule, he happened to observe the conductor and a porter standing close together just inside the next car. Words were exchanged which Clayton could not hear; then the conductor, whose face was empurpled with rage, struck the porter and knocked him down.

Clayton stepped across to the vestibule of the next car and opened the door. The porter, with blood on his lip, was trying to rise, and the conductor had drawn back his foot to kick him.

“Look here,” said Clayton quietly, removing his pipe from his mouth, “This won’t do, you know.”

The conductor turned to him with a foul oath. “You’re only a d—d passenger,” he said. “Keep out of this, if you know what’s good for you, Mr. Clayton.”

The porter, meanwhile, got to his feet and slunk away, casting a malevolent glance back over his shoulder at the conductor.

“I may be only a passenger, as you say,” Clayton said, “But if I observe any such conduct again, I shall report you.”

The conductor, who was obviously drunk, stared at him sullenly with his reddened eyes, then turned with another oath and stalked away.

At breakfast the following morning, Clayton saw a little knot of waiters in close conversation at the end of the car. As Clayton and his wife were rising to leave, one of the waiters approached them casually and murmured in Clayton’s ear, “Black Bart says, you keep in your compartment today.”

“What did that man say, dear?” inquired Alice. “Is something wrong?”

“No, it’s nothing,” said Clayton lightly, but once they were in their compartment he took her hands and said earnestly, “Dearest, I’m afraid there’s going to be trouble on the train. Don’t lose heart. We must just wait and trust in God’s mercy.”

“I’m going to be brave,” said Alice, and they sat down together, with hands clutched tightly. After an hour had passed, they heard a loud report from the forward end of the train; then another, then a fusillade, followed by deathly silence.

The Claytons waited, with straining ears and beating hearts. At last the door was flung open, and in the aperture appeared a porter with a revolver in his hand. “Wanted in the rear,” he said. He would not reply to their anxious questions, but herded them down the corridor. When they reached the dining car, a terrible sight met their eyes. All the other passengers were there, crowded between the tables, with their hands bound behind them, while two waiters rifled their pockets, throwing wallets, watches and coins into a bag held by a third ruffian.

“What is the meaning of this?” Clayton cried, turning to the porter who had escorted them. “Where is the conductor?”

The man’s face split in an evil grin. “The meaning is, we’ve took the train, see? We’ve threw the conductor off, and the engineer and the fireman, see? So stand right there and keep your d—d traps shut, or it’ll be worse for you.”

Clayton put his arm around his trembling wife and they watched as the porters, having finished their thievery, began to herd the bound passengers toward the farther end of the car. At first they did not understand the dreadful thing that was about to take place; then they heard a chorus of shrieks, and, turning to look out the window, saw three passengers tumbling down the embankment as the train hurtled on. The grisly scene was repeated, again and again, until the last passenger was gone: only the Claytons remained.

Toward them now came the man Clayton had seen knocked down by the conductor. Beside him was the man with the bag of stolen valuables.

“Give me your wallet,” said the porter, holding out his hand, “you won’t need it.”

“This is an outrage,” said Clayton, but he handed over his watch and wallet.

“Speak polite when Black Bart talks to you,” said the man with the bag. “Now the lady—purse and rings.” Alice gave him the articles he requested, but when he pointed to the locket she wore on a chain around her neck, she shrank away. “No, please not that,” she protested. “It is the dearest thing I own—a present from my husband. It has no value to you, but to me it is worth more than gold or diamonds.”

“Give it to him, dear, you must,” said Clayton, but Black Bart pushed the bagman aside. “Keep the locket,” he said gruffly to Alice, and pulled the emergency cord. After a moment they heard the squeal of brakes, and the car rocked as the train slowed down.

“Bring their luggage,” said Black Bart, and a porter scurried away.

“What do you intend doing with us?” Clayton demanded.

“Putting you off the train, but you’ll land soft, not like them others. You done me a good turn once, and Black Bart don’t forget.”

“I don’t like it,” said another man, shouldering forward. “I say tie their hands and shove them over the side like the rest.” There was a murmur of agreement from the other mutineers.

“What’s this?” said Bart, turning slowly around. There was a revolver in his hand. “You boys elected me conductor, didn’t you? Well, I’m the conductor, and what I say goes.”

“Maybe it don’t. Suppose we unelect you, Bart, and throw you over too?”

Bart’s expression did not change, but his fist shot out and cracked against the other man’s jaw. The ruffian fell without a sound and sprawled senseless on the floor.

“Anybody else?” demanded Bart, glaring around. The mutineers were silent.

“Now listen,” said Bart, bringing his unshaven face close to Clayton’s. “When we stop, get off quick, because I can’t keep this scum in line forever. You’ll have your luggage, and you’ll find some tools in one of the suitcases. I’m giving you a chance, and that’s the best I can do.”

“But my God, man,” cried Clayton, glancing at the desolate landscape outside, “this is murder.”

The porter appeared with their bags just as the train ground to a halt. “Quick now, or I won’t answer for it,” said Black Bart.

Herded by a gun in the porter’s hands, Clayton and his bride stumbled down onto the rough grade of the railway. Their luggage lay in the weeds below, where the porter had thrown it. No sooner were they clear of the train than it began to move again, gathering speed so quickly that in a few moments the caboose was rushing by them; then the train dwindled in the distance. They watched it until it was only a spot on the horizon.

The Claytons looked about them. They were in the middle of a great wilderness, the heartland of the continent. Not far off there was a little stream, around which trees grew thickly; except for these, and a few other wooded spots, and the railway track itself, there was nothing to break the vast immensity.

“Dearest, what are we to do?” asked Alice.

“Never mind, my dear,” said Clayton, although his heart was sinking within him. “We have our luggage, after all, and we have each other.”

In one of the suitcases, as Black Bart had promised, he found a set of tools, some nails, screws, and hinges, together with a long-barreled revolver and a box of cartridges, an American flag, some fishing lines and hooks, and other useful things. With the tools, Clayton built a rude shelter in a tree, covering it with blankets draped over branches, and there he and Alice spent their first shivering, lonely night in the wilderness.

On the following day a freight train came hurtling out of the west; Clayton took off his shirt and tried to flag it down, but it roared past and was gone in a cloud of cinders. He knew that Alice’s time must be near and that it would be dangerous for her to travel afoot. That day he began the construction of a sturdier house in the tree, and in the intervals of his labor he showed Alice how to catch grasshoppers for bait and fish in the stream.

Clayton finished the cabin before the end of the week, and none too soon, for he had glimpsed a cougar in the distance. The next night they heard the beast prowling around their tree, and although Clayton tried to calm her, Alice’s courage broke when the forest animal climbed the trunk and clawed at the door. That night she bore her child, a boy, while the cougar snarled and snuffled outside.

Alice never recovered completely from the shock of bearing a child in these rude surroundings; she grew steadily weaker and her lucid moments farther apart. At last, three weeks after the birth of the child, she died.

Clayton buried her under a willow beside the stream. Her locket, which contained miniature portraits of her and himself, he kept to remember her by, and he tried to calm the child by swinging the pretty thing back and forth over his crib.

*****

Miles away, in a hobo jungle along the tracks where the freights slowed to climb a steep grade, another boy-child had been born. The mother was Fat Karla, and the father was Big Jim Korchak, who called himself King of the Hoboes. There were others who claimed the title, but wherever Korchak was, he was king. Six feet four and broad in proportion, hairy, dirty, and foul-tempered, Korchak enforced his rule by the weight of his hamlike fists.

He and a half-dozen of his followers had encamped in this desolate place when Karla’s time came upon her; now the victuals were running short, and so was Korchak’s temper.

From the hills they had seen a thread of smoke rising far out on the plain, day after day. “Where there’s smoke there’s folks,” said Korchak. “And where there’s folks there’s grub.” So the little band set out, with Korchak at the head as usual, and Karla in the rear carrying her little bundle. The child was fretful, and Karla lagged behind to nurse him. At last Korchak lost his patience; whirling on her, and scattering the other ‘boes with his fists, he snarled, “Rotten little brat, what’s the use of him anyway?” He plucked the child from its mother’s arms and flung it down on the tracks. With a moan, Karla snatched the pitiful bundle up again, but it was too late: the child was dead.

All the rest of that day Karla stumbled along like one demented, clutching the poor little body to her breast. She never spoke, but if any of the other ‘boes came near her she backed away snarling, and even Korchak did not approach her again to try to take the child away.

Toward evening they came to the forest by the little stream where John Clayton had built his hut. Softly the men crept up the tree. They listened but heard nothing. Korchak swung himself up through the branches, followed by the others.

John Clayton raised his head from his arms just in time to see the giant hobo fling the door open and rush in. He rose to defend himself, but one terrific blow felled him. He lay on the floor, his neck broken.

The other ‘boes were hurrying about the room, ransacking it of its pitiful possessions, but Karla leaped to the crib where the infant, awakened by the struggle, was beginning to wail. She snatched it up, dropping her own dead infant as she did so, and rushed out of the house. The others caught up with her a little way down the track, but Karla would not suffer any of them to come near her. She had another child now, and she would keep it.

In hobo jungles from Natchez to Point Barrow, the boy grew up sturdy and strong. His mother called him George, but because the bottoms of his ragged britches were always black from sitting on the railroad ties, the hoboes called him “Tarcan,” and the name stuck. He learned to use a knife and a slingshot with such deadly accuracy that even the biggest ‘boes dared not challenge him; he learned to board a freight at a grade crossing and how to leap from a moving train without injury; he learned which bulls to avoid, and which jails were the warmest in winter. The locket that had been his mother’s he wore always under his dirty shirt; he did not know who the pictured people were, but he thought the man looked kind, and the woman beautiful.

When Tarcan was sixteen, Karla died, a used-up old woman; Korchak had wandered away long since. Tarcan went on alone.

Every year or two his wanderings brought him back to the place where he had been born. On one of these occasions, roaming the forest beside the track, he stumbled over the abandoned tree house and went in. Marauding animals had scattered the bones of two skeletons, one of a full-grown man and the other of an infant. Mice and squirrels had done their work with blankets, papers, and the few scraps of worn-out clothing the boes had left, but in a closed cabinet Tarcan found a diary, which he could not read, and a children’s book, grimed with the prints of tiny fingers. With the packrat instinct of the hobo, he put both books away in his bindle; he ransacked the little cabin for anything else of value, but found nothing except a tiny leather-bound folder.

Later, crouched by his fire in the jungle, he pored over the children’s book with its faded pictures. Tarcan could read, after a fashion: he knew “RR Xing,” and “Cafe,” “City Limits,” and a few more words, but this was the first book he had ever tried to read. Although he was untaught, his keen intelligence enabled him to make rapid progress. Soon he was able to read such sentences as “The boy runs after the spotted dog.” Next he turned his attention to the leather folder, and after a few attempts discovered the secret of its metal clasp and opened it. Inside were two photographs, one of a man, the other of a woman: and he knew their faces. With leaping heart, Tarcan withdrew the locket which he wore around his neck and compared the pictured faces: they were the same.

Karla had told him nothing about his birth except that his father had been a gent, and that the locket had belonged to him. Was the man who had died in the lonely tree house, then, Tarcan’s father? How had he died, and why had his bones been left for marauding bobcats and coyotes?

Perhaps the other book would give some clue. He opened it eagerly, but it was written in an angular script which at first defeated him. Gradually he began to realize that the letters, unfamiliar as they were, were distorted forms of the printed alphabet. Slowly, sentence by sentence, he puzzled out the diary and read its pathetic story.

When he had done so, he was more bewildered than before. He, Tarcan, could not be the infant the diary spoke of, for its bones were scattered on the floor of the cabin along with its father’s. There was no mention of another child, or of Karla.

Many times after that he came back to the deserted cabin and sat there to brood, reading the diary over and over again and hoping that somehow it would disclose its secret. One day, as he sat thus pensive, he heard the hoot of an approaching express, then a terrific crash. Running outside, he beheld an appalling sight: the train had been derailed and its cars lay buckled and overturned up and down the right of way.

*****

“On a fine summer evening, Charles Clayton, nephew of Cyrus T. Clayton and heir to the Clayton banking millions, sat comfortably in his private train en route from San Francisco to Boston. With him as his guests were Professor Archimedes Q. Potter and his daughter Jane, and a young French naval officer, Paul D’Arnot. D’Arnot, on Clayton’s advice, had converted his personal fortune into gold, obtained at the San Francisco mint; the bullion, in a sealed chest, was locked in the baggage compartment.

After a supper of roast pheasant under glass prepared by Clayton’s personal chef, the party was preparing to retire to their luxurious compartments for the night when there was a tremendous crash; the car toppled over on its side as if struck by a giant hammer, and the stunned occupants lay dazed on the floor.

Clayton was the first to regain his senses. Struggling to his feet, he ascertained that D’Arnot and the Potters were uninjured; then the two young men succeeded in opening a window and helping the others out. By climbing down the undercarriage of the toppled car, they were able to reach the track.

The sight that met their eyes was daunting. The engine and the coal car were still on the tracks, but the sleeping and dining cars, the saloon and the baggage car lay overturned like a child’s toys. All around them lay a vast wasteland, the heart of America.

“My heavens!” ejaculated Professor Potter, fumbling for his glasses, which he had lost in the crash. “What has occurred? Why is the train no longer upright?”

“We have had a crash, Professor,” responded Clayton. “Miss Potter, are you sure you are all right?”

“Yes,” said the girl faintly, pressing her hand to her brow, “only a little dizzy, I think.”

“Sit down here, please, and you, too, Professor, while Paul and I see if the others need help.” Clayton and D’Arnot started off toward the engine, but at this moment the engineer and the fireman dropped to the cinders and came toward them. “What happened, McTaggart?” Clayton called.

“I don’t know, sir,” responded the engineer, a gruff Scot. “It looks to me as if the roadbed gave way, sir, just after the engine passed over it. The maintenance of this line is something shocking, sir, saving your presence.”

It was decided that the engineer and the fireman would proceed to the nearest station and get help. “There is no room for anyone in the cab,” Clayton explained, “and you, Miss Potter, cannot ride in a coal car.” Accordingly, when the engine and the coal car had been uncoupled, the fireman got up steam and the engine moved rapidly off into the distance.

Tarcan watched from the trees as the little party entered the forest and began exploring. Presently they stumbled over the cabin in the tree, and excited shouts rang back and forth. Water was brought from the stream, and the chef began to prepare a late snack. Jane was to sleep in the cabin, while the men wrapped themselves in blankets on the ground. There were five: Clayton, Professor Potter. D’Arnot, the chef, and a rat-faced baggageman.

That night, as he lay in his sleeping bag watching the cabin, Tarcan saw a flicker of movement near the train; a pale glint of light showed between the trees. His curiosity aroused, he crept closer. Down toward the stream a human figure was moving, dim in the starlight: a faint ray of light, as if from a shielded flashlight, preceded it. As Tarcan noiselessly approached, he saw that it was the baggageman, carrying some bulky object in his arms. The man stumbled over a root with a muffled curse, regained his balance, and at last set his burden down. Presently Tarcan heard the clink of a spade. He crept as near as he dared, and saw the man digging a hole at the foot of a great tree. When he was done, he lowered a brass-bound chest into the hole, covered it with dirt, then with leaves and branches. Having done so, and rested a moment from his exertions, the baggageman retreated toward the camp.

Tarcan waited until he was gone, then dug up the chest and filled the hole with rocks and earth. The chest was locked; he could not tell what was in it, but from its weight he knew it must be valuable. He carried it deeper into the forest and buried it again.

On the following afternoon, while the men were busy gathering firewood, he saw the golden-haired girl leave the cabin and stroll off through the woods. He pursued her, at a distance. He saw her dip her fingers in the little stream; he saw her pause to examine a patch of forget-me-nots and press the blossoms against her cheek. She wandered to the edge of the woods and strolled out into the meadow beyond. The air was balmy, and she took off her sun-hat and let it trail in her fingers. Tarcan followed, crouching low, ready to drop and conceal himself in the grasses, but she seemed oblivious of his presence.

They came to a low hill, and Jane went on into the valley beyond. Hastening to catch up, Tarcan beheld a horrifying sight. Jane Potter was standing in the open, transfixed with terror, while a tawny cougar crept toward her.

Tarcan leaped forward, shouting, “Run!” For a moment she hesitated, half-turning toward him; then, too late, she began to move. The cougar was hurtling after her, a streak of golden fur.

Tarcan’s slingshot was in his hand; he fitted a stone to it without pausing in his career, and let fly. The missile struck the cougar’s shoulder and bowled it over, but it was up at once, snarling. Out of the corner of his eye he saw that Jane had tripped or fallen. But he had no time to spare for her: the cougar, with a scream of rage, was springing directly toward him. Another man might have lost his nerve and fled before that juggernaut of feline fury, but Tarcan coolly stood his ground. He took another stone from his pocket, fitted it into the slingshot, took deliberate aim. The stone struck the charging animal squarely in the forehead, and it rolled over, dead, almost at his feet.

Only then did he turn his attention to the prostrate girl. She was sitting up, her face pale. “You’ve saved my life,” she breathed as he came closer. “How can I ever thank you?”

“Can you walk?”

“I think so.” She took his hand and struggled up to her feet, only to collapse again with a little moan. Tarcan’s strong arm went around her, holding her up. “It’s my ankle,” she said, “I think I must have sprained it.”

Tarcan said nothing, but picked her up in his arms as lightly as if she were a child. He crossed the little valley, climbed the hill beyond. At first she was tense with alarm, but after a time she relaxed and let her golden head fall against his shoulder. With the hill behind them, she could not see the railroad tracks, and did not know that he was carrying her in the opposite direction. The sun, dipping toward the western horizon, might have warned her that something was wrong, but Jane Potter, the daughter of an absent-minded Boston professor, was not schooled in the ways of the wilderness.

For a long time they did not speak. Then, “I don’t even know your name,” she said.

“They call me Tarcan.”

“How odd! Is that your real name?”

“Yes.” He carried her to the next little stand of trees, and past it to another. Jane raised her head and looked around. “Surely this isn’t the right place,” she said. “Are we lost?”

Tarcan, who was never lost, said nothing. In the next patch of forest, where a little tributary stream ran, he carried her by a forest trail to a secluded clearing and set her down. It was dark now in the woods; the light was almost gone.

The girl shrank against the bole of a tree and watched as Tarcan opened the bundle he carried on his back. He withdrew a scrap of cloth and tore it into strips with his strong fingers. How strange he was, this silent forest man! Yet she sensed deep within her that he meant her no harm.

With gentle fingers he probed her injured ankle. It was slightly swollen, and painful, but no bones were broken. He bound it with the cloth, then stood up. “You’re not leaving?” she asked in alarm.

“Just a minute,” he said curtly, and disappeared into the trees.

In a few moments he was back, carrying a heap of branches in his arms. With the smaller twigs he built a tiny fire, and with the longer ones he began to construct a rude shelter, leaning the branches together and tying them with twine. When the little fire had died to embers, he opened two cans of pork and beans and heated them. They ate in silence; then Tarcan drew a waterproof poncho from his bindle and draped it across the shelter for a roof. “Time for bed,” he said.

The girl hesitated, for she was alone in the wilderness with an unknown man. Tarcan seemed to sense what she was thinking; he took out his clasp knife, opened it and handed it to her, handle first. She crept into the rude shelter, where Tarcan had made a bed of fragrant leaves, and saw him stretch out on the ground in his sleeping bag.

*****

When the men at camp realized that Jane was missing, they ran about calling her name futilely until the cook discovered a clue: Jane’s dainty handkerchief, dropped beside the trail. They gathered to look at the little scrap of cloth, mute witness to a tragedy. “Give me some food, please, in a knapsack or suitcase,” said old Professor Potter sadly. “I shall go into the wilderness after my daughter, and if I do not find her I shall not return.”

“Professor, pardon me, that will not do,” said Paul D’Arnot. “You have lost your glasses and cannot see even a foot in front of your face. It is I who shall go, and I promise that I shall bring your daughter home safely.”

“And I, too,” cried Clayton.

“Mon ami, a word in your ear,” said the Frenchman quietly, and drew Clayton aside. “If we should both go, who will guard the Professor from harm? There are savage animals here, and besides, to be frank, I do not like the look of your baggageman.”

After some discussion, it was agreed that D’Arnot would go in search of the missing girl, and that if he did not return in two days, the rest would go in search of him; meanwhile, if Jane should return, Clayton would fire a pistol in order to alert him. D’Arnot, with a few provisions hastily thrust into a traveling case, slipped into the forest.

D’Arnot guessed that the girl had followed the path beside the stream, but he did not see the traces where she had wandered away from it; he pursued the stream, therefore, and at nightfall he made camp miles distant from the place where Tarcan and Jane lay.

On the following day he pressed on into the wilderness, heavy of heart, for he did not believe that Jane would ever be found. The sun was low when, in a little clearing, he stopped short. Facing him across the greensward, motionless and menacing, was a gigantic coyote. Seeing his hesitation, the beast bared its fangs and charged.

D’Arnot was a brave man, but he was unarmed. He sprang for the nearest tree and scrambled up it. Then, in a moment of horror, he realized that a branch to which he had trusted his weight was rotten; it parted with a sickening crack and D’Arnot plummeted to the ground. His head struck a stone, and he knew no more.

*****

In the morning Tarcan examined the girl’s ankle and found it still swollen; he picked her up again and started back toward the camp. Jane lay in his arms with a feeling of perfect trust, glancing up now and then through her lashes at his strong, soiled face. She fell into a daydream; she wished the journey might last forever.

All too soon, she saw that they were approaching the camp. Tarcan set her down gently and said, “You’ll be all right now.”

“Jane!” came a joyful shout, and she saw the little group hurrying toward her. “We’ve all been so worried.” cried Clayton, “but here you are safe and sound!”

“Yes, thanks to Mr.—” She turned around to introduce Tarcan, but he was gone.

The others gathered around her, and old Professor Potter pressed her to his trembling breast, murmuring, “My child! My child!”

“But where is D’Arnot?” Clayton said suddenly.

“I don’t understand—isn’t Monsieur D’Arnot here?”

In a few words they explained what had happened, and Clayton, recollecting himself with a start, drew out his pistol and fired it repeatedly into the air. The echoes of the reports died away into silence. “He will hear the signal and come,” said Clayton.

“But what if he does not? Suppose something dreadful has happened to him? Oh, dear, and it would be my fault!”

Tarcan, who had been listening in the shelter of the trees, turned and walked away from the camp. He did not know this D’Arnot, but Jane was concerned about him, and that was enough. He found the Frenchman’s footprints quickly in the soft earth along the stream, and followed them. He saw where Jane had turned aside, and how the Frenchman, missing the almost imperceptible traces of her passage, had continued along the bank. By late afternoon, moving more swiftly and surely than D’Arnot had, he had found the latter’s dead campfire. Pausing only to eat a can of beans, he pressed on. The sun was low when he stepped into a clearing and beheld an appalling sight. The man he sought was in the act of toppling from a tree, while a slavering coyote advanced toward him.

With Tarcan, to think was to act. As he ran forward, he drew his clasp knife from his pocket and opened the deadly blade. The great beast turned at his approach and launched itself in a snarling attack. The impact bowled Tarcan over, but even as he fell beneath the weight of the ferocious beast, his knife drank deep. With a shuddering convulsion, the coyote fell dead.

He found D’Arnot unconscious beneath the tree, with a great bloody welt on his forehead. Tarcan dragged him out of the underbrush carefully, and made sure he had no broken bones; but the blow to his head was injury enough, and it was plain that the man was in no condition to be moved. Tarcan made a bed of branches for the wounded man, built a rude shelter over him, and laid a cold compress on his head. As evening fell, he butchered the coyote and cooked some of the meat in a tin can; it would make a nourishing stew. The rest of the carcass he carried several hundred yards downstream and tossed into the undergrowth, lest it attract other predators.

That night, indeed, other coyotes found the carcass, tore it apart and dragged the remnants away, so that on the following afternoon, when Clayton and his party reached the spot they saw that D’Arnot’s footprints led to a great bloody smear in the shrubbery. Sadly they returned to their camp, and sadly, two days later, they boarded the rescue train which had been sent by McTaggart.

Meanwhile, D’Arnot lay for two days in delirium while Tarcan patiently nursed him. It was three weeks before the Frenchman was strong enough to travel, and during that time the two men became fast friends. Tarcan showed D’Arnot his treasures, including the locket, the folder with its two photographs, the journal and the children’s book. D’Arnot read them with fascination. “But, mon dieu,” he exclaimed, “this means that you yourself, and not Clayton, are the heir to millions!”

“That can’t be.” said Tarcan. “The baby’s bones were there.”

“Let me see,” said the Frenchman, taking the children’s book again. “Here are the fingerprints of that baby. Now let us examine yours.” Taking a sheet of paper from his pocket, he pressed Tarcan’s fingertips upon it one after another. There was no need for ink; Tarcan’s fingers were grimy enough. When the task was done, the Frenchman minutely compared the prints with the aid of a pocket magnifying glass. “It is possible,” he muttered. “But we must be sure—too much is at stake. Let me borrow this book, my friend, and when we get back to civilization I will show it to a policeman that I know. He will tell us.”

A few days later Tarcan pronounced D’Arnot fit to travel, and the two friends retraced their steps to the lonely cabin beside the railroad track. It was empty, but on the desk Tarcan found an envelope bearing his name in a feminine hand. Tearing it open, he read:

Dear Tarcan,

We all wanted to thank you for your kindness, but the rescue train has arrived and we must go. If you are ever in Boston, please call on me.

Jane Potter

He showed the note to D’Arnot. “And will you accept the invitation?” the Frenchman inquired.

Tarcan shook his head. “She’s rich, and I’m a ‘bo.”

“My friend, once I was rich too, and if only I had the chest which was stolen from me, there would be plenty for both of us; but, alas—”

“What chest is that?” Tarcan asked abruptly. D’Arnot explained about the chest of gold that had mysteriously disappeared from the train. Tarcan, in turn, told him of the scene he had witnessed. “I dug the chest up and buried it again, like a packrat,” he said. “We’ll get it, and then you’ll be rich.”

“We shall be rich, mon ami! Do you think I spoke in jest? No, half of all I have is yours!”

Tarcan dug up the chest and they set out along the track until they reached the grade, several miles away, where the fast freights slowed down. They boarded the first train and rode it as far as the nearest station, where D’Arnot paid for the rest of their passage to Boston, and also bought a full set of clothing and luggage for each of them. Bathed, shaved, and dressed in the fashion, Tarcan was, D’Arnot declared, the picture of a gentleman; but his manner left something to be desired.

“Mon Dieu!” the Frenchman remarked, “you must not eat pork chops in your fingers, Tarcan! Do as I do.” Tarcan copied him patiently, and soon learned to eat as daintily as any aristocrat.

Arriving in Boston, they found that the Potters had left for their summer cottage in Brattleboro. D’Arnot had business in the city, including a visit to the policeman he had mentioned, but Tarcan could not wait; he hired a car and set out for Vermont.

Jane Potter was in a quandary. Clayton, who had accompanied them to the summer cottage, had been increasingly attentive of late, and she knew, with the intuition of womankind, that he was about to propose. Clayton loved her; he was young, handsome, rich, and he would do his best to make her happy: but her heart was with the strange forest man who had borne her off into the wilderness.

“Dear Jane,” Clayton said to her when they were alone that afternoon—“I may call you Jane, mayn’t I? You must know, dear, how I feel about you. I want you to marry me. Won’t you say yes?”

“Yes,” she said.

Afterward, pleading a headache, she retired to her room and waited until the others had gone off on their various errands; then she strolled out of the house into a little wood that ran along the railroad track. The scene reminded her of her forest love, and she wandered deeper into the trees, unaware of the black cloud that hung ominously on the horizon.

When at last she smelled the smoke and saw it drifting through the trees, it was too late. She stumbled away from the oncoming flames, only to find another line of fire racing across her path. Suddenly she heard her name called; a tall stranger was running toward her. Without a word he caught her up in his arms and bounded back the way he had come.

On the railroad track, a little distance away, stood a small handcar. The stranger deposited her on it without ceremony, climbed aboard himself, and began to pump. It was only then that Jane saw his face clearly. “You!” she said.

“Yes, me, Tarcan.”

“And you’ve saved my life again!” she marveled.

“Not yet,” said Tarcan grimly. On both sides of the railway, trees were blazing fiercely; flaming bits of debris rained upon them, and they were blinded by smoke. Then, little by little, the flames receded, and they were hurtling down the track in clear air again.

Near the cottage, Tarcan brought the handcar to a halt and handed Jane down. In a moment he had clasped her in his strong arms. “I love you, Jane,” he said. “I want you to be my wife.”

Her eyes were downcast. “I am promised to another,” she said.

“Clayton?”

“Yes.”

“And do you love him?”

“Please don’t ask me that.”

Back at the cottage, Clayton and Professor Potter received Jane joyfully. They were wonderstruck when Jane introduced Tarcan as the mysterious forest wanderer who had rescued her in the wilderness. Professor Potter stammered his gratitude, and Clayton offered him a cigar.

Shortly thereafter a messenger came to the door with a telegram. “Why, it’s for you,” said the Professor in surprise. “Dear me, how did they know you were here?”

“Pardon me,” said Tarcan, and ripped the envelope open. The message read:

Fingerprints prove you Clayton heir.

D’Arnot

Tarcan glanced at his cousin, who was pouring himself a whiskey and soda at the sideboard. Clayton was handsome, well-groomed, and soft; he had never boarded a moving freight in his life, or faced the charge of an enraged coyote. With a word, Tarcan could take away his fortune, and his woman as well.

“I say,” Clayton smiled, crossing the room to him. “This is all very extraordinary, you know. How did you come to be in that wilderness in the first place, if you don’t mind my asking?”

Tarcan folded the telegram and put it in his pocket. “I was born there,” he said deliberately. “My mother was a giant hobo; I never knew my father.”

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