Read Online Lost on a Mountain in Maine by Donn Fendler - Free Book Online

right where I was for a long time. I was afraid it was like all the other cabins I had come to. Still, it looked new and there was an open space in front of it. While I was standing there, things kept going through my mind. What if it were deserted like the rest? Well, I’d just go on. Then I wondered how I’d ever get to it. It seems funny to me now, but I felt sure I could swim across. I’d tie my blue shirt and reefer and gunnysack on my head, somehow, and dogpaddle over. That didn’t seem a hard thing to do at all—but where would I get a piece of string?
    I crawled under the bushes and came out on the bank. I could see the cabin better now, and there was a big elm tree right near the edge of the clearing and boy, oh, boy, two canoes were turned over on the ground. Canoes! There must be people there—fishermen, likely—and they’d help a fellow any way they could. They’d give me something to eat, maybe some bacon and beans, or a doughnut, and then I could find the way back to camp and maybe get there before dark.
    While I was thinking things like that—and I guess I was blubbering some, too, because of my feet—I saw a man come out into the clearing!
    I crawled out on the big log so the man could see me, and began to yell. I guess that yelling was pretty funny, for Mr. McMoarn told me later it sounded to him like a screech owl.
    I yelled and yelled and waved my arms. I saw the man look over towards me, then run into the house. “Christmas!” I said to myself. “What’s the matter with him?”
    While I was wondering, I saw him come out of the house again on the dead run, with other people after him. I saw them slide one of the canoes into the water. A man yelled to me to stay where I was, that they were coming after me. Then I knew I was saved, and I got kind of weak all inside. Ihad to get off that log. I had to get off quickly, because I felt like falling over in another one of those sick spells I had back in the woods. Maybe I did faint, too. I don’t know, but the next thing I remember a big man was picking me up. He didn’t say much—just shook his head and picked me up.
    He was going to leave my gunnysack, but I grabbed it just in time. I wasn’t going to lose that. It had saved my life. I guess Mr. McMoarn asked me some questions, but that’s all hazy in my mind. The next thing I really remember was Mrs. McMoarn. She was grand. She took me in her arms, and she was crying and saying things, and she laid me down on a bed and began telling people what to do. I heard the telephone ringing like mad, and then Mrs. McMoarn came over to me with a bowl of soup. I don’t know what kind of soup it was, but it was good. 30
    I wanted to drink it right away, but they wouldn’t let me. Boy, try eating warm soup out of a spoon when you haven’t eaten much for nine days! Mrs. McMoarn was slow giving it to me, too, and I just couldn’t wait for the next spoonful. I tried to get hold of the spoon myself, but she said that would never do and that she was feeding me exactly the way the doctor ordered over the phone.
    I guess I fell asleep, while I was eating that soup, for the next I knew, noises of people waked me up. Boy, the room next to me seemed filled with people, all whispering together and moving around. Someone was talking very loud on the phone. Pretty soon, Mrs. McMoarn came in and smiled at me. She said they were trying to get my mommy on the phone. Then Mr. McMoarn came in and said everything was ready, and he took me up in his arms and carried me out into another room where the phone was. I heard a voice, but, honest, I didn’t recognize Mommy at first. Her voice didn’t sound natural at all. Maybe it was the crazy wires nailed to trees.
    But when I really listened, I knew it was Mommy.
    She was crying and talking, too, and asking me if I were really safe, and I told her, “Sure, I am all right. I just had a bowl