Kitabı oku: «The Gaunt Gray Wolf», sayfa 10

XXI
THE RIFLED CACHE

The cold of February, intense, searching, deadly, tightened its grip upon the wilderness, sapping the life of the three struggling human derelicts–for derelicts Shad Trowbridge felt himself and his two companions to be–as they fought their way, now hopefully, now despondently, but ever with slower pace, as strength ebbed, toward the precious cache on the shores of the Great Lake; and with the slower progress that growing weakness demanded, it was quickly found necessary to reduce by half the already minute portion of dried caribou meat allotted to each.

Everything in the world save only themselves seemed to have been frozen into oblivion. There was no sound, save the monotonous swish, swish of their own snowshoes, to disturb the silence–a silence otherwise as absolute and vast as the uttermost depths of the grave.

Storms overtook them, but they mercifully were storms of short duration, and seldom interfered with hours of travel. Staggering, but ever struggling forward, they forced their way painfully on and on, over pitiless windswept ridges, across life-sapping, desolate barrens, through scarcely less inhospitable forests. Exerting their waning strength to its utmost, they never stopped, save when exhausted nature compelled them to halt for brief intervals of sleep and rest, to recuperate their wasted energies.

Shad Trowbridge came finally to wonder vaguely if he were not dead, this another existence, and be doomed to keep going and going through endless ages over endless reaches of snow. To his numbed intellect it seemed that he had been thus going for months and years.

Like a vague, pleasant dream of something experienced in a previous life, he remembered Bob and the tilts, Wolf Bight farther back, and the dear old college. What would the fellows say now, if they were to see him–the fellows who had known him in that former, happier life?

At other times he fancied he heard Ungava Bob and the others hallooing in the distance, and he would answer in glad, expectant shouts. But there never came a reply.

The first time this occurred Manikawan turned and looked inquiringly at him, through eyes sunk deep in their sockets. When it was repeated later–and he came to hear the voices and to shout to the empty snow wastes at least once every day–she would step to his side, solicitously touch his shoulder and say:

"The friend of White Brother of the Snow hears the voices of the Matchi Manitu of Hunger. Let him close his ears and be deaf, for the Matchi Manitu is mocking him."

Mookoomahn's face was not pleasant to see now; it was horrible–the dark skin was drawn tight over the high cheek bones, the lips shrunken to the gums, and the eyes fallen far back into the skull. His face resembled more than anything else the smoked and dried skull of a mummy.

Shad laughed sometimes when he looked at Mookoomahn's ghastly face, framed in a mass of long, straggling black hair; at other times he was overcome with a heart-rending pity for Mookoomahn that brought tears to his eyes. But tears froze, and were annoying and painful.

Manikawan, too, had changed woefully. The lean, gaunt figure stalking along uncomplainingly with Shad and Mookoomahn had small resemblance to the beautiful, commanding Manikawan that bade Bob and Shad be patient in their imprisonment on the island until she returned to relieve them; or the glowing, happy Manikawan that accompanied Shad and the others to the river tilt after she had accomplished the rescue. Though there still burned within her an unquenchable fire of energy, and she never lagged on the trail, she was no longer the Manikawan of old.

In spite of all the hardships and all the pain, and slowly starving as she was, she never ceased her attention to Shad, and she never once lost her patience with him.

When Shad laughed hysterically and derisively at his fate, as he did sometimes, Manikawan would step to his side, touch him lightly with her hand, and say in the same old voice, lower than of old, but even more musical and sweet:

"The friend of White Brother of the Snow is brave. He is not a coward. He is not afraid to die."

This always had a magical, soothing effect upon Shad. Though he never learned to interpret her language, the touch of the hand, the human note of encouragement in her voice, the light in the eyes that looked into his, never failed to recall him to his manhood and to himself, and to the remembrance of his vow that as a white man he must by mere force of will prove his superiority.

All record of time was lost. But the days were visibly lengthening with each sunrise and sunset, and when the wind did not blow to freeze them, and the snow did not drift to blind them, the sunshine gave forth a hint–just a hint–of warmth.

One day the dead silence was suddenly startled by the long-drawn-out howl of a wolf. It was a blood-curdling and almost human cry, and Shad likened it to the agonised cry of a lost soul in the depths of eternal torment. Again and again it sounded, then suddenly ceasing, Shad discovered the animal itself trotting leisurely after them far in the rear, and a feeling of fellowship–of pity–welled up in his bosom.

But when he discovered the creature still following them the next day, now so near that he could see its lolling red tongue, its lean sides, and ugly fangs, he became possessed with a feeling of revulsion toward it. Then he fancied it the embodied Spirit of Starvation stalking them and awaiting an opportunity to destroy them. This fancy gave birth to a consuming, intense hatred of the thing. Finally it attained the proportions of a mocking, tantalising demon.

Cunningly he watched for a moment when it was well within rifle shot, and drawing his rifle from the toboggan he dropped upon a knee, aimed carefully, and pulled the trigger. The frost-clogged firing pin did not respond, and the wolf, seeming to understand its peril, slunk away unharmed.

Shad had seen it plainly–its repulsive gray sides so lank that they seemed almost to meet, its red, hungry tongue lolling from its ugly mouth, its cruel white fangs, and its malevolent, gleaming eyes. His hatred for the creature became an obsession, for it appeared again presently, persistently following, but now keeping at a respectful distance.

On the third day, however, the wolf had forgotten its temporary timidity, and with increased boldness stole steadily upon their heels. With a patience quite foreign to him Shad waited, glancing behind constantly, but making no demonstration until the wolf, apparently satisfied that it had little to fear from the hunger-stricken plodders, trotted boldly up and took a place behind them, so near that if the rifle failed at the first snap there would be opportunity for a second attempt before the beast could pass out of range.

Shad again stopped, and seizing the rifle discovered that the beast had also stopped and stood glaring at him, mocking and unafraid. As though, knowing their weakness, it had lost respect for their power to injure it.

A mighty rage took possession of Shad. He fell to his knee again, aimed carefully, and again pulled the trigger. This time there was a report, and in an insane frenzy of delight he beheld the carcass of the tantalising creature stretched upon the snow.

Mookoomahn and Manikawan had halted, and stood in breathless silence watching the result of Shad's shot. Now with an exclamation of pleasure from Mookoomahn the two rushed forward, knives in hand, and in an incredibly short time the carcass of the wolf was quartered, a fire lighted, and some of the meat cooking.

It was a lean, scrawny wolf, and the meat tough and stringy, but to the famished travellers it meant life, and Shad thought the half-cooked piece which Mookoomahn doled to him as his share the sweetest morsel he had ever eaten.

The wolf meat, carefully husbanded, supplied food until one morning Mookoomahn by a series of signs conveyed the information to Shad that they were within one day's march of the cache. Then they ate the last of it, that it might give them strength for the final effort.

It was evening, but not yet dark, when familiar landmarks told Shad that they were nearing the goal, and a little later they halted where the poles of Sishetakushin's lodge stood in the edge of the woods above the lake shore.

With furious haste Shad and Mookoomahn rushed to the cache, but suddenly stopped, aghast and stupefied. The cache had been rifled of its contents, and lying near it, half covered with snow, lay the frozen, emaciated body of an Indian.

XXII
MANIKAWAN'S SACRIFICE

An examination of the surroundings made it plain that a band of eastern Mountaineer or Mingen Indians, in a starving condition, had visited the place; that one of them, already too far exhausted to be revived, had died; that the others, taking the food, had left his body uncared for and fled.

The disappointment was quite beyond expression. Had they been in good physical condition, a short three days' travel would now have carried them to the river tilt and safety. In their present weakened and starved condition at least twice that time would be consumed in the journey, and no food remained to help them on their way.

In deep depression Shad assisted Manikawan to stretch the deerskin covering upon the lodge, while Mookoomahn gathered wood for the fire. Clumsy with weakness, dizzy with disappointment, Shad reached to spread the skin, his snowshoes became entangled, he stumbled and fell. When he attempted to rise he discovered to his dismay that he had wrenched a knee, and when he attempted to walk he was scarcely able to hobble into the lodge.

The last bare chance of life fled, the last thread of flickering hope broken, Shad sank down, little caring for the pain, numb with a certainty of quickly impending death. He could not keep the pace of the Indians. He could not travel at all, and he could neither ask nor expect that they do otherwise than proceed as usual after a period of rest, and leave him to his fate.

Very early in the morning Shad heard a movement in the lodge, and realised that Mookoomahn and Manikawan were engaged in low and earnest conversation. This meant, he was sure, that they were going.

He vaguely wondered whether they would take the lodge with them and leave him to die the more quickly in the intense cold of the open, or whether they would leave it behind them as a weight now too great to be hauled farther upon their toboggan.

He did not care much. He was resigned to his fate. He suffered now no pain of body, save an occasional twitch of the knee when he moved. The hunger pain had gone. It would be sweet and restful, after all, to lie there and die peacefully. It would end the struggle for existence. There would be no more weary plodding over boundless snow wastes. The end of hope was the end of trouble and pain.

With his acceptance of the inevitable, and resignation to his fate, a great lassitude fell upon him. He was overcome with a drowsiness, and as the swish, swish of retreating snowshoes fell upon his ears he dropped into a heavy sleep.

It must have been hours later when Shad opened his eyes to behold sitting opposite him, across the fire, Manikawan. She smiled when she saw that he was awake, and he thought how thin and worn she looked, a mere shadow of the Manikawan he had first known.

Then there dawned upon his slowly-waking brain a realisation of the situation. She had resigned her chance of life to remain with him. He could not permit this. It was a useless waste of life. There was still hope that she might reach the tilts and safety. By remaining with him she was deliberately rejecting a possible opportunity to preserve herself. Much perturbed by this discovery, Shad sat up.

"Mookoomahn?" he asked, pointing toward the south.

"Mookoomahn," she answered, pointing in the same direction. "Manikawan," pointing at the fire, to indicate that Mookoomahn had gone but she had remained.

He protested by signs that she should follow Mookoomahn. He passed around the fire to where she sat, and grasped her arm in his bony fingers, in an attempt to compel her to do so; but she stubbornly shook her head, and, forced to submit, he resumed his seat. Both sorry and glad that he should not be left alone, he reached over and pressed her hand as an indication of his appreciation of her self-sacrifice.

Then she dipped from a kettle by the fire a cup of liquid, which she handed him. He sipped it, and, discovering that it was a weak broth, drank it. He looked at her inquiringly.

Turning again to the pail, she drew forth half a boiled ptarmigan, which she passed him.

"Let the friend of White Brother of the Snow eat. It is little, and it will not drive away the Spirit of Hunger, but it will help to keep away the evil Spirit of Starvation until White Brother of the Snow brings food to his friend."

He accepted it and ate, not ravenously, for his hunger now was not consuming, but with delicious relish. Manikawan did not eat, but he presumed that she had already had a like portion.

Shad was able to hobble, though with considerable pain, in and out of the lodge, and to assist in getting wood for the fire, and so far as she would permit him to do so he relieved her of the task.

The following morning and for four successive mornings the cup of broth and the portion of ptarmigan awaited him when he awoke. It was evident Manikawan had killed them with bow and arrow.

He never saw her eat. It was quite natural that she should have done so before he awoke of mornings, for he made no attempt at early rising.

But he noted with alarm that Manikawan was daily growing weaker. She staggered woefully at times when she walked, like one intoxicated. She was weaker than he, but this he ascribed to his stronger mentality.

By sheer force of will he put aside the insistent weakness, which he knew would get the better of him were he to resign himself to it. By the same force of will he injected into his being a degree of physical energy. But he was a white man, she only an Indian, and this could not be expected of her.

Then there came a day when he awoke to find her gone, and no broth or ptarmigan awaiting him. Later she tottered into the lodge, and empty-handed laid her bow and arrow aside.

The next morning she was lying prone, and the fire was nearly out, for the wood was gone.

"Poor girl," he said, "she is tired and has overslept;" and stealthily, that he might not disturb her, he stole out for the needed wood.

She was awake when he returned, and she tried to rise, but fell helplessly back upon her bed of boughs.

"Manikawan is weak like a little child," she said, in a low, uncertain voice. "But White Brother of the Snow will soon come. The suns are rising and setting. He will soon come. Let the friend of White Brother of the Snow have courage."

Shad brewed her some strong tea–a little still remaining. She drank it, and the hot stimulant presently gave her renewed strength.

But Shad was not deceived. Manikawan's words had sounded to him a prophecy of the impending end. Her voice and her rapidly failing strength told him that the Spirit of Hunger–the Gaunt Gray Wolf–was conquering; that the spirit most dreaded of all the spirits, Death, stood at last at the portal of the lodge, waiting to enter.

XXIII
TUMBLED AIR CASTLES

With the strengthening cold that came with January and continued into February, the animals ceased to venture far from their lairs in search of food, and the harvest of the trails was therefore light. With the disappearance of rabbits, the fox and lynx had also disappeared. The rabbit is the chief prey of these animals during the tight midwinter months, and as the wolf follows the caribou, so the fox follows the rabbit.

With the going of the fox the field of operations was not only narrowed, but the work was robbed of much of its zest. When foxes are fairly numerous the trapper is always buoyed with the hope that a black or silver fox, the most valuable of the fur-bearing animals, may wander into his traps; and this hope renders less irksome the weary tramping of the trails at seasons when the returns might otherwise seem too small a recompense for the hardships and isolation suffered.

The two preceding years had yielded rich harvests to Dick Blake, and had more than fulfilled his modest expectations. He was, therefore, though certainly disappointed, far from discouraged with the present outlook, and very cheerfully accepted the few marten and mink pelts that fell to his lot as a half loaf by no means to be despised.

While Ungava Bob had looked forward to a successful winter's trapping, his chief object in coming so far into the wilderness had been the establishment of his new trails as a basis for future trading operations; and more particularly, therefore, with a view to the future than to the immediate present. Neither was he, for this reason, in any wise discouraged. His youthful mind, engaged in planning the castles he was to build tomorrow, had no room for the disappointments of to-day.

Sishetakushin had given Bob the assurance that the Nascaupees would bring him their furs to barter. He was satisfied, also, that he could secure a large share of the trade of the Eastern, or Bay, Mountaineer Indians, for he would pay a fair and reasonable price for their furs, and they would quickly recognise the advantage of trading with him. And he would have another advantage over the coast traders: he would establish a trading station in the very heart of the wilderness, in the midst of the Indian hunting country.

Previous to his coming into his little fortune his father had, as far back as Bob could remember, been struggling under a load of debt. At times the family had been plunged into the very uttermost depths of poverty; and even now a sickening dread stole upon Bob as he recalled some of the winters through which they had passed when the factor at the post had refused them further credit, and the flour barrel at home was empty, and they could scarcely have survived had it not been for the bounty of Douglas Campbell.

This was the condition still with many of the families of the Bay. They were always in debt to the Company for advances of provisions, and there was no hope that they could ever emerge from the deplorable condition. It was the policy of the Company that they should not.

In accepting credit from the Company, the trapper placed himself under obligation to deliver to the Company every product of his labours until the debt was discharged. The Company allowed the trapper in return for his pelts such an amount as it saw fit. He had no word in the matter, and of necessity was compelled to accept the Company's valuation of his furs, which valuation the Company took good care to place so low as to obviate any probability of his release from debt. At a reasonable valuation of their furs, there was seldom a year that most, if not all, the Bay trappers might not have been freed from their serfdom.

Thus when a trapper died his only inheritance to his children was a burden of debt, which sometimes passed down from generation to generation; for the son who refused to assume his father's debt was denied credit or consideration at the Company's stores.

The Grays, as we have stated, had felt the heavy hand of this inquisitional system. Now that they were free, Bob's sympathy was poured out to his neighbours, and he was secretly planning how, when he became a trader, he might also compass their release.

As rapidly as his profits would permit, Bob was determined to advance, first to one family, then to another, sufficient cash to discharge their debts and relieve them from their obligation to the Company.

Then he would advance them the necessary provisions and supplies to sustain them until they returned from their trails with their hunt. He would buy their pelts at as high a price as he could afford with a reasonable profit. This price would always be certainly double, and often four or five times, that which the Company was accustomed to allow.

Bob, thus forming his Utopian plans, forgot the tedium of the trail. No person is so happy as when doing something to make some other person happy. And Bob was happy because he believed he was to be the means of bringing happiness to many. Making a comfortable living himself, he would make it possible for his neighbours to make a comfortable living, also.

It never occurred to him that failure was possible, or that, with the amount of capital which he believed was still at his disposal, the plan was unpractical. Young, highly optimistic, and somewhat visionary, his dreams assumed the status of reality.

Bob's mind was thus pleasantly occupied when at the end of the first week in February he returned to the river tilt to find Ed Matheson and Bill Campbell back from Eskimo Bay, and Dick Blake, just in from his trail, drawing off his frost-encrusted adicky.

"An' there's Bob, now!" exclaimed Ed, as Bob appeared in the doorway.

"'Tis grand, now, t' see you back," said Bob, his face beaming welcome as he shook the hands of the returned travellers. "Dick an' me's been missin' you wonderful."

"'Twere grand, now, t' see th' tilt when Bill an' me comes in last evenin'. 'Twere th' hardest pull up from th' Bay with our loads we ever has, an' we was tired enough t' drop when we gets here. Where's Shad?"

"Wi' th' Injuns yet, an' I'm worryin' about he not comin' back. They must ha' gone a long ways down north lookin' for deer, or they'd been back before this. How'd you find th' folks at th' Bay, Ed?"

"Fine–all of un fine. Your mother's wantin' wonderful bad t' see you. But when I tells she you'm all right, she stops worryin'. I were forgettin' t' say anything about th' trouble wi' th' Mingens, though;" and Ed grinned.

"Forgettin' a purpose?" asked Bob, smiling.

"Maybe so," admitted Ed. "What's past don't do nobody no good t' know when they's nothin' for un t' make right. 'Twouldn't ha' helped none for she t' know about th' Mingens, so I just naturally forgets un."

"I'm glad o' that. Mother'd 'a' worried an' been thinkin' all sorts o' things happenin' what never would happen;" and, greatly relieved, Bob asked, "An' when'd you make th' Bay?"

"'Twere just New Year. Bill an' me cruises along fast, bein' light, an' takin' short sleeps. 'Twere night when we gets t' Wolf Bight, an' I says t' Bill, says I: ''Tis near midnight, an' likewise t' th' New Year. They'll be sleepin', an' le's's wake un up shootin' th' New Year in like all creation.'

"Gettin' alongside th' winder, we lets go till our rifles is empty, and then rushin' in th' door yells, 'Happy New Year!' They was awake, all right, wonderin' what in time an' creation were turned loose on un, we yellin' like a passel o' Injuns. They was glad t' see us.

"Bill goes home t' Kenemish with daylight, an' your father takes me t' th' post wi' dogs an' komatik, your mother goin' along, an' I gets home th' evenin'."

"Were they goin' right back home?"

"No, they 'bides t' th' post with Tom Black's folks till th' end o' th' week, an' Bessie goes back with un t' be company with your mother. Oh, I were forgettin'! Here's somethin' your mother were sendin';" and Ed reached under the bunk and drew forth a package.

Upon opening the package Bob discovered a quantity of sweet cakes, a loaf of plum bread, and a letter. He passed the cakes around, then drawing up to the candle proceeded at once to read hungrily his mother's letter.

It was a message of love and encouragement, closing with the news of the bank failure and consequent loss of the little fortune with which he had planned to do so many things. Presently looking up he said, in a shaking voice:

"Why–Ed–Mother's sayin' th' bank's broke–an' all our money's gone."

"Aye," admitted Ed, his voice sympathetic and sorrowful. "'Tis broke, lad–I were hopin' she wouldn't write you that, an' you wouldn't know till you gets home. But don't worry about un, now, lad. 'Twon't do no good. If you hadn't known about un now, you wouldn't be worryin' about un. An' now you knows, 'twon't help none."

"I suppose you're right, Ed. But 'twill be hard not t' worry. I were plannin' so."

"'Tain't so bad as t' have some o' your folks die, now. An' I been noticin' all my life that sometimes things happens t' me I thinks is 'most more'n I can stand, an' I feels like givin' up. Then somethin' comes along that's better'n anything I ever thought o' gettin'. An' then when I thinks un out, I finds th' good couldn't ha' come without me havin' th' trouble first. So don't get feelin' too bad about un, Bob. This may be just openin' th' way for some wonderful good luck better 'n all th' money you loses," soothed Ed.

There was a postscript which Bob had overlooked. Now in folding the letter his eye caught it and he read it–a brief line added by Bessie, telling him not to think too much about his loss, for she was sure it would all be well in the end, and not to forget it was the Lord's will or it could not have happened, adding, "Remember, Bob, the Lord is always near you."

Nevertheless, Bob was very quiet at supper. He could not forget his tumbled air castles. He could not forget the fact that the returns from the present year's trapping would be insufficient to buy the next year's outfit.

"They was a band o' Injuns comes t' th' post just before I leaves, pretty nigh on their last legs," remarked Ed, when they had finished eating and he had lighted his pipe. "They was about as nigh starved as any passel o' men I ever seen, an' if they'd been starved much more they'd been dead. I hears some o' th' band did die before these gets out."

"Who were they?" asked Bob.

"Mountaineers," answered Ed. "They was back in th' country huntin', but don't find th' deer. They's camped down t' th' post now."

"Did you hear where 'bouts they was huntin'?" inquired Dick. "In th' nu'th'ard or s'uth'ard?"

"They all comes from th' nu'th'ard and west'ard o' th' post," said Ed. "They tells me they finds it th' worst year for fur an' game up that way they ever seen, an' I tells un 'tis th' same here."

"I wonders, now, how Shad an' th' Injuns he's with is makin' out. They'll be wonderful bad off, an' they don't run on th' deer," suggested Dick.

"They'll be likely t' find un up where they finds un when I was with un," reassured Bob, "but 'tis a long cruise there an' back."

Bob's loss was a keen disappointment to him. For several days it robbed him of ambition, and he tramped along the trails and attended to his traps dully and methodically, with a heavy heart. Then he began to say to himself:

"'Tis th' Lard's way. 'Tweren't right for me to go tradin' or t' have th' money, an' th' Lord knowin' it takes th' money away."

This thought, with his natural buoyancy of temperament, restored again to a large extent his interest and ambition in his work; and when he remembered that he was, after all, the owner of two unencumbered trails, with all their traps, he almost forgot his disappointment–but not altogether; that was impossible.

With the end of February ptarmigans began to reappear among the willows along the river bank. They were welcomed by the trappers, for they supplied a much needed variety to the diet. They offered hope, too, that the period of famine was nearing its end.

Ed Matheson's report of the condition of the Indians appearing at the Eskimo Bay post gave the men food for thought. When they gathered again at the river tilt two weeks later, the chief subject of conversation was Shad's continued absence, and many speculations were put forth as to the probable movements of Shad and their Indian friends. Whether or not they were likely to find caribou, where they would go and what they would be likely to do should they fail, were questions which they discussed at length. And they did not conceal from one another the fact that they were deeply concerned for Shad's safety.

When the trappers gathered again at the rendezvous on Friday, the sixth of March, they fully expected that Shad would be there to greet them, but they were disappointed. His failure to appear at this late date excited alarm, but no course of action that would be in the least likely to lead to results presented itself.

They agreed that the Indians had beyond doubt left a cache at the Great Lake, for Sishetakushin had stated to Bob that he would do so; and upon returning to that point it was believed Shad would have sufficient food to proceed to the river tilt. Any search beyond the Great Lake would be fruitless, for none could know in what direction to search.

Still there was no Shad on Friday, the twentieth of March. They ate their supper and resumed their speculations.

"I'm thinkin', now, t' make a cruise t' th' place where th' Injuns was camped when I left un," declared Bob. "If they ain't there, I'll come back, unless I sees signs of un. And, anyway, 'twill make me feel better."

"An' I'll go along," said Ed. "We'll be startin' in th' mornin' early, an' we may's well get our stuff out t'-night, ready t' pack."

They had blown out the candle and were lying in their bunks, discussing still Shad's long absence, when the door of the tilt was pushed quietly open and the figure of a man appeared in the moonlight at the entrance.

They sprang from their bunks, and Ed Matheson, striking a match, applied it to a candle. As the light flared up the man entered, and Mookoomahn stood before them.