Early in the evening of the fourth day afterWaseche Bill's departure for the unknown Lillimuit Connie Morgan swung McDougall's ten-dog team into Eagle.
The boy, heeding the advice of Black Jack Demaree, had curbed his impatience and religiously held himself to a ten-hour schedule, and the result was easily apparent in the way the dogs dashed up the steep trail and swung into the well-packed street of the big camp.
In front of a wooden building marked "Post Office," he halted. A large man, just emerging from the door, stared in amusement at the tinyparka-clad figure that confronted him.
"Hello, son!" he called. "Where might you be headin' fer?"
"I'm hunting for Waseche Bill," the youngster replied. "Have you seen him?"
"That'll be Scotty McDougall's team," observed the man.
"Yes, but have you seen Waseche?"
"You'll be Sam Morgan's boy," the man continued.
"Yes, sir."
"Well, come on along up to thehotel."
"Is Waseche there?" eagerly inquired the boy.
"Well, no, he ain't jes' right there, this very minute," replied the man, evasively.
"Where has he gone?" asked the boy, with a sudden fear in his heart.
"Oh, jes' siyou'd out on a little prospectin' trip. Come on, I'll give ye a hand with the dogs—supper'll be about ready."
That evening Connie Morgan found himself the centre of an interested group of miners—rough, kindly men, who welcomed him warmly, asked the news of Ten Bow, and recounted in awkward, hesitating sentences stories of his father. Before turning into the bunk assigned to him, the boy sought out the proprietor of the hotel, who sat in the centre of an interested group, discussing local politics with a man from Circle.
"I'll pay my bill now, because I want to hit the trail before breakfast," he said, producing the well-filled pouch that Black Jack Demaree had thrust into his hand. Big Jim Sontag chuckled way back in his beard as he regarded his littlest guest.
"Go 'long, yo', sonny! Shove yo' poke in yo' pocket. Yo' welcome to stop undeh my roof long as yo' want to. Why, if I was to cha'ge yo' fo' boa'd an' lodgin' afteh what yo' pap done fo' me, up on Tillimik—hope the wolves'll eat me, hide an' taller!"
The man called Joe came around the stove and stood looking down at the boy.
"Look here, son, where you aimin' to hit fer so early in the mornin'?"
"Why, to find Waseche, of course!" The boy seemed surprised at the question.
"To the Lillimuit!" someone gasped, but Joe silenced him.
"Son," he said, speaking slowly, "Waseche Bill's struck out fer the Lillimuit—the country where men don't come back from. Waseche's a man—an' a good one. He knows what he's up agin', an' if he wants to take a chanct that's hisbusiness. But, jes' between us, Waseche won't come back." The boy's small shoulders stiffened and his eyes flashed, as the little face uptilted to look into the man's eyes.
"If Waseche don't come back, then I don't come back either!" he exclaimed. "He's mypardner! I'vegotto find him!"
"That's what I call aman!" yelled Fiddle Face, bringing his fist down upon the table with a bang.
"Jes' the same, sonny," continued Joe, firmly, "we can't let ye go. We owes it to you, an' we owes it to Sam Morgan. They's too many a good man's bones layin' somewhere amongst them fiendish peaks an' passes, now. No, son, you c'n stay in Eagle as long as you like, an' welcome. Or, you c'n hit the trail fer Ten Bow. But you can't strike out fer the Lillimuit—an' that goes!" There was finality in the man's tone, and one swift glance into the faces of the others told the boy that they were of the same mind, to a man. For the first time in his life, Connie Morganfaced the opposition of men. Instinctively he knew that every man in the room was his friend, but never in his life had he felt so helplessly alone. What could one small boy do in the face of the ultimatum of these men of the North? Tears rushed to his eyes and, for a moment, threatened to overflow upon his cheeks, but, in that moment, there arose before him the face of Waseche Bill—his "pardner." The little fists clenched, the grey eyes narrowed, forcing back the hot tears, and the tiny jaw squared to the gritting of his teeth.
What could one small boy do in the face of the ultimatum of these men of the North?"What could one small boy do in the face of the ultimatum of these men of the North?"
"Good-night," he said, and selecting a candlefrom among the many on top of the rude desk, disappeared down the dark corridor between the rows of stall-like rooms.
"Jes' fo' all the wo'ld like Sam Mo'gan," drawled big Jim Sontag. "I've sawhiseyes squinch up, an' his jaw clamp shut, that-a-way, a many a time—an' nary time but somethin' happened. We've shore got to keep an eye on that young un, 'cause he aims to give us the slip in the mo'nin'."
"Ye said somethin', then, Jim," agreed Fiddle Face, gnawing at his mustache. "The kid's got sand, an' he's game plumb through, an' when he starts somethin' he aims to finish it—which like his dad used to."
Connie Morgan, for all his tender years, knew men. He knew, when he left the group about the stove, that they would expect him to try to slip out of Eagle, and that if he waited until morning he would have no chance in the world of eluding their vigilance. Minutes counted, for he also knew that once on the trail, he need have nofear of pursuit; for no team in the Yukon country, save only Dutch Henry's Hudson Bays, could come anywhere near the trail record of McDougall's ten gauntmalamutes.
Pausing only long enough in the little room with its scrawling "No. 27" painted on the door to wriggle into hisparkaand snatch his cap from the bunk, he stole cautiously down the narrow passage leading to the rear of the ell, where a small door opened directly into the stockade. With feverish haste he harnessed the dogs and opened the gate. In the shadow of the building he paused and peered anxiously up and down the street. No one was in sight and, through the heavily frosted windows of the buildings, dull squares of light threw but faint illumination upon the deserted thoroughfare.
"Mush! Mush!" he whispered, swinging the long team out onto the hard-packed snow.
As he passed a store the door opened and a man stood outlined in the patch of yellow light. Connie's heart leaped to his throat,but the man only stared in evident surprise that any one would be hitting the trail at that time of night, and then the door closed and the boy breathed again. He wished that he could stop and lay in a supply of grub, but dared not risk it. Better pay twice the price to some prospector, or trapper, than risk being stopped.
Silently the sled glided over the smooth trail and slanted out onto the river with Boris, Mutt, and Slasher capering in its wake.
Connie had only a vague notion as to the location of the unknown Lillimuit. He knew that it lay somewhere among the unmapped headwaters of Peel River, and that he must head up the Tatonduk and cross a divide. Toward morning he halted at the mouth of a river that flowed in from the north-east. A little-used trail was faintly discernible and the boy called the old lead dog.
"Go find Waseche, Boris!" he cried, "go find him!" Notwithstanding the fact that Waseche's trail was nearly five days old, the old dog sniffedat the snow and, with a joyous yelp, headed up the smaller river.
The next morning there was consternation in Eagle, and a half-dozen dog sleds hit the trail. About ten miles up the Tatonduk, the men of Eagle met a half-breed trapper with an empty sled.
"Any one pass ye, goin' up?" asked Joe.
The trapper grinned.
"Yeste'day," he answered, "white man papoose"; he held his hand about four feet from the snow. "Ten-dog team—Mush! Mush! Mush! Go like de wolf! Stop on my camp. Buy all de grub. Nev' min' de cost—hur' up! He try for catch white man, go by four sleeps ago." Joe cracked his whip and the dogs leaped forward.
"You no catch!" the half-breed shouted. "Papoose, him go! go! go! Try for mak' Lillimuit. Him no come back."
Disregarding the prediction of the half-breed, Joe, Fiddle Face, and big Jim Sontag continued their pursuit of the flying dog team, despite thefact that as they progressed the trail grew colder. After many days they came to the foot of the great white divide and camped beneath overcast skies, and in the morning a storm broke with unbelievable fury.
Every man, woman, and child in eastern Alaska remembers the great blizzard that whirled out of the north on the morning of the third of December and raged unabated for four days, ceased as suddenly as it started, and then, for four days more, roared terrifically into the north again.
On the ninth day, the three men burrowed from their shelter at the foot of a perpendicular cliff. The trail was obliterated, and on every hand they were confronted by huge drifts from ten to thirty feet in height, while above them, clinging precariously to the steep side of the mountain that divided them from the dreaded unknown, were vast ridges of snow that momentarily threatened to tear loose and bury them beneath a mighty avalanche.
Silently the men stared into each other's faces, and then—silently, for none dared trust himself to speak—these big men of the North harnessed their dogs and began the laborious homeward journey with heavy hearts.
And, at that very moment, a small boy, eighty miles beyond the impassable barrier of the snow-capped divide, tunnelled through a huge drift that sealed the mouth of an ice cavern in the side of an inland glacier, and looked out upon the bewildering tangle of gleaming peaks. Thanks to the unerring nose of old Boris, and the speed of McDougall's sled dogs, the trail of Waseche had each day become warmer, and the night before the storm, when Connie camped in the convenient ice-cavern, he judged his partner to be only a day ahead. When the storm continued day after day, he chafed at the delay, but comforted himself with the thought that Waseche must also camp.
As he stood at the mouth of his cave gazingat the unfamiliar mountains, towering range upon range, with their peaks glittering in the cold rays of the morning sun, old Boris crowded past him and plunged into the unbroken whiteness of the little valley. Round and round he circled with lowered head. Up and down the jagged ice wall of the glacier he ran, sniffing the snow and whining with eagerness to pick up the trail that he had followed for so many days. And as the boy watched him, a sudden fear clutched at his heart. For instead of starting off with short, joyous yelps of confidence, the old dog continued his aimless circling, and at length, as if giving up in despair, sat upon his haunches, pointed his sharp muzzle skyward, and lifted his voice in howl after quavering howl of disappointment.
"The trail is buried," groaned the boy, "and I had almost caught up with him!" He glanced hopelessly up and down the valley, realizing for the first time that the landmarks of the back trail were obliterated. His eyes narrowed and he gritted his teeth:
"I'll find him yet," he muttered. "My Dad always played in hard luck—but he neverquit! I'll find Waseche—but, if I don't find him, the big men back there that knew Sam Morgan—they'll know Sam Morgan's boy was no quitter, either!" He turned away from the entrance and began to harness the dogs.
Way down the valley, high on the surface of the glacier, Waseche Bill stopped suddenly to listen. Faint and far, a sound was borne to his ears through the thin, cold air. He jerked back hisparkahood and strained to catch the faint echo. Again he heard it—the long, bell-like howl of a dog—and as he listened, the man's face paled, and a strange prickling sensation started at the roots of his hair and worked slowly along his spine. For this man of the North knew dogs. Even in the white fastness of the terrible Lillimuit he could not be mistaken.
"Boris! Boris!" he cried, and whirling his wolf-dogs in their tracks, dashed over the windswept surface of the glacier in the direction of the sound.
"I can't be wrong! I can't be wrong!" he repeated over and over again, "I raised him from a pup!"
IN THE LILLIMUIT
Speakdesolation. What does it mean to you? What picture rises before your eyes? A land laid waste by the ravages of war? A brain picture of sodden, trampled fields, leaning fences, grey piles of smoking ashes which are the ruins of homes, flanking a long, white, unpeopled highway strewn with litter, broken wagons, abandoned caissons, and, here and there, long fresh-heaved ridges of brown earth that cover the men who were? Isn't that the picture? And isn't it the evening of a dull grey day, just at the time when the gloom of twilight shades into the black pall of night, and way toward the edge of the world, on the indistinct horizon, a lurid red glow tints the low-hung clouds—no flames—only the dull, illusive glow that wavers and fades in the heavensabove other burning homes? Yes, that is desolation. And, yet—men have been here—everything about you speaks the presence of people. Here people lived and loved and were happy; and here, also, they were heartbroken and sad. The whole picture breathes humanity—and the inhumanity of men. And, as people have lived here, instinctively you know that people will live here again; for this is man-made desolation.
Only those to whom it has been given to know the Big North—the gaunt, white, silent land beyond the haunts of men—can realize the true significance ofdesolation.
Stand surrounded by range upon towering range of unmapped mountains whose clean-cut peaks show clear and sharp through the keen air—air so dry and thin that the slanting rays of the low-hung midday sun gleam whitely upon the outlines of ice crags a hundred miles away. Stand there alone, enveloped by the solitude of the land where men never lived—nor ever will live—where the silence is athing, pressing closer and closerabout you—smothering you—so that, instinctively, you throw out your hands to push it away that you may breathe—then you begin to know desolation—the utter desolation of the frozen wilderness, the cold, dead land of mystery.
The long howl of the great grey wolf as he lopes over the hunger trail is an eerie sound; so is the cackling, insane laughter of a pack of coyotes in the night-time, and the weird scream of theloup-cervier; but of all sounds, the most desolate, the sound that to the ears of man spells the last word of utter solitude and desolation, is the short, quick, single bark of the Arctic fox as he pads invisible as a phantom in his haunts among the echoing rim-rocks. Amid these surroundings, brains give way. Not soften into maudlin idiocy, but explode in a frenzy of violence, so that men rush screaming before the relentless solitude; or fight foolishly and to the death against the powers of cold amid the unreal colours of the aurora borealis whose whizzing hiss roars in theirears when, at the last, they pitch forward into the frozen whiteness—bushed!
This was the scene of desolation that confronted Connie Morgan as McDougall's strainingmalamutesjerked the sled from the ice-cavern that had served as a shelter through all the days of the great blizzard, when the wind-lashed snow, fine as frozen fog, eddied and whirled across the surface of the glacier which towered above him, and drifted deep in the narrow pass.
The sled runners squeaked loudly in the flinty snow, and Connie halted the dogs and surveyed the forbidding landscape. Never in his life had he been so utterly alone. For twenty days he had followed the trail of Waseche Bill, and now he stood at the end of the trail—worse than that, for the high piled drifts that buried the trail of Waseche covered his own back trail, completely wiping out the one slender thread that connected him with the land of men. He stood alone in the dreaded Lillimuit! Before him rose a confusion of mountains—tier after tier of naked peaksclear and sharp against the blue sky. Fresh as he was from the great Alaska ranges, the boy was strangely awed by the vastness of it all. It was unreal. He missed the black-green of the timber belt that relieved the long sweep of his own mountains, for here, from rounded foothill to topmost pinnacle, the mountains were as bare of vegetation as floating icebergs. The very silence was unnatural and the boy's lips pressed tightly together as thoughts of Ten Bow crowded his brain: the windlass-capped shafts, the fresh dumps that showed against the white snow of the valley; the red flash and glow of the fires in the night that thawed out the gravel for the next day's digging; the rough log cabins ranged up and down the gulch in two straggling rows—he could almost hear the good-natured banter which was daily exchanged across the frozen creek bed between the rival residents of Broadway and "Fiff Avenue," as the two irregular "streets" of the camp were named. He thought of his own cabin and the long evenings with his big partner, Waseche Bill,sitting close to the roaring little "Yukon stove," puffing contentedly upon his black pipe, which he removed now and then from between his lips to judiciously comment upon the stories that the boy read from the man-thumbed, coverless magazines of other years, which had been passed from hand to hand by the big men of the frozen places.
A lump came in his throat and he swallowed hard, and as he looked, the naked peaks blurred and swam together; and two hot, salty tears stung his eyes. At the sting of the tears the little form stiffened and the boy glanced swiftly about him as, with a mittened hand, he dashed the moisture from his eyes. The small fingers clenched hard about the handle of the long-lashed, walrus hide dog whip, and he stepped quickly to the gee-pole of the sled.
"I'm apiker!" he cried, "achechakoand akidand atin-hornand apiker! Crying like a girl because I'm homesick!Bah!What would Waseche say if he could see me now? AndDad?Therewas aman! Sam Morgan!" The littlearms extended impulsively toward the great white peaks and the big blue eyes glowed proudly:
"Oh, Dad!Dad!They call you unlucky! But I'd rather have the big men back there think of me like they talk ofyou, than to have all the gold in the world!" He leaped suddenly beyond the sled and shook a tiny clenched fist toward the glittering crags.
"I'mnota piker!" he cried, fiercely. "I couldn't be a piker, and be Sam Morgan's boy! I got here in spite of the men of Eagle! And I'll find Waseche, too! I'm not afraid of you! You cold, white Lillimuit—with your big, bare, frozen mountains, and your glaciers, and your stillness! You can't bluffme! You maygetme—but you can'tturnme!I'm game!"
As the voice of the boy thinned into the cold air, Slasher, the gaunt, red-eyed wolf-dog, that no man had ever tamed, ranged himself close at his side and, with bristling hair and bared fangs, added his rumbling, throaty growl to Connie Morgan's defiance of the North.
With a high-pitched whoop of encouragement and a loud crack of the whip, the boy swung the impatient ten-team to the westward and headed it down the canyon into the very heart of the Lillimuit. High mountains towered above him to the left, and to the right the sheer wall of the glacier formed an insurmountable barrier. The dry, hard-packed snow afforded excellent footing and McDougall's trained sled dogs made good time as they followed the lead of old Boris who, trotting in advance, unerringly picked the smoothest track between the detached masses of ice and granite that in places all but blocked the narrowing gorge, into which the trail of Waseche Bill had led on the first day of the great blizzard.
Mile after mile they covered, and as the walls drew closer together the light dimmed, for the slanting rays of the winter sun even at midday never penetrated to the floor of the narrow canyon. As he rounded a sharp bend, Connie halted the dogs in dismay for, a short distance in front of him, the ice-wall of the glacier slanted suddenlyagainst the granite shoulder of a high butte. Wide eyed, he stared at the barrier. He was in a blind pocket—acul-de-sacof the mountains! But where was Waseche? Weary and disappointed the boy seated himself on the sled to reason it out.
"Theremustbe a way out," he argued. "I didn't camp till the snow got so thick I couldn't see, and he had to camp, too. If he doubled back I would have seen him." He started to his feet in a sudden panic. "I wonder if he did—while I slept?" Then, as his glance fell upon the dogs, he smiled. "You bet, he didn't!" he cried aloud, "not with thirteen wolf-dogs camped beside the trail. Slasher would growl and bristle up if a man came within half a mile of us, and Waseche could never get past old Boris." He remembered the words of Black Jack Demaree: "Never set up yer own guess agin' a good dog's nose." Connie Morgan was learning the North—he was trusting his dogs.
"There's a trail, somewhere," he exclaimed,"and it's up to me to find it!" He cracked his whip, but instead of leaping to the pull, the dogs crouched quivering in the snow. The ground trembled as in the throes of a mighty earthquake and the boy whirled in his tracks as the canyon reverberated to the crash of a thousand thunders. He dashed to the point where, a few minutes before, he had rounded the sharp angle of the trail and gasped at the sight that met his gaze. The weather-whitened ice of the glacier wall was rent and shivered in a broad, green scar, and in the canyon a mass of broken ice fifty feet high completely blocked the back trail. He was imprisoned! Not in a man-made jail of iron bars and concrete—but a veritable prison of the wilderness, whose impregnable walls of ice and granite seemed to touch the far-off sky. The boy's heart sank as he gazed upon the perpendicular wall that barred the trail. For just an instant his lip quivered and then the little shoulders stiffened and the blue eyes narrowed as they had narrowed that evening he faced the men of Eagle.
"You didn't get me, Lillimuit!" he shouted. "You'll have to shoot the other barrel!" His voice echoed hollow and thin between the gloomy walls, and he turned to the dogs. Old Boris, always in search of a trail, sniffed industriously about the base of the glacier. Big, lumbering Mutt, who in harness could out-pull any dog in the Northland, rolled about in the snow and barked foolishly in his excitement. Slasher, more wolf than dog, stood snarling his red-eyed hate in the face of the new-formed ice barrier. And McDougall'smalamutes, wise in the ways of the snow trail, stood alert, with eyes on the face of the boy, awaiting his command.
Forty rods ahead, where thecul-de-sacterminated in a great moraine, Connie could discern a tangle of scrub growth and dead timber pushed aside by the glacier. The short, three-hour day was spent, and the gloomy walls of the narrow gorge intensified the mysterious semi-darkness of the long, sub-arctic night. The boy shouted to the dogs, and the crack of his long whiplashechoed in the chasm like a pistol shot. At the foot of the moraine he unharnessed and fed the dogs, spread his robes in the shelter of a bold-faced grey rock, and unrolled his sleeping bag. He built a fire and thawed out some bannock, over which he poured the grease from the pan of sizzling bacon. Connie was hungry and he devoured his solitary meal greedily, washing it down with great gulps of steaming black coffee. After supper, surrounded by the thirteen big dogs, he made a hasty inspection of the walls of his prison. The light was dim and he realized he would have to wait until daylight before making anything like a thorough examination; nevertheless, he was unwilling to sleep until he had made at least one effort to locate the trail to the outer world.
An hour later he crawled into his sleeping bag and lay a long time looking upward at the little stars that winked and glittered in cold, white brilliance where the narrow panel of black-blue showed between the towering walls of the canyon.
"I'll get out someway," he muttered bravely.
My dad would have got out, and, you bet, so will I!"My dad would have got out, and, you bet, so will I!"
"If I can't walk out, I'llcrawlout, orclimbout, ordigout! My dad would have got out, and, you bet, so will I!Hewasn't afraid to tacklebigthings—he was ready for 'em. What got him was alittlething—just a little piece of loose ice on a smooth trail—he wasn'tlookingfor it—that's all. But, at that, when he pitched head first into Ragged Falls canyon that day, he died like amandies—in the big outdoors, with the mountains, and the pine trees, and the snow! And that's the way I'll die! If I never get out of this hole, when they find me they won't find me in this sleeping bag—'cause I'll work to the end of my grub. I'll dig, and chop, and hack a way out till my grub's gone, then I'll—I'll eat Mac's dogs—and when they're gone I'll—No! By Jimminy! Iwon'teat old Boris, nor Slasher, nor Mutt—I'll—I'llstarve first!" He reached for the flap of his sleeping bag, and as he drew it over his head there came, faint and far from the rim-rocks, the short, sharp bark of a starving fox.
WASECHE BILL TO THE RESCUE
When Waseche Bill sent his dogs flying over the surface of the glacier in answer to the bell-like call of old Boris, he fully expected that the end of a half-hour would find him at the dog's side. Sound carries far in the keen northern air, and the man urged his team to its utmost. As the sled runners slipped smoothly over the ice and frozen snow, his mind was filled with perplexing questions. How came old Boris into the Lillimuit? Had he deserted the boy and followed the trail of his old master?
"No, no!" muttered the man. "He wouldn't pull out on the kid, that-a-way—an', what's mo', if he had, he'd of catched up with me long befo' now."
Was it possible that the boy had taken the trail?The man's brow puckered. What was it Joe said, that night in Eagle?
"S'pose he follers ye?"
"He couldn't of!" argued Waseche. "It's plumb onpossible, with them there three ol' dawgs. An' he'd of neveh got past Eagle—Fiddle Face, an' Joe, an' Jim Sontag, they wouldn't of let him by—not fo' to go to the Lillimuit, they wouldn't—not in a hund'ed yea's."
The dogs swerved, bringing the outfit to an abrupt halt on the brink of a yawning fissure. Waseche Bill scowled at the delay.
"Sho' some crevasse," he growled, as he peered into the depths of the great ice crack fifty feet wide, which barred his path. Suddenly his eye lighted and he swung the dogs to the southward where, a quarter of a mile away, a great white snow bridge spanned the chasm in a glittering arch. Seizing his axe, he chopped two parallel trenches in the ice close to the end of the bridge. Into these eight-inch depressions he worked the runners of the heavily loaded sled, taking care thatthe blunt rear end of the runners rested firmly against the vertical ends of the trenches. Uncoiling a longbabicheline, he tied one end to the tail rope of the anchored sled and, after making the other end fast about his waist, ventured cautiously out upon the snow bridge. Foot by foot he advanced, testing its strength. The bridge was wide and thick, and evidently quite old and firm, but Waseche Bill was a man who took no foolish risks.
Men who seek gold learn to face danger bravely—it is part of the day's work—for death dogs close upon the trail of the men of the North and must be reckoned with upon short notice. Everytillicumin the White Country, if he would, could tell of hairbreadth escapes, and of times when a clear brain and iron nerve alone stood between him and the Great Beyond. But of these things they rarely speak—for they know of the others, like Sam Morgan, whose work is done, and whose names are burned into the little wooden crosses that dot the white snow of Aurora Land; and whosememory remains fresh in the haunts of the sourdoughs, where their deeds are remembered long and respected when the flash bravado of the reckless tin-horn is scorned and forgotten.
Satisfying himself that the bridge would bear the weight of the outfit, Waseche Bill untied the rope and headed the dogs across at a run.
The surface of the glacier became rougher as he advanced and Waseche was kept busy at the gee-pole as the dogs threaded their way between ice hummocks and made long detours to avoid cracks and fissures, so that the winter sun was just sinking behind the mountains when the man at last found himself upon the edge of the glacier, at a point some distance above the cave where Connie Morgan had sought shelter from the storm. He looked out over the undulating ridges of snow waste that stretched away toward a nearby spur of the mountains. Intently he scanned each nook and byway of the frozen desert, but not a moving object, not a single black dot that might by any stretch of the imagination be construedas a living thing, rewarded his careful scrutiny. Gradually his eyes focused upon the point where the mountains dipped toward the great ice field.
"Yonde's the mouth of the canyon I headed into befo' the blizza'd. I'd bet a blue one the old dawg's trailed me in." Filling his lungs Waseche sent call after call quavering through the still, keen air, but the only answer was the hollow echoing of his own voice as it died away in the mountains. A mile to the eastward he worked his outfit into the valley, following the devious windings of a half-formed lateral moraine, and headed the dogs for the mouth of the canyon.
He searched in vain for tracks as he entered the narrow pass. The snow was smooth and untrampled as the driving wind of the blizzard had left it.
"Sho' is queeah," he muttered. "Sweah to goodness, I hea'd that Boris dawg—I'd know that howl if I hea'd it in Kingdom Come—an' I know itnow! I wondeh," he mused, as the team followed the devious windings of the canyon, "Iwondeh if this heah Lillimuitisa kind of spirit land like folks says. Did I really heah the ol' dawg howl, or has the big Nawth got me, too, like it done got Carlson, an' the rest? 'Cause if they was a dawg wheah's his tracks? An' if it was a ghost dawg, how could he howl?" The sled dogs paused, sniffing excitedly at the snow, and Waseche Bill leaped forward. Before the mouth of an ice-cavern were many tracks, and the man stared dumbfounded.
"Fo' the love of Mike!" he cried excitedly. "It's thekid!" He dropped to his knees and patted affectionately the impressions of the tinymukluks. "Boy! Boy! Yo' li'l ol' sourdough, yo' li'l pa'dner—How'd yo' get heah? Yo' done come, jes' as Joe 'lowed yo' would—yo' doggone li'ltillicum! Come all alone, too! Jes' wait 'til I catch holt of yo'—an' McDougall's dawgs! No one in Alaska could a loaned themmalamutesoffen Mac, 'cept yo'—theah's ol' Scah Foot, that lost two toes in the wolf-trap!" The man leaped to the sled and cracked his whip.
"Mush! Mush!" he cried, and the dogs bounded forward upon the trail of the boy.
Waseche Bill traversed this same canyon on the day before the blizzard. He, too, had run up against the dead end, and it was while retracing his steps that he had discovered the sheep trail, by means of which he gained the surface of the glacier a mile back from the termination of the gorge. He grinned broadly as his sled shot past the foot of this trail, entirely obliterated, now, by the new-fallen snow.
"I got yo', now,kid," he chuckled. "Holed up like a silveh tip 'till the sto'm blowed by, didn't yo', pa'dner? But I got yo' back ag'in, an' from now on, me an' yo' sticks togetheh. I done the wrong thing—to go' way—but yo' so plumb li'l, I fo'got yo' was a sho' nuff man."
His soliloquy was cut short by the sudden stopping of the sled as it bumped upon the heels of the "wheel" dogs, and for the next few minutes the man was busy with whip andmukluksstraightening out the tangle of fighting animals. Dashing in the darkness between a huge granite block and the wall of the glacier, they had brought up sharply against the new-formed ice barrier that completely blocked the trail.
Slashing right and left with his heavy whip, and kicking vigorously and impartially, he finally succeeded in subduing the fighting dogs and removing the tangled harness. And then he stared dumbly at the great mass of broken ice that buried the trail of the boy. In the darkness he could form no conception of the extent of the barrier. Was it a detached fragment? Or had the whole side of the glacier split away and crashed into the canyon? Before his eyes rose the picture of a small body crushed and mangled beneath thousands of tons of ice, and for the first time in his life Waseche Bill gave way to his emotions. Sinking down upon the sled he buried his face in his hands and in the darkness, surrounded by the whimpering dogs, his great shoulders heaved to the violence of his sobs.
The great mass of ice that split from the glacier'sside, while presenting an unscalable face to the imprisoned boy, was by no means so formidable a barrier when approached from the opposite side.
Waseche Bill was not the man to remain long inactive. After a few moments he sprang to his feet and surveyed the huge pile of ice fragments. By the feeble light of the stars he could see that the walls of the canyon towered high above the top of the mass. Tossing his dogs an armful of frozen fish, he caught up the coil ofbabicherope and stepped to the foot of the obstruction.
"I cain't wait till mawnin'," he muttered, "I got to find out if the kid is safe. Reckon I c'n make it, but I sho' do wish they was mo' light."
It was not a difficult climb for a man used to the snow trails, and a half hour later Waseche Bill stood at the top and, with a long sigh of relief, gazed into the depths beyond the barrier.
"Thank the Lawd, it's only a slivah!" he exclaimed. "But, at that, it mout of catched him." With a kick he sent a small fragment of ice spinning into the chasm. Almost instantly, the manheard a low growl, and his eye caught the flash of an indistinct grey shape against the snow floor below him. Straight as an arrow the shape shot toward the ice wall, and Waseche Bill heard the scratching of claws upon the flinty surface, and a low, throaty growl as the shape dropped back into the snow. He laughed aloud.
"Oh, yo' Slashah dawg!" he cried happily, as he proceeded to make the end of his long line fast to a projecting pinnacle.
"I'll jes' slip down an' s'prise the kid," he chuckled, "he's prob'ly rolled in by now." Taking a couple of turns about his leg with the rope, he lowered himself over the edge and slid slowly downward. Suddenly, he gripped hard and checked his descent. He was ten feet from the bottom, and something struck the rope just beneath his feet, and as it struck, he heard again the low growl, and the vicious click of fang on polished fang, and the soft thud with which the wolf-dog struck the snow.
"Hey, yo' Slashah!" he called sharply. "Golay down! It's only me, Slashah—don't yo' know me?" For answer the dog sprang again, and the man hastily drew himself higher—for this time the long white fangs clashed together almost at his feet, and the low growl ended in a snarl as the grey body dropped back upon the snow.
"Doggone yo'! Quit yo' foolin'! Git out!" cried the exasperated man, as he tightened his grip on the swaying line. And then, beneath him, the canyon seemed filled with dogs—gaunt, grey shapes that sprang, and snapped, and growled, and fell back to spring again.
"Now, what d'yo' think of that," muttered the man disgustedly, as he peered downward into green glaring eyes and slavering jaws. "Mac's dawg's, too! I'd sho' hate fo' this heah rope to break! Theh's ol' Boris!" he exclaimed, as the lead dog appeared at the edge of the snarling pack. "Hello, Boris, ol' dawg! Yo' know me—don't yo', Boris?" With a short, sharp yelp of delight, the dog dashed in and leaped towardhis old master, but his activity served only to egg on the others, and they redoubled their efforts to reach the swaying man. Waseche Bill laughed:
Now, what d'yo' think of that! I'd sho' hate fo' this heah rope to break!"Now, what d'yo' think of that! I'd sho' hate fo' this heah rope to break!"
"'Taint no use. Reckon I'll have to wake upthe kid." And the next moment the walls of the canyon rang with his calls for help.
At the other end of the chasm Connie Morgan stirred uneasily and thrust his head from under the flap of his sleeping bag. He listened drowsily to the pandemonium of growls and yelps and snarls, from the midst of which came indistinctly the sound of a voice. He became suddenly wide-awake and, wriggling from the bag, caught up his dog whip and sped swiftly up the canyon.
It was no easy task for the boy to beat the excited dogs into submission, but at length they slunk away before the stinging sweep of the lash, and Waseche Bill, his hands numb from his long gripping of the rope, slid squarely into the up-reaching arms of his little partner.
"Yo' sho' saved my bacon that time, kid. Why, that theah Slashah dawg—he'd of et mealive, an' the rest w'd done likewise, onct they got sta'ted!" Waseche Bill's tongue rattled off the words with which he sought to disguise the real emotion of his heart at finding the boy he had learned to love, safe and sound in the great white wilderness. But Connie Morgan was not deceived, and he smiled happily into the rough hair of his big partner'sparka, as the man strained him to him in a bearlike embrace.
That night the two sat long over the camp fire at the foot of the moraine, and the heart of the man swelled with pride as the boy recounted his adventures on the trail.
"And now I've found you," concluded the boy, "I'm going to take you back. Pardners are pardners, you know—and tomorrow we'll hit for Ten Bow."
The man turned his face away and became busily engaged in arranging the robes into a bed close against the boy's sleeping bag.
"We sho' will, kid. Pa'dnersispa'dners, an'—me an' yo'—somehow—I cain't jes' sayit—but—anyways—Why! Doggone it! Me an' yo's mo'n jes pa'dners—ain't we, kid?"
Later, as the man burrowed deep into his robes a voice sounded drowsily from the depths of the sleeping bag:
"Waseche!"
"Huh?" questioned the man.
"Black Jack Demaree said to tell you—let's see—what was it he said? Oh, yes—he said when I found you to tell you that 'you can't tell by the size of a frog how far he can jump.'"
Waseche Bill chuckled happily to himself:
"Yo' sho' cain't," he agreed. "Black Jack's right about that—trouble is, I nevah know'd much about frawgs."
THE WHITE DEATH
It was yet dark when Waseche Bill opened his eyes and blinked sleepily into the small face that smiled down at him in the light of the flickering fire. The rich aroma of boiling coffee and the appetizing odour of bacon roused him to his senses and he grinned happily at the words of the boy:
"Come on, pardner, grub's ready! And you better fly at it, too. 'Cause if I know anything about it, we'll sure know we've done something by the time we get the outfit out of this hole."
Waseche glanced upward where the tiny stars winked coldly between the high walls of the gloomy gorge in which Sam Morgan's boy found himself held prisoner when the huge mass of ice detacheditself from the side of the glacier and crashed into the canyon.
"Yo' sho's on the job, son—seem's if I jest got good an' asleep. What time is it?" he asked, as he crawled from beneath his robes.
"Six o'clock," answered the boy extending a cup of steaming coffee.
"Six o'clock! Sufferin' cats! Three hours till daylight—Ain't yo got no pity on the ol' man?"
"Old man, nothing!" grinned Connie over the rim of his tin cup. "But if you wait for daylight to come down into the bottom of this well, you will be an old man before you get out."
Breakfast over, the two packed the outfit and, without harnessing the dogs, pulled the sled to the foot of the barrier. Here it was unloaded and the pack made into bundles suitable for hoisting. The sled was the heaviest piece and the only one that offered a serious problem. It was decided that Connie should remain below and make the things fast, while Waseche climbed to the topand did the hoisting. A sling was rigged from a strip of old blanket, by means of which the dogs could be lifted, by passing it under their bellies and fastening it to the rope at their backs. When all was ready Waseche grasped the swayingbabicheline, by means of which he had lowered himself the previous evening.
"Cain't grip nothin' with mittens on," he grumbled, as he bared his hands to the intense cold. Next moment he was pulling himself jerkily upward, hand over hand, while Connie Morgan stood below and watched the indistinct outline of the man who swayed and dangled above him, for all the world like a giant spider ascending a thread of invisible web.
The rope twitched violently as the man drew himself onto the top of the barrier, and a few minutes later the regular taps of his ice axe sounded, as Waseche chopped his "heel holts" as close to the edge as safety permitted. The tapping ceased and the voice of the man rolled and reverberated between the walls of the cistern-like chasm.
"All set, kid!"
"Haul away!" and immediately the bale containing the two sleeping bags swung clear of the snow and was drawn upward, spinning and bumping the ice wall. Other bales followed and soon there remained only the dogs and the sled. After many unsuccessful efforts to induce the wolf-dogs to submit to the unaccustomed sling, Connie hit upon the expedient of harnessing them to the sled, for even McDougall's finely trained dogs, like allmalamutes, were wolves at heart and were trustworthy and tractable only in harness. This accomplished, they submitted readily enough and, beginning with the "wheel dogs," one at a time, Connie passed the sling about them and cast off the harness at the same time. Waseche hauled them, snarling and biting at the encircling band, up the face of the perpendicular wall. Old Boris and good-natured Mutt submitted without a growl of protest; but it was different with the untamed savage Slasher. During the whole unusual proceeding the suspicious wolf-dog hadbristled and growled, and several times it was only by the narrowest margin that Connie succeeded in averting a tragedy, as Slasher leaped with flashing fangs toward a sled dog dangling helplessly from the rope's end. At last Slasher alone remained. The boy called him. He came, with hair abristle, stepping slowly and stiffly. His eyes glared red, and way back in his throat rumbled long, low growls.
"Come on! You can't bluffme—you old grouch, you!" laughed the boy, and stooping, slipped a heavy collar about his neck. Passing a running noose about the long pointed muzzle, he secured the free end to the collar, and to make assurance doubly sure, he tied a strip torn from the old blanket tightly about the dog's jaws, affixed the sling, and gave the signal.
It was not for his own protection that the boy thus muzzled Slasher. In all the Northland he was the only person who did not fear the wild, vicious brute, for he knew that rather than harm him themalamutewould have allowed himselfto be torn in pieces. But he feared for Waseche Bill when he came to release him. Despite the fact that he had lived with Waseche for a year, the dog treated him no whit differently than he treated the veriest stranger. To one person in all the world—and only one—the wolf-dog owed allegiance, and that person was Connie Morgan—the first and only creature of the hated man tribe who had used him with fairness.
Again the line was lowered and Connie, making his own line fast to the sled, grasped the loose end, seated himself in the loop of Waseche's, and gave the signal. Up, up, he rose, fending off from the wall with feet and hands. At length he reached the top and the strong arms of Waseche helped him over the edge. After a brief rest, both laid hold of the remaining line and hauled away at the sled. The pull taxed their combined strength to the utmost, but the heavy sled was up at last, and they stood free upon the top of the barrier.
Their labours had consumed the greater part of the day, and it was well after noon when they satdown to a hasty lunch of cariboucharquiand suet.
"I would never have made it!" exclaimed the boy, thoughtfully, as his eyes travelled over the perpendicular walls of the yawning chasm. "Put her there, pardner," he said, gravely extending his hand toward Waseche. The man grasped the small, mittened hand and wrung it hard:
"Sho' now! Sho' now!" he protested hastily. "Yo' mout of." But the boy noticed that Waseche turned from the place with a shudder.
The work of packing the outfit down into the canyon occupied the remainder of the day and that night they camped at the foot of the barrier, where Waseche had left his own outfit.
"Now for Ten Bow! I sure do love every log and daub of chinking in that cabin. When fellows own their own home—like we do—when they built it with their own hands, you know—a fellow gets homesick when he's away—'specially if he's all alone. Didn't you get homesick, too, pardner?"
Waseche Bill dropped the harness he was untangling, and stepping to the boy's side, laid a big hand upon the small shoulder:
"Yes, kid," he answered, in a soft voice, "I be'n homesick every minute I be'n gone. An' that night—jest befo' I left, I was homesickest of all. I thought it was the squa'h thing to do—but I've learnt a heap since, that I didn't know then. Tell me, son, if yo' love the cabin so, why did yo' come away? The claim was yo'n. I wrote it out that way a purpose." The clear grey eyes of the boy looked up into the man's face.
"Why—why, after you were gone, it—it wasn't the same any more. I—Ihatedthe place. Maybe it's because I'm only a boy——"
"Yes," interrupted the man, speaking slowly, as if to himself. "Yo' only a boy—jest a little boy—an' yet—" his voice became suddenly husky, and he turned away: "Folks calls Sam Mo'ganunlucky!" He cleared his throat loudly, and again the big hand rested on the boy's shoulder:
"Listen, kid, I've had cabins befo' now—a many a one, on big creeks an' little—an' I've come off an' left 'em all, an' neveh a onct was I homesick. But this time I was—it was diffe'nt. Shucks, kid, don't yo' see? It takes mo'n jest a cabin to make—home."
Soon the outfits were ready for the trail.
"We sho' got dawgs enough," grinned Waseche, as he eyed the two teams; "McDougall's ten, eight of mine, an' them three of yo'n—we betteh mush, too, 'cause it takes a sight of feed fo' twenty-one dawgs. I 'lowed to run acrost meat befo' now—caribou, or moose, or sheep—but this heah Lillimuit's as cold an' dead as the outeh voids that the lecture felleh was tellin' about in Dawson. I got right int'rested in the place—till I come to find out it was too fah off to botheh about, bein' located way oveh back of the sun somewheahs."
At a crack of the whip, Waseche's dogs sprang into the lead, and McDougall'smalamutes, with Connie trotting beside them, swung in behind. There was no wind, and in the narrow canyonsounds were strangely magnified. The squeak of sled runners on the hard, dry snow sounded loud and sharp as the creak of a windlass, and, as they passed the foot of the snow-covered sheep trail, the voice of Waseche boomed and reverberated unnaturally:
"Yondeh's the ol' sheep trail wheah I got out of the canyon. Neah's I c'n make out it ain't be'n used fo' mo'n a month. I tell yo' what—times is sho' hawd when the sheep pulls out of a country."
It was very cold. Toward midday the windings of the canyon allowed them occasional glimpses of the low-hung sun. It had a strange unfamiliar appearance, like a huge eye of polished brass, glaring coldly in a bright white light not its own. As each turn of the trail cut off his view, the boy glanced furtively at his partner and was quick to note the man's evident uneasiness. Mile after mile they mushed in silence. The fragmentary conversation of the earlier hours ceased, and each experienced a growing sense of exhaustion. The motionless air hung heavy and dead about them.Its vitality was wanting, so that they were forced to breathe rapidly and concentrate their minds upon the simple act of keeping up with the dogs. Each was conscious of a growing lethargy that sapped his strength. Even the dogs were affected, and plodded mechanically forward with lowered heads and drooping tails.
They were approaching the cavern in which Connie had sought refuge from the blizzard. For several miles the boy had been wondering whether Waseche would camp at the cave. He hoped that he would. He was growing terribly sleepy and it was only by constant effort that he kept his eyes open, although they had been scarcely five hours on the trail. His head felt strangely light and hollow, and white specks danced before his eyes. He closed his eyes and the specks were red. They danced in the darkness, writhing and twisting like fiery snakes. He opened his eyes and held doggedly to his place beside the team. His mind dwelt longingly upon the soft, warm feel of his sleeping bag. The boy's nerves weretense and strained, so that his lips and eyelids twitched spasmodically, with a sting as of extreme cold.
As they drew nearer the mouth of the cavern he felt that he would scream aloud if Waseche did not halt. His gaze became fixed upon the broad back of his partner as he mushed beside his dogs, and he noted that the man walked with quick, jerky steps. He wondered vaguely at this, for it was not Waseche's way. This passing thought vanished, and again his mind reverted to the all-important question: would Waseche camp? He would ask him. He filled his lungs—then, suddenly the thought flashed through his brain: "I'm apiker!I won't ask him—I'll drop in my tracks first." The deep breath stung his lungs and he coughed—a sharp, dry cough that rasped his throat. The man turned at the sound and eyed him sharply.
"Keep yo' mouth shut! An' hurry—hurry!" The man's voice was low and hard, and he, too, coughed.
At the mouth of the cavern the dogs stopped of their own accord and lay down in harness. The boy noted this, and also that instead of waiting alert, with cocked ears and watchful eyes for a word of command, they lay with their pointed muzzles pressed close against the hard snow, as if fearing to move.
Swiftly and silently Waseche began to remove the harness from the dogs and Connie followed his example. As soon as a dog was released, instead of rolling about and ploughing and rooting his snout into the snow, he slunk quickly into the cave. The hitches were cast loose and sleeping bags, robes, grub, and frozen fish for the dogs were carried into the cavern. Waseche made another trip into the canyon while the boy sank down upon his rolled sleeping bag and stared stupidly at the dogs huddled together in the farther end of the cave, their eyes gleaming greenly in the darkness. A quarter of an hour later the man returned with a huge armful of gnarled, grubby brushwood that he had hacked from the crevicesof the rocks. Near the entrance he built a small fire, filled the coffeepot with snow, and thawed some pemmican in the frying pan. He filled his pipe, threw a handful of coffee into the pot, and turned toward Connie. The boy had fallen asleep with his back against the ice wall. Waseche shook him gently:
"Wake up, son! Grub pile!" He stirred uneasily and opened his eyes.
"Let me alone," he muttered, sleepily, "I'm not hungry."
"Yo' got to eat. Heah's some hot coffee—jest climb outside of this, an' then yo' c'n sleep long as yo' like."
The hot liquid revived the boy and he ate some pemmican and bannock. Having finished, he spread his robes and unrolled his sleeping bag. Before turning in, however, he stepped to the door and looked out. He was surprised that it was yet daylight and the sun hung just above the shoulder of a sharp, naked peak. Again the white spots danced before his eyes, and he turned quickly:
"Look! Look at the sun!" he cried in a sudden panic. "One, two, three, four—look Waseche, I can't count 'em."
"Come away, kid," said the man at his side, pulling at his sleeve.
"But the suns! Look! Can you count them?"
"No, kid, we cain't count 'em." The man's voice was very low.
"But what is the matter? There is only one real sun! Where do they come from?"
"I do'no, I do'no. It's—we got to camp heah till—" He was interrupted by the boy:
"It's what?" he asked, bewildered.
"It's—I neveh seen it befo'—but I've hea'd tell—It's thewhite death. Heah, in the Lillimuit, an' some otheh places—nawth of the Endicotts, some say. Tonight—the flashin' lights, an' the blood-red aurora—tomorrow, a thousan' suns in the sky. They ain't no wind, an' the air is dead—dead, an' so cold yo' lungs'll crackle an' split if yo'r caught on the trail. We got to keep out of it, an' then—" His voice trailed into silence.
"And thenwhat?" asked the boy, drowsily.
"I do'no, I do'no, kid—that depends."
Connie Morgan was awakened by the whimpering of dogs. In his ears was a strange sound like the hiss of escaping steam. He wondered, drowsily, how long he had slept, and lay for some moments trying to collect his senses. The sounds in the night terrified him—filled him with an unnamed dread. The strange hissing was not continuous, but broken and interrupted by a roaring crackle, like the sound of a burning forest. But there was no forest—only ice and snow, and the glittering peaks of ranges. With a trembling hand he raised the hood of his sleeping bag and peered cautiously out. To the boy's distorted imagination the whole world seemed on fire. The interior of the cave glowed dimly with a dull red light, while beyond the entrance the snow flashed brilliant lights of scarlet.