"Somebody's shooting me with an air rifle!" he gasped.
"Bad business," agreed Hathaway.
There was another yell, and Hathaway looked out Leon Buttolf was being driven inexorably down the street to the shop. As soon as he was inside, the bombardment overtook Mrs. Camaret, wife of a worker in Pringle's mill.
By the time she had been herded in, the streets were deserted.
"Somebody ought to go to jail for this," Buttolf said.
"That's right," said Delacroix. He looked keenly at Hathaway. "Wonder how everybody gets chased in here?"
"If I sink you have somesing to do wiz zis, Virgil, I tell my Jean," Mrs. Camaret said. "He come, beat you up, stomp you into a leetle jelly!"
"Jeepers Cripus!" protested Hathaway. "How should I make a BB shot fly out in a circle to hit a man on the far side? And my boy Calvin's out back with the mink. You can go look."
"Aw, we ain't suspecting you," said Buttolf.
"I'll walk with you wherever you be going, and take my chance of getting hit," Hathaway said.
"Fair enough," said Delacroix. So the four went out and walked down the street a way. Delacroix turned into his restaurant, and the others went about their business. Hathaway hurried back to his shop just as a pebble hit Wallace Downey in the seat of the pants.
"Gaga!" Hathaway yelled in desperation. "Stop it, blast your hide!"
The bombardment ceased. Downey walked off with a look of deep suspicion. When Hathaway entered his shop, the Gahunga were sitting on the counter.
Gaga grinned infuriatingly.
"We help you, huh, mister?" he said. "Want some more customers?"
"No!" shouted Hathaway. "I don't want your help. I hope I shan't ever see you again!"
The imps exchanged startled glances. Gaga stood up.
"You don't want to be our boss no more?"
"No! I only want you to leave me alone!"
Gaga drew himself to his full twenty-five inches and folded his arms.
"Okay. We help somebody who appreciates us. Don't like Algonquins anyway." He drummed, and the other seven Gahunga did a solemn dance down the counter, disappearing as they came to the pile of miniature birch-bark canoes.
In a few minutes Hathaway's relief was replaced by a faint unease. Perhaps he had been hasty in dismissing the creatures; they had dangerous potentialities.
"Gaga!"
Nothing happened. Calvin Hathaway put in his head. "Did you call me, Pop?"
"No. Yes I did. Ask your maw when dinner's gonna be ready."
It had been a mistake; what would he tell Catfish?
After dinner, Hathaway left his wife in charge of the shop while he went for a walk, to think. In front of Tate's hardware store he found a noisy group consisting of old man Tate, Wallace Downey, and a state trooper. Tate's window was broken, and he was accusing Downey of breaking it and stealing a fishing rod. Downey accused Tate of throwing the rod at him through the window. Each produced witnesses.
"I was buying some film for my camera in the store when bingo! away goes the winda," a witness said. "Mr. Tate and me, we look around, and we see Wally making off with the rod."
"Did you see Downey inside the window?" asked the trooper.
"No, but it stands to reason—"
"What's your story?" the trooper interrupted him, as he turned inquiringly at Downey.
"I was sitting on the steps of the bank havin' a chaw, when Wally comes along carrying that reel, and zowie! out comes the rod through the winda, with busted glass all over the place. If old man Tate didn't throw it at him somebody musta."
Puzzled, the trooper scratched his head. Finally, since Tate had his rod back and the window was insured, he persuaded the two angry men to drop the matter.
"Hello, Virgil," said Downey. "Why does everything screwy have to happen in this town? Say, do you know anything about those BB shot? You yelled something, and they quit."
"I don't know nahthing," said Hathaway innocently. "Some kid with an air rifle, I suppose. What was all this run-in with Tate?"
"I went down to the river to fish," explained Downey. "I had a new tackle, and I no sooner dropped it off the bridge than I got a strike that busted the rod right off short. Musta been the biggest bass in the river. Well, I saved the reel, and I was bringin' it back home when old man Tate shies a new rod at me, right through his window."
Hathaway could see how the Gahunga were responsible for these events; they were being "helpful." He left Downey and sauntered down Main Street, passing the Adirondack Association office. Barbara Scott made a face at him through the glass. Hathaway thought she needed to be spanked, either on account of the séances, or her infatuation with Harvey Pringle, or both.
Returning to his shop, the middle-aged Indian noted that the Gahato Garage seemed to have an unusually brisk trade in the repair of tires. The cars included the trooper's Ford with all four tires flat. Bill Bugby and his mechanics were working on tires like maniacs.
The trooper who had handled the Tate-Downey incident was walking about the street, now and then stooping to pick up something. Presently he came back.
"Hey, Bill!" he shouted, and conferred in low tones with Bugby, who presently raised his voice. "You're crazy, Mark!" he cried. "I ain't never done a thing like that in all the years I been here!"
"Maybe so," said the trooper. "But you got to admit that somebody scattered bright new nails all over this street. And if you didn't, who did?"
Hathaway prudently withdrew. He knew who had scattered the nails.
Newcomb, the game warden, lounged into Chief Soaring Turtle's shop and spread his elbows along a counter. Hathaway asked him what he was looking so sad about.
The warden explained.
"I was walking by the bank this afternoon, when a big car drives up and a young man gets out and goes in the bank," he said. "There was a canvas bundle on the back of the car. I didn't think anything of it, only just as I get past it the canvas comes tearing off the bundle, like somebody is pulling it, and there on the bumper is tied a fresh-killed fawn." "You don't say so?"
"Three months out of season, and no more horns than a pussy-cat. Well, you know and I know there's some of that all the time. I run 'em in when I catch 'em, and if it makes me unpopular that's part of my job. But when this young man comes out and I ask him about it, he admits it—and then it turns out he's Judge Dusenberry's son. Half the village is looking on, so I got to run young Dusenberry in."
"Will that get you into trouble?"
"Don't know; depends on who wins the election next fall. Now, Virgil, I'm not superstitious myself. But some of these people are, especially the Canucks. There's talk of your putting a hoodoo on the town. Some have had rocks thrown at 'em, or something, and Wallace Downey is saying you stopped them. If you can stop it, why can't you start it?"
"I don't know a thing about it," said Hathaway.
"Of course, you don't—I realize that's all nonsense. But I thought you ought to know what folks are saying." And Newcomb slouched out, leaving behind him a much worried Indian.
The next day, Hathaway left his wife in charge of the shop and drove towards Utica. As he was turning on to the state highway, Barbara Scott walked past and called good-morning. He leaned out.
"Hi, Barbara! Be you still going to have your spook hunt?"
"You bet, Chief Wart-on-the-Nose."
"What'll you do if old man Pringle gets up and denounces you as a fake?"