She smiled again. She threw into her smile all the blandness her sex alone can command.
"I guess you're right. It's Lorson all right. It's too good to let slip. Well?"
"Too good? Well, I'd smile. Too good? Gee!" Nicol was wholly deceived as Keeko intended him to be. He turned abruptly away to the counter where the bottle of rye whisky stood and helped himself to a full measure of it. He drank it down at a gulp. He had won the day. He had swept aside the antagonism he had felt threatened his ultimate purposes. He was on the high road to achieving all he had promised the dead mother in her tortured moments. He felt that Keeko was dazzled. He was buying her as he believed he could buy any woman. The rest would be easy. It only needed a little patience, a little care. So he drank without fear of the potent spirit he loved.
He staggered back to the stove and stood swaying beside the girl. And he rested one powerful hand on her buckskin-clad shoulder while his lewd fingers moved, gently caressing the soft flesh underneath. A wild, panicky desire set Keeko half mad to fling his filthy hand from its contact. But she resisted the impulse. She knew she dared not risk it in his present mood and condition. Filled with unutterable loathing she submitted to it.
"Well?" she demanded, while she forced the smile to her eyes again.
The man leered down at her out of his inflamed eyes. He shook his head with maudlin indulgence.
"You don't need to know any more," he said thickly. "What's the use? You're a gal with clean notions. Guess my hands are used to the dirty sort of work Lorson needs."
"Then it is Lorson?"
"Lorson? Sure it's Lorson. Is there any other dirty swine in the North ready to buy the lives of men?"
"Life?"
"Oh, hell! Yes," the man cried, with a gesture of tolerant impatience. "Of course it's life. Lorson! A hundred thousand dollars! It couldn't be for a thing less than life. It don't rattle me any."
Suddenly he flung caution to the winds. His passions were aflame, and his bemused brain was incapable of reckoning cost.
"It's some folks up north," he went on. "They've a secret trade. Lorson needs that trade. He's had 'em trailed, but they're wise, and they've fooled him all the time. He's crazy about it, and——"
Keeko had risen abruptly from her seat. The movement had rid her of those hideously searching fingers. She could stand them no longer. She stood up with one foot resting on the bench she had vacated, tilting it, and holding it balanced. Her smile had gone, but she was searching the bleared eyes of the man.
"He wants them—murdered!" she said.
But her tone, her look conveyed nothing to the man who had been her step-father. He went on ignoring the interruption completely.
"He means to get them. He set it up to me to locate 'em last summer while you were on the river. It was a tough trip, but I beat all I needed out of the hides of an outfit of the Shaunekuk, and I got the location of their post all right. Gee!" He laughed drunkenly. "Oh, yes, I got all the word I need, an' I guess there ain't a soul but me knows it. Well, I'm going along up north this opening, and I'm going to finish the job, and when it's done, and Lorson's handed the cash-pappy over, and it's set deep in my dip, why, then I'll pass him all he needs. He can get all I know—then. It's a cinch that hundred thou——"
"Who are the folks Lorson means to murder? Do I know them? Have I——?"
The man shook his head. The change in the girl's tone was lost upon him.
"Guess not. I'd say no one knows 'em except Tough Alroy and Lorson. They're an outfit carrying on a trade under the name of Brand—Marcel Brand——"
The bench under the girl's moccasined foot crashed to the ground. Instantly she was stooping over it.
When Keeko finally looked up the bench was under her foot again, balanced as before, and she was smiling. She was pale under the weather tanning of her face. That was all. Her mouth was set, and sharp lines were drawn about it. But she smiled. Oh, how she smiled.
Her lips parted. Her parching tongue moved in a vain effort to moisten them. She cleared her throat which was dry—dry as a lime kiln. When she spoke it was with effort, and her voice had lost its usual quality.
"Marcel—Marcel Brand," she said. "It—it sounds foreign. Maybe it's French-Canadian."
The man shrugged. The nationality of the name did not concern him. He was not even thinking of the murder for which he was to receive a price. It was of the girl he was thinking with all the animal there was in him. The alcohol he had consumed was driving him to let go all control.
"Don't know. Can't say," he said indifferently. "It don't matter two cents to me. It's the dollars when I've done and what they'll buy me. Say, kid—" he drew a long breath like a man preparing for a plunge—"what's the matter with us two making out together? I'll be able to buy you——"
"You're my step-father!" Keeko's eyes lit curiously.
"Step-father?" The man laughed as if he had just listened to something profoundly humorous. "Step-father?" He shook his head. He moved a step nearer, his swaying body ill-balanced as he approached. "I'm no step-father to you, kid. There ain't a sign of relationship. You're your mother's kid by her man, the man she married, and she and I never saw the inside of a church together. She couldn't have married me if I'd felt that way. Her man's alive I guess. Leastways, we ain't heard of his death. I'm no step-father of yours. That's the stuff she handed you so you wouldn't think bad of her. I couldn't marry her and didn't want to, but I can marry you. See? And this hundred thousand dollars makes it so I can hand you——"
He lurched forward, his arms out-held. And as he came Keeko sprang back.
"Quit it!" she threatened. "Quit! A step nearer and——"
But the man's passions were aflame. He laughed roughly.
"Quit nothing," he cried. "You can't fool me. I'm out to make good for you, and you're standing in. You're going to——"
"You fool man!"
Keeko's tone was cold and her words full of contempt. The white ring of her gun barrel covered him squarely. It was directed at the pit of his stomach, while her eyes, alight with cold purpose, stared unflinchingly into his drunk and passion-distorted face.
The man's movement ceased. The animal shining in his eyes changed to a sudden, livid fury. The standing veins at his temples visibly pulsed, and Keeko knew he was only gathering afresh the forces which her action had momentarily paralyzed. With lightning impulse she seized the chance afforded her.
"You cur! You filthy brute!" she cried fiercely. "Do you think you can play me as you play the miserable women of the Shaunekuks? Get sense as quick as you know how. Get sense. Do you hear? Get out and do the work you reckon to do, but don't dare to make an inch towards me, or you'll never live to do the murder you're reckoning on."
It was the promptness, the strength and nerve of it all that achieved the girl's purpose. There was no pretence now. Her eyes were alight with a sober, frigid hate and determination.
The man understood. His fury was that of a man whose lusts are thwarted, but his helplessness before the threatening gun was sufficiently obvious.
He sobered abruptly, as once before Keeko had sobered him.
"You can put up your gun," he cried savagely.
He waited. As the girl ignored his invitation he turned abruptly to the counter.
But he was not permitted to reach it. Keeko's voice rang stridently amongst the rafters of the place.
"Stop!"
Nicol stopped and turned.
"You can stop right there," the girl said coldly. "I'm going right out. I'm quitting. You best understand that. I'm quitting, and I'm taking my outfit with me. I don't pass another night under this roof. You best remember I've all I need to fight you. If you get out after me you'll get shot like the dog you are. So you best think—hard."
Keeko moved towards the door. Not for one moment did she turn her back, or lower her gun. And the man's furious eyes followed her till the slam of the door shut her out from his view.
For awhile Nicol remained staring at the dark timbers of the closed door. For awhile it seemed as if his bemused brain failed to grasp the meaning of that which had happened. Then he turned swiftly. He reached the counter and drained the bottle of the last dregs of the spirit it contained. Then, reaching under the counter, he possessed himself of the gun that was always lying there, and made for the door and flung it open.
He stood in the doorway seeking a sight of the girl he had marked down for his own. But there was none. She was nowhere to be seen. Only he looked out upon, the snow, and the woods, and the ice-bound river. So, after awhile, he seemed to change his mind. He closed the door and returned to the stove and seated himself on the bench beside it.
Keeko was with her Indians at work. Snake Foot, and Med'cine Charlie, and Little One Man were working as they always worked for the white woman they loved.
The outfit with which they had returned from Seal Bay was changed. The dogs were fresh, and the long sled was laden with a canoe that was securely lashed to it. The blankets and stores were loaded in the frail body of the light vessel.
Keeko's plan was clear in her mind, and urgency was speeding her efforts and the efforts of her helpers. She had only one thought now. It was—Marcel. She knew. Oh, yes. There could be no doubt. For her there was only one Marcel. There could be no other. It was Nicol's purpose to murder him and his people. It was for her to defeat that purpose.
Daylight was at its last extremity when the work was completed. And, while Keeko enveloped herself in her heavy Arctic furs, and secured the lashings of her snow-shoes, Little One Man put the only question he had asked as to the journey about to begin.
"We mak' him—yes?" he said, his parchment-like eyelids blinking his enquiry.
"North." Keeko's answer came promptly. "Guess we follow the river till the ice breaks up. Then we camp, and I make the rest by the water."
"Oh, yes. Him moose head. Yes? And him big hunter—Marcel?"
Keeko smiled into the dusky face of her faithful ally.
"That's so—if God wills it."
The daylight was lengthening. Very slowly the lolling sun was returning to life and power. A sense of revivifying was in the air. As yet the grip of winter still held. The snow was still spread to the depth of many feet upon the broad expanse of the valley of the Sleepers. But its perfect hue was smirched with the lateness of the season. It had assumed that pearly grey which denotes the coming of the great thaw.
Marcel was standing on the drifted bank of the little river, winding its way towards the Northern hills. He was there for the purpose of ascertaining the conditions prevailing. But his purpose had been forgotten.
Erect, motionless, superb in his physical greatness, he was gazing out at the wall of western hills, heedless of that which he looked upon. He was absorbed in thought that was reaching out far, far beyond the hills which barred his vision. It was somewhere out there where the eyeless sockets of an old moose looked down upon the great river coming up out of the south, cutting its way between the granite walls of the earth's foundations.
Keeko! He was thinking, dreaming of the girl who had come to him in the heart of the far-off woods, with all her woman's appeal to his youthful manhood. He was thinking of her wonderful blue eyes, her radiant smile, her amazing courage. They were the same thoughts which had lightened even the darkest moments of the howling storms of winter and transformed the deadly monotony of it all into something more than an endurance to which the life of the Northern world condemned him.
But there was more than all this stirring him now. He was moved to impatience, the impatience of headstrong youth. It was not new. He had had to battle against it from the moment of his return to the fort. More than all else in the world he desired to fling every caution, every responsibility to the winds, and set out for the meeting-place over which the old moose stood guard.
He knew it could not be. He knew it would be an act of the basest ingratitude and selfishness. Uncle Steve had not yet returned. He could not return for weeks yet. If he, Marcel, yielded to his desires An-ina must be left alone. His impatience was useless. He knew that. The Sleepers would awaken soon, and demand their trade. He could not fling the burden of it all on the willing shoulders of An-ina. He must wait. He could do no less.
He turned away. It was an act of renunciation. The signs on the river had told him nothing, because he had asked no question. He knew it all without asking. He had known before he had sought his excuse. So he floundered through the snow back to the fort.
The silence was profound. The world at the moment was a desert, a frigid desert. There was no life anywhere. There were not even the voices of warring dogs to greet him, and yield him excuse to vent the impatience of his mood.
He passed the gateway of the stockade where he had so often stood searching the distance in the long years. And so he approached the doorway of his home. A weight of depression clouded his handsome eyes. He was weighted with a trouble which seemed to him the greatest in the world.
The door of the store opened before he reached it. Keen, watching, understanding eyes had been observing his approach. They were eyes that read him with an ease such as was denied them on the contemplation of the pages of an open book. An-ina had made up her mind, and she stood framed in the doorway to carry out her purpose.
The man's eyes lighted at sight of her. His trouble was lifted as though by some strong hand. This mother woman never failed in her comfort even in the simple fact of her presence. With his thought still filled with the white beauty of Keeko, the soft copper of An-ina's skin, the smiling gentleness of her dark eyes were things at all times to soften the roughness of Marcel's mood.
"Marcel come back? The ice all hold? Oh, yes. Bimeby the trail open and Marcel mak' him. An-ina know. But—not yet."
Marcel made no attempt to conceal his feelings from this woman. He had told her all. He had spread out before her all his hopes and fears, all the impatience of his youthful heart. She had endured the burden of it throughout the long winter not unwillingly, and her sympathy had been yielded abundantly.
Marcel laughed. It was not out of any feeling of joy. It was the self-consciousness of youth before the eyes of maturity.
He shook his head.
"Not yet," he said. "Uncle Steve isn't back anyway."
"No." An-ina sighed. For a moment her smile died out, and her wistful gaze was unconsciously turned towards the North. It only encountered the crude interior of the storage sheds where the canoes and trail gear were usually kept. One of the sheds was standing empty.
Presently her eyes came back to the man's face, and they were smiling confidently again.
"He come—bimeby. Yes."
Even in the midst of his own troubles Marcel could never be forgetful of this devoted creature.
"He certainly will," he said, in no doubtful fashion. "He'll be along before the Sleepers wake. Say, An-ina, I'm not wise to many things. But there's one I know, like—like nothing else. The North can't beat Uncle Steve."
The dark eyes lit with a feeling which even Marcel realized.
"Marcel good. But An-ina, too, know he come—sure."
The woman paused with her gaze again turned upon the sheds, and after a moment she looked deeply, earnestly into the eyes of the man who held her mother love.
"That why An-ina say to Marcel now," she went on. "She think much. Oh, yes. An-ina think much—this white girl who mak' Marcel all much happy. She far away. Long, long by the trail. Maybe she come where Marcel say when the river all break up. It all long piece 'way. Marcel wait while river him break, then long-piece 'way river break too. So. This Keeko girl she come by river. No? She mak' trail. She think Marcel not come. He no more care find Keeko. So. Marcel go all heap sick. No Keeko—no nothing."
The woman's halting words lost nothing of their purpose in their limitations. Marcel's brows drew sharply together in alarm at the prospect she painted for him. Then, after a moment, he passed a hand across his forehead as though to brush his fears aside.
"But Uncle Steve's not back yet," he said, as though the fact clinched all argument finally.
An-ina, however, had no intention of accepting any such finality. She shook her head.
"That all so. Oh, yes," she said. "Uncle Steve not come back long whiles. But he come back. When him come An-ina say: 'Good. Much good.' Then An-ina say: 'Marcel lose all up white girl, Keeko. Bad. Much bad. No good—nothing.'" She shook her head. "Marcel go now. Take plenty dog. Sled. Canoe. Oh, yes. Take all thing. Reindeer. Everything plenty. So. When river all break Marcel find white girl, Keeko. He bring Keeko to An-ina. An-ina much happy. Uncle Steve happy—too."
The woman drove straight to the purpose at which she aimed. All the problems concerning the lives of the men she loved held for her a perfectly simple solution. Steve would come back to her in his own good time. There was nothing to be considered on that score. Marcel loved the white girl, Keeko. He must meet her again when the winter broke, or he would know no happiness. Then he must go—go now—so that he should be there to greet her when her canoes came up out of the south.
Self never entered into An-ina's calculations. So long as the path of life was made as smooth and pleasant for her men folk as the Northland would permit there was nothing else with which she need concern herself. She would be alone, unprotected. When the Sleepers roused from their torpor their trade must be seen to. Well, that was all right. She could see to it all. She saw nothing in these things which must be allowed to interfere with the happiness of any one belonging to her. Then, too, there was the white girl Keeko. Her simple woman's mind was stirred to wonder and curiosity as to the woman who had taken possession of the heart of the man who was to her as a son.
The unselfishness of it all appealed to the simple heart of the youth. But the passion that had taken possession of him overrode his finer scruples. The selflessness of the woman was the mother in An-ina. The emotions of the man were the emotions belonging to those primal laws of nature wherein self stands out supreme over every other instinct. An-ina was urging him to go—to go now—to leave her unprotected. It was the very thing for which he had blamed Uncle Steve. And he knew from the moment her words had been spoken that he intended to take her at her word. He shook his head, but his eyes were shining.
"I just can't do it, An-ina," he said a little desperately. "I can't leave you here alone. Suppose——"
An-ina interrupted him with her low, almost voiceless laugh.
"An-ina know," she said with a curious gentle derision which was calculated out of her years of study of the youth. "An-ina no good. She not nothing, anyway. Indian man come beat her head. She fall dead quick. Oh, yes. She not know gun from the 'gee-pole.' She got not two hands. She not learn shoot caribou, same like Marcel. She big fool-woman. An-ina know. Marcel think that. Steve not think that way. Oh, no. Boss Steve plenty wise. So Marcel come wise—later." Again came her low laugh. "This Keeko. This white girl so like the sun, the moon, all him star. Marcel love her? Oh, yes? An-ina say 'no.' Marcel not love her. Marcel love her, he say: 'An-ina no 'count Indian woman. She go plumb to hell—anyway. She nothing. Only Keeko. Marcel love her all to death. He go find her. He not care. Only so he find her.'"
Marcel stood dumb with amazement. His eyes were alight with a laugh he strove to restrain, but they were alight with something else, too. An-ina watched him. And her laugh came again as she flung her final taunt.
"Indian man say him love An-ina?" she cried. "Indian man not come fetch her—quick? Indian man say him not leave mother for An-ina? Then An-ina spit at him."
It was the savage breaking through the years of simple culture. The appeal of it all was beyond Marcel's power to resist. Suddenly he flung out his two great arms, and the hands that were immense with his muscular strength came down on the woman's soft, ample shoulders, and he held her in a great affectionate embrace.
"That's fixed it, you dear mother thing!" he cried, his face flushing with the joy of it all, the shame of it. "I'm going right away. I'm just going to leave you right here to the darn Sleepers, to the wolves, and the dogs, and any old thing that fancies to get around. There's no woman going to spit at—your Marcel."
Marcel had gone. An-ina had seen to that. She had given him no chance to change his mind, or to permit his duty to override his desire.
There had been little enough likelihood of any such thing happening. The man was too human, too young, too madly in love. But An-ina was taking no risk. So, with her own hands, she helped him prepare his outfit, and she saw to and considered those details for his comfort which, in his superlative impulse, he would probably have ignored. He went alone. He refused to rouse one single Sleeper to lend him aid. His journey was in that treacherous time between the seasons, when the snow and ice would be rotting, and the latter part of his journey would find his winter equipment an added burden.
Then he had set out. An-ina watched his great figure move away with joy and pride thrilling her heart. He was out to battle with the elements, with everything which the life of the Northland could oppose to him, for the possession of the woman he loved. In her simple, half savage mind it was the sign of the crown of manhood to which she had helped him. She was glad—so glad.
The joy of her thought was her great support in the long days of solitude that followed, and it filled her mind with a peace that left her undisturbed. She filled each moment of her waking hours with the labours which had become her habit. The Sleepers would soon awaken, and all must be made ready for that moment when the work of the open season began. It was her simple pride that with the return of her man he should be able to find no fault.
Ah, she was longing for that moment. The return of her man. Perhaps a triumphant return. She did not know. She could not guess. His success would give her joy only that she would witness the light of triumph shining in his eyes. Happiness for her would lie in his return.
He would come. She knew he would come. Her faith was expressed in the sublime trust and confidence which her woman's adoration had built up about the idol of her life. No god of the human mind was ever endowed with greater, more infallible powers. So the hours of labour were brief and swiftly passing, for she felt that each detail of her daily life was carried out under the approving eyes that, in her imagination, were always looking on. She was happy—utterly, completely happy. She could have sung throughout the hours of waking, had song been her habit. She could have laughed aloud, if the Indian in her permitted it. Heart, mind, and body were absorbed in her faith.
It was in the dead of night. An-ina stirred restlessly under the blankets which were those that once had covered the white mother of Marcel. In a moment she was wide awake, sitting up in the darkness, listening. The savage barking of the three old dogs, the only dogs now left in the compound behind the fort, had roused her from sleep. It was a furious chorus that warned her of the unusual. It suggested to her mind the approach of marauding wolves, or some other creature that haunted the Northern wastes.
She sprang from her bed without a moment's hesitation. Fear was unknown to her. She knew the old dogs, long past the work of the trail, were not easily disturbed in their slumbers. It was for her to ascertain, if necessary——
The chorus was still raging as she flung open the door of the store, and stood peering out into the brilliant night. Steve's repeating rifle was ready in her hand. She had lit the lamp before she removed the bars of the door, and stood silhouetted against its yellow light. Only a woman or the utterly reckless could have committed such a folly.
With every sense alert, those senses that were so keenly instinct with the perception of the animal world, she searched the shadows within the stockade, and the distance beyond its open gateway. There was no sign of the marauder she looked for. But nevertheless the chorus of the canine displeasure and protest went on. At last she pulled the door to behind her and passed out into the night.
Once in the open her search was swift and keen. The great enclosure yielded nothing to disturb, so she passed on to the gateway, where the barking of the aged dogs had no power to confuse her observation.
The coldly gleaming sky shone radiantly upon the white-clad earth. The calm of the world was unbroken. Even the wind was dead flat, and not a sigh came from the woods which hid up the dreaming Sleepers. There was nothing. Nothing at all. And she determined to return and to silence the foolish old trail dogs with the weight of a rawhide. Just a few moments longer she waited searching with eyes and ears, then she turned back.
But her purpose remained unfulfilled. She stood seemingly rooted to the spot while her ears listened to the faint distant shout of a human voice. It was prolonged. It had nothing in it of a cry of distress. It was the call of a voice suggesting a simple signal of approach.
For an instant her heart seemed to leap into her throat. Then, in a wild surge, it started to hammer as though seeking to free itself from the bonds that held it. That call. She knew it. There could be no mistake. Nor could she mistake the voice that uttered it. It was the voice of Steve. It was the great return of which her faith had assured her. And high and shrill she flung back her answer, with all the power of her lungs and a grateful heart.
The greeting had been all An-ina had ever dreamed it. It had been even more, for she had gazed into steady grey eyes shining with the light of triumph.
They were standing in the store where the stove, banked for the long, cold night, was radiating its comforting warmth. Steve, sturdy, unemotional, was replying to the question which had come with the passing of the woman's greeting.
"We're loaded right down, and the dogs are well-nigh beat," he said, in his quiet way. "Guess that's not the reason they're way back camped while I got on to home though. It's the green weed in full bloom, and we daren't open the bales with folks around without masks. We daren't risk a thing that way. I kind of guessed I'd best get on and warn you and Marcel, and make ready to pass it right into the store-house quick." He thrust up a hand and pushed his fur cap back from his brow. And, for a brief moment, he permitted play to his feelings. "Say, it's great, An-ina! And—and I'm just glad. I guess we've been as near hell as this land can show us, but we've made good. The boys are with me back there. They're feeling good and fit, and we've—Where's Marcel?"
An-ina's eyes were shining with the joy of a triumph no less than the man's. It was the greatest moment of her life. Had not her idol proved himself even beyond her dreams? Her gladness only deepened at his sharp question. She had her great story to tell. The story which no woman's heart can resist.
"Him go," she said, with a little gesture of the hands. "An-ina send him. Oh, yes."
"Gone? Where?"
Steve was startled. For a moment a sickening doubt flashed through his mind, and robbed his eyes of the shining joy of his return.
"It Keeko. She call—call. All the time she call to Marcel, who is great man like to Boss Steve. Yes. Oh, yes. She call—this white girl, Keeko. And An-ina say, 'Go! Marcel go! Bring this white girl.' But Marcel say, 'No. Uncle Steve not come back. An-ina alone. Oh, no. Marcel go bimeby.' Then An-ina say, 'Go.' She know. Him all sick for Keeko. So. Marcel go."
An-ina's low, gentle laugh came straight from the woman in her. Just as her account of Marcel's reluctance to leave her was a touch of the mother defending her offspring.
But Steve missed these things. He was amazed. He was wondering—searching.
"White girl? Keeko?" he exclaimed sharply. "What crazy story—Tell me!" he commanded. "Tell me quick!"
He flung aside his cap, and the furs which encased his sturdy body. Then he caught up a bench, and set it beside the stove. He sat down, and held out his strong hands to the warmth with that habit which belongs to the North.
An-ina remained standing. It was her way to stand before him. She would tell her story thus. Was she not in the presence of the man whose smile was her greatest joy on earth?
Marcel flung the fuel upon the fire, and gravely watched the flames lick about the fresh-hewn timber, and the pillar of smoke rolling heavily upwards on the breath of an almost imperceptible breeze.
It was cold—beyond the reach of the great fire—bitterly cold. For all April was near its close the signs of thaw had again given way to an Arctic temperature. It was only another example of the freakishness of the Northland seasons. His journey had been accomplished at a speed that was an expression of his desire. He had taken risks, he had dared chances amidst the rotting, melting snows, only to find at the river, where the old moose head stood guard, that Nature's opening channels had sealed again under a breath that carried with it a return to the depth of winter.
He had not been unprepared. He knew the Northland moods all too well. Besides, his practised eyes had sought in vain the real signs of the passing of winter. The migratory creatures of the feathered world had given no sign. The geese and ducks were still waiting in the shelter of warmer climates. Those wonderful flights, moving like clouds across the sky, had put in no appearance, while the furry world still hugged the shelter and sparse feeding grounds of the aged woods.
His disappointment was none the less at the sight of the solid, ice-bound river, lying in the depths of the earth's foundations. It was impossible as yet for the girl with the smiling blue eyes, who had given him that message of her love at the moment of her going, to approach the tryst, and he was left with the negative consolation that when she arrived she would find him awaiting her.
His purpose, however, was simple. He was at the appointed spot, and he intended to remain there until Keeko came to him. It was a matter of no significance at all if he had to wait till the summer came and passed, or if he must set out to search the ends of the earth for her. His persistent, dogged mood was an expression of the passionate youth in him. He loved as only early youth knows how to love, and nothing else mattered. He was there alone with Nature in her wildest mood, a fit setting for the primal passions sweeping through his soul.
So, in the time of waiting, he had lit a great fire. It was a beacon fire. And in his simple fancy it was sending out a message which the voiceless old moose was powerless to convey. It was a message carrying with it the story of the love burning deep in his heart. And he hoped that distant, searching eyes might see and interpret his signs. The thought of it all pleased him mightily.
For ten days he had carried on his giant's work of feeding the insatiable thing he had created. He laboured throughout the daylight hours. At night he sat about, where his dogs were secured, gazing deep into its ruddy heart, dreaming his dreams till bodily weariness overcame him, and he sank into slumbers that yielded him still more precious visions.
It was all so simple. It was all so real and human. The cares of life left Marcel untouched. The bitter conditions of the outlands passed him by without one thought to mar his enjoyment of being. Life was a perfect thing that held no shadows, and for him it was lit by the sunshine of eyes the thought of which sent the hot blood surging through his veins till the madness of his longing found him yearning to embrace the whole wide world in his powerful arms.
It was with all these undimmed feelings stirring that he took up his customary position before his great signal fire at the close of a laborious day. He had eaten. He had fed his vicious trail dogs and left them for the night. His blankets and his sleeping-bag lay spread out ready to receive him. And the old, sightless moose gazed out in its silent, never-ceasing vigil.
Night shut down with a stillness that must have been maddening to a less preoccupied mind. The perfect night sky shone coldly with the burnish of its million stars. The blazing northern lights plodded their ghostly measure with the sedateness of the ages through which they had endured, while the youth sat on unstirring, smoking his pipe of perfect peace. They were moments such as Marcel would never know again. For all the waiting his happiness was well-nigh perfect.
His pipe went out. It was re-lit in the contemplative fashion of habit. A whimper from the slumbering dogs left him indifferent. Only when the flames of his fire grew less did he bestir himself. A great replenishment and his final task was completed.
Again he returned to his seat. But it was not for long. Tired nature was making herself felt. She was claiming him in the drooping eyelids, in the nodding head. And her final demand came in the fall of his pipe from the grip of his powerful jaws. He passed across to his blankets.
A thunderous crash from the depths below and Marcel was wide awake again. He was sitting up in the shelter of his fur bag with eyes alight with question. He was alert, with the ready wakefulness which is the habit of the trail. That crash! It was——
But he quickly returned to his rest. It was the splitting of the solid bed of ice into which the river that came up out of the south had been transformed.
But somehow he did not readily sleep again. He was weary enough. His mind was at rest. But sleep—sleep was reluctant, and the old thread of his waking dreams came again as he gazed across at the beacon fire.
Hours passed. He had no idea of time. He had no care. He lay there watching the dancing firelight, building for the hundredth time those priceless castles of the night which the daylight loves to shatter. Never were they more resplendent. Never was their lure more irresistible.
But a drowsy fancy began to distort them. He had no knowledge of it. He never realized the change. He passed to the realms of sleep like a tired child, striving to follow the course of the flying sparks from the fire till his final memory was of a hundred pairs of blazing eyes peering at him out of the darkness.
He awoke with the grey of dawn. And as his eyes opened he heard a voice, a gentle, low voice in which rang a world of gladness and tender feeling.
"Why I just knew no one but Marcel could have lit that fire."
"Keeko!"
Every joyous emotion was thrilling in the man's exclamation. He leapt from his blankets, and stood staring, in utter and complete amazement, at the vision of the girl's smiling beauty.
Neither knew how it came about. It simply happened. Neither questioned, or had thought to question. The long months of parting had completed that which the summer had brought about. It was the spontaneous confession of all that which had lain deep in the heart of each.
It was the girl who sought release from those caressing moments. Her arms reaching up, clasped about the boy's muscular shoulders, parted, and her warm woman's body stirred under the crushing embrace holding her. Her lips were withdrawn from his, and, gazing up into the passionate eyes above her, she spoke the desperate fears of her woman's heart which had been submerged in the passion of the moment.
"But there's no time to lose!" she cried urgently. "Oh, Marcel, I came because I just didn't dare to wait. It's you—you and those you love. They mean to murder you. You—and those others. And so I came to bring you warning."
The ardent light in the man's eyes changed. But the change seemed slow, as though with difficulty only he was able to return to the things which lay outside their love. But with the change came a look of incredulous amazement that was almost derision.
"Murder?"
He echoed the word blankly. Then he laughed. It was the laugh of reckless confidence engendered of the wild happiness of holding the girl of his dreams in his arms, and feeling the soft, warm pressure of her lips upon his.
For all Keeko's urgency Marcel refused to be robbed of his joy at their reunion. His embrace relaxed in response to her movement, but he took possession of her hands. Deliberately he moved towards the fallen tree-trunk where the lichen-covered cache of their token lay. He sat himself down, and drew her down beside him.
"Tell me," he said smilingly. "Tell it me all. You came to hand me warning. They guess they're going to murder me, and Uncle Steve, and An-ina. Tell me how you came, and all that happened. And the things that happened to you, I reckon, interest me a heap more than this talk of murder."
The easy assurance of Marcel's manner sobered the girl's alarm. She yielded herself at his bidding, and sat beside him with her clasped hand resting in one of his.
Just for a moment she turned wistful eyes upon the ice of the river below them, and her gaze wandered on southwards.
"Oh, it's a bad story," she cried. "I guess it's as bad as I ever feared—worse. Maybe I best tell it you all. But, oh, Marcel, just don't figger it's nothing. I know you. There's nothing I can say to scare you. We've just got to get right away to your home, and hand the warning, and pass them our help."
The girl's appeal had a different effect from that she hoped. The man's eyes lit afresh. He drew a sharp breath. His arm tightened about her body, and the hand clasping hers crushed them with unconscious force.
"You'll come right back with me to our home?" he cried in a thrilling tone. "You?" Then in a moment the great joy of it all broke forth. "Say, I could just thank God for these—murderers."
But the woman in Keeko left her unsharing in his mood. She turned. And her eyes were startled.
"You could—! Say," she cried with a sudden vehemence in sharp contrast to her appealing manner. "Do you think I made trail from Fort Duggan for a fancy, after months of winter to Seal Bay and back, on the day I'd just made home? Do you think I wouldn't have waited for the river? Do you think I'd have done this if it wasn't all—real? Oh, man, man," she cried in protest, "I'm no fool girl to see things that just aren't. I guess David Nicol has located your post, and he's right on his way there now—for murder. There's——"
"On his way there now?" Marcel broke in sharply, fiercely. "How? How d'you mean? He's located—Who's—this David Nicol? God! An-ina alone! Tell me! Tell me quick. An-ina, my second mother, she's alone at the post. A woman! God in heaven! Tell me quick."
The change was supreme. No tone the girl had used could compare with the force of Marcel's demand. There was no laugh on his lips now, no smile in his eyes. A deadly fear, such as Keeko had never beheld in them before, had taken possession of them. He was stirred to the depths of his very soul.
Keeko's reply came at once.
"Yes. Nicol's the man I believed my step-father. He's a murderer. He's the man who sent my mother to her grave before I made home last summer. He's the man who Lorson Harris is going to hand a hundred thousand dollars for the murder of your outfit, and to steal your trade. He's the man who asked me to share with him the price of his crime, and would have held me prisoner to obey his will if I hadn't just had the means right there to help myself. Oh, my dear, my dear. I'm scared. I'm scared to death now for the folks you love. That's why I struck out on a chance for this old moose head, with my boys and dogs. I hoped, I prayed—oh, God, how I prayed!—that I could get around and find you, and hand you warning."
Marcel was no longer seated. He was standing, his great height towering over the girl who was gazing up at him with tears of emotion shining in her pretty eyes. He did not realize them. He was no longer thinking of her. He was no longer thinking of his love, and the happiness that was so newly born. His thought was far back over the trail of ice and snow over which he had so recently passed. He was contemplating a dusky face with eyes of velvet softness, carrying out her patient labours for the men she loved. He was contemplating the stealing approach of the would-be murderer. He saw in fancy the dawn of horror in the mother woman's eyes as she awoke to realization——
Suddenly he flung out his clenched fists in a gesture of superlative determination and threat.
"Say!" he cried, his eyes hot with a fire such as Keeko had never thought to see in them. "It's two hundred miles of hell's own territory with the thaw coming. I'm going right back—now. I'm going just as quick as I can load my outfit. She's alone—do you get it? An-ina! She raised me—she's my Indian mother woman. God help the swine that harms her body!"
He turned and moved abruptly away. Keeko had come to him with her love. She had faced everything the north country could show her to bring him the warning. He had forgotten her. He had forgotten everything, but the gentle creature whose dark-eyed terror haunted him.
Keeko understood. She had no feeling other than a great, unvoiced joy in the splendid manhood of it all. She stood up. She moved after the man as he made towards his camp. She overtook him.
"They're all down there, Marcel dear. They're down there on the river," she said, as she came to his side and her two hands clasped themselves about his swinging arm. "There's Little One Man, Snake Foot, and Med'cine Charlie. They're good boys, and the dogs are fresh, and ready. I saw to that. We can start right away, and I guess you can't just set the gait too hot."
Steve pushed back from the table in An-ina's kitchen. The woman was standing ready to minister to his lightest demands. She had waited on him throughout the meal, and remained standing the whole time. It was a habit, which, throughout their years of life together, Steve had been powerless to break her of. It was her pride thus to wait upon him.
Her soft, watchful eyes were observing him closely as he filled and lit his pipe. There was something approaching anxiety in their depths. It may have been the dull yellow lamplight that robbed the man's face of its usual look of robust health. But if the shadows wrought upon it and the curious pasty yellow tint of the skin were due to the lamplight, certainly the hollows about the eyes, the cheeks, which had become almost alarmingly drawn, and the sunken lines about the firm mouth could not have been attributed to a similar cause.
An-ina understood this. She understood more. She had realized, during the weeks that had elapsed since Steve's return from the heart of Unaga, a curious growing bodily lassitude in the man. It was something approaching inertia, and she knew its cause. Fear had grown up in her simple Indian mind and heart. She wanted to speak. She wanted to offer her warning. But somehow Steve's will was her law, and she knew that will was driving him now in a fashion that would only leave her words wasted. So, while her lips remained silent, her feelings were clearly enough expressed in her eyes.
"Just a draw or two at the old pipe, An-ina," Steve said, with his flicker of a smile that was full of gentleness. "Guess you can't know the relief of being rid of the mask for awhile. The taste of every breath I draw through it makes me well-nigh sick. Still, it's got to be. It's that or quick death. And I'm not yearning to 'cash in' yet. There's more than two weeks of it still. We brought a hell of a cargo of the stuff. More than I guessed. I'd like to get through with it before Marcel gets back with—this Keeko."
An-ina nodded. Something of her anxiety became absorbed by her tender smile at the reference to Marcel and Keeko.
"The thaw him no come," she said. "Maybe him not find Keeko. Maybe it long—heap long time. Oh, yes?"
Steve stood up and turned his back to the cook-stove. His sunken eyes were reflective.
"No. The thaw's quit, and a sharp spell's closed down again," he said. "He guessed the girl was coming up the river." He shook his head. "There'll be no river open for weeks yet."
He passed across to the door and flung it open. Outside the night was coldly bright, and the still air had a bitter snap in it. He remained only a moment, then he closed the door again.
"We'll get no change till the next moon," he said as he returned. "Anyway, I'll need to get things through before he comes. I don't want the boy to take a hand in the packing. It's a big risk."
"Yes. Boss Steve take all risk. An-ina know." The woman sighed. "An-ina mak' pack. Oh, no! Much big risk. She not mak' pack. So Boss Steve him say. Boss Steve die all up bimeby. Leave An-ina. Leave him Marcel—an' this Keeko. All mak' big weep. Oh, yes."
Steve's eyes smiled gently. He came over to the woman's side. One hand, that seemed to have lost much of its muscular shape, rested gently on her shoulder.
"Don't you just worry a thing, An-ina," he said. "Guess I know. When Marcel gets back I'll be around all right. I reckon to get through quick. That's why I work late into the night. After I get through, and get quit of the masks, I'll eat good, and be as I was. I just get sick with the dope on the mask, that's all. I'll get right on now."
He laid aside his pipe and passed out of the kitchen. And, as he went, the woman's eyes gazed yearningly after him.
Steve had lit his lamp. It burned up. It flooded the great store-room with its rank light. He watched it till it settled into full flame, half his strong face hidden up under the mask saturated with its nauseating "dope." Habit forced him to a swift upward glance at the three ventilators in the roof. They were all set wide open. Then he glanced round him surveying the work that occupied his working-day, and half the night he would gladly have devoted to much-needed rest.
It was a curious scene. It was full of fascination in that it represented the complete triumph which for so many years had been withheld from him.
The great store-house, built with so much care and close study of its purposes, and which had stood for so long empty, a pathetic expression of man's hope deferred, was filled to its capacity. A greater part of its shelving was groaning under bales of closely pressed Adresol in hermetically-sealed wrappings, while the floor was piled with vast quantities of the deadly plant awaiting the process that would render it comparatively harmless to those who had yet to handle it.
In its raw, limp state the plant was unwholesome enough to look at. Its pale foliage had something of the rubbery look of seaweed. But the crushed blooms, oozing thick sap from their wounds, were something almost evil for eyes that had knowledge behind them. Even in his most triumphant mood Steve was not without a feeling of repulsion at the sight. His mask held him impervious to the deadly fumes of the oozing sap, but well enough he knew that, in such a presence, it was only that ingenious contrivance that stood between him and swift death.
He turned to the window to see that it was secure. The door, too, he tried to assure himself that it was shut tight. He was fearful lest the heavy escaping fumes should reach those beyond. The ventilators were built high, chimneys that carried the fumes well up into the night air, where their diffusion was assured, leaving them robbed of their deadly poison. But the window and door were dangerous outlets that needed close watch.
Finally he passed to the far end of the room where his lamp stood on the bench beside the baling machine, and the rolls of curious-looking cloth, almost like oilskin, or some rubber-proofed material, and the large vessel of sealing solution with its brush for application sticking up in it. And forthwith he set to work at the scales upon which he measured his quantities. The organization of it all was perfect. It was Steve through and through, and his calm method seemed to rob the whole process of any sense of danger.
But Steve was sick. He knew it. He knew it was a race between his condition and the completion of the work. He was living in an atmosphere of contending poisons, breathing one to nullify the effects of the other. There were moments when he wondered how long his body could endure the struggle which he knew must go on to the end, whatever that end might be.
His determination remained unweakening. He knew that An-ina had become aware of his condition, and it only made him the more urgent that his task should be completed before Marcel's return. Whatever happened Marcel must not be permitted to participate in the danger. So, for all his appearance of calm, he worked with a feverish energy in the deadly atmosphere.
Whatever Steve's bodily condition mentally he was fully alert. It even seemed as if his bodily weakness stimulated the clear activity of his mental powers. Working through the long hours of voiceless solitude he held under almost microscopic review every aspect of the situation his final triumph had created. Everything must fall out—provided his sick body endured—just as he had calculated. There was only one thing that disturbed the perfect smoothness of the road that lay open before him. It was the story he had listened to from the lips of An-ina. It was Marcel, and this girl with the Indian name of—"Keeko."
The thought was in his mind now. He was uneasy. The whole possibility of Marcel's encountering such a woman in Unaga had seemed so absurdly remote. A white girl! And yet An-ina had assured him it was true, and the manner of her assurance left it impossible for him to doubt.
Who was this Keeko? How came she in those far remotenesses which he knew Marcel hunted? He could not think, unless—His searching mind offered him only one solution. It seemed remote enough. It even seemed extravagant. Lorson Harris was the evil genius he had to fear. And he sought to connect him with the mystery of it all. Was this Keeko some Delilah seeking to betray the secret he had fought to retain so long? Had she discovered Marcel for the sole purpose of serving Lorson Harris? Was she one of those beautiful lost souls haunting the vice-ridden shores of Seal Bay? It was just possible. There were such women, clever enough, hardy enough to accomplish such a task. It looked like the only solution of the mystery. And he smiled to himself as he thought of the tender soul who had told him the story of it all with such appreciation of its romance.
He realized only too well the fascination such a woman must exercise over a boy of Marcel's years. He would be clay in her hands. Chivalrous, honourable, unsuspicious, what an easy prey he must prove! It was too pitifully easy once the woman discovered him. But even with this realization he was by no means dismayed. He remembered poignantly that An-ina had assured him that Marcel would bring the woman to the fort. Well, if that happened Lorson Harris was by no means likely to have things all his own way. He, Steve, had learned his lesson of women, and was not likely to——
Steve was in the act of bearing down upon the lever of the baling machine. He paused, with the lever pressed only half way home. He stood listening, his bent figure unmoving. There was a sound beyond the door. It might have been the sound of a snowfall from the roof above him. It might have found its source in many things. Yet it was unusual enough to hold the man listening acutely.
Presently, as there was no repetition of it, he dismissed the matter. He was always fearful of possible approach. A moment's thoughtlessness on the part of An-ina, on the part of his Indians, and the mischief would be done. Even there was always the risk of Marcel's return, and the attraction of the light of the lamp through the window. He dared not for his own sake bar the door. There was always the risk of his mask failing him.
He completed his operation. The oozing weed was compressed, and the binding cords made fast. Then the lever was raised, and the sticky mass was passed on to the outspread sheet for its final packing.
For all the cloth was spread, however, and the bundle was set in place Steve hesitated before enfolding it. The disturbing sound still haunted him curiously. He could never resist the dread of the deadly atmosphere of the room. It needed only one breath—moments one might count upon the fingers of a hand. The thought occurred to him to risk all and bar the door. But it remained only a thought. He forced himself to continue his work like a man who recognizes the weakness prompting him.
He folded the cloth about the bale and reached for the solution brush. But the brush remained where it was. Distinct on the still night air came the sound of a footstep. It was too heavy for An-ina. It had nothing of Indian moccasins in it. It was the heavy footstep of a man, a white man. Marcel!
Steve swung about in an agony of apprehension. But for once in his life his forethought had failed him. He was too late. There was the swift opening and shutting of the door and a man stood inside the room with his back against it. But it was not Marcel. A heavy gun was thrusting forward, and the muzzle of it was covering Steve's body. Helpless, impotent, the man who had taken and survived every chance the Northern world could offer him, stood like any weakling awaiting the shot that must rob him of life in the hour of his triumph.
Steve stared wide-eyed. The man was no taller than himself. He was white, and above his fur clothing was a dark, brutish face with eyes of almost Indian blackness. For a moment they shone fiercely in the lamplight. They were alive with demoniac purpose. A purpose he had come so many weary miles to fulfil. Then, in a moment, the whole picture changed with the rapidity of a kaleidoscope.
The ferocious purpose in the black eyes faded to a ghastly terror. The lids widened, and the eyeballs rolled upwards. A voiceless gasp escaped through wide open lips, where a moment before they had been firm set with murderous intent. The out-held gun-arm dropped, and the weapon clattered heavily to the ground. The man reeled. He tottered forward. Then, with a sigh, a deep drawn sigh, his knees gave under him and he plunged face downwards amongst the litter of the Adresol whose secret he had come to steal. The deadly drug had done its work.
Steve passed down the room. He came to a stand beside the body of the man, fallen with its face buried amidst the bruised and oozing Adresol. His features were lost in the very heart of a limply spread white bloom. It was as though he were seeking to intake the very dregs of the poison with which the air was laden.
Steve stooped. Seizing the heavy body in his strong arms he dragged it clear of the weed, and laid it upon its back. Then he stood up and gazed down from behind his mask upon the lifeless face that gazed sightlessly up at him.
In those long, silent, contemplative moments memory leapt back, bridging the weary years. There was neither passion nor pity in his heart. It was almost as if all feeling had passed from him, absorbed in a deep curiosity at the signs which the years had set upon a once handsome face. Even in death they remained. And only a dreadful pallor robbed it of the deeper signs which debauchery had impressed.
Yes. Death had been merciful in that it had restored the features to something of their early good looks. Those good looks, which, backed by the subtle tongue of the seducer, had been sufficient to attract the weak vessel of a foolish woman's heart from the path of virtue that had been marked out for it.
Oh, yes. Steve recognized that ghastly, lifeless face. And just for one moment he hoped that as Death secured its stranglehold the dead creature had recognized his. He wondered.
"Garstaing! Hervey Garstaing!"
The words sounded faintly in the heavy atmosphere. It was Steve's voice hushed to something like a whisper. It was a passionless whisper. There was neither contempt nor hatred in it. Neither was there a shadow of pity.
He turned back to the lamp. He picked it up, and brought it towards the door. The body of his would-be murderer lay sprawled across the floor barring his way. He thrust out a foot and pushed it aside. Then he passed on.
Without one backward glance he turned out the light, and, passing out, made fast the door and removed his dreadful mask.
But, for a while at least, he did not return to the woman who was awaiting him. He moved on to the great gateway of the stockade. Then he leant against one of the gate-posts and stood breathing the pure, cold night air, while his thoughts drifted back over a hundred scenes, which, until that moment, had remained deep buried in the back cells of memory. He was thinking hard, wondering and searching, striving to probe the full meaning of the man's attack.
Steve gave no sign. He saw no reason to admit anyone to the secret of that which had transpired in the store-house. He waited for the approach of an accompanying outfit, he searched to discover the supporters of Hervey Garstaing in his attempt on his life, and, failing all further development, he saw no use in sounding a note of alarm to disturb those who looked to him for leadership and protection. Besides, he was more than reluctant to lay bare anything that could stir afresh those memories from which only the passing of the years had brought him peace.
So he went on with his work, that work whose completion had become well-nigh an obsession. The dead body of Garstaing lay huddled aside, ruthlessly flung where it could least obtrude itself and interfere with the labours upon which he was engaged. Its presence was no matter of concern. It lay there held safe from decay by the power of the drug which had robbed it of life. Later, with leisure, and when the desire prompted, Steve would dispose of it as he might dispose of any other refuse that displeased or disgusted him.
To a man of lesser hardihood, of less singleness of purpose such an attitude must have been impossible. But Steve had learned his lessons of life in a ruthless school. He had no thought for any leniency towards an enemy, alive or dead. He had no reverence for the empty shell, which, in life, had contained nothing but vileness.
To the last he fought out the battle of physical endurance, and he won out. It was a bitter, deadly struggle in which will alone turned the scale. When the last bale of Adresol was packed, and the door of the store-house was made secure, its treasure in the keeping of its dead guardian, Steve knew that he was about to pay the price. The final removal of his mask found him an extremely sick man. And for two weeks he was forced to fight against the effect of the deadly toxins he had been inhaling for so long. He had saved others from the risk of handling the Adresol. Now he was called upon to pay for his self-sacrifice.
In her silent, unquestioning fashion An-ina understood, and, for nearly two weeks, she watched and ministered to the man of her love with smiling-eyed devotion. Steve never admitted his condition, and An-ina never reminded him of it. That was their way. But never in all their years of life together had the woman been more surely her man's devoted slave. Her every service was an expression of the happiness which the privilege yielded her. Every thought behind her dark eyes was a prayer for the well-being of her man.
For all the inroad the poisons had made upon him, Steve's robust, healthy body was no easy prey, and, slowly but surely, it won its way and drove back a defeated enemy. The spirit of the man was invincible, and then, too, his knowledge of the drugs, both Adresol and those antitoxins which he had been forced to oppose to it, was well-nigh complete. The dead father of Marcel had left him in no uncertainty. He had equipped him perfectly through his writings.
So, with the complete break-up of winter Steve was once more in his place at the helm of his little vessel. He was there calm, strong, resourceful, ready to deal with every matter that came along as the rush of the open season's business descended upon the fort.
It, was as well. The rush was considerable as the Sleepers roused from their hibernation. An-ina, Julyman, Oolak, were all his able lieutenants, but Steve's was the guiding mind and hand. The others were people of the same colour as these half Eskimos.
The hubbub and chaffer of it all went on the day long. The store was alive with the squat, black-eyed, dusky creatures, swathed in their Arctic furs. They brought all their trade, surplus stocks of the dried Adresol weed, pelts, beaver and grey fox, wolf and seal. And for these they demanded equipment and supplies for the open season's hunt. They were mainly a good-natured and unsuspicious crowd whose guttural tongue was harsh and very voluble. They needed handling. Essentially they needed handling by the white man.
Steve had been relieved for his midday meal. He was relieved by An-ina, assisted by Julyman. Oolak stood by with his club, ready for any display of the predatory instincts that yielded to temptation.
Steve had not yet returned from the kitchen. He had finished his hearty meal and lit his pipe. He was standing before the window, from which all covering had been removed at the advance of the open season.
The air was chill. For the moment he was staring out reflectively at the clear, bright sunlight, while the buzz of voices in the store hummed upon his ears. It was well-nigh a perfect Northern spring day. The sky was a-froth with white, sunlit clouds. But the sunlight had little relation to the sunlight of more temperate climates at such a season. It was fiercely bright against the melting snows, with a steely chill that entirely lacked the gracious promise of budding trees and tender shooting grass. At best it spoke of the final passing of the wastes of snow and ice.
These things, however, were not concerning Steve. It was one of those moments of solitude in which he could give run to the thoughts that most nearly concerned him. His eyes had parted from the shadowy smile which they usually wore before the eyes of others. Just now they were scarcely happy, and the drawn brows suggested a lurking trouble that disturbed him. He was thinking of Marcel. Ever since the visitation of Hervey Garstaing, Marcel had rarely been out of his thoughts.
He removed his pipe and passed a hand across his broad brow. It was a gesture of weariness. There were no eyes to witness the action, so he attempted no disguise. It mattered little enough to him that the whole world about him was awakening. It mattered nothing to him that the white world was passing, and the rivers were starting to flood. The feathered world might wing to greet the new-born season. It might darken the sky with its legions. Such things had no power to stir his pulses, any more than had the thought of the great triumph he had achieved over the desperate Arctic elements, if all was not well with—Marcel.
This was his haunting fear. He was thinking of Marcel—and this white girl, Keeko. Even when he had listened to the delighted tones of An-ina, as she told him the story which she had obtained from the boy's own lips, his fears had been stirred. The woman's delight had been the simple delight of a woman in such romance. That side of it had left him cold. He knew the Northern world, his world, too well. He knew the type of woman that haunted the habitations of man in such regions as Unaga. And so he had feared for Marcel.
Since that time had happened those things which warned him of a wide-flung conspiracy of which his secret trade in Adresol was the centre. Oh, yes, it had needed but one flash of inspiration to warn him of this thing, and his concern was that this beautiful white woman, Keeko, was a link in the chain of the conspiracy with which he was surrounded.
He saw the hand of Lorson Harris in it, guiding, prompting, from that office he knew so well in Seal Bay.
Hervey Garstaing was his tool. There could be no doubt as to that to which the man had sunk. It was the simple logic of such a career as his. A man reduced to haunting Mallard's in his endeavour to escape the law must inevitably sink lower and lower. Garstaing was a Northern man. Sooner or later the Northern wilderness would claim him. The next step would be the embrace of Lorson Harris. No man "on the crook" north of 60° could escape that. Then—? But there was no need to look further in that direction.
But this girl, or woman, this Keeko—her very name suggested to him the vampire creatures haunting the muddy shores of Seal Bay—had discovered Marcel last summer. Marcel, a boy. A boy in years—a child in mind. She would be beautiful. Oh, yes, Lorson Harris would see to that. She would be possessed of every art and wile of the women of her trade. It would be too pitifully easy. She must have returned to her headquarters with the secret he had held so long hidden. And then the coming of the murderer to complete the task Lorson Harris had set.
Now Marcel had gone again to meet this Delilah. He had returned to her in all his splendid youth to be dragged down, down to those backwaters of vice in which her life was spent. Or, having achieved her purpose, would she meet him again? Would she not rather have gone to receive the reward of her betrayal? Anyway it mattered so little. Her mischief was complete. Body and soul, this youth was doubtless hers. What manner of man would he return?
This it was that haunted Steve throughout the long hours of each passing day. Mind and heart had been set on one great purpose of selfishness. He had gambled his life against overwhelming odds for the sake of this youth. He had won out at terrific cost to himself. And now the joy of his thought was submerged in the prospect of that moral destruction which the evil scheming of Lorson Harris had brought about.
The hopelessness of it all was in simple proportion to the strength and depth of the love and parental affection of the man's heart. But he knew that until the naked truth, however hideous, was revealed he must continue the labours that were his. If the merciless hand of Lorson Harris had destroyed the simple soul of Marcel, then Lorson should pay as he little dr——
Steve started. His depressed brows lightened. His eyes, so full of brooding, widened as he listened. The sound of a voice, big, strong, reached him over the guttural buzz of the trading Sleepers' tones.
"Uncle Steve? He's back. He's—safe?"
The tone was urgent. It was Marcel. And there was that note of force and anxiety in his voice which Steve never remembered to have heard before.
Impulse urged him. It was quite beyond his power to restrain it. He waited not a moment for An-ina's reply. Snatching his pipe from his mouth he shouted swift response as he made for the store.
"Why, surely, boy," he cried. "It don't seem to me there's a thing north of 60° to do me hurt."
The two men were standing in the doorway of the store, just where they had met. Outside were two dog trains newly drawn up, and four figures, stranger figures, were moving about them.
Inside the store the clamour of traffic went on undisturbed by the new arrival. Oolak, with his club, continued to shepherd the queer, squat creatures he despised. Julyman was at the rough counter at the command of An-ina, whose outward calm was a perfect mask for the feelings stirred at the unexpected return of Marcel. It was all so characteristic of these people, for all there were momentous words and happenings passing, for all Marcel was conveying news of the threat to their lives which had brought him at such speed back to his home.
The older man, broad of shoulder, sturdy under his rough buckskin, was no match for the youngster who towered over him. And that which he lacked in stature was made up for in the undisturbed expression of his face. Marcel was urgent in his youthful grasp of the threat overshadowing. Steve, while apparently listening to him, seemed to be absorbed in the movements of the strangers beyond the door.
Marcel's story was a brief outline, almost disjointed. It was the story, roughly, as Keeko had brought it to him. He told of the purpose of the man Nicol, bribed by Lorson Harris to steal the secret of their trade. He told of Nicol's confession to Keeko that he had located the whereabouts of the fort, and his purpose forthwith to raid it, and wipe out its occupants, and so earn the price of his crime. He told of Keeko's ultimate terror of this creature's proposals to herself and of the desperate nature of her flight from Fort Duggan to warn Marcel, and seek his protection.
It was all told without a thought for anything beyond the urgency of the threat, and his own youthful absorption in the girl who had taught him the meaning of love. In that supreme moment he had no thought for the thing that had driven Steve out into the winter wilderness, fighting the battle of his great purpose. He had no thought for the success or failure that had attended him. Steve was there in the flesh, the same "Uncle" Steve he had always known. It was sufficient. An-ina, too, was there, safe and well, and the sight of her had banished his worst anxieties. The lover's selfishness was his. Keeko was outside. She had come with him to his home. She had promised him the fulfilment of his man's great desire. Where then was the blame? Steve had no thought of blame in his mind. And An-ina? An-ina's complete happiness lay in the fact of her boy's return.