t
back from the hole, I found the window you drug me out through. That
let in a little light, but it was high up an' no way to get to it. I
heard runnin' water, an' found a crick run right through the middle of
that room, it was the biggest room of all. In one place there was a
rapids not over six inches deep where it run over a ledge of rocks. I
crossed it, an' found another long room. It was hot in there an' damp
an' it stunk of sulphur. There was a boilin' spring in there, an' a
little crick run from it to the big cold crick. I heard a splashin' in
the rapids an' I was so scairt I couldn't run. There wouldn't have been
no place to run to if I could. So I laid there, an' listened. The
splashin' kept up an' I quit bein' so scairt, an' went to the rapids.
The splashin' was still goin' on an' it took me quite a while there in
the dark to figure out it was fish. Well, when I did figure it, I give a
whoop. I wasn't goin' to starve, anyhow--not with fish, an' a boilin'
spring to cook 'em. I took off my shoes an' waded in an' stood still in
the rapids. Pretty quick I could feel 'em bumpin' my feet. Then I stuck
my hands in an' when they bumped into 'em I'd throw 'em out. I got so I
never missed after a couple of years. They run in schools, an' it got so
I knew when they was up the river, an' when they was down. I'd scoop
one or two out, an' carry 'em to the spring, an' I made a sort of pen
out of rocks in the boilin' water, an' I'd throw 'em in, an' a half-hour
or so later, they'd be done. But they stunk of sulphur, an' tasted
rotten, an' at first I couldn't go 'em--but I got used to it after a
while.

"The first year, I used to yell out the door, about every couple of
hours, then three times a day, an' at last I only yelled when the light
in the hole told me the sun was going down, an' again when it come up.
In summer a rabbit would now an' then come in the hole an' I got so I
could kill 'em with rocks when they set for a minute in the light at the
end of the hole. They was plenty o' weasels--ermine they call 'em up
here, but they ain't fit to eat. Towards spring a couple of black fox
come nosin' into the hole, an' I slipped in a rock so they couldn't get
out. I done it first, jest to have company. They was so wild, I couldn't
see nothin' but their eyes for a long time. But I scooped fish out for
'em an' fed 'em every day in the same place an' they got tamer. Then
they had a litter of young ones! Say, they was the cutest li