Alroy laughed immoderately at the prospect he contemplated, and held out his hand in friendly farewell as his customer prepared to depart.
"Well, so long, Mister," he grinned amiably. "I guess there's things worse in the world than the shelter of this old shanty. Anyway I'd sooner you hit the Northern trail than me. I'll be mighty pleased to see you around come—next year."
"So long."
Alroy's cordiality found very little that was responsive in the other. Perhaps the trail man understood its exact value. Perhaps he was simply indifferent. The saloon-keeper served a purpose, and was amply paid for his service. Anyway he shook hands, and departed without any other response.
Alroy watched him go. There was nothing else to do at this early hour with his entire establishment still abed, and Seal Bay's main thoroughfare still a desert of dirty, rutted snow, some foot or more deep. He stood in his doorway gazing out at the cheerless grey of early morning, watching with interest the handling of the three great dog trains which he had seen come into town with their laden sleds only three days before.
For all the cold and the early morning drear, for all he was of the life of the desolate shores of Seal Bay, for all the comings and goings of the men of the trails, for whom he mostly entertained a more or less profound contempt, for Alroy Leclerc there was still a fascination attached to the mysterious beyond to which these people belonged. Somewhere out there was a great white world whose secrets he could only guess at. The life was a life he did not envy. He knew it by the thousand and one stories of disaster and miraculous escape he had listened to, but that was all. There was more in it, he knew. Much more. It held fascinated the adventurous, untamed spirits of men whose superhuman efforts, yielding them little better than a pittance, still made possible the enormous profits of a parasitic world which battened upon them, and sucked them dry. Oh, yes. Whatever his sympathies he had a pretty wide understanding of the lives of these men. He also knew that he was one of the parasites which battened upon them. But he had no scruples. Nor had he envy. Only a sort of fascination which never failed at the sight of a sled, and a powerful train of well-handled dogs.
It was that which he looked upon now. He watched the two Indians stir the savage creatures from their crouching upon the snow. It was the harsh law of the club administered by skilled but merciless hands. The great, grey beasts, fully half wolf, understood nothing more gentle.
In moments only the whole of the three trains were alert and ready on their feet straining against the rawhide breast draws of their harness. Then the white man shouted the word to "mush." The long hardwood poles of the men broke out the sleds from the frozen grip of snow, and the whole of the lightened outfit dashed off at a rapid, almost headlong gait.
For a few moments Alroy remained at his post gazing after them. Then of a sudden his attention was drawn in an opposite direction.
It was an incoming train. A single sled, heavily laden, but with only a team of three dogs, far inferior to those which had just passed out of the town. They cut into the main thoroughfare out of a side turning and headed at once for the store of the Seal Bay Trading Company.
He looked for the owner. The owner was always his chief interest. He anticipated that a liberal share of the value of the man's cargo would find its way across his counter, and the extent of his profit would depend on the man's identity.
He was destined to receive the surprise of his life. He looked for an Indian, a half-breed, or a white man. Some well-known man of the trail. But it was none of these. Despite the fur-lined tunic almost to the knees, despite the tough, warm nether garments, and the felt leggings, and beaded moccasins, and the well-strung snow-shoes, there remained no doubt in his startled mind. None whatsoever. It was a woman! A girl!
Alroy ran a hand across his astonished eyes. He pushed back his fur cap and stared. The girl was moving down the trail towards him. He had a full view of the face looking out of the fur hood which surrounded it. A white girl, with the heightened colour and brightening eyes of youth and perfect health and strength. She was tall, beautifully tall, and as she swept on past him in her gliding snow-shoes he had a fleeting vision of a strand of fair hair escaped from beneath her fur hood, and a pair of beautiful blue eyes, and pretty, parted lips which left him hugging himself.
The vision had rewarded him for his early rising.
It was a moment when memories were stirring. An-ina searched the distance with eyes untroubled and full of a glad content. Had she not every reason for content? Oh, yes. She knew.
It was the same scene she had gazed upon for many seasons, for many years, and the limit of her vision had become practically the limits of her world. There stretched the white snow-clad valley with the still frozen river winding its way throughout its length to the north and south. There were the far-off hills beyond, white, grey; and purpling as the distance gained. Dark forest patches chequered the prospect. It was the same all ways, north, south, and west.
For all the few changings of aspect with the passing of the seasons there was no weariness in the woman's heart. She was bound up to the exclusion of all else with the human associations which were hers. No prison could hold bondage for her, so long as those associations were not denied her.
Out of the tail of her eyes she glanced at the great figure that was standing near her in the gateway of the fort. It was a figure, the sight of which filled her with a great sense of pride, and joy, and gratitude. In her simple way she understood something of the debt owed her for her years of untiring, watchful care of the small body which had grown to such splendid manhood. But the thought of its discharge never occurred to her uncalculating mind. That which she beheld more than repaid.
Marcel was great for Indian eyes to gaze upon. Tall as was the woman, comely in her maturing years, she was left dwarfed beside the youthful manhood she had watched grow from its earliest days. The young man had the erect, supple, muscular body of a trained athlete and the face of the mother who had long since been laid to rest in the woods of the Sleeper Indians. He had moreover the strength of the father's unspoiled character, and all the purposeful method which the patient upbringing of "Uncle Steve" had been capable of inspiring. He was a simple human product, unspoiled by contamination with the evil which lurks under the veneer of civilization, yet he possessed all the trained mind that both Steve and he had been able to achieve from the wealth of learning which his father's laboratory had been found to contain.
Beyond this, the bubbling springs of youth were in full flood, and the tide ran strong in his rich veins. A passionate enthusiasm was the outlet for this tide. A buoyant, fearless energy, a youthful pride in strenuous achievement. It was with these he faced the bitterness of the cruel Northland which he had grown to look upon like the Indians, who knew no better, as the whole setting of human life and all that was to be desired.
He was a hunter and a man of the trail before all things. His every thought was wrapt up in the immensity of the striving. He had absorbed the teachings of Steve, and added to them his own natural instincts. And in all this he had raised himself to that ideal of manhood which nature had implanted in An-ina's Indian heart. If she had thought of him as she would have thought of him years ago in the teepees of her race, she would have been content that he was a great "brave" and a "mighty hunter." As it was her feelings were restricted to an immense pride that she had been permitted the inestimable privilege of raising a real white child to well-nigh perfect manhood.
Marcel knocked out the pipe he was smoking. It was with something like reluctance he withdrew his gaze from the far distance.
"I've only two days more, An-ina," he said. "The outfit's ready to the last ounce of tea and the filling of the last cartridge. The Sleepers are wide awake, and squatting around waiting for the word to 'mush.' We just daren't lose the snow for the run to our headquarters. I wish Uncle Steve would get around. I just can't quit till he comes."
"No."
The squaw's reply was one of complete agreement. She understood. The long summer trail was claiming the man. The hunter in him was clamouring for the silent forests, where King Moose reigned supreme, the racing mountain streams alive with trout and an untold wealth of salmon, the open stretches of plain where the caribou browsed upon the weedy, tufted Northern grass, the marsh land and lakes, where the beavers spend the open season preparing their winter quarters. Then the traps, and the wealth of fox pelts they would yield, while the eternal dazzle of the much-prized black fox was always before his eyes. But stronger than all was his thought for Steve. No passion, so far, was greater in his life than his regard for this man who had been father, mother, and mentor to him in the years of his helplessness.
An-ina pointed down the course of the winding river where it came out of the southern hills.
"He come that way," she said. Then she smiled. "The same he come always. The same he come long time gone, when Marcel hide by waters and make big shout. Him much scared. Marcel think? Oh, yes."
The man laughed in a happy boyish way.
"I'd like to, but I just can't," he said. Then he added: "You always think of that, An-ina. No," he went on with a shake of the head. "I remember riding Uncle Steve's back. Seems it was for days and days. I sort of remember sitting around and watching him while he looked down at a pair of feet like raw meat, with the flies all trying to settle on them. The sort of way flies have. Then there were his eyes. I've still got the picture of 'em in my mind. They were red—red with blood, it seemed. They were sort of straining, too. And they shone—shone like the blazing coals of a camp-fire."
An-ina nodded, and into her dark eyes came a look of the dread of the days he had recalled.
"That so," she said, in a tone of suppressed emotion. "It was bad—so bad. Him carry Marcel. Oh, yes. Carry all time, like the squaw carry pappoose. So you live,—and An-ina glad."
"Yes." The man bestirred himself abruptly. He stood up from his lounging against the gatepost, and his great height and breadth of muscular shoulders seemed suddenly to have grown. "So I live. And you are glad. That's it. So I live. It's always that way—with you and Uncle Steve. It's for me. All the time for me. Not a thing for yourselves—ever."
The woman's eyes were suddenly filled with startled questioning and solicitude.
"Oh, yes? That so," she said simply. "Why not? You all Uncle Steve got. You all An-ina got. So."
"And aren't you both all—I've got?" The man's smile disarmed the sudden passionate force which had taken possession of his voice and manner. "Can't I act that way, too? Can't I sort of carry you and Uncle Steve on my back? Can't I come along and say, 'Here, you've done all this for me when I couldn't act for myself, now it's my turn? You sit around and look on, and act foolish, like I've done all the time, while I get busy.' Can't I say this, same as you've acted all these years? No. You two great creatures won't let me. And sometimes it makes me mad. And sometimes it makes me want to stretch out these fool arms of mine and hug you for the kindest, bravest, and best in the world."
An-ina laughed in her silent Indian fashion, and the delight in her eyes was a reflection of the joy in her soul.
"You say all those. It make no matter," she said.
"But it does make matter." The man's handsome face flushed, and his keen blue eyes shone with a half angry, half impatient light. With a curious gesture of suppressed feeling he passed a hand over his clean-shaven mouth, as though to smooth the whiskers that had never been permitted to disfigure it. "It makes me feel a darn selfish, useless hulk of a man. And I'm not," he cried. "I'm neither those things. Say An-ina," he went on, more calmly, and with a light of humour in his eyes, "Don't you dare to laff at me. Don't you dare deny the things I'm saying. I won't stand for it. For all you're my old nurse I'll just pick you up like nothing and throw you to the dogs back in the yard there. And maybe that'll let you see I can do the things I figure to. I'm a grown man, and Uncle Steve says 'no' every time I ask to take on the work of locating where the weed grows, which he hasn't found in fourteen years, and which my father was yearning to find before he died. 'No,' he says. 'This is for me. It's my work. It's the thing I set out to do—for you.' When I ask to do the trade at Seal Bay, it's the same. He guesses the 'sharps' would beat me. Me! who could break a dozen of their heads in as many minutes. So I'm left to the trail—the summer trail—to gather pelts, and learn a craft I know by heart. I keep the Sleeper boys busy, and in good heart. I'm the big hunter they like to follow. I'm the son of a great white chief they say, and, for me, they're sort of fool dolls I pull the strings of, while Uncle Steve does the big man's work. Can you beat it? It's all wrong. You and Uncle Steve are twice my age. You've crowded a life's work—for me. You both reckon to go on—always for me. While I sit around guessing I'm a man because I know a jack-rabbit from a bull-moose. It's got to alter. It's going to alter—after the summer. I want the big scrap, An-ina. The real scrap life can hand a feller that can write 'man' to his name. I'm out for it all. I want it all. And if Uncle Steve's right, and I'm wrong, and I go under, I'm ready to take the med'cine however it comes."
The smile of the woman was full of the mother. It was full of the Indian, too.
"Oh, yes," she said quickly. "What you call him, 'chance.' The 'big chance.' So it is. It good. So very, very good for the big man. Marcel the big man. I know. Oh, yes. I know. The chance it come. Maybe easy. Maybe not. It come. So it is always. It come, you take it. You not must look, or you find trouble. You take it. Always take it when it come. That how An-ina think."
Marcel laughed. His impatience had vanished before the sun of his happy temperament.
"You've dodged the dogs, An-ina," he cried. "You're too cute for me. You've agreed with me, and haven't handed an inch of ground. But I tell you right here, you dear old second mother of mine, I'm going to play the man as I see the game. And I'm going to play it good."
The expression on the man's dusky face was deadly earnest. His lean brown hands were spread out over the fire for warmth. His fur-clad body was hunched upon his quarters, as near to the glowing embers as safety permitted. And as he talked a look of awe and apprehension dilated his usually unexpressive eyes.
"The fire run this way—that way," he cried, in a voice of monotonous cadence, but with a note of urgency behind it. "The man stand by dogs. He look—look all the time. Fire all same everywhere. It burn up all. Nothing left. Only two men. Boss Steve and Julyman. Oh, yes. They stan'. They look, too. They no fear. So they not burn all up. The man by the dogs much scare. He left him club, an' beat all dogs. So they all crazed with him club. They run. Oh, yes. An' the man turn. He run, too. Then Oolak see him face. Oh, yes. Him face of Oolak. Him eyes big with fear. Him cry out. So him run lak hell so the fire not get him."
The silent Oolak had committed himself to speech. He had talked long out of the superstitious dread that beset his Indian heart. He had dreamed a dream that filled him with fear of the future, towards which he looked for its fulfilment.
The grey dawn was searching the obscurity of the fringe of woody shelter in which the camp was made—the last camp on the return journey from Seal Bay to the fort. The smell of cooked meat rose from the pan which Julyman held over the fire. Steve sat on a fallen log, smoking, and listening tolerantly to the man's recital, while the sharp yapping of the dogs near by suggested the usual altercation over their daily meal of frozen fish. The cold was intense, but the cracking, splitting booming which came up out of the heart of the woods told of the reluctant yielding of the tenacious grip of winter.
Something of Oolak's awe found reflection in the eyes of Julyman. He, too, was an easy prey to the other's primitive superstition. Steve alone seemed untroubled. He understood these men. They were comrades on the trail. There was no distinction. There was no master and servant here. They fought the battle together, the Indians only looking to him for leadership. Thus he restrained the lurking smile of irony as he listened to the awesome recital of a dream that filled the dreamer with serious apprehension.
"And this fire? Where did it come from?" he demanded, with a seriousness he by no means felt.
Oolak met his gaze with a look of appeal.
"The earth all fire," he said. "The hills, the valleys, the trees. All same. Him fire everywhere. Oh, yes. It run so as water. It fill 'em up all things—everywhere. An' it burn all up. Not boss Steve an' Julyman. Oh, no."
Steve meditated awhile. Oolak needed an interpretation of his dream, or, anyway, must listen to the voice of comfort. He understood this as he gazed upon the partially crippled body of the man who was still a giant on the trail.
The passing of years had touched Steve lightly enough. Time might almost have stood still altogether. A few grey hairs about the temples. A thinning of his dark hair perhaps. Then the lines of his face had perhaps deepened. But in the fourteen years that had elapsed since his return to Unaga the raw muscle and the powerful frame of his youthful body had only gained in mass and left him the more capable of withstanding the demands which his life on the merciless plateau made upon his endurance.
Julyman, too, was much the Julyman of bygone years. The only change in him was that opportunity had robbed him of many of those lapses he had been wont to indulge in. But he was still no nearer the glory of a halo. Oolak alone displayed the wear and tear of the life that was theirs. His body was slightly askew from the disaster of the return from the first visit to Unaga, and one leg was shorter than the other. But the effect of these things was only in appearance. His vigour of body remained unimpaired. His silence was even more profound. And his mastery of the trail dogs left him a source of endless admiration to his companions.
Steve dipped some tea into a pannikin.
"Oolak had a nightmare, I guess," he said, feeling that a gentle ridicule could do no harm.
Julyman grinned his relief that the white man saw nothing serious in that which all Indians regard as the voice of the spirits haunting their world.
"Oolak eat plenty, much," he observed slyly.
Steve helped himself to meat from the pan and dipped some beans from the camp kettle beside the fire.
"Dreams are damn-fool things, anyway," he said. Then he laughed, "Guess we've dreamed dreams these fourteen years. And we're still sitting around waiting for things to happen."
Despite his concern Oolak tore at the meat with his sharp teeth, and ate with noisy satisfaction.
"Him all fire. Burn up all things. Oh, yes. Bimeby we find him," he said doggedly.
Steve was in the act of drinking. He paused, his pannikin remaining poised.
"You guess——"
"Him fire," said Oolak, wiping the grease from his lips on the sleeve of his furs. "Him big fires. Oolak know. Him not eat plenty. Him see this thing. The spirits show him so he know all time."
Steve gulped his tea down, and set the pannikin on the ground.
"That's crazy," he declared. "It's not spirits who show Oolak. It's as Julyman says. He eats plenty. So he dreams fool things that don't mean a thing. Oolak doesn't need to believe the spirits are busy around him when he sleeps."
He laughed in the face of the unsmiling Oolak. But his laugh was cut short by the Indian's stolid response.
"Boss white man know all things plenty," he said, with the patient calm of a mind made up. "He big man. Oh, yes. Him bigger as all Indian man. Sure. But he not know the voice of the spirits that speak much with Indian man. Oolak know him. So. An' the father of Oolak. Oh, yes. So we find this fire sometime. We find him. This fire of the world. The spirits tell Oolak, so him not afraid nothing."
Julyman set a pannikin down with a clatter. He raised a brown hand pointing. He was pointing at Oolak, and his eyes were wide with inspiration.
"He dream of Unaga—him fire of Unaga! So!"
Steve started. In a moment, at the challenge of Julyman, his mind had bridged a gulf of fourteen years. He was gazing upon a scene he had almost forgotten. A strange, magnificent scene in the heart of a white world where snow and ice held nature's wonderful creation buried deep in its crystal dungeons. The distant, towering spire rising sheer above a surrounding of lofty mountains. The pillar of ruddy smoke and mist piercing deep into the heart of a cloud belt lit with the vivid reflection of blazing volcanic fires. The splendour of it had been awesome, terrific. He remembered it now.
All thought of ridicule had died within him. For the inspiration of Julyman had stirred his own inspiration beyond all reason. In a moment his mind was a surge of teeming thought, with Unaga—the fires of Unaga—the centre of a vivid, reckless imagination.
For fourteen years a wealth of dogged effort had been expended in an accumulation of failure, as he had admitted to Lorson Harris only a few weeks back in Seal Bay. The whole purpose of his life on Unaga had been denied him. Where he had sought and striven for Marcel, he had only partially made good. The promised fortune was amassing only slowly, painfully, while the child had grown to manhood with a rapidity that far outstripped it. The source of the elusive Adresol had remained hidden. Nature, and the Sleeper Indians, had refused him their secret.
For fourteen years the winter trail had been faced under the direst perils. And in all that time never once had the memory of the Spire of Unaga come to inspire him. He had pursued his endless search along the lines which the learning of the dead chemist had laid down. He had sought to trap the secret of the Sleeper men by every means in his power. But always and everywhere he had run upon the blank wall of failure.
Now—now, at a time when he had learned in Seal Bay disquieting news suggesting jeopardy for his whole enterprise, a flash of imagination had stirred in him an inspiration, which, against all reason, had changed the whole outlook of the future.
Unaga! Could it be? Was that the secret hiding-place of Nature? Could he make it? How far? Where? Somewhere within the boundaries of the Arctic ice? Maybe. He could not tell. The Spire was for all to see. Somewhere beyond. Somewhere lost in the grey world of the North. A lure to—what? A hundred miles. Two. Three. Four. No, he could not estimate. He did not know. All he knew was that it was there, a fiery pillar, the simple sight of which set the heart of the Indian quaking. Was it there that the secret of the Adresol plant lay hidden? Was it there that the sturdy Sleepers dared the summer trail for their priceless treasure? What monstrous conditions had produced it? What amazing anachronism had Nature created in the far-off Arctic world?
And the terror of that journey in the dead of winter. It was a journey into the unknown, unguessed heart of a world's desolation. Was it possible? Was it within human powers of endurance? If the land of fire were the nursery whence the Sleepers drew their supplies of Adresol they made the journey. But it was in summer. Winter? Was it possible?
Yes. It was possible. It must be made possible. If it were not, if the effort were too great he could always pay the price. Marcel had grown to manhood. Fourteen years of failure had elapsed since the taking of his great decision. Here was a prospect. Here was a chance. Had he not in the past fourteen years taken every chance? Well, it was no time to shrink before the fiery heart of Unaga.
The men devoured their food. Steve had no desire to talk of his new-born inspiration. Bald words would never convince these primitive creatures. They looked to him for leadership. It was for him to dictate. It was for them to follow. To discuss the project he contemplated would weaken his authority.
So he smoked on in silence, with a tumult of thought passing behind the steady eyes gazing so deeply into the heart of the fire.
An-ina watched them pass out of the store together, her dark eyes following them until they vanished beyond the range of the doorway. Her regard for both was intense. The untamed Indian heart knew no reservations. She had no thought for anything in the world but these two men, and that which pertained to their well-being.
The depth of her devotion was unfathomable. Only its quality varied with each. For the one it was the devotion of the wife. For the other it was the devotion of the mother.
She made no comparison between them. How could she? Each in his way was perfect in her eyes. Young Marcel's superb manhood had no greater claim upon her woman's admiration than had the sturdy set of Steve's broad shoulders. The boy's sunny smile, and often humorous eyes, were no greater source of delight to her than the steady, honest purpose which was in every line of the older man's strong face. Age and temperament were far enough apart, but, to An-ina, they were children of a great mother heart.
At the lean-to store-house, built against the stockade wall, designed by the dead chemist to hold the bulk of Adresol he had hoped some day to discover and which had never yet been called upon to fulfil its original purpose, Steve came to a halt. The melting snow lay heavy upon the sloping thatch of the roof, which was battened secure by heavy logs. It was banked against the door. It was laden upon the sills of the one long window. Steve kicked it clear of the door and took down the fastenings which secured it. He passed within, with Marcel close upon his heels.
"We're going to need it, boy—after all," Steve said, with a note in his voice and a light in his eyes that rarely found place in either. He laughed shortly. "Yes. I think so."
"You think so?"
There was a quick glance of responsive eagerness in Marcel's eyes. Well enough he knew the store had been built for one purpose only. He had long since dubbed it "The Poison House." Steve's words meant——
It had a long low interior, with a heavily raftered roof, and an earthen floor. It was a shadowed, empty tunnel that was only half lit, and gloomily seemed to merit the name Marcel had chosen for it. At the far end stood a small unused baling machine, and beside it a set of iron scales. And on the bench, set up under the windows, stood a few oddments of appliances of a scientific nature. For the rest it was pathetically empty. It was altogether a tragic expression of the failure of the living as well as the dead.
Steve laughed again. It was the same short laugh.
"Maybe I'm crazy," he said. "If I'm not, and there's two cents of luck waiting around on us, why, we'll need this old store-house after all. Yes, and I guess we'll need those poison masks your father made and figgered to need sometime. The whole thing leaves me guessing and wondering at the sort of fool man I am not to see what's been looking me in the face for the last fourteen years."
The flash of excitement leapt into Marcel's eyes.
"You've—found the stuff?" he demanded, in a curious hushed tone. Then with a rush: "Where? On the road to Seal Bay? Or the shores of Hudson's Bay? It's the sort of thing for a coast like that. Guess it's like seaweed. Where?"
Steve shook his head.
"Guess again," he said, with a smile of added confidence. "No, I haven't seen it. I haven't found it. It's just a notion in my fool head." His eyes lapsed again into their wonted seriousness. "It's a notion I've got, and—it's right. Oh, yes. In my mind's eye I can see the stuff growing. And—I—know—where. It's just for me to locate the place and make the journey——"
"For us, Uncle Steve."
Steve turned sharply and gazed up into the boy's handsome, determined face. He studied the unsmiling blue eyes that returned his look unflinchingly. And that which he read in them left him with a realization that a new chapter in the history of their companionship was about to open.
"We'll get along to your father's office, boy," he said quietly. "It's been our refuge and schoolroom for fourteen years. Maybe it's still the best place for us both to learn our lessons."
He led the way out without waiting for reply. And as they passed from the portals of the Poison House he again set up the fastenings.
Each had his own place in the simple room which Marcel's father had dedicated to the science which had been his whole life. For him it had been all sufficient. The storming of the elements outside might have been the breathlessness of a tropical climate so far as he cared, once absorbed in the studies that claimed him. And in a measure the atmosphere of the room had a similar influence upon these two who came after him.
Steve occupied the chair at the desk. Marcel had taken possession of the chair which stood before a small table upon which he had been accustomed to pursue the simple studies Steve had been able to prepare for him. He had turned the chair about so that he sat with his feet upon the rail of the stove in which summer and winter the fire was never permitted to go out. He had come prepared to listen to the man who had always been his guide and well-loved friend. But he had come also with the intention of pressing those claims of manhood which were passionately crying out within him.
The room was changed only that the belongings of these men, accumulated in fourteen years, predominated over those things which the dead man had left behind him. The room was intimate with the personalities of its new tenants, while it still retained full evidence of the man who had modelled its original character.
For some moments Steve searched amongst the drawers of the desk. Finally he produced a number of note books and well-worn diaries. These he set on the writing pad before him. Then he smilingly regarded the man who was as a son to him.
"Guess I've got the things I need, boy," he said. "They're support for the notion I'm going to tell you about. That's so you won't think I'm crazy," he added, laying a hand on the books.
Marcel nodded keenly.
"Sure. And the notion?"
Steve understood the other's impatience.
"Ordinarily I'd hand you what's got into my mind right away," he said, still regarding the books. "But that way I couldn't convince anything. There's got to be arguments, and your father's got to hand us the argument."
He thrust his fur cap back from his forehead.
"Light a pipe, boy," he went on kindly. "I've got to make a big talk. And, for a while, anyway, you've got to listen."
Marcel laughed. He obeyed without demur. But Steve was in no way blinded to the fact that for all his excited interest there was lying, at the back of every thing, a tug-of-war coming between them, a tug-of-war which he was by no means sure he was equal to.
"I'm just glad about the big talk," Marcel said. "You see, Uncle Steve, there isn't much of the kid left in me. This country doesn't leave us kids long. I'm still ready to act when you say so, and mostly without question. But a whole heap of questions have been buzzing around in my head lately, and they need to get out sometime. May as well be now. Talk all you need, an' I'll blow the pipe."
Steve nodded. He knew the rope for the tug was laid.
"I'll begin at the right start," he said. "That way I'll have to hand you things you already know. But I don't want to leave you guessing anywhere along the line, because you're going to tell me all you think when I've done. First we'll look right back. For fourteen years we've chased over this territory where your father chased before us. We've followed his notions to the letter set out in these old books. We've gone further. We've tried tracking the Sleepers in the open season, which he reckoned was a bad play. The result? Nix. We've done all he's done and more, and we've no better result than he had. We've read and re-read his stuff. We've dreamed, and wondered, and guessed till we know the whole of Unaga like the pages of one of his books. We've failed to find the growing ground of this darn Adresol, and, like your father, we've had to content ourselves with a trade in the dried stuff these dopey rascals choose to hand us. In twice the years he had at his disposal we haven't advanced a step along the path he's handed to us."
He turned the pages of some of the notebooks while the smoke of Marcel's pipe distributed a pleasant haze about the room.
"Now your father was a heap more than a clever scientific man," he went on a moment later, "and I get that through his notes, which I well-nigh know by heart. He was a reasoner in those things that had nothing to do with his science. Guess he was dead practical, too, well-nigh a genius that way. As for his courage and patience—well, I guess you've only got to look around you at this old fort. You won't need my hot air to tell you of it. So I'm left guessing at the wonder of it.He just missed the whole point of his own observations, and knowledge, and research."
A smile crept into Steve's eyes as he made the final announcement. It grew into his characteristic short laugh.
"Oh, I'm not going to tell you how wise I am. I'm not going to tell you your great old father was a fool man, and I'm the wise guy that's figgered out all he missed. I'm the fool man who's been handed a fool's luck. I was sitting around over the camp-fire on the trail from Seal Bay with nothing better to do than to listen to the crazy dream of an ignorant, superstitious neche. It was in that fool yarn I found the answer to all the questions we've asked in fourteen years. As I tell you, it was just a crazy notion till I started in to fit it to the arguments your father handed to us. Then I saw in a flash, and got the start of my life. There's times that I'm still wondering if I'm not plumb crazed."
He indicated a notebook which he had opened. Its pages were scored with his own pencilled notes.
"I don't need to worry you with all the stuff written here," he went on. "You know it like I do. But I'm going to read a piece so you'll get the full drift of my argument when I hand it you. First, though, we'll reconstruct some. The neches go out for this stuff in the open season. They start when the ice breaks, and don't get back to home till things freeze up again. That's important. They bring the Adresol indried. Like stuff dead for months. They don't bring it green, and dry it themselves. They bring itdried. Now then, your father says that one root would yield a thousand per cent. more Adresol than the green foliage. And the green foliage five hundred per cent. more than the dried. Why then do the neches bring in the dried stuff in the open growing season? Do they prefer it that way?" He shook his head thoughtfully. "Guess it's not that. There's a reason though. These folk have been using this stuff for ages. Yet they never bring it green. They never bring the root. Why not? Do they know about the yield of the foliage, of the root? Maybe. But I don't think so. I'd like to saythey've never seen the stuff in its growing state. Only dead!"
Steve picked up the notebook in front of him.
"I want to read this to you, boy. You've read it. We've both read it, but it's got a different meaning—now. Listen."
"Adresol has many features, interesting and deadly, foreign to all other known drug-producing flora. Aconite, digitalis, and the commoner varieties of toxins lie dormant in the producing plant. That is, there are no exhalations of a noxious nature. In Adresol the drug is active—violently active. Adresol extracted and duly treated (see note X, Book C) for uses in medicine is not only harmless to the human body in critical stages of disease, but even beneficial to the whole system in a manner not yet fully explored. But in its active, crude state in the growing plant, it is of a very violent and deadly character. It would almost seem that an All-wise Creator has, for this reason, set it to flourish in climates almost unendurable to human and animal life, and in remotenesses almost inaccessible. No animal or human life could exist within the range of the poison its deadly bloom exhales. The plant belongs to the order Liliaceæ and would seem from its general form to be closely allied with the Lilium Candidum. This, however, only applies to its form, and by no means to its habit. Its magnificent bloom is dead white and of intense purity. A field of this strange plant in full bloom, viewed from above, would probably give an appearance like the spread of a white damask table-cloth of giant proportions. The blooms almost entirely obscure the weed-like foliage. The danger lies in the pungent, sickly, but delicious perfume it exhales, which is so intense, that, coming up against the wind, it could be detected miles away. Before and after its blooming season it is only less deadly that it can be safely approached. To cut or break the sappy stems and foliage would be only to court prompt disaster without the use of adequate poison masks. The newly cut plant exhales the same deadly perfume as the bloom, one deep breath of which would frequently be fatal to human life. The cuts in the foliage heal up quickly, however, and after a day's delay its transport could be safely undertaken. The reference here is to transport in the open air. The green harvest once stored in a confined space again becomes actively dangerous. All stores containing it should be carefully locked up, and isolated, and should only be entered by those with poison masks carefully adjusted. The only moment at which Adresol, in its native conditions, is perfectly innocuous is in its dead season, when the bulbous root lies dormant. The proportion of the drug contained in the dried foliage, however, is infinitely small.'"
Steve looked up from his reading.
"That," he said, "is all we need to convince us of the Sleepers' lack of understanding of the nature of the plant. I'd say right here they've never seen the plant in growth. If they had they'd be scared to get next it by a thousand miles. Whatever we don't know of Adresol, we do surely know Indians. But I guess there's a heap more importance in that writing than that. How do these folk get the dead stuff in the growing season—the blooming season? How can they face that deadly scent? They've no scientific poison masks. Yet year after year an outfit makes the summer trail and they get back when things freeze up with enough Adresol for their own doping, and a big bunch for trade to us. Your father doesn't answer that. He leaves us guessing, and thinking of winter when the whole darn country is covered feet thick in snow and ice."
The interest in Marcel's eyes was profound, and he drew a deep breath as Steve paused. He had no question, however. He sat leaning forward in his chair expectantly, waiting, his pipe dead out and forgotten.
Steve's face suddenly lit with a smile.
"Now I'm going to give you a crazy man's answer to all those things. I'd hate for your father to hear me. I'm going to say the growing, blooming season of this queer stuff isdead, hard winter. At least up here. I'm going to say the foliage lies dead the whole of the open season, and the root is dormant. I'm going to say these Sleepers don't know a thing but the stuff they find, and never have known in all their history. I believe that some where away back their ancestors found the dead weed, and maybe used it to smoke like other weeds some of the Northern Indians use. Maybe it doped them in the pipe. Maybe some bright squaw tried boiling it into a drink. It's a guess. You can't say how they came to use it as dope. Anyway the thing just developed, and has gone on without them getting wise to any of the things your father knew."
"Oh, yes, it all sounds crazy," Steve hurried on as Marcel stirred. "It's too crazy I guess for a scientific head like your father's. But he hadn't listened to Oolak's fool dream, and he never saw the thing I've seen—twice."
"You've seen?"
Marcel could deny himself no longer. Intense excitement urged him. Steve shook his head.
"I haven't found it—yet," he said. "No. The thing I've seen you've seen, too. You were just a bit of a kiddie and won't remember. I'll try and fix up the picture of what I saw then in the far-away distance, and what I see now in my crazy mind's eye."
He paused. Then, with a swift movement that had something of excitement in it, he flung out an arm pointing while his voice took on a new note, and his words came rapidly.
"Somewhere out there," he cried. "A land of glacial ice, endless snow and ice. Hills everywhere, broken, bald, immense. A range of mountains. In the midst of 'em a giant hill bigger and higher than anything I've ever dreamed. A hill of blasting, endless fire. It never dies out. It burns right along, belching the fiery heart out of the bowels of the earth. And everywhere about, for maybe miles, a blistering tropical heat that defies the deadliest cold the Arctic hands out. Do you get it? Sure you do. You're getting my crazy notion, that isn't so crazy. Well, what then? Winter. A temperature that turns a snowstorm into a pleasant summer rain, and the buzzard into a summer gale. Vegetation starts into growth. I can't guess how the absence of sun fixes it. Maybe it grows—white. But it grows—grows all the time, like those things of the folk who grow out of season. Then spring, and the sun again. Rising temperature. The heat from this hell ripens the stuff quick, and the sun makes it green again. This Adresol. A great field of dead white. Then, as swiftly, it dies. Dies before the Indians come. Burnt up by the rising temperature of the advancing seasonand the blistering volcanic heat."
Marcel started up from his chair with an excited cry.
"You're right, Uncle," he cried, completely carried away. "But where? Where's this place? This old hill? I've seen it? Where?"
"It's north, boy. Away north. God knows how far."
Steve's voice had lost something of its note of inspiration before the hard facts which Marcel's question had brought home to him. He paused for a moment with his eyes hidden. Then, with a curious movement which suggested the determined squaring of his shoulders, he broke out again.
"Yes. It's miles—maybe hundreds of miles away north. It's somewhere in the heart of Unaga. Some place explorers never hit. It's the great Spire of Unaga. The unquenchable Fires of Unaga. It's a living volcano that sets all other volcanoes looking like two cents. I've seen it twice—in the far-off distance. You've seen it once. The boys have seen it, too. It looked like a pillar propping up the roof of the heavens. A pillar of fire. It set me nigh crazy with wonder. And it scared the boys to death. They guessed it was the breeding ground of all evil spirits. But it's there, and it grows our stuff. And I'm going right out after it."
"Yes!"
Marcel dropped back into his chair. His exclamation was a vent to the emotions which the force of Steve's words had stirred.
"Yes. Sure," he added a moment later. "We'll go right out after it."
"We?"
Steve looked up with a start.
The boy's excitement had passed. He regarded his foster-father with a pair of challenging, smiling eyes that were full of humour. But the challenge was definite. He re-lit his pipe.
"Why, yes, Uncle," he said promptly. "We'll go. That's how you said. I'm all in on this. I'm crazy to see all that wonderland can show me. It doesn't scare me a thing. You see, it's a winter trail. I guess I know the summer trail so I won't forget it. The winter trail's new and I'm crazy for it. You'll need us all on this thing. I——"
Steve shook his head. Marcel broke off at the sign, and the smile passed out of his searching eyes as he sought to read what lay behind that silent negative.
"You mean—?" he went on, a moment later, a flush mounting to his cheeks and suggesting a sudden stirring of passionate protest.
"I don't mean a thing but that you can come right along if you think that way."
The smile that accompanied Steve's words was gently disarming. There was no equivocation. It was impossible for the boy to misread what he said. The capitulation had not waited for the passionate challenge Marcel had been prepared to make.
"You—mean that, Uncle?"
"Surely. If you're yearning to take a hand, boy, I don't figger to get in your way." Steve closed up the books on his desk and dropped them back in the drawer from which he had taken them. Then he thrust back his chair and prepared to join the other in a smoke. "I've got just two feelings on this thing, Marcel," he went on, as he filled his pipe. "I'm glad you feel that way, but I'm kind of sorry to think you're going along with me. You see, I kind of think of you as my son. I've done all I know in fourteen years to teach you my notion of what a man needs to be. I've done the best I know that way. And I'd have hated to find you short of the grit I reckon this enterprise is going to need." He laughed. "If you'd have turned out a sort of 'Squaw-man' I guess I'd have hated you like a nigger. But there wasn't a chance of it, with a father and mother like you had. No." He lit his pipe, and settled himself in his chair. "The way you've learned to beat the summer trail, your woodcraft. You're a 'great hunter and brave,' as An-ina says, and you've got every Indian I've ever known left cold behind you. You've grown to all I've hoped, and I'm glad. And now—now this great last enterprise is coming along, why, it just leaves me proud thinking that you couldn't listen to the yarn of it, even, without reckoning to be on the outfit yourself. I'm glad—just glad."
Marcel's eyes shone. Steve's approval, unqualified, was something he had not hoped for. He had been prepared to battle for his rights as a man, and now—now the wonder of it. He was admitted to the task confronting them without question; with only cordial agreement. He remembered with regret his outburst to An-ina, when he had been waiting for Steve's return from Seal Bay.
"You see," he burst out with impulsive frankness, "I was scared you'd hold me to the fort, Uncle, the same as it's been every winter. I was just getting mad thinking I was only fit for the open summer trail, chasing up pelts with a bunch of these doper neches. Oh, yes. It set me mad. And I told An-ina. I'm not a kid, Uncle. Guess I'm all the man I'll ever be, and I just want to get busy on a man's work. I can't stand for seeing you doing these things for me. You don't get younger. And I—I'm bursting with health and muscle, and my spirit's just crying out against being nursed like a kid. I came here to kick, Uncle, I did—sure. To kick hard—if you'd refused me. But I needn't have thought that way—with you. And I'm sore now that I did. By Gee! It's just great! That hill, those fires! We'll start to fix the whole thing. And we'll get right out in the fall."
"Sure." Steve nodded. His eyes were very tender, and their smile was the smile he always held for the boy who had now become a man. "It'll be fall—early fall. We can't start out too early, but it mustn't be till the dopers are asleep. You see, we've got to leave An-ina behind—without a soul to protect her."
"Yes." Marcel's happy eyes shadowed. But they brightened at once. "Couldn't we leave Julyman? There'd still be the three of us."
"I s'pose we could."
Steve seemed to consider for a moment, his serious eyes turned on the stove. Marcel watched him anxiously. Presently the elder man looked up. To the other it seemed that all doubt had passed out of his mind.
"I'd best tell you what's in my mind," he said. "I got it from Leclerc at Seal Bay. I got it, by inference, from my talks with Lorson Harris. The Seal Bay Co. are out after us all they know. They're out after our stuff. Our secret. They've opened up Fort Duggan, and sent a crook called David Nicol there to run it. And he's out to jump our claim. It comes to this. This outfit is on the prowl. Their job is to locate us. Well? An-ina alone! Even Julyman with her! What then if this bunch hits up against the fort while we're away? Oh, I'm not thinking of our 'claim.' It's An-ina. The soul who's handed over her life to us. The woman who's nursed you ever since you were born. And who'd give up her life any hour of the day or night if she guessed it would help you. Can we leave her to Julyman? You best tell me how you think—just how you think."
The expressive face of Marcel reflected the emotion which Steve's words had set stirring in his boyish heart. The delight at his contemplated share in the great adventure had been shining in his eyes. Now they were shadowed with anxiety at the talk of Lorson Harris and his scouts. A moment's disappointment followed. But this was swept away by a rush of feeling at the thought of his second mother left alone and unprotected, except by an Indian.
In a moment all that was loyal and generous in him swamped the selfishness of his own youthful desire. His passionate rebellion at being shut out from all he considered as man's work was completely forgotten. He remembered only the gentle dusky creature who needed his man's support.
"You needn't say a thing, Uncle Steve," the youngster cried. "I was crazy to go. I'm that way still. But—well, I just can't stand for An-ina being left. She's more than my second mother. She's the only mother I remember."
Steve nodded.
"I guessed you'd feel that way boy, and—I'm glad."
Beyond the river, the trees came down to the water's edge, where roots lay bare to the lap of the stream which frothed about them. They shadowed the wide waters with a reflection of their own dark mystery. They helped to close in the world about old Fort Duggan, deepening the gloom of its aged walls, and serving to aggravate the shadow of superstition with which the native mind surrounded it.
The hills rose up in every direction. They were clothed with forests whose silence only yielded to crude sounds possessing no visible source. The river seemed to drive its way through invisible passes. It appeared out of a barrier of woodlands, backed by a rampart of seemingly impassable hills, and vanished again in a similar opposite direction. Between these points it lay there, a broad, sluggish stretch of water upon which the old fort looked down from the rising foreshore.
The benighted instincts of the Shaunekuks know no half measure. Fort Duggan to them was the gateway of Unaga, which was the home of all Evil Spirits. So they looked upon the fort without favour, and left it severely alone.
But now all that was changed. Fort Duggan was no longer silent, still, the shadowed abode of evil spirits. Crazy white folks had come and taken possession of it. They had dared the wrath of the Evil One, and the old place rang with the echo of many voices.
For awhile these primitive folk had looked on in silence. They wondered. They thought of the Evil One and waited for the blow to fall. But as the weeks and months went by without the looked-for retribution they began to take heart and give rein to a curiosity they could no longer resist. Who were these folk? Why had they come? But most important of all, what had they brought with them?
They found a white man and two white women. They found several dusky creatures like themselves, only of different build. Oh, yes, they were Indians, Northern Indians, but they were foreigners. They were slim, tough creatures who gazed in silent contempt upon the undersized people who came to observe them.
But the Shaunekuks were not concerned deeply with the men of their own colour. It was the white man and the white women who chiefly aroused their curiosity. Years of tradition warned them that the coming of the white man was by no means necessarily an unmixed blessing, and so they had doubts, very grave doubts.
Perhaps the white man understood. Anyway he promptly took steps. He invited them to feast their eyes upon the treasures he had brought with him from far distant lands. He assured them that he had come to give away all these splendid things in exchange for the furs, which only great hunters like the Shaunekuks knew how to obtain.
Capitulation was instant. The Indians forthwith held a council of their wise men, and set about inundating the fort with priceless furs. So it had gone on ever since. In a year the white man was complete master of the situation. In less than two years he had assumed the office of dictator.
The man Nicol knew his work. He had been sent there by Lorson Harris, which was sufficient guarantee. None knew it better. Having established in the Indian mind the necessity for his existence amongst them, he exploited the position to its extreme limits. Through methods which knew no scruple he usurped the authority of the wise men, or adapted it to his own uses. He saw to it that the generosity of his original trading was swiftly reduced to the bare bone of extortion. And the Indians submitted. The white man had come in the midst of their darkness and had given them light, at least he had dazzled their eyes, and excited their cupidity by his display of trade. Furs—furs. They could always obtain furs. If he were foolish enough to exchange simple furs for beautiful beads, and blankets, and tobacco, and essences, and coloured prints, and even fire-water, well, that was his lookout. At least they were not the fools.
With the coming of the white man and the two white women with their several Indian followers the life of the Shaunekuks at Fort Duggan was completely revolutionized. Before the foolish Indians knew what was happening they were captured body and soul. They quickly learned that the white man was to be feared rather than loved. They realized it was better to risk the anger of the Evil Spirits of Unaga rather than to offend him. So they yielded to the course which they hoped would afford them the greatest benefit. It was no less than submitting to an unacknowledged slavery.
It was perhaps a dangerous condition, a situation full of risk for the white man and all his people, should his force and ruthlessness weaken even for one moment. But Nicol was too widely experienced, too naturally cut out for his work to fall for weakness. He treated the Indian as he would treat a trail dog, as a savage beast to be beaten down to the master will, and kept alive only as long as it yielded return for the clemency.
For the women folk of this man the benighted Indians had little concern. One of them was sick, which made her a creature of even less consequence. The other, the one who called herself Keeko, she seemed to live her own life regardless of the man, regardless of everybody except the sick woman, who was her mother. She made the summer trail after pelts and so trespassed upon what the Indians regarded as their rights, but since the white man seemed to approve there was little to be said.
Just now the spring freshet had subsided, which meant that the river was clear of ice. Keeko was at the landing preparing for the trail. She was there with her Indians looking on while the laden canoes received their final lashings, and the joy of the open season was surging in her rich young veins.
Keeko was more than a little tall. She was as graceful as a young fawn in her suit of beaded buckskin. She was as slim as a well-grown boy in her mannish suit, with muscles of steel under flesh of velvet softness. Reliance and purpose, and the joy of living, looked out of her beautiful, deeply fringed eyes. Her ripe lips and firm chin were as full of decision as the oval of her wholesomely tanned cheeks was full of girlish beauty.
An Indian looked up quickly at the sound of her keen tone of authority. His face was crumpled and scored with advancing years, and the merciless blast of the northern winter trail. But for all his years he was hard as nails.
"We'll pull out after we've eaten," cried the girl. "We're days late. Get Snake Foot, and don't leave the outfit unguarded. Guess we're not yearning for the scalliwag Shaunekuks thieving around. It'll be two hours. The sun'll be shining there," she pointed, indicating an immense bank of forest trees. "Where's Med'cine Charlie? By the teepees of the Shaunekuks? He's most generally that way."
Little One Man nodded, and grinned in his crumpled way.
"Oh, yes," he said. "But I get 'em."
"Good. See to it." The girl nodded. "Don't forget. Two hours. The sun on the water. I come."
Keeko turned away up the rising foreshore in the direction of the long, low building of the fort.
Once she was beyond the observation of the Indian's keen eyes her whole expression underwent a change. The light died out of her eyes and a deep anxiety replaced it. She was torn by conflicting feelings. The desire of the trail had grown to a passion. The immense solitudes of the great forests were the paradise she dreamed of during the long dark days of winter. But deep in her heart there were other feelings that preoccupied her no less.
Her mother was sick, sick to death with the ravages of consumption, on a bed from which she would only be removed for a grave somewhere in the shadows of the surrounding woods. And she loved her mother. She loved her mother with a passionate devotion.
It was the thought of all that might happen during her prolonged absence that robbed Keeko's eyes of their buoyant light and happy smile. But—what could she do? She must go. She knew she must go. It had all been arranged between her and her mother. And with each season her work became more urgent.
As she passed up to the fort her mind had leapt back to the early days when she had reached full young womanhood. And a scene that lived in her memory came back again to urge her, as it never failed to urge her at such moments.
It was one of the many times that her mother had hovered at the brink of the grave. She and her step-father had shared the watch at the sick-bed. Up till that time the man had displayed no regard for herself but the treatment he would bestow upon an unwelcome burden on his life. There had been a bitter antagonism on his part, an antagonism that suggested positive hatred. But while they sat watching the closed, sunken eyes and waxen features of her mother, as she lay gasping in what seemed to be the last throes before collapse, an amazing change seemed to take place in him. His whole attitude towards herself appeared to alter. It became impressive in its kindliness and solicitude. He seemed suddenly to have become far more tenderly thoughtful for her welfare than for the wife who lay dying before his eyes. And when he spoke—But his words and tones did more than disturb her. It was at the sound of them that the almost dead eyes of her mother opened wide and turned a dreadful stare upon him. For minutes it seemed they stared while the ashen lips remained silent, unmoving. It was painful, dreadful. It was the man, who, at last, broke the horror of it all. He rose abruptly, silently from his chair and passed out of the room.
Then had come the great change. The moment the man had passed beyond the door her mother stirred. She seemed to become feverishly alive in a manner suggesting the victory of sheer will over a half dead body. She turned on her bed, and a warm light flooded her eyes.
"Don'tyougo, child," she had gasped eagerly. "I'm not dead yet and I don't intend to die. I'm going to live long enough to fool him. Say, you've got to quit nursing me. I tell you I shan't die—yet. A squaw can do all I need. You reckon to help me. I know. You're a good girl. You're too good to be—If you reckon to help me there's just one way. Get out. Get right out. Learn to help yourself. Get out into the open. It's only the woods, and the trail, and the Northern world'll teach you the same as they taught your father. You've got to get so you can face life—when the time comes around—alone. Learn to handle a gun—and use it. Learn to face men, and hold them in the place that belongs them, whether they're Indians or white. I'll die later on. But I won't die till I'm ready. And that'll only be when I see you fit to stand alone. Then I'll be glad, and I'll die easy."
The natural protest had promptly risen to the girl's lips.
"But I'll have Father," she cried. "Please, please let me help you, Mother dear. I want to make you happy, and comfortable, and better. I don't want you to die, and——"
But her plea was never completed. A hard, cold light suddenly leapt into the sick woman's haggard eyes.
"Don't mention your father to me," she cried fiercely, "He's no father of yours. Cut the thought of his help right out of your mind. Forget it, and work—work as I say. Work and learn, so you don't need to fear man or—devil."
It was more than three years ago since the scene occurred. Her mother had said she would live. She had lived, and was still dragging on a now completely bedridden life. She lived, and, to the girl, it sometimes seemed that it was only the fierce purpose in her mind that kept her alive.
From that time, despite all other inclination, Keeko had obeyed. She had plunged herself into the battle of the Northland which only the hardiest could hope to survive. Even the winter trail she had dared and—conquered. Oh, yes. She had obeyed and she had realized her mother's commands to the letter. She had reached that point now when she feared neither man nor—devil.
But for all her ability the whole of Keeko's equipment was only a splendid veneer. Under it all she remained the simple-hearted girl, the loyally devoted daughter. Her mother was still her first concern, a concern that haunted her in the far distant woods, and on the waters of the river, in storm and sunshine alike, and amidst the snows of the winter trail. Each time she returned to her home she feared to find her mother gone, flown to that rest from which there was no returning. And, as the seasons passed her fears only increased. Her mother fought with a passion of bitter purpose, but she was struggling against an irresistible foe.
It was this that troubled Keeko now. It was the thought of nearly six months' absence, and that which she might return to, that robbed her eyes of their smiling light. She must go, she knew. It was her mother's will. But she was loth, bitterly loth.
She passed within the low doorway of the fort, and approached her mother's room. The place was all very crude. Its atmosphere lacked all sense of comfort. It was all makeshift, and the stern days of the old buccaneers frowned out of every shadowed corner. Keeko had neither time nor inclination to brighten the place to which her step-father's plans had brought them. And her mother—? Her mother was indifferent to all but the purpose which seemed to keep her hovering upon the brink of the grave.
When Keeko entered the sick room the attendant squaw gladly enough departed to the sunlight outside. And, left alone, the girl prepared to take her customary farewell. The eyes of the sick woman lit at the sight which was her only remaining joy in life. But the tone of her voice retained its privileged quality of complaint.
"You're pulling out?" she demanded, in a low, husky voice, in which there was always a gasp. "I was hoping you'd be around earlier, seeing you won't get back till fall."
The girl understood. She did not take up the challenge.
"I had to fix the outfit right, Mother," she said. "You can't even rely on Little One Man. But I guess it's all fixed now. How are you feeling? Better? You're looking——"
"You don't need to ask fool questions. You don't need to worry how I look. It's you we need to think for. How many boys are you taking?"
"Three. Little One Man, Snake Foot, and Med'cine Charlie. They're all I need. Snake Foot and Charlie with the big canoe and outfit, and Little One Man and me with the other. We're out after a big bunch of pelts."
The sick woman's eyes shone prompt approval, for all the fixity of their regard.
"See and get them. You've put your cash away. You've hidden it close. I mean the cash for your trade at Seal Bay. That way you'll be fixed all right. Keep it close, child. This year you need a good haul. Yes, yes. And trade it, and hide the cash. Always hide your money. How much have you got?"
"Nearly two thousand dollars."
"Not enough. Not enough. You need more. See you get it this year."
The mother broke off in a spasm of coughing, and Keeko stood helpless and fearing until the fit had passed.
The tragedy of it all was terrible to the girl who had to look on so utterly helpless. The convulsed figure beneath the coloured blankets was simply skin and bone. The alabaster of the sunken cheeks was untouched by any hectic display. The ravages of the consumption were too far advanced for that. The wreck was terrible, and the dreadful cough seemed to be tearing the last remaining life out of the poor soul's body.
"Well, don't stand around, child," the sick woman gasped, after a prolonged struggle for breath. "You're going to eat. I can smell the cooking. Well, go and eat. It's good to be able to. You've got to get another three thousand dollars. You can get them out of your furs—if you've any luck. Maybe this year. Don't worry for me. I'll die when I feel like it, but not before. God bless you, child—as you deserve. You needn't come around again before you pull out. It's time wasted, and you've none to spare. Good-bye. You can send Lu-cana in to me again when you go."
The straining eyes closed as though to shut out sight of the going of the child who was all that was left to the remnant of a mother heart. And Keeko knew that the dismissal must be accepted. There could be no tender farewell. Her mother forbade it. Yet the girl was longing to nurse and caress the suffering creature in her arms. But she understood. Her mother refused everything for herself in a burning fever of urgency. There was time for nothing—nothing but that purpose which she had set her heart on.
Keeko obeyed. She passed out of the room at once.
Her meal was awaiting her, a rough, plain meal prepared by the squaw of Little One Man. She partook of it in the kitchen, the long, dark old hallplace that had probably served as some sort of barracks for the disreputable pirates of centuries ago. She ate with a healthy appetite, and some half hour later quit the shadows of the gloomy fort for the bright sunlight of a spring noon.
The hour of her departure was nearing, and Keeko glanced down at the landing. Her canoes lay there at their moorings, but——
Her orders had been disobeyed! The canoes were deserted. Little One Man was nowhere to be seen. Neither were the other boys. A quick frown of displeasure darkened her pretty face, and she moved down to the water's edge almost at a run.
But her journey was interrupted. It was the sound of a familiar, angry voice, harsh, furious. It came from behind her, somewhere behind the fort. The words were indistinguishable in their violence, but, as she listened, there came another sound with which she was all too familiar. It was the sickening flog of a rawhide quirt on a human body. It was her step-father flogging an Indian, with all the brutality of his ungovernable temper.
Keeko's eyes flashed in the direction of the canoes. Inspiration leapt. Where wereherboys? They had no concern with the work of the fort. They werehers. Something of the teachings and instincts of the life she had learned stirred her to action. Light as a deer she ran to the landing, and snatched up a rifle lying in one of the boats. It was the instinct of self-preservation. But it was also an expression of her determination to enforce her rights—if need be.
There was no hesitation. Keeko had learned so much in the past three years. She knew the man who was her step-father. She knew his brutality to Indians, and she suspected more. She hated the thought in her mind now. She even feared it. But she was determined.
She was late by the seconds it had taken her to reach the spot. It was a spot she knew well enough. A single tree standing by itself just behind the fort. She found a group of Indians gathered about it looking on in apparent indifference. Above their heads, in their midst, she beheld the rise and fall of a heavy quirt.
Into the midst of this gathering she thrust her way. And, in a moment, her worst suspicions were realized. Her boy, Snake Foot, was bound to the tree-trunk. Bared to the waist, cowering but silent, he was shrinking under the cruel blows of the quirt. Nicol, his dark eyes blazing with a merciless fury, was flinging every ounce of his strength into each blow of the terrible weapon in his hand. Keeko's horrified eyes missed nothing. She saw that Little One Man and Med'cine Charlie were amongst the crowd. It was all she needed.
In a moment she had flung herself in front of her Indian's bleeding body, and whether by design or chance the muzzle of her rifle was pointing and covering her step-father.
Her eyes were on his inflamed face. They were confronting him without a sign of fear or any other emotion.
"Don't let that quirt fall on me!" she cried. "I want Snake Foot right now, and I'm going to have him. Little One Man," she went on, without removing her eyes from the furious face of the man still flourishing his quirt aloft, "just cut him adrift right away, and hustle down to the landing. We're going to pull out—sharp."
But Nicol had recovered from his surprise, and his mad fury suddenly leapt into full flood again.
"Stand aside, girl!" he roared violently. "This swine refused to obey my orders and I'm going to teach him—and anyone else—who's master here. Get out of my way," he bellowed with an ominous threat of the quirt.
Keeko stood her ground. Her two boys had closed in towards her. They were on either side of her, and a wicked gleam lit the eyes of Little One Man as he watched the man with his upraised weapon. Keeko knew her step-father had been drinking. The signs were plain enough to her. They were all too familiar. But there was no yielding in her, whatever the consequences of her act.
"Cut him adrift," she cried sharply, to the men beside her. Then to Nicol her tone was only a shade less commanding. "Let that quirt touch me, and I won't answer for the consequences. Guess you've no right to thrash my boy, and I'm right here to see you quit. Think it over," she added, and, with her last word, there was a movement of her rifle which added to its aggression.