As twilight darkened to the full gloom of the forest night, Ben and
Beatrice rode to a lonely cabin on the Yuga River,--one that had been
built by Hiram Melville years past and was just at the mouth of the
little creek on which, less than a half-mile distant, he had his claim.
They had seen a lighted window from afar, marking the end of Beatrice's
hard day's ride.
"Of course you won't try to go on to-night?" she asked Ben. "You'll stay
at the cabin?"
"There likely won't be room for three," he answered. "But it's a clear
night. I can make a fire and sleep out."
It was true. The stars were emerging, faint points of light through the
darkening canopy of the sky; and to the East a silver glint on the
horizon forecast the rising moon.
They halted at last; and Beatrice saw her father's form, framed in the
doorway. She hastened into his arms: waiting in the darkness Ben could
not help but hear his welcome. Many things were doubtful; but there
could be no doubt of the love that Neilson bore his daughter. The
amused, half-teasing words with which he received her did not in the
least disguise it. "The joy and the light of his life," Ben commented to
himself. The gray old claim-jumper had this to redeem him, at least.
"But why so many horses, Beatrice?" he asked. "You--brought some one
with you?"
Ben was not so far distant that he failed to discern the instant change
in Neilson's tone. It had a strained, almost an apprehensive quality
such as few men had ever heard in his voice before. Plainly all visitors
in this end of the mountains were regarded with suspicion.
"He's a prospector--Mr. Darby," the girl replied. "Come here, Ben--and
be introduced." She turned toward her new-found friend; and the latter
walked near, into the light that streamed over him from the doorway.
"This is my father, Mr. Darby--Mr. Neilson. Some one told him this was a
good gold country."
Ben had already decided upon his course of action and had his answer
ready. He knew perfectly that it would only put Neilson on his guard if
he stated his true position; and besides, he wanted word of Ezram. "I
may have a wrong steer, Mr. Neilson," he said, "but a man I met down on
the river-trail, out of Snowy Gulch, advised me to come here. He said
that he had some sort of a claim up here that his brother left him, and
though it was a pocket country, he thought there'd soon be a great rush
up this way."
"I hardly know who it could have been that you met," Neilson began
doubtfully. "He didn't tell you his name--"
"Melville. I believe that was it. And if you'll tell me how to find him,
I'll try to go on to-night. I brought him some of his belongings from
Snowy Gulch--"
"Melville, eh? I guess I know who you mean now. But no--I don't know of
any claim unless it's over east, beyond here. Maybe further down the
river."
Ben made no reply at once; but his mind sped like lightning. Of course
Neilson was lying about the claim: he knew perfectly that at that moment
he was occupying one of Hiram Melville's cabins. He was a first-class
actor, too--his voice indicating scarcely no acquaintance with or
interest in the name.
"He hasn't come up this way?" Ben asked casually.
"He hasn't come through here that I know of. Of course I'm working at my
claim--with my partners--and he might have gone through without our
seeing him. It seems rather unlikely."
Ben was really puzzled now. If Ezram had already made his presence known
and was camping somewhere in the hills about, there was no reason
immediately evident why Neilson should deny his presence. Ben found
himself wondering whether by any chance Ezram had been delayed along the
trail, perhaps had even lost his way, and had not yet put in an
appearance.
"He told me, in the few minutes that I talked to him, that his cabin was
somewhere close to this one--I thought he said up this creek."
"There is a cabin up the creek a way," Neilson admitted, "but it isn't
the one he meant. It's on my claim, and my two partners are living in
it. But when he said near to this one, he might have meant ten miles.
That's the way we Northern men speak of distance."
There was nothing more to say, nothing to do at present. He said his
farewells to the girl, refused an invitation to pass the night in the
cabin, and made his way to the green bank of the stream. Four hundred
yards from the cabin, and perhaps a like number from the cabin of Ray
and Charley--obscured from both by the thickets--he pitched his camp.
In the cabin he had left Jeffery Neilson catechized his daughter, trying
to learn all he could concerning Ben. It was true that he carried the
dead Hiram's rifle, and that the latter's pet wolf followed at his
heels, but it was wholly probable that the old man, Hiram's brother,
with whom he had conversed at the river, had designated him to get them.
He had been courteous and respectful throughout the journey to the Yuga,
Beatrice said, and he had also saved her from possible death in the
fangs of the wolf the evening previous. Neilson decided that he would
take no steps at present but merely wait and watch developments.
Meanwhile Ben had made his fire and unpacked his horses. He confined his
riding horse with a picket rope; the others he turned loose. Then he
cooked a simple meal for himself and the gaunt servant at his heels.
When the night had come down in full, and as he sat about the glowing
coals of his supper fire, he had time to devote serious thought to the
fate of Ezram. It occurred to him that perhaps the old man had
discovered, at a distance, the presence of the claim-jumpers; and was
merely waiting in the thickets for a chance to take action. If such were
the case, sooner or later they could join their fortunes again. It was
also easy to imagine that Ezram had lost his way on the journey out.
He stood at the edge of the firelight, gazing out into the darkened
forest. The wolf crouched beside him: alert, watching his face for any
command. It was wholly plain that the gaunt woods creature had accepted
him at once as his master; and that the bond between them, because of
some secret similarity of spirit, was already far closer than between
most masters and their pets.
Ben sensed another side of the forest to-night because of his inborn
love of the waste places not often seen. The thickets were menacing,
sinister to-night. The spruce crept up to the skyline with darkness and
mystery: he realized the eternal malevolence that haunts their silent
fastnesses. They would have tricks in plenty to play on such as would
lose their way on their dusky trails! Oh, they would have no mercy or
remorse for any one who was lost, _out there_, to-night! Ben felt a
heavy burden of dread!
Even now, old Ezram might be wandering, vainly, through the gloomy,
whispering woods, ever penetrating farther into their merciless
solitudes. And no homes smoked in the clearings, no camps glowed in the
immensity of the dark--out there. This was just the beginning of the
forest; clear into the shadow of the Arctic Circle, where the woodlands
gave way to the Weary wastes of barrens, there was no break, no tilled
fields or fisher's villages, only an occasional Indian encampment which
not even a wolf, running through the night, might find. His supply of
food would quickly be exhausted, fatigue would break his valiant spirit.
Ben planned an extensive search for his tracks as soon as the morning
light permitted him to see.
He missed the old man's comradeship with a deep and fervid longing. They
had come to count on each other, these past weeks. It wasn't alone
infinite gratitude that he felt for him now. The thing went too deep to
tell. Yet there was no use seeking for him to-night.
He turned to the wolf and dropped his hand upon the animal's shoulder.
Fenris started, then quivered in ecstasy. "I wish I had your nose,
to-night, old boy," Ben told him. "I'd find that old buddy of mine. I
wish I had your eyes to see in the dark, and your legs to run. Fenris,
do you know where he is?"
The wolf turned his wild eyes toward his master's face, as if he were
trying to understand.