Nearly the whole winter was before them, but it was none too long a
time to consider their plans. Horace had found diamonds, it is true,
but they had been found miles apart, one at a time, in the river
gravel. This is not the natural home of diamonds, which are always
found native to the peculiar formation known in South Africa as "blue
clay." Nobody had ever found a trace of blue clay in Ontario, yet
Horace felt certain that the blue-clay beds must exist. They were the
only thing worth looking for. To poke over the river gravel in hopes
of finding a chance stone would be sheer waste of time. Hundreds of
men had done it without lighting on a single diamond.
Horace was a trained geologist, and that winter he spent much time in
study, without saying a word even to Fred as to what he was meditating.
He pored over geological surveys, and went to Ottawa to consult the
departmental maps at the Legislative Library. By slow degrees he was
working out a theory, and at last, one February evening, he came into
his brother's room.
"Just look at this, Fred, and see what you think of it," he remarked
casually.
It was a large pen-and-ink map, skillfully drawn, for Horace was a
practiced map-maker.
"It's the country of the Abitibi and Missanabie Rivers," Horace
explained. "These red crosses show where I found my diamonds--see, in
the Whitefish River, the Smoke River, and another river that hasn't any
name, so far as I know. Right here is the trappers' cabin where you
boys found me. My bones might have been up there now but for you, old
boy!"
And he thumped Fred's back affectionately.
"If you hadn't come along when you did I'm pretty certain our bones
would be there, anyway," said Fred.
"Well, let's hope we all saved one another. But see, most of these
diamonds were found many miles apart. They didn't grow where I found
them. They must have been washed down, perhaps from the very
headwaters of the river. Now look at the map. Do you see, all these
three rivers rise in pretty much the same region."
"So they do," said Fred, his eyes fixed on the paper. "Then you
think--"
"The stones were probably all washed down from that region. The
blue-clay beds, the diamond field, must be up there, somewhere within
this black circle I've drawn."
Fred's heart began to throb with excitement.
"But some prospector would have hit on them before now," he said.
"I doubt if any prospector has ever gone in there. They say it's one
of the roughest bits of country in the North, and no mineral strikes
have ever been made in that region. I've never been up there myself.
It's up in the hills, you see; the rivers are too broken for a canoe,
and the ground is too rough to get over on foot, except in the winter.
The Ojibwas hunt there in the winter, they say, and I dare say there's
plenty of game."
"But if it's so rough to get into, how can we travel?"
"Oh, often those bad places are not so bad when you get there. I'd
like to see the place I couldn't get into if there were diamonds there!
We'll get into it somehow, for the diamond-beds must surely be there if
they're anywhere. But there's no doubt it'll be a rough trip."
"Rough? What of that?" cried Fred. "If your theory is right we'll
make our fortunes--millions, maybe! Of course you'll let me go, won't
you? And Maurice, and Mac?"
"I couldn't manage without you. But mind, not a word to anybody else!"
They telephoned the other boys that day, and in the evening a meeting
was held in Fred's room, like the previous time when the first
expedition had been so hurriedly planned. But this was to be a
different affair, carefully thought out and equipped for all sorts of
possibilities.
"Of course you'll both be able to go?" said Fred.
"I certainly will," answered Peter. "I've lost so much time this
winter already, with our other trip, and then having my mind on the
diamonds and dodging newspaper reporters and things, that I've got
hopelessly behind. My laboratory work especially has gone all to
pieces. I'm bound to fail on next summer's exams, anyway, so I'm going
to let it slide and make the trip, on the chance that I'll make such a
fortune that I won't have to practice medicine for a living at all.
How about you, Maurice?"
"I wouldn't miss it for anything--if I could help it," Maurice replied.
"I don't know, though, whether I can afford it."
Maurice's parents were not in rich circumstances, and Horace hastened
to say--
"I'm paying for this expedition, you know, out of the diamond money.
There'll be plenty, and some to spare."
"Well, it isn't exactly the cost," said Maurice, "but my father is
awfully anxious for me to make an honor pass next summer. I couldn't
afford to fail, and have to take another year at the work. I don't
know, though,--I'll see. I'd be awfully disappointed if I had to stay
out of it."
Under the circumstances they could not urge him to say more. As for
Horace and Fred, they had very few family ties. Their closest
relatives were an aunt and uncle in Montreal. The trip was quite in
the line of Horace's profession, and Fred did not mind resigning the
post he held in the real estate office. The firm was shaky; it was not
likely to continue in business much longer, and he would be likely to
have to look for another position soon in any event. As they had
feared, Maurice was obliged to announce his inability to go with them.
His professors thought that an absence of two months would be a
handicap that he could never make up. In the eyes of his parents the
expedition was no more than a hare-brained expedition into the woods,
that would cost a whole year of collegiate work. To his bitter
disappointment, he had to give it up.
Fred and Macgregor at once began to train as if for an athletic
contest. They took long cross-country runs in the snow and worked hard
in the gymnasium. They introduced a new form of exercise that made
their friends stare. They appeared on the indoor running track bent
almost double; each carried on his back a sack of sawdust, held in
place by a broad leather band that passed over the top of his forehead.
Thus burdened they jogged round the track at a fast walk.
They were the butt of many jokes before the other men at the gymnasium
discovered the reason for this queer form of exercise. It had been
Horace's idea. He knew that there would be long portages where they
would have to carry the supplies with a tumpline; and he also knew that
nothing is so wearing on a novice.
Fred and Peter found it so. Strong as they were, they discovered that
it brought a new set of muscles into play, and they had trouble in
staggering over a mile with a fifty-pound pack; but they kept at it,
and before the expedition started, Fred could travel five miles with a
hundred pounds, and big Macgregor could do even better.
As soon as the ice on Toronto Bay broke up, they bought a large
Peterboro canoe, which Horace inspected thoroughly. He was a skilled
canoeman; Fred and Peter could also handle a paddle. When the ice went
out of the Don and Humber Rivers, the boys began to practice canoeing
assiduously. The streams were running yellow and flooded, and they got
more than one ducking, but it was all good training.
They decided to start as soon as the Northern rivers were navigable,
for at that early season they would escape the worst of the black-fly
pest, and the smaller streams would be more easily traveled than when
shallow in midsummer. Besides, they all felt anxious to get on the
ground at once. But although the streams were free in Toronto, in the
Far North winter held them locked. It was hard to wait; but not until
May did Horace think it safe to start.
Since Maurice was not going, the boys decided to take only one canoe.
It was impossible to say how long they might be gone, but Horace made
out a list of supplies for six weeks. It was rather a formidable list,
and the outfit would be heavy to transport. They carried a tent and
mosquito-bar, and a light spade and pick for prospecting the blue clay,
besides Horace's own regular outfit for mineralogical testing work.
For weapons they decided upon a 44-caliber repeating rifle and a
shotgun, with assorted loads of shells. It was not the season for
hunting, but they wished to live on the country as far as possible to
save their flour and pork. Fish should be abundant, however, and they
took a steel rod with a varied stock of artificial flies and
minnow-baits.
It was warm weather, almost summery, when they took the northbound
express in Toronto; but when Fred opened the car window the next
morning, a biting cold air rushed in. Rough spruce woods lined the
track, and here and there he saw patches of snow.
It was almost noon when they got off at the station that was a favorite
starting-point for prospectors. Here they had to spend two days, for
Horace wished to engage Indian packers to help them portage over the
Height of Land. As it was early in the season, they had their pick of
men, and obtained three French half-breeds, who furnished their own
canoe and supplies.
The boys' canoe and duffel sacks had come up by freight. All was ready
at last. The next morning they put the canoes into the water; the
paddles dipped, and the half-dozen houses of the village dropped out of
sight behind the pines.
The first week of that voyage was uneventful, except for hard work and
considerable discomfort. It rained four days in the seven, and once it
snowed a little. They were going upstream always, against a rushing
current swollen with snow water. Sometimes they could paddle, more
often they had to pole, and frequently they were forced either to
carry, or else to wade and "track" the canoes up the current. The
nearer they came to the head of the river, the swifter and more broken
the stream became. At last they could go no farther in the canoes.
Then came the long portage. In order to reach the head of the
Missanabie River, which flowed in the opposite direction, they had to
carry the canoe and over six hundred pounds of outfit for about twelve
miles, across the Height of Land.
Here they camped for one night. At daylight next morning they started
over the long portage, heavily burdened, and before the first hour had
passed they were thankful that they had brought along the half-breed
packers, who strode along sturdily under a load that made Fred stare.
It is only fair to say, though, that the half-breeds were almost
equally surprised at the performance of the boys, for their previous
experience with city campers had not led them to expect anything in the
way of weight-carrying. Thanks to their gymnasium practice, however,
Fred and Macgregor were able to travel under a sixty-pound load without
actually collapsing.
The trail was rough and wound up and down over rocky ridges, through
tangles of swamp-alder and tamarack, but continually zigzagged up
toward the hills. It was a chilly day; the streams had been rimmed
with ice that morning, but after a few miles the boys were dripping
with perspiration.
That was a killing march. If it had not been for their weeks of hard
training the boys could never have stood up under it, and they had all
they could do to reach the topmost ridge of the Height of Land by the
middle of the afternoon.
Fred slipped the tumpline from his head, slung the sixty-pound pack on
the ground, and sat down heavily on the pack.
"That part's over, anyway!" he gasped.
"There won't be anything much rougher, old boy," replied Horace, as he
came up and threw off his own burden.
Staggering through the underbrush, slipping on the wet, mossy stones of
the slope, came a queer procession. In front was a bronze-faced
half-breed, bent double, with the broad tump-line over the top of his
head, and a mountainous pack of blankets and food supplies on his back.
Behind him came two more half-breeds, each with a heavy pack of camp
outfit. Macgregor brought up the rear; he carried a Peterboro canoe
upside down on his shoulders, and steadied it with his hands.
They all sat down on the top of the hill to rest. The three white
boys, although trained athletes, were pretty well at the end of their
strength; but the half-breeds seemed little the worse for their labor.
They were on the top of the Height of Land, which divides the flow of
the rivers between the Great Lakes and Hudson Bay. Behind them was the
long, undulating line of hills and valleys they had just crossed.
Before them the land fell away sharply. In the clear May sunshine they
could see for miles over the tree-tops until the dark green of the
spruce and tamarack faded to a hazy blue. A great ridge showed a split
face of gray granite; in the distance a lake glimmered.
About two miles away to the northwest a yellowish-green strip showed
here and there through the trees. It was a river--one of the
tributaries of the Missanabie, which was to take them North.
The descent on the other side of the ridge was almost as hard as the
ascent had been. The northern slope was wet and rocky; in the hollows
were deep banks of snow. The rocks were loosened by the frost, which
made the footing dangerous. But it was only two miles now to the
river, and they reached it in time to camp before dusk. The next
morning they paid off the half-breeds, who returned over the ridges
southward. The boys were left alone; the real expedition had begun.
The work now looked easy, but dangerous. The river was narrow,
swollen; its tremendous current, roaring over rocks and rapids, would
carry them along at a rapid pace. They would have to do some careful
steering, however, if they did not wish to upset.
As the most skillful canoeman, Horace took the stern; Macgregor sat in
the bow, and Fred in the middle behind a huge pile of dunnage.
For a quarter of a mile they shot down the river; then they had to land
and make a fifty-yard carry. Another swift run in the canoe followed,
and then another and longer portage.
It was like that for about fifteen miles. Then they caught sight of
wider water ahead, and the little river poured into a great, brown,
swift-flowing stream a hundred yards wide. It was the Missanabie.
During the rest of that day they ran over forty miles. The current
carried them fast, and the river was so big and deep that it was seldom
broken by dangerous rapids.
The country grew lower and less hilly; it was covered with a rather
stunted growth of spruce, tamarack, and birch. Ducks splashed up from
the water as the canoe came in sight; and when the boys stopped to make
camp for the night they found at the river's edge the tracks of a moose.
It was wintry cold in camp that night, and there was ice in the pools
the next morning. Shortly after sunrise the boys launched the canoe
again, and it was not much more than an hour later when a sound of
roaring water began to grow loud in their ears. With vast commotion
and foam a smaller stream swept into the Missanabie from the southwest.
"Hurrah! I've been here before!" cried Horace. "It's the Smoke River.
Up here real work begins."
"And up here," Peter said, gazing at the wild, swift stream, "is the
diamond country."