Many men were in debt to the trader at Flambeau, and many counted him as a friend. The latter never reasoned why, except that he had done them favors, and in the North that counts for much. Perhaps they built likewise upon the fact that he was ever the same to all, and that, in days of plenty or in times of famine, his store was open to every man, and all received the same measure. Nor did he raise his prices when the boats were late. They recalled one bleak and blustery autumn when the steamer sank at the Lower Ramparts, taking with her all their winter's food, how he eked out his scanty stock, dealing to each and every one his portion, month by month. They remembered well the bitter winter that followed, when the spectre of famine haunted their cabins, and when for endless periods they cinched their belts, and cursed and went hungry to sleep, accepting, day by day, the rations doled out to them by the grim, gray man at the log store. Some of them had money-belts weighted low with gold washed from the bars at Forty Mile, and there were others who had wandered in from the Koyukuk with the first frosts, foot-sore and dragging, the legs of their skin boots eaten to the ankle, and the taste of dog meat still in their mouths. Broken and dispirited, these had fared as well through that desperate winter as their brothers from up-river, and received pound for pound of musty flour, strip for strip of rusty bacon, lump for lump of precious sugar. Moreover, the price of no single thing had risen throughout the famine.
Some of them, to this day, owed bills at Old Man Gale's, of which they dared not think; but every fall and every spring they came again and told of their disappointment, and every time they fared back into the hills bearing another outfit, for which he rendered no account, not even when the debts grew year by year, not even to "No Creek" Lee, the most unlucky of them all, who said that a curse lay on him so that when a pay-streak heard him coming it got up and moved away and hid itself.
There were some who had purposely shirked a reckoning, in years past, but these were few, and their finish had been of a nature to discourage a similar practice on the part of others, and of a nature, moreover, to lead good men to care for the trader and for his methods. He mixed in no man's business, he took and paid his dues unfalteringly. He spoke in a level voice, and he smiled but rarely. He gazed at a stranger once and weighed him carefully, thereafter his eyes sought the distances again, as if in search of some visitor whom he knew or hoped or feared would come. Therefore, men judged he had lived as strong men live, and were glad to call him friend.
This day he stood in the door of his post staring up the sun-lit river, absorbing the warmth of the Arctic afternoon. The Yukon swept down around the great bend beneath the high, cut banks and past the little town, disappearing behind the wooded point below, which masked the up-coming steamers till one heard the sighing labor of their stacks before he saw their smoke. It was a muddy, rushing giant, bearing a burden of sand and silt, so that one might hear it hiss and grind by stooping at its edge to listen; but the slanting sun this afternoon made it appear like a boiling flood of molten gold which issued silently out of a land of mystery and vanished into a valley of forgetfulness. At least so the trader fancied, and found himself wishing that it might carry away on its bosom the heavy trouble which weighed him down, and bring in its place forgetfulness of all that had gone before. Instead, however, it seemed to hurry with news of those strange doings "up-river," news that every down-coming steamboat verified. For years he had known that some day this thing would happen, that some day this isolation would be broken, that some day great hordes of men would overrun this unknown land, bringing with them that which he feared to meet, that which had made him what he was. And now that the time had come, he was unprepared.
The sound of shouting caused him to turn his head. Down-stream, a thousand yards away, men were raising a flag-staff made from the trunk of a slender fir, from which the bark had been stripped, heaving on their tackle as they sang in unison. They stood well out upon the river's bank before a group of well-made houses, the peeled timbers of which shone yellow in the sun. He noted the symmetrical arrangement of the buildings, noted the space about them that had been smoothed for a drill-ground, and from which the stumps had been removed; noted that the men wore suits of blue; and noted, in particular, the figure of an officer commanding them.
The lines about the trader's mouth deepened, and his heavy brows contracted.
That means the law, he murmured, half aloud, while in his voice was no trace of pleasure, nor of that interest which good men are wont to show at sight of the flag. "The last frontier is gone. The trail ends here!"
He stood so, meditating sombrely, till the fragment of a song hummed lightly by a girl fell pleasantly on his ears, whereupon the shadows vanished from his face, and he turned expectantly, the edges of his teeth showing beneath his mustache, the corners of his eyes wrinkling with pleasure.
The sight was good to him, for the girl approaching down the trail was like some wood sprite, light-footed, slender, and dark, with twin braids of hair to her waist framing an oval face colored by the wind and sun. She was very beautiful, and a great fever surged up through the old man's veins, till he gripped the boards at his side and bit sharply at the pipe between his teeth.
The salmon-berries are ripe, she announced, "and the hills back of the village are pink with them. I took Constantine's squaw with me, and we picked quarts and quarts. I ate them all!"
Her laughter was like the tinkle of silver bells. Her head, thrown back as she laughed gayly, displayed a throat rounded and full and smooth, and tanned to the hue of her wind-beaten cheeks. Every move of her graceful body was unrestrained and flowing, with a hint of Indian freedom about it. Beaded and trimmed like a native princess, her garments manifested an ornature that spoke of savagery, yet they were neatly cut and held to the pattern of the whites.
Constantine was drunk again last night, and I had to give him a talking to when we came back. Oh, but I laid him out! He's frightened to death of me when I'm angry.
She furrowed her brow in a scowl—the daintiest, most ridiculous pucker of a brow that ever man saw—and drew her red lips into an angry pout as she recounted her temperance talk till the trader broke in, his voice very soft, his gray-blue eyes as tender as those of a woman:
It's good to have you home again, Necia. The old sun don't shine as bright when you're away, and when it rains it seems like the moss and the grass and the little trees was crying for you. I reckon everything weeps when you're gone, girl, everything except your old dad, and sometimes he feels like he'd have to bust out and join the rest of them.
He seated himself upon the worn spruce-log steps, and the girl settled beside him and snuggled against his knee.
I missed you dreadfully, daddy, she said. "It seemed as if those days at the Mission would never end. Father Barnum and the others were very kind, and I studied hard, but there wasn't any fun in things without you."
I reckon you know as much as a priest, now, don't you?
Oh, lots more, she said, gravely. "You see, I am a woman."
He nodded reflectively. "So you are! I keep forgetting that."
Their faces were set towards the west, where the low sun hung over a ragged range of hills topped with everlasting white. The great valley, dark with an untrodden wilderness of birch and spruce and alder, lay on this side, sombre and changeless, like a great, dark-green mat too large for its resting-place, its edges turned up towards the line of unmelting snow. Beyond were other ranges thrust skyward in a magnificent confusion, while still to the farther side lay the purple valley of the Koyukuk, a valley that called insistently to restless men, welcoming them in the spring, and sending them back in the late summer tired and haggard with the hunger of the North. Each year a tithe remained behind, the toll of the trackless places, but the rest went back again and again, and took new brothers with them.
Did you like the books I sent you with Poleon when he went down to the coast? I borrowed them from Shakespeare George.
The girl laughed. "Of course I did—that is, all but one of them."
Which one?
I think it was called The Age of Reason, or something like that. I didn't get a good look at it, for Father Barnum shrieked when he saw it, then snatched it as if it were afire. He carried it down to the river with the tongs.
H'm! Now that I think of it, said the old man, "Shakespeare grinned when he gave it to me. You see, Poleon ain't much better on the read than I am, so we never noticed what kind of a book it was."
When will Poleon get back, do you suppose?
Most any day now, unless the Dawson dance-halls are too much for him. It won't take him long to sell our skins if what I hear is true.
What is that?
About these Cheechakos. They say there are thousands of tenderfeet up there, and more coming in every day.
Oh! If I had only been here in time to go with him! breathed the girl. "I never saw a city. It must be just like Seattle, or New York."
Gale shook his head. "No. There's considerable difference. Some time I'll take you out to the States, and let you see the world—maybe." He uttered the last word in an undertone, as if in self-debate, but the girl was too excited to notice.
You will take mother, too, and the kiddies, won't you?
Of course!
Oh! I—I— The attempt to express what this prospect meant to her was beyond her girlish rapture, but her parted lips and shining eyes told the story to Gale. "And Poleon must go, too. We can't go anywhere without him." The old man smiled down upon her in reassurance. "I wonder what he'll say when he finds the soldiers have come. I wonder if he'll like it."
Gale turned his eyes down-stream to the barracks, and noted that the long flag-staff had at last been erected. Even as he looked he saw a bundle mounting towards its tip, and then beheld the Stars and Stripes flutter out in the air, while the men below cheered noisily. It was some time before he answered.
Poleon Doret is like the rest of us men up here in the North. We have taken care of ourselves so far, and I guess we're able to keep it up without the help of a smooth-faced Yankee kid for guardian.
Lieutenant Burrell isn't a Yankee, said Necia. "He is a blue-grass man. He comes from Kentucky."
Her father grunted contemptuously. "I might have known it. Those rebels are a cultus, lazy lot. A regular male man with any ginger in him would shed his coat and go to work, instead of wearing his clothes buttoned up all day. It don't take much 'savvy' to run a handful of thirteen-dollar-a-month soldiers." Necia stirred a bit restlessly, and the trader continued: "It ain't man's work, it's—loafing. If he tries to boss us he'll get QUITE a surprise."
He won't try to boss you. He has been sent here to build a military post, and to protect the miners in their own self-government. He won't take any part in their affairs as long as they are conducted peaceably.
Being at a loss for an answer to this unexpected defence, the old man grunted again, with added contempt, while his daughter continued:
This rush to the upper country has brought in all sorts of people, good, bad—and worse; and the soldiers have been sent to prevent trouble, and to hold things steady till the law can be established. The Canadian Mounted Police are sending all their worst characters down-river, and our soldiers have been scattered among the American camps for our protection. I think it's fine.
Where did you learn all this?
Lieutenant Burrell told me, she replied; at which her father regarded her keenly. She could not see the curious look in his eyes, nor did she turn when, a moment later, he resumed, in an altered tone:
I reckon Poleon will bring you something pretty from Dawson, eh?
He has never failed to bring me presents, no matter where he came from. Dear old Poleon! She smiled tenderly. "Do you remember that first day when he drifted, singing, into sight around the bend up yonder? He had paddled his birch-bark from the Chandelar without a thing to eat; hunger and hardship only made him the happier, and the closer he drew his belt the louder he sang."
He was bound for his 'New Country'!
Yes. He didn't know where it lay, but the fret for travel was on him, and so he drifted and sang, as he had drifted and sung from the foot of Lake Le Barge.
That was four years ago, mused Gale, "and he never found his 'New Country,' did he?"
No. We tied him down and choked it out of him, Necia laughed. "Dear, funny old Poleon—he loves me like a brother."
The man opened his lips, then closed them, as if on second thought, and rose to his feet, for, coming towards them up the trail from the barracks, he beheld a trim, blue-coated figure. He peered at the approaching officer a moment, set his jaw more firmly, and disappeared into the store.
Well, we have raised our flag-staff, said the Lieutenant as he took a seat below Necia. "It's like getting settled to keep house."
Are you lazy? inquired the girl.
I dare say I am, he admitted. "I've never had time to find out. Why?"
Are you going to boss our people around? she continued, bent on her own investigation.
No. Not as long as they behave. In fact, I hardly know what I am to do. Maybe you can tell me. His smile was peculiarly frank and winning. "You see, it's my first command, and my instructions, although comprehensive, are rather vague. I am supposed to see that mining rights are observed, to take any criminals who kindly offer themselves up to be arrested, and to sort of handle things that are too tough for the miners themselves."
Why, you are a policeman! said Necia, at which he made a wry face.
The Department, in its wisdom, would have me, a tenderfoot, adjust those things that are too knotty for these men who have spent their lives along the frontier.
I don't believe you will be very popular with our people, Necia announced, meditatively.
No. I can see that already. I wasn't met with any brass-bands, and I haven't received any engraved silver from the admiring citizens of Flambeau. That leaves nothing but the women to like me, and, as you are the only one in camp, you will have to like me very much to make up for its shortcomings.
She approved of his unusual drawl; it gave him a kind of deliberation which every move of his long, lithe body belied and every glance of his eyes contradicted. Moreover, she liked his youth, so clean and fresh and strange in this land where old men are many and the young ones old with hardship and grave with the silence of the hills. Her life had been spent entirely among men who were her seniors, and, although she had ruled them like a spoiled queen, she knew as little of their sex as they did of hers. Unconsciously the strong young life within her had clamored for companionship, and it was this that had drawn her to Poleon Doret—who would ever remain a boy—and it was this that drew her to the young Kentuckian; this, and something else in him, that the others lacked.
Now that I think it over, he continued, "I'd rather have you like me than have the men do so."
Of course, she nodded. "They do anything I want them to—all but father, and—"
It isn't that, he interrupted, quickly. "It is because you ARE the only woman of the place, because you are such a surprise. To think that in the heart of this desolation I should find a girl like—like you, like the girls I know at home."
Am I like other girls? she inquired, eagerly. "I have often wondered."
You are, and you are not. You are surprisingly conventional for these surroundings, and yet unconventionally surprising—for any place. Who are you? Where did you come from? How did you get here?
I am just what you see. I came from the States, and I was carried. That is all I can remember.
Then you haven't lived here always?
Oh, dear, no! We came here while I was very little, but of late I have been away at school.
Some seminary, eh?
At this she laughed aloud. "Hardly that, either. I've been at the Mission. Father Barnum has been teaching me for five years. I came up-river a day ahead of you."
She asked no questions of him in return, for she had already learned all there was to know the day before from a grizzled corporal in whom was the hunger to talk. She had learned of a family of Burrells whose name was known throughout the South, and that Meade Burrell came from the Frankfort branch, the branch that had raised the soldiers. His father had fought with Lee, and an uncle was now in the service at Washington. On the mother's side the strain was equally militant, but the Meades had sought the sea. The old soldier had told her much more, of which she understood little; told her of the young man's sister, who had come all the way from Kentucky to see her brother off when he sailed from San Francisco; told her of the Lieutenant's many friends in Washington, and of his family name and honor. Meade Burrell was undoubtedly a fine young fellow in his corporal's eyes, and destined to reach great heights, as the other Burrells had before him. The old soldier, furthermore, had looked at her keenly and added that the Burrells were known as "divils among the weemen."
Resting thus on the steps of Old Man Gale's store, the two talked on till they were disturbed by the sound of shrill voices approaching, at which the man looked up. Coming down the trail from the town was a squaw and two children. At sight of Necia the little ones shouted gleefully and scampered forward, climbing over her like half-grown puppies. They were boy and girl, both brown as Siwashes, with eyes like jet beads and hair that was straight and coarse and black. At a glance Burrell knew them for "breeds," and evidently the darker half was closer to the surface now, for they choked, gurgled, stuttered, and coughed in their Indian tongue, while Necia answered them likewise. At a word from her they turned and saw him, then, abashed at the strange splendor of his uniform, fell silent, pressing close to her. The squaw, also, seemed to resent his presence, for, after a lowering glance, she drew the shawl closer about her head, and, leaving the trail, slunk out of sight around the corner of the store.
Burrell looked up at his companion's clear-cut, delicate face, at the wind-tanned cheeks, against which her long braids lay like the blue-black locks of an Egyptian maid, then at her warm, dark eyes, in which was a hint of the golden light of the afternoon sun. He noted covertly the slender lines of her body and the dainty, firm, brown hands flung protectingly about the shoulders of her little friends, who were peering at him owlishly from their shelter.
The bitter revolt that had burned in him at the prospect of a long exile in this undiscovered spot died out suddenly. What a picture she made! How fresh and flower-like she looked, and yet the wisdom of her! He spoke impulsively:
I am glad you are here, Miss Necia. I was glad the moment I saw you, and I have been growing gladder ever since, for I never imagined there would be anybody in this place but men and squaws—men who hate the law and squaws who slink about—like that. He nodded in the direction of the Indian woman's disappearance. "Either that, or, at best, a few 'breeds' like these little fellows."
She looked at him quickly.
Well! What difference would that make?
Ugh! Squaws and half-breeds! His tone conveyed in full his utter contempt.
The tiny hands of the boy and girl slid into her own as she arose. A curiously startled look lay in her eyes, and an inquiring, plaintive wrinkle came between her brows.
I don't believe you understand, she said. "Lieutenant Burrell, this is my sister, Molly Gale, and this is my little brother John." Both round-eyed elfs made a ducking courtesy and blinked at the soldier, who gained his feet awkwardly, a flush rising into his cheeks.
From the regions at the rear of the store came the voice of an Indian woman calling:
Necia! Necia!
Coming in a moment! the girl called back; then, turning to the young officer, she added, quietly: "Mother needs me now. Good-bye!"
The trader's house sat back of the post, farther up on the hill. It was a large, sleepy house, sprawling against the sunny side of the slope, as if it had sought the southern exposure for warmth, and had dozed off one sultry afternoon and never waked up from its slumber. It was of great, square-hewn timbers, built in the Russian style, the under side of each log hollowed to fit snugly over its fellow underneath, upon which dried moss had previously been spread, till in effect the foot-thick walls were tongued and grooved and, through years of seasoning, become so tinder dry that no frosts or heats could penetrate them. Many architects had worked on it as it grew, room by room, through the years, and every man had left behind the mark of his individuality, from Pretty Charlie the pilot, who swung an axe better than any Indian on the river, to Larsen the ship's carpenter, who worked with an adze and who starved the summer following on the Koyukuk. It had stretched a bit year by year, for the trader's family had been big in the early days when hunters and miners of both breeds came in to trade, to loaf, and to swap stories with him. Through the winter days, when the caribou were in the North and the moose were scarce, whole families of natives came and camped there, for Alluna, his squaw, drew to her own blood, and they felt it their due to eat of the bounty of him who ruled them like an overlord; but when the first goose honked they slipped away until, by the time the salmon showed, the house was empty again and silent, save for Alluna and the youngsters. In return these people brought him many skins and much fresh meat, for which he paid no price, and, with the fall, his cache was filled with fish of which the bulk were dried king salmon as long as a grown man's leg and worth a dollar apiece to any traveller.
There are men whose wits are quick as light, and whose muscles have been so tempered and hardened by years of exercise that they are like those of a wild animal. Of such was John Gale; but with all his intelligence he was very slow at reading, hence he chose to spend his evenings with his pipe and his thoughts, rather than with a book, as lonesome men are supposed to do. He did with little sleep, and many nights he sat alone till Alluna and Necia would be awakened by his heavy step as he went to his bed. That he was a man who could really think, and that his thoughts were engrossing, no one doubted who saw him sitting enthralled at such a time, for he neither rocked, nor talked, nor moved a muscle hour after hour, and only his eyes were alive. To-night the spell was on him again, and he sat bulked up in his chair, rocklike and immovable.
From the open door of the next room he could hear Necia and the little ones. She had made them ready for bed, and was telling them the tale of the snow-bird's spot.
So when all the other birds had failed, he heard her say, "the little snowbird asked for a chance to try. He flew and flew, and just before he came to the edge of the world where the two Old Women lived he pulled out all of his feathers. When he came to them he said:"
'I am very cold. May I warm myself at your fire?'
They saw how little and naked he was, and how he shivered, so they did not throw sticks at him, but allowed him to creep close. He watched his chance, and when they were not looking he picked up a red-hot coal in his beak and flew back home with it as fast as ever he could—and that is how fire came to the Indian people.
Of course the coal was hot, and it burned his throat till a drop of blood came through, so ever since that day the snowbird has had a red spot on his throat.
The two children spoke out in their mother's tongue, clamoring for the story of the Good Beaver who saved the hunter's life, and she began, this time in the language of the Yukon people, while Gale listened to the low music of her voice, muffled and broken by the log partition.
His squaw came in, her arrival unannounced except by the scuff of her moccasins, and seated herself against the wall. She did not use a chair, of which there were several, but crouched upon a bear-skin, her knees beneath her chin, her toes a trifle drawn together. She sat thus for a long time, while Necia continued her stories and put the little ones to bed. Soon the girl came to say good-night.
John Gale had never kissed his daughter, and, as it was not a custom of her mother's race, she never missed the caresses. On rare occasions the old man romped with the little ones and took them in his arms and acted as other fathers act, but he had never done these things with her. When she had gone he spoke without moving.
She'll never marry Poleon Doret.
Why? inquired Alluna.
He ain't her kind.
Poleon is a good man.
None better. But she'll marry some—some white man.
Poleon is white, the squaw declared.
He is and he ain't. I mean she'll marry an 'outside' man. He ain't good enough, and—well, he ain't her kind. Alluna's grunt of indignation was a sufficient answer to this, but he resumed, jerking his head in the direction of the barracks. "She's been talking a lot with this—this soldier."
Him good man, too, I guess, said the wife.
The hell he is! cried the trader, fiercely. "He don't mean any good to her."
Him got a woman, eh? said the other.
No, no! I reckon he's single all right, but you don't understand. He's different from us people. He's—he's— Gale paused, at a loss for words to convey his meaning. "Well, he ain't the kind that would marry a half-breed."
Alluna pondered this cryptic remark unsuccessfully, and was still seeking its solution when her lord continued:
If she really got to loving him it would be bad for all of us.
Evidently Alluna read some hidden meaning back of these words, for she spoke quickly, but in her own tongue now, as she was accustomed to do when excited or alarmed.
Then this thing must cease at once. The risk is too great. Better that you kill him before it is too late.'
Hardly that, said the trader.
Think of the little ones and of me, the squaw insisted, and, encouraged by his silence, continued: "Why not? Soon the nights will grow dark. The river runs swiftly, and it never gives up its dead. I can do it if you dare not. No one would suspect me."
Gale rose and laid his big hand firmly on her shoulder.
Don't talk like that. There has been too much blood let already. We'll allow things to run along a bit as they are. There's time enough to worry.
He rose, but instead of going to his room he strode out of the house and walked northward up the trail, passing through the town and out of sight. Alluna sat huddled up in the doorway, her shawl drawn close about her head, and waited for him until the late sun—which at this time of year revolves in a great circle overhead—dipped down below the distant mountains for the midnight hour, then rolled slanting out again a few points farther north, to begin its long journey anew; but he did not return. At last she crept stiffly in-doors, like an old and weary woman, the look of fright still staring in her eyes.
About nine o'clock the next morning a faint and long-drawn cry came from the farthest limits of the little camp. An instant later it was echoed closer, and then a dog began to howl. Before its voice had died away another took it up sadly, and within three breaths, from tip and down the half-mile of scanty water-front, came the cry of "Steam-bo-o-a-t!" Cabin doors opened and men came out, glanced up the stream and echoed the call, while from sleepy nooks and sun-warmed roofs wolf-dogs arose, yawning and stretching. Those who had slept late dressed as they hurried towards the landing-place, joining in the plaint, till men and malamutes united in the shrill, slow cry.
Down-stream came the faint-sighing whoof-whoof of a steamer, and then out from behind the bend she burst, running on the swift spring current with the speed of a deer. She blew hoarsely before the tardy ones had reached the bank, and when abreast of the town her bell clanged, the patter of her great wheel ceased, she reversed her engines and swung gracefully till her bow was up against the current, then ploughed back, inching in slowly until, with much shouting and the sound of many gongs, she slid her nose quietly into the bank beneath the trading-post and was made fast. Her cabin-deck was lined with passengers, most of whom were bound for the "outside," although still clad in mackinaw and overalls. They all gazed silently at the hundred men of Flambeau, who stared back at them till the gang-plank was placed, when they came ashore to stretch their legs. One of them, however, made sufficient noise to make up for the silence of the others. Before the steamer had grounded he appeared among the Siwash deck-hands, his head and shoulders towering above them, his white teeth gleaming from a face as dark as theirs, shouting to his friends ashore and pantomiming his delight to the two Gale children who had come with Alluna to welcome him.
Who's dose beeg, tall people w'at stan' 'longside of you, Miz Gale? he called to her; then, shading his eyes elaborately, he cried, in a great voice: "Wall! wal! I b'lieve dat's M'sieu Jean an' Mam'selle Mollee. Ba Gar! Dey get so beeg w'ile I'm gone I don' know dem no more!"
The youthful Gales wriggled at this delicious flattery and dug their tiny moccasined toes into the sand. Molly courtesied nervously and continuously as she clung to her mother, and the boy showed a gap where two front teeth had been and was now filled by a very pink tongue.
Wen you goin' stop grow, anyhow, you two, eh? continued the Frenchman, and then, in a tone of sadness: "If I t'ink you ack lak' dis, I don' buy all dese present. Dese t'ing ain' no good for ole folks. I guess I'll t'row dem away." He made as if to heave a bundle that he carried into the river, whereupon the children shrieked at him so shrilly that he laughed long and incontinently at the success of his sally.
Lieutenant Burrell had come with the others, for the arrival of a steamboat called for the presence of every soul in camp, and, spying Necia in the outskirts of the crowd, he took his place beside her. He felt constrained, after what had happened on the previous evening, but she seemed to have forgotten the episode, and greeted him with her usual frankness. Even had she remembered it, there was nothing he could say in explanation or in apology. He had lain awake for hours thinking of her, and had fallen asleep with her still in his mind, for the revelation of her blood had come as a shock to him, the full force of which he could not appreciate until he had given himself time to think of it calmly.
He had sprung from a race of Slave-holders, from a land where birth and breed are more than any other thing, where a drop of impure blood effects an ineradicable stain; therefore the thought of this girl's ignoble parentage was so repugnant to him that the more he pondered it the more pitiful it seemed, the more monstrous. Lying awake and thinking of her in the stillness of his quarters, it had seemed a very unfortunate and a very terrible thing. During his morning duties the vision of her had been fresh before him again, and his constant contemplation of the matter had wrought a change in his attitude towards the girl, of which he was uncomfortably conscious and which he was glad to see she did not perceive.
There are some of the lucky men from El Dorado Creek, she informed him, pointing out certain people on the deck. "They are going out to the States to get something to eat. They say that nothing like those mines have ever been heard of in the world. I wish father had gone up last year when the news came."
Why didn't he? asked the Lieutenant. "Surely he must have been among the first to learn of it."
Yes. 'Stick' George sent him word a year ago last fall, when he made the first discovery, but for some reason father wouldn't go.
The men were pouring off the boat now, and through the crowd came the tall Frenchman, bearing in the hollow of each arm a child who clasped a bundle to its breast. His eyes grew brighter at sight of Necia, and he broke into a flood of patois; they fairly bombarded each other with quick questions and fragmentary answers till she remembered her companion, who had fallen back a pace and was studying the newcomer, whereupon she turned.
Oh, I forgot my manners. Lieutenant Burrell, this is Napoleon Doret—our Poleon! she added, with proud emphasis.
Doret checked his volubility and stared at the soldier, whom he appeared to see for the first time. The little brown people in his arms stared likewise, and it seemed to Burrell that a certain distrust was in each of the three pairs of eyes, only in those of the man there was no shyness. Instead, the Canadian looked him over gravely from head to heel, seeming to note each point of the unfamiliar attire; then he inquired, without removing his glance:
Were'bouts you live, eh?
I live at the post yonder, said the Lieutenant.
Wat biznesse you work at?
I am a soldier.
Wat for you come 'ere? Dere's nobody fightin' roun' dis place.
The Lieutenant has been stationed here, foolish, said Necia. "Come up to the store quick and tell me what it's like at Dawson." With a farewell nod to Burrell, she went off with Doret, whose speech was immediately released again.
In spite of the man's unfriendliness, Burrell watched him with admiration. There were no heels to his tufted fur boots, and yet he stood a good six feet two, as straight as a pine sapling, and it needed no second glance to tell of what metal he was made. His spirit showed in his whole body, in the set of his head, and, above all, in his dark, warm face, which glowed with eagerness when he talked, and that was ever—when he was not singing.
I never see so many people since I lef Quebec, he was saying. "She's jus' lak' beeg city—mus' be t'ree, four t'ousan' people. Every day some more dey come, an' all night dey dance an' sing an' drink w'iskee. Ba gosh, dat's fine place!"
Are there lots of white women? asked the girl.
Yes, two, t'ree hondred. Mos' of dem is work in dance-halls. Dere's one fine gal I see, name' Marie Bourgette. I tell you 'bout her by-an'-by.
Oh, Poleon, you're in love! cried Necia.
No, siree! he denied. "Dere's none of dem gal look half so purty lak' you." He would have said more, but spying the trader at the entrance of the store, he went to him, straightway launching into the details of their commercial enterprise, which, happily, had been most successful. Before they could finish, the crowd from the boat began to drift in, some of them buying drinks at the bar and others making purchases of tobacco and so forth, but for the main part merely idling about curiously.
Among the merchandise of the Post there were for sale a scanty assortment of fire-arms, cheap shot-guns, and a Winchester or two, displayed in a rack behind the counter in a manner to attract the eye of such native hunters as might need them, and with the rest hung a pair of Colt's revolvers. One of the new arrivals, who had separated from the others at the front, now called to Gale:
Are those Colts for sale? Mine was stolen the other day. Evidently he was accustomed to Yukon prices, for he showed no surprise at the figure the trader named, but took the guns and tested each of them, whereupon the old man knew that here was no "Cheechako," as tenderfeet are known in the North, although the man's garb had deceived him at first glance. The stranger balanced the weapons, one in either hand, then he did the "double roll" neatly, following which he executed a move that Gale had not witnessed for many years. He extended one of the guns, butt foremost, as if surrendering it, the action being free and open, save for the fact that his forefinger was crooked and thrust through the trigger-guard; then, with the slightest jerk of the wrist, the gun spun about, the handle jumped into his palm, and instantly there was a click as his thumb flipped the hammer. It was the old "road-agent spin," which Gale as a boy had practised hours at a time; but that this man was in earnest he showed by glancing upward sharply when the trader laughed.
This one hangs all right, he said; "give me a box of cartridges."
He emptied his gold-sack in payment for the gun and ammunition, then remarked: "That pretty nearly cleans me. If I had the price I'd take them both."
Gale wondered what need induced this fellow to spend his last few dollars on a fire-arm, but he said nothing until the man had loosened the bottom buttons of his vest and slipped the weapon inside the band of his trousers, concealing its handle beneath the edge of his waistcoat. Then he inquired:
Bound for the outside?
No. I'm locating here.
The trader darted a quick glance at him. He did not like this man.
There ain't much doing in this camp; it's a pretty poor place, he said, guardedly.
I'll put in with you, from its looks, agreed the other. "It's got too many soldiers to be worth a damn." He snarled this bitterly, with a peculiar leering lift of his lip, as if his words tasted badly.
Most of the boys are going up-river, said Gale.
Well, those hills look as if they had gold in them, said the stranger, pointing vaguely. "I'm going to prospect."
Gale knew instinctively that the fellow was lying, for his hands were not those of a miner; but there was nothing to be said. His judgment was verified, however, when Poleon drew him aside later and said:
You know dat feller?
No.
He's bad man.
How do you know?
She's leave Dawson damn queeck. Dose Mounted Police t'row 'im on de boat jus' before we lef. Then he told a story that he had heard. The man, it seemed, had left Skagway between two suns, upon the disruption of Soapy Smith's band of desperadoes, and had made for the interior, but had been intercepted at the Pass by two members of the Citizens' Committee who came upon him suddenly. Pretending to yield, he had executed some unexpected coup as he delivered his gun, for both men fell, shot through the body. No one knew just what it was he did, nor cared to question him overmuch. The next heard of him was at Lake Bennett, over the line, where the Mounted Police recognized him and sent him on. They marked him well, however, and passed him on from post to post as they had driven others whose records were known; but he had lost himself in the confusion at Dawson for a few weeks, until the scarlet-coated riders searched him out, disarmed him, and forced him sullenly aboard this steamer. The offscourings of the Canadian frontier were drifting back into their native country to settle.
Old Man Gale cared little for this, for he had spent his life among such men, but as he watched the fellow a scheme outlined itself in his head. Evidently the man dared not go farther down the river, for there was nothing save Indian camps and a Mission or two this side of St. Michael's, and at that point there was a court and many soldiers, where one was liable to meet the penalty of past misdeeds, hence he was probably resolved to stop here, and, judging by his record, he was a man of settled convictions. Continued persecution is wont to stir certain natures to such reckless desperation that interference is dangerous, and Gale, recalling his sullen look and ill-concealed contempt for the soldiers, put the stranger down as a man of this type. Furthermore, he had been impressed by the fellow's remarkable dexterity of wrist.
The trader stepped to the door, and, seeing Burrell on the deck of the steamer, went down towards him. It was a long chance, but the stakes were big and worth the risk. He had thought much during the night previous—in fact, for many hours—and the morning had found him still undecided, wherefore he took this course.
Necia tells me that you aim to keep law and order here, he began, abruptly, having drawn the young man aside.
Those are my instructions, said Burrell, "but they are so vague—"
Well! This camp is bigger than it was an hour ago, and it 'ain't improved any in the growth. Yonder goes the new citizen. He pointed to the stranger, who had returned to the steamer for his baggage and was descending the gang-plank beneath them, a valise in each hand. "He's a thief and a murderer, and we don't want him here. Now, it's up to you."
I don't understand, said the Lieutenant, whereupon the trader told him Doret's tale. "You and your men were sent here to keep things peaceable," he concluded, "and I reckon when a man is too tough for the Canuck police he is tough enough for you to tackle. There ain't a lock and key in the camp, and we ain't had a killing or a stealing in ten years. We'd like to keep it that way."
Well—you see—I know nothing of that shooting affray, so I doubt if my authority would permit me to interfere, the soldier mused, half to himself.
I allowed you were to use your own judgment, said the elder man.
So I am, I suppose. There is one chance, Mr. Gale. If you'll back me up I'll send him on down to St. Michael's. That is the most I can do.
The Lieutenant outlined his plan, and as he went on the trader nodded approval.
The young man gazed back at him so squarely, his eyes were so pleasant and friendly, his whole person breathed such straight-up honesty and freshness, that shame arose in the old man, and he had hard shift to keep his glance from wavering. Without forethought he answered, impulsively:
He's desperate and he's dangerous. I sold him a '45' just now. He was about to tell him where the man wore it, and to add a word concerning his dexterity with the gun, when the very fearless deliberation of the youth deterred him. On second thought, Gale yielded to an impulse to wait and see how Meade Burrell would act under fire. If the soldier emerged scathless, it would give him a line on his character; if he did not—well, that would be even better. The sight of his blue and brass awoke in the elder man dread and cowardice, emotions he had never experienced before. Anyhow, he owed it to himself, to Necia, and to the others to find out what kind of man this soldier was.
The crowd was coming back to the steamer, which had discharged her few bundles of freight, and there was no one inside the log post as they entered except Doret and the stranger, who had deposited his baggage at the rear and was talking with the Frenchman at the bar. At sight of the Lieutenant he became silent, and turned carelessly, although with a distrustful stare. Burrell wasted no time.
Are you going to locate here? he began.
Yes.
I notice you go skeleton-rigged, the soldier continued, indicating the man's baggage. "Pretty small outfit for a miner, isn't it?"
It's plenty for me.
Have you enough money to buy your season's grub?
I guess that's my business.
Pardon me, it is my business also.
What is this—a hold-up? The man laughed harshly, at the same time swinging around till he faced his questioner. Gale noted that his right hand now hung directly over the spot where his suspenders buttoned on the right side. The trader moved aside and took up a position at some distance.
My orders are to see that all new-comers either have an outfit or are able to buy one, said Burrell. "Those that are not equipped properly are to be sent down-river to St. Michael's, where there is plenty of everything and where they will be taken care of by the government. Mr. Gale has only sufficient provisions to winter the men already in this district."
I can take care of myself, said the man, angrily, "whether I'm broke or not, and I don't want any of your interference." He shot a quick glance at Poleon Doret, but the Frenchman's face was like wood, and his hand still held the neck of the whiskey bottle he had set out for the stranger before the others entered. Gale leaned against the opposite counter, his countenance inert but for the eyes, which were fixed upon the Lieutenant.
Come, said the officer, peremptorily, "I have heard all about you, and you are not the kind of citizen we want here, but if you have enough money for an outfit I can't send you away. If you haven't—"
I'm broke, said the man, but at the note in his voice Poleon Doret's muscles tightened, and Burrell, who also read a sinister message in the tone, slid his heavy service revolver from its holster beneath his coat.
He had never done this thing before, and it galled him. He had never drawn a weapon on a man, and this playing at policeman became suddenly most repugnant, stirring in him the uncomfortable feeling that he was doing a mean thing, and not only a mean thing, but one of which he ought to be heartily ashamed. He felt decidedly amateurish, especially when he saw that the man apparently intended no resistance and made no move. However, he was in for it now, and must end as he had begun.
Give me your gun, he said; "I'll unload it and give it back to you at the gang-plank."
All right, you've got the upper hand, said the man through lips that had gone white. Drawing his weapon from beneath his vest, he presented it to the officer, butt foremost, hammer underneath. The cylinder reposed naturally in the palm of his hand, and the tip of his forefinger was thrust through the trigger-guard.
Burrell lowered the barrel of his revolver and put out his left hand for the other's weapon. Suddenly the man's wrist jerked, the soldier saw a blue flicker of sunlight on the steel as it whirled, saw the arm of Poleon Doret fling itself across the bar with the speed of a striking serpent, heard a smash of breaking glass, felt the shock of a concussion, and the spatter of some liquid in his face. Then he saw the man's revolver on the floor half-way across the room, saw fragments of glass with it, and saw the fellow step backward, snatching at the fingers of his right hand. A smell of powder-smoke and rank whiskey was in the air.
There are times when a man's hand will act more swiftly than his tongue. Napoleon Doret had seen the manner of the stranger's surrender of his gun, and, realizing too late what it meant, had acted. At the very instant of the fellow's treachery, Doret struck with his bottle just in time to knock the weapon from his hand, but not in time to prevent its discharge. The bullet was lodged in the wall a foot from where Gale stood. As the stranger staggered back, the Frenchman vaulted the bar, but, though swift as a cat, the soldier, who had also leaped, was before him. Aiming a sweeping downward blow with his Colt, Burrell clipped the Skagway man just above the ear, and he reeled; then as he fell the officer struck wickedly again at his opponent's skull, but Doret seized him by the arm.
Ba Gar, don't kill 'im twice!
Burrell wrenched his arm free and turned on Doret a face that remained long in the Frenchman's memory, a face suffused with fury and convulsed like that of a sprinter at the finish of a race. The two men stared at each other over the fallen figure for a brief moment, until the soldier gained mastery of himself and sheathed his weapon, when Poleon smiled.
I spoil' a quart of good w'iskee on you. Dat's wort' five dollar.
The Lieutenant wiped the liquor from his face.
Quick work, Doret, he said. "I owe you one."
Gale's face was hidden as he bent over the prostrate man, fingering a long and ragged cut which laid the fellow's scalp open from back of the ear to the temple, but he mumbled something unintelligible.
Is he hurt badly?
No, you chipped him too low, said the trader. "I told you he was bad."
He's goin' have nice birt'-mark, anyhow, said Doret, going back of the bar for some water. They revived the man, then bound up his injury hastily, and as the steamer cast off they led him to the bank and passed his grip-sacks to a roustabout. He said no word as he walked unsteadily up the plank, but turned and stared malignantly at them from the deck; then, as the craft swung outward into the stream, he grinned through the trickle of blood that stole down from beneath his wide hat, if the convulsive grimace he made could be termed a grin, and cried:
I'd like to introduce myself, for I'm coming back to winter with you, Lieutenant! My name is Runnion. And until the steamer was hidden behind the bend below they saw him standing there gazing back at them fixedly.
As Burrell left the two men at the store, he gave his hand frankly to the French-Canadian, and said, while his cheeks flushed:
I want to thank you for saving me from my own awkwardness.
Doret became even more embarrassed than the Lieutenant at this show of gratitude, and grunted churlishly. But when the young man had gone he turned to Gale, who had watched them silently, and said:
He's nice young feller, ole man. Sapre! Wen he's mad his eye got so red lak' my ondershirt.
But the trader made no reply.
When the steamer had gone Napoleon Doret went to look for Necia, and found her playing with the younger Gales, who revelled in the gifts he had brought. Never had there been such a surprise. Never had there been such gorgeous presents for little folks. This was a land in which there were no toys, a country too young for babes; and any one whose youth had been like that of other children would have seen a pathos in the joy of these two. Poleon had been hard put to it to find anything suitable for his little friends, for although there was all manner of merchandise coming into Dawson, none of it was designed for tiny people, not even clothes.
It was evident that he had pleased them, for when he appeared they ran at his legs like twin cubs, incoherent and noisy, the pleasure within them too turbulent for expression. They had never played with a toy that Poleon had not built for them, nor worn a garment that Alluna had not made. This, then, was a day of revelations, for the first thing they beheld upon opening their packs was a pair of rubber boots for each. They were ladies' knee-boots, the smallest size in stock, but the Gales entered them bodily, so to speak, moccasins and all, clear to their hips, like the waders that duck-hunters use. When they ran they fell down and out of them, but their pride remained upright and serene, for were not these like the boots that Poleon wore, and not of Indian make, with foolish beads on them? Next, the youthful heir had found a straw hat of strange and wondrous fashion, with a brim like a board and a band of blue, which Poleon had bought from a college man who had retained this emblem of his past to the final moment. Like the boots, it was much too large for little John, and hard to master, but it made a brave display, as did a red cravat, which covered his front like a baseball catcher's harness. Molly had also two sets of side-combs, gorgeously ornamented with glass diamonds, and a silver-handled tooth-brush, with which she scrubbed the lame puppy. This puppy had three legs and the mange, and he was her particular pride.
There were certain other things, the use of which they did not understand, like queer-smelling, soft, yellow balls which Necia said were oranges and good to eat, although the skins were leathery and very bitter, nor were they nearly so pleasant to the nose as the toilet soap, which Necia would not allow them even to taste. Then there was a box of chocolate candies such as the superintendent at St. Michael's sent them every spring, and an atomizer, which Necia had filled with Florida Water. This worked on the puppy even better than the tooth-brush.
The elder girl laughed gladly as Poleon entered, though her eyes were wet with the pity of it.
You seem to bring sunshine wherever you go, she said. "They have never had things to play with like other children, and it makes me cry to watch them."
Ho, ho! he chuckled, "dis ain'no time for cryin'. Ba gosh! I guess you don' have so much present w'en you was li'l' gal you'se'f, w'at? Mebbe you t'ink I forget you. Wal, I didn't."
He began to undo the fastenings of a parcel he carried in his arms, for Napoleon Doret had brought other things from Dawson besides his gifts to the children. Necia snatched at the package.
Don't you dare open it! Why, that's half the fun. She was a child herself now, her face flushed and her hands a-tremble. Taking the package to the table, she hurriedly untied the knots while he stood watching her, his teeth showing white against his dark face, and his eyes half shut as if dazzled by the sight of her.
Oh, why didn't you tie more knots in it? she breathed as she undid the last, and then, opening the wrappings slowly, she gasped in astonishment. She shook it out gently, reverently—a clinging black lace gown of Paris make. Next she opened a box and took from it a picture hat, with long jet plumes, which she stroked and pressed fondly against her face. There were other garments also—a silken petticoat, silk stockings, and a pair of high-heeled shoes to match, with certain other delicate and dainty things which she modestly forbore to inspect before the Frenchman, who said no word, but only gazed at her, and for whom she had no eyes as yet. Finally she laid her presents aside, and, turning to him, said, in a hushed, awe-stricken voice:
It's all there, everything complete! Oh, Poleon—you dear, dear Poleon! She took his two big hands by the thumbs, as had been her custom ever since she was a child, and looked up at him, her eyes wet with emotion. But she could not keep away from the dress for long, and returned to feast her eyes upon it, the two children standing beside her, sprouting out of their rubber boots, with eyes and mouths round and protruding.
You lak' it, eh? pressed Poleon, hungry for more demonstrative expression.
Oh-h, she sighed, "can't you SEE? Where on earth did you get it?" Then suddenly realizing its value, she cried, "Why, it must have cost a fortune!" A quick reproach leaped into her face, but he only laughed again.
Wan night I gamble in beeg saloon. Yes, sir! I gamble good dat night, too. For w'ile I play roulette, den I dance, den I play some more, an' by-an'-by I see a new dance gal. She's Franche gal, from Montreal. Dat's de one I tol' you 'bout. Ba Gar! She's swell dress', too. She's name' Marie Bourgette.
Oh, I've heard about her, said Necia. "She owns a claim on Bonanza Creek."
Sure, she's frien's wit' Charlie McCormack, dat riche feller, but I don' know it dis tam', so I ask her for dance wit' me. Den we drink a bottle of champagne—twenty dollar.
'Mamselle,' I say, 'how much you charge for sell me dat dress?'
'For w'y shall I sell im,' she say; 'I don' wear 'im before till to-night, an' I don' get no more dress lak' dis for t'ousan' dollar.'
Necia exclaimed excitedly.
'"For w'y you sell 'im?' I say. 'Biccause I'll tak' 'im down to Flambeau for Necia Gale, w'at never had no dress lak' dat in all her life.' Wal, sir, dat Marie Bourgette, she's hear of you before, an' your dad, too—mos' all dose Cheechakos know 'bout Old Man Gale—so she say:
'Wat lookin' kind of gal is dis Necia?' An' I tell her all 'bout you. Wen I'm t'rough she say:'
'But maybe your little frien' is more bigger as I am. Maybe de dress won't fit.'
'Ha! You don' know me, mamselle,' I say. 'I can guess de weight of a caribou to five poun'. She'll be same size la'kin' one inch 'roun' de wais'.'
'Poleon Doret,' she say, 'you ain' no Franchemans to talk lak'dat. Look here! I can sell dis dress for t'ousan' dollar to-night, or I can trade 'im for gol'-mine on El Dorado Creek to some dose Swede w'at want to catch a gal, but I'm goin' sell 'im to you for t'ree hondred dollar, jus' w'at I pay for 'im. You wait here till I come back.'
'No, no, Mamselle Marie, I'll go 'long, too, for so you don' change your min',' I say; an' I stan' outside her door till she pass me de whole dam' works.
' Don' forget de little shoes,' I say—an' dat's how it come!
And you paid three hundred dollars for it! Necia said, aghast. The Canadian shrugged.
Only for de good heart of Marie Bourgette I pay wan t'ousan', said he. "I mak' seven hondred dollar clean profit!"
It was very nice of both of you, but—I can't wear it. I've never seen a dress like it, except in pictures, and I couldn't— She saw his face fall, and said, impulsively:
I'll wear it once, anyhow, Poleon, just for you. Go away quick, now, and let me put it on.
Dat's good, he nodded, as he moved away. "I bet you mak' dose dance-hall women look lak' sucker."
No man may understand the girl's feelings as she set about clothing herself in her first fine dress. Time and again she had studied pictures from the "outside" showing women arrayed in the newest styles, and had closed her eyes to fancy herself dressed in like manner. She had always had an instinctive feeling that some day she would leave the North and see the wonderful world of which men spoke so much, and mingle with the fine ladies of her picture-books, but she never dreamed to possess an evening-gown while she lived in Alaska. And now, even while she recognized the grotesqueness of the situation, she burned to wear it and see herself in the garb of other women. So, with the morning sun streaming brightly into her room, lighting up the moss-chinked walls, the rough barbarism of fur and head and trophy, she donned the beautiful garments.
Poleon's eye had been amazingly correct, for it fitted her neatly, save at the waist, which was even more than an inch too large, notwithstanding the fact that she had never worn such a corset as the well-formed Marie Bourgette was accustomed to.
She pondered long and hesitated modestly when she saw its low cut, which exposed her neck and shoulders in a totally unaccustomed manner, for it struck her as amazingly indecent until she scurried through her magazines again and saw that its construction, as compared with others, was most conservative. Even so she shrank at sight of herself below the line of sunburn, for she was ringed about like a blue-winged teal, the demarcation being more pronounced because of the natural whiteness of her skin. The year previous Doret had brought her from the coast a Spanish shawl, which a salt-water sailor had sold him, and which had lain folded away ever since. She brought it forth now and arranged it about her shoulders, but in spite of this covering the fair flesh beneath peeped through its wide interstices most brazenly. She had never paid marked attention to the fairness of her skin till now, and all at once this difference between herself and her little brother and sister struck her. She had been a mother to them ever since they came, and had often laughed when she saw how brown their little bodies were, rejoicing in blushing quietude at her own whiteness, but to-day she neither laughed nor felt any joy, rather a dim wonder. She sat down, dress and all, in the thick softness of a great brown bear-skin and thought it over.
How odd it was, now that she considered it, that she needed no aid with these alien garments, that she knew instinctively their every feature, that there was no intricacy to cause her more than an instant's trouble. This knowledge must be a piece with the intuitive wit that had been the wonder of Father Barnum and had enabled her to absorb his teachings as fast as he gave them forth.
She was interrupted in her reverie by the passing of a shadow across her window and the stamp of a man's feet on the planks at the door. Of course, it was Poleon, who had come back to see her; so she rose hastily, gave one quick glance at the mirror above her washstand, choosing the side that distorted her image the least, and, hearing him still stamping, perfunctorily called:
Come in! I'll be right out.
She kicked the train into place behind her, looped the shawl carelessly about her in a way to veil her modesty effectively, and, with an expectant smile at his extravagance of admiration, swept out into the big room, very self-conscious and very pleasing to the eye. She crossed proudly to the reading-table to give him a fair view of her splendor, and was into the middle of the room before she looked up. Taken aback, she uttered a little strangled cry and made a quick movement of retreat, only to check herself and stand with her chin high in the air, while wave after wave of color swept over her face.
Great lovely dove! ejaculated Burrell, fervently, staring at her.
Oh, I—I thought you were Poleon. He— In spite of herself she glanced towards her room as if to flee; she writhed at the utter absurdity of her appearance, and knew the Lieutenant must be laughing at her. But flight would only make it worse, so she stood as she was, having drawn back as far as she could, till the table checked her. Burrell, however, was not laughing, nor smiling even, for his embarrassment rivalled hers.
I was looking for your father, he said, wondering if this glorious thing could be the quaint half-breed girl of yesterday. There was nothing of the native about her now, for her lithe young figure was drawn up to its height, and her head, upon which the long, black braids were coiled, was tipped back in a haughty poise. She had flung her hands out to grasp the table edge behind her, forgetful of her shawl, which drooped traitorously and showed such rounded lines as her ordinary dress scarce hinted at. This was no Indian maid, the soldier vowed; no blood but the purest could pulse in such veins, no spirit save the highest could flash in such eyes as these. A jealous rancor irked him at the thought of this beauty intended for the Frenchman's eyes.
Can't you show yourself to me as well as to Poleon? he said.
Certainly not! she declared. "He bought this dress for me, and I put it on to please him." Now she was herself again, for some note in the Lieutenant's voice gave her dominance over him. "After he sees it I will take it off, and—"
Don't—don't take it off—ever, said Burrell. "I thought you were beautiful before, because of your quaintness and simplicity, but now—" his chest swelled—"why, this is a breath from home. You're like my sister and the girls back in Kentucky, only more wonderful."
Am I? she cried, eagerly. "Am I like other girls? Do I really look as if I'd always worn clothes like these?"
Born to them, said he.
A smile broke over her grave face, assuming a hundred different shades of pleasure and making a child of her on the instant; all her reserve and hauteur vanished. Her warmth and unaffected frankness suffused him, as she stood out, turning to show the beauties of her gown, her brown hands fluttering tremulously as she talked.
It's my first party-dress, you know, and I'm as proud of it as Molly is of her rubber boots. It's too big in here and too small right there; that girl must have had a bad chest; but otherwise it fits me as if it had been made for me, doesn't it? And the shoes! Aren't they the dearest things? See. She held her skirts back, showing her two feet side by side, her dainty ankles slim and shapely in their silk.
They won't shed water, he said.
I know; and look at the heels. I couldn't walk a mile to save my life.
And they will come off if they get wet.
But they make me very tall.
They don't wear as well as moccasins. Both laughed delightedly till he broke in, impulsively:
Oh, girl, don't you know how beautiful you are?
Of course I do! she cried, imitating his change of voice; then added, naively, "That's why I hate to take it off."
Where did you learn to wear things like that? he questioned. "Where did you get that—well—that air?"
It seems to me I've always known. There's nothing strange about it. The buttons and the hooks and the eyes are all where they belong. It's instinct, I suppose, from father's side—
Probably. I dare say I should understand the mechanism of a dress-suit, even if I'd never seen one, said the man, amused, yet impressed by her argument.
I've always had visions of women dressed in this kind of clothing, white women—never natives—not dressed like this exactly, but in dainty, soft things, not at all like the ones I wear. I seem to have a memory, although it's hardly that, either—it's more like a dream—as if I were somebody else. Father says it is from reading too much.
A memory of what?
It's too vague and tantalizing to tell what it is, except that I should be called Merridy.
Merridy? Why that?
I'll show you. See. She slipped her hand inside the shawl and drew from her breast a thin gold chain on which was strung a band ring. "It was grandmother's—that's where I got the fancy for the name of Merridy, I suppose."
May I look?
Of course. But I daren't take it off. I haven't had it off my neck since I was a baby. She held it out for him to examine, and, although it brought his head close to hers, there was no trace of coquetry in the invitation. He read the inscription, "From Dan to Merridy," but had no realization of what it meant, for he glimpsed the milk-white flesh almost at his lips, and felt her breath stirring his hair, while the delicate scent of her person seemed to loose every strong emotion in him. She was so dainty and yet so virile, so innocent and yet so wise, so cold and yet so pulsating.
It is very pretty, he said, inanely.
At the look in his eyes as he raised his head her own widened, and she withdrew from him imperceptibly, dismissing him with a mere inflection.
I wish you would send Poleon here. It's time he saw his present.
As Burrell walked out into the air he shut his jaws grimly and muttered: "Hold tight, young man. She's not your kind—she's not your kind."
Inside the store he found Doret and the trader in conversation with a man he had not met before, a ragged nondescript whose overalls were blue and faded and patched, particularly on the front of the legs above the knees, where a shovel-handle wears hardest; whose coat was of yellow mackinaw, the sleeves worn thin below the elbows, where they had rubbed against his legs in his work. As the soldier entered, the man turned on him a small, shrewd, weather-beaten face with one eye, while he went on talking to Gale.
It ain't nothin' to git excited over, but it's wuth follerin'. If I wasn't so cussed unlucky I'd know there was a pay streak som'ere close by.
Your luck is bound to change, Lee, said the trader, who helped him to roll up a pack of provisions.
Mebbe so. Who's the dressmaker? He jerked his bushy head towards Burrell, who had stopped at the front door with Poleon to examine some yellow grains in a folded paper.
He's the boss soldier.
Purty, ain't he?
If you ain't good he'll get you, said Gale, a trifle cynically, at which Lee chuckled.
I reckon there's several of us in camp that ain't been a whole lot too good, said he. "Has he tried to git anybody yet?"
No, but he's liable to. What would happen if he did? Suppose, for instance, he went after you—or me?
The one-eyed man snorted derisively. "It ain't wuth considerin'!"
Why not? insisted Gale, guardedly. "Maybe I've got a record—you don't know."
If you have, don't tell me nothin' about it, hastily observed Lee. "I'm a God-fearin' citizen myself, leanin' ever towards peace and quietudes, but what's past is dead and gone, and I'd hate to see a lispin' child like that blue-and-yeller party try to reezureck it."
He's got the American army to back him up—at least five of them.
Five agin a hundred. He aims to overawe us, don't he? snickered the unregenerate Lee, but his wrinkles changed and deepened as he leaned across the counter confidentially.
You say the word, John, and I'll take some feller along to help me, and we'll transfer this military post. There's plenty that would like the job if you give the wink.
Pshaw! I'm just supposing, said the trader. "As long as they play around and drill and toot that horn, and don't bother anybody, I allow they're not in the way."
All right! It's up to you. However, if I happen to leap down on this pay streak before it sees me comin', I'm goin' to put my friends in first and foremost, and shut out these dressmakers complete. So long! He thrust his arms beneath the legs of a new pair of blue overalls that formed his pack-straps, wriggled the burden comfortably into place between his shoulders, and slouched out past Doret, to whom he nodded, ignoring the "dressmaker."
Having given Necia's message to Poleon, the Lieutenant took up his business with the trader. It concerned the purchase of certain supplies that had been omitted from the military outfit, and when this was concluded he referred to the encounter of that morning.
I don't want you to think I bungle everything in that manner, he said, "for I don't. I want to work with you, and I want to be friends with you."
I'm willing, said Gale.
Nobody dislikes playing policeman more than I do, but it's a part of my duty, and I'll have to do it, continued the young man.
I reckon you simply aim to keep peace, eh? You ain't lookin' for nobody in particular?
Of course not—outside of certain notorious criminals who have escaped justice and worked north.
Then there is a few that you want, eh?
Yes, certain old-timers. The officers at every post have descriptions of a few such, and if they show up we will take them in and hold them till courts are established.
If you've got their names and descriptions, mebbe I could help you, said the trader, carelessly.
Thank you, I'll bring up the list and we'll go over it together. You must have been here a good while.
About ten years.
Then Miss Necia was born out in the States?
Gale shot a startled glance at the soldier before he answered in the affirmative, but Burrell was studying a pattern of sunlight on the floor and did not observe him. A moment later he inquired, hesitatingly:
Is this your first marriage, Mr. Gale? When the other did not answer, he looked up and quickly added:
I beg your pardon, sir. What led me to ask was Miss Necia—she is so—well—she is such a remarkable girl.
Gale's face had undergone a change, but he answered, quietly:
I 'ain't never been married.
What?
When I took Alluna it wasn't the style, and neither one of us has thought much about it since.
Oh, I see, exclaimed Burrell, hurriedly. "I'll bring that list with me the first time I think about it," and, nodding amiably, he sauntered out. But his mind was in a whirl, and even after he had reached his quarters he found himself repeating:
The other was bad enough. Poor little girl! Poor little girl!
Gale likewise left the store and went into his house, the odd look still strong in his eyes, to find Necia posing in her new regalia for Poleon's benefit. At sight of her he fell into a strange and unexpected humor, and to their amazement commanded her roughly to take the things off. His voice and manner were harsh and at utter variance with any mood he had ever displayed before; nor would he explain his unreasoning fury, but strode out again, leaving her in tears and the Frenchman staring.
During the weeks that followed Meade Burrell saw much of Necia. At first he had leaned on the excuse that he wanted to study the curious freak of heredity she presented; but that wore out quickly, and he let himself drift, content with the pleasure of her company and happy in the music of her laughter. Her quick wit and keen humor delighted him, and the mystery of her dark eyes seemed to hold the poetry and beauty of all the red races that lay behind her on the maternal side. At times he thought of her as he had seen her that morning in the dance-girl's dress, and remembered the purity of neck and breast it had displayed, but he attributed that to the same prank of heritage that had endowed her with other traits alien to her mother's race.
He had experienced a profound sense of pity for her upon learning her father's relation to Alluna, but this also largely vanished when he found that the girl was entirely oblivious to its significance. He had tried her in many subtle ways, and found that she regarded the matter innocently, as customary, and therefore in the light of an accepted convention; nor did she seem to see anything in her blood or station to render her inferior to other women. She questioned him tirelessly about his sister, and he was glad of this, for it placed no constraint between them. So that, as he explored her many quaint beliefs and pagan superstitions, the delight of being with her grew, and he ceased to reason whither it might lead him.
As for her, each day brought a keener delight. She unfolded before the Kentuckian like some beautiful woodland flower, and through innumerable, unnoticed familiarities took him into her innermost confidence, sharing with him those girlish hopes and beliefs and aspirations she had never voiced till now.
A month of this went by, and then Runnion returned. He came on an up-going steamer which panted in for a rest from its thousand-mile climb, and for breath to continue its fight against the never-tiring sweep of waters. The manner of his coming was bold, for he stood fairly upon the ship's deck, staring at the growing picture of the town, as he had watched it recede a month before, and his smile was evil now, as it had been then. With him was a stranger. When the boat was at rest Runnion sauntered down the gang-plank and up to the Lieutenant, who stood above the landing-place, and who noted that the scar, close up against his hat-band, was scarce healed. He accosted the officer with an insolent assurance.
Well, I'm back again, you see, and I'm back to stay.
Very well, Runnion; did you bring an outfit with you? The young man addressed him civilly, although he felt that the fellow's presence was a menace and would lead to trouble.
Yes, and I'm pretty fat besides. He shook a well-laden gold-sack at the officer. "I reckon I can rustle thirteen dollars a month most anywhere, if I'm left alone."
What do you want in this place, anyhow? demanded Burrell, curiously.
None of your damned business, the man answered, grinning.
Be sure it isn't, retorted the Lieutenant, "because it would please me right down to the ground if it were. I'd like to get you."
I'm glad we understand each other, Runnion said, and turned to oversee the unloading of his freight, falling into conversation with the stranger, who had been surveying the town without leaving the boat. Evidently this man had a voice in Runnion's affairs, for he not only gave him instructions, but bossed the crew who handled his merchandise, and Meade Burrell concluded that he must be some incoming tenderfoot who had grub-staked the desperado to prospect in the hills back of Flambeau. As the two came up past him he saw that he was mistaken—this man was no more of a tenderfoot than Runnion; on the contrary, he had the bearing of one to whom new countries are old, who had trod the edge of things all his life. There was a hint of the meat-eating animal about him; his nose was keen and hawk-like, his walk and movements those of the predatory beast, and as he passed by, Burrell observed that his eyes were of a peculiar cruelty that went well with his thin lips. He was older by far than Runnion, but, while the latter was mean-visaged and swaggering, the stranger's manner was noticeable for its repression.
Impelled by an irresistible desire to learn something about the man, the Lieutenant loitered after Runnion and his companion, and entered the store in time to see the latter greet "No Creek" Lee, the prospector, who had come into town for more food. Both men spoke with quiet restraint.
Nine years since I saw you, Stark, said the miner. "Where you bound?"
The diggings, replied Stark, as Lee addressed the stranger.
Mining now?
No, same old thing, but I'm grub-staking a few men, as usual. One of them stays here. I may open a house in Dawson if the camp is as good as they say it is.
This here's a good place for you.
Stark laughed noiselessly and without mirth. "Fine! There must be a hundred people living here."
Never mind, you take it from me, said the miner, positively, "and get in now on the quiet. There's something doing." His one sharp eye detected the Lieutenant close by, so he drew his friend aside and began talking to him earnestly and with such evident effect as to alter Stark's plans on the moment; for when Runnion entered the store shortly Stark spoke to him quickly, following which they both hurried back to the steamer and saw to the unloading of much additional freight and baggage. From the volume and variety of this merchandise, it was evident that Mr. Stark would in no wise be a burden to the community.
Burrell was not sufficiently versed in the ways of mining-camps to know exactly what this abrupt change of policy meant, but that there was something in the air he knew from the mysterious manner of "No Creek" Lee and from the suppressed excitement of Doret and the trader. His curiosity got the better of him finally, and he fell into talk with Lee, inquiring about the stranger by way of an opening.
That's Ben Stark. I knew him back in the Cassiar country, said Lee.
Is he a mining man?
Well, summat. He's made and lost a bank-roll that a greyhound couldn't leap over in the mining business, but it ain't his reg'lar graft. He run one of the biggest places in the Northwest for years.
Saloon, eh?
Saloon and variety house—seven bartenders, that's all. He's the feller that killed the gold-commissioner. Of course, that put him on the hike again.
How do you mean?
Well, he had a record as long as a sick man's drug bill before he went into that country, and when he put the commissioner away them Canadian officials went after him like they was killin' snakes, and it cost him all he had made to get clear. If it had happened across the line, the coroner's jury would have freed him, 'cause the commissioner was drunk and started the row; but it happened right in Stark's saloon, and you know Canucks is stronger than vitriol for law and order. Not bein' his first offence, it went hard with him.
He looks like a killer, said Burrell.
Yes, but he ain't the common kind. He always lets the other man begin, and therefore he ain't never done time.
Come, now, argued the Lieutenant, "if it were the other man who invariably shot first, Stark would have been killed long ago."
I don't care what WOULD have happened, it 'AIN'T happened, and he's got notches on his gun till it looks like a cub bear had chawed it. If you was a Western man you'd know what they say about him.
'The bullet 'ain't been run to kill him.' That's the sayin'. You needn't grin, there's many a better man than you believes it.
Who is it that the bullet hasn't been run to kill? said the trader's deep voice behind them. He had finished with his duties, and now sauntered forward.
Ben Stark, said Lee, turning. "You know him, John?"
No, I never saw him, but I know who he is—used to hear of him in the Coeur d'Alenes.
That's him I was talking to, said the miner. "He's an old friend of mine, and he's going to locate here."
Burrell thought he saw Lee wink at the trader, but he was not sure, for at that moment the man of whom they were speaking re-entered. Lee introduced him, and the three men shook hands. While the soldier fell into easy conversation with the new-comer, Gale gazed at him narrowly, studying him as he studied all men who came as strangers. As he was doing so Alluna entered, followed by Johnny and Molly. She had come for sugar, and asked for it in her native tongue. Upon her exit Stark broke off talking to the Lieutenant and turned to the trader.
Your squaw, Mr. Gale?
The old man nodded.
Pah-Ute, eh?
Yes. Why, do you savvy the talk?
Some. I lived in California once.
Where? The question came like a shot.
Oh, here and there; I followed the Mother Lode for a spell.
I don't recall the name, said the trader, after a bit.
Possibly. Where were you located?
I never lit on any one place long enough to call it home.
It seemed to Burrell that both men were sparring cautiously in an indirect, impersonal manner.
Those your kids, too, eh? Stark continued.
Yes, and I got another one besides—older. A girl.
She's a 'pip,' too, said "No Creek" Lee, fervently. "She's plumb beautiful."
All of them half-breeds? questioned Stark.
Sure. The trader's answer was short, and when the other showed no intention of pressing the subject further he sauntered away; but no sooner was he out of hearing than Stark said: "Humph! They're all alike."
Who?
Squaw-men.
This one ain't, Lee declared. "He's different; ain't he, Lieutenant?"
He certainly is, agreed Burrell. This was the first criticism he had heard of Necia's father, and although Stark volunteered no argument, it was plain that his opinion remained unaffected.
The old man went through the store at the rear and straightway sought Alluna. Speaking to her with unwonted severity in the Pah-Ute language, he said:
I have told you never to use your native tongue before strangers. That man in the store understands.
I only asked for sugar to cook the berries with, she replied.
True, but another time you might say more, therefore the less you speak it the better. He is the kind who sees much and talks little. Address me in Siwash or in English unless we are alone.
I do not like that man, said the woman. "His eyes are bad, like a fish eagle's, and he has no heart."
Suddenly she dropped her work and came close up to him. "Can he be the one?"
I don't know. Stark is not the name, but he might have changed it; he had reasons enough.
Who is this man Stark?
I don't know that, either. I used to hear of him when I was in British Columbia.
But surely you must know if he is the same—she must have told you how he looked—others must have told you—
Gale shook his head. "Very little. I could not ask her, and others knew him so well they never doubted that I had seen him; but this much I do know, he was dark—"
This man is dark—
—and his spirit was like that of a mad horse—
This man's temper is black—
—and his eyes were cruel.
This man has evil eyes.
He lacked five years of my age, said the trader.
This man is forty years old. It must be he, said the squaw.
Even Necia would have marvelled had she heard this revelation of her father's age, for his hair and brows were grizzled, and his face had the look of a man of sixty, while only those who knew him well, like Doret, were aware of his great strength and the endurance that belied his appearance.
We will send Necia down to the Mission to-night, and let Father Barnum keep her there till this man goes, said the squaw, after some deliberation.
No, she must stay here, Gale replied, with decision. "The man has come here to live, so it won't do any good to send her away, and, after all, what is to be will be. But she must never be seen in that dance-girl's dress again, at least, not till I learn more about this Stark. It makes no difference whether this one is the man or not; he will come and I shall know him. For a year I have felt that the time was growing short, and now I know it."
No, no! Alluna cried; "we have no strangers here. No white men except the soldiers and this one have come in a year. This is but a little trading-post."
It was yesterday, but it isn't to-day. Lee has made a strike—like the one George Carmack made on the Klondike. He came to tell me and Poleon, and we are going back with him to-night, but you must say nothing or it will start a stampede.
Other men will come—a great many of them? interrogated Alluna, fearfully, ignoring utterly the momentous news.
Yes. Flambeau will be another Dawson if this find is what Lee thinks it is. I stayed away from the Upper Country because I knew crowds of men would come from the States, and I feared that he might be among them; but it's no use hiding any longer, there's no other place for us to go. If Lee has got a mine, I'll have the one next to it, for we will be the first ones on the ground. What happens after that won't matter much, you four will be provided for. We are to leave in an hour, one at a time, to avoid comment.
But why did this man stop here? insisted the woman. "Why did he not stay on the steamboat and go to Dawson?"
He's a friend of Lee's. He is going with us. Then he added, almost in a whisper, "Before we return I shall know."
Alluna seized his arm. "Promise to come back, John! Promise that you will come back even if this should be the man."
I promise. Don't worry, little woman; I'm not ready for a reckoning yet.
He gave her certain instructions about the store, charging her in particular to observe the utmost secrecy regarding the strike, else she might precipitate a premature excitement which would go far towards ruining his and Poleon's chances. All of which she noted; then, as he turned away, she laid her hand on his arm and said:
If you do not know him he will not know you. Is it not so?
Yes.
Then the rest is easy—
But he only shook his head doubtfully and answered, "Perhaps—I am not sure," and went inside, where he made up a light pack of bacon, flour and tea, a pail or two, a coffee-pot and a frying-pan, which he rolled inside a robe of rabbit-skin and bound about in turn with a light tarpaulin. It did not weigh thirty pounds in all. Selecting a new pair of water-boots, he stuffed dry grass inside them, oiled up his six-shooter, then slipped out the back way, and in five minutes was hidden in the thickets. Half an hour later, having completed a detour of the town, he struck the trail to the interior, where he found Poleon Doret, equipped in a similar manner, resting beside a stream, singing the songs of his people.
When Burrell returned to his quarters he tried to mitigate the feeling of lonesomeness that oppressed him by tackling his neglected correspondence. Somehow, to-day, the sense of his isolation had come over him stronger than ever. His rank forbade any intimacy with his miserable handful of men, who had already fallen into the monotony of routine, while every friendly overture he made towards the citizens of Flambeau was met with distrust and coldness, his stripes of office seeming to erect a barrier and induce an ostracism stronger and more complete than if they had been emblems of the penitentiary. He began to resent it keenly. Even Doret and the trader seemed to share the general feeling, hence the thought of the long, lonesome winter approaching reduced the Lieutenant to a state of black despondency, deepened by the knowledge that he now had an open enemy in camp in the person of Runnion. Then, too, he had taken a morbid dislike to the new man, Stark. So that, all in all, the youth felt he had good reason to be in the dumps this afternoon. There was nothing desirable in this place—everything undesirable—except Necia. Her presence in Flambeau went far towards making his humdrum existence bearable, but of late he had found himself dwelling with growing seriousness on the unhappy circumstances of her birth, and had almost made up his mind that it would be wise not to see her any more. The tempting vision of her in the ball-dress remained vividly in his imagination, causing him hours of sweet torment. There was a sparkle, a fineness, a gentleness about her that seemed to make the few women he had known well dull and commonplace, and even his sister, whom till now he had held as the perfection of all things feminine, suffered by comparison with this maiden of the frontier.
He was steeped in this sweet, grave melancholy, when a knock came at his door, and he arose to find Necia herself there, excited and radiant. She came in without sign of embarrassment or slightest consciousness of the possible impropriety of her act.
The most wonderful thing has happened, she began at once, when she found they were alone. "You'll faint for joy."
What is it?
Nobody knows except father and Poleon and the two new men—
What is it?
I teased the news out of mother, and then came right here.
He laughed. "But what—may I ask—"
Lee has made a strike—a wonderful strike—richer than the Klondike.
So? The old man's luck has changed. I'm right glad of that, said the soldier.
I came as fast as I could, because to-morrow everybody will know about it, and it will be too late.
Too late for what?
"
For us to get in on it, of course. Oh, but won't there be a stampede! Why, all the people bound for Dawson on the next boat will pile off here, then the news will go up-river and down-river, and thousands of others will come pouring in from everywhere, and this will be a city. Then we will stake our town lots and sell them for ever so much money, and go around with our noses in the air, and they will say to each other: 'Who is that beautiful lady with the fine clothes?' and somebody will answer:
""
'Why, that is Miss Necia Gale, the mine-owner.' And then you will come along, and they will say: 'That is Lieutenant Burrell, the millionaire, and—'""
"
Hold on! hold on! said the soldier, stopping her breathless patter. "Tell me all about this."
Well, 'No Creek' came in this morning to tell dad and Poleon. Then the boat arrived with an old friend of Lee's, a Mr. Stark, so Lee told him, too, and now they've all gone back to his creek to stake more claims. They slipped away quietly to prevent suspicion, but I knew there was something up from the way Poleon acted, so I made Alluna tell me all about it. They haven't more than two hours start of us, and we can overtake them easily.
We! Why, we are not going?
Yes, we are, she insisted, impatiently—"you and I. That's why I came, so you can get a mine for yourself and be a rich man, and so you can help me get one. I know the way. Hurry up!"
No, said he, in as firm a tone as he could command. "In the first place, these men don't like me, and they don't want me to share in this."
What do you care?
In the second place, I'm not a miner. I don't know how to proceed.
Nevermind; I do. I've heard nothing but mining all my life.
In the third place, I don't think I have the right, for I'm a soldier. I'm working for Uncle Sam, and I don't believe I ought to take up mining claims. I'm not sure there is anything to prevent it, but neither am I sure it would be quite the square thing—are you?
Why, of course it's all right, said Necia, her eager face clouding with the look of a hurt child. "If you don't do it, somebody else will."
But the Lieutenant shook his head. "Maybe I'm foolish, but I can't see my way clear, much as I would like to."
Oh, dear! Oh, dear! she exclaimed, brokenly. "I do so want to go. I want you to be rich, and I want to be rich myself. I want to be a fine lady, and go outside and live like other girls. It's—the only chance—I ever had—and I'll never have another. Oh, it means so much to me; it means life, future, everything! Why, it means heaven to a girl like me!" Her eyes were wet with the sudden dashing of her hopes, and her chin quivered in a sweet, girlish way that made the youth almost surrender on the instant. But she turned to the window and gazed out over the river, continuing, after a moment's pause: "Please don't—mind me—but you can't understand what a difference this would make to me."
We couldn't possibly overtake them if we tried, he said, as if willing to treat with his conscience.
No, but we could beat them in. I know where Lee is working, for I went up last winter with Constantine and his dog-team, over a short cut by way of Black Bear Creek. We took it coming back, and I could find it again, but Lee doesn't know that route, so he will follow the summer trail, which is fifteen miles farther. You see, his creek makes a great bend to the southward, and heads back towards the river, so by crossing the divide at the source of Black Bear you drop into it a few miles above his cabin.
While she made this appeal Burrell fought with himself. There were reasons why he longed to take this trip, more than he had longed for anything since boyhood. These men of Flambeau had disregarded him, and insisted on treating him with contemptuous distrust, despite his repeated friendly overtures; wherefore he was hungry to beat them at their own game, hungry to thrust himself ahead of them and compel them to reckon with him as an equal, preferring a state of open enmity, if necessary, to this condition of indifferent toleration. Moreover, he knew that Necia was coveted by half of them, and if he spent a night in the woods alone with her it would stir them up a bit, he fancied. By Heaven! That would make them sit up and notice him! But then—it might work a wrong upon her; and yet, would it? He was not so sure that it would. She had come to him; she was old enough to know her mind, and she was but a half-breed girl, after all, who doubtless was not so simple as she seemed. Other men had no such scruples in this or any other land, and yet the young man hesitated until, encouraged by his silence, the girl came forward and spoke again, impulsively:
Don't be silly, Mr. Burrell. Come! Please come with me, won't you?
She took him by the edges of his coat and drew him to her coaxingly. It may have been partly the spirit of revolt that had been growing in him all day, or it may have been wholly the sense of her there beside him, warm and pleading, but something caused a great wave to surge up through his veins, caused him to take her in his arms, fiercely kissing her upturned face again and again, crying softly, deep down in his throat:
Yes! Yes! Yes! You little witch! I'll go anywhere with you! Anywhere! Anywhere! The impulse was blind and ungovernable, and it grew as his lips met hers, while, strangely enough, she made no resistance, yielding herself quietly, till he found her arms wound softly about his neck and her face nestling close to his. Neither of them knew how long they stood thus blended together, but soon he grew conscious of the beating of her heart against his breast, as she lay there like a little fluttering bird, and felt the throbbing of his own heart swaying him. Her arms, her lips, and her whole body clung to his in a sweet surrender, and yet there was nothing immodest or unmaidenly about it, for his strength and ardor had lifted her and drawn her to him as on the sweep of a great wave.
She drew her face free and hid it against his neck, breathing softly and with shy timidity, as if the sound of the words she whispered half frightened her.
I love you. I love you, Meade.
It may happen that a man will spend months in friendly and charming intimacy with a woman and never feel the violence or tenderness of passion till there comes a psychic moment or a physical touch that suddenly enwraps them like a flame. So it was with Burrell. The sweet burden of this girl in his arms, the sense of her yielding lips, the warmth of her caressing hands, momentarily unleashed a leaping pack of mad desires, and it was she who finally drew herself away to remind him smilingly that he was wasting time.
My lips will be here when those mines are worked out, she said. "No, no!" and she held him off as he came towards her again, insisting that if they were going they must be off at once, and that he could have no more kisses for the present. "But, of course, it is a long trip, and we will have to sit down now and then to rest," she added, shyly; at which he vowed that he was far from strong, and could not walk but a little way at a time, yet even so, he declared, the trail would be too short, even though it led to Canada.
Then get your pack made up, she ordered, "for we must be well up towards the head of Black Bear Creek before it grows dark enough to camp."
Swiftly he made his preparations; a madness was upon him now, and he took no pains to check or analyze the reasons for his decision. The thought of her loveliness in his arms once more, far up among the perfumed wooded heights, as the silent darkness stole upon them, stirred in him such a fret to be gone that it was like a fever. He slipped away to the barracks with instructions for his corporal, but was back again in a moment. Finally he took up his burden of blanket and food, then said to her:
Well, are you ready, little one?
Yes, Meade, she answered, simply.
And you are sure you won't regret it?
Not while you love me.
He kissed her again before they stepped out on the river trail that wound along the bank. A hundred yards beyond they were hidden by the groves of birch and fir.
Two hours later they paused where the foaming waters of Black Bear Creek rioted down across a gravelled bar and into the silent, sweeping river, standing at the entrance to a wooded, grass-grown valley, with rolling hills and domes displayed at its head, while back of them lay the town, six miles away, its low, squat buildings tiny and toy like, but distinctly silhouetted against the evening sky.
Is it not time to rest? said the soldier, laughingly, yet with a look of yearning in his misty eyes as he took the girlish figure in his arms. But she only smiled up at him and, releasing his hold, led the way into the forest.
He turned for a moment and shook his fist at the village and those in it, laughing loudly as if from the feel of the blood that leaped within him. Then he joined his companion, and, hand-in-hand, they left the broad reaches of the greater stream behind them and plunged into the untrodden valley.
"It's fonny t'ing how two brown eye
Was changin' everything—
De cloud she's no more on de sky,
An' winter's jus' lak' spring
Dey mak' my pack so very light,
De trail, she's not so long—
I'd walk it forty mile to-night
For hear her sing wan song
But now I'm busy mak' fortune
For marry on dat girl,
An' if she's tole me yass, dat's soon,
Bonheur! I'm own de worl'!"
Poleon Doret sang gayly as the trader came towards him through the open grove of birch, for he was happy this afternoon, and, being much of a dreamer, this fresh enterprise awoke in him a boyish pleasure. Then Necia had teased him as he came away, and begged him, as was always her custom, to take her with him, no matter whence or whither, so long as there was adventure afoot. Well, it would not be long now before he could say yes, and he would take her on a journey far longer than either of them had yet taken—a journey that would never end. Had not the gods looked with favor, at last, upon his long novitiate, and been pleased with the faith he had kept? Had not this discovery of "No Creek" Lee's been providentially arranged for his own especial benefit? A fool could see that this was a mark of celestial approbation, and none but a fool would question the wisdom of the gods. Had he not watched the girl grow from a slip of thirteen and spoken never a word of his love? Had he not served and guarded her with all the gentle chivalry of an olden knight? Of course! And here was his reward, a gift of wealth to crown his service, all for her. Now that she was a woman, and had seen him tried, and knew he was a man, he would bring his burden of prosperity and lay it at her feet, saying:
Here is another offering, my Necia, and with it go the laughter and the music and the heart of Poleon Doret.
Sacré! It would not take her long to wake up after that! The world was very bright indeed this afternoon, and he burst again into song in company with the voices of the forest people:
"
Chanté, rossignol, chanté! Toi qui à le coeur gai; Tu as le coeur à rire Mai j' l' ai-tà pleurer, Il y a longtemps que j' t'aime Jamais je ne t'oublierai.
"[Footnote:
"Sing, little bird, oh, sing away! You with the voice so light and gay! Yours is a heart that laughter cheers, Mine is a hearts that's full of tears. Long have I loved, I love her yet; Leave her I can, but not forget.]
"
Whew! said Gale, slipping out of his pack-straps, "the skeeters is bad."
You bet your gum boots, said Poleon. "Dey're mos' so t'ick as de summer dey kill Johnnie Platt on de Porcupine." Both men wore gauntleted gloves of caribou-skin and head harnesses of mosquito-netting stretched over globelike frames of thin steel bands, which they slipped on over their hats after the manner of divers' helmets, for without protection of some kind the insects would have made travel impossible once the Yukon breezes were left behind or once the trail dipped from the high divides where there was no moss.
Let's see. It was you that found him, wasn't it? said Gale.
Sure t'ing! I'm comin' down for grub in my canoe, w'en I see dis feller on de bank, walkin' lak' he's in beeg horry. 'Ba Gar!' I say, 'dere's man goin' so fast he'll meet hese'f comin' home!' Den he turn roun' an' go tearin' back, wavin' hees arms lak' he's callin' me, till he fall down. Wen I paddle close up, I don' know 'im no more dan stranger, an' me an' Johnnie Platt is trap togeder wan winter. Wat you t'ink of dat?
I saw a fellow killed that way at Holy Cross, interpolated the trader.
'Hello,' I say, 'w'at's de matter?' An' den I see somet'ing 'bout 'im dat look familiar. Hees face she's all swell' up an' bleedin' lak' raw meat. The Frenchman curled his upper lip back from his teeth and shook his head at the remembrance.
Jesu, dat's 'orrible sight! Dem fly is drive 'im crazee. Hees nose an' ears is look lak' holes in beeg red sponge, an' hees eye are close up tight.
He died before you got him in, didn't he?
Yes. He was good man, too. Some tam' if I ever have bad enemy w'at I like to see catch hell I'm goin' turn 'im loose 'mong dose skeeter-bug.
Holy Mackinaw! ejaculated Gale. "Who'd ever think of that? Why, that's worse than dropping water on his skull till he goes crazy, like them Chinamen do."
The Frenchman nodded. "It's de wors' t'ing I know. Dat's w'y I lak' to geeve it to my enemy."
Imagine fightin' the little devils till they stung you crazy and pizened your eyes shut!
Gale fell to considering this, while Poleon filled his pipe, and, raising his veil, undertook to smoke. The pests proved too numerous, however, and forced him to give it up.
Bagosh! Dey're hongry!
It will be all right when we get out of the woods, said the elder man.
I guess you been purty glad for havin' Necia home again, eh? ventured the other after a while, unable to avoid any longer the subject uppermost in his mind.
Yes, I'm glad she's through with her schooling.
She's gettin' purty beeg gal now.
That's right.
By-an'-by she's goin' marry on some feller—w'at?
I suppose so. She ain't the kind to stay single.
Ha! Dat's right, too. Mebbe you don' care if she does get marry, eh?
Not if she gets a man that will treat her right.
Wal! Wal! Dere's no trouble 'bout dat, exclaimed Doret, fervently. "No man w'at's livin' could treat her bad. She's too good an' too purty for have bad husban'."
She is, is she? Gale turned on him with a strange glare in his eyes. "Them's the kind that get the he-devils. There's something about a good girl that attracts a bad man, particularly if she's pretty; and it goes double, too—the good men get the hellions. A fellow can't get so tough but what he can catch a good woman, and a decent man usually draws a critter that looks like a sled and acts like a timber wolf."
Necia wouldn't marry on no bad man, said Doret, positively.
No? said Gale. "Let me tell you what I saw with my own eyes. I knew a girl once that was just as good and pure as Necia, and just as pretty, too—yes, and a thousand times prettier."
Ho, ho! laughed Doret, sceptically.
She was an Eastern girl, and she come West where men were different to what she'd been used to. Those were early days, and it was a new country, where a person didn't know much about his neighbor's past and cared less; and, although there were a heap of girls thereabouts, they were the kind you'll always find in such communities, while this one was plumb different. Man! Man! But she was different. She was a WOMAN! Two fellows fell in love with her. One of them lived in the same camp as her, and he was a good man, leastways everybody said he was, but he wasn't wise to all the fancy tricks that pretty women hanker after; and, it being his first affair, he was right down buffaloed at the very thought of her, so he just hung around and slept late so that he might dream about her and feel like he was her equal or that she loved back at him. You know! The other fellow came from a neighboring town, and he wasn't the same kind, for he'd knocked around more, and was a better liar, but he wasn't right. No, sir! He was sure a wrong guy, as it came out, but he was handsomer and younger, and the very purity and innocence of the girl drew him, I reckon, being a change from what he had ever mixed up with.
W'y don' dis good man tak' a shot at him? asked Poleon, hotly.
First, he didn't realize what was going on, being too tied up with dreaming, I reckon; and, second, neither man didn't know the other by sight, living as they did in different parts; third, he was an ordinary sort of fellow, and hadn't ever had any trouble, man to man, at that time. Anyhow, the girl up and took the bad one.
Wat does de good man do, eh?
Well, he was all tore up about it, but he went away like a sick quail hides out.
Dat's too bad.
He heard about them now and then, and what he heard tore him up worse than the other had, for the girl's husband couldn't wear the harness long, and, having taken away what good there was in her, he made up in deviltry for the time he had lost. She stood it pretty well, and never whimpered, even when her eyes were open and she saw what a prize-package she had drawn. The fact that she was game enough to stand for him and yet keep herself clean without complaint made the man worse. He tried to break her spirit in a thousand ways, tried to make her the same as he was, tried to make her a bad woman, like the others he had known. It appeared like the one pleasure he got was to torture her.
W'y don' she quit 'im? said Doret. "Dat ain' wrong for quit a man lak' him."
She couldn't quit on account of the kid. They had a youngster. Then, too, she had ideas of her own; so she stood it for three years, living worse than a dog, till she saw it wasn't any use—till she saw that he would make a bad woman of her as sure as he would make one of the kid—till he got rough—
No! No! You don' mean dat? No man don' hurt no woman, interjected Doret.
By God! That's just what I mean, the trader answered, while his face had grown so gray as to match his brows. "He beat her."
Poleon broke into French words that accorded well with the trader's harsh voice.
The woman sent for the other man after that, for he had been living lonely, loving her all the time, and you'd better believe he went.
Ha! Dat's fine! Dat's dam' fine! said the other. "I'll bet dere's hell to pay den—w'at?"
Yes, there was a kind of reckoning. The old man lapsed into moody silence, the younger one waiting eagerly for him to continue, but there came the sound of voices down the trail, and they looked up.
Here comes Lee, said Gale.
Wat happen' den? I'm got great interes' 'bout dis woman, insisted Poleon.
It's a long story, and I just told you this much to show what I said was true about a good girl and a bad man, and to show why I want Necia to get a good one. The sooner it happens the better it will suit me.
Neither man had ever spoken thus openly to the other about Necia before, and although their language was indirect, each knew the other's thought. But there was no time for further talk now, for the others were close upon them. As they came into view, Gale exclaimed:
Well, if he hasn't brought Runnion along!
Humph! grunted Doret. "I don' t'ink much of dat feller. Wat's de matter wit' 'No Creek,' anyhow?"
The three new arrivals dropped down upon the moss to rest, for the up-trail was heavy and the air sultry inside the forest. Lee was the first to speak.
Did you get away without bein' seen? he asked.
Sure, answered Gale. "Poleon has been here two hours."
That's good; I don't want nobody taggin' along.
We came right through the town boldly, announced Stark; "but if they had seen you two they would have suspected something, sure."
Runnion volunteered nothing except oaths at the mosquitoes and at his pack-straps, which were new and cut him already. As no explanation of his presence was offered, neither the trader nor Doret made any comment then, but it came out later, when the old miner dropped far enough behind the others to render conversation possible.
You decided to take in another one, eh? Gale asked Lee.
It wasn't exactly my doin's, replied the miner. "Stark asked me to let Runnion come 'long, bein' as he had grub-staked him, and he seemed so set on it that I ackeressed. You see, it's the first chance I ever had to pay him back for a favor he done me in the Cassiar country. There's plenty of land to go around."
It was Lee's affair, thought the trader, and he might tell whom he liked, so he said no more, but fell to studying the back of the man next in front, who happened to be Stark, observing every move and trick of him, and, during the frequent pauses, making a point of listening and watching him guardedly.
All through the afternoon the five men wound up the valley, following one another's footsteps, emerging from sombre thickets of fir to flounder across wide pastures of "nigger-heads," that wobbled and wriggled and bowed beneath their feet, until at cost of much effort and profanity they gained the firmer footing of the forest. Occasionally they came upon the stream, and found easier going along its gravel bars, till a bend threw them again into the meadows and mesas on either hand. Their course led them far up the big valley to another stream that entered from the right, bearing backward in a great bow towards the Yukon, and always there were dense clouds of mosquitoes above their heads. At one point Stark, hot and irritable, remarked:
There must be a shorter cut than this, Lee?
I reckon there is, the miner replied, "but I've always had a pack to carry, so I chose the level ground ruther than climb the divides."
S'pose dose people at camp hear 'bout dis strike an' beat us in? suggested Poleon.
It wouldn't be easy going for them after they got there, Stark said, sourly. "I, for one, wouldn't stand for it."
Nor I, agreed Runnion.
I don't see how you'd help yourself, the trader remarked. "One man's got as good a right as another."
I guess I'd help myself, all right, Stark laughed, significantly, as did Runnion, who added:
Lee is entitled to put in anybody he wants on his own discovery, and if anybody tries to get ahead of us there's liable to be trouble.
I reckon if I don't know no short-cut, nobody else does, Lee remarked, whereupon Doret spoke up reassuringly:
Dere's no use gettin' scare' lak' dat, biccause nobody knows w'ere Lee's creek she's locate' but John an' me, an' dere's nobody w'at knows he mak' de strike but us four.
That's right, said Gale; "the only other way across is by Black Bear Creek, and there ain't a half-dozen men ever been up to the head of that stream, much less over the divide, so I don't allow there's any use to fret ourselves."
They went on their way, travelling leisurely until late evening, when they camped at the mouth of the valley up which the miner's cabin lay. They chose a long gravel bar, that curved like a scimitar, and made down upon its outer tip where the breeze tended to thin the plague of insects. They were all old-stagers in the ways of camplife, so there was no lost motion or bickering as to their respective duties. Their preparations were simple. First they built a circle of smudges out of wet driftwood, and inside this Lee kindled a camp-fire of dry sticks, upon which he cooked, protected by the smoke of the others, while Gale went back to the edge of the forest and felled a dozen small firs, the branches of which he clipped. These Poleon and Runnion bore down to the end of the spit for bedding, while Stark chopped a pile of dry wood for the night. Gale noted that the new man swung an axe with the free dexterity of one to whom its feel was familiar, also that he never made a slip nor dulled it on the gravel of the bar, displaying an all-round completeness and a knack of doing things efficiently that won reluctant approval from the trader despite the unreasoning dislike he had taken to him.
Lee was ready for them by the time they had finished their tasks, and, fanned by the breeze that sucked up the stream and lulled by the waters, they ate their scanty supper. Their one-eyed guide had lived so long among mosquitoes and had become so inoculated with their poison that he was in a measure impervious to their sting, hence the insects gathered on his wrinkled, hair-grown hide only to give up in melancholy disgust and fly to other and fuller-blooded feeding-grounds. Camp had been made early, at Gale's suggestion, instead of pushing on a few miles farther, as Lee had intended; and now, when the cool evening fell and the draught quickened, it became possible to lay off gloves and head-gear; so they sat about the fire, talking, smoking, and rubbing their tired feet.
It is at such hours and in the smoke of such fires that men hark backward and bring forth the sacred, time-worn memories they have treasured, to turn them over fondly by the glow of dying embers. It is at such times that men's garrulity asserts itself, for the barriers of caution are let down, as are the gates of remembrance, and it is then that friends and enemies are made, for there are those who cannot listen and others who cannot understand.
No Creek Lee, the one-eyed miner who had made this lucky strike, told in simple words of his long and solitary quest, when ill-luck had risen with him at the dawn and misfortune had stalked beside him as he drifted and drank from camp to camp, while the gloom of a settled pessimism soured him, and men began to shun him because of the evil that seemed to follow in his steps.
I've been rainbow-chasin' forty years, he said, "and never caught nothin' but cramps and epidemics and inflammations. I'm the only miner in Alaska that never made a discovery of gold and never had a creek named after him."
Is that how you got your name? asked Runnion.
It is. I never was no good to myself nor nobody else. I just occupied space. I've been the vermifuge appendix of the body politic; yes, worse'n that—I've been an appendix with a seed in it. I made myself sore, and everybody around me, but I'm at the bat now, and don't you never let that fact escape you.
How are you going to spend your money? inquired Stark.
I'm goin' to eat it up! I've fed on dried and desiccated and other disastrous and dissatisfactory diets till I'm all shrivelled up inside like a dead puff-ball; now it's me for the big feed and the long drink. I'm goin' to 'Frisco and get full of wasteful and exorbitant grub, of one kind and another, like tomatters and French vicious water.
Poleon Doret laughed with the others; he was bubbling with the spirits of a boy whose life is clean, for whom there are no eyes in the black dark that lies beyond a camp-fire, and for whom there are no unforgettable faces in its smoke. When Lee fell silent the trader and Stark resumed their talk, which was mainly of California, it seemed to the Frenchman, who also noted that it was his friend who subtly shaped the topics. In time their stories revived his memory of the conversation in the birch grove that morning, and when there occurred a lapse in the talk he said:
Say, John, w'at happen' to dat gal we was talkin' 'bout dis mornin'?
Gale shook his head and turned again to his companion, but the young man's mind was bent on its quest, and he continued:
Dat was strange tale, for sure.
What was it? questioned Runnion.
John was tell 'bout a feller he knowed w'at marry a good gal jus' to mak' her bad lak' hese'f.
How's that? inquired Stark, turning curiously upon the old man; but Gale knocked the ashes from his pipe and replied:
Oh, it's a long story—happened when I was in Washington State.
Poleon was about to correct him—it was California, he had said—when Gale arose, remarking sleepily that it was time to turn in if they wished to get any rest before the mosquitoes got bad again, then sauntered away from the fire and spread his blanket. The rest followed and made down their beds; then, drawing on gloves and hat-nets, and rolling themselves up in their coverings, fell to snoring. All except the trader, who lay for hours on his back staring up at the stars, as if trying to solve some riddle that baffled him.
They awoke early, and in half an hour had eaten, remade their packs, and were ready to resume their march. As they were about to start, Gale said:
I reckon we'd better settle right now who has the choice of locations when we get up yonder. I've been on stampedes where it saved a heap of hard feeling.
I'm agreeable, said Stark. "Then there won't be any misunderstanding."
The others, being likewise old at the game, acquiesced. They knew that in such cases grave trouble has often occurred when two men have cast eyes on the same claim, and have felt the miner's causeless "hunch" that gold lies here or there, or that the ground one of them covets is wanted by the other.
I'll hold the straws, said Lee, "and every feller will have an even break." Turning his back on the others, he cut four splinters of varying lengths, and, arranging them so that the ends peeped evenly from his big hand, he held them out.
The longest one has the first choice, and so on, he said, presenting them to Gale, who promptly drew the longest of the four. He turned to Doret, but the Frenchman waved him courteously to Stark, and, when both he and Runnion had made their choice, Lee handed him the remaining one, which was next in length to that of the trader. Stark and Runnion qualified in the order they drew, the latter cursing his evil luck.
Never min', ole man, laughed Poleon, "de las' shot she's de sure wan."
They took up their burdens again, and filed towards the narrow valley that stretched away into the hazy distances.
Not until his dying day will Burrell lose the memory of that march with Necia through the untrodden valley, and yet its incidents were never clear-cut nor distinct when he looked back upon them, but blended into one dreamlike procession, as if he wandered through some calenture where every image was delightfully distorted and each act deliriously unreal, yet all the sweeter from its fleeting unreality. They talked and laughed and sang with a rush of spirits as untamed as the waters in the course they followed. They wandered, hand-in-hand, into a land of illusions, where there was nothing real but love and nothing tangible but joy. The touch of their lips had waked that delight which comes but once in a lifetime and then to but few; it was like the moon-madness of the tropics or the dementia of the forest folk in spring. A gentle frenzy possessed them, rendering them insensible to fatigue and causing them to hurry the more breathlessly that they might sooner rest and sit beside each other. At times they fell into sweet silences where the waters laughed with them and the trees whispered their secret, bowing and nodding in joyous surprise at this invasion; or, again, the breezes romped with them, withdrawing now and then to rush out and greet them at the bends in boisterous pleasure.
They held to the bed of the stream, for its volume was low and enabled them to ford it from bar to bar. Necia had been raised in the open, with the wild places for her playground, and her muscles were like those of a boy, hence the two swung merrily onward, as if in playful contest, while the youth had never occasion to wait for her or to moderate his gait. Indeed, her footing was more sure than his, as he found when she ventured out unhesitatingly upon felled logs that lay across swift, brawling depths. The wilderness had no mystery for her, and no terrors, so she was ever at his side, or in advance, while her eyes, schooled in the tints of the forest, and more active than those of a bird, saw every moving thing, from the flash of a camp-robber's wing through some hidden glade to the inquisitive nodding of a fool hen where it perched high up against the bole of a spruce. They surprised a marten fishing in a drift-wood dam, but she would not let the soldier shoot, and made him pass it by, where it sat amazed till it realized that these were lovers and resumed its fishing. Gradually the stream diminished, and its bowldered bed became more difficult to traverse, until, assuming the airs of a leader, the girl commanded him to lay off his pack, at which he pretended to obey mutinously, though thrilling with the keenest delight at his own submission.
What are you going to do? he inquired.
Mind your own business, sir, she commanded, sternly.
From her belt she drew a little hunting-knife, with which she cut and trimmed a slender birch the thickness of his thumb, whereupon he pretended great fright, and said:
Please! please! What have I done?
A great deal! You are a most bold and stubborn creature.
All pack animals are stubborn, he declared. "It's the only privilege they have."
You are much too presumptuous, also, as I discovered in your quarters.
My only presumption is in loving you.
That was not presumption, she smiled; "it was pre-emption. You must be punished."
I shall run away, he threatened. "I shall gallop right off through the woods and—begin to eat grass. I am very wild."
As she talked she drew from her pocket a spool of line, and took a fly-hook from her hat; then, in a trice, she had rigged a fishing-rod, and, creeping out upon a ledge, she whipped the pool below of a half-dozen rainbow trout, which she thrust into his coat while they were still wriggling. Then she as quickly put up her gear, and they resumed their journey, climbing more steeply now, until, when the sun was low, they quit the stream-bed and made through the forest towards the shoulder of an untimbered ridge that ran down into the valley. And there, high up on the edge of the spruce, they selected a mossy shelf and pitched their camp.
They had become so intimate by now as to fall into a whimsical mode of speech, and Necia reverted to a childish habit in her talk that brought many a smile to the youth's face. It had been her fancy as a little girl to speak in adjectives, ignoring many of her nouns, and its quaintness had so amused her father that on rare occasions, when the humor was on him, he also took it up. She now addressed herself to Burrell in the same manner.
I think we are very smarts to come so far, she said.
You travel like a deer, he declared, admiringly. "Why, you have tired me down." Removing his pack, he stretched his arms and shook out the ache in his shoulders.
Which way does our course lie now, Pathfinder?
Right up the side of this big, and then along the ridge. In two hours we come to a gully running so—she indicated an imaginary direction—"which we go down till it joins another stream so, and right there we'll find old 'No Creek's' cabin, so! Won't they be surprised to see us! I think we're very cunning to beat them in, don't you?" She laughed a glad little bubbling laugh, and he cried:
Oh, girl! How wonderful you are!
It's getting very dark and fierce, she chided, "and all the housework must be done."
So he built a fire, then fetched a bucket of water from a rill that trickled down among the rocks near by. He made as if to prepare their meal, but she would have none of it.
Bigs should never cook, she declared. "That work belongs to littles," then forced him to vacate her domain and turn himself to the manlier duties of chopping wood and boughs.
First, however, she showed him how to place two green foot-logs upon which the teapot and the frying-pan would sit without upsetting, and how long she wished the sticks of cooking-wood. Then she banished him, as it were, and he built a wickiup of spruce tops, under the shelter of which he piled thick, fragrant billows of "Yukon feathers."
Once while he was busy at his task he paused to revel in the colors that lay against hill and valley, and to drink in the splendid isolation of it all. Below lay the bed of Black Bear Creek, silent and sombre in the creeping twilight; beyond, away beyond, across the westward brim of the Yukon basin, the peaks were blue and ivory and gold in the last rays of the sun; while the open slopes behind and all about wore a carpet of fragrant short-lived flowers, nodding as if towards sleep, and over all was the hush of the lonely hills. A gust blew a whiff of the camp smoke towards him, and he turned back to watch Necia kneeling beside the fire like some graceful virgin at her altar rites, while the peculiar acrid out-door odor of burning spruce was like an incense in his nostrils.
He filled his chest deeply and leaned on his axe, for he found himself shaking as if under the spell of some great expectancy.
Your supper is getting cold, she called to him.
He took a seat beside her on a pile of boughs where the smoke was least troublesome; he had chosen a spot that was sheltered by a lichen-covered ledge, and this low wall behind, with the wickiup joining it, formed an enclosure that lent them a certain air of privacy. They ate ravenously, and drank deep cupfuls of the unflavored tea. By the time they were finished the night had fallen and the air was just cool enough to make the fire agreeable. Burrell heaped on more wood and stretched out beside her.
This day has been so wonderful, said the girl, "that I shall never go to sleep. I can't bear to end it."
But you must be weary, little maid, he said, gently; "I am."
Wait, let me see. She stretched her limbs and moved slightly to try her muscles. "Yes, I am a very tired, but not the kind of tired that makes you want to go to bed. I want to talk, talk, talk, and not about ourselves either, but about sensibles. Tell me about your people—your sister."
He had expected her to ask this, for the subject seemed to have an inexhaustible charm for her. She would sit rapt and motionless as long as he cared to talk of his sister, in her wide, meditative eyes the shadow of a great unvoiced longing. It always seemed to make her grave and thoughtful, he had noticed, so he had tried lately to avoid the topic, and to-night in particular he wanted to do so, for this was no time for melancholy. He had not even allowed himself to think, as yet, and there were reasons why he did not wish her to do so; thought and realization and a readjustment of their relations would come after to-night, but this was the hour of illusion, and it must not be broken; therefore he began to tell her of other people and of his youth, making his tales as fanciful as possible, choosing deliberately to foster the merry humor in which they had been all day. He told her of his father, the crotchety old soldier, whose absurd sense of duty and whose elaborate Southern courtesy had become a byword in the South. He told her household tales that were prized like pieces of the Burrell plate, beautiful heirlooms of sentiment that mark the honor of high-blooded houses; following which there was much to recount of the Meades, from the admiral who fought as a boy in the Bay of Tripoli down to the cousin who was at Annapolis; the while his listener hung upon his words hungrily, her mind so quick in pursuit of his that it spurred him unconsciously, her great, dark eyes half closed in silent laughter or wide with wonder, and in them always the warmth of the leaping firelight blended with the trust of a new-born virginal love.
Without realizing it, the young man drifted further than he had intended, and further than he had ever allowed himself to go before, for in him was a clean and honest pride of birth, like his mother's glory in her forebears, the expression of which he had learned to repress, inasmuch as it was a Dixie-land conceit and had been misunderstood when he went North to the Academy. In some this would have seemed bigoted and feminine, this immoderate admiration for his own blood, this exaggerated appreciation of his family honor, but in this Southern youth it was merely the unconscious commendation of an upright manliness for an upright code. When he had finished, the girl remarked, with honest approval:
What a fine you are. Those people of yours have all been good men and women, haven't they?
Most of them, he admitted, "and I think the reason is that we've been soldiers. The army discipline is good for a man. It narrows a fellow, I suppose, but it keeps him straight."
Then he began to laugh silently.
What is it? she said, curiously.
Oh, nothing! I was just wondering what my strait-laced ancestors would say if they could see me now.
What do you mean? the girl asked, in open-eyed wonderment.
I don't care, he went on, unheeding her question. "They did worse things in their time, from what I hear." He leaned forward to draw her to him.
Worse things? But we are doing nothing bad, said Necia, holding him off. "There's no wrong in loving."
Of course not, he assured her.
I am proud of it, she declared. "It is the finest thing, the greatest thing that has ever come into my life. Why, I simply can't hold it; I want to sing it to the stars and cry it out to the whole world. Don't you?"
I hardly think we'd better advertise, he said, dryly.
Why not?
Well, I shouldn't care to publish the tale of this excursion of ours, would you?
I don't see any reason against it. I have often taken trips with Poleon, and been gone with him for days and days at a time.
But you were not a woman then, he said, softly.
No, not until to-day, that's true. Dear, dear! How I did grow all of a sudden! And yet I'm just the same as I was yesterday, and I'll always be the same, just a wild little. Please don't ever let me be a big tame. I don't want to be commonplace and ordinary. I want to be natural—and good.
You couldn't be like other women, he declared, and there was more tenderness than hunger in his tone now, as she looked up at him trustingly from the shelter of his arms. "It would spoil you to grow up."
It is so good to be alive and to love you like this! she continued, dreamily, staring into the fire. "I seem to have come out of a gloomy house into the glory of a warm spring day, for my eyes are blinded and I can't see half the beautifuls I want to, there are so many about me."
Those are my arms, interjected the soldier, lightly, in an effort to ward off her growing seriousness.
I've never been afraid of anything, and yet I feel so safe inside them. Isn't it queer?
The young man became conscious of a vague discomfort, and realized dimly that for hours now he had been smothering with words and caresses a something that had striven with him to be heard, a something that instead of dying grew stronger the more utterly this innocent maid yielded to him. It was as if he had ridden impulse with rough spurs in a fierce desire to distance certain voices, and in the first mad gallop had lost them, but now far back heard them calling again more strongly every moment. A man's honor, if old, may travel feebly, but its pursuit is persistent. It was the talk about his people that had raised this damned uneasiness and indecision, he thought. Why had he ever started it?
The marvellous part of it all, continued the girl, "is that it will never end. I know I shall love you always. Do you suppose I am really different from other girls?"
Everything is different to-night—the whole world, he declared, impatiently. "I thought I knew myself, but suddenly I seem strange in my own eyes."
I've had a big handicap, she said, "but you must help me to overcome it. I want to be like your sister."
He rose and piled more wood upon the fire. What possessed the girl? It was as if she knew each cunning joint of his armor, as if she had realized her peril and had set about the awakening of his conscience, deliberately and with a cautious wisdom beyond her years. Well, she had done it—and he swore to himself. Then he melted at the sight of her, crouched there against the shadows, following his every movement with her soul in her eyes, the tenderest trace of a smile upon her lips. He vowed he was a reprobate to wrong her so; it was her white soul and her woman's love that spoke.
When she beheld him gazing at her, she tilted her head sidewise daintily, like a little bird.
Oh, my! What a fierce you are all at once!
Her smile flashed up as if illumined by the leaping blaze, and he crossed quickly, kneeling beside her.
Dear, wonderful girl, he said, "it is going to be my heart's work to see that you never change and that you remain just what you are. You can't understand what this means to me, for I, too, was blinded, but the darkness of the night has restored my vision. Now you must go to sleep; the hours are short and we must be going early."
He piled up a great, sweet-scented couch of springy boughs, and fashioned her a pillow out of a bundle of smaller ones, around which he wrapped his khaki coat; then he removed her high-laced boots, and, taking her tiny feet, one in the palm of either hand, bowed his head over them and kissed them with a sense of her gracious purity and his own unworthiness. He spread one of the big gray blankets over her, and tucked her in, while she sighed in delightful languor, looking up at him all the time.
I'll sit here beside you for a while, he said. "I want to smoke a bit."
She stole a slim, brown hand out from beneath the cover and snuggled it in his, and he leaned forward, closing her lids down with his lips. Her utter weariness was manifest, for she fell asleep almost instantly, her fingers twined about his in a childlike grip.
At times a great desire to feel her in his arms, to have her on his breast, surged over him, for he had lived long apart from women, and the solitude of the night seemed to mock him. He was a strong man, and in his veins ran the blood of wayward forebears ho were wont to possess that which they conquered in the lists of love, mingled with which was the blood of spirited Southern women who had on occasion loved not wisely, according to Kentucky rumor, but only too well. Nevertheless, they were honest men and women, if over-sentimental, and had transmitted to him a heritage of chivalry and a high sense of honor and courage. Strange to say, this little, simple half-breed girl had revived this honor and courage, even when he tried most stubbornly to smother it. If only her love was like her blood, he might have had no scruples; or if her blood were as pure as her love—even then it would be easier; but, as it was, he must give her up to-night, and for all time. Her love had placed a barrier between them greater and more insurmountable than her blood.
He sat for a long time with the dwindling firelight playing about him, his manhood and his desires locked in a grim struggle, wondering at the hold this forest elf had gained upon him, wondering how it was that she had stolen into his heart and head and taken such utter possession of him. It would be no easy task to shut her out of his mind and put her away from him. And she...?
He gently withdrew his fingers from her grasp, and, seeking the other side of the wickiup, covered himself over without disturbing her, and fell asleep.
It was early dawn when Necia crept to him.
I dreamed you had gone away, she said, shivering violently and drawing close. "Oh, it was a terrible awakening—"
I was too tired to dream, he said.
So I had to come and see if you were really here.
He quickly rekindled the fire, and they made a hasty breakfast. Before the warmth of the rising sun had penetrated the cold air they had climbed the ridge and obtained a wondrous view of broken country, the hills alight with the morning rays, the valleys misty and mystical. They made good progress on the summit, which was paved with barren rock and sparsely carpeted with short moss, while there was never a hint of insects to annoy them. Merrily they swung along, buoyed up by an unnatural exaltation; yet now and then, as they drew near their destination, the young man had a chilling premonition of evil to come, and wondered if he had not been foolhardy to undertake this rash enterprise.
I wish Stark was not one of Lee's party, he said once. "He may misunderstand our being together this way."
But when he learns that we love each other, that will explain everything.
I'm not so sure. He doesn't know you as Lee and Poleon and your father do. I think we had better say nothing at all about—you and me—to any one.
But why? questioned the girl, stopping abruptly. "They will know it, anyhow, when they see us. I can't conceal it."
I am wiser in this than you are, the soldier insisted, "and we mustn't act like lovers; trust this to me."
Oh, I won't play that! cried Necia, petulantly. "If all this is going to end when we get to Lee's cabin, we'll stay right here forever."
He was not sure of all the logic he advanced in convincing her, but she yielded finally, saying:
Well, I suppose you know best, and, anyhow, littles should always mind.
They clung to the divide for several hours, then descended into the bed of a stream, which they followed until it joined a larger one a couple of miles below, and there, sheltered in a grove of whispering firs, they found Lee's cabin nestling in a narrow, forked valley. Evidently the miner had selected a point on the main creek just below the confluence of the feeders as a place in which to prospect, and Burrell fell to wondering which one of these smaller streams supplied the run of gold.
There's no one here, said Necia, gleefully. "We've beat them in! We've beat them in!"
They had been walking rapidly since dawn, and, although Burrell's watch showed two o'clock, she refused to halt for lunch, declaring that the others might arrive at any moment; so down they went to the lower end of "No Creek" Lee's location, where Burrell blazed a smooth spot on the down-stream side of a tree and wrote thereon at Necia's dictation. When he had finished, she signed her name, and he witnessed it, then paced off four hundred and forty steps, where he squared a spruce-tree, which she marked: "Lower centre end stake of No. I below discovery. Necia Gale, locator." She was vastly excited and immensely elated at her good-fortune in acquiring the claim next to Lee's, and chattered like a magpie, filling the glades with resounding echoes and dancing about in the bright sunlight that filtered through the branches.
Now you stake the one below mine, she said. "It's just as good, and maybe better—nobody can tell." But he shook his head.
I'm not going to stake anything, said he.
You must! she cried, quickly, the sparkle dying from her eyes. "You said you would, or I never would have brought you."
I merely said I would come with you, he corrected. "I did not promise to take up a claim, for I don't think I ought to do so. If I were a civilian, it would be different, but this is government land, and I am a part of the government, as it were. Then, too, in addition to the question of my right to do it, there would be the certainty of making enemies of your people, old "No Creek" and the rest, and I can't afford that now. With you it is different, for you are entitled to this ground. After Lee's friends have shared in his discovery I may change my mind."
All arguments and pleading were in vain; he remained obdurate and insisted on her locating two other claims for herself, one on each of the smaller creeks where they came together above the house.
But nobody ever stakes more than one claim on a gulch, objected the girl. "It's a custom of the miners."
Then we'll call each one of these branches a different and separate creek, he said. "The gold was carried down one of those smaller streams, and we won't take any chances on which one it was. When a fellow plays a big game he should play to win, and, as this means such a great deal to you, we won't overlook any bets."
Necia consented, and when her three claims had been properly located the couple returned to the cabin to get lunch and to await with some foreboding the coming of the others and what of good or ill it might bring.
Before the party came in sight, the sound of their voices reached the cabin, and Burrell rose nervously and sauntered to the door. Uncertain how this affair might terminate, he chose to get first look at his enemies, if they should prove to be such, realizing the advantage that goes to a man who stands squarely on both feet.
The trail came through the brush at the rear, and he heard Lee say:
This here's the place, boys—the shack ain't fifty yards away.
Likely looking gulch, Gale was heard to reply, in his deep tones—there was a crackle of dead brush, a sound as of a man tripping and falling heavily, then oaths in a voice that made the Lieutenant start.
Ha, ha! laughed Doret. "You mus' be tired, Meestaire R-r-unnion. Better you pick up your feet. Dat's free tarn' you've-"
They emerged into the open behind the house to pause in line back of Lee, who was staring at the stove-pipe of his cabin, from which came a wisp of smoke. It seemed to Burrell that they held their position for a long time. Then he heard Lee say:
Well, I'll be damned! Somebody's here ahead of us.
We've been beaten, growled Stark, angrily, pushing past him and coming round the corner, an ugly look in his eyes.
Burrell was standing at ease in the door, smoking, one forearm resting on the jamb, his wide shoulders nearly filling the entrance.
Good-afternoon, he nodded, pleasantly.
Lee answered him unintelligibly; Stark said nothing, but Runnion's exclamation was plain.
It's that damned blue-belly!
When did YOU get here? said Stark, after a pause.
A few hours ago.
How did you come? asked Lee.
Black Bear Creek, said the soldier, curtly, at which Runnion broke into profanity.
Better hush, Burrell admonished him; "there's a lady inside," and at that instant Necia showed her laughing face under his arm, while the trader uttered her name in amazement.
Lunch is ready, she said. "We've been expecting you for quite a while."
Ba Gar! Dat's fonny t'ing for sure, said Poleon. "Who tol' you 'bout dis strike—eh?"
Mother; I made her, the girl answered.
Take off your packs and come in, Burrell invited, but Stark strode forward.
Hold on a minute. This don't look good to me. You say your mother told you. I suppose you're Old Man Gale's other daughter—eh?
Necia nodded.
What time of day was it when you learned about this?
Cut that out, roughly interjected Gale. "Do you think I double-crossed you?"
The other turned upon him.
It looks that way, and I intend to find out. You said yesterday you hadn't told anybody—
I didn't think about the woman, said the trader, a trifle disconcerted, whereupon Runnion gave vent to an ironical sneer.
But here's your girl and this man ahead of us. I suppose there's others on the way, too.
Nonsense! Burrell cut in. "Don't quarrel about this. Miss Gale got wind of your secret, and beat you at your own game, so that ends it; but there's plenty of ground left for all of you, and no harm done. Nobody knows of this strike from us, I can assure you."
I call it dam' sleeck work, chuckled the Canadian, slipping out of his straps. "De nex' tam' I go stampedin' I tak' you 'long, Necia."
Me, too, said Lee. "An' now I'm goin' to tear into some of them beans I smell a bilin' in yonder."
The others followed, although Stark and Runnion looked black and had little to say. It was an uncomfortable meal—every one was ill at ease; Gale, in particular, was quiet, and ate less than any of them. His eyes sought Stark's face frequently, and once the blood left his cheeks and his eyes blazed as he observed the gambler eying Necia, gazing at her with the same boldness he would have used in scanning a horse.
You are a mighty good-looking girl for a 'blood,' remarked Stark, at last.
Thank you, she replied, simply, and the soldier's vague dislike of the man crystallized into hate on the instant. There was a tone back of his words that seemed aimed at the trader, Meade thought, but Gale showed no sign of it, so the meal was finished in silence, after which the five belated prospectors went out to make their locations, for the fear of interruption was upon them now.
First they went down-stream, and, according to their agreement, the trader staked first, followed by Poleon and Stark, thus throwing Runnion's claim more than a mile distant from Lee's discovery. From here they went up the creek to find the girl's other locations, one on each branch, at which Stark sneeringly remarked that she had pre-empted enough ground for a full-grown white woman.
Runnion's displeasure was even more open, and he fell into foul-mouthed mutterings, addressing himself to Poleon and Stark while the trader was out of earshot.
This affair don't smell right, and I still think it's a frame-up.
Bah! exclaimed Doret.
The old man sent the girl on ahead of us to blanket all the good ground. That's what he did!
Dat's fool talk, declared the Frenchman.
I'm not so sure, Stark broke in. "You remember he hung back and wanted to go slow from the start; and didn't he ask us to camp early last night? Looks now as if he did it just to give her time to get in first. He admitted that he knew the Black Bear trail, and if he lied about keeping his mouth shut to the squaw, he'd lie about other—"
Wait wan minnit, interrupted Poleon, his voice as soft as a woman's. "I tol' you dat I know all 'bout dis Black Bear Creek, too—you 'member, eh? Wal, mebbe you t'ink I'm traitor, too. Wat? W'y don' you spik out?"
The three of them were alone, and only the sound of Gale's axe came to them; but at the light in the Canadian's face Runnion hastily disclaimed any such thought on his part, and Stark shrugged his denial.
I don' know you feller' at all, continued Poleon, "but Ole Man Gale, he's my frien', so I guess you don' better talk no more lak' dat."
Don't get sore, said Stark. "I simply say it looks bad." But the other had turned his back and was walking on.
There are men quite devoid of the ability to read the human face, and Runnion was of this species. Moreover, malice was so bitter in his mouth that he must have it out, so when they paused to blaze the next stake he addressed himself to Stark loud enough for Poleon to hear.
That Lieutenant is more of a man than I thought he was.
How so? inquired the older man.
Well, it takes nerve to steal a girl for one night and then face the father; but the old man don't seem to mind it any more than she does. I guess he knows what it means, all right.
Stark laughed raucously. "I thought of that myself," he said.
That's probably how Gale got his squaw, concluded Runnion, with a sneer.
It seemed a full minute before the Frenchman gave sign that he had heard, then a strange cry broke from his throat and he began to tremble as if with cold. He was no longer the singer of songs or the man who was forever a boy; the mocking anger of a moment ago was gone; in its place was a consuming fury that sucked the blood from beneath his tan, leaving him the pallor of ashes, while his mouth twitched and his head rolled slightly from side to side like a palsied old man's. The red of his lips was blanched, leaving two white streaks against a faded, muddy background, through which came strange and frightful oaths in a bastard tongue. Runnion drew back, fearful, and the older man ceased chopping and let his axe hang loosely in his hand. But evidently Poleon meant no violence, for he allowed the passion to run from him freely until it had spent its vigor, then said to Runnion:
M'sieu, eider you are brave man or dam' fool.
What do you mean, Frenchy? said the man addressed, uneasily.
Somebody goin' die for w'at you say jus' now. Mebbe it's goin' be you, m'sieu; mebbe it's goin' be him; I can't tell yet, but I'm hope an' pray it's goin' be you, biccause I t'ink w'at you say is a lie, an' nobody can spik dose kin' of lie 'bout Necia Gale.
He went crashing blindly through the underbrush, his head wagging, his shoulders slumped loosely forward like those of a drunken man, his lips framing words they could not understand.
When he had disappeared Runnion drew a deep breath.
I guess I've framed something for Mister Burrell this time.
You go about it queer, said Stark. "I'd rather tackle a gang-saw than a man like Poleon Doret. Your frame-up may work double."
Huh! No chance. The soldier was out all night alone with that half-breed girl, and anybody can see she's crazy about him. What's the answer?
Well, she's mighty pretty, agreed the other, "most too pretty for a mixed blood, but you can't make that Frenchman believe she's wrong."
Why, he believes it now, chuckled Runnion, "or at least he's jealous, and that's just as good. Those two will have trouble before dark. I wish they would—then I'd have a chance."
Have you got your eye on her, too?
Sure! Do you blame me?
No, but she's too good for you.
Then she's too good for them. I think I'll enter the running.
Better stay out, the gambler advised; "you'll have sore feet before you finish. As a matter of fact, I don't like her father any better than you like her lovers—"
Well, it's mutual. I can see Gale hates you like poison.
—and I don't intend to see him and his tribe hog all the best ground hereabouts.
They've already done it. You can't stop them.
Before answering, Stark listened for the trader, but evidently Gale had finished his task and returned to the shack, for there was neither sign nor sound of him.
Yes, I can stop them, said Stark. "I want the ground that girl has staked, and I'm going to get it. It lies next to Lee's, and it's sure to be rich; ours is so far away it may not be worth the recorder's fees. This creek may be as spotted as a coach-dog, so I don't intend to take any chances."
She made her locations legally, said Runnion.
You leave that to me. When will the other boys he here?
To-morrow morning. I told them to follow about four hours behind, and not to run in on us till we had finished. They'll camp a few miles down the creek, and be in early.
You couldn't get but three, eh?
That's all I could find who would agree to give up half.
Can we count on them?
Huh! the other grunted. "They worked with me and Soapy on the Skagway trail."
Good. Five against three, not counting the girl and the Lieutenant, Stark mused. "Well, that will do it." He outlined his plan, then the two returned to the cabin to find Lee cooking supper. Poleon was there with the others, but, except for his silence, he showed no sign of what had taken place that afternoon.
Stark developed a loquacious mood after supper, devoting himself entirely to Necia, in whom he seemed to take great interest. He was an engaging talker, with a peculiar knack of suggestion in story-telling—an unconscious halting and elusiveness that told more than words could express—and, knowing his West so well, he fascinated the girl, who hung upon his tales with flattering eagerness.
Poleon had finished several pipes, and now sat in the shadows in the open doorway, apparently tired and dejected, though his eyes shone like diamonds and roved from one to the other. Half unconsciously he heard Stark saying:
This girl was about your size, but not so dark. However, you remind me of her in some ways—that's why it puts her in my mind, I suppose. She was about your age at the time—nineteen.
Oh, I'm not eighteen yet, said Necia.
Well, she was a fine woman, anyhow, the best that ever set foot in Chandon, and there was a great deal of talk when she chose young Bennett over the Gaylord man, for Bennett had been running second best from the start, and everybody thought it was settled between her and the other one. However, they were married quietly.
The story did not interest the Canadian; his mind was in too great agitation to care for dead tales; his heart burned within him too fiercely, and he felt too great a desire to put his hands to work. As he watched Burrell and Runnion bend over the table looking at a little can of gold-dust that Lee had taken from under his bunk, his eyes grew red and bloodshot beneath his hat-brim. Which one of the two would it be, he wondered. From the corner of his eye he saw Gale rise from Lee's bed, where he had stretched himself to smoke, and take his six-shooter from his belt, then remove the knotted bandanna from his neck, and begin to clean the gun, his head bowed over it earnestly, his face in the shadow. He had ever been a careful and methodical man, reflected Poleon, and evidently would not go to sleep with his fire-arm in bad condition.
Nobody imagined that Gaylord would cause trouble, Stark was saying, "for he didn't seem to be a jealous sort, just stupid and kind of heavy-witted; but one night he took advantage of Bennett's absence and sneaked up to the house." The story-teller paused, and Necia, who was under the spell of his recital, urged him on:
Yes, yes. What happened then? Go on. But Stark stared gloomily at his hands, and held his silence for a full minute, the tale appearing to have awakened more than a fleeting interest in him.
It was one of the worst killings that ever happened in those parts, he continued. "Bennett came back to find his wife murdered and the kid gone."
Oh! said the girl, in a shocked voice.
Yes, there was the deuce of a time. The town rose up in a body, and we—you see, I happened to be there—we followed the man for weeks. We trailed him and the kid clear over into the Nevada desert where we lost them.
Poor man!
Poor man? The story-teller raised his eyes and laughed sinisterly. "I don't see where that comes in."
And you never caught him?
No. Not yet.
He died of thirst in the desert, maybe, he and the little one.
That's what we thought at the time, but I don't believe it now.
How so?
Well, I've crossed his trail since then. No. Gaylord is alive to-day, and so is the girl. Some time we'll meet— His voice gave out, and he stared again at the floor.
Couldn't the little girl be traced? said Necia. "What was her name?"
Stark made to speak, but the word was never uttered, for there came a deafening roar that caused Lee's candle to leap and flicker and the air inside the cabin to strike the occupants like a blow. Instantly there was confusion, and each man sprang to his feet crying out affrightedly, for the noise had come with utter unexpectedness.
My God, I've killed him! cried Gale, and with one jump he cleared half the room and was beside Stark, while his revolver lay on the floor where he had been sitting.
What is it? exclaimed Burrell; but there was no need to ask, for powder-smoke was beginning to fill the room and the trader's face gave answer. It was whiter than that of his daughter, who had crouched fearfully against the wall, and he shook like a man with ague. But Stark stood unhurt, and more composed than any of them; following the first bound from his chair, he had relapsed into his customary quiet. There had blazed up one momentary flash of suspicion and anger, but it died straightway, for no man could have beheld the trader and not felt contrition. His condition was pitiable, and the sight of a strong man overcome is not pleasant; when it was seen that no harm had been done the others strove to make light of the accident.
Get together, all of you! It's nothing to be excited over, said Stark.
How did it happen? Runnion finally asked Gale, who had sunk limply upon the edge of the bunk; but when the old man undertook to answer his words were unintelligible, and he shook his head helplessly.
Stark laid his finger on the hole that the bullet had bored in the log close to where he was sitting, and laughed.
Never mind, old man, it missed me by six inches. You know there never was a bullet that could kill me. I'm six-shooter proof.
Wha'd I tell you? triumphantly ejaculated Lee, turning his one eye upon the Lieutenant. "You laughed at me, didn't you?"
I'm beginning to believe it myself, declared the soldier.
It's a cinch, said Stark, positively,
Doret, of all in the cabin, had said nothing. Seated apart from the others, he had seen the affair from a distance, as it were, and now stepped to the bed to lay his hand on Gale's shoulder.
Brace up, John! Sacré bleu! Your face look lak' flour. Come outside an' get li'l' air.
It will do you good, father, urged Necia.
The trader silently rose, picked up his hat, and shambled out into the night behind the Frenchman.
The old man takes it hard, said Lee, shaking his head, and Burrell remarked:
I've seen things like that in army quarters, and the fellow who accidentally discharges his gun invariably gets a greater shock than his companion.
I call it damned careless, begging your pardon, Miss Necia, said Runnion.
Poleon led his friend down the trail for half a mile without speaking, till Gale had regained a grip of himself and muttered, finally:
I never did such a thing before, Poleon, never in all my life.
The young man turned squarely and faced him, the starlight illumining their faces dimly.
Why? said Doret.
Why? echoed Gale, with a start. "Well, because I'm careful, I suppose."
Why? insisted the Frenchman.
I—I—I—What do you mean?
Don' lie wit' me, John. I'm happen to be watch you underneat' my hat w'en you turn roun' for see if anybody lookin'.
You saw?
Yes.
I thought you were asleep, said Gale.
In every community, be it never so small, there are undesirable citizens; and, while the little party was still at breakfast on the following morning, three such members of society came around the cabin and let fall their packs, greeting the occupants boisterously.
Well, well! said Lee, coming to the door. "You're travellin' kind of early, ain't you?"
Yes—early and late, one of them laughed, while the other two sprawled about as if to rest.
How far are you goin'?
Not far, the spokesman answered.
Now in the North there is one formality that must be observed with friend or enemy, and, though Lee knew these men for what they were, he said:
Better have some breakfast, anyhow.
We just ate. There was an uncomfortable pause, then the speaker continued: "Look here. It's no use to flush around. We want a piece of this creek."
What are you goin' to do with it?
Cut that out, Lee. We're on.
Who wised you up to this? inquired the miner, angrily, for he had other friends besides those present whom he wished to profit by this strike, and he had hoped to keep out this scum.
Never mind who put us Jerry. We're here, ain't we?
Stark spoke up. "You can't keep news of a gold strike when the wind blows, Lee. It travels on the breeze."
The harm was done, and there was no use in concealment, so Lee reluctantly told them of his discovery and warned them of the stakes already placed.
And see here, you fellers, he concluded, "I've been forty years at this game and never had a creek named after me, but this one is goin' to be called '"No Creek" Lee Creek' or I fight. Does it go?"
Sure, that's a good name, and we'll vote for it.
Then go as far as you like, said the miner, dismissing them curtly.
I'll step along with the boys and show them where our upper stakes are, volunteered Stark, and Runnion offered to do the same, adding that it were best to make sure of no conflict so early in the game. The five disappeared into the woods, leaving the others at the cabin to make preparations for the homeward trip.
That man who did the talking is a tin-horn gambler who drifted in a month ago, the same as Runnion, and the others ain't much better, said Gale, when they had gone. "Seems like the crooks always beat the straight men in."
Never knowed it to fail, Lee agreed. "There's a dozen good men in camp I'd like to see in on this find, but it'll be too late 'gin we get back."
Dose bum an' saloon feller got all de bes' claims at Klondike, said Poleon. "I guess it's goin' be de same here."
I don't like the look of this, observed the Lieutenant, thoughtfully. "I'm afraid there's some kind of a job on foot."
There's nothing they can do, Gale answered. "We've got our ground staked out, and it's up to them to choose what's left."
They were nearly ready to set out for Flambeau when the five men returned.
Before you go, said Stark, "I think we'd better organize our mining district. There are enough present to do it."
We can make the kind of laws we want before the gang comes along, Runnion chimed in, "and elect a recorder who will give us a square deal."
I'll agree if we give Lee the job, said Gale. "It's coming to him as the discoverer, and I reckon the money will be handy, seeing the hard luck he's played in."
That's agreeable to me, Stark replied, and proceeded forthwith to call a miners' meeting, being himself straightway nominated as chairman by one of the strangers. There was no objection, so he went in, as did Lee, who was made secretary, with instructions to write out the business of the meeting, together with the by-laws as they were passed.
The group assembled in the cleared space before the cabin to make rules and regulations governing the district, for it is a custom in all mining sections removed from authority for the property holders thus to make local laws governing the size of claims, the amount of assessment work, the size of the recorder's fees, the character of those who may hold mines, and such other questions as arise to affect their personal or property interests. In the days prior to the establishment of courts and the adoption of a code of laws for Alaska, the entire country was governed in this way, even to the adjudication of criminal actions. It was the primitive majority rule that prevails in every new land, and the courts later recognized and approved the laws so made and administered, even when they differed in every district, and even when these statutes were often grotesque and ridiculous. As a whole, however, they were direct in their effect and worked no hardship; in fact, government by miners' meeting is looked upon to this day, by those who lived under it, as vastly superior to the complicated machinery which later took its place.
The law permits six or more people to organize a mining district and adopt articles of government, so this instance was quite ordinary and proper.
Lee had come by his learning slowly, and he wrote after the fashion of a school-boy, who views his characters from every angle and follows their intricacies with corresponding movements of the tongue, hence the business of the meeting progressed slowly.
It was of wondrous interest to Necia to be an integral part of such important matters, and she took pride in voting on every question; but Burrell, who observed the proceedings from neutral ground, could not shake off the notion that all was not right. Things moved too smoothly. It looked as if there had been a rehearsal. Poleon and the trader, however, seemed not to notice it, and Lee was wallowing to the waist in his own troubles, so the young man kept his eyes open and waited.
The surprise came when they had completed the organization of the district and had nearly finished adopting by-laws. It was so boldly attempted and so crude in its working-out that it seemed almost laughable to the soldier, until he saw these men were in deadly earnest and animated by the cruelest of motives. Moreover, it showed the first glimpse of Stark's spite against the trader, which the Lieutenant had divined.
Runnion moved the adoption of a rule that no women be allowed to locate mining claims, and one of the strangers seconded it.
What's that? said Lee, raising his one eye from the note-book in which he was transcribing.
It isn't right to let women in on a man's game, said Runnion.
That's my idea, echoed the seconder.
I s'pose this is aimed at my girl, said Gale, springing to his feet. "I might have known you bums were up to some crooked work."
Poleon likewise rose and ranged himself with the trader.
Ba Gar! I don' stan' for dat, said he, excitedly. "You want for jump Necia's claims, eh?"
As long as I'm chairman we'll have no rough work, declared Stark, glaring at them. "If you want trouble, you two, I reckon you can have it, but, whether you do or not, the majority is going to rule, and we'll make what laws we want to."
He took no pains now to mask his dislike of Gale, who began to move towards him in his dogged, resolute way. Necia, observing them, hastened to her father's side, for that which she sensed in the bearing of both men quite overcame her indignation at this blow against herself.
No, no, don't have any trouble, she pleaded, as she clung to the trader. "For my sake, daddy, sit down." Then she whispered fiercely into his ear: "Can't you see he's trying to make you fight? There's too many of them. Wait! Wait!"
Burrell attempted to speak, but Stark, who was presiding, turned upon him fiercely:
Now this is one time when you can't butt in, Mr. Soldier Man. This is our business. Is that plain?
The Lieutenant realized that he had no place in this discussion, and yet their move was so openly brazen that he could restrain himself with difficulty. A moment later he saw the futility of interference, when Stark continued, addressing the trader:
This isn't aimed at you in particular, Gale, nor at your girl, for a motion to disqualify her isn't necessary. She isn't old enough to hold mining property.
She's eighteen, declared the trader.
Not according to her story.
Well, I can keep her claims for her till she gets of age.
We've just fixed it so you can't, grinned Runnion, cunningly. "No man can hold more than one claim on a creek. You voted for that yourself."
Too late, Gale saw the trick by which Stark had used him to rob his own daughter. If he and his two friends had declined to be a part of this meeting, the others could not have held it, and before another assembly could have been called the creek would have been staked from end to end, from rim to rim, by honest men, over whom no such action could pass; but, as it was, his own votes had been used to sew him up in a mesh of motions and resolutions.
No Creek Lee had the name of a man slow in speech and action, and one who roused himself to anger deliberately, much as a serpent stings itself into a painful fury; but now it was apparent that he was boiling over, for he stammered and halted and blurted explosively.
You're a bunch of rascals, all of you, tryin' to down a pore girl and get her ground; but who put ye wise to this thing, in the first place? Who found this gold? Just because there's enough of you to vote that motion through, that don't make it legal, not by a damned sight, and it won't hold, because I won't write it in the book. You—you— He glared at them malevolently, searching his mind for an epithet sufficiently vile, and, finding it, spat it out—"dressmakers!"
So this was why both Stark and Runnion had gone up the creek with the three new men, thought Burrell. No doubt they had deliberately arranged the whole thing so that the new arrivals could immediately relocate each of Necia's claims—the pick of all the ground outside Lee's discovery, and the surest to be valuable—and that Stark would share in the robbery. He or Runnion, or both of them, had broken Lee's oath of secrecy even before leaving camp, which accounted for the presence of these thugs; and now, as he revolved the situation rapidly in his mind, the soldier looked up at a sudden thought. Poleon had begun to speak, and from his appearance it seemed possible that he might not cease with words; moreover, it was further evident that they were all intent on the excited Frenchman and had no eyes for the Lieutenant. Carefully slipping around the corner of the cabin, and keeping the house between him and the others, Burrell broke into a swift run, making the utmost possible speed for fear they should miss him and guess his purpose, or, worse yet, finish their discussion and adjourn before he could complete his task. He was a light man on his feet, and he dodged through the forest, running more carelessly the farther he went, visiting first the upper claims, then, making a wide detour of the cabin, he came back to the initial stake of Necia's lower claim, staggering from his exertions, his lungs bursting from the strain. He had covered nearly a mile, but, even so, he laughed grimly as he walked back towards the cabin, for it was a game worth playing, and he was glad to take a hand on the side of the trader and the girl. Coming within earshot, he heard the meeting vote to adjourn. It could not have terminated more opportunely had he held a stopwatch on it.
From the look of triumph on Runnion's face, the Lieutenant needed no glance at Gale or Poleon or Necia to know that the will of the majority had prevailed, and that the girl's importunities had restrained her advocates from a resort to violence. She looked very forlorn, like a little child just robbed and deceived, with the shock of its first great disillusionment still fresh in its eyes.
Runnion addressed the other conspirators loudly.
Well, boys, there are three good claims open for relocation. I'm sorry I can't stake one of them.
They won't lie open long, said one of the undesirable citizens, starting to turn down-stream while his two companions made for the opposite direction. But Burrell stopped them.
Too late, boys. Your little game went wrong. Now! Now! Don't get excited. Whew! I had quite a run.
Gale paused in his tracks and looked at the young man queerly.
What do you mean?
I've jumped those claims myself.
YOU jumped them! cried Necia.
Sure! I changed my mind about staking.
It's a lie! cried Runnion, at which Burrell whirled on him.
I've been waiting for this, Runnion—ever since you came back. Now—
I mean you haven't had time, the other temporized, hurriedly.
Oh, that sounds better! If you don't believe me take a look for yourself; you'll find my notice just beneath Miss Gale's. Then to "No Creek" Lee he continued, "Kindly record them for me so there will be no question of priority."
I'll be damned if I do! said the belligerent recorder. "You're worse'n these crooks. That ground belongs to Necia Gale."
Up to this time Stark had remained silent, his impassive face betraying not a shadow of chagrin, for he was a good loser; but now he spoke at large.
Anybody who thinks the American army is asleep is crazy. Then to Burrell, "You certainly are a nice young man to double-cross your friends like that."
You're no friend of mine, Meade retorted.
I? What do you mean?
I double-crossed you, Stark, nobody else.
The Kentuckian glared at him with a look like that which Runnion had seen in his face on that first day at the trading-post. The thought of these five men banded together to rob this little maid had caused a giddiness to rise up in him, and his passions were beginning to whirl and dance.
There's no use mouthing words about it, said he. "These thugs are your tools, and you tried to steal that ground because it's sure to be rich."
Stark exclaimed angrily, but the other gave him no time to break in.
Now, don't get rough, because THAT is my game, and I'd be pleased enough to take you back a prisoner. Then turning to Lee, he said: "Don't make me force you to record my locations. I staked those claims for Miss Gale, and I'll deed them to her when she turns eighteen."
Poleon Doret called to Runnion: "M'sieu, you 'member w'at I tol' you yestidday? I'm begin for t'ink it's goin' be you."
The man paled in his anger, but said nothing. Necia clapped her hands gleefully.
Seeing that the game had gone against him, Stark got his feelings under control quickly, and shrugged his shoulders as he turned away.
You're in the wrong, Lieutenant, he remarked; "but I don't want any trouble. You've got the law with you." Then to Runnion and the others he said, "Well, I'm ready to hit the trail."
When they had shouldered their packs and disappeared down the valley, Gale held out his hand to the soldier. "Young man, I reckon you and I will be friends."
Thank you, said Burrell, taking the offer of friendship which he knew was genuine at last.
I'm in on that! said "No Creek" Lee; "you're all right!"
Poleon had been watching Stark's party disappear, but now he turned and addressed the young soldier.
You mak' some enemies to-day, M'sieu.
That's right, agreed Lee. "Ben Stark will never let up on you now."
Very well, that is his privilege.
You don't savvy what it means to get him down on you, insisted Lee. "He'll frame things up to suit himself, then pick a row with you. He's the quickest man on a trigger in the West, but he won't never make no open play, only just devil the life out of you with little things till you flare up, then he'll down you. That's how he killed the gold commissioner back in British Columbia."
Necia had said little so far, but the look in her eyes repaid the soldier for his undertaking in her behalf, and for any mischief that might ensue from it. She came forward and laid her hands upon his.
Promise that you won't have trouble with him, she begged, anxiously, "for it's all my fault, and I'd—I'd always blame myself if any hurt came to you. Promise! Won't you?"
Don't worry, daughter, reassured Gale. "There's nothing Stark can do, and whatever happens we're with the Lieutenant. He's our kind of people."
Burrell liked this grizzled old fellow with the watchful eyes, and was glad now that he could grip his hand and face him squarely with no guilt upon his conscience.
By this time Doret had finished with their blankets, and the four set out for town, but instead of following the others they accepted Necia as guide and chose the trail to Black Bear Creek. They had not gone far before she took occasion to lag behind with the Lieutenant.
I couldn't thank you before all those people—they would have read our secret—but you know how I feel, don't you, Meade?
Why! It was a simple thing—
It was splendid when you defied them. My, what a fierce you are! Oh, boy! What if something should happen to you over this!
But there's no chance. It's all done, and you'll have your fine dresses and be able to hold your nose just as high as you want.
Whatever I get I will owe to you. I—I've been thinking. Suppose—well, suppose you keep two of those claims; they are sure to be rich—
Why, Necia! he exclaimed.
They're yours, and I have no right to them under the law. Of course it would be very handsome of you to give me one—the poorest.
You ought to have your ears boxed, he laughed at her.
I don't see why. You—you—may be very poor, for all I know.
I am, he declared, "but not poor enough to take payment for a favor."
Well, then, if they are really mine to do with as I please, I'll sell one to you—
Thanks. I couldn't avail myself of the offer, he said, with mock hauteur.
If you were a business man instead of a fighting person you would listen to my proposition before you declined it. I'll make the price right, and you may pay me when we get behind yonder clump of bushes. She pouted her lips invitingly, but he declared she was a minor and as such her bargain would not hold.
It was evidently her mood to re-enter the land of whims and travel again, as they had on the way from town, but he knew that for him such a thing could not be, for his eyes had cleared since then. He knew that he could never again wander through the happy valley, for he vowed this maid should be no plaything for him or for any other man, and as there could be no honorable end to this affair, it must terminate at once. Just how this was to be consummated he had not determined as yet, nor did he like to set about its solution, it hurt him so to think of losing her. However, she was very young, only a child, and in time would come to count him but a memory, no doubt; while as for him—well, it would be hard to forget her, but he could and would. He reasoned glibly that this was the only honest course, and his reasoning convinced him; then, all of a sudden, the pressure of her warm lips came upon him and the remembrance upset every premise and process of his logic. Nevertheless, he was honest in his stubborn determination to conclude the affair, and finally decided to let time show him the way.
She seemed to be very happy, her mood being in marked contrast to that of Poleon and the trader, both of whom had fallen silent and gloomy, and in whom the hours wrought no change. The latter had tacitly acknowledged his treachery towards Stark on the previous night, but beyond that he would not go, offering no motive, excuse, or explanation, choosing to stand in the eyes of his friend as an intended murderer, notwithstanding which Poleon let the matter drop—for was not his friend a good man? Had he not been tried in a hundred ways? The young Frenchman knew there must have been strong reason for Gale's outburst, and was content to trust him without puzzling his mind to discover the cause of it.
Now, a secret must either grow or die—there is no fallow age for it—and this one had lived with Gale for fifteen years, until it had made an old man of him. It weighed him down until the desire to be rid of it almost became overpowering at times; but his caution was ingrained and powerful, and so it was that he resisted the temptation to confide in his partner, although the effort left him tired and inert. The only one to whom he could talk was Alluna—she understood, and though she might not help, the sound of his own voice at least always afforded him some relief.
As to Poleon, no one had ever seen him thus. Never in all his life of dream and song and romance had he known a heavy heart until now, for if at times he had wept like a girl, it was at the hurts of others. He had loved a bit and gambled much, with equal misfortune, and the next day he had forgotten. He had lived the free, clean life of a man who wins joyously or goes down with defiance in his throat, but this venomous thing that Runnion had planted in him had seeped and circulated through his being until every fibre was penetrated with a bitter poison. Most of his troubles could be grappled with bare hands, but here was one against which force would not avail, hence he was unhappy.
The party reached Flambeau on the following day, sufficiently ahead of Stark and his men for Lee to make known his find to his friends, and by sunset the place was depopulated, while a line of men could be seen creeping slowly up the valleys.
Gale found Alluna in charge of the store, but no opportunity of talking alone with her occurred until late in the evening, after Necia had put the two little ones to bed and had followed them wearily. Then he told his squaw. She took the news better than he expected, and showed no emotion such as other women would have displayed, even when he told her of the gunshot. Instead, she inquired:
Why did you try it there before all those others?
Well, when I heard him talking, the wish to kill him was more than I could stand, and it came on me all at once, so that I was mad, I suppose. I never did the like before. He half shuddered at the memory.
I am sorry, she said.
Yes! So am I.
Sorry that you failed, for you will never have as good a chance again. What was the matter with your aim? I have seen you hit a knot-hole, shooting from the hip.
The man is charmed, declared Gale. "He's bullet-proof."
There are people, she agreed, "that a gunshot will not injure. There was a man like that among my people—my father's enemy—but he was not proof against steel."
Your old man knifed him, eh?
She nodded.
Ugh! the man shivered. "I couldn't do that. A gun is a straight man's friend, but a knife is the weapon of traitors. I couldn't drive it home."
Does this man suspect?
No.
Then it is child's play. We will lay a trap.
No, by God! Gale interrupted her hotly. "I tried that kind of work, and it won't do. I'm no murderer."
Those are only words, said the woman, quietly. "To kill your enemy is the law."
The only light in the room came from the stove, a great iron cylinder made from a coal-oil tank that lay on a rectangular bed of sand held inside of four timbers, with a door in one end to take whole lengths of cord-wood, and which, being open, lit the space in front, throwing the sides and corners of the place into blacker mystery.
When he made no answer the squaw slipped out into the shadows, leaving him staring into the flames, to return a moment later bearing something in her hands, which she placed in his. It was a knife in a scabbard, old and worn.
There is no magic that can turn bright steel, she said, then squatted again in the dimness outside of the firelight. Gale slid the case from the long blade and held it in his palm, letting the firelight flicker on it. He balanced it and tested the feel of its handle against his palm, then tried the edge of it with his thumb-nail, and found it honed like a razor.
A child could kill with it, said Alluna. "Both edges of the blade are so thin that a finger's weight will bury it. One should hold the wrist firmly till it pierces through the coat, that is all—after that the flesh takes it easily, like butter."
The glancing, glinting light flashing from the deadly thing seemed to fascinate the man, for he held it a long while silently. Then he spoke.
For fifteen years I've been a haunted man, with a soul like a dark and dismal garret peopled with bats and varmints that flap and flutter all the time. I used to figger that if I killed this man I'd kill that memory, too, and those flitting, noiseless things would leave me, but the thought of doing it made me afraid every time, so I ran away, which never did no good—you can't outfoot a memory—and I knew all the while that we'd meet sooner or later. Now that the day is here at last, I'm not ready for it. I'd like to run away again if there was any place to run to, but I've followed frontiers till I've seen them disappear one by one; I've retreated till my back is against the Circle, and there isn't any further land to go to. All the time I've prayed and planned for this meeting, and yet—I'm undecided.
Kill him! said Alluna.
God knows I've always hated trouble, whereas it's what he lives on. I've always wanted to die in bed, while he's been a killer all his life and the smoke hangs forever in his eyes. Only for an accident we might have lived here all our days and never had a 'run-in,' which makes me wonder if I hadn't better let things go on as they are.
Kill him! It is the law, repeated Alluna, stubbornly, but he put her aside with a slow shake of the head and arose as if very tired.
No! I don't think I can do it—not in cold blood, anyhow. Good-night! I'm going to sleep on it. He crossed to the door of his room, but as he went she noted that he slipped the knife and scabbard inside the bosom of his shirt.
Early the next morning Corporal Thomas came into the store and found Necia tending it while Gale was out. Ever since the day she had questioned him about Burrell, this old man had taken every occasion to talk with the girl, and when he asked her this morning about the reports concerning Lee's strike, she told him of her trip, and all that had occurred.
You see, I'm a mine-owner now, she concluded. "If it hadn't been a secret I would have told you before I went so you could have been one of the first."
I'm goin', anyhow, he said, "if the Lieutenant will let me and if it's not too late."
Then she told him of the trail by Black Bear Creek which would save him several hours.
So that's how you and he made it? he observed, gazing at her shrewdly. "I supposed you went with your father?"
Oh, no! We beat him in, she said, and fell to musing at the memory of those hours passed alone with Meade, while her eyes shone and her cheeks glowed. The Corporal saw the look, and it bore out a theory he had formed during the past month, so, as he lingered, he set about a task that had lain in his mind for some time. As a rule he was not a careful man in his speech, and the delicacy of this manoeuvre taxed his ingenuity to the utmost, for he loved the girl and feared to say too much.
The Lieutenant is a smart young fellow, he began; "and it was slick work jumpin' all those claims. It's just like him to befriend a girl like you—I've seen him do it before—"
What! exclaimed Necia, "befriend other girls?"
Or things just like it. He's always doing favors that get him into trouble.
This couldn't cause him trouble, could it, outside of Stark's and Runnion's grudge?
No, I reckon not, assented the Corporal, groping blindly for some way of expressing what he wished to say. "Except, of course, it might cause a lot of talk at headquarters when it's known what he's done for you and how he done it. I heard something about it down the street this morning, so I'm afraid it will get to St. Michael's, and then to his folks." He realized that he was not getting on well, for the task was harder than he had imagined.
I don't understand, said Necia. "He hasn't done anything that any man wouldn't do under the same circumstances."
No man's got a right to make folks talk about a nice girl, said the Corporal; "and the feller that told me about it said he reckoned you two was in love." He hurried along now without offering her a chance to speak. "Of course, that had to be caught up quick; you're too fine a girl for that."
Too fine? Necia laughed.
I mean you're too fine and good to let him put you in wrong, just as he's too fine a fellow and got too much ahead of him to make what his people would call a messy alliance.
Would his people object to—to such a thing? questioned the girl. They were alone in the store, and so they could talk freely. "I'm just supposing, you know."
Oh, Lord! Would they object? Corporal Thomas laughed in a highly artificial manner that made Necia bridle and draw herself up indignantly.
Why should they, I'd like to know? I'm just as pretty as other girls, and I'm just as good. I know just as much as they do, too, except—about certain things.
You sure are all of that and more, too, the Corporal declared, heartily, "but if you knowed more about things outside you'd understand why it ain't possible. I can't tell you without hurtin' your feelin's, and I like you too much for that, Miss Necia. Seems as if I'm almost a daddy to you, and I've only knowed you for a few weeks—"
Go ahead and tell me; I won't be offended, insisted the girl. "You must. I don't know much about such things, for I've lived all my life with men like father and Poleon, and the priests at the Mission, who treat me just like one of themselves. But somebody will want to marry me some day, I suppose, so I ought to know what is wrong with me." She flushed up darkly under her brown cheeks.
The feeling came over Corporal Thomas that he had hurt a helpless animal of some gentle kind; that he was bungling his work, and that he was not of the calibre to go into the social amenities. He began to perspire uncomfortably, but went on, doggedly:
I'm goin' to tell you a story, not because it applies to Lieutenant Burrell, or because he's in love with you, which of course he ain't any more than you be with him—
Of course, said the girl.
—but just to show you what I mean. It was a good long spell ago, when I was at Fort Supply, which was the frontier in them days like this is now. We freighted in from Dodge City with bull teams, and it was sure the fringe of the frontier; no women—no society—nothin' much except a fort, a lot of Injuns, and a few officials with their wives and families. Now them kind of places is all right for married men, but they're tough sleddin' for single ones, and after a while a feller gets awful careless about himself; he seems to go backward and run down mighty quick when he gets away from civilization and his people and restaurants and such things; he gets plumb reckless and forgetful of what's what. Well, there was a captain with us, a young feller that looked like the Lieutenant here, and a good deal the same sort—high-tempered and chivalrious and all that sort of thing; a West Pointer, too, good family and all that, and, what's more, a captain at twenty-five. Now, our head freighter was married to a squaw, or leastways he had been, but in them days nobody thought much of it any more than they do up here now, and particularly because he'd had a government contract for a long while, ran a big gang of men and critters, and had made a lot of money. Likewise he had a girl, who lived at the fort, and was mighty nice to look at, and restful to the eye after a year or so of cactus-trees and mesquite and buffalo-grass. She was twice as nice and twice as pretty as the women at the post, and as for money—well, her dad could have bought and sold all the officers in a lump; but they and their wives looked down on her, and she didn't mix with them none whatever. To make it short, the captain married her. Seemed like he got disregardful of everything, and the hunger to have a woman just overpowered him. She'd been courted by every single man for four hundred miles around. She was pretty and full of fire, and they was both of an age to love hard, so Jefferson swore he'd make the other women take her; but soldierin' is a heap different from any other profession, and the army has got its own traditions. The plan wouldn't work. By-and-by the captain got tired of trying, and gave up the attempt—just devoted himself to her—and then we was transferred, all but him. We shifted to a better post, but Captain Jefferson was changed to another company and had to stay at Supply. Gee! it was a rotten hole! Influence had been used, and there he stuck, while the new officers cut him out completely, just like the others had done, so I was told, and it drifted on that way for a long time, him forever makin' an uphill fight to get his wife reco'nized and always quittin' loser. His folks back East was scandalized and froze him cold, callin' him a squaw-man; and the story went all through the army, till his brother officers had to treat him cold in order to keep enough warmth at home to live by, one thing leading to another till he finally resented it openly. After that he didn't last long. They made it so unpleasant that he quit the service—crowded him out, that's all. He was a born soldier, too, and didn't know nothing else nor care for nothing else; as fine a man as I ever served under, but it soured him so that a rattlesnake couldn't have lived with him. He tried to go into some kind of business after he quit the army, but he wasn't cut out for it, and never made good as long as I knew of him. The last time I seen him was down on the border, and he had sure grown cultus. He had quit the squaw, who was livin' with a greaser in Tucson—
And do you think I'm like that woman? said Necia, in a queer, strained voice. She had listened intently to the Corporal's story, but he had purposely avoided her eyes and could not tell how she was taking it.
No! You're different, but the army is just the same. I told you this to show you how it is out in the States. It don't apply to you, of course—
Of course! agreed Necia again. "But what would happen to Lieutenant Burrell if—if—well, if he should do something like that? There are many half-breed girls, I dare say, like this other girl, or—like me."
She did not flush now as before; instead, her cheeks were pale.
It would go a heap worse with him than it did with Captain Jefferson, said the Corporal, "for he's got more ahead of him and he comes from better stock. Why, his family is way up! They're all soldiers, and they're strong at headquarters; they're mighty proud, too, and they wouldn't stand for his doing such a thing, even if he wanted to. But he wouldn't try; he's got too much sense, and loves the army too well for that. No, sir! He'll go a long ways, that boy will, if he's let alone."
I never thought of myself as an Indian, said Necia, dully. "In this country it's a person's heart that counts."
That's how it ought to be, said the Corporal, heartily; "and I'm mighty sorry if I've hurt you, little girl. I'm a rough old rooster, and I never thought but what you understood all this. Up here folks look at it right, but outside it's mighty different; even yet you don't half understand."
I'm glad I'm what I am! cried the girl. "There's nothing in my blood to be ashamed of, and I'm white in here!" She struck her bosom fiercely. "If a man loves me he'll take me no matter what it means to him."
Right for you, assented the other; "and if I was younger myself, I'd sure have a lot of nice things to say to you. If I'd 'a' had somebody like you I'd 'a' let liquor alone, maybe, and amounted to something, but all I'm good for now is to give advice and draw my pay." He slid down from the counter where he had been sitting. "I'm goin' to hunt up the Lieutenant and get him to let me off. Mebbe I can stake a claim and sell it."
The moment he was gone the girl's composure vanished and she gave vent to her feelings.
It's a lie! It's a lie! she cried, aloud, and with her fists she beat the boards in front of her. "He loves me! I know he does!" Then she began, to tremble, and sobbed: "I'm just like other girls."
She was still wrestling with herself when Gale returned, and he started at the look in her face as she approached him.
Why did you marry my mother? she asked. "Why? Why did you do it?"
He saw that she was in a rage, and answered, bluntly, "I didn't."
She shrank at this. "Then why didn't you? Shame! Shame! That makes me worse than I thought I was. Oh, why did you ever turn squaw-man? Why did you make me a breed?"
Look here! What ails you? said the trader.
What ails me? she mocked. "Why, I'm neither white nor red; I'm not even a decent Indian. I'm a—a—" She shuddered. "You made me what I am. You didn't do me the justice even to marry my mother."
Somebody's been saying things about you, said Gale, quietly, taking her by the shoulders. "Who is it? Tell me who it is."
No, no! It's not that! Nobody has said anything to my face; they're afraid of you, I suppose, but God knows what they think and say to my back.
I'll— began the trader, but she interrupted him.
I've just begun to realize what I am. I'm not respectable. I'm not like other women, and never can be. I'm a squaw—a squaw!
You're not! he cried.
It's a nice word, isn't it?
What's wrong with it?
No honest man can marry me. I'm a vagabond! The best I can get is my bed and board, like my mother.
By God! Who offered you that? Gale's face was whiter than hers now, but she disregarded him and abandoned herself to the tempest of emotion that swept her along.
He can play with me, but nothing more, and when he is gone another one can have me, and then another and another and another—as long as I can cook and wash and work. In time my man will beat me, just like any other squaw, I suppose, but I can't marry; I can't be a wife to a decent man.
She was in the clutch of an hysteria that made her writhe beneath Gale's hand, choking and sobbing, until he loosed her; then she leaned exhausted against a post and wiped her eyes, for the tears were coming now.
That's all damned rot, he said. "There's fifty good men in this camp would marry you to-morrow."
Bah! I mean real men, not miners. I want to be a lady. I don't want to pull a hand-sled and wear moccasins all my life, and raise children for men with whiskers. I want to be loved—I want to be loved! I want to marry a gentleman.
Burrell! said Gale.
No! she flared up. "Not him nor anybody in particular, but somebody like him, some man with clean finger-nails."
He found nothing humorous or grotesque in her measure of a gentleman, for he realized that she was strung to a pitch of unreason and unnatural excitement, and that she was in terrible earnest.
Daughter, he said, "I'm mighty sorry this knowledge has come to you, and I see it's my fault, but things are different now to what they were when I met Alluna. It wasn't the style to marry squaws where we came from, and neither of us ever thought about it much. We were happy with each other, and we've been man and wife to each other just as truly as if a priest had mumbled over us."
But why didn't you marry her when I came? Surely you must have known what it would mean to me. It was bad enough without that.
The old man hesitated. "I'll own I was wrong," he said, finally, staring out into the sunshine with an odd expression. "It was thoughtless and wrong, dead wrong; but I've loved you better than any daughter was ever loved in this wide world, and I've worked and starved and froze and saved, and so has Alluna, so that you might have something to live on when I'm gone, and be different to us. It won't be long now, I guess. I've given you the best schooling of any girl on the river, and I'd have sent you out to a convent in the States, but I couldn't let you go so far away—God! I loved you too much for that—I couldn't do it, girl. I've tried, but you're all I've got, and I'm a selfish man, I reckon."
No, no! You're not, his daughter cried, impulsively. "You're everything that's good and dear, but you've lived a different life from other men and you see things differently. It was mean of me to talk as I did." She put her arms around his neck and hugged him. "But I'm very unhappy, dad."
Don't you aim to tell what started this? he said, gently, caressing her with his great, hard hand as softly as a mother. But she shook her head, and he continued, "I'll take the first boat down to the Mission and marry your ma, if you want me to."
That wouldn't do any good, said she. "We'd better leave things as they are." Then she drew away and smiled at him bravely from the door. "I'm a very bad to act this way. S'cuses?"
He nodded and she went out, but he gazed after her for a long minute, then sighed.
Poor little girl!
Necia was in a restless mood, and, remembering that Alluna and the children had gone berrying on the slopes behind the Indian village, she turned her way thither. All at once a fear of seeing Meade Burrell came upon her. She wanted to think this out, to find where she stood, before he had word with her. She had been led to observe herself from a strange angle, and must verify her vision, as it were. As yet she could not fully understand. What if he had changed, now that he was alone, and had had time to think? It would kill her if she saw any difference in him, and she knew she would be able to read it in his eyes.
As she went through the main street of the camp she saw Stark occupied near the water-front, where he had bought a building lot. He spoke to her as she was about to pass.
Good-morning, Miss. Are you rested from your trip?
She answered that she was, and would have continued on her way, but he stopped her.
I don't want you to think that mining matter was my doing, he said. "I've got nothing against you. Your old man hasn't wasted any affection on me, and I can get along without him, all right, but I don't make trouble for girls if I can help it."
The girl believed that he meant what he said; his words rang true, and he spoke seriously. Moreover, Stark was known already in the camp as a man who did not go out of his way to make friends or to render an accounting of his deeds, so it was natural that when he made her a show of kindness Necia should treat him with less coldness than might have been expected. The man had exercised an occult influence upon her from the time she first saw him at Lee's cabin, but it was too vague for definite feeling, and she had been too strongly swayed by Poleon and her father in their attitude towards him to be conscious of it. Finding him now, however, in a gentle humor, she was drawn to him unwittingly, and felt an overweening desire to talk with him, even at the hazard of offending her own people. The encounter fitted in with her rebellious mood, for there were things she wished to know, things she must find out from some one who knew the world and would not be afraid to answer her questions candidly.
I'm going to build a big dance-hall and saloon here, said Stark, showing her the stakes that he had driven. "As soon as the rush to the creek is over I'll hire a gang of men to get out a lot of house logs. I'll finish it in a week and be open for the stampede."
Do you think this will be a big town? she asked.
Nobody can tell, but I'll take a chance. If it proves to be a false alarm I'll move on—I've done it before.
You've been in a great many camps, I suppose.
He said that he had, that for twenty years he had been on the frontier, and knew it from West Texas to the Circle.
And are they all alike?
Very much. The land lies different but the people are the same.
I've never known anything except this. She swept the points of the compass with her arm. "And there is so much beyond that I want to know about—oh, I feel so ignorant! There is something now that perhaps you could tell me, you have travelled so much."
Let's have it, said he, smiling at her seriousness.
She hesitated, at a loss for words, finally blurting out what was in her mind.
My father is a squaw-man, Mr. Stark, and I've been raised to think that such things are customary.
They are, in all new countries, he assured her.
But how are they regarded when civilization comes along?
Well, they aren't regarded, as a rule. Squaw-men are pretty shiftless, and people don't pay much attention to them. I guess if they weren't they wouldn't be squaw-men.
My father isn't shiftless, she challenged, at which he remained silent, refusing to go on record. "Isn't a half-breed just as good as a white?"
Look here, said he. "What are you driving at?"
I'm a 'blood,' she declared, recklessly, "and I want to know what people think of me. The men around here have never made me feel conscious of it, but—"
You're afraid of these new people who are coming, eh? Well, don't worry about that, Miss. It wouldn't make any difference to me or to any of your friends whether you were red, white, black, or yellow.
But it would make a difference with some people? insisted the girl.
Oh, I reckon it would with Eastern people. They look at things kind of funny, but we're not in the East.
That's what I wanted to know. Nice people back there wouldn't tolerate a girl like me for a moment, would they? They wouldn't consider me good enough to associate with them?
He shrugged his shoulders. "I guess you'd have a hard time breaking in among the 'bon-tonners.' But what's the use of thinking about it. This is your country and these are your people."
A morbid desire was upon her to track down this intangible racial distinction, but she saw Runnion, whom she could not bear, coming towards them, so thanked Stark hurriedly and went on her way.
Been making friends with that squaw, eh? remarked Runnion, casually.
Yes, replied Stark. "She's a nice little girl, and I like her. I told her I didn't have any part in that miners' meeting affair."
Huh! What's the matter with you? It was all your doing.
I know it was, but I didn't aim it at her. I wanted that ground next to Lee's, and I wanted to throw a jolt into Old Man Gale. I couldn't let the girl stand in my way; but now that it's over, I'm willing to be friends with her.
Me, too, said Runnion, looking after Necia as her figure diminished up the street. "By Heaven! She's as graceful as a fawn; she's white, too. Nobody would ever know she was a breed."
She's a good girl, said Stark, musingly, in a gentle tone that Runnion had never heard before.
Getting kind of mushy, ain't you? I thought you had passed that stage, old man.
No, I don't like her in that way.
Well, I do, and I'm dead sore on that soldier.
She's not your kind, said Stark. "A bad man can't hold a good woman; he can win one easy enough, but he can't keep her. I know!"
Nobody but a fool would want to keep one, Runnion replied, "specially a squaw."
She's just woke up to the fact that she is a squaw and isn't as good as white. She's worried.
I'll lay you a little eight to five that Burrell has thrown her down, chuckled Runnion.
I never thought of that. You may be right.
If it's true I'll shuffle up a hand for that soldier.
If I were you I wouldn't deal it to him, said the gambler, dryly. "He may not cut to your break."
Meanwhile, Necia had passed on out of the town and through the Indian village at the mouth of the creek, until high up on the slopes she saw Alluna and the little ones. She climbed up to them and seated herself where she could look far out over the westward valley, with the great stream flowing half a mile beneath her. She stayed there all the morning, and although the day was bright and the bushes bending with their burden of blue, she picked no berries, but fought resolutely through a dozen varying moods that mirrored themselves in her delicate face. It was her first soul struggle, but in time the buoyancy of youth and the almighty optimism of early love prevailed; she comforted herself with the fond illusion that this man was different from all others, that his regard was equal to her own, and that his love would rise above such accidental things as blood or breed or birth. And so she was in a happier frame of mind when the little company made their descent at mid-day.
As they approached the town they heard the familiar cry of "Steam-bo-o-o-at," and by the time they had reached home the little camp was noisy with the plaint of wolf-dogs. There were few men to join in the welcome to-day, every able-bodied inhabitant having disappeared into the hills, but the animals came trooping lazily to the bank, and sat down on their haunches watching the approaching steamer, in their soft eyes the sadness of a canine race of slaves. Behind them limped a sick man or two, a soldier from the barracks, and in the rear a fellow who had drifted in the week before with scurvy. It was a pitiful review that lined up to greet the tide of tenderfeet crowding towards their El Dorado, and unusual also, for as yet the sight of new faces was strange in the North.
The deserted aspect of the town puzzled the captain of the steamer, and upon landing he made his way at once to John Gale's store, where he learned from the trader of the strike and of the stampede that had resulted. Before the recital was finished a man approached and spoke excitedly.
Captain, my ticket reads to Dawson, but I'm getting off here. Won't you have my outfit put ashore? He was followed by a group of fellow-passengers who made a similar request.
This place is good enough for me, one of them said.
Me, too, another volunteered. "This strike is new, and we've hit her just in time."
Outside a dozen men had crowded "No Creek" Lee against the wall of the store and were clamoring to hear about his find. Before the tardy ones had cleared the gang-plank the news had flashed from shore to ship, and a swarm came up the bank and into the post, firing questions and answers at each other eagerly, elbowing and fighting for a place within ear-shot of the trader or the ragged man outside.
The frenzy of a gold stampede is like the rush from a burning building, and equally easy to arouse. No statement is too wild to lack believers, no rumor too exaggerated to find takers. Within an hour the crew of the steamer was busy unloading countless tons of merchandise and baggage billed to Dawson, and tents began to show their snowy whiteness here and there. As a man saw his outfit appear he would pounce upon it, a bundle at a time, and pile it by itself, which resulted in endless disputes and much confusion; but a spirit of youth and expectancy permeated all and prevented more than angry words. Every hour the heaps of baggage grew larger and the tents more numerous.
Stark wasted no time. With money in his hands he secured a dozen men who were willing to work for hire, for there are always those who prefer the surety of ten coined dollars to the hope of a hundred. He swooped down with these helpers on his pile of merchandise that had lain beneath tarpaulins on the river-bank since the day he and Runnion landed, and by mid-afternoon a great tent had been stretched over a framework of peeled poles built on the lot where he and Necia had stood earlier in the day. Before dark his saloon was running. To be sure, there was no floor, and his polished fixtures looked strangely new and incongruous, but the town at large had assumed a similar air of incompleteness and crude immaturity, and little wonder, for it had grown threefold in half a day. Stark swiftly unpacked his gambling implements, keen to scent every advantage, and out of the handful of pale-faced jackals who follow at the heels of a healthy herd, he hired men to run them and to deal. By night Flambeau was a mining-camp.
Late in the evening the boat swung out into the river, and disclosed a strange scene of transformation to the puzzled captain of a few hours ago. The riverbank was lined with canvas shelters, illumined dully by the tent-lights within till they looked like a nest of glowworms in deep grass. A long, hoarse blast of good wishes rose from the steamer, then she sighed her way around the point above bearing forth the message that a new camp had been born.
"No Creek" Lee had come into his own at last, and was a hero, for the story of his long ill-luck was common gossip now, and men praised him for his courage. He had never been praised for anything before and was uncertain just how to take it.
Say, are these people kiddin' me? he inquired, confidentially, of Poleon.
W'y? Wat you mean?
Well, there's a feller makin' a speech about me down by the landing.
Wat he say?
It ain't nothin' to fight over. He says I'm another Dan'l Boom, leadin' the march of empire westward.
Dat's nice, for sure.
Certainly sounds good, but is it on the level?
Wal, I guess so, admitted Poleon.
The prospector swelled with indignation. "Then, why in hell didn't you fellers tell me long ago?"
The scanty ounce or two of gold from his claim lay in the scales at the post, where every new-comer might examine it, and, realizing that he was a never-ending source of information, they fawned on him for his tips, bribing him with newspapers, worth a dollar each, or with cigars, which he wrapped up carefully and placed in his mackinaw till every pocket of the rusty garment bulged so that he could not sit without losing them. They dwelt upon his lightest word, and stood him up beside the bar where they filled him with proofs of friendliness until he shed tears from his one good eye.
He had formed a habit of parsimony born of his years of poverty, and was so widely known as a tight man by the hundreds who had lent to him that his creditors never at any time hoped for a reckoning. And he never offered one; on the contrary, he had invariably flown into a rage when dunned, and exhibited such resentment as to discourage the practice. Now, however, the surly humor of the man began to mellow, and in gradual stages he unloosened, the process being attended by a disproportionate growth of the trader's cash receipts. Cautiously, at first he let out his wit, which was logy from long disuse, and as heavy on its feet as the Jumping Frog of Calaveras, but when they laughed at its labored leaps and sallies his confidence grew. With the regularity of a clock he planted cigars and ordered "a little more hard stuff," while his roving eye rejoiced in lachrymose profusion, its over-burden losing itself in the tangle of his careless beard. By-and-by he wandered through the town, trailed by a troop of tenderfeet, till the women marked him, whereupon he fled back to the post and hugged the bar, for he was a bashful man. When Stark's new place opened it offered him another retreat of which he availed himself for some time. But late in the evening he reappeared at Old Man Gale's store, walking a bit unsteadily, and as he mounted the flight of logs to the door he stepped once too often.
What's become of that fourth step? he demanded, sharply, of Poleon.
Dere she is, said the Frenchman.
I'm damned if it is. You moved it since I was here.
I'll have 'im put back, laughed the other.
Say! It's a grand thing to be rich, ain't it?
I don' know, I ain' never try it.
Well, it is; and now that I've arrived, I'm goin' to change my ways complete. No more extravagance in mine—I'll never lend another cent.
Wat's dat? ejaculated Doret, in amazement.
No more hard-luck stories and 'hurry-ups' for mine. I'm the stony-hearted jailer, I am, from now, henceforth, world 'thout end, amen! No busted miners need apply. I've been a good thing, but to-night I turn on the time-lock.
Ba gosh! You're fonny feller, laughed Poleon, who had lent the one-eyed man much money in the past and, like others, regarded him not merely as a bad risk but as a total loss. "Mebbe you t'ink you've been a spen't'rif all dese year."
I've certainly blowed a lot of money on my friends, Lee acknowledged, "and they're welcome to what they've got so far, but I'm goin' to chop all them prodigal habits and put on the tin vest. I'll run the solderin'-iron up my seams so they can't get to me without a can-opener. I'm air-tight for life, I am." He fumbled in his pockets and unwrapped a gift cigar, then felt for a match. Poleon tossed one on the bar, and he reached for it twice, missing it each time.
I guess dose new frien' of yours is mak' you purty full, M'sieu' Tin Vest.
Nothin' of the sort. I've got a bad dose of indigestion.
Dat's 'orrible disease! Dere's plaintee riche man die on dat seecknesse. You better lie down.
Doret took the hero of the day by the arm and led him to the rear of the store, where he bedded him on a pile of flour sacks, but he had hardly returned to the bar when Lee came veering out of the dimness, making for the light like a ship tacking towards a beacon.
What kind of flour is that? he spluttered.
Dat's just plain w'eat flour.
Not on your life, said the miner, with the firmness of a great conviction. "It's full of yeast powders. Why, it's r'arin' and risin' like a buckin' hoss. I'm plumb sea-sick." He laid a zigzag course for the door.
W'ere you goin'? asked Poleon.
I'm goin' to get somethin' for this stomach trouble. It's fierce. He descended into the darkness boldly, and stepped off with confidence—this time too soon. Poleon heard him floundering about, his indignant voice raised irascibly, albeit with a note of triumph.
Wha'd I tell you? You put it back while I was ashleep. Then whistling blithely, if somewhat out of tune, he steered for the new saloon to get something for his "stomach trouble."
At Stark's he found a large crowd of the new men who welcomed him heartily, plying him with countless questions, and harking to his maudlin tales of this new country which to him was old. He had followed the muddy river from Crater Lake to the Delta, searching the bars and creek-beds in a tireless quest, till he knew each stream and tributary, for he had been one of the hardy band that used to venture forth from Juneau on the spring snows, disappearing into the uncharted valley of the Yukon, to return when the river clogged and grew sluggish, and, like Gale, he had lived these many years ahead of the law where each man was his own court of appeals and where crime was unknown. He had helped to build camps like Forty Mile and Circle; he knew by heart the by-laws and rules that governed every town and mining district in the country; he knew every man and child by name, but, while many of his friends had prospered, unceasing ill-luck had dogged him. Yet he had held to honesty and hard work, measuring a man by his ability to swing an axe or a shovel, and, despite his impecuniosity, regarding theft as the one crime deserving capital punishment.
Oh, there's lots of countries worse'n this, he declared. "We may not be very han'some to the naked eye, and we may not wear our handk'chiefs in our shirt cuffs, but there ain't no widders and orphans doin' our washin', and a man can walk away from his house, stay a month, and find it there when he comes back."
Those days are past, said Stark, who had joined in the discussion. "There's too many new people coming in for all of them to be honest."
They'd better be, said Lee, aggressively. "We ain't got no room for stealers. Why, I had a hand in makin' the by-laws of this camp myself, 'long with John Gale, and they stip'lates that any person caught robbin' a cache is to be publicly whipped in front of the tradin'-post, then, if it's winter time, he's to be turned loose on the ice barefooted, or, if it's summer, he's to be set adrift on a log with his shirt off."
Either one would mean certain death, said a stranger. "Frost in winter, mosquitoes in summer!"
That's all right, another bystander declared. "A man's life depends on his grub up here, and I'd be in favor of enforcing that punishment to the letter if we caught any one thieving."
All the same, I take no chances, said Stark. "There's too many strangers here. Just to show you how I stand, I've put Runnion on guard over my pile of stuff, and I'll be glad when it's under cover. It isn't the severity of punishment that keeps a man from going wrong, it's the certainty of it."
Well, he'd sure get it, and get it proper in this camp, declared Lee; and at that moment, as if his words had been a challenge, the flaps of the great tent were thrust aside, and Runnion half led, half threw a man into the open space before the bar.
Let's have a look at you, he panted. "Well, if it ain't a nigger!"
What's up? cried the men, crowding about the prisoner, who crouched, terror-stricken, in the trampled mud and moss, while those playing roulette and "bank" left the tables, followed by the dealers.
He's a thief, said Runnion, mopping the sweat from his brow. "I caught him after your grub pile, Stark."
In my cache?
Yes. He dropped a crate of hams when I came up on him, and tried to run, but I dropped him. He held his Colt in his right hand, and a trickle of blood from the negro's head showed how he had been felled.
Why didn't you shoot? growled Stark, angrily, at which the negro half arose and broke into excited denials of his guilt. Runnion kicked him savagely, and cursed him, while the crowd murmured approval.
Le' me see him, said Lee, elbowing his way through the others. Fixing his one eye upon the wretch, he spoke impressively.
You're the first downright thief I ever seen. Was you hungry?
No, he's got plenty, answered one of the tenderfeet, who had evidently arrived on the boat with the darky. "He's got a bigger outfit than I have."
The prisoner drew himself up against the bar, facing his enemies sullenly.
Then I reckon it's a divine manifestation, said "No Creek" Lee, tearfully. "This black party is goin' to furnish an example as will elevate the moral tone of our community for a year."
Let me take him outside, cried Stark, reaching under the bar for a weapon. His eyes were cruel, and he had the angry pallor of a dangerous man. "I'll save you a lot of trouble."
Why not do it legal? expostulated Lee. "It's just as certain."
Yes! Lee is right, echoed the crowd, bent on a Roman holiday.
What y'all aim to do? whined the thief.
We're goin' to try you, announced the one-eyed miner, "and if you're found guilty, as you certainly are goin' to be, you'll be flogged. After which perdicament you'll have a nice ride down-stream on a saw-log without your laundry."
But the mosquitoes—
Too bad you didn't think of them before. Let's get at this, boys, and have it over with.
In far countries, where men's lives depend upon the safety of their food supply, a side of bacon may mean more than a bag of gold; therefore, protection is a strenuous necessity. And though any one of those present would have gladly fed the negro had he been needy, each of them likewise knew that unless an example were made of him no tent or cabin would be safe. The North being a gameless, forbidding country, has ever been cruel to thieves, and now it was heedless of the black man's growing terror as it set about to try him. A miners' meeting was called on the spot, and a messenger sent hurrying to the post for the book in which was recorded the laws of the men who had made the camp. The crowd was determined that this should be done legally and as prescribed by ancient custom up and down the river. So, to make itself doubly sure, it gave Runnion's evidence a hearing; then, taking lanterns, went down to the big tarpaulin-covered pile beside the river, where it found the crate of hams and the negro's tracks. There was no defence for the culprit and he offered none, being too scared by now to do more than plead. The proceedings were simple and quiet and grim, and were wellnigh over when Lieutenant Burrell walked into the tent saloon. He had been in his quarters all day, fighting a fight with himself, and in the late evening, rebelling against his cramped conditions and the war with his conscience, he had sallied out, and, drawn by the crowd in Stark's place, had entered.
A man replied to his whispered question, giving him the story, for the meeting was under Lee's domination, and the miners maintained an orderly and business-like procedure. The chairman's indigestion had vanished with his sudden assumption of responsibility, and he showed no trace of drink in his bearing. Beneath a lamp one was binding four-foot lengths of cotton tent-rope to a broomstick for a knout, while others, whom Lee had appointed, were drawing lots to see upon whom would devolve the unpleasant duty of flogging the captive. The matter-of-fact, relentless expedition of the affair shocked Burrell inexpressibly, and seeing Poleon and Gale near by, he edged towards them, thinking that they surely could not be in sympathy with this barbarous procedure.
You don't understand, Lieutenant, said Gale, in a low voice. "This nigger is a THIEF!"
You can't kill a man for stealing a few hams.
It ain't so much WHAT he stole; it's the idea, and it's the custom of the country.
Whipping is enough, without the other.
Dis stealin' she's bad biznesse, declared Poleon. "Mebbe dose ham is save some poor feller's life."
It's mob law, said the Lieutenant, indignantly, "and I won't stand for it."
Gale turned a look of curiosity upon the officer. "How are you going to help yourself?" said he; but the young man did not wait to reply. Quickly he elbowed his way towards the centre of the scene with that air of authority and determination before which a crowd melts and men stand aside. Gale whispered to his companion:
Keep your eye open, lad. There's going to be trouble. They stood on tiptoe, and watched eagerly.
Gentlemen, announced Burrell, standing near the ashen-gray wretch, and facing the tentful of men, "this man is a thief, but you can't kill him!"
Stark leaned across the bar, his eyes blazing, and touched the Lieutenant on the shoulder.
Do you mean to take a hand in all of my affairs?
This isn't your affair; it's mine, said the officer. "This is what I was sent here for, and it's my particular business. You seem to have overlooked that important fact."
He stole my stuff, and he'll take his medicine.
I say he won't!
For the second time in their brief acquaintance these two men looked fair into each other's eyes. Few men had dared to look at Stark thus and live; for when a man has once shed the blood of his fellow, a mania obsesses him, a disease obtains that is incurable. There is an excitation of every sense when a hunter stands up before big game; it causes a thrill and flutter of undiscovered nerves, which nothing else can conjure up, and which once lived leaves an incessant hunger. But the biggest game of all is man, and the fiercest sensation is hate. Stark had been a killer, and his brain had been seared with the flame till the scar was ineradicable. He had lived those lurid seconds when a man gambles his life against his enemy's, and, having felt the great sensation, it could never die; yet with it all he was a cautious man, given more to brooding on his injuries and building up a quarrel than to reckless paroxysms of passion, and experience had taught him the value of a well-handled temper as well as the wisdom of knowing when to use it and put it in action. He knew intuitively that his hour with Burrell had not yet come.
The two men battled with their eyes for an opening. Lee and the others mastered their surprise at the interruption, and then began to babble until Burrell turned from the gambler and threw up his arm for silence.
There's no use arguing, he told the mob. "You can't do it. I'll hold him till the next boat comes, then I'll send him down-river to St. Michael's."
He laid his hand upon the negro and made for the door, with face set and eyes watchful and alert, knowing that a hair's weight might shift the balance and cause these men to rive him like wolves.
Lee's indignation at this miscarriage of justice had him so by the throat as to strangle expostulation for a moment, till he saw the soldier actually bearing off his quarry. Then he broke into a flood of invective.
Stop that! he bellowed. "To hell with YOUR law—we're goin' accordin' to our own." An ominous echo arose, and in the midst of it the miner, in his blind fury forgetting his exalted position, took a step too near the edge of the bar, and fell off into the body of the meeting. With him fell the dignity of the assemblage. Some one laughed; another took it up; the nervous tension broke, and a man cried:
The soldier is right. You can't blame a dinge for stealing, and another: "Sure! Hogs and chickens are legitimate prey."
Lee was helped back to his stand, and called for order; but the crowd poked fun at him, and began moving about restlessly till some one shouted a motion to adjourn, and there arose a chorus of seconders. A few dissenting voices opposed them, but in the meantime Burrell was gone, and with him the cause of the tumult; so the meeting broke up of its own weight a moment later.
As Poleon and Gale walked home, the Frenchman said, "Dat was nervy t'ing to do."
The trader made no answer, and the other continued, "Stark is goin' for kill 'im, sure."
It's a cinch, agreed Gale, "unless somebody gets Stark first."
When they were come to his door the trader paused, and, looking back over the glowing tents and up at the star-sprinkled heavens, remarked, as if concluding some train of thought, "If that boy has got the nerve to take a nigger thief out of a miners' meeting and hold him against this whole town, he wouldn't hesitate much at taking a white man, would he?"
Wal, hesitated the other, "mebbe dat would depen' on de crime."
Suppose it was—murder?
Ha! We ain' got no men lak' dat in Flambeau.
They said good-night, and the old man entered his house to find Alluna waiting for him, a look of worry on her stolid face.
What's wrong? he inquired.
All night Necia has been weeping.
Is she sick? He started for the girl's door, but Alluna stopped him.
No! It is not that kind of weeping; this comes from the heart. It is there she is sick. I went to her, but she grew angry, and said I had a black skin and could not understand; then she went out-doors and has not returned.
Gale sat down dejectedly. "Yes, she's sick in her heart, all right, and so am I, Alluna. When did she go out?"
An hour ago.
Where is she?
Out by the river-bank—I followed her in the shadows. It is best for her to stay there till she is calm.
I know what ails her, said the father. "She's found that she's not like other girls. She's found that a white soul doesn't count with white people; they never go below the skin." Then he told her of the scene that morning in the store, adding that he believed she loved Lieutenant Burrell.
Did she say so?
No, she denied it, now that she knows she hasn't got his kind of blood in her.
Blood makes no difference, said the woman, stubbornly. "If he loves her, he will take her; if he does not—that is all."
Gale looked up at her, and was about to explain, when the utter impossibility of her comprehending him made him desist, and he fell moody again. At last he said, "I've got to tell her, Alluna."
No, no! cried the woman, aghast. "Don't tell her the truth! Nothing could be worse than that!"
But he continued, deliberately: "Love is the biggest thing in the world; it's the only thing worth while, and she has got to have a fair show at it. This has been on my mind for weeks, and I've put it away, hoping I wouldn't have to do it; but to-day I came face to face with it again, and it's up to me. She'll have to know some time, so the sooner the better."
She would not believe you, said the woman, at which he started.
I never thought of that. I wonder if she would doubt! I couldn't stand that.
There is no proof, and it would mean your life. A good man's life is a great price to pay for the happiness of one girl—
I gave it once before, said Gale, a trifle bitterly, "and now that the game is started I've got to play the string out; but—I wonder if she would doubt—" He paused for a long moment. "Well, I'll have to risk it. However, I've got a lot of things to do first—you and the youngsters must be taken care of."
And Stark? said Alluna.
Yes, and Stark.
Burrell took his prisoner to the barracks, where he placed him under guard, giving instructions to hold him at any cost, not knowing what wild and reckless humor the new citizens of Flambeau might develop during the night, for it is men who have always lived with the halter of the law tight upon their necks who run wildest when it is removed. Men grown old on the frontier adhere more closely to a rigid code than do tenderfeet who feel for the first time the liberty and license of utter unrestraint, and it was these strangers whom the soldier feared rather than men like Gale and "No Creek" Lee, who would recognize the mercy of his intervention and let the matter drop.
After he had taken every precaution he went out into the night again, and fought with himself as he had fought all that day and all the night before; in fact, ever since old Thomas had come to him after leaving Necia, and had so cunningly shaped his talk that Burrell never suspected his object until he perceived his position in such a clear light that the young man looked back upon his work with startled eyes. The Corporal had spoken garrulously of his officer's family; of their pride, and of their love for his profession; had dwelt enthusiastically upon the Lieutenant's future and the length he was sure to go, and finally drifted into the same story he had told Necia. Burrell at last sensed the meaning of the crafty old soldier's strategy and dismissed him, but not before his work had been accomplished. If a coarse-fibred, calloused old campaigner like Corporal Thomas could recognize the impossibility of a union between Necia and himself, then the young man must have been blind indeed not to have seen it for himself. The Kentuckian was a man of strong and virile passions, but he was also well balanced, and had ever followed his head rather than his heart, holding, as he did, a deep-seated contempt for weak men who laid their courses otherwise. The generations of discipline back of him spoke to his conscience. He had allowed himself to become attached to this girl until—yes, he knew now he loved her. If only he had not awakened her and himself with that first hot kiss; if only—But there was no going back now, no use for regrets, only the greater necessity of mapping out a course that would cause her least unhappiness. If he could have run away he would have done so gladly, but he was bound here to this camp, with no possibility of avoiding her.
When he drove his reason with firm hands he saw but one course to follow; but, when his mind went slack for a moment, the old desire to have her returned more strongly than ever, and he heard voices arguing, pleading, persuading—she was the equal of any woman in the world, they said, in mind, in purity, and in innocence. He hated himself for hesitating; he railed at his own indecision; and then, when he had justified his love and persuaded himself that he was right in seeking this union, there would rise again the picture of his people, their chagrin, and what would result from such a marriage. He knew how they would take it; he knew what his friends would say, and how he would be treated as the husband of a half-breed Indian; for in his country one drop of colored blood made a negro, and his people saw but little difference between the red and the black. It would mean his social ostracism; he would be shunned by his brother officers, and his career would be at an end. He swore aloud in the darkness that this was too great a price to pay for love, that he owed it to himself and to his dear ones at home to give up this dark-eyed maid who had bewitched him.
He had wandered far during this debate, clear past the town, and out through the Indian village; but now that he believed he had come to an understanding with himself, he turned back towards his quarters. He knew it would be hard to give her up; but he had irrevocably decided, and his path began to unfold itself so clear and straight that he marvelled how he could have failed to see it. He was glad he had conquered, although the pain was still sharp. He felt a better man for it, and, wrapped in this complacent optimism, he passed close by the front of the trader's store, where Necia had crept to be alone with her misery.
The high moon cast a deep, wide shadow upon the store steps where the girl sat huddled, staring out into the unreal world, waiting for the night wind to blow away the fears and forebodings that would not let her sleep. It was late, and the hush of a summer midnight lay upon the distant hills. Burrell had almost passed her when he was startled by the sound of his name breathed softly; then, to his amazement, he saw her come forth like a spirit into the silver sheen.
Necia! he cried, "what are you doing here at this hour?" She looked up at him sadly; he saw that her cheeks were wet, and something inside him snapped and broke. Without a word he took her in his arms, meeting her lips in a long kiss, while she, trembling with the joy of his strong embrace, drew closer and closer and rested her body wearily against his.
Little girl! little girl! he whispered, over and over, his tone conveying every shade of sympathy, love, and understanding she had craved. He knew what had made her sad, and she knew that he knew. There was no need for words; the anguish of this long day had whetted the edge of their desire, and they were too deeply, too utterly lost in the ecstasy of meeting to care for speech.
As she lay cradled in his arms, which alternately held her with the soft tenderness of a mother and crushed her with the fierce ardor of a lover, she lost herself in the bliss of a woman's surrender, and forgot all her terrifying doubts and fears. What were questions of breed or birth or color now, when she knew he loved her? Mere vapors that vanished with the first flutter of warm wings.
Nor did Meade Burrell recall his recent self-conquest or pause to reason why he should not love this little wisp of the wilderness. The barriers he had built went down in the sight and touch of his love and disappeared; his hesitation and infirmity seemed childish now—yes, more than that, cowardly. He realized all in a moment that he had been supremely selfish, that his love was a covenant, a compact, which he had entered into with her and had no right to dissolve without her consent, and, strangely enough, now that he acknowledged the bond to himself, it became very sweet and satisfying.
Your lips cling so that I can't get free, sighed the girl, at last.
You never shall, he whispered. But when she smiled up at him piteously, her eyes swimming, and said, "I must," he wrenched himself away and let her go.
As he went lightly towards the barracks through the far-stretching shadows, for the moon was yellow now, Meade Burrell sighed gladly to himself. Again his course ran clear and straight before him though wholly at variance with the one he had decided upon so recently. But he knew not that his vision was obscured and that the moon-madness was upon him.