CHITSAH’S NATURAL TELEPHONE
Seventeen green wolf-skins formed a heavy sledge-load, especially for
the weakened dog-teams; but fortunately Jalap Coombs’s feet were again
in condition for walking, and snow on the river was not yet deep. So it
was determined to carry them――at least, for the present. On the evening
following that of the encounter with the wolves, Phil, leaving the
work of preparing camp to the others, unpacked the Eskimo wolf-traps
of compressed whalebone that he had procured at Makagamoot. He had
twenty of the ingenious little contrivances, and wrapped each one in a
strip of frozen wolf-meat that he had saved and brought along for the
purpose. When all were thus prepared, he carried them about a quarter
of a mile from camp, and then dropped them at short intervals in a
great circle about it. He knew the dogs would not stray that far since
their experience of the night before, and so felt pretty certain that
the traps would only find their way to the destination for which they
were intended.
The first blood-chilling howl was heard soon after dark, and a few
minutes later it was apparent that wolves were again gathering from all
quarters. Then the anxious watchers caught occasional glimpses of dim
forms, and sometimes of a pair of gleaming eyes, that invariably drew
a shot from Phil’s rifle. Still the wolves seemed to remember their
lesson, or else they waited for the occupants of the camp to fall
asleep, for they made no effort at an attack.
As time passed the wolf tones began to change, and defiant howlings
to give place to yelps and yells of distress. Soon other sounds were
mingled with these――the fierce snarlings of savage beasts fighting
over their prey. The traps were doing their work. Those wolves that
had eagerly gulped them down were so stricken with deadly pains that
they staggered, fell, and rolled in the snow. At the first symptoms of
distress others sprang upon them and tore them in pieces, at the same
time battling fiercely over their cannibal feast. So wolf fed wolf,
while the night echoed with their hideous outcries, until finally the
survivors, gorged with the flesh of their own kind, slunk away, and
after some hours of bedlam quiet once more reigned in the forest.
So Phil’s scheme proved a success, and for the remainder of that night
he and his companions slept in peace. At daylight they visited the
scenes of wolfish feasting, and found everywhere plentiful evidence
of what had taken place; but this time they gathered in neither rugs
nor robes, for only blood-stains, bones, and tattered shreds of fur
remained.
Phil’s only regret was that he had not a lot more of those same useful
traps, though, as was afterwards proved, they were not needed, for
never again during their journey did wolves appear in sufficient
numbers to cause them any alarm.
For another week did the sledge party journey down the several streams
that, emptying one into another, finally formed the Conehill River, or,
as the gold-diggers call it, Forty Mile Creek, because its mouth is
forty miles down the Yukon from the old trading-post of Fort Reliance.
As the first half of their long journey drew towards a close they
became anxious as to its results and impatient for its end. When would
they reach the settlement? and could they get there before their rivals
who had followed the Yukon? were the two questions that they constantly
asked of each other, but which none could answer.
Phil grew almost despondent as he reflected upon the length of time
since they left old Fort Adams, and gave it as his opinion that the
other party must have reached Forty Mile long since.
Serge also feared they had, though he didn’t see how they could.
Jalap Coombs was firm in his belief that the other party was still far
away, and that his would be the first in; for, quoth he, “Luck allers
has been on my side, and I’m going to believe it allers will be. My
old friend Kite Roberson useter say, speaking of luck, and he give it
as his own experience, that them as struck the best kinds of luck was
them as worked the hardest for it; and ef they didn’t get it one way
they was sure to another. Likewise he useter say, Kite did, consarning
worriments, that ef ye didn’t pay no attention to one ’twould be mighty
apt to pass ye by; but ef ye encouraged it by so much as a wink or a
nod, ye’d have to fight it to git red of it. So, seeing as they hain’t
no worriments hove in sight yet, what’s the use in s’arching for ’em?”
As for Kurilla, whenever his opinion was asked, he always grinned and
returned the same answer:
“You come pretty quick, mebbe. Yaas.”
So each day of the last three or four brought its fresh hope; at each
succeeding bend of the stream all eyes were strained eagerly forward
for a sight of the expected cluster of log-huts, and each night brought
an added disappointment.
At length one evening, when Phil, who had pushed on longer than usual,
in an effort to end their suspense, was reluctantly compelled, by
gathering darkness, to go into camp, Chitsah suddenly attracted
attention to himself by running to a tree and pressing an ear to its
trunk. As the others stared at him, a broad smile overspread his
face, and he said something to his father, which the latter instantly
interpreted.
“What?” cried Phil, incredulously. “He thinks he hears the sound of
chopping?”
“Yaas,” answered Kurilla. “Axe, chop um, white men, plenty. Yaas.”
“I, too, can hear something!” exclaimed Serge, who had imitated
Chitsah’s movements, “though I wouldn’t swear it was chopping.”
“Hurrah! So can I!” shouted Phil, after a moment of intent listening
at another tree. “First time, though, I ever knew that the public
telephone service was extended to this country. The sound I heard
might be a train of cars twenty miles away, or a woodpecker somewhere
within sight. No matter. If Chitsah says it’s chopping, it must be, for
he ought to know, seeing that he first heard it with the aid of the
tree-telephone. So let’s go for it. We can afford to travel an hour or
two in the dark for the sake of meeting the white man who is swinging
that axe, can’t we?”
“Of course we can,” replied Serge.
“Aye, aye, sir!” answered Jalap Coombs.
“Mebbe catch um. Yaas,” added Kurilla, sharing the general enthusiasm.
Even the tired dogs barked, pricked up their sharp ears, sniffed the
air, and did not, seemingly, object to moving on.
So the long teams were again swung into line, the pistol-like reports
of the three sledge-whips rang sharply through the keen air, and the
whole party swept on down the darkening river at a greater speed than
they had made that day.
An hour later, as they rounded a projecting point, Phil uttered an
exulting shout. A cluster of twinkling lights shone dead ahead, and our
travellers knew that their goal was won.
“Let’s give them a volley,” suggested Serge. “It’s the custom of the
country, you know.”
So the guns were taken from their deerskin coverings, and at Phil’s
word of command a roar from double-barrel, flintlock, and Winchester
woke glad echoes from both sides of the broad valley and from the
rugged Yukon cliffs beyond. Then, with whoopings and cheers and frantic
yelpings of dogs, the sledge brigade dashed on towards the welcoming
lights.
“Hello the camp!” yelled Phil, as they approached the dark cluster of
cabins.
“On deck!” roared Jalap Coombs, as though he were hailing a ship at sea.
“Hello yourself!” answered a gruff voice――the first hail in their own
tongue that the boys had heard in many a week. “Who are you? Where do
you come from? And what’s all this racket about?”
“White men,” replied Phil, “with dog-sledges, up from Yukon mouth.”
“Great Scott! You don’t say so! No wonder you’re noisy! Hi, boys!
Here’s the first winter outfit that ever came from Yukon mouth to Forty
Mile. What’s the matter with giving them a salute?”
“Nothing at all!” cried a score of voices, and then volley after volley
rang forth, until it seemed as though every man there must have carried
a loaded gun and emptied it of all six shots in honor of the occasion.
Men came running from all directions, and before the shooting ceased
the entire population of the camp, some three hundred in number, were
eagerly crowding about the new-comers, plying them with questions, and
struggling for the honor of shaking hands with the first arrivals of
the year.
“Are we really the first to come up the river?” asked Phil.
“To be sure you are. Not only that, but the first to reach the diggings
from any direction since navigation closed. But how did you come? Not
by the river, I know, for when I heard your shooting ’twas clear away
up the creek.”
“We came by the Tanana and across the Divide,” answered Phil. “There is
another party coming by way of the river, though, and we were afraid
they might get in ahead of us.”
“Hark to that, boys! One train just arrived, and another coming!
I tell you, old Forty Mile is right in it. Daily express from all
points, through tickets to Europe, Arup, and Arrap; morning papers and
opera-houses, circus and theaytres. Looks like the boom had struck us
at last. But say, stranger, what _is_ the news from below?”
“New steamer on her way up the river, with saw-mill, mining machinery,
and best stock of goods ever seen in Alaska,” replied Phil, quick to
seize the opportunity, and anxious to make his business known while he
still had the field to himself. “We have come from her, and are on our
way to San Francisco to send up a new stock for next season. So we have
only stopped to take your orders and find out what will be the most
acceptable.”
“Hurrah!” yelled the crowd, wild with excitement. “Send us a
brass-band,” shouted one. “In swaller-tails and white kids,” added
another. “What’s the matter with moving the Palace Hotel up here?”
suggested a third, “seeing as San Francisco isn’t in it any longer with
Forty Mile. Especially send along the café.”
“Come, fellows, let up,” cried the man who had been the first to
welcome the new arrivals, and whose name was Riley. “We mustn’t keep
these gentlemen standing out here in the cold any longer. I reckon
they’re hungry, too, and wondering why we don’t invite ’em to grub. So,
men, just come into my shebang and make yourselves at home. There isn’t
much to it, but such as it is it’s yours, so long as you’ll honor yours
truly.”
“No, come with me,” cried another voice. “I’ve got beans, Boston baked,
fresh from the can.” “I’ve got molasses and soft-tack,” and “I’ve just
made a dish of scouse,” “Come with us,” shouted others.
“No, you don’t!” roared Mr. Riley. “They’re my meat, and they are going
to bunk in with me. But, boys, you can send along your beans and your
dope and your scouse, and whatever else comes handy, for I’ve only got
roast beef and chicken-salad and a few terrapin, and we want to do this
thing up in style. So, ‘all small contributions thankfully received’
is the word, and if we don’t scare up just the niftiest spread on the
coast this night then my name isn’t Platt Riley, that’s all.”