SPURLING MAKES A REQUEST
There had been a time when Granger had desired to kill Spurling, and,
though latterly he had not consciously wished that he were dead, yet
he resented his reappearance; his presence broke in as a
storm-influence on the stoical quiet which he had attained. This man
stood for so many things which had been sinful and passionate in the
past--things which it had cost him so much even to attempt to forget;
things which he had promised himself that he would forget for Peggy's
sake. And now, because he had chosen to return, it seemed necessary
that he should call to mind the entire tragedy by asking the question,
"When you shot that woman in the Klondike, did you know that she was
not a man? And was she clothed in a woman's dress?"
Even though he kept silence, any hour Spurling himself might reopen
the subject by inquiring after Strangeways, as to whether he had
pursued farther, as to how he had fared, as to where he was at
present. Granger was by no means certain that he did not already know
that the corporal was dead. He shrank from the discomfort of playing
the accuser again; he shrank still more from making the ugly
confession that he himself was likely to be suspected of having
committed a kindred crime,--a confession which would tend to degrade
him to the level of this man whom he affected to despise. So, from
day to day, he postponed his questions and, in the meanwhile, watched
Spurling narrowly.
His conduct had been very curious since that morning of his arrival,
when he had announced himself by playing the spy, through the window
of Bachelors' Hall, on the inhabitants of the Point. How long he had
been there, and how much he had heard of what the Man with the Dead
Soul had had to say, kneeling outside in the semi-darkness with his
ear pressed against the pane, Granger had no means of discovering. But
from the first it was clear to him that Spurling and Eyelids were
possessed of a common knowledge, which made them enemies. Perhaps they
had met before near the Forbidden River, and this had been the cause
of Eyelids' delay.
Under ordinary circumstances, the mystery would soon have been swept
aside by the putting of a single interrogation; but men on the Last
Chance River get out of the habit of asking leading questions; in
their parsimony over words, they prefer to watch and to wait the
reading of the minds of their fellows, and the secreting of their own
motives, is almost their only pastime. So Granger watched and waited.
In Spurling, so soon as he had been fed and cared for, he was quick to
discover a change. He had become manlier and braver--more like his old
self. He carried himself with a kind of timid pride, as though he knew
himself to be of a greater value than he was likely to be reckoned at
by others; almost as though he were confident that he was possessed of
a claim to merit which, once stated, could not fail to be recognised.
At the same time, there was a distressful hesitancy in his manner, not
unnatural under the circumstances, of a man not sure of his
acceptability. He seemed forever on the point of declaring himself,
and forever thinking better of his decision--postponing his
declaration to a later time. His bearing was an irritating combination
of false humility and suppressed self-assertion.
Beorn, when he had recovered from his debauch, was as silent,
absorbed, and uncompanionable as ever. He appeared to have retained no
memory of what he had said, and to be quite unconscious of Spurling's
arrival--he had become again in all things the Man with the Dead Soul.
But with Peggy and Eyelids it was different. Half-breeds as they were,
and, by reason of their Indian blood, instinctive disguisers of
emotion, their aversion for Spurling was plain. Sometimes, when his
back was turned and they thought that they were unobserved, they would
glance swiftly up at one another, and an expression would come into
their eyes, a small pin-point of angry fire, which betokened danger
for the man they hated. Very strangely to Granger, since Spurling's
arrival, they had manifested a great fondness for being in his own
company; one or other of them was never far from his side. Though he
turned upon them angrily, telling them that he wished to be by
himself, they continually disobeyed and, next minute, like faithful
dogs, with apologetic faces, were to be found watching near by. What
was the motive of their conduct? Did they think that he was in danger,
and required protecting?
But there was a graver happening which he had noticed. With Spurling's
return, he had thought that now certainly he had solved the mystery of
the signalling to the bend. On the first day, however, he had found
himself mistaken. Sitting in the doorway of his store, he had watched
the undesired one go down to the pier, push off in a canoe, and paddle
down-river for a bathe. Quarter of a mile from the bend, he had seen
him back-water, rise to his knees, gaze straight ahead in a startled
manner, and then, turning quickly about, come racing back like one
pursued for his life. Looking round, he had seen that Peggy and
Eyelids were also witnessing these tactics, with expressions which
betrayed their consternation. As he watched, they had raised their
hands and waved. When Spurling had landed, he had been waiting for him
at the pier-head. "What was it that you saw over there?" he asked
sternly.
Spurling, being panic-stricken, had at first found difficulty in
recovering his voice. Then, "Where? What do you mean?" he had panted.
Granger, in silence, had pointed northeasterly towards the bend.
With a nervous laugh, though his face was bloodless, Spurling had
replied, "Nothing. I saw nothing. I just thought that it looked a bit
lonesome, . . . so I turned back."
Gazing at him attentively, and seeing how he trembled, Granger knew
that he had not answered truly. With a shrug of his shoulders,
twisting round on his heel, he had said sneeringly, "On the Last
Chance River we don't run away from loneliness as though the hangman
were behind us. If we did, we should be running all the time."
He had not stayed to see the effect of his words, but long afterwards,
when he looked down to the water's edge, Spurling was still sitting
there, with his head between his hands and his body shaking.
Early one evening, some days later, he came to him and said, "Mr.
Granger," and it sounded oddly from those lips--in the old days, even
in the beginning of their acquaintance, they had never mistered one
another, "Mr. Granger, is there anywhere we can go to be quiet? I have
something very private which I want to say."
"O yes, there's the whole of Keewatin."
"But isn't there some place where we shan't be overheard?"
"We can paddle down to the bend. There's only one man who can hear us
there--and he's in his grave."
"Not there. Not there," Spurling had cried, trembling with fear and
excitement.
"Well, then, if you're so particular, you can speak with me here."
Spurling looked round to where, at a short distance, Eyelids was
diligently idling above a broken net. "Somewhere where we can't be
overheard," he reiterated. At that moment Eyelids turned his head.
This continual spying on all that he did, the reason for which he
could not comprehend, was getting on Granger's nerves; he felt that it
would be a relief to be alone, even though it meant being alone with
the man whom he had most cause to hate. However, somehow he pitied him
just now; perhaps because of the manner of his address, which had
brought into sharp contrast their present relations with those of
other days.
"There's the island up-river to the westward, where I keep my dogs in
summer-time; if that will suit your purpose."
Spurling showed his pleasure at the suggestion, and, hurrying his
steps, led the way down to the river-bank. Getting into a canoe, they
set out towards the west. They had not gone half a mile before they
caught the sound of paddle-strokes behind them. Turning about, they
saw that Eyelids was following. He attempted to loiter, and threw in a
line as if his only intention were to fish. Granger flushed with
anger. Without a word, he commenced to paddle back till they drew
nearly level with the intruder, who pretended to be so engaged in his
pastime as not to notice their approach. Then he cried in a voice that
was choking with rage, "Get back to the Point, you half-breed spy. If
you dare to follow me again, I'll turn you out to-morrow, and you can
take your trade elsewhere." Nor would he proceed farther on his
journey till he had watched his brother-in-law get safe to land; then,
with a twist of the paddle, he brought his own craft round, and
continued towards the sunset. Two miles up-river, in the
middle-stream, stood a rocky island; as yet it was only a dull grey
speck in a pathway of red.
They pushed on in silence up the straight, dark grove of mysterious
forest. Water-birds were calling in the rushes; at one point, as they
passed, a great bull caribou lifted up his head from drinking, and
regarded them with a look of curiosity, totally void of fear; a heron
drifted slowly over the tree-tops, and disappeared. To Granger, with
even this short distance placed between himself and his customary
associates, there came a sense of release, and with it an instinct for
kindness. As they neared the shore of the island, the huskies
commenced to howl; soon they could see them bunched together on the
shore awaiting their arrival. A dog in the north, even though he has
been imported, is never heard to bark. To hear them at first, a
stranger might suppose that a woman was wearily weeping herself to
death in the forest, because of a grief which was inconsolable. The
wail of the huskies, reaching him at intervals across the expanse of
water, seemed the voice of his own desolation, coming out to meet him.
The whole world was empty, and he began to feel the need of
friendship. He let his eyes linger on the head and shoulders of the
man in front of him, and remembered with what eagerness long ago, when
awaiting his arrival at some appointed rendezvous, he had striven to
catch sight of him approaching, towering above the littler people of
the London crowd. And now, instead of brief and chance-snatched
moments, they were allowed to pass whole days together; yet, because
of what had happened, they could find no pleasure in one another.
Pleasure! The only sensation which he derived from Spurling's company
was one of intense annoyance. And there had been a time when, if
anyone had dared to tell him that that could ever happen, he would
have denied it with an oath.
Could it be that the fault was his own, and that he had misjudged this
man? He recalled how, when he had discovered Strangeways' body at the
bend, and had thought it Spurling's, he had bitterly accused himself
of all manner of unkindness. He smiled grimly at the remembrance--it
was human nature to do that. He could quite well imagine that at some
future time, when Spurling was truly dead, he might blame himself
afresh, with an equal bitterness and an equal sincerity. It would be
easy to judge charitably of him then, for he would be beyond power of
working any further mischief to the living. It is fear, not cruelty,
which lies at the root of all uncharitableness. If apprehension were
removed from our lives, it would be possible for the weakest man to
live well. It was the fact that, trusting in God, he took no thought
for the morrow, which enabled Jesus to become Christ.
Gliding round the island, they came to a sandy cove, which faced the
sunset. There they landed. Lifting the canoe a dozen paces up the
shore and placing it in the scrub, where it might be out of sight,
they struck into the brushwood by a narrow trail, which at once
commenced to climb. After three minutes of travelling, they came out
on to a tall bare rock, to one side of which grew a solitary pine.
From there they could command a view of the river on every side.
Granger settled himself down, with his back toward his companion,
propping himself against the pine-trunk, with his face towards the
fading light. The huskies gathered hungrily round in a semicircle,
squatting on their haunches, wondering whether the coming of these men
meant that they were going to be fed. The frogs croaked in the river;
the mosquitoes trumpetted about their heads; save for these sounds,
and the continual low murmur of the river, there was absolute quiet.
In this environment, his eyes upon the faery domes and fiery spires of
the western sky, into the inmost mystery of which the Last Chance
River led, that torturing and old desire, which had always made it
impossible for him to enjoy the moment in its flight, again possessed
his mind: he had known it from a child, the ambition to follow,
follow, follow, in the hope that somewhere, perhaps behind the setting
sun, he might arrive at the land of perfectness for which he craved.
His thoughts were disturbed somewhat brutally by a voice behind.
"Still careless of your life! I see you hav'n't brought your gun with
you. How did you know that it wasn't 'Die,' that I wanted to say?"
He turned lazily round, and was surprised at the altered expression
which had come into Spurling's face. It was frank and self-reliant,
and, oddly enough, had a look that was almost tender.
"What made you say that?" Granger inquired.
Spurling drew nearer. "Well, a fellow had to say something to break
the ice," he replied; "so I thought I might as well give you your
chance of taking the worst impression of me." He paused; then he asked
in a low voice, "You were thinking of London and the old times?"
Granger nodded his head.
"I've often done that; I can understand. It was torture to me in the
Yukon, and it was madness to me over there," pointing with his hand to
the northward, where the Forbidden River lay. "What would you say," he
added, "if I were to tell you that it could all come back again?"
Granger's reply was quiet and calculated, so that it seemed to be
quite within the bounds of courteous conversation. "I think I should
tell you that you lied," he said.
"But if I should give you proof that not only the old things were
possible, but that El Dorado might come true, and that within a year
we could seek it out together, as we have always planned to do?"
For answer Granger jerked out his foot, and sent a gaunt grey husky
flying, which had come within his range. It was one of those which
Spurling had left behind over two months ago at Murder Point, when he
had exchanged teams with Granger in his endeavour to escape
Strangeways. Spurling, when he saw it, recognised the meaning which
Granger's action implied. It was as if he had said, "So the old things
are possible, are they, you villain? What about that man whom you say
that you killed, whose body was washed up near Forty-Mile?" He opened
his lips to explain, and then fell silent. It was impossible to excuse
himself in the presence of those wolfish beasts, who had been
witnesses to all the degradation of mind and body which had overtaken
him in that terrible escape. No man could estimate the penalty which
he had had to pay for his moment's folly, except one who had endured
it. When he allowed his memory to dwell upon it, that frenzied rush
across half a continent seemed to have occupied all his life. The
thought of it made him afraid.
"Good God! And my mother meant me for a minister!" he exclaimed,
burying his face in his hands.
Granger looked up suspiciously, but he said nothing.
"No, I never told you that," he continued fiercely, "and I suppose you
don't believe me now. Seems somehow odd to you, I daresay, that Druce
Spurling should ever have thought himself worthy to talk to men about
their souls and Christ. You'd have thought it a good joke if I'd told
you even when you knew me at my best. _When you knew me!_ Bah! You
never knew me; you were always a harsh judge when it came to setting a
value on things which you didn't understand."
When Granger still kept silent and gave no sign of interest, Spurling
broke out afresh: "Damnation! I tell you you never knew anything about
me. You were always too selfish to take the trouble to get into other
folks' insides; yet you went about complaining that people were
unsympathetic. Here's the difference between us; I may be a scoundrel,
but whatever I've done I've played the man and never blamed anyone
else for my crimes, while you--! You were always a weak dreamer,
depending on others for your strength. You were discontented, but you
never raised your littlest finger in an attempt to make men better.
All you could think of was yourself, and your own ambition to escape.
So though, perhaps, I've sunk to a lower level than you have ever
touched, I want you to know there was once a time when I did reach up
to a nobler and a better."
Gradually, as he had spoken, there had grown into his voice a
concentrated fury. He was giving utterance to an old grievance over
which he had brooded for many years; as happens frequently in such
cases, only a portion of his complaint could be proved by facts, the
remainder being an overgrowth of embittered imagination.
His eyes sought out the face of the man whom he accused, but it told
him nothing; he sat there silent, with his head thrown back a little,
unemotional as the distant stretch of cold grey river up which he
gazed.
The sun had vanished, and the prolonged dusk of the northland was
stealing from out the forest. At length Granger answered him: "It may
be true, and if so, what follows?"
"Oh, nothing: only I thought I'd tell you this so that one man might
not think too badly of me, if before long I should be called upon to
die. I must have looked a horrid beast when I came to you last April."
Whether consciously or not, Granger nodded his head, as much as to
say, "You did. Most certainly you did."
His companion broke into a harsh laugh. "The Reverend Druce Spurling!
How d'you like the sound of it? That's what I might have been to-day,
and a fat lot you care about it."
To Granger, as he listened, there had come the painful knowledge,
bearing out the accusation that he had never cared for the inward
things of men, that this was the first scrap of confession which
Spurling had ever let fall in his presence. Why, up to that moment he
had not heard a word about his mother, and had certainly never
credited him with a pronounced religious instinct.
Yes, perhaps that statement, which had sounded so exaggerated at
first, was true; and he was a hard and selfish man. Up to now he'd
excused himself on the score of his superior sensitiveness and
ideality. Probably it was this same error which Pere Antoine, in
gentler manner, had tried to point out, when he said, "You will never
help yourself, or the world, by merely being sad. No man ever has. It
is because of your flight from sadness that you have met with all your
dangers. All your life you have spent in striving to escape from
things which are sad." His thoughts travelled back to those earlier
days, when he'd poured out his troubles to Spurling, and told him all
about himself; and always with the assurance that he would be
understood and would gain sympathy. John Granger as he had been then,
now seemed like a complaining child to himself. He was certain that,
were he to be met by that old self to-day, he would have no patience
with him. But Spurling had had patience.
So, when all was said and done, he must consider himself a pretty
worthless fellow; and, after all, Spurling, despite his blood-stained
hands, was probably the better man.
"Why Spurling failed to become a parson"--a strange topic for thought
and conversation this, on the Last Chance River at nightfall!
But Spurling was speaking again, timidly and half to himself. "Suppose
God should brand a mark on our foreheads for every crime which we have
perpetrated, I wonder what kind of beasts we should appear to one
another then?"
Turning his head, in order that his face might not be seen, Granger
replied, "Much the same kind of beasts, I suspect, as we appear to one
another now." Then, speaking more hurriedly, "It wasn't to talk of
these things, and to ask me that question, that you required me to
come with you to some place where we might be by ourselves. Tell me,
what is it that you want me to do for you? You were good to me once,
and I'm willing to help you in any way that is honourable, and that
isn't too dangerous."
Spurling laughed shortly, and said, "It isn't your help that I'm
asking; it's you that I'm trying to help. Here, look at that." He
passed something to him. "I didn't act squarely by you in the
Klondike, and I want to make up for it now. When we made that strike
in Drunkman's Shallows, the success of it turned my head; even then,
if you'd not been so impatient, I think I should have come to myself
and have behaved decently. You put my back up with your suspicions,
and by seeming to claim a part of my wealth as though it were yours by
right. But I'm anxious to forget that now."
In the meanwhile, Granger had been examining the thing which had been
placed in his hands. It was wrapped up carefully in several rags,
which were knotted and tedious to untie. When he had stript them off,
he found that they contained a nugget, somewhat bigger than the one
which Eyelids had shown him, but of the same rounded formation, as
though it had been taken from a river-bed. "Where did you get it?" he
asked excitedly.
"Where the half-breed got his--from the Forbidden River. Does El
Dorado seem more possible to you now?"
But Granger was thinking, and he did not answer the question. Suddenly
the dream of his life had become recoverable. He had forgotten Peggy,
and Murder Point, and even Spurling himself. Once more in imagination
he was sailing up the Great Amana, following in his father's track.
Once more he saw, as in Raleigh's day, the deer come down to the
water's side, as if they were used to the keeper's call; and he
watched anxiously ahead lest, in the rounding of the latest bend, the
shining city should meet his sight and the salt expanse of Parima,
from whose shores its towers are said to rise. In his eyes was the
vision of the island near Puna, which Lopez wrote about, with its
silver herb-gardens, and its flowers of gold, and its trees of gold
and of silver; and in his ears was the tinkling music, which the
sea-wind was wont to make as it swept through the metal forest,
causing its branches to clang and its leaves to shake. He was far away
from Keewatin now, making the phantom journey to the land of his
desire.
"Does El Dorado seem more possible to you now?"
He turned to Spurling a face which had grown thin with earnestness,
"Druce, tell me quickly," he said, "how long will it take us to get
there?"
"To get to El Dorado? The answer to that you should know best. But to
get to the place on the Forbidden River where this gold was found? Oh,
about five days."
"Let us go there at once, then, before Beorn finds us out."
"Ah, Beorn! The old trapper who put that half-breed on my track!"
"Did he do that? Tell me about it."