Kitabı oku: «Gulf and Glacier; or, The Percivals in Alaska», sayfa 4

“Just steady it a bit,” he asked; and Mr. Bedlow, with conscientious misgivings as to the propriety of his assisting at a gymnastic performance on Sunday, did as he was bid.

Up went the minister like a cat; and presently down came the knotted end of the rope. “Now, let’s have a good, hearty pull, Mr. Bedlow.”

The sexton grasped the rope and pulled. There was one frightened, discordant outcry from the astonished bell; and there stood poor Mr. Bedlow with about three yards of detached rope in his hands. It had broken just above the point where it passed through the flooring over his head.

“Now, sir,” expostulated the sexton.

“Here, Dick!” called Mr. Olsen, to a bright-faced little fellow who had put his head in at the door and was regarding these unwonted proceedings with round-eyed astonishment; “won’t you run over to my house and ask my wife for that long piece of clothes-line that hangs up in the kitchen closet?”

Dick was gone like a flash, his curiosity excited to the highest pitch.

“What does he want it for?” asked pretty Olga Olsen, hurrying to produce the required article.

“Don’t know,” panted Dick. “He’s got Mr. Bedlow – in the entry – an’ he sent for a rope, double quick!”

With which bewildering statement he tore out of the house and back to the church.

Five minutes later the population of North Penfield were astounded by hearing a long-silent, but only too familiar voice.

“It’s that old cracked bell!” exclaimed half a hundred voices at once, in as many families. “Do let’s go to meetin’ an’ see what’s the matter.”

The afternoon’s congregation was, in fact, even larger than the morning’s. Harold noted it with quiet satisfaction, and gave out as his text the first verse of the sixty-sixth Psalm.

At the close of his brief sermon he paused a moment, then referred to the subject in all their thoughts, speaking in no flippant or jesting tone, but in a manner that showed how sacredly important he considered the matter.

“I have been pained to notice,” he said gravely, “the tardiness with which we begin our meetings. It is perfectly natural that we should be late, when there is no general call, such as we have been accustomed to hear from childhood. I do not blame anybody in the least. I do believe that we have all grown into a certain sluggishness, both physical and spiritual, in our assembling together, as a direct consequence of the omission of those chimes which to us and our fathers have always spoken but one blessed word – ‘Come!’ I believe,” he continued, looking about over the kindly faces before him, “I believe you agree with me that something should be done. Don’t think me too hasty or presuming in my new pastorate, if I add that it seems to me vitally important to take action at once. Our bell is not musical, it is true, but its tones, cracked and unmelodious as they are, will serve to remind us of our church home, its duties and its pleasures. On Tuesday evening we will hold a special meeting in this house to consider the question of purchasing a new bell, to take the place of the old. The Prudential Committee, and all who are interested in the subject are urged to be present. Let us pray.”

It was a wonderful “season,” that Tuesday evening conference. The cracked bell did its quavering best for a full twenty minutes before the hour appointed, to call the people together; and no appeal could have been more irresistible.

Two thirds of the sum required was raised that night. For ten days more the old bell rang on every possible occasion, until it became an accusing voice of conscience to the parish. Prayer meetings once more began sharp on the hour, and proceeded with old-time vigor. The interest spread until a real revival was in progress before the North Penfield Society were fairly aware of the change. Still the “bell fund” lacked fifty dollars of completion.

On the evening of the twentieth of December, in the midst of a furious storm, a knock was heard at the parsonage, and lo, at the hastily opened door stood Squire Radbourne, powdered with snowflakes, and beaming like a veritable Santa Claus.

“I couldn’t feel easy,” he announced, after he had been relieved of coat and furs, and seated before the blazing fire, “to have next Sunday go by without a new bell on the meeting-house. We must have some good hearty chimes on that morning, sure; it’s the twenty-fifth, you know. So here’s a little Christmas present to the parish – or the Lord, either way you want to put it.”

The crisp fifty dollar note he laid down before the delighted couple was all that was needed.

Harold made a quick calculation – he had already selected a bell at a foundry a hundred miles away – and sitting down at his desk, wrote rapidly.

“I’ll mail your letter,” said the squire. “It’s right on my way – or near enough. Let’s get it off to-night, to save time.”

And away he trudged again, through the deepening drifts and the blur of the white storm.

On Saturday evening, after all the village people were supposed to be abed and asleep, two dark figures might have been seen moving to and fro in the old meeting-house, with a lantern. After some irregular movements in the entry, the light appeared in the belfry, and a little later, one queer, flat, brassy note, uncommonly like the voice of the cracked bell, rang out on the night air. Then there was absolute silence; and before long the meeting-house was locked up and left to itself again on Christmas Eve – alone, with the wonder-secret of a new song in its faithful heart, waiting to break forth in praise of God at dawn of day.

How the people started that fair Christmas morning, as the sweet, silvery notes fell on their ears! They hastened to the church; they pointed to the belfry where the bell swung to and fro in a joyous call of “Come! come! come! come!”

They listened in rapt silence, and some could not restrain their sobs, while others with grateful tears in their eyes looked upon the old, rusty, cracked bell that rested, silent, on the church floor; and as they looked, and even passed their hands lovingly over its worn sides, they thanked God for its faithful service and the good work it had wrought – and for the glad hopes that filled that blessed Christmas Day.

CHAPTER VII.
SOLOMON BARANOV

“All ashore!” sung out Tom as the Queen touched the wharf at Fort Wrangell, at nine o’clock the next morning. “Come on, all of you. We have four hours here, the captain says.”

Mounting the rail for a jump, the boy brought upon himself a sharp rebuke from the officer; but the ship was soon safely moored and the gangplank run down to the wharf.

The excursionists straggled ashore in twos and threes, and began an eager inspection of their first Alaskan town.

The Percivals and their friends stroll down the single street of the village, which borders the shore with a row of low wooden houses.

Here are three or four squaws in gaudy blankets, crouching on a little wooden platform in front of their hut. Their favorite position is that of a seal, or a pussy cat – half-reclining, face downward. Spread out on the platform are baskets made of cedar-root, fiber and bark; carved wooden knives and forks; spoons of horn; little stone images, silver bracelets, and other curiosities of home manufacture.

Mr. Percival purchased one or two of these trinkets for friends at home, and continued his walk, followed by a pack of yelping dogs.

A singular object now came in view – a pole about twenty feet tall and two feet in diameter, carved in strange and fantastic shapes. There were the figures of a bear, a raven, a fish and a frog, with a grotesque human head at the top of all. This was one of the famous “totem poles,” which indicate the tribe to which the owner belongs, and generally display an image of one or more ancestors. A thousand good American dollars could hardly purchase this ugly, worn, weather-beaten old pole from the natives who live in squalid poverty in the log hut behind it.

Here was another totem pole belonging to the chief of the Bear tribe. It had simply the figure of a crouching bear on the top, with prints of his feet carved in the wood leading up to it. Another had a raven in the same way. There was a huge wooden wolf set on the tomb of a prominent member of the “Wolves” – once a powerful Alaskan tribe.

“Do you suppose they would let us go inside their house?” whispered Adelaide to her brother, glancing timidly in at one of the open front doors.

“I’ll see,” he replied, and soon returned, laughing. “They don’t object in the least,” he said. “They seem used to visitors.”

Entering the door, the party found themselves in a large square room, which comprised the whole interior of the house. The floor was of earth, beaten hard, but a wooden platform, raised about two feet, ran around three sides. In the exact center was a smouldering fire of logs, the smoke finding its way out through a hole in the roof.

“Where do you sleep?” asked Rossiter.

Only one of the half-dozen natives who were seated around the fire could understand English.

“Bed,” she said, pointing to a heap of blankets lying on the raised platform in one corner of the room.

On the dingy walls of the little hut there hung a colored print of the Saviour’s face. All around were the strange heathen carvings and rude implements of the Alaskan native. The four posts which supported the roof were “totems,” representing in hideous caricature the tribe to which the inhabitants of the hut belonged. The natives themselves, slow of movement and speech, their dull eyes hardly glancing at the strangers, were grouped on the raised margin of the floor.

I said the faces were dull. There was one exception. A young mother bent over a solemn brown baby who lay, round-eyed and contented, in her lap. The girl’s eyes shone with mother-love; her dark hand was gentle as she smoothed Baby’s tumbled little blanket, and looked up shyly and proudly at the new-comers.

The child in its mother’s bosom; the Christ face upon the wall: these were the two points of light in that shadowy home. Christ, who came as a little child to Bethlehem, had sent a baby to Fort Wrangell, and a thought, vague and unformed though it was, of the Saviour whose face looked down upon the little group, from its rude frame upon the wall.

The girls waved their hands to the round little brown berry of a baby, and the mother laughed and looked pleased, just as a New England mother would. Mr. Selborne left in her hand a silver coin – “two bits,” everybody in Alaska called a quarter – and said good-by.

“What tribe do they belong to?” asked Randolph, as they emerged from the gloomy hut.

“Stickeen,” promptly replied Tom. “Let’s give ’em a sing.” And sing they did, until the solemn faces of the natives gathering about them on the beach, actually relaxed into the semblance of a smile.

Reaching the steamer once more, they displayed their treasures before Bess, who could not yet quite venture on a long walk.

There were toy paddles, with ravens’ and bears’ heads painted in red and black; horn spoons, dark and light, with finely carved profiles on the handle; great rough garnets, of which Tom had purchased half a handful for a song, and many other oddities. Of course the kodak army had been busy, but the results could not yet be seen. Many a Stickeen portrait and ugly totem lay snugly hidden in those black leather boxes, to be “developed,” printed and laughed over in gay city parlors the coming winter.

Just as the boat cast off her moorings, an Indian, fantastically dressed, appeared on the wharf, and gave a dance for the benefit of the departing passengers, who threw down bits of silver as the Queen once more started on her course.

As the heart of the great ship began to throb and she swung slowly out toward the sea, one tall, quiet-faced man stood upon the old wharf among the Indians, silently watching the departure of all that meant home and friends. He waved his hand and lifted his hat to some one on deck, then turned gravely, and with firm step walked back toward the straggling row of huts which sheltered the poor, degraded natives of Fort Wrangell.

“Who is that?” queried some one carelessly, and the answer came: “The missionary.”

It was Mr. Selborne who spoke last. He explained that he had just been talking with the man, who was doing noble work in this squalid, miserable community. His pay was a mere pittance, and the society supporting him were in sore need of funds for the establishment of a school or home for native children.

Rossiter paused.

“Let’s give them a helping hand,” said Mr. Percival, passing over a bill. Another and another fell into the hat that was sent around, and a few days afterward that missionary’s eyes filled with glad tears as he opened a package containing one hundred and thirty dollars for the needed Home, from the passengers of the Queen.

Another wonderfully beautiful evening followed the Wrangell experience. At half-past nine fine print could be read by daylight, and at eleven it was by no means dark.

The next day the steamer touched at Douglas Island, giving its passengers time for a run up to the richest gold mine in the world. In the early afternoon the Queen steamed across the strait to Juneau, only a few miles distant, and stopped there for the night.

It was a larger town than any they had yet seen in Alaska, and curved around a fine bay at the base of high mountains, on whose high slopes could be seen patches of snow and “young glaciers,” as Fred called them.

Mr. Selborne and his sister at once hunted up the Mission House, and had a long talk with Mrs. Willard, the brave and gentle lady who gave up a happy and comfortable home life in the East to help the Alaskan natives.

“One could listen to her stories all day and not tire of them,” said Rossiter to Mr. Percival afterward. “The sufferings and the superstitions of these poor creatures are almost incredible.”

Shortly after returning from the Mission, he mailed to Fort Wrangell the valuable letter of which we have spoken.

The young people scattered through the village as soon as the steamer was moored. Mr. Percival rode off with two gentlemen who met him upon the wharf, to look at the Silver Bow Basin gold mines, of which he was part owner.

Tom and Fred strolled along arm in arm, in front of the houses and stores that lined the beach, now and then stopping to speak to a native, or examine the trinkets and furs that were everywhere exposed for sale.

They were handling an unusually fine brown bear rug, when a curious-looking man, perhaps fifty years of age, halted by their side.

His hair and beard were long and rough, and his garments seemed to have been made for a wearer much shorter and stouter than himself. He was over six feet in height, and had a kindly, almost child-like look in his blue eyes, which, however, were keen as a hawk’s, looking out from under a pair of shaggy eyebrows.

“Pretty good pelt, that,” he remarked, running his hand over the skin. “Thinkin’ o’ buyin’?”

There was no mistaking the New England “Down East” accent, which reminded Tom of Ruel at “the Pines.”

“Well, hardly that,” answered Fred, taking the man for the proprietor of the store. “We thought we might price some of these rugs, though. How much do you ask for this one?”

“Bless ye!” exclaimed the other, with a good-natured laugh; “I don’t know nothin’ ’baout selling ’em. Ask the storekeeper in there.”

“Oh! I thought” – began Fred, blushing a little at his mistake.

“I see,” laughed their new friend; “ye took me for the owner. Wall, you war’n’t so fur aout o’ the way, either. I was the owner o’ that pelt, last fall.”

The boys waited for more; seeing which the hunter – for such he seemed to be – went on: “I shot that ’ar b’ar up ’n the Yukon valley, last September. He was jest lookin’ fer a place to den up, I reckon, when he run foul o’ my rifle,” he added, with a silent chuckle.

“What kind of a bear is it?” asked Tom. “A cinnamon?”

“Reg’lar cinnamon. Braown b’ar, some folks call ’em. They’re’s thick’s squirrels back in the maountings. But this was an extra fine one, an’ no mistake.”

Just then the storekeeper came out and greeted the party. “How do you do, gentlemen? Won’t you walk in? Finest skins in Juneau – no harm looking at ’em, whether you want to buy or not. Halloo, Solomon! round again? How soon do you start North?”

“Wall, in ’baout a month, I reckon. The musquiters are too thick to make it more’n half-comf’table in the woods jest naow.”

“That is Solomon Baranov, the best shot in these parts,” explained the storekeeper, leading the way into his shop. “He shoots and traps all the time except in the hottest months of the year. He could tell you some good bear stories, I reckon!”

“‘Baranov’? He’s not a Russian, is he?”

“Father was Russian, and mother a Yankee. She came from somewhere East, I’m told. Now, what can I show you in the way of furs or Indian curios, gentlemen? Look at that for a fox robe!”

The boys purchased a good gray wolf skin, handsomely mounted, knowing that Juneau was the best place in Alaska for buying fine furs. But they hurried out again as soon as this piece of business was transacted, anxious to renew their acquaintance with Baranov.

He was sitting on a raised platform at a little distance, smoking an old brierwood pipe, and talking seriously to a couple of black cubs, who gamboled clumsily about him, tugging at their chains and pushing their snouts into his capacious jacket pockets for eatables.

“Seems to me,” he was saying gravely as the boys came up, “I’d think o’ somethin’ else besides eatin’ all day. Haven’t ye got any ambition? Don’t it wear on ye bein’ tied up, instead o’ rootin’ raound in the woods I took ye from last March? Halloo, boys! Find a pelt ye liked?”

Tom opened his package and displayed the wolf skin.

“Very good, very good,” said the old hunter, running his hand through the fur. “An auk brought that in last winter. He got clawed up putty well, too, killin’ the critter.”

“I wish you’d tell us something about the hunting around here,” said Tom, as he and Fred flung themselves down beside the man.

“Tell ye somethin’! I’d show ye somethin’ ef we only hed time. Why, thar’s b’ars within three gunshot o’ this very spot, like’s not, back a piece on the maounting. How long d’ye stay here?”

“Only to-night.”

“Stoppin’ on the Queen?”

“Yes; with a big Excursion from Boston.”

“Wall, then, your Excursion won’t get away from Juneau before day after to-morrow evenin’, at the arliest.”

“What do you mean? How’s that?” cried both boys at once.

“Somethin’s given aout in the steamer’s machinery. I heard Cap’n Carroll say an hour ago that he must stop here to fix it, and ’twould take two days at least.”

“Then we could go with you. Will you take us?”

“Why, ef your folks is willin’, and you ain’t afraid of a long tramp, an’ wet feet, and mebbe a b’ar or two – an’ musquiters,” he added in a comical tone, “we could fix it so’s to git away arly to-morrow mornin’, camp one night, and be back before noon Thursday, ef nothin’ happened.”

“But we haven’t any guns” —

“Oh! two rifles is all we’d want in this craowd. Thar’s my piece at home, and I’d borrow one somewhars in Juneau.”

“Well, I tell you what, Fred,” shouted Tom, “if father’s willing we should go, we can have a big time, and perhaps kill a bear!”

“That’s so!” said Fred, catching fire from the other’s enthusiasm. “That’ll be seeing a bit of Alaska that isn’t down on the programme, eh?”

“Is your father raound?” asked Solomon, with a meditative puff at his pipe.

“He’s gone off to look at some mines.”

“H’m – ‘Silver Bow,’ I s’pose. When d’ye expect him back?”

“Before supper, he said. Where can we find you, Mr. – Mr.” —

“You c’n call me Solomon or Baranov, jest’s ye please,” said the hunter. “There ain’t no ‘mister’ to it. I’ll meet you here, or what’s better, I’ll be daown on the wharf at eight o’clock to-night. What’s your names?”

“Tom Percival and Fred Seacomb. I’ll bring my father with me.” And with mutual good-bys they parted for the afternoon.

Tom could think of nothing but the coming tramp, and dignified Fred displayed a degree of excitement which was, to say the least, unusual. The girls looked anxious when they heard the plan, but admitted that if they were boys it would be great fun.

“Of course,” remarked Tom, “you’ll be awfully lonesome without us, that day and a half. But you must bear up under it.”

“We’ll try,” said Kittie demurely. “But if you go, we shall expect a good bear skin apiece, to pay for the lonesomeness.”

“Don’t let ’em put their paws on your shoulders, Tom,” counseled Randolph solemnly.

“Nor try to pacify them with sugar,” added Pet, to whom Randolph had basely confided the story of his cousin’s adventure at Glacier Station.

In the midst of the laughter, Mr. Percival arrived.

“Father, we want to go off on a bear-hunt,” began Tom, all in a breath. “Of course you’re willing, aren’t you, sir? And Solomon says” —

“Wait, wait,” laughed Mr. Percival, taking a seat on a stool – for this conversation took place on the deck of the Queen, just in front of the open stateroom doors – “who is it that wants to go on a bear-hunt? Bess, I suppose, and Miss Selborne?”

They all shouted at this, Adelaide as merrily as the rest.

“Oh! I don’t want to hunt bears, Mr. Percival,” she cried. “Nothing short of elephants will do for me.”

Then they all began talking at once, and at last Mr. Percival obtained some clear idea of the plan. He looked grave.

“I’ll see Captain Carroll first,” he said, “and then I’ll talk with your friend, Baranov.” And that was all the satisfaction he would give the eager young hunters.

The captain, who seemed to know all the old miners, traders and hunters on the coast, must have given Mr. Percival a good report of Solomon, for the father’s face cleared as he talked with the bluff commander of the Queen.

Supper over, all the interested parties descended to the wharf, where, in due time, the old hunter made his appearance.

Tom performed the necessary introductions, and for ten minutes there was an earnest conversation between the two men, as to the proposed trip. The boys watched every turn and gesture, as they talked. Randolph had been asked to join the party, but he was greatly interested in the new works at the mine, and preferred to spend the day in visiting the Basin and going through the great half-mile tunnel in which the gold was to be drawn off by the “placer” process.

“Tom,” said Mr. Percival, wheeling around suddenly on his heel, “I have decided to let you go. Baranov says he will take good care of you; and Captain Carroll tells me he always keeps his word.”

Solomon inclined his head gravely, but smoked in silence.

“You will start at three o’clock to-morrow morning,” added Mr. Percival. “Solomon will bring all the necessary outfit for the trip, including an extra rifle.”

“Good-night,” said Baranov, moving off in a leisurely manner, as if he had engaged to step across the street, rather than take charge of two inexperienced city boys on a twenty-mile tramp over the mountain.