Ridgwell Cullum

“ She had learned her simple understanding of life amongst the rough men of the northern trail. Here was a man recklessly plunging into the far-off world, ready to face and battle with every chance with which that world was crowded. He was fearless. Yes. He was all she looked for in courage. He was a leader, a strong, determined leader of men no less brave and adventurous than himself. And as for the rest it was all there. She had seen for herself. A great stature, a strong man’s face. And eyes that calmly shone with honesty and kindliness. ”

“ The homestead lying back in its shelter of windswept bluff had no place in the bustle and traffic on the river. It was a home of even deeper calm now than was its wont when the northern world aroused itself at the dawn of the open season. Usually at such a time the caribou herd was brought in, and the work its advent entailed never failed to absorb the rising spirits of those young lives, ready like the simple wild flowers of spring, to hurl themselves into their annual labours after the long night of winter’s inactivity. ”

“ Look! Look there! Yes, and there! Oh, God! It’s everywhere the same.” A shaking hand was outthrust. “Dead! Mutilated! Old men! Old women! And poor little bits of life that had only just begun. The barbarity! The monstrousness!”
Marty Le Gros, the missionary of the Hekor River, spoke in a tone that was almost choking with grief. His eyes, so dark and wide, were full of the horror upon which they gazed. His Gallic temperament was stirred to its depths. The heart of the man was overflowing with pity and grief, and outraged parental affection.
Usak, the Indian, his servant, stood beside him. ”

“ But word came back, and the rush began. Out into the twilight of the Arctic night leapt the army of trail dogs and their teamsters. Hundreds of sleds hissed their way over the snow-bed on the great river. Hundreds of voices shouted the jargon of the trail at their eager beasts of burden, and the fierce whips flung out. Many were rushing on disaster in the blind northern night. Many would never reach the hoped-for goal to grab the alluring wealth from the bosom of mother earth. ”

“ So it is always in the great hill countries. The sense of threat is ever present to the human mind, driving men to seek companionship, even if it be only association with the creatures who are there to bear his burdens.
Threat was stirring acutely now. It was in the profound quiet, in the saturating heat; it was in the portentous silence wrapt about the hidden habitation which the man at the water’s edge had just left behind him.
Leaning on his old-fashioned rifle the Indian, Usak, was gazing out northwards over the winding course of the river. His dark eyes were alert, fiercely alert. ”

“ For Bill Wilder, and Chilcoot, and even the hot-head, Red Mike knew that it was work, or the complete disintegration of the will to endure, which, in turn, would mean disruption and final disaster to the whole of their outfit.
So desperate was the interminable winter that every man of the outfit welcomed the deluge of spring with its promptly swarming flies and mosquitoes, and the reopening of hostilities with their almost unseen human enemy. ”

“ To the human mind day was no longer a thing of joy, but only a respite in which to complete those labours essential to existence in the northern wilderness before the long twilight of night finally closed down upon the world.
At the farm on the Caribou preparations for the winter were already in full swing. Already the reindeer herd had been passed up to the shelter of the hills to roam well-nigh free through the dark aisles of the woodland bluffs which lined the deeper valleys of the great divide, out of the heart of which the waters of the Caribou sprang. ”

“ THE VENGEANCE OF USAK The towering Alaskan hills overshadowed the broad waterway of the Hekor River. From the level of the water the shores rose up monstrously. There were precipitate, sterile, encompassing walls of granite that rose hundreds of feet without a break. And back of them, mounting by dizzy slopes, the great hills raised their snow-crowned crests till the misty cloud line enveloped them. The world was grey, and dark, and something overwhelming towards the headwaters of the great river. ”

“ So the expedition had endured through alternating periods of snow-storm and blizzard, when the blackness of the northern night could well-nigh be felt. Then had come those brilliant intervals of starlight when the twilight grew under the splendour of a blazing aurora, and the temperature dropped, dropped till the depths of cold seemed illimitable.
It was in these extremities that the whiteman displayed his right to his position in the scheme of life. An iron discipline ruled the camp, and never for a moment was it relaxed. Never was the mind permitted to drift from the appointed labours. ”

“ Yet you fear the coming of this man you call—Usak. You fear the sight of every stranger?”
Wilder’s gaze was on the anxious face of the woman. His words were for her benefit. But they had an unexpected effect. The blindman suddenly unbent.
“It is as I said,” he declared, his tone moderating but assuming a bitterness of real feeling. “I fear no one and nothing. I am blind. I am completely alone, but for my good wife. I live through her hands, her eyes, her will. What is the worst that may happen? Death? It is nothing—now. I am a dead man to the world—now. ”

“ Half an hour before the last of the daylight a canoe crept down to the landing.
Wilder was ready to cast off. He had spent the interim in preparing room in his vessel for the added burden of his passengers. He knew they would come.
There had been no doubt in his mind whatsoever. And curiously enough, he was the more sure since the man was blind. In his philosophy the more surely the man was afflicted the more surely he would cling to life, and dread the final slaughtering of his body by an unseen enemy. ”

“ Wilder suddenly squared himself in his chair.
“Here,” he cried. “Let’s be frank. My name’s Wilder. Bill Wilder. I’m a gold man first and foremost. After that, why, I guess I’m just as much an adventurer as most of the folk of this Northland. That’s all right. I’m not out to rob a soul of anything he’s a right to. And as for the things you guess I had no right to do, just think a bit. Here I find a house without a sign of life. You choose to hide yourselves up. Well? A derelict house here in the Arctic? ”

“ You come to Caribou.” He shook his head, and his eyes suddenly opened wide, and their black depths were full of that fierce resentment which was to be feared like a cyclonic storm. “I tell you no!” he cried hotly. “Caribou is not for whiteman gold man. No. It is for the white girl the good boss Marty leave to the care of Usak. Him all mans quit Caribou quick. I say him. I—Usak. You’m go quick as you come. You not go, then all mans get kill up dead. It so. Him no gold on Caribou, an’ Caribou him for my good white-girl boss, Kid.” ”

“ The ice-cold waters of the river lay behind the outfit. They had just crossed the shallow ford where the stream played boisterously over the boulder-strewn gravel bed. The labouring caribou were moving slowly up the gentle incline of lichen-covered foreshore. And the Indian on the lead, and the white youth trailing behind the last of the three beasts of burden, knew that in less than two hours the last eight miles or so of their summer-long journey would be accomplished. ”

“ Again came Wilder’s sharp question. He had steeled himself against the pity which the woman’s unutterable despair inspired.
The little creature shook her head in complete helplessness.
“How we go?” she asked. “It cannot be. He is blind. We are alone. The men leave us now he is blind. They trade for themselves. Hela no longer has power. They laugh in his face if he make order for them to obey. No. And they will not let him go either. They keep him here. They know. If he go back to Japan then another is sent who sees. Then these men no longer trade for themselves. ”

“ She was standing over a boiler of steaming water, frothing with soap suds and full of a laundry made up of the rainbow hues of a Joseph’s coat. The kitchen was reeking with steam. It was also littered with piles of well-wrung garments awaiting the services of Mary Justicia for transfer to the drying ground outside. The swarming flies were more than usually sticky in the humid atmosphere, and the prevailing confusion in the rough living room was as splendid as the most ardent housewife could have desired on such an occasion. ”

“ Wilder searched the ghastly features. A surge of anger leapt, and his cheeks flushed till his broad brow was suffused to the edge of his thick fur cap.
“It don’t matter a thing to me what you know, or what you don’t know,” he said sharply. “Usak’s on the river, making right here with his gun. Ther’s a getaway there at the landing till the daylight goes. You can take it or not. It’s right up to you. It’s there because murder’s going to happen around, and it’s my notion to prevent it. You’re blind, and your woman helpless. It don’t seem to me you matter a hoot in hell. ”

“ And as for the Euralians, with whom they had been in fighting contact for at least half the time, their identity, their personality was the same sealed book to Wilder that it had been before he had listened to their story from the lips of George Raymes. They had never yet made one single prisoner, or possessed themselves of the slain body of a single victim of their rifles. No member of the outfit had as yet more than a rifle shot view of these savages, who so skilfully avoided contact while yet prosecuting their warfare. ”

“ The imagination, the sweeping grasp of the clear-thinking mind that had lifted Bill Wilder from the depths of the whirlpool of humanity that had early flooded the gold regions of the North, to the highest pinnacle of success in a traffic wherein vision and courage were the chief essentials, had served him now far better than he knew. ”

“ Now he was no longer the missionary but a simple man of single purpose which he intended to put through in such way as lay within his power, aided by the friendship of Jim McLeod.
A shadowy smile lit his eyes.
“Yes. It’s the gold now,” he said, with an expressive gesture. “But,” he went on, with a shake of the head, “for the life of me I can’t get behind the minds of these mysterious northern—devils. Why, why in the name of all that’s sane and human should these Euralians descend on a pitiful bunch of poor, simple fisher-folk, and butcher and burn them off the face of the earth? ”

“ Daily the hauling of fuel went on from the distant forest bluff which sheltered the ruins of the missionary’s home where the Kid had first seen the light of the northern day. And this work was undertaken by the boys, and the half-breed Eskimos, whose work amongst the deer herd had ceased with its departure to the hills in search of winter keep.
Life just now was a sheer routine. A routine which demanded faithful observance. The least neglect might well spell disaster for those who knew the narrowness of the margin in human victory over the merciless winter season. ”

“ Man with his simple skill and profound daring. No rampart set up by Nature was sufficient to bar the way.
A small kyak was driving against the stream of waters surging at its prow. It was driven with irresistible skill and power, for the man at the paddle was consuming with passionate desire and purpose. For days and days he had driven on up against a stream that was growing in speed with every passing mile. He knew the thing confronting him. He knew every inch of the great waterway’s rugged course. Every shoal, every rapid was an open book to him. ”

“ Fierce, harsh words leapt in answer to the sound, and the Indian spoke out of the original savagery that was his.
“So! Euralian Chief!” he cried exultantly. “You not know all this you mak, or you not mak it so. No. I tell you this—I, Usak. You come kill my woman, Pri-loo. You kill my good boss, Marty Le Gros. You come to steal. But you not steal. Only you kill my woman, Pri-loo, an’ my good boss. So I, Usak, come. I kill up all the mans, everything. But not so I kill your woman. Not so I kill you. Oh, no. That for bimeby. Now I tak out your eyes. If I kill up your woman you die. No good. ”

“ Bill Wilder was the wealthiest gold man in a city of extreme wealth. Ten years of abounding success had transformed a youth of barely eighteen, lean, large, angular, yearning with every wholesome human desire, into a man of twenty-eight, glutted and overburdened with a fortune and mining interests the extent of which even he found it well nigh impossible to estimate. ”