NEL-TE QUALIFIES AS A BRANCH PILOT
Although disappointed of their guide, there was nothing for the sledge
party to do but push on and trust to their own good judgment to carry
them safely to the end of their journey. So as much of the moose meat
as could be loaded on a sledge, or several hundred pounds in all, was
prepared and frozen that evening. Both then and in the morning the dogs
were given all they could eat――so much, in fact, that they were greatly
disinclined to travel during most of the following day.
The latest addition to the party, after being rudely awakened from
the slumber into which Jalap Coombs’s singing had lulled him, called
pitifully for his mother, and, refusing to be comforted, finally sobbed
himself to sleep on Phil’s bear-skin in front of the fire. Here he
spent the night, tucked warmly in a rabbit-skin robe, nestled between
Phil and Serge with all his sorrows forgotten for the time being. In
the early morning he was a very sober little lad, with a grievance that
was not to be banished even by the sight of his beloved “doggies,”
while the advances of his human friends were met by a dignified
silence. He was too hungry to refuse the food offered him by Serge; but
he ate it with a strictly business-like air, in which there was nothing
of unbending nor forgiveness. To Phil’s attempts at conversation he
turned a deaf ear, nor would he even so much as smile when Jalap
Coombs made faces at him, or got down on hands and knees and growled
for his special benefit. He was evidently not to be won by any such
foolishness.
He was roused to an exhibition of slight interest by the tinkling music
of Musky’s bells when the dogs were harnessed; and when, everything
being ready for a start, Phil lifted him on the foremost sledge, and
tucked him into a spare sleeping-bag that was securely lashed to it, he
murmured: “Mamma, Nel-te go mamma.”
The loads having been redistributed to provide for the accommodation of
the young passenger, this foremost sledge bore, besides Nel-te, only
the Forty Mile mail, the sleeping equipment of the party, and their
extra fur clothing, the chynik, in which was stored the small quantity
of tea still remaining, what was left of the pemmican, and an axe. As,
with its load, it did not weigh over two hundred pounds, its team was
reduced to three dogs, Musky, Luvtuk, and big Amook. Serge still drove
seven dogs, and his sledge bore the entire camp equipment and stock of
provisions, except the recently acquired moose meat. This was loaded
on the last sledge, which was drawn by five dogs, and driven by Jalap
Coombs according to his own peculiar fashion.
As soon as the sledges were in motion, and Nel-te conceived the idea
that he was going home, his spirits revived to such an extent that he
chirruped cheerfully to the dogs, and even smiled occasionally at Phil,
who strode alongside.
They crossed Fox Lake, passed up the stream that connected it with
Indian Trail Lake, and finally went into camp on the edge of the forest
at the head of the latter earlier than usual, because they could not
see their way to the making of any further progress. Although they
felt certain that there must be some stream flowing into the lake by
which they could leave it, they could discover no sign of its opening.
So they made camp, and, leaving Jalap Coombs to care for it, Phil and
Serge departed in opposite directions to scan every foot of the shore
in search of a place of exit.
On reaching this camping-place Nel-te looked about him inquiringly
and with evident disappointment, but he said nothing, and only gazed
wistfully after the two lads when they set forth on their search. For
a time he hung about the camp-fire watching Jalap Coombs, who was too
busily engaged in cooking supper and preparing for the night to pay
much attention to him. At length the little chap strolled over to the
sledges, and engaged in a romp with the three dogs who dragged his
particular conveyance. Every now and then his shrill laughter came to
Jalap’s ears, and assured the latter that the child was safe.
After a while the explorers returned, both completely discouraged and
perplexed.
“I don’t believe there is any inlet to this wretched lake!” cried Phil,
flinging himself down on a pile of robes. “I’ve searched every foot of
coast on my side, and am willing to swear that there isn’t an opening
big enough for a rabbit to squeeze through, so far as I went.”
“Nor could I find a sign of one,” affirmed Serge, “though perhaps in
the morning――”
“Hello! Where’s Nel-te?” interrupted Phil, springing to his feet and
gazing about him anxiously.
“He were about here jest as you boys kim in,” replied Jalap Coombs,
suspending operations at the fire, and gazing about him with a startled
expression. “I heered him playing with the dogs not more’n a minute
ago.”
“Well, he isn’t in sight now,” said Phil, in a voice whose tone
betrayed his alarm, “and if we don’t find him in a hurry there’s a
chance of our not doing it at all, for it will be dark in fifteen
minutes more.”
As he spoke, Phil hastily replaced the snow-shoes that he had just laid
aside. Serge did the same thing, and then they began to circle about
the camp with heads bent low in search of the tiny trail. At short
intervals they called aloud the name of the missing one, but only the
mocking forest echoes answered them.
Suddenly Serge uttered a joyful shout. He had found the prints of small
snow-shoes crossed and recrossed by those of dogs. In a moment Phil
joined him, and the two followed the trail together. It led for a short
distance along the border of the lake in the direction previously taken
by Phil, and then, making a sharp bend to the right, struck directly
into the forest.
When the boys reached the edge of the timber they found a low opening
so overhung by bushes as to be effectually concealed from careless
observation. The curtaining growth was so bent down with a weight of
snow that even Nel-te must have stooped to pass under it. That he had
gone that way was shown by the trail still dimly visible in the growing
dusk, and the lads did not hesitate to follow. Forcing a path through
the bushes, which extended only a few yards back from the lake, they
found themselves in an open highway, evidently the frozen surface of a
stream.
“Hurrah!” shouted Phil, who was the first to gain it. “I believe this
is the very creek we have been searching for. It must be, and the
little chap has found it for us.”
“Yes,” replied Serge. “It begins to look as though Cree Jim’s son had
taken Cree Jim’s place as guide.”
Now the boys pushed forward with increased speed. At length they heard
the barking of dogs, and began to shout, but received no answer. They
had gone a full quarter of a mile from the lake ere they caught sight
of the little fur-clad figure plodding steadily forward on what he
fondly hoped to be his way towards home and the mother for whom his
baby heart so longed. Musky, Luvtuk, and big Amook were his companions,
and not until he was caught up in Phil’s arms did the child so much as
turn his head or pay the slightest heed to those who followed his trail.
As he was borne back in triumph towards camp his lower lip quivered,
and two big tears rolled down his chubby cheeks, but he did not cry nor
utter a complaint; nor from that time on did he make further effort to
regain his lost home. The boys had hardly begun to retrace their steps
when another figure loomed out of the shadows and came rapidly towards
them. It looked huge in the dim light, and advanced with gigantic
strides.
“Hello!” cried Phil, as he recognized the new-comer. “Where are you
bound?”
“Bound to get lost along with the rest of the crew,” replied Jalap
Coombs, stoutly. “Didn’t I tell ye I wouldn’t put up with your gettin’
lost alone ag’in?”
“That’s so; but you see I forgot,” laughed Phil. “Now that we are all
found, though, let’s get back to the supper that you were cooking
before you decided to get lost. By the way, Mr. Coombs, do you realize
that this is the very stream for which we have been hunting? What do
you think of our young pilot now?”
“Think of him!” exclaimed Jalap Coombs. “I think he’s jest the same as
all in the piloting business――pernicketty. Knows a heap more’n he’ll
ever tell, and won’t ever p’int out a channel till you’re just about to
run aground. Then he’ll do it kinder keerless and onconsarned, same as
the kid done jest now. Oh, he’s a regular branch pilot, he is, and up
to all the tricks of the trade.”
Bright and early the following morning, thanks to Nel-te’s pilotage,
the sledges were speeding up the creek on their way to Lost Lake. By
nightfall they had crossed it, three other small lakes, descended
an outlet of the last to Little Salmon River, and after a run of
five miles down that stream found themselves once more amid the ice
hummocks of the Yukon, one hundred and twenty miles above the mouth of
the Pelly. Of this distance they had saved about one-third by their
adventurous cut-off.
The end of another week found them one hundred and fifty miles farther
up the Yukon and at the mouth of the Tahkeena. It had been a week of
the roughest kind of travel, and its hard work was telling severely on
the dogs.
As they made their last camp on the mighty river they were to leave for
good on the morrow, they were both glad and sorry. Glad to leave its
rough ice and escape the savage difficulties that it offered in the
shape of cañons and roaring rapids only a few miles above, and sorry to
desert its well-marked course for the little-known Tahkeena.
Still, their dogs could not hold out for another week on the Yukon,
while over the smooth going of the tributary stream they might survive
the hardships of the journey to its very end; and without these
faithful servants our travellers would indeed be in a sorry plight.
So, while they reminisced before their roaring camp-fire of the many
adventures they had encountered since entering Yukon mouth, two
thousand miles away, they looked hopefully forward to their journey’s
end, now less than as many hundred miles from that point. To the
dangers of the lofty mountain range they had yet to cross they gave but
little thought, for the mountains were still one hundred miles away.