The Trail of 98 (41 page)

How clear the air was! It was like looking through a crystal lensevery leaf
seemed to stand out vividly. Sounds came up to me with marvellous distinctness.
Summer was coming, and with it the assurance of a new peace. Down there I could
see
our home, and on
its veranda, hammock-swung, the white figure of Berna. How precious she was to
me! How anxiously I watched over her! A look, a word meant more to me than
volumes. If she was happy I was full of joy; if she was sad the sunshine paled,
the flowers drooped, there was no gladness in the day. Often as she slept I
watched her, marvelling at the fine perfection of her face. Always was she an
object of wonder to mesomething to be adored, to demand all that was fine and
high in me.

Yet sometimes it was the very intensity of my love that made me fear; so that
in the ecstasy of a moment I would catch my breath and wonder if it all could
last. And always the memory of Locasto was a sinister shadow. He had gone
"outside," terribly broken in health, gone cursing me hoarsely and vowing he
would return. Would he?

Who that knows the North can ever deny its lure? Wherever you be, it will
call and call to you. In the sluggish South you will hear it, will long for the
keen tingle of its silver days, the vaster glory of its star-strewn nights. In
the city's heart it will come to you till you hunger for its big, clean spaces,
its racing rivers, its purple tundras. In the homes of the rich its voice will
seek you out, and you will ache for your lonely camp-fire, a sunset splendouring
to golden death, the night where the silence clutches and the heavens vomit
forth white fire. Yes, you will hear it, and hear it, till a madness comes over
you, till you leave the crawling men of the sticky pavements to seek it out once
more, the sapphire of
its lustrous lakes, the white yearning of its peaks to the
myriad stars. Then, as a child comes home, will you come home. And I knew that
some day to the land wherein he had reigned a conqueror, Locasto, too, would
return.

As I looked down on the grey town, the wonder of its growth came over me. How
changed from the muddle of tents and cabins, the boat-lined river, the swarming
hordes of the Argonauts! Where was the niggerhead swamp, the mud, the unrest,
the mad fever of '98? I looked for these things and saw in their stead fine
residences, trim gardens, well-kept streets. I almost rubbed my eyes as I
realised the magic of the transformation.

And great as was the city's outward change, its change of spirit was still
greater. The day of dance-hall domination was over. Vice walked very
circumspectly. No longer was it possible on the street to speak to a lady of
easy virtue without causing comment.

The demireps of the deadline had been banished over the Klondike, where, in a
colony reached by a crazy rope bridge, their red lights gleamed like semaphores
of sin. The dance-halls were still running, but the picturesque impunity of the
old muckluck days was gone forever. You looked in vain for the crude scenes
where the wilder passions were unleashed, and human nature revealed itself in
primal nakedness. Heroism, brutality, splendid achievement, unbridled license,
the North seems to bring out all that is best and worst in a man. It
breeds an exuberant
vitality, a madness for action, whether it be for good or evil.

In the town, too, life was becoming a thing of more sober hues. Sick of
slipshod morality, men were sending for their wives and children. The old ideals
of home and love and social purity were triumphing. With the advent of the good
woman, the dance-hall girl was doomed. The city was finding itself. Society
divided into sets. The more pretentious were called Ping-pongs, while a majority
rejoiced in the name of Rough-necks. The post-office abuses were remedied, the
grafters ousted from the government offices. Rapidly the gold-camp was becoming
modernised.

Yes, its spectacular days were over. No more would the "live one" disport
himself in his wild and woolly glory. The delirium of '98 was fast becoming a
memory. The leading actors in that fateful dramawhere were they? Dead: some by
their own hands; down and out many, drivelling sottishly of by-gone days; poor
prospectors a few, dreaming of a new gold strike.

And, as I think of it, it comes over me that the thing is vastly tragic.
Where are they now, these Klondike Kings, these givers of champagne baths, these
plungers of the gold-camp? How many of those that stood out in the limelight of
'98 can tell the tale to-day? Ladue is dead, leaving little behind. Big Alec
MacDonald, after lavishing a dozen fortunes on his friends, dies at last, almost
friendless and alone. Nigger Jim and Stillwater Williein what
back slough of vicissitude do they
languish to-day? Dick Low lies in a drunkard's grave. Skookum Jim would fain
qualify for one. Dawson Charlie, reeling home from a debauch, drowns in the
river. In impecunious despair, Harry Waugh hangs himself. Charlie Anderson,
after squandering a fortune on a thankless wife, works for a labourer's
hire.

So I might go on and on. Their stories would fill volumes. And as I sat on
the quiet hillside, listening to the drowsy hum of the bees, the inner meaning
of it all came home to me. Once again the great lone land was sifting out and
choosing its own. Far-reaching was its vengeance, and it worked in divers ways.
It fell on them, even as it had fallen on their brethren of the trail. In the
guise of fortune it dealt their ruin. From the austere silence of its snows it
was mocking them, beguiling them to their doom. Again it was the Land of the
Strong. Before all it demanded strength, moral and physical strength. I was
minded of the words of old Jim, "Where one wins ninety and nine will fail"; and
time had proved him true. The great, grim land was weeding out the unfit, was
rewarding those who could understand it, the faithful brotherhood of the high
North.

Full of such thoughts as these, I raised my eyes and looked down the river
towards the Moosehide Bluffs. Hullo! There, just below the town, was a great
sheet of water, and even as I watched I saw it spread and spread. People were
shouting, running from their houses, speeding to the beach. I was conscious
of a thrill of excitement.
Ever widening was the water, and now it stretched from bank to bank. It crept
forward to the solitary post. Now it was almost there. Suddenly the post started
to move. The vast ice-field was sliding forward. Slowly, serenely it went, on,
on.

Then, all at once, the steam-whistles shrilled out, the bells pealed, and
from the black mob of people that lined the banks there went up an exultant
cheer. "The ice is going outthe ice is going out!"

I looked at my watch. Could I believe my eyes? Seven seconds, seven minutes
past onehis "hunch" was right; his guardian angel had intervened; the Jam-wagon
had been given his chance to make a new start.

The waters were wild with joy. From the mountain snows the sun had set them
free. Down hill and dale they sparkled, trickling from boulders, dripping from
mossy crannies, rioting in narrow runlets. Then, leaping and laughing in a mad
ecstasy of freedom, they dashed into the dam.

Here was something they did not understand, some contrivance of the tyrant
Man to curb them, to harness them, to make them his slaves. The waters were
angry. They gloomed fearsomely. As they swelled higher in the broad basin their
wrath grew apace. They chafed against their prison walls, they licked and lapped
at the stolid bank. Higher and higher they mounted, growing stronger with every
leap. More and more bitterly they fretted at their durance. Behind them other
waters were pressing, just as eager to escape as they. They lashed and writhed
in savage spite. Not much longer could these patient walls withstand their
anger. Something must happen.

The "something" was a man. He raised the floodgate, and there at last was a
way of escape. How joyously the eager waters rushed at it! They tumbled and
tossed in their mad hurry to get out. They surged and swept and roared about the
narrow opening.

But what was this?
They had come on a wooden box that streaked down the slope as straight as an
arrow from the bow. It was some other scheme of the tyrant Man. Nevertheless,
they jostled and jammed to get into it. On its brink they poised a moment, then
down, down they dashed.

Like a cataract they rushed, ever and ever growing faster. Ho! this was
motion now, this was action, strength, power. As they shot down that steep hill
they shrieked for very joy. Freedom, freedom at last! No more trickling feebly
from snowbanks; no more boring devious channels in oozy clay, no more stagnating
in sullen dams. They were alive, alive, swift, intense, terrific. They gloried
in their might. They roared the raucous song of freedom, and faster and faster
they charged. Like a stampede of maddened horses they thundered on. What power
on earth could stop them? "We must be free! We must be free!" they cried.

Suddenly they saw ahead the black hole of a great pipe, a hollow shard of
steel. Prison-like it looked, again some contrivance of the tyrant Man. They
would fain have overleapt it, but it was too late. Countless other waters were
behind them, forcing them forward with irresistible power. And, faster and
faster still, they crashed into the shard of steel.

They were trapped, atrociously trapped, cabined, confined, rammed forward by
a vast and remorseless pressure. Yet there was escape just ahead. It was a tiny
point of light, an outlet. They must squeeze through it. They were crushed and
pinioned in that
prison
of steel, and mightily they tried to burst it. No! there was only that orifice;
they must pass through it. Then with that great force behind them, tortured,
maddened, desperate, the waters crashed through the shard of steel, to serve the
will of Man.

The man stood by his water-gun and from its nozzle, the gleaming terror
leapt. At first it was only a slim volley of light, compact and solid as a shaft
of steel. To pierce it would have splintered to pieces the sharpest sword. It
was a core of water, round, glistening and smooth, yet in its mighty power it
was a monster of destruction.

The man was directing it here and there on the face of the hill. It flew like
an arrow from the bow, and wherever he aimed it the hillside seemed to reel and
shudder at the shock. Great cataracts of gravel shot out, avalanches of clay
toppled over; vast boulders were hurled into the air like heaps of fleecy
wool.

Yes, the waters were mad. They were like an angry bull that gored the
hillside. It seemed to melt and dissolve before them. Nothing could withstand
that assault. In a few minutes they would reduce the stoutest stronghold to a
heap of pitiful ruins.

There, where the waters shot forth in their fury, stood their conqueror. He
was one man, yet he was doing the work of a hundred. As he battered at that bank
of clay he exulted in his power. A little turn of the wrist and a huge mass of
gravel crumbled into nothingness. He bored deep holes in the frozen muck, he
hammered his way down to bed
rock, he swept it clean as a floor. There, with the solid
force of a battering-ram, he pounded at the heart of the hill.

The roar deafened him. He heard the crash of falling rock, but he was so
intent on his work he did not hear another man approach. Suddenly he looked up
and saw.

He gave a mighty start, then at once he was calm again. This was the meeting
he had dreaded, longed for, fought against, desired. Primordial emotions surged
within him, but outwardly he gave no sign. Almost savagely, and with a curious
blaze in his eyes he redirected the little giant.

He waved his hand to the other man.

"Go away!" he shouted.

Mosher refused to budge. The generous living of Dawson had made him pursy,
almost porcine. His pig eyes glittered, and he took off his hat to wipe some
beads of sweat from the monumental baldness of his forehead. He caressed his
coal-black beard with a podgy hand on which a large diamond sparkled. His manner
was arrogance personified. He seemed to say, "I'll make this man dance to my
music."

His rich, penetrating voice pierced through the roar of the "giant."

"Here, turn off your water. I want to speak to you. Got a business
proposition to make."

Still Jim was dumb.

Mosher came close to him and shouted into his ear. The two men were very
calm.

"Say, your wife's in
town. Been there for the last year. Didn't you know it?"

Jim shook his head. He was particularly interested in his work just then.
There was a great saddle of clay, and he scooped it up magically.

"Yes, she's in townliving respectable."

Jim redirected his giant with a savage swish.

"Say, I'm a sort of a philant'ropic guy," went on Mosher, "an' there's
nothing I like better than doing the erring wife restitootion act. I think I
could induce that little woman of yours to come back to you."

Jim gave him a swift glance, but the man went on.

"To tell the truth, she's a bit stuck on me. Not my fault, of course. Can't
help it if a girl gets daffy on me. But say, I think I could get her switched on
to you if you made it worth my while. It's a business proposition."

He was sneering now, frankly villainous. Jim gave no sign.

"What d'ye say? This is a likely bit of groundgive me a half-share in this
ground, an' I'll guarantee to deliver that little piece of goods to you. There's
an offer."

Again that smug look of generosity beamed on the man's face. Once more Jim
motioned him to go, but Mosher did not heed. He thought the gesture was a
refusal. His face grew threatening. "All right, if you won't," he snarled, "look
out! I know you love her still. Let me tell you, I own that woman, body and
soul, and I'll make life hell
for her. I'll torture you through her. Yes, I've got a cinch.
You'd better change your mind."

He had stepped back as if to go. Then, whether it was an accident or not no
one will ever knowbut the little giant swung round till it bore on him.