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Title: The Son of the Wolf

Author: Jack London

Posting Date: March 1, 2009 [EBook #2377]
Release Date: October, 2000

Language: English

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The Son of the Wolf

Jack London


1900



Contains

  The White Silence
  The Son of the Wolf
  The Men of Forty Mile
  In a Far Country
  To the Man on the Trail
  The Priestly Prerogative
  The Wisdom of the Trail
  The Wife of a King
  An Odyssey of the North




The White Silence

'Carmen won't last more than a couple of days.' Mason spat out a chunk
of ice and surveyed the poor animal ruefully, then put her foot in his
mouth and proceeded to bite out the ice which clustered cruelly between
the toes.

'I never saw a dog with a highfalutin' name that ever was worth a rap,'
he said, as he concluded his task and shoved her aside. 'They just fade
away and die under the responsibility. Did ye ever see one go wrong
with a sensible name like Cassiar, Siwash, or Husky? No, sir! Take a
look at Shookum here, he's--' Snap! The lean brute flashed up, the
white teeth just missing Mason's throat.

'Ye will, will ye?' A shrewd clout behind the ear with the butt of the
dog whip stretched the animal in the snow, quivering softly, a yellow
slaver dripping from its fangs.

'As I was saying, just look at Shookum here--he's got the spirit. Bet
ye he eats Carmen before the week's out.' 'I'll bank another
proposition against that,' replied Malemute Kid, reversing the frozen
bread placed before the fire to thaw. 'We'll eat Shookum before the
trip is over. What d'ye say, Ruth?' The Indian woman settled the coffee
with a piece of ice, glanced from Malemute Kid to her husband, then at
the dogs, but vouchsafed no reply. It was such a palpable truism that
none was necessary. Two hundred miles of unbroken trail in prospect,
with a scant six days' grub for themselves and none for the dogs, could
admit no other alternative. The two men and the woman grouped about the
fire and began their meager meal. The dogs lay in their harnesses for
it was a midday halt, and watched each mouthful enviously.

'No more lunches after today,' said Malemute Kid. 'And we've got to
keep a close eye on the dogs--they're getting vicious. They'd just as
soon pull a fellow down as not, if they get a chance.' 'And I was
president of an Epworth once, and taught in the Sunday school.' Having
irrelevantly delivered himself of this, Mason fell into a dreamy
contemplation of his steaming moccasins, but was aroused by Ruth
filling his cup.

'Thank God, we've got slathers of tea! I've seen it growing, down in
Tennessee. What wouldn't I give for a hot corn pone just now! Never
mind, Ruth; you won't starve much longer, nor wear moccasins either.'
The woman threw off her gloom at this, and in her eyes welled up a
great love for her white lord--the first white man she had ever
seen--the first man whom she had known to treat a woman as something
better than a mere animal or beast of burden.

'Yes, Ruth,' continued her husband, having recourse to the macaronic
jargon in which it was alone possible for them to understand each
other; 'wait till we clean up and pull for the Outside. We'll take the
White Man's canoe and go to the Salt Water. Yes, bad water, rough
water--great mountains dance up and down all the time. And so big, so
far, so far away--you travel ten sleep, twenty sleep, forty sleep'--he
graphically enumerated the days on his fingers--'all the time water,
bad water. Then you come to great village, plenty people, just the same
mosquitoes next summer. Wigwams oh, so high--ten, twenty pines.

'Hi-yu skookum!' He paused impotently, cast an appealing glance at
Malemute Kid, then laboriously placed the twenty pines, end on end, by
sign language. Malemute Kid smiled with cheery cynicism; but Ruth's
eyes were wide with wonder, and with pleasure; for she half believed he
was joking, and such condescension pleased her poor woman's heart.

'And then you step into a--a box, and pouf! up you go.' He tossed his
empty cup in the air by way of illustration and, as he deftly caught
it, cried: 'And biff! down you come. Oh, great medicine men! You go
Fort Yukon. I go Arctic City--twenty-five sleep--big string, all the
time--I catch him string--I say, "Hello, Ruth! How are ye?"--and you
say, "Is that my good husband?"--and I say, "Yes"--and you say, "No can
bake good bread, no more soda"--then I say, "Look in cache, under
flour; good-by." You look and catch plenty soda. All the time you Fort
Yukon, me Arctic City. Hi-yu medicine man!' Ruth smiled so ingenuously
at the fairy story that both men burst into laughter. A row among the
dogs cut short the wonders of the Outside, and by the time the snarling
combatants were separated, she had lashed the sleds and all was ready
for the trail.--'Mush! Baldy! Hi! Mush on!' Mason worked his whip
smartly and, as the dogs whined low in the traces, broke out the sled
with the gee pole. Ruth followed with the second team, leaving Malemute
Kid, who had helped her start, to bring up the rear. Strong man, brute
that he was, capable of felling an ox at a blow, he could not bear to
beat the poor animals, but humored them as a dog driver rarely
does--nay, almost wept with them in their misery.

'Come, mush on there, you poor sore-footed brutes!' he murmured, after
several ineffectual attempts to start the load. But his patience was at
last rewarded, and though whimpering with pain, they hastened to join
their fellows.

No more conversation; the toil of the trail will not permit such
extravagance.

And of all deadening labors, that of the Northland trail is the worst.
Happy is the man who can weather a day's travel at the price of
silence, and that on a beaten track.  And of all heartbreaking labors,
that of breaking trail is the worst. At every step the great webbed
shoe sinks till the snow is level with the knee. Then up, straight up,
the deviation of a fraction of an inch being a certain precursor of
disaster, the snowshoe must be lifted till the surface is cleared; then
forward, down, and the other foot is raised perpendicularly for the
matter of half a yard. He who tries this for the first time, if haply
he avoids bringing his shoes in dangerous propinquity and measures not
his length on the treacherous footing, will give up exhausted at the
end of a hundred yards; he who can keep out of the way of the dogs for
a whole day may well crawl into his sleeping bag with a clear
conscience and a pride which passeth all understanding; and he who
travels twenty sleeps on the Long Trail is a man whom the gods may envy.

The afternoon wore on, and with the awe, born of the White Silence, the
voiceless travelers bent to their work. Nature has many tricks
wherewith she convinces man of his finity--the ceaseless flow of the
tides, the fury of the storm, the shock of the earthquake, the long
roll of heaven's artillery--but the most tremendous, the most
stupefying of all, is the passive phase of the White Silence. All
movement ceases, the sky clears, the heavens are as brass; the
slightest whisper seems sacrilege, and man becomes timid, affrighted at
the sound of his own voice. Sole speck of life journeying across the
ghostly wastes of a dead world, he trembles at his audacity, realizes
that his is a maggot's life, nothing more.

Strange thoughts arise unsummoned, and the mystery of all things
strives for utterance.

And the fear of death, of God, of the universe, comes over him--the
hope of the Resurrection and the Life, the yearning for immortality,
the vain striving of the imprisoned essence--it is then, if ever, man
walks alone with God.

So wore the day away. The river took a great bend, and Mason headed his
team for the cutoff across the narrow neck of land. But the dogs balked
at the high bank. Again and again, though Ruth and Malemute Kid were
shoving on the sled, they slipped back. Then came the concerted effort.
The miserable creatures, weak from hunger, exerted their last strength.
Up--up--the sled poised on the top of the bank; but the leader swung
the string of dogs behind him to the right, fouling Mason's snowshoes.
The result was grievous.

Mason was whipped off his feet; one of the dogs fell in the traces; and
the sled toppled back, dragging everything to the bottom again.

Slash! the whip fell among the dogs savagely, especially upon the one
which had fallen.

'Don't,--Mason,' entreated Malemute Kid; 'the poor devil's on its last
legs.  Wait and we'll put my team on.' Mason deliberately withheld the
whip till the last word had fallen, then out flashed the long lash,
completely curling about the offending creature's body.

Carmen--for it was Carmen--cowered in the snow, cried piteously, then
rolled over on her side.

It was a tragic moment, a pitiful incident of the trail--a dying dog,
two comrades in anger.

Ruth glanced solicitously from man to man. But Malemute Kid restrained
himself, though there was a world of reproach in his eyes, and, bending
over the dog, cut the traces. No word was spoken. The teams were
doublespanned and the difficulty overcome; the sleds were under way
again, the dying dog dragging herself along in the rear. As long as an
animal can travel, it is not shot, and this last chance is accorded
it--the crawling into camp, if it can, in the hope of a moose being
killed.

Already penitent for his angry action, but too stubborn to make amends,
Mason toiled on at the head of the cavalcade, little dreaming that
danger hovered in the air. The timber clustered thick in the sheltered
bottom, and through this they threaded their way. Fifty feet or more
from the trail towered a lofty pine. For generations it had stood
there, and for generations destiny had had this one end in
view--perhaps the same had been decreed of Mason.

He stooped to fasten the loosened thong of his moccasin. The sleds came
to a halt, and the dogs lay down in the snow without a whimper. The
stillness was weird; not a breath rustled the frost-encrusted forest;
the cold and silence of outer space had chilled the heart and smote the
trembling lips of nature. A sigh pulsed through the air--they did not
seem to actually hear it, but rather felt it, like the premonition of
movement in a motionless void. Then the great tree, burdened with its
weight of years and snow, played its last part in the tragedy of life.
He heard the warning crash and attempted to spring up but, almost
erect, caught the blow squarely on the shoulder.

The sudden danger, the quick death--how often had Malemute Kid faced
it! The pine needles were still quivering as he gave his commands and
sprang into action. Nor did the Indian girl faint or raise her voice in
idle wailing, as might many of her white sisters. At his order, she
threw her weight on the end of a quickly extemporized handspike, easing
the pressure and listening to her husband's groans, while Malemute Kid
attacked the tree with his ax. The steel rang merrily as it bit into
the frozen trunk, each stroke being accompanied by a forced, audible
respiration, the 'Huh!' 'Huh!' of the woodsman.

At last the Kid laid the pitiable thing that was once a man in the
snow. But worse than his comrade's pain was the dumb anguish in the
woman's face, the blended look of hopeful, hopeless query. Little was
said; those of the Northland are early taught the futility of words and
the inestimable value of deeds. With the temperature at sixty-five
below zero, a man cannot lie many minutes in the snow and live. So the
sled lashings were cut, and the sufferer, rolled in furs, laid on a
couch of boughs. Before him roared a fire, built of the very wood which
wrought the mishap. Behind and partially over him was stretched the
primitive fly--a piece of canvas, which caught the radiating heat and
threw it back and down upon him--a trick which men may know who study
physics at the fount.

And men who have shared their bed with death know when the call is
sounded. Mason was terribly crushed. The most cursory examination
revealed it.

His right arm, leg, and back were broken; his limbs were paralyzed from
the hips; and the likelihood of internal injuries was large. An
occasional moan was his only sign of life.

No hope; nothing to be done. The pitiless night crept slowly by--Ruth's
portion, the despairing stoicism of her race, and Malemute Kid adding
new lines to his face of bronze.

In fact, Mason suffered least of all, for he spent his time in eastern
Tennessee, in the Great Smoky Mountains, living over the scenes of his
childhood. And most pathetic was the melody of his long-forgotten
Southern vernacular, as he raved of swimming holes and coon hunts and
watermelon raids. It was as Greek to Ruth, but the Kid understood and
felt--felt as only one can feel who has been shut out for years from
all that civilization means.

Morning brought consciousness to the stricken man, and Malemute Kid
bent closer to catch his whispers.

'You remember when we foregathered on the Tanana, four years come next
ice run? I didn't care so much for her then. It was more like she was
pretty, and there was a smack of excitement about it, I think. But d'ye
know, I've come to think a heap of her. She's been a good wife to me,
always at my shoulder in the pinch. And when it comes to trading, you
know there isn't her equal. D'ye recollect the time she shot the
Moosehorn Rapids to pull you and me off that rock, the bullets whipping
the water like hailstones?--and the time of the famine at
Nuklukyeto?--when she raced the ice run to bring the news?

'Yes, she's been a good wife to me, better'n that other one. Didn't
know I'd been there?

'Never told you, eh? Well, I tried it once, down in the States. That's
why I'm here. Been raised together, too. I came away to give her a
chance for divorce. She got it.

'But that's got nothing to do with Ruth. I had thought of cleaning up
and pulling for the Outside next year--her and I--but it's too late.
Don't send her back to her people, Kid. It's beastly hard for a woman
to go back. Think of it!--nearly four years on our bacon and beans and
flour and dried fruit, and then to go back to her fish and caribou.
It's not good for her to have tried our ways, to come to know they're
better'n her people's, and then return to them. Take care of her, Kid,
why don't you--but no, you always fought shy of them--and you never
told me why you came to this country. Be kind to her, and send her back
to the States as soon as you can. But fix it so she can come
back--liable to get homesick, you know.

'And the youngster--it's drawn us closer, Kid. I only hope it is a boy.
Think of it!--flesh of my flesh, Kid. He mustn't stop in this country.
And if it's a girl, why, she can't. Sell my furs; they'll fetch at
least five thousand, and I've got as much more with the company. And
handle my interests with yours. I think that bench claim will show up.
See that he gets a good schooling; and Kid, above all, don't let him
come back. This country was not made for white men.

'I'm a gone man, Kid. Three or four sleeps at the best. You've got to
go on.  You must go on! Remember, it's my wife, it's my boy--O God! I
hope it's a boy! You can't stay by me--and I charge you, a dying man,
to pull on.'

'Give me three days,' pleaded Malemute Kid. 'You may change for the
better; something may turn up.'

'No.'

'Just three days.'

'You must pull on.'

'Two days.'

'It's my wife and my boy, Kid. You would not ask it.'

'One day.'

'No, no! I charge--'

'Only one day. We can shave it through on the grub, and I might knock
over a moose.'

'No--all right; one day, but not a minute more. And, Kid, don't--don't
leave me to face it alone. Just a shot, one pull on the trigger. You
understand. Think of it! Think of it! Flesh of my flesh, and I'll never
live to see him!

'Send Ruth here. I want to say good-by and tell her that she must think
of the boy and not wait till I'm dead. She might refuse to go with you
if I didn't. Goodby, old man; good-by.

'Kid! I say--a--sink a hole above the pup, next to the slide. I panned
out forty cents on my shovel there.

'And, Kid!' He stooped lower to catch the last faint words, the dying
man's surrender of his pride. 'I'm sorry--for--you know--Carmen.'
Leaving the girl crying softly over her man, Malemute Kid slipped into
his parka and snowshoes, tucked his rifle under his arm, and crept away
into the forest. He was no tyro in the stern sorrows of the Northland,
but never had he faced so stiff a problem as this. In the abstract, it
was a plain, mathematical proposition--three possible lives as against
one doomed one. But now he hesitated. For five years, shoulder to
shoulder, on the rivers and trails, in the camps and mines, facing
death by field and flood and famine, had they knitted the bonds of
their comradeship. So close was the tie that he had often been
conscious of a vague jealousy of Ruth, from the first time she had come
between. And now it must be severed by his own hand.

Though he prayed for a moose, just one moose, all game seemed to have
deserted the land, and nightfall found the exhausted man crawling into
camp, lighthanded, heavyhearted. An uproar from the dogs and shrill
cries from Ruth hastened him.

Bursting into the camp, he saw the girl in the midst of the snarling
pack, laying about her with an ax. The dogs had broken the iron rule of
their masters and were rushing the grub.

He joined the issue with his rifle reversed, and the hoary game of
natural selection was played out with all the ruthlessness of its
primeval environment. Rifle and ax went up and down, hit or missed with
monotonous regularity; lithe bodies flashed, with wild eyes and
dripping fangs; and man and beast fought for supremacy to the bitterest
conclusion. Then the beaten brutes crept to the edge of the firelight,
licking their wounds, voicing their misery to the stars.

The whole stock of dried salmon had been devoured, and perhaps five
pounds of flour remained to tide them over two hundred miles of
wilderness. Ruth returned to her husband, while Malemute Kid cut up the
warm body of one of the dogs, the skull of which had been crushed by
the ax. Every portion was carefully put away, save the hide and offal,
which were cast to his fellows of the moment before.

Morning brought fresh trouble. The animals were turning on each other.
Carmen, who still clung to her slender thread of life, was downed by
the pack. The lash fell among them unheeded. They cringed and cried
under the blows, but refused to scatter till the last wretched bit had
disappeared--bones, hide, hair, everything.

Malemute Kid went about his work, listening to Mason, who was back in
Tennessee, delivering tangled discourses and wild exhortations to his
brethren of other days.

Taking advantage of neighboring pines, he worked rapidly, and Ruth
watched him make a cache similar to those sometimes used by hunters to
preserve their meat from the wolverines and dogs. One after the other,
he bent the tops of two small pines toward each other and nearly to the
ground, making them fast with thongs of moosehide. Then he beat the
dogs into submission and harnessed them to two of the sleds, loading
the same with everything but the furs which enveloped Mason. These he
wrapped and lashed tightly about him, fastening either end of the robes
to the bent pines. A single stroke of his hunting knife would release
them and send the body high in the air.

Ruth had received her husband's last wishes and made no struggle. Poor
girl, she had learned the lesson of obedience well. From a child, she
had bowed, and seen all women bow, to the lords of creation, and it did
not seem in the nature of things for woman to resist. The Kid permitted
her one outburst of grief, as she kissed her husband--her own people
had no such custom--then led her to the foremost sled and helped her
into her snowshoes. Blindly, instinctively, she took the gee pole and
whip, and 'mushed' the dogs out on the trail. Then he returned to
Mason, who had fallen into a coma, and long after she was out of sight
crouched by the fire, waiting, hoping, praying for his comrade to die.

It is not pleasant to be alone with painful thoughts in the White
Silence. The silence of gloom is merciful, shrouding one as with
protection and breathing a thousand intangible sympathies; but the
bright White Silence, clear and cold, under steely skies, is pitiless.

An hour passed--two hours--but the man would not die. At high noon the
sun, without raising its rim above the southern horizon, threw a
suggestion of fire athwart the heavens, then quickly drew it back.
Malemute Kid roused and dragged himself to his comrade's side. He cast
one glance about him. The White Silence seemed to sneer, and a great
fear came upon him. There was a sharp report; Mason swung into his
aerial sepulcher, and Malemute Kid lashed the dogs into a wild gallop
as he fled across the snow.



The Son of the Wolf

Man rarely places a proper valuation upon his womankind, at least not
until deprived of them. He has no conception of the subtle atmosphere
exhaled by the sex feminine, so long as he bathes in it; but let it be
withdrawn, and an ever-growing void begins to manifest itself in his
existence, and he becomes hungry, in a vague sort of way, for a
something so indefinite that he cannot characterize it. If his comrades
have no more experience than himself, they will shake their heads
dubiously and dose him with strong physic. But the hunger will continue
and become stronger; he will lose interest in the things of his
everyday life and wax morbid; and one day, when the emptiness has
become unbearable, a revelation will dawn upon him.

In the Yukon country, when this comes to pass, the man usually
provisions a poling boat, if it is summer, and if winter, harnesses his
dogs, and heads for the Southland. A few months later, supposing him to
be possessed of a faith in the country, he returns with a wife to share
with him in that faith, and incidentally in his hardships. This but
serves to show the innate selfishness of man. It also brings us to the
trouble of 'Scruff' Mackenzie, which occurred in the old days, before
the country was stampeded and staked by a tidal-wave of the
che-cha-quas, and when the Klondike's only claim to notice was its
salmon fisheries.

'Scruff' Mackenzie bore the earmarks of a frontier birth and a frontier
life.

His face was stamped with twenty-five years of incessant struggle with
Nature in her wildest moods,--the last two, the wildest and hardest of
all, having been spent in groping for the gold which lies in the shadow
of the Arctic Circle. When the yearning sickness came upon him, he was
not surprised, for he was a practical man and had seen other men thus
stricken. But he showed no sign of his malady, save that he worked
harder. All summer he fought mosquitoes and washed the sure-thing bars
of the Stuart River for a double grubstake. Then he floated a raft of
houselogs down the Yukon to Forty Mile, and put together as comfortable
a cabin as any the camp could boast of. In fact, it showed such cozy
promise that many men elected to be his partner and to come and live
with him. But he crushed their aspirations with rough speech, peculiar
for its strength and brevity, and bought a double supply of grub from
the trading-post.

As has been noted, 'Scruff' Mackenzie was a practical man. If he wanted
a thing he usually got it, but in doing so, went no farther out of his
way than was necessary. Though a son of toil and hardship, he was
averse to a journey of six hundred miles on the ice, a second of two
thousand miles on the ocean, and still a third thousand miles or so to
his last stamping-grounds,--all in the mere quest of a wife. Life was
too short. So he rounded up his dogs, lashed a curious freight to his
sled, and faced across the divide whose westward slopes were drained by
the head-reaches of the Tanana.

He was a sturdy traveler, and his wolf-dogs could work harder and
travel farther on less grub than any other team in the Yukon. Three
weeks later he strode into a hunting-camp of the Upper Tanana Sticks.
They marveled at his temerity; for they had a bad name and had been
known to kill white men for as trifling a thing as a sharp ax or a
broken rifle.

But he went among them single-handed, his bearing being a delicious
composite of humility, familiarity, sang-froid, and insolence. It
required a deft hand and deep knowledge of the barbaric mind
effectually to handle such diverse weapons; but he was a past-master in
the art, knowing when to conciliate and when to threaten with Jove-like
wrath.

He first made obeisance to the Chief Thling-Tinneh, presenting him with
a couple of pounds of black tea and tobacco, and thereby winning his
most cordial regard. Then he mingled with the men and maidens, and that
night gave a potlach.

The snow was beaten down in the form of an oblong, perhaps a hundred
feet in length and quarter as many across. Down the center a long fire
was built, while either side was carpeted with spruce boughs. The
lodges were forsaken, and the fivescore or so members of the tribe gave
tongue to their folk-chants in honor of their guest.

'Scruff' Mackenzie's two years had taught him the not many hundred
words of their vocabulary, and he had likewise conquered their deep
gutturals, their Japanese idioms, constructions, and honorific and
agglutinative particles. So he made oration after their manner,
satisfying their instinctive poetry-love with crude flights of
eloquence and metaphorical contortions. After Thling-Tinneh and the
Shaman had responded in kind, he made trifling presents to the menfolk,
joined in their singing, and proved an expert in their fifty-two-stick
gambling game.

And they smoked his tobacco and were pleased. But among the younger men
there was a defiant attitude, a spirit of braggadocio, easily
understood by the raw insinuations of the toothless squaws and the
giggling of the maidens. They had known few white men, 'Sons of the
Wolf,' but from those few they had learned strange lessons.

Nor had 'Scruff' Mackenzie, for all his seeming carelessness, failed to
note these phenomena. In truth, rolled in his sleeping-furs, he thought
it all over, thought seriously, and emptied many pipes in mapping out a
campaign. One maiden only had caught his fancy,--none other than
Zarinska, daughter to the chief. In features, form, and poise,
answering more nearly to the white man's type of beauty, she was almost
an anomaly among her tribal sisters. He would possess her, make her his
wife, and name her--ah, he would name her Gertrude! Having thus
decided, he rolled over on his side and dropped off to sleep, a true
son of his all-conquering race, a Samson among the Philistines.

It was slow work and a stiff game; but 'Scruff' Mackenzie maneuvered
cunningly, with an unconcern which served to puzzle the Sticks. He took
great care to impress the men that he was a sure shot and a mighty
hunter, and the camp rang with his plaudits when he brought down a
moose at six hundred yards. Of a night he visited in Chief
Thling-Tinneh's lodge of moose and cariboo skins, talking big and
dispensing tobacco with a lavish hand. Nor did he fail to likewise
honor the Shaman; for he realized the medicine-man's influence with his
people, and was anxious to make of him an ally. But that worthy was
high and mighty, refused to be propitiated, and was unerringly marked
down as a prospective enemy.

Though no opening presented for an interview with Zarinska, Mackenzie
stole many a glance to her, giving fair warning of his intent. And well
she knew, yet coquettishly surrounded herself with a ring of women
whenever the men were away and he had a chance. But he was in no hurry;
besides, he knew she could not help but think of him, and a few days of
such thought would only better his suit.

At last, one night, when he deemed the time to be ripe, he abruptly
left the chief's smoky dwelling and hastened to a neighboring lodge. As
usual, she sat with squaws and maidens about her, all engaged in sewing
moccasins and beadwork. They laughed at his entrance, and badinage,
which linked Zarinska to him, ran high. But one after the other they
were unceremoniously bundled into the outer snow, whence they hurried
to spread the tale through all the camp.

His cause was well pleaded, in her tongue, for she did not know his,
and at the end of two hours he rose to go.

'So Zarinska will come to the White Man's lodge? Good! I go now to have
talk with thy father, for he may not be so minded. And I will give him
many tokens; but he must not ask too much. If he say no? Good! Zarinska
shall yet come to the White Man's lodge.'

He had already lifted the skin flap to depart, when a low exclamation
brought him back to the girl's side. She brought herself to her knees
on the bearskin mat, her face aglow with true Eve-light, and shyly
unbuckled his heavy belt. He looked down, perplexed, suspicious, his
ears alert for the slightest sound without.

But her next move disarmed his doubt, and he smiled with pleasure. She
took from her sewing bag a moosehide sheath, brave with bright
beadwork, fantastically designed. She drew his great hunting-knife,
gazed reverently along the keen edge, half tempted to try it with her
thumb, and shot it into place in its new home. Then she slipped the
sheath along the belt to its customary resting-place, just above the
hip.  For all the world, it was like a scene of olden time,--a lady and
her knight.

Mackenzie drew her up full height and swept her red lips with his
moustache, the, to her, foreign caress of the Wolf. It was a meeting of
the stone age and the steel; but she was none the less a woman, as her
crimson cheeks and the luminous softness of her eyes attested.

There was a thrill of excitement in the air as 'Scruff' Mackenzie, a
bulky bundle under his arm, threw open the flap of Thling-Tinneh's
tent. Children were running about in the open, dragging dry wood to the
scene of the potlach, a babble of women's voices was growing in
intensity, the young men were consulting in sullen groups, while from
the Shaman's lodge rose the eerie sounds of an incantation.

The chief was alone with his blear-eyed wife, but a glance sufficed to
tell Mackenzie that the news was already told. So he plunged at once
into the business, shifting the beaded sheath prominently to the fore
as advertisement of the betrothal.

'O Thling-Tinneh, mighty chief of the Sticks And the land of the
Tanana, ruler of the salmon and the bear, the moose and the cariboo!
The White Man is before thee with a great purpose. Many moons has his
lodge been empty, and he is lonely. And his heart has eaten itself in
silence, and grown hungry for a woman to sit beside him in his lodge,
to meet him from the hunt with warm fire and good food. He has heard
strange things, the patter of baby moccasins and the sound of
children's voices. And one night a vision came upon him, and he beheld
the Raven, who is thy father, the great Raven, who is the father of all
the Sticks. And the Raven spake to the lonely White Man, saying: "Bind
thou thy moccasins upon thee, and gird thy snow-shoes on, and lash thy
sled with food for many sleeps and fine tokens for the Chief
Thling-Tinneh. For thou shalt turn thy face to where the mid-spring sun
is wont to sink below the land and journey to this great chief's
hunting-grounds. There thou shalt make big presents, and Thling-Tinneh,
who is my son, shall become to thee as a father. In his lodge there is
a maiden into whom I breathed the breath of life for thee. This maiden
shalt thou take to wife." 'O Chief, thus spake the great Raven; thus do
I lay many presents at thy feet; thus am I come to take thy daughter!'
The old man drew his furs about him with crude consciousness of
royalty, but delayed reply while a youngster crept in, delivered a
quick message to appear before the council, and was gone.

'O White Man, whom we have named Moose-Killer, also known as the Wolf,
and the Son of the Wolf! We know thou comest of a mighty race; we are
proud to have thee our potlach-guest; but the king-salmon does not mate
with the dogsalmon, nor the Raven with the Wolf.' 'Not so!' cried
Mackenzie. 'The daughters of the Raven have I met in the camps of the
Wolf,--the squaw of Mortimer, the squaw of Tregidgo, the squaw of
Barnaby, who came two ice-runs back, and I have heard of other squaws,
though my eyes beheld them not.' 'Son, your words are true; but it were
evil mating, like the water with the sand, like the snow-flake with the
sun. But met you one Mason and his squaw' No?

He came ten ice-runs ago,--the first of all the Wolves. And with him
there was a mighty man, straight as a willow-shoot, and tall; strong as
the bald-faced grizzly, with a heart like the full summer moon; his-'
'Oh!' interrupted Mackenzie, recognizing the well-known Northland
figure, 'Malemute Kid!' 'The same,--a mighty man. But saw you aught of
the squaw? She was full sister to Zarinska.' 'Nay, Chief; but I have
heard. Mason--far, far to the north, a spruce-tree, heavy with years,
crushed out his life beneath. But his love was great, and he had much
gold. With this, and her boy, she journeyed countless sleeps toward the
winter's noonday sun, and there she yet lives,--no biting frost, no
snow, no summer's midnight sun, no winter's noonday night.'

A second messenger interrupted with imperative summons from the council.

As Mackenzie threw him into the snow, he caught a glimpse of the
swaying forms before the council-fire, heard the deep basses of the men
in rhythmic chant, and knew the Shaman was fanning the anger of his
people. Time pressed. He turned upon the chief.

'Come! I wish thy child. And now, see! Here are tobacco, tea, many cups
of sugar, warm blankets, handkerchiefs, both good and large; and here,
a true rifle, with many bullets and much powder.' 'Nay,' replied the
old man, struggling against the great wealth spread before him. 'Even
now are my people come together. They will not have this marriage.'

'But thou art chief.' 'Yet do my young men rage because the Wolves have
taken their maidens so that they may not marry.' 'Listen, O
Thling-Tinneh! Ere the night has passed into the day, the Wolf shall
face his dogs to the Mountains of the East and fare forth to the
Country of the Yukon. And Zarinska shall break trail for his dogs.'
'And ere the night has gained its middle, my young men may fling to the
dogs the flesh of the Wolf, and his bones be scattered in the snow till
the springtime lay them bare.' It was threat and counter-threat.
Mackenzie's bronzed face flushed darkly. He raised his voice. The old
squaw, who till now had sat an impassive spectator, made to creep by
him for the door.

The song of the men broke suddenly and there was a hubbub of many
voices as he whirled the old woman roughly to her couch of skins.

'Again I cry--listen, O Thling-Tinneh! The Wolf dies with teeth
fast-locked, and with him there shall sleep ten of thy strongest
men,--men who are needed, for the hunting is not begun, and the fishing
is not many moons away. And again, of what profit should I die? I know
the custom of thy people; thy share of my wealth shall be very small.
Grant me thy child, and it shall all be thine. And yet again, my
brothers will come, and they are many, and their maws are never filled;
and the daughters of the Raven shall bear children in the lodges of the
Wolf. My people are greater than thy people. It is destiny. Grant, and
all this wealth is thine.' Moccasins were crunching the snow without.
Mackenzie threw his rifle to cock, and loosened the twin Colts in his
belt.

'Grant, O Chief!' 'And yet will my people say no.' 'Grant, and the
wealth is thine. Then shall I deal with thy people after.' 'The Wolf
will have it so. I will take his tokens,--but I would warn him.'
Mackenzie passed over the goods, taking care to clog the rifle's
ejector, and capping the bargain with a kaleidoscopic silk kerchief.
The Shaman and half a dozen young braves entered, but he shouldered
boldly among them and passed out.

'Pack!' was his laconic greeting to Zarinska as he passed her lodge and
hurried to harness his dogs. A few minutes later he swept into the
council at the head of the team, the woman by his side. He took his
place at the upper end of the oblong, by the side of the chief. To his
left, a step to the rear, he stationed Zarinska, her proper place.
Besides, the time was ripe for mischief, and there was need to guard
his back.

On either side, the men crouched to the fire, their voices lifted in a
folk-chant out of the forgotten past. Full of strange, halting cadences
and haunting recurrences, it was not beautiful. 'Fearful' may
inadequately express it. At the lower end, under the eye of the Shaman,
danced half a score of women. Stern were his reproofs of those who did
not wholly abandon themselves to the ecstasy of the rite. Half hidden
in their heavy masses of raven hair, all dishevelled and falling to
their waists, they slowly swayed to and fro, their forms rippling to an
ever-changing rhythm.

It was a weird scene; an anachronism. To the south, the nineteenth
century was reeling off the few years of its last decade; here
flourished man primeval, a shade removed from the prehistoric
cave-dweller, forgotten fragment of the Elder World. The tawny
wolf-dogs sat between their skin-clad masters or fought for room, the
firelight cast backward from their red eyes and dripping fangs. The
woods, in ghostly shroud, slept on unheeding.

The White Silence, for the moment driven to the rimming forest, seemed
ever crushing inward; the stars danced with great leaps, as is their
wont in the time of the Great Cold; while the Spirits of the Pole
trailed their robes of glory athwart the heavens.

'Scruff' Mackenzie dimly realized the wild grandeur of the setting as
his eyes ranged down the fur-fringed sides in quest of missing faces.
They rested for a moment on a newborn babe, suckling at its mother's
naked breast. It was forty below,--seven and odd degrees of frost. He
thought of the tender women of his own race and smiled grimly. Yet from
the loins of some such tender woman had he sprung with a kingly
inheritance,--an inheritance which gave to him and his dominance over
the land and sea, over the animals and the peoples of all the zones.
Single-handed against fivescore, girt by the Arctic winter, far from
his own, he felt the prompting of his heritage, the desire to possess,
the wild danger--love, the thrill of battle, the power to conquer or to
die.

The singing and the dancing ceased, and the Shaman flared up in rude
eloquence.

Through the sinuosities of their vast mythology, he worked cunningly
upon the credulity of his people. The case was strong. Opposing the
creative principles as embodied in the Crow and the Raven, he
stigmatized Mackenzie as the Wolf, the fighting and the destructive
principle. Not only was the combat of these forces spiritual, but men
fought, each to his totem. They were the children of Jelchs, the Raven,
the Promethean fire-bringer; Mackenzie was the child of the Wolf, or in
other words, the Devil. For them to bring a truce to this perpetual
warfare, to marry their daughters to the arch-enemy, were treason and
blasphemy of the highest order. No phrase was harsh nor figure vile
enough in branding Mackenzie as a sneaking interloper and emissary of
Satan. There was a subdued, savage roar in the deep chests of his
listeners as he took the swing of his peroration.

'Aye, my brothers, Jelchs is all-powerful! Did he not bring
heaven-borne fire that we might be warm? Did he not draw the sun, moon,
and stars, from their holes that we might see? Did he not teach us that
we might fight the Spirits of Famine and of Frost? But now Jelchs is
angry with his children, and they are grown to a handful, and he will
not help.

'For they have forgotten him, and done evil things, and trod bad
trails, and taken his enemies into their lodges to sit by their fires.
And the Raven is sorrowful at the wickedness of his children; but when
they shall rise up and show they have come back, he will come out of
the darkness to aid them. O brothers! the Fire-Bringer has whispered
messages to thy Shaman; the same shall ye hear. Let the young men take
the young women to their lodges; let them fly at the throat of the
Wolf; let them be undying in their enmity! Then shall their women
become fruitful and they shall multiply into a mighty people! And the
Raven shall lead great tribes of their fathers and their fathers'
fathers from out of the North; and they shall beat back the Wolves till
they are as last year's campfires; and they shall again come to rule
over all the land! 'Tis the message of Jelchs, the Raven.' This
foreshadowing of the Messiah's coming brought a hoarse howl from the
Sticks as they leaped to their feet. Mackenzie slipped the thumbs of
his mittens and waited. There was a clamor for the 'Fox,' not to be
stilled till one of the young men stepped forward to speak.

'Brothers! The Shaman has spoken wisely. The Wolves have taken our
women, and our men are childless. We are grown to a handful. The Wolves
have taken our warm furs and given for them evil spirits which dwell in
bottles, and clothes which come not from the beaver or the lynx, but
are made from the grass.

And they are not warm, and our men die of strange sicknesses. I, the
Fox, have taken no woman to wife; and why? Twice have the maidens which
pleased me gone to the camps of the Wolf. Even now have I laid by skins
of the beaver, of the moose, of the cariboo, that I might win favor in
the eyes of Thling-Tinneh, that I might marry Zarinska, his daughter.
Even now are her snow-shoes bound to her feet, ready to break trail for
the dogs of the Wolf. Nor do I speak for myself alone.

As I have done, so has the Bear. He, too, had fain been the father of
her children, and many skins has he cured thereto. I speak for all the
young men who know not wives. The Wolves are ever hungry. Always do
they take the choice meat at the killing. To the Ravens are left the
leavings.

'There is Gugkla,' he cried, brutally pointing out one of the women,
who was a cripple.

'Her legs are bent like the ribs of a birch canoe. She cannot gather
wood nor carry the meat of the hunters. Did the Wolves choose her?'
'Ai! ai!' vociferated his tribesmen.

'There is Moyri, whose eyes are crossed by the Evil Spirit. Even the
babes are affrighted when they gaze upon her, and it is said the
bald-face gives her the trail.

'Was she chosen?' Again the cruel applause rang out.

'And there sits Pischet. She does not hearken to my words. Never has
she heard the cry of the chit-chat, the voice of her husband, the
babble of her child.

'She lives in the White Silence. Cared the Wolves aught for her? No!
Theirs is the choice of the kill; ours is the leavings.

'Brothers, it shall not be! No more shall the Wolves slink among our
campfires. The time is come.' A great streamer of fire, the aurora
borealis, purple, green, and yellow, shot across the zenith, bridging
horizon to horizon. With head thrown back and arms extended, he swayed
to his climax.

'Behold! The spirits of our fathers have arisen and great deeds are
afoot this night!' He stepped back, and another young man somewhat
diffidently came forward, pushed on by his comrades. He towered a full
head above them, his broad chest defiantly bared to the frost. He swung
tentatively from one foot to the other.

Words halted upon his tongue, and he was ill at ease. His face was
horrible to look upon, for it had at one time been half torn away by
some terrific blow. At last he struck his breast with his clenched
fist, drawing sound as from a drum, and his voice rumbled forth as does
the surf from an ocean cavern.

'I am the Bear,--the Silver-Tip and the Son of the Silver-Tip! When my
voice was yet as a girl's, I slew the lynx, the moose, and the cariboo;
when it whistled like the wolverines from under a cache, I crossed the
Mountains of the South and slew three of the White Rivers; when it
became as the roar of the Chinook, I met the bald-faced grizzly, but
gave no trail.' At this he paused, his hand significantly sweeping
across his hideous scars.

'I am not as the Fox. My tongue is frozen like the river. I cannot make
great talk. My words are few. The Fox says great deeds are afoot this
night. Good! Talk flows from his tongue like the freshets of the
spring, but he is chary of deeds.

'This night shall I do battle with the Wolf. I shall slay him, and
Zarinska shall sit by my fire. The Bear has spoken.' Though pandemonium
raged about him, 'Scruff' Mackenzie held his ground.

Aware how useless was the rifle at close quarters, he slipped both
holsters to the fore, ready for action, and drew his mittens till his
hands were barely shielded by the elbow gauntlets. He knew there was no
hope in attack en masse, but true to his boast, was prepared to die
with teeth fast-locked. But the Bear restrained his comrades, beating
back the more impetuous with his terrible fist. As the tumult began to
die away, Mackenzie shot a glance in the direction of Zarinska. It was
a superb picture. She was leaning forward on her snow-shoes, lips apart
and nostrils quivering, like a tigress about to spring. Her great black
eyes were fixed upon her tribesmen, in fear and defiance. So extreme
the tension, she had forgotten to breathe. With one hand pressed
spasmodically against her breast and the other as tightly gripped about
the dog-whip, she was as turned to stone. Even as he looked, relief
came to her. Her muscles loosened; with a heavy sigh she settled back,
giving him a look of more than love--of worship.

Thling-Tinneh was trying to speak, but his people drowned his voice.
Then Mackenzie strode forward. The Fox opened his mouth to a piercing
yell, but so savagely did Mackenzie whirl upon him that he shrank back,
his larynx all agurgle with suppressed sound. His discomfiture was
greeted with roars of laughter, and served to soothe his fellows to a
listening mood.

'Brothers! The White Man, whom ye have chosen to call the Wolf, came
among you with fair words. He was not like the Innuit; he spoke not
lies. He came as a friend, as one who would be a brother. But your men
have had their say, and the time for soft words is past.

'First, I will tell you that the Shaman has an evil tongue and is a
false prophet, that the messages he spake are not those of the
Fire-Bringer. His ears are locked to the voice of the Raven, and out of
his own head he weaves cunning fancies, and he has made fools of you.
He has no power.

'When the dogs were killed and eaten, and your stomachs were heavy with
untanned hide and strips of moccasins; when the old men died, and the
old women died, and the babes at the dry dugs of the mothers died; when
the land was dark, and ye perished as do the salmon in the fall; aye,
when the famine was upon you, did the Shaman bring reward to your
hunters? did the Shaman put meat in your bellies? Again I say, the
Shaman is without power. Thus I spit upon his face!' Though taken aback
by the sacrilege, there was no uproar. Some of the women were even
frightened, but among the men there was an uplifting, as though in
preparation or anticipation of the miracle. All eyes were turned upon
the two central figures. The priest realized the crucial moment, felt
his power tottering, opened his mouth in denunciation, but fled
backward before the truculent advance, upraised fist, and flashing
eyes, of Mackenzie. He sneered and resumed.

'Was I stricken dead? Did the lightning burn me? Did the stars fall
from the sky and crush me? Pish! I have done with the dog. Now will I
tell you of my people, who are the mightiest of all the peoples, who
rule in all the lands. At first we hunt as I hunt, alone.

'After that we hunt in packs; and at last, like the cariboo-run, we
sweep across all the land.

'Those whom we take into our lodges live; those who will not come die.
Zarinska is a comely maiden, full and strong, fit to become the mother
of Wolves. Though I die, such shall she become; for my brothers are
many, and they will follow the scent of my dogs.

'Listen to the Law of the Wolf: Whoso taketh the life of one Wolf, the
forfeit shall ten of his people pay. In many lands has the price been
paid; in many lands shall it yet be paid.

'Now will I deal with the Fox and the Bear. It seems they have cast
eyes upon the maiden. So? Behold, I have bought her! Thling-Tinneh
leans upon the rifle; the goods of purchase are by his fire. Yet will I
be fair to the young men. To the Fox, whose tongue is dry with many
words, will I give of tobacco five long plugs.

'Thus will his mouth be wetted that he may make much noise in the
council. But to the Bear, of whom I am well proud, will I give of
blankets two; of flour, twenty cups; of tobacco, double that of the
Fox; and if he fare with me over the Mountains of the East, then will I
give him a rifle, mate to Thling-Tinneh's. If not? Good! The Wolf is
weary of speech. Yet once again will he say the Law: Whoso taketh the
life of one Wolf, the forfeit shall ten of his people pay.'

Mackenzie smiled as he stepped back to his old position, but at heart
he was full of trouble. The night was yet dark. The girl came to his
side, and he listened closely as she told of the Bear's battle-tricks
with the knife.

The decision was for war. In a trice, scores of moccasins were widening
the space of beaten snow by the fire. There was much chatter about the
seeming defeat of the Shaman; some averred he had but withheld his
power, while others conned past events and agreed with the Wolf. The
Bear came to the center of the battle-ground, a long naked
hunting-knife of Russian make in his hand. The Fox called attention to
Mackenzie's revolvers; so he stripped his belt, buckling it about
Zarinska, into whose hands he also entrusted his rifle. She shook her
head that she could not shoot,--small chance had a woman to handle such
precious things.

'Then, if danger come by my back, cry aloud, "My husband!" No; thus,
"My husband!"'

He laughed as she repeated it, pinched her cheek, and reentered the
circle. Not only in reach and stature had the Bear the advantage of
him, but his blade was longer by a good two inches. 'Scruff' Mackenzie
had looked into the eyes of men before, and he knew it was a man who
stood against him; yet he quickened to the glint of light on the steel,
to the dominant pulse of his race.

Time and again he was forced to the edge of the fire or the deep snow,
and time and again, with the foot tactics of the pugilist, he worked
back to the center.  Not a voice was lifted in encouragement, while his
antagonist was heartened with applause, suggestions, and warnings. But
his teeth only shut the tighter as the knives clashed together, and he
thrust or eluded with a coolness born of conscious strength. At first
he felt compassion for his enemy; but this fled before the primal
instinct of life, which in turn gave way to the lust of slaughter. The
ten thousand years of culture fell from him, and he was a cave-dweller,
doing battle for his female.

Twice he pricked the Bear, getting away unscathed; but the third time
caught, and to save himself, free hands closed on fighting hands, and
they came together.

Then did he realize the tremendous strength of his opponent. His
muscles were knotted in painful lumps, and cords and tendons threatened
to snap with the strain; yet nearer and nearer came the Russian steel.
He tried to break away, but only weakened himself. The fur-clad circle
closed in, certain of and anxious to see the final stroke. But with
wrestler's trick, swinging partly to the side, he struck at his
adversary with his head. Involuntarily the Bear leaned back, disturbing
his center of gravity. Simultaneous with this, Mackenzie tripped
properly and threw his whole weight forward, hurling him clear through
the circle into the deep snow. The Bear floundered out and came back
full tilt.

'O my husband!' Zarinska's voice rang out, vibrant with danger.

To the twang of a bow-string, Mackenzie swept low to the ground, and a
bonebarbed arrow passed over him into the breast of the Bear, whose
momentum carried him over his crouching foe. The next instant Mackenzie
was up and about. The bear lay motionless, but across the fire was the
Shaman, drawing a second arrow. Mackenzie's knife leaped short in the
air. He caught the heavy blade by the point. There was a flash of light
as it spanned the fire. Then the Shaman, the hilt alone appearing
without his throat, swayed and pitched forward into the glowing embers.

Click! Click!--the Fox had possessed himself of Thling-Tinneh's rifle
and was vainly trying to throw a shell into place. But he dropped it at
the sound of Mackenzie's laughter.

'So the Fox has not learned the way of the plaything? He is yet a woman.

'Come! Bring it, that I may show thee!' The Fox hesitated.

'Come, I say!' He slouched forward like a beaten cur.

'Thus, and thus; so the thing is done.' A shell flew into place and the
trigger was at cock as Mackenzie brought it to shoulder.

'The Fox has said great deeds were afoot this night, and he spoke true.
There have been great deeds, yet least among them were those of the
Fox. Is he still intent to take Zarinska to his lodge? Is he minded to
tread the trail already broken by the Shaman and the Bear?

'No? Good!'

Mackenzie turned contemptuously and drew his knife from the priest's
throat.

'Are any of the young men so minded? If so, the Wolf will take them by
two and three till none are left. No? Good! Thling-Tinneh, I now give
thee this rifle a second time. If, in the days to come, thou shouldst
journey to the Country of the Yukon, know thou that there shall always
be a place and much food by the fire of the Wolf. The night is now
passing into the day. I go, but I may come again. And for the last
time, remember the Law of the Wolf!' He was supernatural in their sight
as he rejoined Zarinska. She took her place at the head of the team,
and the dogs swung into motion. A few moments later they were swallowed
up by the ghostly forest. Till now Mackenzie had waited; he slipped
into his snow-shoes to follow.

'Has the Wolf forgotten the five long plugs?' Mackenzie turned upon the
Fox angrily; then the humor of it struck him.

'I will give thee one short plug.' 'As the Wolf sees fit,' meekly
responded the Fox, stretching out his hand.



The Men of Forty Mile

When Big Jim Belden ventured the apparently innocuous proposition that
mush-ice was 'rather pecooliar,' he little dreamed of what it would
lead to.

Neither did Lon McFane, when he affirmed that anchor-ice was even more
so; nor did Bettles, as he instantly disagreed, declaring the very
existence of such a form to be a bugaboo.

'An' ye'd be tellin' me this,' cried Lon, 'after the years ye've spint
in the land! An' we atin' out the same pot this many's the day!' 'But
the thing's agin reasin,' insisted Bettles.

'Look you, water's warmer than ice--' 'An' little the difference, once
ye break through.'

'Still it's warmer, because it ain't froze. An' you say it freezes on
the bottom?' 'Only the anchor-ice, David, only the anchor-ice. An' have
ye niver drifted along, the water clear as glass, whin suddin, belike a
cloud over the sun, the mushy-ice comes bubblin' up an' up till from
bank to bank an' bind to bind it's drapin' the river like a first
snowfall?' 'Unh, hunh! more'n once when I took a doze at the
steering-oar. But it allus come out the nighest side-channel, an' not
bubblin' up an' up.' 'But with niver a wink at the helm?'

'No; nor you. It's agin reason. I'll leave it to any man!' Bettles
appealed to the circle about the stove, but the fight was on between
himself and Lon McFane.

'Reason or no reason, it's the truth I'm tellin' ye. Last fall, a year
gone, 'twas Sitka Charley and meself saw the sight, droppin' down the
riffle ye'll remember below Fort Reliance. An' regular fall weather it
was--the glint o' the sun on the golden larch an' the quakin' aspens;
an' the glister of light on ivery ripple; an' beyand, the winter an'
the blue haze of the North comin' down hand in hand. It's well ye know
the same, with a fringe to the river an' the ice formin' thick in the
eddies--an' a snap an' sparkle to the air, an' ye a-feelin' it through
all yer blood, a-takin' new lease of life with ivery suck of it. 'Tis
then, me boy, the world grows small an' the wandtherlust lays ye by the
heels.

'But it's meself as wandthers. As I was sayin', we a-paddlin', with
niver a sign of ice, barrin' that by the eddies, when the Injun lifts
his paddle an' sings out, "Lon McFane! Look ye below!" So have I heard,
but niver thought to see! As ye know, Sitka Charley, like meself, niver
drew first breath in the land; so the sight was new. Then we drifted,
with a head over ayther side, peerin' down through the sparkly water.
For the world like the days I spint with the pearlers, watchin' the
coral banks a-growin' the same as so many gardens under the sea. There
it was, the anchor-ice, clingin' an' clusterin' to ivery rock, after
the manner of the white coral.

'But the best of the sight was to come. Just after clearin' the tail of
the riffle, the water turns quick the color of milk, an' the top of it
in wee circles, as when the graylin' rise in the spring, or there's a
splatter of wet from the sky. 'Twas the anchor-ice comin' up. To the
right, to the lift, as far as iver a man cud see, the water was covered
with the same.

An' like so much porridge it was, slickin' along the bark of the canoe,
stickin' like glue to the paddles. It's many's the time I shot the
self-same riffle before, and it's many's the time after, but niver a
wink of the same have I seen. 'Twas the sight of a lifetime.' 'Do
tell!' dryly commented Bettles. 'D'ye think I'd b'lieve such a yarn?
I'd ruther say the glister of light'd gone to your eyes, and the snap
of the air to your tongue.' ''Twas me own eyes that beheld it, an' if
Sitka Charley was here, he'd be the lad to back me.' 'But facts is
facts, an' they ain't no gettin' round 'em. It ain't in the nature of
things for the water furtherest away from the air to freeze first.'
'But me own eyes-' 'Don't git het up over it,' admonished Bettles, as
the quick Celtic anger began to mount.

'Then yer not after belavin' me?' 'Sence you're so blamed forehanded
about it, no; I'd b'lieve nature first, and facts.'

'Is it the lie ye'd be givin' me?' threatened Lon. 'Ye'd better be
askin' that Siwash wife of yours. I'll lave it to her, for the truth I
spake.' Bettles flared up in sudden wrath. The Irishman had unwittingly
wounded him; for his wife was the half-breed daughter of a Russian
fur-trader, married to him in the Greek Mission of Nulato, a thousand
miles or so down the Yukon, thus being of much higher caste than the
common Siwash, or native, wife. It was a mere Northland nuance, which
none but the Northland adventurer may understand.

'I reckon you kin take it that way,' was his deliberate affirmation.

The next instant Lon McFane had stretched him on the floor, the circle
was broken up, and half a dozen men had stepped between.

Bettles came to his feet, wiping the blood from his mouth. 'It hain't
new, this takin' and payin' of blows, and don't you never think but
that this will be squared.' 'An' niver in me life did I take the lie
from mortal man,' was the retort courteous. 'An' it's an avil day I'll
not be to hand, waitin' an' willin' to help ye lift yer debts, barrin'
no manner of way.'

'Still got that 38-55?' Lon nodded.

'But you'd better git a more likely caliber. Mine'll rip holes through
you the size of walnuts.'

'Niver fear; it's me own slugs smell their way with soft noses, an'
they'll spread like flapjacks against the coming out beyand. An'
when'll I have the pleasure of waitin' on ye? The waterhole's a
strikin' locality.' ''Tain't bad. Jest be there in an hour, and you
won't set long on my coming.' Both men mittened and left the Post,
their ears closed to the remonstrances of their comrades. It was such a
little thing; yet with such men, little things, nourished by quick
tempers and stubborn natures, soon blossomed into big things.

Besides, the art of burning to bedrock still lay in the womb of the
future, and the men of Forty-Mile, shut in by the long Arctic winter,
grew high-stomached with overeating and enforced idleness, and became
as irritable as do the bees in the fall of the year when the hives are
overstocked with honey.

There was no law in the land. The mounted police was also a thing of
the future. Each man measured an offense, and meted out the punishment
inasmuch as it affected himself.

Rarely had combined action been necessary, and never in all the dreary
history of the camp had the eighth article of the Decalogue been
violated.

Big Jim Belden called an impromptu meeting. Scruff Mackenzie was placed
as temporary chairman, and a messenger dispatched to solicit Father
Roubeau's good offices. Their position was paradoxical, and they knew
it. By the right of might could they interfere to prevent the duel; yet
such action, while in direct line with their wishes, went counter to
their opinions. While their rough-hewn, obsolete ethics recognized the
individual prerogative of wiping out blow with blow, they could not
bear to think of two good comrades, such as Bettles and McFane, meeting
in deadly battle. Deeming the man who would not fight on provocation a
dastard, when brought to the test it seemed wrong that he should fight.

But a scurry of moccasins and loud cries, rounded off with a
pistol-shot, interrupted the discussion. Then the storm-doors opened
and Malemute Kid entered, a smoking Colt's in his hand, and a merry
light in his eye.

'I got him.' He replaced the empty shell, and added, 'Your dog,
Scruff.' 'Yellow Fang?'

Mackenzie asked.

'No; the lop-eared one.' 'The devil! Nothing the matter with him.'
'Come out and take a look.' 'That's all right after all. Buess he's got
'em, too. Yellow Fang came back this morning and took a chunk out of
him, and came near to making a widower of me. Made a rush for Zarinska,
but she whisked her skirts in his face and escaped with the loss of the
same and a good roll in the snow. Then he took to the woods again. Hope
he don't come back. Lost any yourself?' 'One--the best one of the
pack--Shookum. Started amuck this morning, but didn't get very far. Ran
foul of Sitka Charley's team, and they scattered him all over the
street. And now two of them are loose, and raging mad; so you see he
got his work in. The dog census will be small in the spring if we don't
do something.'

'And the man census, too.' 'How's that? Who's in trouble now?' 'Oh,
Bettles and Lon McFane had an argument, and they'll be down by the
waterhole in a few minutes to settle it.' The incident was repeated for
his benefit, and Malemute Kid, accustomed to an obedience which his
fellow men never failed to render, took charge of the affair. His
quickly formulated plan was explained, and they promised to follow his
lead implicitly.

'So you see,' he concluded, 'we do not actually take away their
privilege of fighting; and yet I don't believe they'll fight when they
see the beauty of the scheme. Life's a game and men the gamblers.
They'll stake their whole pile on the one chance in a thousand.

'Take away that one chance, and--they won't play.' He turned to the man
in charge of the Post. 'Storekeeper, weight out three fathoms of your
best half-inch manila.

'We'll establish a precedent which will last the men of Forty-Mile to
the end of time,' he prophesied. Then he coiled the rope about his arm
and led his followers out of doors, just in time to meet the principals.

'What danged right'd he to fetch my wife in?' thundered Bettles to the
soothing overtures of a friend. ''Twa'n't called for,' he concluded
decisively. ''Twa'n't called for,' he reiterated again and again,
pacing up and down and waiting for Lon McFane.

And Lon McFane--his face was hot and tongue rapid as he flaunted
insurrection in the face of the Church. 'Then, father,' he cried, 'it's
with an aisy heart I'll roll in me flamy blankets, the broad of me back
on a bed of coals. Niver shall it be said that Lon McFane took a lie
'twixt the teeth without iver liftin' a hand! An' I'll not ask a
blessin'. The years have been wild, but it's the heart was in the right
place.' 'But it's not the heart, Lon,' interposed Father Roubeau; 'It's
pride that bids you forth to slay your fellow man.' 'Yer Frinch,' Lon
replied. And then, turning to leave him, 'An' will ye say a mass if the
luck is against me?' But the priest smiled, thrust his moccasined feet
to the fore, and went out upon the white breast of the silent river. A
packed trail, the width of a sixteen-inch sled, led out to the
waterhole. On either side lay the deep, soft snow. The men trod in
single file, without conversation; and the black-stoled priest in their
midst gave to the function the solemn aspect of a funeral. It was a
warm winter's day for Forty-Mile--a day in which the sky, filled with
heaviness, drew closer to the earth, and the mercury sought the
unwonted level of twenty below. But there was no cheer in the warmth.
There was little air in the upper strata, and the clouds hung
motionless, giving sullen promise of an early snowfall. And the earth,
unresponsive, made no preparation, content in its hibernation.

When the waterhole was reached, Bettles, having evidently reviewed the
quarrel during the silent walk, burst out in a final ''Twa'n't called
for,' while Lon McFane kept grim silence. Indignation so choked him
that he could not speak.

Yet deep down, whenever their own wrongs were not uppermost, both men
wondered at their comrades. They had expected opposition, and this
tacit acquiescence hurt them. It seemed more was due them from the men
they had been so close with, and they felt a vague sense of wrong,
rebelling at the thought of so many of their brothers coming out, as on
a gala occasion, without one word of protest, to see them shoot each
other down. It appeared their worth had diminished in the eyes of the
community. The proceedings puzzled them.

'Back to back, David. An' will it be fifty paces to the man, or double
the quantity?'

'Fifty,' was the sanguinary reply, grunted out, yet sharply cut.

But the new manila, not prominently displayed, but casually coiled
about Malemute Kid's arm, caught the quick eye of the Irishman, and
thrilled him with a suspicious fear.

'An' what are ye doin' with the rope?' 'Hurry up!' Malemute Kid glanced
at his watch.

'I've a batch of bread in the cabin, and I don't want it to fall.
Besides, my feet are getting cold.' The rest of the men manifested
their impatience in various suggestive ways.

'But the rope, Kid' It's bran' new, an' sure yer bread's not that heavy
it needs raisin' with the like of that?' Bettles by this time had faced
around. Father Roubeau, the humor of the situation just dawning on him,
hid a smile behind his mittened hand.

'No, Lon; this rope was made for a man.' Malemute Kid could be very
impressive on occasion.

'What man?' Bettles was becoming aware of a personal interest.

'The other man.' 'An' which is the one ye'd mane by that?' 'Listen,
Lon--and you, too, Bettles! We've been talking this little trouble of
yours over, and we've come to one conclusion. We know we have no right
to stop your fighting-' 'True for ye, me lad!' 'And we're not going to.
But this much we can do, and shall do--make this the only duel in the
history of Forty-Mile, set an example for every che-cha-qua that comes
up or down the Yukon. The man who escapes killing shall be hanged to
the nearest tree. Now, go ahead!'

Lon smiled dubiously, then his face lighted up. 'Pace her off,
David--fifty paces, wheel, an' niver a cease firin' till a lad's down
for good. 'Tis their hearts'll niver let them do the deed, an' it's
well ye should know it for a true Yankee bluff.'

He started off with a pleased grin on his face, but Malemute Kid halted
him.

'Lon! It's a long while since you first knew me?' 'Many's the day.'
'And you, Bettles?'

'Five year next June high water.' 'And have you once, in all that time,
known me to break my word' Or heard of me breaking it?' Both men shook
their heads, striving to fathom what lay beyond.

'Well, then, what do you think of a promise made by me?' 'As good as
your bond,' from Bettles.

'The thing to safely sling yer hopes of heaven by,' promptly endorsed
Lon McFane.

'Listen! I, Malemute Kid, give you my word--and you know what that
means that the man who is not shot stretches rope within ten minutes
after the shooting.' He stepped back as Pilate might have done after
washing his hands.

A pause and a silence came over the men of Forty-Mile. The sky drew
still closer, sending down a crystal flight of frost--little geometric
designs, perfect, evanescent as a breath, yet destined to exist till
the returning sun had covered half its northern journey.

Both men had led forlorn hopes in their time--led with a curse or a
jest on their tongues, and in their souls an unswerving faith in the
God of Chance. But that merciful deity had been shut out from the
present deal. They studied the face of Malemute Kid, but they studied
as one might the Sphinx. As the quiet minutes passed, a feeling that
speech was incumbent on them began to grow. At last the howl of a
wolf-dog cracked the silence from the direction of Forty-Mile. The
weird sound swelled with all the pathos of a breaking heart, then died
away in a long-drawn sob.

'Well I be danged!' Bettles turned up the collar of his mackinaw jacket
and stared about him helplessly.

'It's a gloryus game yer runnin', Kid,' cried Lon McFane. 'All the
percentage of the house an' niver a bit to the man that's buckin'. The
Devil himself'd niver tackle such a cinch--and damned if I do.' There
were chuckles, throttled in gurgling throats, and winks brushed away
with the frost which rimed the eyelashes, as the men climbed the
ice-notched bank and started across the street to the Post. But the
long howl had drawn nearer, invested with a new note of menace. A woman
screamed round the corner. There was a cry of, 'Here he comes!' Then an
Indian boy, at the head of half a dozen frightened dogs, racing with
death, dashed into the crowd. And behind came Yellow Fang, a bristle of
hair and a flash of gray. Everybody but the Yankee fled.

The Indian boy had tripped and fallen. Bettles stopped long enough to
grip him by the slack of his furs, then headed for a pile of cordwood
already occupied by a number of his comrades. Yellow Fang, doubling
after one of the dogs, came leaping back. The fleeing animal, free of
the rabies, but crazed with fright, whipped Bettles off his feet and
flashed on up the street. Malemute Kid took a flying shot at Yellow
Fang. The mad dog whirled a half airspring, came down on his back,
then, with a single leap, covered half the distance between himself and
Bettles.

But the fatal spring was intercepted. Lon McFane leaped from the
woodpile, countering him in midair. Over they rolled, Lon holding him
by the throat at arm's length, blinking under the fetid slaver which
sprayed his face. Then Bettles, revolver in hand and coolly waiting a
chance, settled the combat.

''Twas a square game, Kid,' Lon remarked, rising to his feet and
shaking the snow from out his sleeves; 'with a fair percentage to
meself that bucked it.' That night, while Lon McFane sought the
forgiving arms of the Church in the direction of Father Roubeau's
cabin, Malemute Kid talked long to little purpose.

'But would you,' persisted Mackenzie, 'supposing they had fought?'
'Have I ever broken my word?' 'No; but that isn't the point. Answer the
question. Would you?' Malemute Kid straightened up. 'Scruff, I've been
asking myself that question ever since, and--'

'Well?'

'Well, as yet, I haven't found the answer.'



In a Far Country

When a man journeys into a far country, he must be prepared to forget
many of the things he has learned, and to acquire such customs as are
inherent with existence in the new land; he must abandon the old ideals
and the old gods, and oftentimes he must reverse the very codes by
which his conduct has hitherto been shaped. To those who have the
protean faculty of adaptability, the novelty of such change may even be
a source of pleasure; but to those who happen to be hardened to the
ruts in which they were created, the pressure of the altered
environment is unbearable, and they chafe in body and in spirit under
the new restrictions which they do not understand. This chafing is
bound to act and react, producing divers evils and leading to various
misfortunes. It were better for the man who cannot fit himself to the
new groove to return to his own country; if he delay too long, he will
surely die.

The man who turns his back upon the comforts of an elder civilization,
to face the savage youth, the primordial simplicity of the North, may
estimate success at an inverse ratio to the quantity and quality of his
hopelessly fixed habits. He will soon discover, if he be a fit
candidate, that the material habits are the less important. The
exchange of such things as a dainty menu for rough fare, of the stiff
leather shoe for the soft, shapeless moccasin, of the feather bed for a
couch in the snow, is after all a very easy matter. But his pinch will
come in learning properly to shape his mind's attitude toward all
things, and especially toward his fellow man. For the courtesies of
ordinary life, he must substitute unselfishness, forbearance, and
tolerance. Thus, and thus only, can he gain that pearl of great
price--true comradeship. He must not say 'thank you'; he must mean it
without opening his mouth, and prove it by responding in kind. In
short, he must substitute the deed for the word, the spirit for the
letter.

When the world rang with the tale of Arctic gold, and the lure of the
North gripped the heartstrings of men, Carter Weatherbee threw up his
snug clerkship, turned the half of his savings over to his wife, and
with the remainder bought an outfit. There was no romance in his
nature--the bondage of commerce had crushed all that; he was simply
tired of the ceaseless grind, and wished to risk great hazards in view
of corresponding returns. Like many another fool, disdaining the old
trails used by the Northland pioneers for a score of years, he hurried
to Edmonton in the spring of the year; and there, unluckily for his
soul's welfare, he allied himself with a party of men.

There was nothing unusual about this party, except its plans. Even its
goal, like that of all the other parties, was the Klondike. But the
route it had mapped out to attain that goal took away the breath of the
hardiest native, born and bred to the vicissitudes of the Northwest.
Even Jacques Baptiste, born of a Chippewa woman and a renegade voyageur
(having raised his first whimpers in a deerskin lodge north of the
sixty-fifth parallel, and had the same hushed by blissful sucks of raw
tallow), was surprised. Though he sold his services to them and agreed
to travel even to the never-opening ice, he shook his head ominously
whenever his advice was asked.

Percy Cuthfert's evil star must have been in the ascendant, for he,
too, joined this company of argonauts. He was an ordinary man, with a
bank account as deep as his culture, which is saying a good deal. He
had no reason to embark on such a venture--no reason in the world save
that he suffered from an abnormal development of sentimentality. He
mistook this for the true spirit of romance and adventure. Many another
man has done the like, and made as fatal a mistake.

The first break-up of spring found the party following the ice-run of
Elk River. It was an imposing fleet, for the outfit was large, and they
were accompanied by a disreputable contingent of half-breed voyageurs
with their women and children. Day in and day out, they labored with
the bateaux and canoes, fought mosquitoes and other kindred pests, or
sweated and swore at the portages. Severe toil like this lays a man
naked to the very roots of his soul, and ere Lake Athabasca was lost in
the south, each member of the party had hoisted his true colors.

The two shirks and chronic grumblers were Carter Weatherbee and Percy
Cuthfert. The whole party complained less of its aches and pains than
did either of them. Not once did they volunteer for the thousand and
one petty duties of the camp. A bucket of water to be brought, an extra
armful of wood to be chopped, the dishes to be washed and wiped, a
search to be made through the outfit for some suddenly indispensable
article--and these two effete scions of civilization discovered sprains
or blisters requiring instant attention.

They were the first to turn in at night, with score of tasks yet
undone; the last to turn out in the morning, when the start should be
in readiness before the breakfast was begun.

They were the first to fall to at mealtime, the last to have a hand in
the cooking; the first to dive for a slim delicacy, the last to
discover they had added to their own another man's share. If they
toiled at the oars, they slyly cut the water at each stroke and allowed
the boat's momentum to float up the blade. They thought nobody noticed;
but their comrades swore under their breaths and grew to hate them,
while Jacques Baptiste sneered openly and damned them from morning till
night. But Jacques Baptiste was no gentleman.

At the Great Slave, Hudson Bay dogs were purchased, and the fleet sank
to the guards with its added burden of dried fish and pemican. Then
canoe and bateau answered to the swift current of the Mackenzie, and
they plunged into the Great Barren Ground. Every likely-looking
'feeder' was prospected, but the elusive 'pay-dirt' danced ever to the
north. At the Great Bear, overcome by the common dread of the Unknown
Lands, their voyageurs began to desert, and Fort of Good Hope saw the
last and bravest bending to the towlines as they bucked the current
down which they had so treacherously glided.

Jacques Baptiste alone remained. Had he not sworn to travel even to the
never-opening ice? The lying charts, compiled in main from hearsay,
were now constantly consulted.

And they felt the need of hurry, for the sun had already passed its
northern solstice and was leading the winter south again. Skirting the
shores of the bay, where the Mackenzie disembogues into the Arctic
Ocean, they entered the mouth of the Little Peel River. Then began the
arduous up-stream toil, and the two Incapables fared worse than ever.
Towline and pole, paddle and tumpline, rapids and portages--such
tortures served to give the one a deep disgust for great hazards, and
printed for the other a fiery text on the true romance of adventure.
One day they waxed mutinous, and being vilely cursed by Jacques
Baptiste, turned, as worms sometimes will. But the half-breed thrashed
the twain, and sent them, bruised and bleeding, about their work. It
was the first time either had been manhandled.

Abandoning their river craft at the headwaters of the Little Peel, they
consumed the rest of the summer in the great portage over the Mackenzie
watershed to the West Rat. This little stream fed the Porcupine, which
in turn joined the Yukon where that mighty highway of the North
countermarches on the Arctic Circle.

But they had lost in the race with winter, and one day they tied their
rafts to the thick eddy-ice and hurried their goods ashore. That night
the river jammed and broke several times; the following morning it had
fallen asleep for good. 'We can't be more'n four hundred miles from the
Yukon,' concluded Sloper, multiplying his thumb nails by the scale of
the map. The council, in which the two Incapables had whined to
excellent disadvantage, was drawing to a close.

'Hudson Bay Post, long time ago. No use um now.' Jacques Baptiste's
father had made the trip for the Fur Company in the old days,
incidentally marking the trail with a couple of frozen toes.

Sufferin' cracky!' cried another of the party. 'No whites?' 'Nary
white,' Sloper sententiously affirmed; 'but it's only five hundred more
up the Yukon to Dawson. Call it a rough thousand from here.' Weatherbee
and Cuthfert groaned in chorus.

'How long'll that take, Baptiste?' The half-breed figured for a moment.
'Workum like hell, no man play out, ten--twenty--forty--fifty days. Um
babies come' (designating the Incapables), 'no can tell. Mebbe when
hell freeze over; mebbe not then.' The manufacture of snowshoes and
moccasins ceased. Somebody called the name of an absent member, who
came out of an ancient cabin at the edge of the campfire and joined
them. The cabin was one of the many mysteries which lurk in the vast
recesses of the North. Built when and by whom, no man could tell.

Two graves in the open, piled high with stones, perhaps contained the
secret of those early wanderers. But whose hand had piled the stones?
The moment had come. Jacques Baptiste paused in the fitting of a
harness and pinned the struggling dog in the snow. The cook made mute
protest for delay, threw a handful of bacon into a noisy pot of beans,
then came to attention. Sloper rose to his feet. His body was a
ludicrous contrast to the healthy physiques of the Incapables. Yellow
and weak, fleeing from a South American fever-hole, he had not broken
his flight across the zones, and was still able to toil with men. His
weight was probably ninety pounds, with the heavy hunting knife thrown
in, and his grizzled hair told of a prime which had ceased to be. The
fresh young muscles of either Weatherbee or Cuthfert were equal to ten
times the endeavor of his; yet he could walk them into the earth in a
day's journey. And all this day he had whipped his stronger comrades
into venturing a thousand miles of the stiffest hardship man can
conceive. He was the incarnation of the unrest of his race, and the old
Teutonic stubbornness, dashed with the quick grasp and action of the
Yankee, held the flesh in the bondage of the spirit.

'All those in favor of going on with the dogs as soon as the ice sets,
say ay.' 'Ay!' rang out eight voices--voices destined to string a trail
of oaths along many a hundred miles of pain.

'Contrary minded?' 'No!' For the first time the Incapables were united
without some compromise of personal interests.

'And what are you going to do about it?' Weatherbee added belligerently.

'Majority rule! Majority rule!' clamored the rest of the party.

'I know the expedition is liable to fall through if you don't come,'
Sloper replied sweetly; 'but I guess, if we try real hard, we can
manage to do without you.

What do you say, boys?' The sentiment was cheered to the echo.

'But I say, you know,' Cuthfert ventured apprehensively; 'what's a chap
like me to do?'

'Ain't you coming with us.' 'No--o.' 'Then do as you damn well please.
We won't have nothing to say.' 'Kind o' calkilate yuh might settle it
with that canoodlin' pardner of yourn,' suggested a heavy-going
Westerner from the Dakotas, at the same time pointing out Weatherbee.
'He'll be shore to ask yuh what yur a-goin' to do when it comes to
cookin' an' gatherin' the wood.' 'Then we'll consider it all arranged,'
concluded Sloper.

'We'll pull out tomorrow, if we camp within five miles--just to get
everything in running order and remember if we've forgotten anything.'
The sleds groaned by on their steel-shod runners, and the dogs strained
low in the harnesses in which they were born to die.

Jacques Baptiste paused by the side of Sloper to get a last glimpse of
the cabin. The smoke curled up pathetically from the Yukon stovepipe.
The two Incapables were watching them from the doorway.

Sloper laid his hand on the other's shoulder.

'Jacques Baptiste, did you ever hear of the Kilkenny cats?' The
half-breed shook his head.

'Well, my friend and good comrade, the Kilkenny cats fought till
neither hide, nor hair, nor yowl, was left. You understand?--till
nothing was left. Very good.

Now, these two men don't like work. They'll be all alone in that cabin
all winter--a mighty long, dark winter. Kilkenny cats--well?' The
Frenchman in Baptiste shrugged his shoulders, but the Indian in him was
silent. Nevertheless, it was an eloquent shrug, pregnant with prophecy.
Things prospered in the little cabin at first. The rough badinage of
their comrades had made Weatherbee and Cuthfert conscious of the mutual
responsibility which had devolved upon them; besides, there was not so
much work after all for two healthy men. And the removal of the cruel
whiphand, or in other words the bulldozing half-breed, had brought with
it a joyous reaction. At first, each strove to outdo the other, and
they performed petty tasks with an unction which would have opened the
eyes of their comrades who were now wearing out bodies and souls on the
Long Trail.

All care was banished. The forest, which shouldered in upon them from
three sides, was an inexhaustible woodyard. A few yards from their door
slept the Porcupine, and a hole through its winter robe formed a
bubbling spring of water, crystal clear and painfully cold. But they
soon grew to find fault with even that. The hole would persist in
freezing up, and thus gave them many a miserable hour of ice-chopping.
The unknown builders of the cabin had extended the sidelogs so as to
support a cache at the rear. In this was stored the bulk of the party's
provisions.

Food there was, without stint, for three times the men who were fated
to live upon it. But the most of it was the kind which built up brawn
and sinew, but did not tickle the palate.

True, there was sugar in plenty for two ordinary men; but these two
were little else than children. They early discovered the virtues of
hot water judiciously saturated with sugar, and they prodigally swam
their flapjacks and soaked their crusts in the rich, white syrup.

Then coffee and tea, and especially the dried fruits, made disastrous
inroads upon it. The first words they had were over the sugar question.
And it is a really serious thing when two men, wholly dependent upon
each other for company, begin to quarrel.

Weatherbee loved to discourse blatantly on politics, while Cuthfert,
who had been prone to clip his coupons and let the commonwealth jog on
as best it might, either ignored the subject or delivered himself of
startling epigrams. But the clerk was too obtuse to appreciate the
clever shaping of thought, and this waste of ammunition irritated
Cuthfert.

He had been used to blinding people by his brilliancy, and it worked
him quite a hardship, this loss of an audience. He felt personally
aggrieved and unconsciously held his muttonhead companion responsible
for it.

Save existence, they had nothing in common--came in touch on no single
point.

Weatherbee was a clerk who had known naught but clerking all his life;
Cuthfert was a master of arts, a dabbler in oils, and had written not a
little. The one was a lower-class man who considered himself a
gentleman, and the other was a gentleman who knew himself to be such.
From this it may be remarked that a man can be a gentleman without
possessing the first instinct of true comradeship. The clerk was as
sensuous as the other was aesthetic, and his love adventures, told at
great length and chiefly coined from his imagination, affected the
supersensitive master of arts in the same way as so many whiffs of
sewer gas. He deemed the clerk a filthy, uncultured brute, whose place
was in the muck with the swine, and told him so; and he was
reciprocally informed that he was a milk-and-water sissy and a cad.
Weatherbee could not have defined 'cad' for his life; but it satisfied
its purpose, which after all seems the main point in life.

Weatherbee flatted every third note and sang such songs as 'The Boston
Burglar' and 'the Handsome Cabin Boy,' for hours at a time, while
Cuthfert wept with rage, till he could stand it no longer and fled into
the outer cold. But there was no escape. The intense frost could not be
endured for long at a time, and the little cabin crowded them--beds,
stove, table, and all--into a space of ten by twelve. The very presence
of either became a personal affront to the other, and they lapsed into
sullen silences which increased in length and strength as the days went
by. Occasionally, the flash of an eye or the curl of a lip got the
better of them, though they strove to wholly ignore each other during
these mute periods.

And a great wonder sprang up in the breast of each, as to how God had
ever come to create the other.

With little to do, time became an intolerable burden to them. This
naturally made them still lazier. They sank into a physical lethargy
which there was no escaping, and which made them rebel at the
performance of the smallest chore. One morning when it was his turn to
cook the common breakfast, Weatherbee rolled out of his blankets, and
to the snoring of his companion, lighted first the slush lamp and then
the fire. The kettles were frozen hard, and there was no water in the
cabin with which to wash. But he did not mind that. Waiting for it to
thaw, he sliced the bacon and plunged into the hateful task of
bread-making. Cuthfert had been slyly watching through his half-closed
lids.

Consequently there was a scene, in which they fervently blessed each
other, and agreed, henceforth, that each do his own cooking. A week
later, Cuthfert neglected his morning ablutions, but none the less
complacently ate the meal which he had cooked. Weatherbee grinned.
After that the foolish custom of washing passed out of their lives.

As the sugar-pile and other little luxuries dwindled, they began to be
afraid they were not getting their proper shares, and in order that
they might not be robbed, they fell to gorging themselves. The luxuries
suffered in this gluttonous contest, as did also the men.

In the absence of fresh vegetables and exercise, their blood became
impoverished, and a loathsome, purplish rash crept over their bodies.
Yet they refused to heed the warning.

Next, their muscles and joints began to swell, the flesh turning black,
while their mouths, gums, and lips took on the color of rich cream.
Instead of being drawn together by their misery, each gloated over the
other's symptoms as the scurvy took its course.

They lost all regard for personal appearance, and for that matter,
common decency. The cabin became a pigpen, and never once were the beds
made or fresh pine boughs laid underneath. Yet they could not keep to
their blankets, as they would have wished; for the frost was
inexorable, and the fire box consumed much fuel. The hair of their
heads and faces grew long and shaggy, while their garments would have
disgusted a ragpicker. But they did not care. They were sick, and there
was no one to see; besides, it was very painful to move about.

To all this was added a new trouble--the Fear of the North. This Fear
was the joint child of the Great Cold and the Great Silence, and was
born in the darkness of December, when the sun dipped below the horizon
for good. It affected them according to their natures.

Weatherbee fell prey to the grosser superstitions, and did his best to
resurrect the spirits which slept in the forgotten graves. It was a
fascinating thing, and in his dreams they came to him from out of the
cold, and snuggled into his blankets, and told him of their toils and
troubles ere they died. He shrank away from the clammy contact as they
drew closer and twined their frozen limbs about him, and when they
whispered in his ear of things to come, the cabin rang with his
frightened shrieks. Cuthfert did not understand--for they no longer
spoke--and when thus awakened he invariably grabbed for his revolver.
Then he would sit up in bed, shivering nervously, with the weapon
trained on the unconscious dreamer. Cuthfert deemed the man going mad,
and so came to fear for his life.

His own malady assumed a less concrete form. The mysterious artisan who
had laid the cabin, log by log, had pegged a wind-vane to the
ridgepole. Cuthfert noticed it always pointed south, and one day,
irritated by its steadfastness of purpose, he turned it toward the
east. He watched eagerly, but never a breath came by to disturb it.
Then he turned the vane to the north, swearing never again to touch it
till the wind did blow. But the air frightened him with its unearthly
calm, and he often rose in the middle of the night to see if the vane
had veered--ten degrees would have satisfied him. But no, it poised
above him as unchangeable as fate.

His imagination ran riot, till it became to him a fetish. Sometimes he
followed the path it pointed across the dismal dominions, and allowed
his soul to become saturated with the Fear. He dwelt upon the unseen
and the unknown till the burden of eternity appeared to be crushing
him. Everything in the Northland had that crushing effect--the absence
of life and motion; the darkness; the infinite peace of the brooding
land; the ghastly silence, which made the echo of each heartbeat a
sacrilege; the solemn forest which seemed to guard an awful,
inexpressible something, which neither word nor thought could compass.

The world he had so recently left, with its busy nations and great
enterprises, seemed very far away. Recollections occasionally
obtruded--recollections of marts and galleries and crowded
thoroughfares, of evening dress and social functions, of good men and
dear women he had known--but they were dim memories of a life he had
lived long centuries agone, on some other planet. This phantasm was the
Reality. Standing beneath the wind-vane, his eyes fixed on the polar
skies, he could not bring himself to realize that the Southland really
existed, that at that very moment it was a-roar with life and action.

There was no Southland, no men being born of women, no giving and
taking in marriage.

Beyond his bleak skyline there stretched vast solitudes, and beyond
these still vaster solitudes.

There were no lands of sunshine, heavy with the perfume of flowers.
Such things were only old dreams of paradise. The sunlands of the West
and the spicelands of the East, the smiling Arcadias and blissful
Islands of the Blest--ha! ha! His laughter split the void and shocked
him with its unwonted sound. There was no sun.

This was the Universe, dead and cold and dark, and he its only citizen.
Weatherbee? At such moments Weatherbee did not count. He was a Caliban,
a monstrous phantom, fettered to him for untold ages, the penalty of
some forgotten crime.

He lived with Death among the dead, emasculated by the sense of his own
insignificance, crushed by the passive mastery of the slumbering ages.
The magnitude of all things appalled him. Everything partook of the
superlative save himself--the perfect cessation of wind and motion, the
immensity of the snow-covered wildness, the height of the sky and the
depth of the silence. That wind-vane--if it would only move. If a
thunderbolt would fall, or the forest flare up in flame.

The rolling up of the heavens as a scroll, the crash of Doom--anything,
anything! But no, nothing moved; the Silence crowded in, and the Fear
of the North laid icy fingers on his heart.

Once, like another Crusoe, by the edge of the river he came upon a
track--the faint tracery of a snowshoe rabbit on the delicate
snow-crust. It was a revelation.

There was life in the Northland. He would follow it, look upon it,
gloat over it.

He forgot his swollen muscles, plunging through the deep snow in an
ecstasy of anticipation. The forest swallowed him up, and the brief
midday twilight vanished; but he pursued his quest till exhausted
nature asserted itself and laid him helpless in the snow.

There he groaned and cursed his folly, and knew the track to be the
fancy of his brain; and late that night he dragged himself into the
cabin on hands and knees, his cheeks frozen and a strange numbness
about his feet. Weatherbee grinned malevolently, but made no offer to
help him. He thrust needles into his toes and thawed them out by the
stove. A week later mortification set in.

But the clerk had his own troubles. The dead men came out of their
graves more frequently now, and rarely left him, waking or sleeping. He
grew to wait and dread their coming, never passing the twin cairns
without a shudder. One night they came to him in his sleep and led him
forth to an appointed task. Frightened into inarticulate horror, he
awoke between the heaps of stones and fled wildly to the cabin. But he
had lain there for some time, for his feet and cheeks were also frozen.

Sometimes he became frantic at their insistent presence, and danced
about the cabin, cutting the empty air with an axe, and smashing
everything within reach.

During these ghostly encounters, Cuthfert huddled into his blankets and
followed the madman about with a cocked revolver, ready to shoot him if
he came too near.

But, recovering from one of these spells, the clerk noticed the weapon
trained upon him.

His suspicions were aroused, and thenceforth he, too, lived in fear of
his life. They watched each other closely after that, and faced about
in startled fright whenever either passed behind the other's back. The
apprehensiveness became a mania which controlled them even in their
sleep. Through mutual fear they tacitly let the slush-lamp burn all
night, and saw to a plentiful supply of bacon-grease before retiring.
The slightest movement on the part of one was sufficient to arouse the
other, and many a still watch their gazes countered as they shook
beneath their blankets with fingers on the trigger-guards.

What with the Fear of the North, the mental strain, and the ravages of
the disease, they lost all semblance of humanity, taking on the
appearance of wild beasts, hunted and desperate. Their cheeks and
noses, as an aftermath of the freezing, had turned black.

Their frozen toes had begun to drop away at the first and second
joints. Every movement brought pain, but the fire box was insatiable,
wringing a ransom of torture from their miserable bodies. Day in, day
out, it demanded its food--a veritable pound of flesh--and they dragged
themselves into the forest to chop wood on their knees. Once, crawling
thus in search of dry sticks, unknown to each other they entered a
thicket from opposite sides.

Suddenly, without warning, two peering death's-heads confronted each
other. Suffering had so transformed them that recognition was
impossible. They sprang to their feet, shrieking with terror, and
dashed away on their mangled stumps; and falling at the cabin's door,
they clawed and scratched like demons till they discovered their
mistake.

Occasionally they lapsed normal, and during one of these sane
intervals, the chief bone of contention, the sugar, had been divided
equally between them. They guarded their separate sacks, stored up in
the cache, with jealous eyes; for there were but a few cupfuls left,
and they were totally devoid of faith in each other.

But one day Cuthfert made a mistake. Hardly able to move, sick with
pain, with his head swimming and eyes blinded, he crept into the cache,
sugar canister in hand, and mistook Weatherbee's sack for his own.

January had been born but a few days when this occurred. The sun had
some time since passed its lowest southern declination, and at meridian
now threw flaunting streaks of yellow light upon the northern sky. On
the day following his mistake with the sugar-bag, Cuthfert found
himself feeling better, both in body and in spirit. As noontime drew
near and the day brightened, he dragged himself outside to feast on the
evanescent glow, which was to him an earnest of the sun's future
intentions. Weatherbee was also feeling somewhat better, and crawled
out beside him. They propped themselves in the snow beneath the
moveless wind-vane, and waited.

The stillness of death was about them. In other climes, when nature
falls into such moods, there is a subdued air of expectancy, a waiting
for some small voice to take up the broken strain. Not so in the North.
The two men had lived seeming eons in this ghostly peace.

They could remember no song of the past; they could conjure no song of
the future. This unearthly calm had always been--the tranquil silence
of eternity.

Their eyes were fixed upon the north. Unseen, behind their backs,
behind the towering mountains to the south, the sun swept toward the
zenith of another sky than theirs. Sole spectators of the mighty
canvas, they watched the false dawn slowly grow. A faint flame began to
glow and smoulder. It deepened in intensity, ringing the changes of
reddish-yellow, purple, and saffron. So bright did it become that
Cuthfert thought the sun must surely be behind it--a miracle, the sun
rising in the north! Suddenly, without warning and without fading, the
canvas was swept clean. There was no color in the sky. The light had
gone out of the day.

They caught their breaths in half-sobs. But lo! the air was aglint with
particles of scintillating frost, and there, to the north, the
wind-vane lay in vague outline of the snow.

A shadow! A shadow! It was exactly midday. They jerked their heads
hurriedly to the south. A golden rim peeped over the mountain's snowy
shoulder, smiled upon them an instant, then dipped from sight again.

There were tears in their eyes as they sought each other. A strange
softening came over them. They felt irresistibly drawn toward each
other. The sun was coming back again. It would be with them tomorrow,
and the next day, and the next.

And it would stay longer every visit, and a time would come when it
would ride their heaven day and night, never once dropping below the
skyline. There would be no night.

The ice-locked winter would be broken; the winds would blow and the
forests answer; the land would bathe in the blessed sunshine, and life
renew.

Hand in hand, they would quit this horrid dream and journey back to the
Southland. They lurched blindly forward, and their hands met--their
poor maimed hands, swollen and distorted beneath their mittens.

But the promise was destined to remain unfulfilled. The Northland is
the Northland, and men work out their souls by strange rules, which
other men, who have not journeyed into far countries, cannot come to
understand.

An hour later, Cuthfert put a pan of bread into the oven, and fell to
speculating on what the surgeons could do with his feet when he got
back. Home did not seem so very far away now. Weatherbee was rummaging
in the cache. Of a sudden, he raised a whirlwind of blasphemy, which in
turn ceased with startling abruptness. The other man had robbed his
sugar-sack. Still, things might have happened differently, had not the
two dead men come out from under the stones and hushed the hot words in
his throat. They led him quite gently from the cache, which he forgot
to close. That consummation was reached; that something they had
whispered to him in his dreams was about to happen. They guided him
gently, very gently, to the woodpile, where they put the axe in his
hands.

Then they helped him shove open the cabin door, and he felt sure they
shut it after him--at least he heard it slam and the latch fall sharply
into place. And he knew they were waiting just without, waiting for him
to do his task.

'Carter! I say, Carter!' Percy Cuthfert was frightened at the look on
the clerk's face, and he made haste to put the table between them.

Carter Weatherbee followed, without haste and without enthusiasm. There
was neither pity nor passion in his face, but rather the patient,
stolid look of one who has certain work to do and goes about it
methodically.

'I say, what's the matter?'

The clerk dodged back, cutting off his retreat to the door, but never
opening his mouth.

'I say, Carter, I say; let's talk. There's a good chap.' The master of
arts was thinking rapidly, now, shaping a skillful flank movement on
the bed where his Smith & Wesson lay. Keeping his eyes on the madman,
he rolled backward on the bunk, at the same time clutching the pistol.

'Carter!' The powder flashed full in Weatherbee's face, but he swung
his weapon and leaped forward. The axe bit deeply at the base of the
spine, and Percy Cuthfert felt all consciousness of his lower limbs
leave him. Then the clerk fell heavily upon him, clutching him by the
throat with feeble fingers. The sharp bite of the axe had caused
Cuthfert to drop the pistol, and as his lungs panted for release, he
fumbled aimlessly for it among the blankets. Then he remembered. He
slid a hand up the clerk's belt to the sheath-knife; and they drew very
close to each other in that last clinch.

Percy Cuthfert felt his strength leave him. The lower portion of his
body was useless, The inert weight of Weatherbee crushed him--crushed
him and pinned him there like a bear under a trap. The cabin became
filled with a familiar odor, and he knew the bread to be burning. Yet
what did it matter? He would never need it. And there were all of six
cupfuls of sugar in the cache--if he had foreseen this he would not
have been so saving the last several days. Would the wind-vane ever
move? Why not' Had he not seen the sun today? He would go and see. No;
it was impossible to move. He had not thought the clerk so heavy a man.

How quickly the cabin cooled! The fire must be out. The cold was
forcing in.

It must be below zero already, and the ice creeping up the inside of
the door. He could not see it, but his past experience enabled him to
gauge its progress by the cabin's temperature. The lower hinge must be
white ere now. Would the tale of this ever reach the world? How would
his friends take it? They would read it over their coffee, most likely,
and talk it over at the clubs. He could see them very clearly, 'Poor
Old Cuthfert,' they murmured; 'not such a bad sort of a chap, after
all.' He smiled at their eulogies, and passed on in search of a Turkish
bath. It was the same old crowd upon the streets.

Strange, they did not notice his moosehide moccasins and tattered
German socks! He would take a cab. And after the bath a shave would not
be bad. No; he would eat first.

Steak, and potatoes, and green things how fresh it all was! And what
was that? Squares of honey, streaming liquid amber! But why did they
bring so much? Ha! ha! he could never eat it all.

Shine! Why certainly. He put his foot on the box. The bootblack looked
curiously up at him, and he remembered his moosehide moccasins and went
away hastily.

Hark! The wind-vane must be surely spinning. No; a mere singing in his
ears.

That was all--a mere singing. The ice must have passed the latch by
now. More likely the upper hinge was covered. Between the moss-chinked
roof-poles, little points of frost began to appear. How slowly they
grew! No; not so slowly. There was a new one, and there another.
Two--three--four; they were coming too fast to count. There were two
growing together. And there, a third had joined them.

Why, there were no more spots. They had run together and formed a sheet.

Well, he would have company. If Gabriel ever broke the silence of the
North, they would stand together, hand in hand, before the great White
Throne. And God would judge them, God would judge them!

Then Percy Cuthfert closed his eyes and dropped off to sleep.



To the Man on the Trail

'Dump it in!.' 'But I say, Kid, isn't that going it a little too
strong? Whisky and alcohol's bad enough; but when it comes to brandy
and pepper sauce and-' 'Dump it in. Who's making this punch, anyway?'
And Malemute Kid smiled benignantly through the clouds of steam. 'By
the time you've been in this country as long as I have, my son, and
lived on rabbit tracks and salmon belly, you'll learn that Christmas
comes only once per annum.

And a Christmas without punch is sinking a hole to bedrock with nary a
pay streak.'

'Stack up on that fer a high cyard,' approved Big Jim Belden, who had
come down from his claim on Mazy May to spend Christmas, and who, as
everyone knew, had been living the two months past on straight moose
meat. 'Hain't fergot the hooch we-uns made on the Tanana, hey yeh?'
'Well, I guess yes. Boys, it would have done your hearts good to see
that whole tribe fighting drunk--and all because of a glorious ferment
of sugar and sour dough. That was before your time,' Malemute Kid said
as he turned to Stanley Prince, a young mining expert who had been in
two years. 'No white women in the country then, and Mason wanted to get
married. Ruth's father was chief of the Tananas, and objected, like the
rest of the tribe. Stiff? Why, I used my last pound of sugar; finest
work in that line I ever did in my life. You should have seen the
chase, down the river and across the portage.' 'But the squaw?' asked
Louis Savoy, the tall French Canadian, becoming interested; for he had
heard of this wild deed when at Forty Mile the preceding winter.

Then Malemute Kid, who was a born raconteur, told the unvarnished tale
of the Northland Lochinvar. More than one rough adventurer of the North
felt his heartstrings draw closer and experienced vague yearnings for
the sunnier pastures of the Southland, where life promised something
more than a barren struggle with cold and death.

'We struck the Yukon just behind the first ice run,' he concluded, 'and
the tribe only a quarter of an hour behind. But that saved us; for the
second run broke the jam above and shut them out. When they finally got
into Nuklukyeto, the whole post was ready for them.

'And as to the forgathering, ask Father Roubeau here: he performed the
ceremony.' The Jesuit took the pipe from his lips but could only
express his gratification with patriarchal smiles, while Protestant and
Catholic vigorously applauded.

'By gar!' ejaculated Louis Savoy, who seemed overcome by the romance of
it. 'La petite squaw: mon Mason brav. By gar!' Then, as the first tin
cups of punch went round, Bettles the Unquenchable sprang to his feet
and struck up his favorite drinking song: 'There's Henry Ward Beecher
And Sunday-school teachers, All drink of the sassafras root; But you
bet all the same, If it had its right name, It's the juice of the
forbidden fruit.'

'Oh, the juice of the forbidden fruit,' roared out the bacchanalian
chorus, 'Oh, the juice of the forbidden fruit; But you bet all the
same, If it had its right name, It's the juice of the forbidden fruit.'

Malemute Kid's frightful concoction did its work; the men of the camps
and trails unbent in its genial glow, and jest and song and tales of
past adventure went round the board.

Aliens from a dozen lands, they toasted each and all. It was the
Englishman, Prince, who pledged 'Uncle Sam, the precocious infant of
the New World'; the Yankee, Bettles, who drank to 'The Queen, God bless
her'; and together, Savoy and Meyers, the German trader, clanged their
cups to Alsace and Lorraine.

Then Malemute Kid arose, cup in hand, and glanced at the greased-paper
window, where the frost stood full three inches thick. 'A health to the
man on trail this night; may his grub hold out; may his dogs keep their
legs; may his matches never miss fire.' Crack!

Crack! heard the familiar music of the dog whip, the whining howl of
the Malemutes, and the crunch of a sled as it drew up to the cabin.
Conversation languished while they waited the issue.

'An old-timer; cares for his dogs and then himself,' whispered Malemute
Kid to Prince as they listened to the snapping jaws and the wolfish
snarls and yelps of pain which proclaimed to their practiced ears that
the stranger was beating back their dogs while he fed his own.

Then came the expected knock, sharp and confident, and the stranger
entered.

Dazzled by the light, he hesitated a moment at the door, giving to all
a chance for scrutiny. He was a striking personage, and a most
picturesque one, in his Arctic dress of wool and fur. Standing six foot
two or three, with proportionate breadth of shoulders and depth of
chest, his smooth-shaven face nipped by the cold to a gleaming pink,
his long lashes and eyebrows white with ice, and the ear and neck flaps
of his great wolfskin cap loosely raised, he seemed, of a verity, the
Frost King, just stepped in out of the night.

Clasped outside his Mackinaw jacket, a beaded belt held two large
Colt's revolvers and a hunting knife, while he carried, in addition to
the inevitable dog whip, a smokeless rifle of the largest bore and
latest pattern. As he came forward, for all his step was firm and
elastic, they could see that fatigue bore heavily upon him.

An awkward silence had fallen, but his hearty 'What cheer, my lads?'
put them quickly at ease, and the next instant Malemute Kid and he had
gripped hands. Though they had never met, each had heard of the other,
and the recognition was mutual. A sweeping introduction and a mug of
punch were forced upon him before he could explain his errand.

How long since that basket sled, with three men and eight dogs,
passed?' he asked.

'An even two days ahead. Are you after them?' 'Yes; my team. Run them
off under my very nose, the cusses. I've gained two days on them
already--pick them up on the next run.' 'Reckon they'll show spunk?'
asked Belden, in order to keep up the conversation, for Malemute Kid
already had the coffeepot on and was busily frying bacon and moose meat.

The stranger significantly tapped his revolvers.

'When'd yeh leave Dawson?' 'Twelve o'clock.' 'Last night?'--as a matter
of course.

'Today.' A murmur of surprise passed round the circle. And well it
might; for it was just midnight, and seventy-five miles of rough river
trail was not to be sneered at for a twelve hours' run.

The talk soon became impersonal, however, harking back to the trails of
childhood. As the young stranger ate of the rude fare Malemute Kid
attentively studied his face. Nor was he long in deciding that it was
fair, honest, and open, and that he liked it. Still youthful, the lines
had been firmly traced by toil and hardship.

Though genial in conversation, and mild when at rest, the blue eyes
gave promise of the hard steel-glitter which comes when called into
action, especially against odds. The heavy jaw and square-cut chin
demonstrated rugged pertinacity and indomitability. Nor, though the
attributes of the lion were there, was there wanting the certain
softness, the hint of womanliness, which bespoke the emotional nature.

'So thet's how me an' the ol' woman got spliced,' said Belden,
concluding the exciting tale of his courtship. '"Here we be, Dad," sez
she. "An' may yeh be damned," sez he to her, an' then to me, "Jim,
yeh--yeh git outen them good duds o' yourn; I want a right peart slice
o' thet forty acre plowed 'fore dinner." An' then he sort o' sniffled
an' kissed her. An' I was thet happy--but he seen me an' roars out,
"Yeh, Jim!" An' yeh bet I dusted fer the barn.' 'Any kids waiting for
you back in the States?' asked the stranger.

'Nope; Sal died 'fore any come. Thet's why I'm here.' Belden
abstractedly began to light his pipe, which had failed to go out, and
then brightened up with, 'How 'bout yerself, stranger--married man?'
For reply, he opened his watch, slipped it from the thong which served
for a chain, and passed it over. Belden picked up the slush lamp,
surveyed the inside of the case critically, and, swearing admiringly to
himself, handed it over to Louis Savoy. With numerous 'By gars!' he
finally surrendered it to Prince, and they noticed that his hands
trembled and his eyes took on a peculiar softness. And so it passed
from horny hand to horny hand--the pasted photograph of a woman, the
clinging kind that such men fancy, with a babe at the breast. Those who
had not yet seen the wonder were keen with curiosity; those who had
became silent and retrospective. They could face the pinch of famine,
the grip of scurvy, or the quick death by field or flood; but the
pictured semblance of a stranger woman and child made women and
children of them all.

'Never have seen the youngster yet--he's a boy, she says, and two years
old,' said the stranger as he received the treasure back. A lingering
moment he gazed upon it, then snapped the case and turned away, but not
quick enough to hide the restrained rush of tears.  Malemute Kid led
him to a bunk and bade him turn in.

'Call me at four sharp. Don't fail me,' were his last words, and a
moment later he was breathing in the heaviness of exhausted sleep.

'By Jove! He's a plucky chap,' commented Prince. 'Three hours' sleep
after seventy-five miles with the dogs, and then the trail again. Who
is he, Kid?' 'Jack Westondale. Been in going on three years, with
nothing but the name of working like a horse, and any amount of bad
luck to his credit. I never knew him, but Sitka Charley told me about
him.' 'It seems hard that a man with a sweet young wife like his should
be putting in his years in this Godforsaken hole, where every year
counts two on the outside.' 'The trouble with him is clean grit and
stubbornness. He's cleaned up twice with a stake, but lost it both
times.' Here the conversation was broken off by an uproar from Bettles,
for the effect had begun to wear away. And soon the bleak years of
monotonous grub and deadening toil were being forgotten in rough
merriment. Malemute Kid alone seemed unable to lose himself, and cast
many an anxious look at his watch. Once he put on his mittens and
beaver-skin cap, and, leaving the cabin, fell to rummaging about in the
cache.

Nor could he wait the hour designated; for he was fifteen minutes ahead
of time in rousing his guest. The young giant had stiffened badly, and
brisk rubbing was necessary to bring him to his feet. He tottered
painfully out of the cabin, to find his dogs harnessed and everything
ready for the start. The company wished him good luck and a short
chase, while Father Roubeau, hurriedly blessing him, led the stampede
for the cabin; and small wonder, for it is not good to face
seventy-four degrees below zero with naked ears and hands.

Malemute Kid saw him to the main trail, and there, gripping his hand
heartily, gave him advice.

'You'll find a hundred pounds of salmon eggs on the sled,' he said.
'The dogs will go as far on that as with one hundred and fifty of fish,
and you can't get dog food at Pelly, as you probably expected.' The
stranger started, and his eyes flashed, but he did not interrupt. 'You
can't get an ounce of food for dog or man till you reach Five Fingers,
and that's a stiff two hundred miles. Watch out for open water on the
Thirty Mile River, and be sure you take the big cutoff above Le Barge.'
'How did you know it? Surely the news can't be ahead of me already?' 'I
don't know it; and what's more, I don't want to know it. But you never
owned that team you're chasing. Sitka Charley sold it to them last
spring. But he sized you up to me as square once, and I believe him.
I've seen your face; I like it. And I've seen--why, damn you, hit the
high places for salt water and that wife of yours, and--' Here the Kid
unmittened and jerked out his sack.

'No; I don't need it,' and the tears froze on his cheeks as he
convulsively gripped Malemute Kid's hand.

'Then don't spare the dogs; cut them out of the traces as fast as they
drop; buy them, and think they're cheap at ten dollars a pound. You can
get them at Five Fingers, Little Salmon, and Hootalinqua. And watch out
for wet feet,' was his parting advice. 'Keep a-traveling up to
twenty-five, but if it gets below that, build a fire and change your
socks.'

Fifteen minutes had barely elapsed when the jingle of bells announced
new arrivals. The door opened, and a mounted policeman of the Northwest
Territory entered, followed by two half-breed dog drivers. Like
Westondale, they were heavily armed and showed signs of fatigue. The
half-breeds had been born to the trail and bore it easily; but the
young policeman was badly exhausted. Still, the dogged obstinacy of his
race held him to the pace he had set, and would hold him till he
dropped in his tracks.

'When did Westondale pull out?' he asked. 'He stopped here, didn't he?'
This was supererogatory, for the tracks told their own tale too well.

Malemute Kid had caught Belden's eye, and he, scenting the wind,
replied evasively, 'A right peart while back.' 'Come, my man; speak
up,' the policeman admonished.

'Yeh seem to want him right smart. Hez he ben gittin' cantankerous down
Dawson way?'

'Held up Harry McFarland's for forty thousand; exchanged it at the P.C.
store for a check on Seattle; and who's to stop the cashing of it if we
don't overtake him? When did he pull out?'

Every eye suppressed its excitement, for Malemute Kid had given the
cue, and the young officer encountered wooden faces on every hand.

Striding over to Prince, he put the question to him. Though it hurt
him, gazing into the frank, earnest face of his fellow countryman, he
replied inconsequentially on the state of the trail.

Then he espied Father Roubeau, who could not lie. 'A quarter of an hour
ago,' the priest answered; 'but he had four hours' rest for himself and
dogs.' 'Fifteen minutes' start, and he's fresh! My God!' The poor
fellow staggered back, half fainting from exhaustion and
disappointment, murmuring something about the run from Dawson in ten
hours and the dogs being played out.

Malemute Kid forced a mug of punch upon him; then he turned for the
door, ordering the dog drivers to follow. But the warmth and promise of
rest were too tempting, and they objected strenuously. The Kid was
conversant with their French patois, and followed it anxiously.

They swore that the dogs were gone up; that Siwash and Babette would
have to be shot before the first mile was covered; that the rest were
almost as bad; and that it would be better for all hands to rest up.

'Lend me five dogs?' he asked, turning to Malemute Kid.

But the Kid shook his head.

'I'll sign a check on Captain Constantine for five thousand--here's my
papers--I'm authorized to draw at my own discretion.'

Again the silent refusal.

'Then I'll requisition them in the name of the Queen.' Smiling
incredulously, the Kid glanced at his well-stocked arsenal, and the
Englishman, realizing his impotency, turned for the door. But the dog
drivers still objecting, he whirled upon them fiercely, calling them
women and curs. The swart face of the older half-breed flushed angrily
as he drew himself up and promised in good, round terms that he would
travel his leader off his legs, and would then be delighted to plant
him in the snow.

The young officer--and it required his whole will--walked steadily to
the door, exhibiting a freshness he did not possess. But they all knew
and appreciated his proud effort; nor could he veil the twinges of
agony that shot across his face. Covered with frost, the dogs were
curled up in the snow, and it was almost impossible to get them to
their feet. The poor brutes whined under the stinging lash, for the dog
drivers were angry and cruel; nor till Babette, the leader, was cut
from the traces, could they break out the sled and get under way.

'A dirty scoundrel and a liar!' 'By gar! Him no good!' 'A thief!'
'Worse than an Indian!'

It was evident that they were angry--first at the way they had been
deceived; and second at the outraged ethics of the Northland, where
honesty, above all, was man's prime jewel.

'An' we gave the cuss a hand, after knowin' what he'd did.' All eyes
turned accusingly upon Malemute Kid, who rose from the corner where he
had been making Babette comfortable, and silently emptied the bowl for
a final round of punch.

'It's a cold night, boys--a bitter cold night,' was the irrelevant
commencement of his defense. 'You've all traveled trail, and know what
that stands for. Don't jump a dog when he's down. You've only heard one
side. A whiter man than Jack Westondale never ate from the same pot nor
stretched blanket with you or me.

'Last fall he gave his whole clean-up, forty thousand, to Joe Castrell,
to buy in on Dominion. Today he'd be a millionaire. But, while he
stayed behind at Circle City, taking care of his partner with the
scurvy, what does Castell do? Goes into McFarland's, jumps the limit,
and drops the whole sack. Found him dead in the snow the next day. And
poor Jack laying his plans to go out this winter to his wife and the
boy he's never seen. You'll notice he took exactly what his partner
lost--forty thousand. Well, he's gone out; and what are you going to do
about it?' The Kid glanced round the circle of his judges, noted the
softening of their faces, then raised his mug aloft. 'So a health to
the man on trail this night; may his grub hold out; may his dogs keep
their legs; may his matches never miss fire.

'God prosper him; good luck go with him; and--' 'Confusion to the
Mounted Police!' cried Bettles, to the crash of the empty cups.



The Priestly Prerogative

This is the story of a man who did not appreciate his wife; also, of a
woman who did him too great an honor when she gave herself to him.
Incidentally, it concerns a Jesuit priest who had never been known to
lie. He was an appurtenance, and a very necessary one, to the Yukon
country; but the presence of the other two was merely accidental. They
were specimens of the many strange waifs which ride the breast of a
gold rush or come tailing along behind.

Edwin Bentham and Grace Bentham were waifs; they were also tailing
along behind, for the Klondike rush of '97 had long since swept down
the great river and subsided into the famine-stricken city of Dawson.
When the Yukon shut up shop and went to sleep under a three-foot
ice-sheet, this peripatetic couple found themselves at the Five Finger
Rapids, with the City of Gold still a journey of many sleeps to the
north.

Many cattle had been butchered at this place in the fall of the year,
and the offal made a goodly heap. The three fellow-voyagers of Edwin
Bentham and wife gazed upon this deposit, did a little mental
arithmetic, caught a certain glimpse of a bonanza, and decided to
remain. And all winter they sold sacks of bones and frozen hides to the
famished dog-teams. It was a modest price they asked, a dollar a pound,
just as it came. Six months later, when the sun came back and the Yukon
awoke, they buckled on their heavy moneybelts and journeyed back to the
Southland, where they yet live and lie mightily about the Klondike they
never saw.

But Edwin Bentham--he was an indolent fellow, and had he not been
possessed of a wife, would have gladly joined issued in the dog-meat
speculation. As it was, she played upon his vanity, told him how great
and strong he was, how a man such as he certainly was could overcome
all obstacles and of a surety obtain the Golden Fleece. So he squared
his jaw, sold his share in the bones and hides for a sled and one dog,
and turned his snowshoes to the north. Needless to state, Grace
Bentham's snowshoes never allowed his tracks to grow cold. Nay, ere
their tribulations had seen three days, it was the man who followed in
the rear, and the woman who broke trail in advance. Of course, if
anybody hove in sight, the position was instantly reversed. Thus did
his manhood remain virgin to the travelers who passed like ghosts on
the silent trail. There are such men in this world.

How such a man and such a woman came to take each other for better and
for worse is unimportant to this narrative. These things are familiar
to us all, and those people who do them, or even question them too
closely, are apt to lose a beautiful faith which is known as Eternal
Fitness.

Edwin Bentham was a boy, thrust by mischance into a man's body,--a boy
who could complacently pluck a butterfly, wing from wing, or cower in
abject terror before a lean, nervy fellow, not half his size. He was a
selfish cry-baby, hidden behind a man's mustache and stature, and
glossed over with a skin-deep veneer of culture and conventionality.
Yes; he was a clubman and a society man, the sort that grace social
functions and utter inanities with a charm and unction which is
indescribable; the sort that talk big, and cry over a toothache; the
sort that put more hell into a woman's life by marrying her than can
the most graceless libertine that ever browsed in forbidden pastures.
We meet these men every day, but we rarely know them for what they are.
Second to marrying them, the best way to get this knowledge is to eat
out of the same pot and crawl under the same blanket with them
for--well, say a week; no greater margin is necessary.

To see Grace Bentham, was to see a slender, girlish creature; to know
her, was to know a soul which dwarfed your own, yet retained all the
elements of the eternal feminine. This was the woman who urged and
encouraged her husband in his Northland quest, who broke trail for him
when no one was looking, and cried in secret over her weakling woman's
body.

So journeyed this strangely assorted couple down to old Fort Selkirk,
then through fivescore miles of dismal wilderness to Stuart River. And
when the short day left them, and the man lay down in the snow and
blubbered, it was the woman who lashed him to the sled, bit her lips
with the pain of her aching limbs, and helped the dog haul him to
Malemute Kid's cabin. Malemute Kid was not at home, but Meyers, the
German trader, cooked great moose-steaks and shook up a bed of fresh
pine boughs. Lake, Langham, and Parker, were excited, and not unduly so
when the cause was taken into account.

'Oh, Sandy! Say, can you tell a porterhouse from a round? Come out and
lend us a hand, anyway!' This appeal emanated from the cache, where
Langham was vainly struggling with divers quarters of frozen moose.

'Don't you budge from those dishes!' commanded Parker.

'I say, Sandy; there's a good fellow--just run down to the Missouri
Camp and borrow some cinnamon,' begged Lake.

'Oh! oh! hurry up! Why don't--' But the crash of meat and boxes, in the
cache, abruptly quenched this peremptory summons.

'Come now, Sandy; it won't take a minute to go down to the Missouri--'

'You leave him alone,' interrupted Parker. 'How am I to mix the
biscuits if the table isn't cleared off?'

Sandy paused in indecision, till suddenly the fact that he was
Langham's 'man' dawned upon him. Then he apologetically threw down the
greasy dishcloth, and went to his master's rescue.

These promising scions of wealthy progenitors had come to the Northland
in search of laurels, with much money to burn, and a 'man' apiece.
Luckily for their souls, the other two men were up the White River in
search of a mythical quartz-ledge; so Sandy had to grin under the
responsibility of three healthy masters, each of whom was possessed of
peculiar cookery ideas. Twice that morning had a disruption of the
whole camp been imminent, only averted by immense concessions from one
or the other of these knights of the chafing-dish. But at last their
mutual creation, a really dainty dinner, was completed.

Then they sat down to a three-cornered game of 'cut-throat,'--a
proceeding which did away with all casus belli for future hostilities,
and permitted the victor to depart on a most important mission.

This fortune fell to Parker, who parted his hair in the middle, put on
his mittens and bearskin cap, and stepped over to Malemute Kid's cabin.
And when he returned, it was in the company of Grace Bentham and
Malemute Kid,--the former very sorry her husband could not share with
her their hospitality, for he had gone up to look at the Henderson
Creek mines, and the latter still a trifle stiff from breaking trail
down the Stuart River.

Meyers had been asked, but had declined, being deeply engrossed in an
experiment of raising bread from hops.

Well, they could do without the husband; but a woman--why they had not
seen one all winter, and the presence of this one promised a new era in
their lives.

They were college men and gentlemen, these three young fellows,
yearning for the flesh-pots they had been so long denied. Probably
Grace Bentham suffered from a similar hunger; at least, it meant much
to her, the first bright hour in many weeks of darkness.

But that wonderful first course, which claimed the versatile Lake for
its parent, had no sooner been served than there came a loud knock at
the door.

'Oh! Ah! Won't you come in, Mr. Bentham?' said Parker, who had stepped
to see who the newcomer might be.

'Is my wife here?' gruffly responded that worthy.

'Why, yes. We left word with Mr. Meyers.' Parker was exerting his most
dulcet tones, inwardly wondering what the deuce it all meant. 'Won't
you come in? Expecting you at any moment, we reserved a place. And just
in time for the first course, too.' 'Come in, Edwin, dear,' chirped
Grace Bentham from her seat at the table.

Parker naturally stood aside.

'I want my wife,' reiterated Bentham hoarsely, the intonation savoring
disagreeably of ownership.

Parker gasped, was within an ace of driving his fist into the face of
his boorish visitor, but held himself awkwardly in check. Everybody
rose. Lake lost his head and caught himself on the verge of saying,
'Must you go?' Then began the farrago of leave-taking. 'So nice of
you--' 'I am awfully sorry' 'By Jove! how things did brighten--'
'Really now, you--'

'Thank you ever so much--' 'Nice trip to Dawson--' etc., etc.

In this wise the lamb was helped into her jacket and led to the
slaughter. Then the door slammed, and they gazed woefully upon the
deserted table.

'Damn!' Langham had suffered disadvantages in his early training, and
his oaths were weak and monotonous. 'Damn!' he repeated, vaguely
conscious of the incompleteness and vainly struggling for a more virile
term. It is a clever woman who can fill out the many weak places in an
inefficient man, by her own indomitability, re-enforce his vacillating
nature, infuse her ambitious soul into his, and spur him on to great
achievements. And it is indeed a very clever and tactful woman who can
do all this, and do it so subtly that the man receives all the credit
and believes in his inmost heart that everything is due to him and him
alone.

This is what Grace Bentham proceeded to do. Arriving in Dawson with a
few pounds of flour and several letters of introduction, she at once
applied herself to the task of pushing her big baby to the fore. It was
she who melted the stony heart and wrung credit from the rude barbarian
who presided over the destiny of the P. C. Company; yet it was Edwin
Bentham to whom the concession was ostensibly granted. It was she who
dragged her baby up and down creeks, over benches and divides, and on a
dozen wild stampedes; yet everybody remarked what an energetic fellow
that Bentham was. It was she who studied maps, and catechised miners,
and hammered geography and locations into his hollow head, till
everybody marveled at his broad grasp of the country and knowledge of
its conditions. Of course, they said the wife was a brick, and only a
few wise ones appreciated and pitied the brave little woman.

She did the work; he got the credit and reward. In the Northwest
Territory a married woman cannot stake or record a creek, bench, or
quartz claim; so Edwin Bentham went down to the Gold Commissioner and
filed on Bench Claim 23, second tier, of French Hill. And when April
came they were washing out a thousand dollars a day, with many, many
such days in prospect.

At the base of French Hill lay Eldorado Creek, and on a creek claim
stood the cabin of Clyde Wharton. At present he was not washing out a
diurnal thousand dollars; but his dumps grew, shift by shift, and there
would come a time when those dumps would pass through his sluice-boxes,
depositing in the riffles, in the course of half a dozen days, several
hundred thousand dollars. He often sat in that cabin, smoked his pipe,
and dreamed beautiful little dreams,--dreams in which neither the dumps
nor the half-ton of dust in the P. C. Company's big safe, played a part.

And Grace Bentham, as she washed tin dishes in her hillside cabin,
often glanced down into Eldorado Creek, and dreamed,--not of dumps nor
dust, however. They met frequently, as the trail to the one claim
crossed the other, and there is much to talk about in the Northland
spring; but never once, by the light of an eye nor the slip of a
tongue, did they speak their hearts.

This is as it was at first. But one day Edwin Bentham was brutal. All
boys are thus; besides, being a French Hill king now, he began to think
a great deal of himself and to forget all he owed to his wife. On this
day, Wharton heard of it, and waylaid Grace Bentham, and talked wildly.
This made her very happy, though she would not listen, and made him
promise to not say such things again. Her hour had not come.

But the sun swept back on its northern journey, the black of midnight
changed to the steely color of dawn, the snow slipped away, the water
dashed again over the glacial drift, and the wash-up began. Day and
night the yellow clay and scraped bedrock hurried through the swift
sluices, yielding up its ransom to the strong men from the Southland.

And in that time of tumult came Grace Bentham's hour.

To all of us such hours at some time come,--that is, to us who are not
too phlegmatic.

Some people are good, not from inherent love of virtue, but from sheer
laziness. But those of us who know weak moments may understand.

Edwin Bentham was weighing dust over the bar of the saloon at the
Forks--altogether too much of his dust went over that pine board--when
his wife came down the hill and slipped into Clyde Wharton's cabin.
Wharton was not expecting her, but that did not alter the case. And
much subsequent misery and idle waiting might have been avoided, had
not Father Roubeau seen this and turned aside from the main creek
trail. 'My child,--' 'Hold on, Father Roubeau! Though I'm not of your
faith, I respect you; but you can't come in between this woman and me!'
'You know what you are doing?' 'Know! Were you God Almighty, ready to
fling me into eternal fire, I'd bank my will against yours in this
matter.' Wharton had placed Grace on a stool and stood belligerently
before her.

'You sit down on that chair and keep quiet,' he continued, addressing
the Jesuit. 'I'll take my innings now. You can have yours after.'

Father Roubeau bowed courteously and obeyed. He was an easy-going man
and had learned to bide his time. Wharton pulled a stool alongside the
woman's, smothering her hand in his.

'Then you do care for me, and will take me away?' Her face seemed to
reflect the peace of this man, against whom she might draw close for
shelter.

'Dear, don't you remember what I said before? Of course I-' 'But how
can you?--the wash-up?' 'Do you think that worries? Anyway, I'll give
the job to Father Roubeau, here.

'I can trust him to safely bank the dust with the company.' 'To think
of it!--I'll never see him again.' 'A blessing!' 'And to go--O, Clyde,
I can't! I can't!' 'There, there; of course you can, just let me plan
it.--You see, as soon as we get a few traps together, we'll start,
and-' 'Suppose he comes back?' 'I'll break every-' 'No, no! No
fighting, Clyde! Promise me that.' 'All right! I'll just tell the men
to throw him off the claim. They've seen how he's treated you, and
haven't much love for him.'

'You mustn't do that. You mustn't hurt him.' 'What then? Let him come
right in here and take you away before my eyes?' 'No-o,' she half
whispered, stroking his hand softly.

'Then let me run it, and don't worry. I'll see he doesn't get hurt.
Precious lot he cared whether you got hurt or not! We won't go back to
Dawson. I'll send word down for a couple of the boys to outfit and pole
a boat up the Yukon. We'll cross the divide and raft down the Indian
River to meet them. Then--' 'And then?' Her head was on his shoulder.

Their voices sank to softer cadences, each word a caress. The Jesuit
fidgeted nervously.

'And then?' she repeated.

'Why we'll pole up, and up, and up, and portage the White Horse Rapids
and the Box Canon.' 'Yes?' 'And the Sixty-Mile River; then the lakes,
Chilcoot, Dyea, and Salt Water.' 'But, dear, I can't pole a boat.' 'You
little goose! I'll get Sitka Charley; he knows all the good water and
best camps, and he is the best traveler I ever met, if he is an Indian.
All you'll have to do, is to sit in the middle of the boat, and sing
songs, and play Cleopatra, and fight--no, we're in luck; too early for
mosquitoes.'

'And then, O my Antony?' 'And then a steamer, San Francisco, and the
world! Never to come back to this cursed hole again. Think of it! The
world, and ours to choose from! I'll sell out. Why, we're rich! The
Waldworth Syndicate will give me half a million for what's left in the
ground, and I've got twice as much in the dumps and with the P. C.
Company. We'll go to the Fair in Paris in 1900. We'll go to Jerusalem,
if you say so.

'We'll buy an Italian palace, and you can play Cleopatra to your
heart's content. No, you shall be Lucretia, Acte, or anybody your
little heart sees fit to become. But you mustn't, you really mustn't-'
'The wife of Caesar shall be above reproach.' 'Of course, but--' 'But I
won't be your wife, will I, dear?' 'I didn't mean that.' 'But you'll
love me just as much, and never even think--oh! I know you'll be like
other men; you'll grow tired, and--and-'

'How can you? I--' 'Promise me.' 'Yes, yes; I do promise.' 'You say it
so easily, dear; but how do you know?--or I know? I have so little to
give, yet it is so much, and all I have. O, Clyde! promise me you
won't?'

'There, there! You mustn't begin to doubt already. Till death do us
part, you know.'

'Think! I once said that to--to him, and now?' 'And now, little
sweetheart, you're not to bother about such things any more.

Of course, I never, never will, and--' And for the first time, lips
trembled against lips.

Father Roubeau had been watching the main trail through the window, but
could stand the strain no longer.

He cleared his throat and turned around.

'Your turn now, Father!' Wharton's face was flushed with the fire of
his first embrace.

There was an exultant ring to his voice as he abdicated in the other's
favor. He had no doubt as to the result. Neither had Grace, for a smile
played about her mouth as she faced the priest.

'My child,' he began, 'my heart bleeds for you. It is a pretty dream,
but it cannot be.'

'And why, Father? I have said yes.' 'You knew not what you did. You did
not think of the oath you took, before your God, to that man who is
your husband. It remains for me to make you realize the sanctity of
such a pledge.' 'And if I do realize, and yet refuse?'

'Then God'

'Which God? My husband has a God which I care not to worship. There
must be many such.' 'Child! unsay those words! Ah! you do not mean
them. I understand. I, too, have had such moments.' For an instant he
was back in his native France, and a wistful, sad-eyed face came as a
mist between him and the woman before him.

'Then, Father, has my God forsaken me? I am not wicked above women. My
misery with him has been great. Why should it be greater? Why shall I
not grasp at happiness? I cannot, will not, go back to him!' 'Rather is
your God forsaken. Return. Throw your burden upon Him, and the darkness
shall be lifted. O my child,--' 'No; it is useless; I have made my bed
and so shall I lie. I will go on. And if God punishes me, I shall bear
it somehow. You do not understand. You are not a woman.' 'My mother was
a woman.'

'But--' 'And Christ was born of a woman.' She did not answer. A silence
fell. Wharton pulled his mustache impatiently and kept an eye on the
trail. Grace leaned her elbow on the table, her face set with resolve.
The smile had died away. Father Roubeau shifted his ground.

'You have children?'

'At one time I wished--but now--no. And I am thankful.' 'And a mother?'
'Yes.' 'She loves you?' 'Yes.' Her replies were whispers.

'And a brother?--no matter, he is a man. But a sister?' Her head
drooped a quavering 'Yes.' 'Younger? Very much?' 'Seven years.' 'And
you have thought well about this matter? About them? About your mother?
And your sister? She stands on the threshold of her woman's life, and
this wildness of yours may mean much to her. Could you go before her,
look upon her fresh young face, hold her hand in yours, or touch your
cheek to hers?'

To his words, her brain formed vivid images, till she cried out,
'Don't! don't!' and shrank away as do the wolf-dogs from the lash.

'But you must face all this; and better it is to do it now.' In his
eyes, which she could not see, there was a great compassion, but his
face, tense and quivering, showed no relenting.

She raised her head from the table, forced back the tears, struggled
for control.

'I shall go away. They will never see me, and come to forget me. I
shall be to them as dead. And--and I will go with Clyde--today.' It
seemed final. Wharton stepped forward, but the priest waved him back.

'You have wished for children?' A silent 'Yes.' 'And prayed for them?'
'Often.' 'And have you thought, if you should have children?' Father
Roubeau's eyes rested for a moment on the man by the window.

A quick light shot across her face. Then the full import dawned upon
her. She raised her hand appealingly, but he went on.

'Can you picture an innocent babe in your arms? A boy? The world is not
so hard upon a girl. Why, your very breast would turn to gall! And you
could be proud and happy of your boy, as you looked on other
children?--' 'O, have pity! Hush!' 'A scapegoat--'

'Don't! don't! I will go back!' She was at his feet.

'A child to grow up with no thought of evil, and one day the world to
fling a tender name in his face. A child to look back and curse you
from whose loins he sprang!'

'O my God! my God!' She groveled on the floor. The priest sighed and
raised her to her feet.

Wharton pressed forward, but she motioned him away.

'Don't come near me, Clyde! I am going back!' The tears were coursing
pitifully down her face, but she made no effort to wipe them away.

'After all this? You cannot! I will not let you!' 'Don't touch me!' She
shivered and drew back.

'I will! You are mine! Do you hear? You are mine!' Then he whirled upon
the priest. 'O what a fool I was to ever let you wag your silly tongue!
Thank your God you are not a common man, for I'd--but the priestly
prerogative must be exercised, eh? Well, you have exercised it. Now get
out of my house, or I'll forget who and what you are!' Father Roubeau
bowed, took her hand, and started for the door. But Wharton cut them
off.

'Grace! You said you loved me?' 'I did.' 'And you do now?' 'I do.' 'Say
it again.'

'I do love you, Clyde; I do.' 'There, you priest!' he cried. 'You have
heard it, and with those words on her lips you would send her back to
live a lie and a hell with that man?'

But Father Roubeau whisked the woman into the inner room and closed the
door. 'No words!' he whispered to Wharton, as he struck a casual
posture on a stool. 'Remember, for her sake,' he added.

The room echoed to a rough knock at the door; the latch raised and
Edwin Bentham stepped in.

'Seen anything of my wife?' he asked as soon as salutations had been
exchanged.

Two heads nodded negatively.

'I saw her tracks down from the cabin,' he continued tentatively, 'and
they broke off, just opposite here, on the main trail.' His listeners
looked bored.

'And I--I thought--'

'She was here!' thundered Wharton.

The priest silenced him with a look. 'Did you see her tracks leading up
to this cabin, my son?' Wily Father Roubeau--he had taken good care to
obliterate them as he came up the same path an hour before.

'I didn't stop to look, I--' His eyes rested suspiciously on the door
to the other room, then interrogated the priest. The latter shook his
head; but the doubt seemed to linger.

Father Roubeau breathed a swift, silent prayer, and rose to his feet.
'If you doubt me, why--' He made as though to open the door.

A priest could not lie. Edwin Bentham had heard this often, and
believed it.

'Of course not, Father,' he interposed hurriedly. 'I was only wondering
where my wife had gone, and thought maybe--I guess she's up at Mrs.
Stanton's on French Gulch. Nice weather, isn't it? Heard the news?
Flour's gone down to forty dollars a hundred, and they say the
che-cha-quas are flocking down the river in droves.

'But I must be going; so good-by.' The door slammed, and from the
window they watched him take his guest up French Gulch. A few weeks
later, just after the June high-water, two men shot a canoe into
mid-stream and made fast to a derelict pine. This tightened the painter
and jerked the frail craft along as would a tow-boat. Father Roubeau
had been directed to leave the Upper Country and return to his swarthy
children at Minook. The white men had come among them, and they were
devoting too little time to fishing, and too much to a certain deity
whose transient habitat was in countless black bottles.

Malemute Kid also had business in the Lower Country, so they journeyed
together.

But one, in all the Northland, knew the man Paul Roubeau, and that man
was Malemute Kid. Before him alone did the priest cast off the
sacerdotal garb and stand naked. And why not? These two men knew each
other. Had they not shared the last morsel of fish, the last pinch of
tobacco, the last and inmost thought, on the barren stretches of Bering
Sea, in the heartbreaking mazes of the Great Delta, on the terrible
winter journey from Point Barrow to the Porcupine? Father Roubeau
puffed heavily at his trail-worn pipe, and gazed on the reddisked sun,
poised somberly on the edge of the northern horizon.

Malemute Kid wound up his watch. It was midnight.

'Cheer up, old man!' The Kid was evidently gathering up a broken thread.

'God surely will forgive such a lie. Let me give you the word of a man
who strikes a true note: If She have spoken a word, remember thy lips
are sealed, And the brand of the Dog is upon him by whom is the secret
revealed.

If there be trouble to Herward, and a lie of the blackest can clear,
Lie, while thy lips can move or a man is alive to hear.'

Father Roubeau removed his pipe and reflected. 'The man speaks true,
but my soul is not vexed with that. The lie and the penance stand with
God; but--but--'

'What then? Your hands are clean.' 'Not so. Kid, I have thought much,
and yet the thing remains. I knew, and made her go back.' The clear
note of a robin rang out from the wooden bank, a partridge drummed the
call in the distance, a moose lunged noisily in the eddy; but the twain
smoked on in silence.



The Wisdom of the Trail

Sitka Charley had achieved the impossible. Other Indians might have
known as much of the wisdom of the trail as he did; but he alone knew
the white man's wisdom, the honor of the trail, and the law. But these
things had not come to him in a day. The aboriginal mind is slow to
generalize, and many facts, repeated often, are required to compass an
understanding. Sitka Charley, from boyhood, had been thrown continually
with white men, and as a man he had elected to cast his fortunes with
them, expatriating himself, once and for all, from his own people. Even
then, respecting, almost venerating their power, and pondering over it,
he had yet to divine its secret essence--the honor and the law. And it
was only by the cumulative evidence of years that he had finally come
to understand. Being an alien, when he did know, he knew it better than
the white man himself; being an Indian, he had achieved the impossible.

And of these things had been bred a certain contempt for his own
people--a contempt which he had made it a custom to conceal, but which
now burst forth in a polyglot whirlwind of curses upon the heads of
Kah-Chucte and Gowhee. They cringed before him like a brace of snarling
wolf dogs, too cowardly to spring, too wolfish to cover their fangs.
They were not handsome creatures. Neither was Sitka Charley. All three
were frightful-looking. There was no flesh to their faces; their
cheekbones were massed with hideous scabs which had cracked and frozen
alternately under the intense frost; while their eyes burned luridly
with the light which is born of desperation and hunger. Men so
situated, beyond the pale of the honor and the law, are not to be
trusted. Sitka Charley knew this; and this was why he had forced them
to abandon their rifles with the rest of the camp outfit ten days
before. His rifle and Captain Eppingwell's were the only ones that
remained.

'Come, get a fire started,' he commanded, drawing out the precious
matchbox with its attendant strips of dry birchbark.

The two Indians fell sullenly to the task of gathering dead branches
and underwood. They were weak and paused often, catching themselves, in
the act of stooping, with giddy motions, or staggering to the center of
operations with their knees shaking like castanets.

After each trip they rested for a moment, as though sick and deadly
weary. At times their eyes took on the patient stoicism of dumb
suffering; and again the ego seemed almost burst forth with its wild
cry, 'I, I, I want to exist!'--the dominant note of the whole living
universe.

A light breath of air blew from the south, nipping the exposed portions
of their bodies and driving the frost, in needles of fire, through fur
and flesh to the bones. So, when the fire had grown lusty and thawed a
damp circle in the snow about it, Sitka Charley forced his reluctant
comrades to lend a hand in pitching a fly. It was a primitive affair,
merely a blanket stretched parallel with the fire and to windward of
it, at an angle of perhaps forty-five degrees. This shut out the chill
wind and threw the heat backward and down upon those who were to huddle
in its shelter. Then a layer of green spruce boughs were spread, that
their bodies might not come in contact with the snow. When this task
was completed, Kah-Chucte and Gowhee proceeded to take care of their
feet. Their icebound moccasins were sadly worn by much travel, and the
sharp ice of the river jams had cut them to rags.

Their Siwash socks were similarly conditioned, and when these had been
thawed and removed, the dead-white tips of the toes, in the various
stages of mortification, told their simple tale of the trail.

Leaving the two to the drying of their footgear, Sitka Charley turned
back over the course he had come. He, too, had a mighty longing to sit
by the fire and tend his complaining flesh, but the honor and the law
forbade. He toiled painfully over the frozen field, each step a
protest, every muscle in revolt. Several times, where the open water
between the jams had recently crusted, he was forced to miserably
accelerate his movements as the fragile footing swayed and threatened
beneath him. In such places death was quick and easy; but it was not
his desire to endure no more.

His deepening anxiety vanished as two Indians dragged into view round a
bend in the river. They staggered and panted like men under heavy
burdens; yet the packs on their backs were a matter of but a few
pounds. He questioned them eagerly, and their replies seemed to relieve
him. He hurried on. Next came two white men, supporting between them a
woman. They also behaved as though drunken, and their limbs shook with
weakness. But the woman leaned lightly upon them, choosing to carry
herself forward with her own strength. At the sight of her a flash of
joy cast its fleeting light across Sitka Charley's face. He cherished a
very great regard for Mrs. Eppingwell. He had seen many white women,
but this was the first to travel the trail with him. When Captain
Eppingwell proposed the hazardous undertaking and made him an offer for
his services, he had shaken his head gravely; for it was an unknown
journey through the dismal vastnesses of the Northland, and he knew it
to be of the kind that try to the uttermost the souls of men.

But when he learned that the captain's wife was to accompany them, he
had refused flatly to have anything further to do with it. Had it been
a woman of his own race he would have harbored no objections; but these
women of the Southland--no, no, they were too soft, too tender, for
such enterprises.

Sitka Charley did not know this kind of woman. Five minutes before, he
did not even dream of taking charge of the expedition; but when she
came to him with her wonderful smile and her straight clean English,
and talked to the point, without pleading or persuading, he had
incontinently yielded. Had there been a softness and appeal to mercy in
the eyes, a tremble to the voice, a taking advantage of sex, he would
have stiffened to steel; instead her clear-searching eyes and
clear-ringing voice, her utter frankness and tacit assumption of
equality, had robbed him of his reason. He felt, then, that this was a
new breed of woman; and ere they had been trail mates for many days he
knew why the sons of such women mastered the land and the sea, and why
the sons of his own womankind could not prevail against them. Tender
and soft! Day after day he watched her, muscle-weary, exhausted,
indomitable, and the words beat in upon him in a perennial refrain.
Tender and soft! He knew her feet had been born to easy paths and sunny
lands, strangers to the moccasined pain of the North, unkissed by the
chill lips of the frost, and he watched and marveled at them twinkling
ever through the weary day.

She had always a smile and a word of cheer, from which not even the
meanest packer was excluded. As the way grew darker she seemed to
stiffen and gather greater strength, and when Kah-Chucte and Gowhee,
who had bragged that they knew every landmark of the way as a child did
the skin bails of the tepee, acknowledged that they knew not where they
were, it was she who raised a forgiving voice amid the curses of the
men. She had sung to them that night till they felt the weariness fall
from them and were ready to face the future with fresh hope. And when
the food failed and each scant stint was measured jealously, she it was
who rebelled against the machinations of her husband and Sitka Charley,
and demanded and received a share neither greater nor less than that of
the others.

Sitka Charley was proud to know this woman. A new richness, a greater
breadth, had come into his life with her presence. Hitherto he had been
his own mentor, had turned to right or left at no man's beck; he had
moulded himself according to his own dictates, nourished his manhood
regardless of all save his own opinion. For the first time he had felt
a call from without for the best that was in him, just a glance of
appreciation from the clear-searching eyes, a word of thanks from the
clear-ringing voice, just a slight wreathing of the lips in the
wonderful smile, and he walked with the gods for hours to come. It was
a new stimulant to his manhood; for the first time he thrilled with a
conscious pride in his wisdom of the trail; and between the twain they
ever lifted the sinking hearts of their comrades. The faces of the two
men and the woman brightened as they saw him, for after all he was the
staff they leaned upon. But Sitka Charley, rigid as was his wont,
concealing pain and pleasure impartially beneath an iron exterior,
asked them the welfare of the rest, told the distance to the fire, and
continued on the back-trip.

Next he met a single Indian, unburdened, limping, lips compressed, and
eyes set with the pain of a foot in which the quick fought a losing
battle with the dead. All possible care had been taken of him, but in
the last extremity the weak and unfortunate must perish, and Sitka
Charley deemed his days to be few. The man could not keep up for long,
so he gave him rough cheering words. After that came two more Indians,
to whom he had allotted the task of helping along Joe, the third white
man of the party. They had deserted him. Sitka Charley saw at a glance
the lurking spring in their bodies, and knew they had at last cast off
his mastery. So he was not taken unawares when he ordered them back in
quest of their abandoned charge, and saw the gleam of the hunting
knives that they drew from the sheaths. A pitiful spectacle, three weak
men lifting their puny strength in the face of the mighty vastness; but
the two recoiled under the fierce rifle blows of the one and returned
like beaten dogs to the leash. Two hours later, with Joe reeling
between them and Sitka Charley bringing up the rear, they came to the
fire, where the remainder of the expedition crouched in the shelter of
the fly.

'A few words, my comrades, before we sleep,' Sitka Charley said after
they had devoured their slim rations of unleavened bread. He was
speaking to the Indians in their own tongue, having already given the
import to the whites. 'A few words, my comrades, for your own good,
that ye may yet perchance live. I shall give you the law; on his own
head by the death of him that breaks it. We have passed the Hills of
Silence, and we now travel the head reaches of the Stuart. It may be
one sleep, it may be several, it may be many sleeps, but in time we
shall come among the men of the Yukon, who have much grub. It were well
that we look to the law. Today Kah-Chucte and Gowhee, whom I commanded
to break trail, forgot they were men, and like frightened children ran
away.

'True, they forgot; so let us forget. But hereafter, let them remember.
If it should happen they do not...' He touched his rifle carelessly,
grimly. 'Tomorrow they shall carry the flour and see that the white man
Joe lies not down by the trail. The cups of flour are counted; should
so much as an ounce be wanting at nightfall... Do ye understand? Today
there were others that forgot. Moose Head and Three Salmon left the
white man Joe to lie in the snow. Let them forget no more. With the
light of day shall they go forth and break trail. Ye have heard the
law. Look well, lest ye break it.' Sitka Charley found it beyond him to
keep the line close up. From Moose Head and Three Salmon, who broke
trail in advance, to Kah-Chucte, Gowhee, and Joe, it straggled out over
a mile. Each staggered, fell or rested as he saw fit.

The line of march was a progression through a chain of irregular halts.
Each drew upon the last remnant of his strength and stumbled onward
till it was expended, but in some miraculous way there was always
another last remnant. Each time a man fell it was with the firm belief
that he would rise no more; yet he did rise, and again and again. The
flesh yielded, the will conquered; but each triumph was a tragedy. The
Indian with the frozen foot, no longer erect, crawled forward on hand
and knee. He rarely rested, for he knew the penalty exacted by the
frost.

Even Mrs. Eppingwell's lips were at last set in a stony smile, and her
eyes, seeing, saw not. Often she stopped, pressing a mittened hand to
her heart, gasping and dizzy.

Joe, the white man, had passed beyond the stage of suffering. He no
longer begged to be let alone, prayed to die; but was soothed and
content under the anodyne of delirium. Kah-Chucte and Gowhee dragged
him on roughly, venting upon him many a savage glance or blow. To them
it was the acme of injustice.

Their hearts were bitter with hate, heavy with fear. Why should they
cumber their strength with his weakness? To do so meant death; not to
do so--and they remembered the law of Sitka Charley, and the rifle.

Joe fell with greater frequency as the daylight waned, and so hard was
he to raise that they dropped farther and farther behind. Sometimes all
three pitched into the snow, so weak had the Indians become. Yet on
their backs was life, and strength, and warmth.

Within the flour sacks were all the potentialities of existence. They
could not but think of this, and it was not strange, that which came to
pass. They had fallen by the side of a great timber jam where a
thousand cords of firewood waited the match. Near by was an air hole
through the ice. Kah-Chucte looked on the wood and the water, as did
Gowhee; then they looked at each other.

Never a word was spoken. Gowhee struck a fire; Kah-Chucte filled a tin
cup with water and heated it; Joe babbled of things in another land, in
a tongue they did not understand.

They mixed flour with the warm water till it was a thin paste, and of
this they drank many cups. They did not offer any to Joe; but he did
not mind. He did not mind anything, not even his moccasins, which
scorched and smoked among the coals.

A crystal mist of snow fell about them, softly, caressingly, wrapping
them in clinging robes of white. And their feet would have yet trod
many trails had not destiny brushed the clouds aside and cleared the
air. Nay, ten minutes' delay would have been salvation.

Sitka Charley, looking back, saw the pillared smoke of their fire, and
guessed. And he looked ahead at those who were faithful, and at Mrs.
Eppingwell. 'So, my good comrades, ye have again forgotten that you
were men? Good! Very good. There will be fewer bellies to feed.' Sitka
Charley retied the flour as he spoke, strapping the pack to the one on
his own back. He kicked Joe till the pain broke through the poor
devil's bliss and brought him doddering to his feet. Then he shoved him
out upon the trail and started him on his way. The two Indians
attempted to slip off.

'Hold, Gowhee! And thou, too, Kah-Chucte! Hath the flour given such
strength to thy legs that they may outrun the swift-winged lead? Think
not to cheat the law. Be men for the last time, and be content that ye
die full-stomached.

Come, step up, back to the timber, shoulder to shoulder. Come!' The two
men obeyed, quietly, without fear; for it is the future which pressed
upon the man, not the present.

'Thou, Gowhee, hast a wife and children and a deerskin lodge in the
Chipewyan. What is thy will in the matter?' 'Give thou her of the goods
which are mine by the word of the captain--the blankets, the beads, the
tobacco, the box which makes strange sounds after the manner of the
white men. Say that I did die on the trail, but say not how.' 'And
thou, Kah-Chucte, who hast nor wife nor child?' 'Mine is a sister, the
wife of the factor at Koshim. He beats her, and she is not happy. Give
thou her the goods which are mine by the contract, and tell her it were
well she go back to her own people. Shouldst thou meet the man, and be
so minded, it were a good deed that he should die. He beats her, and
she is afraid.' 'Are ye content to die by the law?' 'We are.' 'Then
good-bye, my good comrades. May ye sit by the well-filled pot, in warm
lodges, ere the day is done.' As he spoke he raised his rifle, and many
echoes broke the silence. Hardly had they died away when other rifles
spoke in the distance. Sitka Charley started.

There had been more than one shot, yet there was but one other rifle in
the party.

He gave a fleeting glance at the men who lay so quietly, smiled
viciously at the wisdom of the trail, and hurried on to meet the men of
the Yukon.



The Wife of a King

Once when the northland was very young, the social and civic virtues
were remarkably alike for their paucity and their simplicity. When the
burden of domestic duties grew grievous, and the fireside mood expanded
to a constant protest against its bleak loneliness, the adventurers
from the Southland, in lieu of better, paid the stipulated prices and
took unto themselves native wives. It was a foretaste of Paradise to
the women, for it must be confessed that the white rovers gave far
better care and treatment of them than did their Indian copartners. Of
course, the white men themselves were satisfied with such deals, as
were also the Indian men for that matter. Having sold their daughters
and sisters for cotton blankets and obsolete rifles and traded their
warm furs for flimsy calico and bad whisky, the sons of the soil
promptly and cheerfully succumbed to quick consumption and other swift
diseases correlated with the blessings of a superior civilization.

It was in these days of Arcadian simplicity that Cal Galbraith
journeyed through the land and fell sick on the Lower River. It was a
refreshing advent in the lives of the good Sisters of the Holy Cross,
who gave him shelter and medicine; though they little dreamed of the
hot elixir infused into his veins by the touch of their soft hands and
their gentle ministrations. Cal Galbraith, became troubled with strange
thoughts which clamored for attention till he laid eyes on the Mission
girl, Madeline. Yet he gave no sign, biding his time patiently. He
strengthened with the coming spring, and when the sun rode the heavens
in a golden circle, and the joy and throb of life was in all the land,
he gathered his still weak body together and departed.

Now, Madeline, the Mission girl, was an orphan. Her white father had
failed to give a bald-faced grizzly the trail one day, and had died
quickly. Then her Indian mother, having no man to fill the winter
cache, had tried the hazardous experiment of waiting till the
salmon-run on fifty pounds of flour and half as many of bacon. After
that, the baby, Chook-ra, went to live with the good Sisters, and to be
thenceforth known by another name.

But Madeline still had kinsfolk, the nearest being a dissolute uncle
who outraged his vitals with inordinate quantities of the white man's
whisky. He strove daily to walk with the gods, and incidentally, his
feet sought shorter trails to the grave. When sober he suffered
exquisite torture. He had no conscience. To this ancient vagabond Cal
Galbraith duly presented himself, and they consumed many words and much
tobacco in the conversation that followed. Promises were also made; and
in the end the old heathen took a few pounds of dried salmon and his
birch-bark canoe, and paddled away to the Mission of the Holy Cross.

It is not given the world to know what promises he made and what lies
he told--the Sisters never gossip; but when he returned, upon his
swarthy chest there was a brass crucifix, and in his canoe his niece
Madeline. That night there was a grand wedding and a potlach; so that
for two days to follow there was no fishing done by the village. But in
the morning Madeline shook the dust of the Lower River from her
moccasins, and with her husband, in a poling-boat, went to live on the
Upper River in a place known as the Lower Country. And in the years
which followed she was a good wife, sharing her husband's hardships and
cooking his food. And she kept him in straight trails, till he learned
to save his dust and to work mightily. In the end, he struck it rich
and built a cabin in Circle City; and his happiness was such that men
who came to visit him in his home-circle became restless at the sight
of it and envied him greatly.

But the Northland began to mature and social amenities to make their
appearance.

Hitherto, the Southland had sent forth its sons; but it now belched
forth a new exodus--this time of its daughters. Sisters and wives they
were not; but they did not fail to put new ideas in the heads of the
men, and to elevate the tone of things in ways peculiarly their own. No
more did the squaws gather at the dances, go roaring down the center in
the good, old Virginia reels, or make merry with jolly 'Dan Tucker.'
They fell back on their natural stoicism and uncomplainingly watched
the rule of their white sisters from their cabins.

Then another exodus came over the mountains from the prolific Southland.

This time it was of women that became mighty in the land. Their word
was law; their law was steel. They frowned upon the Indian wives, while
the other women became mild and walked humbly. There were cowards who
became ashamed of their ancient covenants with the daughters of the
soil, who looked with a new distaste upon their dark-skinned children;
but there were also others--men--who remained true and proud of their
aboriginal vows. When it became the fashion to divorce the native
wives. Cal Galbraith retained his manhood, and in so doing felt the
heavy hand of the women who had come last, knew least, but who ruled
the land.

One day, the Upper Country, which lies far above Circle City, was
pronounced rich. Dog-teams carried the news to Salt Water; golden
argosies freighted the lure across the North Pacific; wires and cables
sang with the tidings; and the world heard for the first time of the
Klondike River and the Yukon Country. Cal Galbraith had lived the years
quietly. He had been a good husband to Madeline, and she had blessed
him. But somehow discontent fell upon him; he felt vague yearnings for
his own kind, for the life he had been shut out from--a general sort of
desire, which men sometimes feel, to break out and taste the prime of
living. Besides, there drifted down the river wild rumors of the
wonderful El Dorado, glowing descriptions of the city of logs and
tents, and ludicrous accounts of the che-cha-quas who had rushed in and
were stampeding the whole country.

Circle City was dead. The world had moved on up river and become a new
and most marvelous world.

Cal Galbraith grew restless on the edge of things, and wished to see
with his own eyes.

So, after the wash-up, he weighed in a couple of hundred pounds of dust
on the Company's big scales, and took a draft for the same on Dawson.
Then he put Tom Dixon in charge of his mines, kissed Madeline good-by,
promised to be back before the first mush-ice ran, and took passage on
an up-river steamer.

Madeline waited, waited through all the three months of daylight. She
fed the dogs, gave much of her time to Young Cal, watched the short
summer fade away and the sun begin its long journey to the south. And
she prayed much in the manner of the Sisters of the Holy Cross. The
fall came, and with it there was mush-ice on the Yukon, and Circle City
kings returning to the winter's work at their mines, but no Cal
Galbraith. Tom Dixon received a letter, however, for his men sledded up
her winter's supply of dry pine. The Company received a letter for its
dogteams filled her cache with their best provisions, and she was told
that her credit was limitless.

Through all the ages man has been held the chief instigator of the woes
of woman; but in this case the men held their tongues and swore harshly
at one of their number who was away, while the women failed utterly to
emulate them. So, without needless delay, Madeline heard strange tales
of Cal Galbraith's doings; also, of a certain Greek dancer who played
with men as children did with bubbles. Now Madeline was an Indian
woman, and further, she had no woman friend to whom to go for wise
counsel. She prayed and planned by turns, and that night, being quick
of resolve and action, she harnessed the dogs, and with Young Cal
securely lashed to the sled, stole away.

Though the Yukon still ran free, the eddy-ice was growing, and each day
saw the river dwindling to a slushy thread. Save him who has done the
like, no man may know what she endured in traveling a hundred miles on
the rim-ice; nor may they understand the toil and hardship of breaking
the two hundred miles of packed ice which remained after the river
froze for good. But Madeline was an Indian woman, so she did these
things, and one night there came a knock at Malemute Kid's door.
Thereat he fed a team of starving dogs, put a healthy youngster to bed,
and turned his attention to an exhausted woman. He removed her icebound
moccasins while he listened to her tale, and stuck the point of his
knife into her feet that he might see how far they were frozen.

Despite his tremendous virility, Malemute Kid was possessed of a
softer, womanly element, which could win the confidence of a snarling
wolf-dog or draw confessions from the most wintry heart. Nor did he
seek them. Hearts opened to him as spontaneously as flowers to the sun.
Even the priest, Father Roubeau, had been known to confess to him,
while the men and women of the Northland were ever knocking at his
door--a door from which the latch-string hung always out. To Madeline,
he could do no wrong, make no mistake. She had known him from the time
she first cast her lot among the people of her father's race; and to
her half-barbaric mind it seemed that in him was centered the wisdom of
the ages, that between his vision and the future there could be no
intervening veil.

There were false ideals in the land. The social strictures of Dawson
were not synonymous with those of the previous era, and the swift
maturity of the Northland involved much wrong. Malemute Kid was aware
of this, and he had Cal Galbraith's measure accurately.

He knew a hasty word was the father of much evil; besides, he was
minded to teach a great lesson and bring shame upon the man. So Stanley
Prince, the young mining expert, was called into the conference the
following night as was also Lucky Jack Harrington and his violin. That
same night, Bettles, who owed a great debt to Malemute Kid, harnessed
up Cal Galbraith's dogs, lashed Cal Galbraith, Junior, to the sled, and
slipped away in the dark for Stuart River.


II

'So; one--two--three, one--two--three. Now reverse! No, no! Start up
again, Jack. See--this way.' Prince executed the movement as one should
who has led the cotillion.

'Now; one--two--three, one--two--three. Reverse! Ah! that's better. Try
it again. I say, you know, you mustn't look at your feet.
One--two--three, one--two--three. Shorter steps! You are not hanging to
the gee-pole just now. Try it over.

'There! that's the way. One--two--three, one--two--three.' Round and
round went Prince and Madeline in an interminable waltz. The table and
stools had been shoved over against the wall to increase the room.
Malemute Kid sat on the bunk, chin to knees, greatly interested. Jack
Harrington sat beside him, scraping away on his violin and following
the dancers.

It was a unique situation, the undertaking of these three men with the
woman.

The most pathetic part, perhaps, was the businesslike way in which they
went about it.

No athlete was ever trained more rigidly for a coming contest, nor
wolf-dog for the harness, than was she. But they had good material, for
Madeline, unlike most women of her race, in her childhood had escaped
the carrying of heavy burdens and the toil of the trail. Besides, she
was a clean-limbed, willowy creature, possessed of much grace which had
not hitherto been realized. It was this grace which the men strove to
bring out and knock into shape.

'Trouble with her she learned to dance all wrong,' Prince remarked to
the bunk after having deposited his breathless pupil on the table.
'She's quick at picking up; yet I could do better had she never danced
a step. But say, Kid, I can't understand this.' Prince imitated a
peculiar movement of the shoulders and head--a weakness Madeline
suffered from in walking.

'Lucky for her she was raised in the Mission,' Malemute Kid answered.
'Packing, you know,--the head-strap. Other Indian women have it bad,
but she didn't do any packing till after she married, and then only at
first. Saw hard lines with that husband of hers. They went through the
Forty-Mile famine together.' 'But can we break it?' 'Don't know.

'Perhaps long walks with her trainers will make the riffle. Anyway,
they'll take it out some, won't they, Madeline?' The girl nodded
assent. If Malemute Kid, who knew all things, said so, why it was so.
That was all there was about it.

She had come over to them, anxious to begin again. Harrington surveyed
her in quest of her points much in the same manner men usually do
horses. It certainly was not disappointing, for he asked with sudden
interest, 'What did that beggarly uncle of yours get anyway?' 'One
rifle, one blanket, twenty bottles of hooch. Rifle broke.' She said
this last scornfully, as though disgusted at how low her maiden-value
had been rated.

She spoke fair English, with many peculiarities of her husband's
speech, but there was still perceptible the Indian accent, the
traditional groping after strange gutturals. Even this her instructors
had taken in hand, and with no small success, too.

At the next intermission, Prince discovered a new predicament.

'I say, Kid,' he said, 'we're wrong, all wrong. She can't learn in
moccasins.

'Put her feet into slippers, and then onto that waxed floor--phew!'
Madeline raised a foot and regarded her shapeless house-moccasins
dubiously. In previous winters, both at Circle City and Forty-Mile, she
had danced many a night away with similar footgear, and there had been
nothing the matter.

But now--well, if there was anything wrong it was for Malemute Kid to
know, not her.

But Malemute Kid did know, and he had a good eye for measures; so he
put on his cap and mittens and went down the hill to pay Mrs.
Eppingwell a call. Her husband, Clove Eppingwell, was prominent in the
community as one of the great Government officials.

The Kid had noted her slender little foot one night, at the Governor's
Ball. And as he also knew her to be as sensible as she was pretty, it
was no task to ask of her a certain small favor.

On his return, Madeline withdrew for a moment to the inner room. When
she reappeared Prince was startled.

'By Jove!' he gasped. 'Who'd a' thought it! The little witch! Why my
sister--' 'Is an English girl,' interrupted Malemute Kid, 'with an
English foot. This girl comes of a small-footed race. Moccasins just
broadened her feet healthily, while she did not misshape them by
running with the dogs in her childhood.' But this explanation failed
utterly to allay Prince's admiration. Harrington's commercial instinct
was touched, and as he looked upon the exquisitely turned foot and
ankle, there ran through his mind the sordid list--'One rifle, one
blanket, twenty bottles of hooch.' Madeline was the wife of a king, a
king whose yellow treasure could buy outright a score of fashion's
puppets; yet in all her life her feet had known no gear save red-tanned
moosehide. At first she had looked in awe at the tiny white-satin
slippers; but she had quickly understood the admiration which shone,
manlike, in the eyes of the men. Her face flushed with pride. For the
moment she was drunken with her woman's loveliness; then she murmured,
with increased scorn, 'And one rifle, broke!' So the training went on.
Every day Malemute Kid led the girl out on long walks devoted to the
correction of her carriage and the shortening of her stride.

There was little likelihood of her identity being discovered, for Cal
Galbraith and the rest of the Old-Timers were like lost children among
the many strangers who had rushed into the land. Besides, the frost of
the North has a bitter tongue, and the tender women of the South, to
shield their cheeks from its biting caresses, were prone to the use of
canvas masks. With faces obscured and bodies lost in squirrel-skin
parkas, a mother and daughter, meeting on trail, would pass as
strangers.

The coaching progressed rapidly. At first it had been slow, but later a
sudden acceleration had manifested itself. This began from the moment
Madeline tried on the white-satin slippers, and in so doing found
herself. The pride of her renegade father, apart from any natural
self-esteem she might possess, at that instant received its birth.
Hitherto, she had deemed herself a woman of an alien breed, of inferior
stock, purchased by her lord's favor. Her husband had seemed to her a
god, who had lifted her, through no essential virtues on her part, to
his own godlike level. But she had never forgotten, even when Young Cal
was born, that she was not of his people. As he had been a god, so had
his womenkind been goddesses. She might have contrasted herself with
them, but she had never compared.

It might have been that familiarity bred contempt; however, be that as
it may, she had ultimately come to understand these roving white men,
and to weigh them.

True, her mind was dark to deliberate analysis, but she yet possessed
her woman's clarity of vision in such matters. On the night of the
slippers she had measured the bold, open admiration of her three
man-friends; and for the first time comparison had suggested itself. It
was only a foot and an ankle, but--but comparison could not, in the
nature of things, cease at that point. She judged herself by their
standards till the divinity of her white sisters was shattered. After
all, they were only women, and why should she not exalt herself to
their midst? In doing these things she learned where she lacked and
with the knowledge of her weakness came her strength. And so mightily
did she strive that her three trainers often marveled late into the
night over the eternal mystery of woman.

In this way Thanksgiving Night drew near. At irregular intervals
Bettles sent word down from Stuart River regarding the welfare of Young
Cal. The time of their return was approaching. More than once a casual
caller, hearing dance-music and the rhythmic pulse of feet, entered,
only to find Harrington scraping away and the other two beating time or
arguing noisily over a mooted step. Madeline was never in evidence,
having precipitately fled to the inner room.

On one of these nights Cal Galbraith dropped in. Encouraging news had
just come down from Stuart River, and Madeline had surpassed
herself--not in walk alone, and carriage and grace, but in womanly
roguishness. They had indulged in sharp repartee and she had defended
herself brilliantly; and then, yielding to the intoxication of the
moment, and of her own power, she had bullied, and mastered, and
wheedled, and patronized them with most astonishing success. And
instinctively, involuntarily, they had bowed, not to her beauty, her
wisdom, her wit, but to that indefinable something in woman to which
man yields yet cannot name.

The room was dizzy with sheer delight as she and Prince whirled through
the last dance of the evening. Harrington was throwing in inconceivable
flourishes, while Malemute Kid, utterly abandoned, had seized the broom
and was executing mad gyrations on his own account.

At this instant the door shook with a heavy rap-rap, and their quick
glances noted the lifting of the latch. But they had survived similar
situations before. Harrington never broke a note. Madeline shot through
the waiting door to the inner room. The broom went hurtling under the
bunk, and by the time Cal Galbraith and Louis Savoy got their heads in,
Malemute Kid and Prince were in each other's arms, wildly schottisching
down the room.

As a rule, Indian women do not make a practice of fainting on
provocation, but Madeline came as near to it as she ever had in her
life. For an hour she crouched on the floor, listening to the heavy
voices of the men rumbling up and down in mimic thunder. Like familiar
chords of childhood melodies, every intonation, every trick of her
husband's voice swept in upon her, fluttering her heart and weakening
her knees till she lay half-fainting against the door. It was well she
could neither see nor hear when he took his departure.

'When do you expect to go back to Circle City?' Malemute Kid asked
simply.

'Haven't thought much about it,' he replied. 'Don't think till after
the ice breaks.' 'And Madeline?'

He flushed at the question, and there was a quick droop to his eyes.
Malemute Kid could have despised him for that, had he known men less.
As it was, his gorge rose against the wives and daughters who had come
into the land, and not satisfied with usurping the place of the native
women, had put unclean thoughts in the heads of the men and made them
ashamed.

'I guess she's all right,' the Circle City King answered hastily, and
in an apologetic manner. 'Tom Dixon's got charge of my interests, you
know, and he sees to it that she has everything she wants.' Malemute
Kid laid hand upon his arm and hushed him suddenly. They had stepped
without. Overhead, the aurora, a gorgeous wanton, flaunted miracles of
color; beneath lay the sleeping town. Far below, a solitary dog gave
tongue.

The King again began to speak, but the Kid pressed his hand for
silence. The sound multiplied. Dog after dog took up the strain till
the full-throated chorus swayed the night.

To him who hears for the first time this weird song, is told the first
and greatest secret of the Northland; to him who has heard it often, it
is the solemn knell of lost endeavor. It is the plaint of tortured
souls, for in it is invested the heritage of the North, the suffering
of countless generations--the warning and the requiem to the world's
estrays.

Cal Galbraith shivered slightly as it died away in half-caught sobs.
The Kid read his thoughts openly, and wandered back with him through
all the weary days of famine and disease; and with him was also the
patient Madeline, sharing his pains and perils, never doubting, never
complaining. His mind's retina vibrated to a score of pictures, stern,
clear-cut, and the hand of the past drew back with heavy fingers on his
heart. It was the psychological moment. Malemute Kid was half-tempted
to play his reserve card and win the game; but the lesson was too mild
as yet, and he let it pass. The next instant they had gripped hands,
and the King's beaded moccasins were drawing protests from the outraged
snow as he crunched down the hill.

Madeline in collapse was another woman to the mischievous creature of
an hour before, whose laughter had been so infectious and whose
heightened color and flashing eyes had made her teachers for the while
forget. Weak and nerveless, she sat in the chair just as she had been
dropped there by Prince and Harrington.

Malemute Kid frowned. This would never do. When the time of meeting her
husband came to hand, she must carry things off with high-handed
imperiousness. It was very necessary she should do it after the manner
of white women, else the victory would be no victory at all. So he
talked to her, sternly, without mincing of words, and initiated her
into the weaknesses of his own sex, till she came to understand what
simpletons men were after all, and why the word of their women was law.

A few days before Thanksgiving Night, Malemute Kid made another call on
Mrs. Eppingwell. She promptly overhauled her feminine fripperies, paid
a protracted visit to the dry-goods department of the P. C. Company,
and returned with the Kid to make Madeline's acquaintance. After that
came a period such as the cabin had never seen before, and what with
cutting, and fitting, and basting, and stitching, and numerous other
wonderful and unknowable things, the male conspirators were more often
banished the premises than not. At such times the Opera House opened
its double storm-doors to them.

So often did they put their heads together, and so deeply did they
drink to curious toasts, that the loungers scented unknown creeks of
incalculable richness, and it is known that several checha-quas and at
least one Old-Timer kept their stampeding packs stored behind the bar,
ready to hit the trail at a moment's notice.

Mrs. Eppingwell was a woman of capacity; so, when she turned Madeline
over to her trainers on Thanksgiving Night she was so transformed that
they were almost afraid of her. Prince wrapped a Hudson Bay blanket
about her with a mock reverence more real than feigned, while Malemute
Kid, whose arm she had taken, found it a severe trial to resume his
wonted mentorship. Harrington, with the list of purchases still running
through his head, dragged along in the rear, nor opened his mouth once
all the way down into the town. When they came to the back door of the
Opera House they took the blanket from Madeline's shoulders and spread
it on the snow. Slipping out of Prince's moccasins, she stepped upon it
in new satin slippers. The masquerade was at its height. She hesitated,
but they jerked open the door and shoved her in. Then they ran around
to come in by the front entrance.


III

'Where is Freda?' the Old-Timers questioned, while the che-cha-quas
were equally energetic in asking who Freda was. The ballroom buzzed
with her name.

It was on everybody's lips. Grizzled 'sour-dough boys,' day-laborers at
the mines but proud of their degree, either patronized the
spruce-looking tenderfeet and lied eloquently--the 'sour-dough boys'
being specially created to toy with truth--or gave them savage looks of
indignation because of their ignorance. Perhaps forty kings of the
Upper and Lower Countries were on the floor, each deeming himself hot
on the trail and sturdily backing his judgment with the yellow dust of
the realm. An assistant was sent to the man at the scales, upon whom
had fallen the burden of weighing up the sacks, while several of the
gamblers, with the rules of chance at their finger-ends, made up
alluring books on the field and favorites.

Which was Freda? Time and again the 'Greek Dancer' was thought to have
been discovered, but each discovery brought panic to the betting ring
and a frantic registering of new wagers by those who wished to hedge.
Malemute Kid took an interest in the hunt, his advent being hailed
uproariously by the revelers, who knew him to a man. The Kid had a good
eye for the trick of a step, and ear for the lilt of a voice, and his
private choice was a marvelous creature who scintillated as the 'Aurora
Borealis.' But the Greek dancer was too subtle for even his
penetration. The majority of the gold-hunters seemed to have centered
their verdict on the 'Russian Princess,' who was the most graceful in
the room, and hence could be no other than Freda Moloof.

During a quadrille a roar of satisfaction went up. She was discovered.
At previous balls, in the figure, 'all hands round,' Freda had
displayed an inimitable step and variation peculiarly her own. As the
figure was called, the 'Russian Princess' gave the unique rhythm to
limb and body. A chorus of I-told-you-so's shook the squared
roof-beams, when lo! it was noticed that 'Aurora Borealis' and another
masque, the 'Spirit of the Pole,' were performing the same trick
equally well. And when two twin 'Sun-Dogs' and a 'Frost Queen' followed
suit, a second assistant was dispatched to the aid of the man at the
scales.

Bettles came off trail in the midst of the excitement, descending upon
them in a hurricane of frost. His rimed brows turned to cataracts as he
whirled about; his mustache, still frozen, seemed gemmed with diamonds
and turned the light in varicolored rays; while the flying feet slipped
on the chunks of ice which rattled from his moccasins and German socks.
A Northland dance is quite an informal affair, the men of the creeks
and trails having lost whatever fastidiousness they might have at one
time possessed; and only in the high official circles are conventions
at all observed. Here, caste carried no significance. Millionaires and
paupers, dog-drivers and mounted policemen joined hands with 'ladies in
the center,' and swept around the circle performing most remarkable
capers. Primitive in their pleasure, boisterous and rough, they
displayed no rudeness, but rather a crude chivalry more genuine than
the most polished courtesy.

In his quest for the 'Greek Dancer,' Cal Galbraith managed to get into
the same set with the 'Russian Princess,' toward whom popular suspicion
had turned.

But by the time he had guided her through one dance, he was willing not
only to stake his millions that she was not Freda, but that he had had
his arm about her waist before. When or where he could not tell, but
the puzzling sense of familiarity so wrought upon him that he turned
his attention to the discovery of her identity. Malemute Kid might have
aided him instead of occasionally taking the Princess for a few turns
and talking earnestly to her in low tones. But it was Jack Harrington
who paid the 'Russian Princess' the most assiduous court. Once he drew
Cal Galbraith aside and hazarded wild guesses as to who she was, and
explained to him that he was going in to win. That rankled the Circle
City King, for man is not by nature monogamic, and he forgot both
Madeline and Freda in the new quest.

It was soon noised about that the 'Russian Princess' was not Freda
Moloof. Interest deepened. Here was a fresh enigma. They knew Freda
though they could not find her, but here was somebody they had found
and did not know. Even the women could not place her, and they knew
every good dancer in the camp. Many took her for one of the official
clique, indulging in a silly escapade. Not a few asserted she would
disappear before the unmasking. Others were equally positive that she
was the woman-reporter of the Kansas City Star, come to write them up
at ninety dollars per column. And the men at the scales worked busily.

At one o'clock every couple took to the floor. The unmasking began amid
laughter and delight, like that of carefree children. There was no end
of Oh's and Ah's as mask after mask was lifted. The scintillating
'Aurora Borealis' became the brawny negress whose income from washing
the community's clothes ran at about five hundred a month. The twin
'Sun-Dogs' discovered mustaches on their upper lips, and were
recognized as brother Fraction-Kings of El Dorado. In one of the most
prominent sets, and the slowest in uncovering, was Cal Galbraith with
the 'Spirit of the Pole.' Opposite him was Jack Harrington and the
'Russian Princess.' The rest had discovered themselves, yet the 'Greek
Dancer' was still missing. All eyes were upon the group. Cal Galbraith,
in response to their cries, lifted his partner's mask. Freda's
wonderful face and brilliant eyes flashed out upon them. A roar went
up, to be squelched suddenly in the new and absorbing mystery of the
'Russian Princess.' Her face was still hidden, and Jack Harrington was
struggling with her. The dancers tittered on the tiptoes of expectancy.
He crushed her dainty costume roughly, and then--and then the revelers
exploded. The joke was on them. They had danced all night with a
tabooed native woman.

But those that knew, and they were many, ceased abruptly, and a hush
fell upon the room.

Cal Galbraith crossed over with great strides, angrily, and spoke to
Madeline in polyglot Chinook. But she retained her composure,
apparently oblivious to the fact that she was the cynosure of all eyes,
and answered him in English. She showed neither fright nor anger, and
Malemute Kid chuckled at her well-bred equanimity. The King felt
baffled, defeated; his common Siwash wife had passed beyond him.

'Come!' he said finally. 'Come on home.' 'I beg pardon,' she replied;
'I have agreed to go to supper with Mr. Harrington. Besides, there's no
end of dances promised.'

Harrington extended his arm to lead her away. He evinced not the
slightest disinclination toward showing his back, but Malemute Kid had
by this time edged in closer. The Circle City King was stunned. Twice
his hand dropped to his belt, and twice the Kid gathered himself to
spring; but the retreating couple passed through the supper-room door
where canned oysters were spread at five dollars the plate.

The crowd sighed audibly, broke up into couples, and followed them.
Freda pouted and went in with Cal Galbraith; but she had a good heart
and a sure tongue, and she spoiled his oysters for him. What she said
is of no importance, but his face went red and white at intervals, and
he swore repeatedly and savagely at himself.

The supper-room was filled with a pandemonium of voices, which ceased
suddenly as Cal Galbraith stepped over to his wife's table. Since the
unmasking considerable weights of dust had been placed as to the
outcome. Everybody watched with breathless interest.

Harrington's blue eyes were steady, but under the overhanging
tablecloth a Smith & Wesson balanced on his knee. Madeline looked up,
casually, with little interest.

'May--may I have the next round dance with you?' the King stuttered.

The wife of the King glanced at her card and inclined her head.



An Odyssey of the North

The sleds were singing their eternal lament to the creaking of the
harness and the tinkling bells of the leaders; but the men and dogs
were tired and made no sound. The trail was heavy with new-fallen snow,
and they had come far, and the runners, burdened with flint-like
quarters of frozen moose, clung tenaciously to the unpacked surface and
held back with a stubbornness almost human.

Darkness was coming on, but there was no camp to pitch that night. The
snow fell gently through the pulseless air, not in flakes, but in tiny
frost crystals of delicate design. It was very warm--barely ten below
zero--and the men did not mind. Meyers and Bettles had raised their ear
flaps, while Malemute Kid had even taken off his mittens.

The dogs had been fagged out early in the after noon, but they now
began to show new vigor. Among the more astute there was a certain
restlessness--an impatience at the restraint of the traces, an
indecisive quickness of movement, a sniffing of snouts and pricking of
ears. These became incensed at their more phlegmatic brothers, urging
them on with numerous sly nips on their hinder quarters. Those, thus
chidden, also contracted and helped spread the contagion. At last the
leader of the foremost sled uttered a sharp whine of satisfaction,
crouching lower in the snow and throwing himself against the collar.
The rest followed suit.

There was an ingathering of back hands, a tightening of traces; the
sleds leaped forward, and the men clung to the gee poles, violently
accelerating the uplift of their feet that they might escape going
under the runners. The weariness of the day fell from them, and they
whooped encouragement to the dogs. The animals responded with joyous
yelps. They were swinging through the gathering darkness at a rattling
gallop.

'Gee! Gee!' the men cried, each in turn, as their sleds abruptly left
the main trail, heeling over on single runners like luggers on the wind.

Then came a hundred yards' dash to the lighted parchment window, which
told its own story of the home cabin, the roaring Yukon stove, and the
steaming pots of tea. But the home cabin had been invaded. Threescore
huskies chorused defiance, and as many furry forms precipitated
themselves upon the dogs which drew the first sled. The door was flung
open, and a man, clad in the scarlet tunic of the Northwest Police,
waded knee-deep among the furious brutes, calmly and impartially
dispensing soothing justice with the butt end of a dog whip. After that
the men shook hands; and in this wise was Malemute Kid welcomed to his
own cabin by a stranger.

Stanley Prince, who should have welcomed him, and who was responsible
for the Yukon stove and hot tea aforementioned, was busy with his
guests. There were a dozen or so of them, as nondescript a crowd as
ever served the Queen in the enforcement of her laws or the delivery of
her mails. They were of many breeds, but their common life had formed
of them a certain type--a lean and wiry type, with trail-hardened
muscles, and sun-browned faces, and untroubled souls which gazed
frankly forth, clear-eyed and steady.

They drove the dogs of the Queen, wrought fear in the hearts of her
enemies, ate of her meager fare, and were happy. They had seen life,
and done deeds, and lived romances; but they did not know it.

And they were very much at home. Two of them were sprawled upon
Malemute Kid's bunk, singing chansons which their French forebears sang
in the days when first they entered the Northwest land and mated with
its Indian women. Bettles' bunk had suffered a similar invasion, and
three or four lusty voyageurs worked their toes among its blankets as
they listened to the tale of one who had served on the boat brigade
with Wolseley when he fought his way to Khartoum.

And when he tired, a cowboy told of courts and kings and lords and
ladies he had seen when Buffalo Bill toured the capitals of Europe. In
a corner two half-breeds, ancient comrades in a lost campaign, mended
harnesses and talked of the days when the Northwest flamed with
insurrection and Louis Riel was king.

Rough jests and rougher jokes went up and down, and great hazards by
trail and river were spoken of in the light of commonplaces, only to be
recalled by virtue of some grain of humor or ludicrous happening.
Prince was led away by these uncrowned heroes who had seen history
made, who regarded the great and the romantic as but the ordinary and
the incidental in the routine of life. He passed his precious tobacco
among them with lavish disregard, and rusty chains of reminiscence were
loosened, and forgotten odysseys resurrected for his especial benefit.

When conversation dropped and the travelers filled the last pipes and
lashed their tight-rolled sleeping furs. Prince fell back upon his
comrade for further information.

'Well, you know what the cowboy is,' Malemute Kid answered, beginning
to unlace his moccasins; 'and it's not hard to guess the British blood
in his bed partner. As for the rest, they're all children of the
coureurs du bois, mingled with God knows how many other bloods. The two
turning in by the door are the regulation 'breeds' or Boisbrules. That
lad with the worsted breech scarf--notice his eyebrows and the turn of
his jaw--shows a Scotchman wept in his mother's smoky tepee. And that
handsome looking fellow putting the capote under his head is a French
half-breed--you heard him talking; he doesn't like the two Indians
turning in next to him. You see, when the 'breeds' rose under the Riel
the full-bloods kept the peace, and they've not lost much love for one
another since.' 'But I say, what's that glum-looking fellow by the
stove? I'll swear he can't talk English. He hasn't opened his mouth all
night.' 'You're wrong. He knows English well enough. Did you follow his
eyes when he listened? I did. But he's neither kith nor kin to the
others. When they talked their own patois you could see he didn't
understand. I've been wondering myself what he is. Let's find out.'
'Fire a couple of sticks into the stove!'

Malemute Kid commanded, raising his voice and looking squarely at the
man in question.

He obeyed at once.

'Had discipline knocked into him somewhere.' Prince commented in a low
tone.

Malemute Kid nodded, took off his socks, and picked his way among
recumbent men to the stove. There he hung his damp footgear among a
score or so of mates.

'When do you expect to get to Dawson?' he asked tentatively.

The man studied him a moment before replying. 'They say seventy-five
mile. So? Maybe two days.' The very slightest accent was perceptible,
while there was no awkward hesitancy or groping for words.

'Been in the country before?' 'No.' 'Northwest Territory?' 'Yes.' 'Born
there?' 'No.'

'Well, where the devil were you born? You're none of these.' Malemute
Kid swept his hand over the dog drivers, even including the two
policemen who had turned into Prince's bunk. 'Where did you come from?
I've seen faces like yours before, though I can't remember just where.'
'I know you,' he irrelevantly replied, at once turning the drift of
Malemute Kid's questions.

'Where? Ever see me?' 'No; your partner, him priest, Pastilik, long
time ago. Him ask me if I see you, Malemute Kid. Him give me grub. I no
stop long. You hear him speak 'bout me?' 'Oh! you're the fellow that
traded the otter skins for the dogs?' The man nodded, knocked out his
pipe, and signified his disinclination for conversation by rolling up
in his furs. Malemute Kid blew out the slush lamp and crawled under the
blankets with Prince.

'Well, what is he?' 'Don't know--turned me off, somehow, and then shut
up like a clam.

'But he's a fellow to whet your curiosity. I've heard of him. All the
coast wondered about him eight years ago. Sort of mysterious, you know.
He came down out of the North in the dead of winter, many a thousand
miles from here, skirting Bering Sea and traveling as though the devil
were after him. No one ever learned where he came from, but he must
have come far. He was badly travel-worn when he got food from the
Swedish missionary on Golovin Bay and asked the way south. We heard of
all this afterward. Then he abandoned the shore line, heading right
across Norton Sound. Terrible weather, snowstorms and high winds, but
he pulled through where a thousand other men would have died, missing
St. Michaels and making the land at Pastilik. He'd lost all but two
dogs, and was nearly gone with starvation.

'He was so anxious to go on that Father Roubeau fitted him out with
grub; but he couldn't let him have any dogs, for he was only waiting my
arrival, to go on a trip himself. Mr. Ulysses knew too much to start on
without animals, and fretted around for several days. He had on his
sled a bunch of beautifully cured otter skins, sea otters, you know,
worth their weight in gold. There was also at Pastilik an old Shylock
of a Russian trader, who had dogs to kill. Well, they didn't dicker
very long, but when the Strange One headed south again, it was in the
rear of a spanking dog team. Mr. Shylock, by the way, had the otter
skins. I saw them, and they were magnificent. We figured it up and
found the dogs brought him at least five hundred apiece. And it wasn't
as if the Strange One didn't know the value of sea otter; he was an
Indian of some sort, and what little he talked showed he'd been among
white men.

'After the ice passed out of the sea, word came up from Nunivak Island
that he'd gone in there for grub. Then he dropped from sight, and this
is the first heard of him in eight years. Now where did he come from?
and what was he doing there? and why did he come from there? He's
Indian, he's been nobody knows where, and he's had discipline, which is
unusual for an Indian. Another mystery of the North for you to solve,
Prince.' 'Thanks awfully, but I've got too many on hand as it is,' he
replied.

Malemute Kid was already breathing heavily; but the young mining
engineer gazed straight up through the thick darkness, waiting for the
strange orgasm which stirred his blood to die away. And when he did
sleep, his brain worked on, and for the nonce he, too, wandered through
the white unknown, struggled with the dogs on endless trails, and saw
men live, and toil, and die like men. The next morning, hours before
daylight, the dog drivers and policemen pulled out for Dawson. But the
powers that saw to Her Majesty's interests and ruled the destinies of
her lesser creatures gave the mailmen little rest, for a week later
they appeared at Stuart River, heavily burdened with letters for Salt
Water.

However, their dogs had been replaced by fresh ones; but, then, they
were dogs.

The men had expected some sort of a layover in which to rest up;
besides, this Klondike was a new section of the Northland, and they had
wished to see a little something of the Golden City where dust flowed
like water and dance halls rang with never-ending revelry. But they
dried their socks and smoked their evening pipes with much the same
gusto as on their former visit, though one or two bold spirits
speculated on desertion and the possibility of crossing the unexplored
Rockies to the east, and thence, by the Mackenzie Valley, of gaining
their old stamping grounds in the Chippewyan country.

Two or three even decided to return to their homes by that route when
their terms of service had expired, and they began to lay plans
forthwith, looking forward to the hazardous undertaking in much the
same way a city-bred man would to a day's holiday in the woods.

He of the Otter Skins seemed very restless, though he took little
interest in the discussion, and at last he drew Malemute Kid to one
side and talked for some time in low tones.

Prince cast curious eyes in their direction, and the mystery deepened
when they put on caps and mittens and went outside. When they returned,
Malemute Kid placed his gold scales on the table, weighed out the
matter of sixty ounces, and transferred them to the Strange One's sack.
Then the chief of the dog drivers joined the conclave, and certain
business was transacted with him.

The next day the gang went on upriver, but He of the Otter Skins took
several pounds of grub and turned his steps back toward Dawson.

'Didn't know what to make of it,' said Malemute Kid in response to
Prince's queries; 'but the poor beggar wanted to be quit of the service
for some reason or other--at least it seemed a most important one to
him, though he wouldn't let on what. You see, it's just like the army:
he signed for two years, and the only way to get free was to buy
himself out. He couldn't desert and then stay here, and he was just
wild to remain in the country.

'Made up his mind when he got to Dawson, he said; but no one knew him,
hadn't a cent, and I was the only one he'd spoken two words with. So he
talked it over with the lieutenant-governor, and made arrangements in
case he could get the money from me--loan, you know. Said he'd pay back
in the year, and, if I wanted, would put me onto something rich.
Never'd seen it, but he knew it was rich.

'And talk! why, when he got me outside he was ready to weep. Begged and
pleaded; got down in the snow to me till I hauled him out of it.
Palavered around like a crazy man.

'Swore he's worked to this very end for years and years, and couldn't
bear to be disappointed now. Asked him what end, but he wouldn't say.

'Said they might keep him on the other half of the trail and he
wouldn't get to Dawson in two years, and then it would be too late.
Never saw a man take on so in my life. And when I said I'd let him have
it, had to yank him out of the snow again. Told him to consider it in
the light of a grubstake. Think he'd have it? No sir! Swore he'd give
me all he found, make me rich beyond the dreams of avarice, and all
such stuff. Now a man who puts his life and time against a grubstake
ordinarily finds it hard enough to turn over half of what he finds.
Something behind all this, Prince; just you make a note of it. We'll
hear of him if he stays in the country--' 'And if he doesn't?' 'Then my
good nature gets a shock, and I'm sixty some odd ounces out.' The cold
weather had come on with the long nights, and the sun had begun to play
his ancient game of peekaboo along the southern snow line ere aught was
heard of Malemute Kid's grubstake. And then, one bleak morning in early
January, a heavily laden dog train pulled into his cabin below Stuart
River. He of the Otter Skins was there, and with him walked a man such
as the gods have almost forgotten how to fashion. Men never talked of
luck and pluck and five-hundred-dollar dirt without bringing in the
name of Axel Gunderson; nor could tales of nerve or strength or daring
pass up and down the campfire without the summoning of his presence.
And when the conversation flagged, it blazed anew at mention of the
woman who shared his fortunes.

As has been noted, in the making of Axel Gunderson the gods had
remembered their old-time cunning and cast him after the manner of men
who were born when the world was young. Full seven feet he towered in
his picturesque costume which marked a king of Eldorado. His chest,
neck, and limbs were those of a giant. To bear his three hundred pounds
of bone and muscle, his snowshoes were greater by a generous yard than
those of other men. Rough-hewn, with rugged brow and massive jaw and
unflinching eyes of palest blue, his face told the tale of one who knew
but the law of might. Of the yellow of ripe corn silk, his
frost-incrusted hair swept like day across the night and fell far down
his coat of bearskin.

A vague tradition of the sea seemed to cling about him as he swung down
the narrow trail in advance of the dogs; and he brought the butt of his
dog whip against Malemute Kid's door as a Norse sea rover, on southern
foray, might thunder for admittance at the castle gate.

Prince bared his womanly arms and kneaded sour-dough bread, casting, as
he did so, many a glance at the three guests--three guests the like of
which might never come under a man's roof in a lifetime. The Strange
One, whom Malemute Kid had surnamed Ulysses, still fascinated him; but
his interest chiefly gravitated between Axel Gunderson and Axel
Gunderson's wife. She felt the day's journey, for she had softened in
comfortable cabins during the many days since her husband mastered the
wealth of frozen pay streaks, and she was tired. She rested against his
great breast like a slender flower against a wall, replying lazily to
Malemute Kid's good-natured banter, and stirring Prince's blood
strangely with an occasional sweep of her deep, dark eyes. For Prince
was a man, and healthy, and had seen few women in many months. And she
was older than he, and an Indian besides. But she was different from
all native wives he had met: she had traveled--had been in his country
among others, he gathered from the conversation; and she knew most of
the things the women of his own race knew, and much more that it was
not in the nature of things for them to know. She could make a meal of
sun-dried fish or a bed in the snow; yet she teased them with
tantalizing details of many-course dinners, and caused strange internal
dissensions to arise at the mention of various quondam dishes which
they had well-nigh forgotten. She knew the ways of the moose, the bear,
and the little blue fox, and of the wild amphibians of the Northern
seas; she was skilled in the lore of the woods, and the streams, and
the tale writ by man and bird and beast upon the delicate snow crust
was to her an open book; yet Prince caught the appreciative twinkle in
her eye as she read the Rules of the Camp. These rules had been
fathered by the Unquenchable Bettles at a time when his blood ran high,
and were remarkable for the terse simplicity of their humor.

Prince always turned them to the wall before the arrival of ladies; but
who could suspect that this native wife--Well, it was too late now.

This, then, was the wife of Axel Gunderson, a woman whose name and fame
had traveled with her husband's, hand in hand, through all the
Northland. At table, Malemute Kid baited her with the assurance of an
old friend, and Prince shook off the shyness of first acquaintance and
joined in. But she held her own in the unequal contest, while her
husband, slower in wit, ventured naught but applause. And he was very
proud of her; his every look and action revealed the magnitude of the
place she occupied in his life. He of the Otter Skins ate in silence,
forgotten in the merry battle; and long ere the others were done he
pushed back from the table and went out among the dogs. Yet all too
soon his fellow travelers drew on their mittens and parkas and followed
him.

There had been no snow for many days, and the sleds slipped along the
hardpacked Yukon trail as easily as if it had been glare ice. Ulysses
led the first sled; with the second came Prince and Axel Gunderson's
wife; while Malemute Kid and the yellow-haired giant brought up the
third.

'It's only a hunch, Kid,' he said, 'but I think it's straight. He's
never been there, but he tells a good story, and shows a map I heard of
when I was in the Kootenay country years ago. I'd like to have you go
along; but he's a strange one, and swore point-blank to throw it up if
anyone was brought in. But when I come back you'll get first tip, and
I'll stake you next to me, and give you a half share in the town site
besides.' 'No! no!' he cried, as the other strove to interrupt. 'I'm
running this, and before I'm done it'll need two heads.

'If it's all right, why, it'll be a second Cripple Creek, man; do you
hear?--a second Cripple Creek! It's quartz, you know, not placer; and
if we work it right we'll corral the whole thing--millions upon
millions. I've heard of the place before, and so have you. We'll build
a town--thousands of workmen--good waterways--steamship lines--big
carrying trade--light-draught steamers for head reaches--survey a
railroad, perhaps--sawmills--electric-light plant--do our own
banking--commercial company--syndicate--Say! Just you hold your hush
till I get back!' The sleds came to a halt where the trail crossed the
mouth of Stuart River. An unbroken sea of frost, its wide expanse
stretched away into the unknown east.

The snowshoes were withdrawn from the lashings of the sleds. Axel
Gunderson shook hands and stepped to the fore, his great webbed shoes
sinking a fair half yard into the feathery surface and packing the snow
so the dogs should not wallow. His wife fell in behind the last sled,
betraying long practice in the art of handling the awkward footgear.
The stillness was broken with cheery farewells; the dogs whined; and He
of the Otter Skins talked with his whip to a recalcitrant wheeler.

An hour later the train had taken on the likeness of a black pencil
crawling in a long, straight line across a mighty sheet of foolscap.


II

One night, many weeks later, Malemute Kid and Prince fell to solving
chess problems from the torn page of an ancient magazine. The Kid had
just returned from his Bonanza properties and was resting up
preparatory to a long moose hunt.

Prince, too, had been on creek and trail nearly all winter, and had
grown hungry for a blissful week of cabin life.

'Interpose the black knight, and force the king. No, that won't do.
See, the next move-'

'Why advance the pawn two squares? Bound to take it in transit, and
with the bishop out of the way-' 'But hold on! That leaves a hole,
and-' 'No; it's protected. Go ahead! You'll see it works.' It was very
interesting. Somebody knocked at the door a second time before Malemute
Kid said, 'Come in.' The door swung open. Something staggered in.

Prince caught one square look and sprang to his feet. The horror in his
eyes caused Malemute Kid to whirl about; and he, too, was startled,
though he had seen bad things before. The thing tottered blindly toward
them. Prince edged away till he reached the nail from which hung his
Smith & Wesson.

'My God! what is it?' he whispered to Malemute Kid.

'Don't know. Looks like a case of freezing and no grub,' replied the
Kid, sliding away in the opposite direction. 'Watch out! It may be
mad,' he warned, coming back from closing the door.

The thing advanced to the table. The bright flame of the slush lamp
caught its eye. It was amused, and gave voice to eldritch cackles which
betokened mirth.

Then, suddenly, he--for it was a man--swayed back, with a hitch to his
skin trousers, and began to sing a chantey, such as men lift when they
swing around the capstan circle and the sea snorts in their ears:
Yan-kee ship come down de ri-ib-er, Pull! my bully boys! Pull! D'yeh
want--to know de captain ru-uns her? Pull! my bully boys! Pull!
Jon-a-than Jones ob South Caho-li-in-a, Pull! my bully. He broke off
abruptly, tottered with a wolfish snarl to the meat shelf, and before
they could intercept was tearing with his teeth at a chunk of raw
bacon. The struggle was fierce between him and Malemute Kid; but his
mad strength left him as suddenly as it had come, and he weakly
surrendered the spoil. Between them they got him upon a stool, where he
sprawled with half his body across the table.

A small dose of whiskey strengthened him, so that he could dip a spoon
into the sugar caddy which Malemute Kid placed before him. After his
appetite had been somewhat cloyed, Prince, shuddering as he did so,
passed him a mug of weak beef tea.

The creature's eyes were alight with a somber frenzy, which blazed and
waned with every mouthful. There was very little skin to the face. The
face, for that matter, sunken and emaciated, bore little likeness to
human countenance.

Frost after frost had bitten deeply, each depositing its stratum of
scab upon the half-healed scar that went before. This dry, hard surface
was of a bloody-black color, serrated by grievous cracks wherein the
raw red flesh peeped forth. His skin garments were dirty and in
tatters, and the fur of one side was singed and burned away, showing
where he had lain upon his fire.

Malemute Kid pointed to where the sun-tanned hide had been cut away,
strip by strip--the grim signature of famine.

'Who--are--you?' slowly and distinctly enunciated the Kid.

The man paid no heed.

'Where do you come from?' 'Yan-kee ship come down de ri-ib-er,' was the
quavering response.

'Don't doubt the beggar came down the river,' the Kid said, shaking him
in an endeavor to start a more lucid flow of talk.

But the man shrieked at the contact, clapping a hand to his side in
evident pain. He rose slowly to his feet, half leaning on the table.

'She laughed at me--so--with the hate in her eye; and
she--would--not--come.' His voice died away, and he was sinking back
when Malemute Kid gripped him by the wrist and shouted, 'Who? Who would
not come?' 'She, Unga. She laughed, and struck at me, so, and so. And
then-' 'Yes?'

'And then--' 'And then what?' 'And then he lay very still in the snow a
long time. He is-still in--the--snow.' The two men looked at each other
helplessly.

'Who is in the snow?' 'She, Unga. She looked at me with the hate in her
eye, and then--'

'Yes, yes.' 'And then she took the knife, so; and once, twice--she was
weak. I traveled very slow. And there is much gold in that place, very
much gold.' 'Where is Unga?' For all Malemute Kid knew, she might be
dying a mile away. He shook the man savagely, repeating again and
again, 'Where is Unga? Who is Unga?' 'She--is--in--the--snow.' 'Go on!'
The Kid was pressing his wrist cruelly.

'So--I--would--be--in--the snow--but--I--had--a--debt--to--pay.
It--was--heavy--I--had--a-debt--to--pay--a--debt--to--pay I--had-' The
faltering monosyllables ceased as he fumbled in his pouch and drew
forth a buckskin sack. 'A--debt--to--pay--five--pounds--of--gold-grub--
stake--Mal--e--mute--Kid--I--y--' The exhausted head dropped upon the
table; nor could Malemute Kid rouse it again.

'It's Ulysses,' he said quietly, tossing the bag of dust on the table.
'Guess it's all day with Axel Gunderson and the woman. Come on, let's
get him between the blankets. He's Indian; he'll pull through and tell
a tale besides.' As they cut his garments from him, near his right
breast could be seen two unhealed, hard-lipped knife thrusts.


III

'I will talk of the things which were in my own way; but you will
understand. I will begin at the beginning, and tell of myself and the
woman, and, after that, of the man.' He of the Otter Skins drew over to
the stove as do men who have been deprived of fire and are afraid the
Promethean gift may vanish at any moment. Malemute Kid picked up the
slush lamp and placed it so its light might fall upon the face of the
narrator. Prince slid his body over the edge of the bunk and joined
them.

'I am Naass, a chief, and the son of a chief, born between a sunset and
a rising, on the dark seas, in my father's oomiak. All of a night the
men toiled at the paddles, and the women cast out the waves which threw
in upon us, and we fought with the storm. The salt spray froze upon my
mother's breast till her breath passed with the passing of the tide.
But I--I raised my voice with the wind and the storm, and lived.

'We dwelt in Akatan--' 'Where?' asked Malemute Kid.

'Akatan, which is in the Aleutians; Akatan, beyond Chignik, beyond
Kardalak, beyond Unimak. As I say, we dwelt in Akatan, which lies in
the midst of the sea on the edge of the world. We farmed the salt seas
for the fish, the seal, and the otter; and our homes shouldered about
one another on the rocky strip between the rim of the forest and the
yellow beach where our kayaks lay. We were not many, and the world was
very small. There were strange lands to the east--islands like Akatan;
so we thought all the world was islands and did not mind.

'I was different from my people. In the sands of the beach were the
crooked timbers and wave-warped planks of a boat such as my people
never built; and I remember on the point of the island which overlooked
the ocean three ways there stood a pine tree which never grew there,
smooth and straight and tall. It is said the two men came to that spot,
turn about, through many days, and watched with the passing of the
light. These two men came from out of the sea in the boat which lay in
pieces on the beach. And they were white like you, and weak as the
little children when the seal have gone away and the hunters come home
empty. I know of these things from the old men and the old women, who
got them from their fathers and mothers before them. These strange
white men did not take kindly to our ways at first, but they grew
strong, what of the fish and the oil, and fierce. And they built them
each his own house, and took the pick of our women, and in time
children came. Thus he was born who was to become the father of my
father's father.

'As I said, I was different from my people, for I carried the strong,
strange blood of this white man who came out of the sea. It is said we
had other laws in the days before these men; but they were fierce and
quarrelsome, and fought with our men till there were no more left who
dared to fight. Then they made themselves chiefs, and took away our old
laws, and gave us new ones, insomuch that the man was the son of his
father, and not his mother, as our way had been. They also ruled that
the son, first-born, should have all things which were his father's
before him, and that the brothers and sisters should shift for
themselves. And they gave us other laws. They showed us new ways in the
catching of fish and the killing of bear which were thick in the woods;
and they taught us to lay by bigger stores for the time of famine. And
these things were good.

'But when they had become chiefs, and there were no more men to face
their anger, they fought, these strange white men, each with the other.
And the one whose blood I carry drove his seal spear the length of an
arm through the other's body. Their children took up the fight, and
their children's children; and there was great hatred between them, and
black doings, even to my time, so that in each family but one lived to
pass down the blood of them that went before. Of my blood I was alone;
of the other man's there was but a girl. Unga, who lived with her
mother. Her father and my father did not come back from the fishing one
night; but afterward they washed up to the beach on the big tides, and
they held very close to each other.

'The people wondered, because of the hatred between the houses, and the
old men shook their heads and said the fight would go on when children
were born to her and children to me. They told me this as a boy, till I
came to believe, and to look upon Unga as a foe, who was to be the
mother of children which were to fight with mine. I thought of these
things day by day, and when I grew to a stripling I came to ask why
this should be so.

'And they answered, "We do not know, but that in such way your fathers
did." And I marveled that those which were to come should fight the
battles of those that were gone, and in it I could see no right. But
the people said it must be, and I was only a stripling.

'And they said I must hurry, that my blood might be the older and grow
strong before hers. This was easy, for I was head man, and the people
looked up to me because of the deeds and the laws of my fathers, and
the wealth which was mine. Any maiden would come to me, but I found
none to my liking. And the old men and the mothers of maidens told me
to hurry, for even then were the hunters bidding high to the mother of
Unga; and should her children grow strong before mine, mine would
surely die.

'Nor did I find a maiden till one night coming back from the fishing.
The sunlight was lying, so, low and full in the eyes, the wind free,
and the kayacks racing with the white seas. Of a sudden the kayak of
Unga came driving past me, and she looked upon me, so, with her black
hair flying like a cloud of night and the spray wet on her cheek. As I
say, the sunlight was full in the eyes, and I was a stripling; but
somehow it was all clear, and I knew it to be the call of kind to kind.

'As she whipped ahead she looked back within the space of two
strokes--looked as only the woman Unga could look--and again I knew it
as the call of kind. The people shouted as we ripped past the lazy
oomiaks and left them far behind. But she was quick at the paddle, and
my heart was like the belly of a sail, and I did not gain. The wind
freshened, the sea whitened, and, leaping like the seals on the
windward breech, we roared down the golden pathway of the sun.' Naass
was crouched half out of his stool, in the attitude of one driving a
paddle, as he ran the race anew. Somewhere across the stove he beheld
the tossing kayak and the flying hair of Unga. The voice of the wind
was in his ears, and its salt beat fresh upon his nostrils.

'But she made the shore, and ran up the sand, laughing, to the house of
her mother. And a great thought came to me that night--a thought worthy
of him that was chief over all the people of Akatan. So, when the moon
was up, I went down to the house of her mother, and looked upon the
goods of Yash-Noosh, which were piled by the door--the goods of
Yash-Noosh, a strong hunter who had it in mind to be the father of the
children of Unga. Other young men had piled their goods there and taken
them away again; and each young man had made a pile greater than the
one before.

'And I laughed to the moon and the stars, and went to my own house
where my wealth was stored. And many trips I made, till my pile was
greater by the fingers of one hand than the pile of Yash-Noosh. There
were fish, dried in the sun and smoked; and forty hides of the hair
seal, and half as many of the fur, and each hide was tied at the mouth
and big bellied with oil; and ten skins of bear which I killed in the
woods when they came out in the spring. And there were beads and
blankets and scarlet cloths, such as I got in trade from the people who
lived to the east, and who got them in trade from the people who lived
still beyond in the east.

'And I looked upon the pile of Yash-Noosh and laughed, for I was head
man in Akatan, and my wealth was greater than the wealth of all my
young men, and my fathers had done deeds, and given laws, and put their
names for all time in the mouths of the people.

'So, when the morning came, I went down to the beach, casting out of
the corner of my eye at the house of the mother of Unga. My offer yet
stood untouched.

'And the women smiled, and said sly things one to the other. I
wondered, for never had such a price been offered; and that night I
added more to the pile, and put beside it a kayak of well-tanned skins
which never yet had swam in the sea. But in the day it was yet there,
open to the laughter of all men. The mother of Unga was crafty, and I
grew angry at the shame in which I stood before my people. So that
night I added till it became a great pile, and I hauled up my oomiak,
which was of the value of twenty kayaks. And in the morning there was
no pile.

'Then made I preparation for the wedding, and the people that lived
even to the east came for the food of the feast and the potlatch token.
Unga was older than I by the age of four suns in the way we reckoned
the years. I was only a stripling; but then I was a chief, and the son
of a chief, and it did not matter.

'But a ship shoved her sails above the floor of the ocean, and grew
larger with the breath of the wind. From her scuppers she ran clear
water, and the men were in haste and worked hard at the pumps. On the
bow stood a mighty man, watching the depth of the water and giving
commands with a voice of thunder. His eyes were of the pale blue of the
deep waters, and his head was maned like that of a sea lion. And his
hair was yellow, like the straw of a southern harvest or the manila
rope yarns which sailormen plait.

'Of late years we had seen ships from afar, but this was the first to
come to the beach of Akatan. The feast was broken, and the women and
children fled to the houses, while we men strung our bows and waited
with spears in hand. But when the ship's forefoot smelled the beach the
strange men took no notice of us, being busy with their own work. With
the falling of the tide they careened the schooner and patched a great
hole in her bottom. So the women crept back, and the feast went on.

'When the tide rose, the sea wanderers kedged the schooner to deep
water and then came among us. They bore presents and were friendly; so
I made room for them, and out of the largeness of my heart gave them
tokens such as I gave all the guests, for it was my wedding day, and I
was head man in Akatan. And he with the mane of the sea lion was there,
so tall and strong that one looked to see the earth shake with the fall
of his feet. He looked much and straight at Unga, with his arms folded,
so, and stayed till the sun went away and the stars came out. Then he
went down to his ship. After that I took Unga by the hand and led her
to my own house. And there was singing and great laughter, and the
women said sly things, after the manner of women at such times. But we
did not care. Then the people left us alone and went home.

'The last noise had not died away when the chief of the sea wanderers
came in by the door. And he had with him black bottles, from which we
drank and made merry. You see, I was only a stripling, and had lived
all my days on the edge of the world. So my blood became as fire, and
my heart as light as the froth that flies from the surf to the cliff.
Unga sat silent among the skins in the corner, her eyes wide, for she
seemed to fear. And he with the mane of the sea lion looked upon her
straight and long. Then his men came in with bundles of goods, and he
piled before me wealth such as was not in all Akatan. There were guns,
both large and small, and powder and shot and shell, and bright axes
and knives of steel, and cunning tools, and strange things the like of
which I had never seen. When he showed me by sign that it was all mine,
I thought him a great man to be so free; but he showed me also that
Unga was to go away with him in his ship.

'Do you understand?--that Unga was to go away with him in his ship. The
blood of my fathers flamed hot on the sudden, and I made to drive him
through with my spear. But the spirit of the bottles had stolen the
life from my arm, and he took me by the neck, so, and knocked my head
against the wall of the house. And I was made weak like a newborn
child, and my legs would no more stand under me.

'Unga screamed, and she laid hold of the things of the house with her
hands, till they fell all about us as he dragged her to the door. Then
he took her in his great arms, and when she tore at his yellow hair
laughed with a sound like that of the big bull seal in the rut.

'I crawled to the beach and called upon my people, but they were
afraid. Only Yash-Noosh was a man, and they struck him on the head with
an oar, till he lay with his face in the sand and did not move. And
they raised the sails to the sound of their songs, and the ship went
away on the wind.

'The people said it was good, for there would be no more war of the
bloods in Akatan; but I said never a word, waiting till the time of the
full moon, when I put fish and oil in my kayak and went away to the
east. I saw many islands and many people, and I, who had lived on the
edge, saw that the world was very large. I talked by signs; but they
had not seen a schooner nor a man with the mane of a sea lion, and they
pointed always to the east. And I slept in queer places, and ate odd
things, and met strange faces. Many laughed, for they thought me light
of head; but sometimes old men turned my face to the light and blessed
me, and the eyes of the young women grew soft as they asked me of the
strange ship, and Unga, and the men of the sea.

'And in this manner, through rough seas and great storms, I came to
Unalaska. There were two schooners there, but neither was the one I
sought. So I passed on to the east, with the world growing ever larger,
and in the island of Unamok there was no word of the ship, nor in
Kadiak, nor in Atognak. And so I came one day to a rocky land, where
men dug great holes in the mountain. And there was a schooner, but not
my schooner, and men loaded upon it the rocks which they dug. This I
thought childish, for all the world was made of rocks; but they gave me
food and set me to work. When the schooner was deep in the water, the
captain gave me money and told me to go; but I asked which way he went,
and he pointed south. I made signs that I would go with him, and he
laughed at first, but then, being short of men, took me to help work
the ship. So I came to talk after their manner, and to heave on ropes,
and to reef the stiff sails in sudden squalls, and to take my turn at
the wheel. But it was not strange, for the blood of my fathers was the
blood of the men of the sea.

'I had thought it an easy task to find him I sought, once I got among
his own people; and when we raised the land one day, and passed between
a gateway of the sea to a port, I looked for perhaps as many schooners
as there were fingers to my hands. But the ships lay against the
wharves for miles, packed like so many little fish; and when I went
among them to ask for a man with the mane of a sea lion, they laughed,
and answered me in the tongues of many peoples. And I found that they
hailed from the uttermost parts of the earth.

'And I went into the city to look upon the face of every man. But they
were like the cod when they run thick on the banks, and I could not
count them. And the noise smote upon me till I could not hear, and my
head was dizzy with much movement. So I went on and on, through the
lands which sang in the warm sunshine; where the harvests lay rich on
the plains; and where great cities were fat with men that lived like
women, with false words in their mouths and their hearts black with the
lust of gold. And all the while my people of Akatan hunted and fished,
and were happy in the thought that the world was small.

'But the look in the eyes of Unga coming home from the fishing was with
me always, and I knew I would find her when the time was met. She
walked down quiet lanes in the dusk of the evening, or led me chases
across the thick fields wet with the morning dew, and there was a
promise in her eyes such as only the woman Unga could give.

'So I wandered through a thousand cities. Some were gentle and gave me
food, and others laughed, and still others cursed; but I kept my tongue
between my teeth, and went strange ways and saw strange sights.
Sometimes I, who was a chief and the son of a chief, toiled for
men--men rough of speech and hard as iron, who wrung gold from the
sweat and sorrow of their fellow men. Yet no word did I get of my quest
till I came back to the sea like a homing seal to the rookeries.

'But this was at another port, in another country which lay to the
north. And there I heard dim tales of the yellow-haired sea wanderer,
and I learned that he was a hunter of seals, and that even then he was
abroad on the ocean.

'So I shipped on a seal schooner with the lazy Siwashes, and followed
his trackless trail to the north where the hunt was then warm. And we
were away weary months, and spoke many of the fleet, and heard much of
the wild doings of him I sought; but never once did we raise him above
the sea. We went north, even to the Pribilofs, and killed the seals in
herds on the beach, and brought their warm bodies aboard till our
scuppers ran grease and blood and no man could stand upon the deck.
Then were we chased by a ship of slow steam, which fired upon us with
great guns. But we put sail till the sea was over our decks and washed
them clean, and lost ourselves in a fog.

'It is said, at this time, while we fled with fear at our hearts, that
the yellow-haired sea wanderer put in to the Pribilofs, right to the
factory, and while the part of his men held the servants of the
company, the rest loaded ten thousand green skins from the salt houses.
I say it is said, but I believe; for in the voyages I made on the coast
with never a meeting the northern seas rang with his wildness and
daring, till the three nations which have lands there sought him with
their ships.

'And I heard of Unga, for the captains sang loud in her praise, and she
was always with him. She had learned the ways of his people, they said,
and was happy. But I knew better--knew that her heart harked back to
her own people by the yellow beach of Akatan.

'So, after a long time, I went back to the port which is by a gateway
of the sea, and there I learned that he had gone across the girth of
the great ocean to hunt for the seal to the east of the warm land which
runs south from the Russian seas.

'And I, who was become a sailorman, shipped with men of his own race,
and went after him in the hunt of the seal. And there were few ships
off that new land; but we hung on the flank of the seal pack and
harried it north through all the spring of the year. And when the cows
were heavy with pup and crossed the Russian line, our men grumbled and
were afraid. For there was much fog, and every day men were lost in the
boats. They would not work, so the captain turned the ship back toward
the way it came. But I knew the yellow-haired sea wanderer was
unafraid, and would hang by the pack, even to the Russian Isles, where
few men go. So I took a boat, in the black of night, when the lookout
dozed on the fo'c'slehead, and went alone to the warm, long land. And I
journeyed south to meet the men by Yeddo Bay, who are wild and
unafraid. And the Yoshiwara girls were small, and bright like steel,
and good to look upon; but I could not stop, for I knew that Unga
rolled on the tossing floor by the rookeries of the north.

'The men by Yeddo Bay had met from the ends of the earth, and had
neither gods nor homes, sailing under the flag of the Japanese. And
with them I went to the rich beaches of Copper Island, where our salt
piles became high with skins.

'And in that silent sea we saw no man till we were ready to come away.
Then one day the fog lifted on the edge of a heavy wind, and there
jammed down upon us a schooner, with close in her wake the cloudy
funnels of a Russian man-of-war. We fled away on the beam of the wind,
with the schooner jamming still closer and plunging ahead three feet to
our two. And upon her poop was the man with the mane of the sea lion,
pressing the rails under with the canvas and laughing in his strength
of life. And Unga was there--I knew her on the moment--but he sent her
below when the cannons began to talk across the sea.

As I say, with three feet to our two, till we saw the rudder lift green
at every jump--and I swinging on to the wheel and cursing, with my back
to the Russian shot. For we knew he had it in mind to run before us,
that he might get away while we were caught. And they knocked our masts
out of us till we dragged into the wind like a wounded gull; but he
went on over the edge of the sky line--he and Unga.

'What could we? The fresh hides spoke for themselves. So they took us
to a Russian port, and after that to a lone country, where they set us
to work in the mines to dig salt. And some died, and--and some did not
die.' Naass swept the blanket from his shoulders, disclosing the
gnarled and twisted flesh, marked with the unmistakable striations of
the knout. Prince hastily covered him, for it was not nice to look upon.

'We were there a weary time and sometimes men got away to the south,
but they always came back. So, when we who hailed from Yeddo Bay rose
in the night and took the guns from the guards, we went to the north.
And the land was very large, with plains, soggy with water, and great
forests. And the cold came, with much snow on the ground, and no man
knew the way. Weary months we journeyed through the endless forest--I
do not remember, now, for there was little food and often we lay down
to die. But at last we came to the cold sea, and but three were left to
look upon it. One had shipped from Yeddo as captain, and he knew in his
head the lay of the great lands, and of the place where men may cross
from one to the other on the ice. And he led us--I do not know, it was
so long--till there were but two. When we came to that place we found
five of the strange people which live in that country, and they had
dogs and skins, and we were very poor. We fought in the snow till they
died, and the captain died, and the dogs and skins were mine. Then I
crossed on the ice, which was broken, and once I drifted till a gale
from the west put me upon the shore. And after that, Golovin Bay,
Pastilik, and the priest. Then south, south, to the warm sunlands where
first I wandered.

'But the sea was no longer fruitful, and those who went upon it after
the seal went to little profit and great risk. The fleets scattered,
and the captains and the men had no word of those I sought. So I turned
away from the ocean which never rests, and went among the lands, where
the trees, the houses, and the mountains sit always in one place and do
not move. I journeyed far, and came to learn many things, even to the
way of reading and writing from books. It was well I should do this,
for it came upon me that Unga must know these things, and that someday,
when the time was met--we--you understand, when the time was met.

'So I drifted, like those little fish which raise a sail to the wind
but cannot steer. But my eyes and my ears were open always, and I went
among men who traveled much, for I knew they had but to see those I
sought to remember. At last there came a man, fresh from the mountains,
with pieces of rock in which the free gold stood to the size of peas,
and he had heard, he had met, he knew them. They were rich, he said,
and lived in the place where they drew the gold from the ground.

'It was in a wild country, and very far away; but in time I came to the
camp, hidden between the mountains, where men worked night and day, out
of the sight of the sun. Yet the time was not come. I listened to the
talk of the people. He had gone away--they had gone away--to England,
it was said, in the matter of bringing men with much money together to
form companies. I saw the house they had lived in; more like a palace,
such as one sees in the old countries. In the nighttime I crept in
through a window that I might see in what manner he treated her. I went
from room to room, and in such way thought kings and queens must live,
it was all so very good. And they all said he treated her like a queen,
and many marveled as to what breed of woman she was for there was other
blood in her veins, and she was different from the women of Akatan, and
no one knew her for what she was. Aye, she was a queen; but I was a
chief, and the son of a chief, and I had paid for her an untold price
of skin and boat and bead.

'But why so many words? I was a sailorman, and knew the way of the
ships on the seas. I followed to England, and then to other countries.
Sometimes I heard of them by word of mouth, sometimes I read of them in
the papers; yet never once could I come by them, for they had much
money, and traveled fast, while I was a poor man. Then came trouble
upon them, and their wealth slipped away one day like a curl of smoke.
The papers were full of it at the time; but after that nothing was
said, and I knew they had gone back where more gold could be got from
the ground.

'They had dropped out of the world, being now poor, and so I wandered
from camp to camp, even north to the Kootenay country, where I picked
up the cold scent. They had come and gone, some said this way, and some
that, and still others that they had gone to the country of the Yukon.
And I went this way, and I went that, ever journeying from place to
place, till it seemed I must grow weary of the world which was so
large. But in the Kootenay I traveled a bad trail, and a long trail,
with a breed of the Northwest, who saw fit to die when the famine
pinched. He had been to the Yukon by an unknown way over the mountains,
and when he knew his time was near gave me the map and the secret of a
place where he swore by his gods there was much gold.

'After that all the world began to flock into the north. I was a poor
man; I sold myself to be a driver of dogs. The rest you know. I met him
and her in Dawson.

'She did not know me, for I was only a stripling, and her life had been
large, so she had no time to remember the one who had paid for her an
untold price.

'So? You bought me from my term of service. I went back to bring things
about in my own way, for I had waited long, and now that I had my hand
upon him was in no hurry.

'As I say, I had it in mind to do my own way, for I read back in my
life, through all I had seen and suffered, and remembered the cold and
hunger of the endless forest by the Russian seas. As you know, I led
him into the east--him and Unga--into the east where many have gone and
few returned. I led them to the spot where the bones and the curses of
men lie with the gold which they may not have.

'The way was long and the trail unpacked. Our dogs were many and ate
much; nor could our sleds carry till the break of spring. We must come
back before the river ran free. So here and there we cached grub, that
our sleds might be lightened and there be no chance of famine on the
back trip. At the McQuestion there were three men, and near them we
built a cache, as also did we at the Mayo, where was a hunting camp of
a dozen Pellys which had crossed the divide from the south.

'After that, as we went on into the east, we saw no men; only the
sleeping river, the moveless forest, and the White Silence of the
North. As I say, the way was long and the trail unpacked. Sometimes, in
a day's toil, we made no more than eight miles, or ten, and at night we
slept like dead men. And never once did they dream that I was Naass,
head man of Akatan, the righter of wrongs.

'We now made smaller caches, and in the nighttime it was a small matter
to go back on the trail we had broken and change them in such way that
one might deem the wolverines the thieves. Again there be places where
there is a fall to the river, and the water is unruly, and the ice
makes above and is eaten away beneath.

'In such a spot the sled I drove broke through, and the dogs; and to
him and Unga it was ill luck, but no more. And there was much grub on
that sled, and the dogs the strongest.

'But he laughed, for he was strong of life, and gave the dogs that were
left little grub till we cut them from the harnesses one by one and fed
them to their mates. We would go home light, he said, traveling and
eating from cache to cache, with neither dogs nor sleds; which was
true, for our grub was very short, and the last dog died in the traces
the night we came to the gold and the bones and the curses of men.

'To reach that place--and the map spoke true--in the heart of the great
mountains, we cut ice steps against the wall of a divide. One looked
for a valley beyond, but there was no valley; the snow spread away,
level as the great harvest plains, and here and there about us mighty
mountains shoved their white heads among the stars. And midway on that
strange plain which should have been a valley the earth and the snow
fell away, straight down toward the heart of the world.

'Had we not been sailormen our heads would have swung round with the
sight, but we stood on the dizzy edge that we might see a way to get
down. And on one side, and one side only, the wall had fallen away till
it was like the slope of the decks in a topsail breeze. I do not know
why this thing should be so, but it was so. "It is the mouth of hell,"
he said; "let us go down." And we went down.

'And on the bottom there was a cabin, built by some man, of logs which
he had cast down from above. It was a very old cabin, for men had died
there alone at different times, and on pieces of birch bark which were
there we read their last words and their curses.

'One had died of scurvy; another's partner had robbed him of his last
grub and powder and stolen away; a third had been mauled by a baldface
grizzly; a fourth had hunted for game and starved--and so it went, and
they had been loath to leave the gold, and had died by the side of it
in one way or another. And the worthless gold they had gathered
yellowed the floor of the cabin like in a dream.

'But his soul was steady, and his head clear, this man I had led thus
far. "We have nothing to eat," he said, "and we will only look upon
this gold, and see whence it comes and how much there be. Then we will
go away quick, before it gets into our eyes and steals away our
judgment. And in this way we may return in the end, with more grub, and
possess it all." So we looked upon the great vein, which cut the wall
of the pit as a true vein should, and we measured it, and traced it
from above and below, and drove the stakes of the claims and blazed the
trees in token of our rights. Then, our knees shaking with lack of
food, and a sickness in our bellies, and our hearts chugging close to
our mouths, we climbed the mighty wall for the last time and turned our
faces to the back trip.

'The last stretch we dragged Unga between us, and we fell often, but in
the end we made the cache. And lo, there was no grub. It was well done,
for he thought it the wolverines, and damned them and his gods in one
breath. But Unga was brave, and smiled, and put her hand in his, till I
turned away that I might hold myself. "We will rest by the fire," she
said, "till morning, and we will gather strength from our moccasins."
So we cut the tops of our moccasins in strips, and boiled them half of
the night, that we might chew them and swallow them. And in the morning
we talked of our chance. The next cache was five days' journey; we
could not make it. We must find game.

'"We will go forth and hunt," he said.

'"Yes," said I, "we will go forth and hunt." 'And he ruled that Unga
stay by the fire and save her strength. And we went forth, he in quest
of the moose and I to the cache I had changed. But I ate little, so
they might not see in me much strength. And in the night he fell many
times as he drew into camp. And I, too, made to suffer great weakness,
stumbling over my snowshoes as though each step might be my last. And
we gathered strength from our moccasins.

'He was a great man. His soul lifted his body to the last; nor did he
cry aloud, save for the sake of Unga. On the second day I followed him,
that I might not miss the end. And he lay down to rest often. That
night he was near gone; but in the morning he swore weakly and went
forth again. He was like a drunken man, and I looked many times for him
to give up, but his was the strength of the strong, and his soul the
soul of a giant, for he lifted his body through all the weary day. And
he shot two ptarmigan, but would not eat them. He needed no fire; they
meant life; but his thought was for Unga, and he turned toward camp.

'He no longer walked, but crawled on hand and knee through the snow. I
came to him, and read death in his eyes. Even then it was not too late
to eat of the ptarmigan. He cast away his rifle and carried the birds
in his mouth like a dog. I walked by his side, upright. And he looked
at me during the moments he rested, and wondered that I was so strong.
I could see it, though he no longer spoke; and when his lips moved,
they moved without sound.

'As I say, he was a great man, and my heart spoke for softness; but I
read back in my life, and remembered the cold and hunger of the endless
forest by the Russian seas. Besides, Unga was mine, and I had paid for
her an untold price of skin and boat and bead.

'And in this manner we came through the white forest, with the silence
heavy upon us like a damp sea mist. And the ghosts of the past were in
the air and all about us; and I saw the yellow beach of Akatan, and the
kayaks racing home from the fishing, and the houses on the rim of the
forest. And the men who had made themselves chiefs were there, the
lawgivers whose blood I bore and whose blood I had wedded in Unga. Aye,
and Yash-Noosh walked with me, the wet sand in his hair, and his war
spear, broken as he fell upon it, still in his hand. And I knew the
time was meet, and saw in the eyes of Unga the promise.

'As I say, we came thus through the forest, till the smell of the camp
smoke was in our nostrils. And I bent above him, and tore the ptarmigan
from his teeth.

'He turned on his side and rested, the wonder mounting in his eyes, and
the hand which was under slipping slow toward the knife at his hip. But
I took it from him, smiling close in his face. Even then he did not
understand. So I made to drink from black bottles, and to build high
upon the snow a pile--of goods, and to live again the things which had
happened on the night of my marriage. I spoke no word, but he
understood. Yet was he unafraid. There was a sneer to his lips, and
cold anger, and he gathered new strength with the knowledge. It was not
far, but the snow was deep, and he dragged himself very slow.

'Once he lay so long I turned him over and gazed into his eyes. And
sometimes he looked forth, and sometimes death. And when I loosed him
he struggled on again. In this way we came to the fire. Unga was at his
side on the instant. His lips moved without sound; then he pointed at
me, that Unga might understand. And after that he lay in the snow, very
still, for a long while. Even now is he there in the snow.

'I said no word till I had cooked the ptarmigan. Then I spoke to her,
in her own tongue, which she had not heard in many years. She
straightened herself, so, and her eyes were wonder-wide, and she asked
who I was, and where I had learned that speech.

'"I am Naass," I said.

'"You?" she said. "You?" And she crept close that she might look upon
me.

'"Yes," I answered; "I am Naass, head man of Akatan, the last of the
blood, as you are the last of the blood." 'And she laughed. By all the
things I have seen and the deeds I have done may I never hear such a
laugh again. It put the chill to my soul, sitting there in the White
Silence, alone with death and this woman who laughed.

'"Come!" I said, for I thought she wandered. "Eat of the food and let
us be gone. It is a far fetch from here to Akatan." 'But she shoved her
face in his yellow mane, and laughed till it seemed the heavens must
fall about our ears. I had thought she would be overjoyed at the sight
of me, and eager to go back to the memory of old times, but this seemed
a strange form to take.

'"Come!" I cried, taking her strong by the hand. "The way is long and
dark. Let us hurry!" "Where?" she asked, sitting up, and ceasing from
her strange mirth.

'"To Akatan," I answered, intent on the light to grow on her face at
the thought. But it became like his, with a sneer to the lips, and cold
anger.

'"Yes," she said; "we will go, hand in hand, to Akatan, you and I. And
we will live in the dirty huts, and eat of the fish and oil, and bring
forth a spawn--a spawn to be proud of all the days of our life. We will
forget the world and be happy, very happy. It is good, most good. Come!
Let us hurry. Let us go back to Akatan." And she ran her hand through
his yellow hair, and smiled in a way which was not good. And there was
no promise in her eyes.

'I sat silent, and marveled at the strangeness of woman. I went back to
the night when he dragged her from me and she screamed and tore at his
hair--at his hair which now she played with and would not leave. Then I
remembered the price and the long years of waiting; and I gripped her
close, and dragged her away as he had done. And she held back, even as
on that night, and fought like a she-cat for its whelp. And when the
fire was between us and the man. I loosed her, and she sat and
listened. And I told her of all that lay between, of all that had
happened to me on strange seas, of all that I had done in strange
lands; of my weary quest, and the hungry years, and the promise which
had been mine from the first. Aye, I told all, even to what had passed
that day between the man and me, and in the days yet young. And as I
spoke I saw the promise grow in her eyes, full and large like the break
of dawn. And I read pity there, the tenderness of woman, the love, the
heart and the soul of Unga. And I was a stripling again, for the look
was the look of Unga as she ran up the beach, laughing, to the home of
her mother. The stern unrest was gone, and the hunger, and the weary
waiting.

'The time was met. I felt the call of her breast, and it seemed there I
must pillow my head and forget. She opened her arms to me, and I came
against her. Then, sudden, the hate flamed in her eye, her hand was at
my hip. And once, twice, she passed the knife.

'"Dog!" she sneered, as she flung me into the snow. "Swine!" And then
she laughed till the silence cracked, and went back to her dead.

'As I say, once she passed the knife, and twice; but she was weak with
hunger, and it was not meant that I should die. Yet was I minded to
stay in that place, and to close my eyes in the last long sleep with
those whose lives had crossed with mine and led my feet on unknown
trails. But there lay a debt upon me which would not let me rest.

'And the way was long, the cold bitter, and there was little grub. The
Pellys had found no moose, and had robbed my cache. And so had the
three white men, but they lay thin and dead in their cabins as I
passed. After that I do not remember, till I came here, and found food
and fire--much fire.' As he finished, he crouched closely, even
jealously, over the stove. For a long while the slush-lamp shadows
played tragedies upon the wall.

'But Unga!' cried Prince, the vision still strong upon him.

'Unga? She would not eat of the ptarmigan. She lay with her arms about
his neck, her face deep in his yellow hair. I drew the fire close, that
she might not feel the frost, but she crept to the other side. And I
built a fire there; yet it was little good, for she would not eat. And
in this manner they still lie up there in the snow.'

'And you?' asked Malemute Kid.

'I do not know; but Akatan is small, and I have little wish to go back
and live on the edge of the world. Yet is there small use in life. I
can go to Constantine, and he will put irons upon me, and one day they
will tie a piece of rope, so, and I will sleep good. Yet--no; I do not
know.' 'But, Kid,' protested Prince, 'this is murder!' 'Hush!'
commanded Malemute Kid. 'There be things greater than our wisdom,
beyond our justice. The right and the wrong of this we cannot say, and
it is not for us to judge.' Naass drew yet closer to the fire. There
was a great silence, and in each man's eyes many pictures came and went.



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