A TEST OF ENDURANCE
The boys were sitting on the beach next morning after breakfast when Mr.
Oliver looked across at Harry, who had not yet said anything about their
adventures.
"What were you two doing last night?" he asked casually.
Harry started. "Then you heard us?"
"I did," said his father. "You were out of the door before I quite
realized what was going on, and it didn't seem altogether wise to
commence talking when you came back, but that's not the point. You
haven't answered my question."
"We went in swimming," Harry informed him with a grin.
"Considering that most people would prefer to swim in daylight, I wonder
if you had any particular reason for choosing the middle of the night?"
mused Mr. Oliver thoughtfully.
"Why, yes," was Harry's answer. "I've a notion it was rather a good one.
I wanted the Siwash to see us in the water, because it would explain the
thing. There were at least two of them about the beach, though only one
left the rancherie after we came into it."
"Then the fellow must have gone out a good deal more quietly than you
did, because I didn't hear him. I suppose you felt you had to get after
him and see what he was doing?"
Mr. Barclay smiled and waved his hand.
"Sure," he broke in. "The temptation would be irresistible. What else
would you expect from two enterprising youngsters like these, who have
no doubt been studying detective literature and the exploits of other
young men in the brave old jayhawking days?"
A flush crept into Harry's face, but he answered quietly:
"Well, it's perhaps as well we went, because I can tell you what the
Siwash were watching for. We saw the schooner."
Mr. Barclay gave a sudden start and cast a significant glance at Mr.
Oliver.
"The dramatic climax! There's no doubt you have sprung it upon us
smartly, but now you have worked it off you can go ahead with the tale."
Harry told him what they had seen and when he had finished Mr. Barclay
seemed to be considering the matter ponderously. Then he turned to Mr.
Oliver.
"It seems to me there's nothing more to keep us here."
"No," said the rancher. "On the other hand, it might, perhaps, be better
if we waited until those canoes arrive--if it's only for the look of the
thing."
His companion made a sign of agreement and neither one said anything
further on the subject. The boys lounged about the beach and gathered
delicious berries in the woods most of the day, and on the following day
two more canoes ran in. Their crews had, however, traded off their
peltries somewhere else, and shortly after their arrival Mr. Oliver and
his party left the inlet in the canoe which he had sent the Indians back
to bring. The weather had changed in the night, and when they paddled
down the strip of sheltered water their ears were filled with the clamor
of the surf, and the hillsides were lost in thin drizzle and sliding
mist. A filmy spray cloud hung about the entrance, and beyond it big,
gray combers tipped with froth came rolling up in long succession. The
sight of them affected Frank disagreeably, and he was not astonished
when Mr. Oliver, who spoke to one of the Indians, suggested that he and
Harry had better help with the spare paddles until they were far enough
off shore to get the masts up.
Frank found it hard enough work, for the sea was almost ahead and the
canoe lurched viciously, pitching her bows out. The crag beyond the
inlet, however, still slightly sheltered them, and straining at the
paddle with the rain in their faces they made shift to drive her over
the big, gray-sided ridges, though every now and then the frothing top
of one came splashing in. At length one of the Siwash lifted the short
mast forward into its place, and thrusting in the sprit, shook loose the
sail. His companion, who knelt aft gripping a long-bladed paddle, seized
the sheet, and the craft, gathering speed, headed out toward the point
to lee of them. When she had cleared it the Siwash raised a second mast
farther aft, and setting the sail upon it, slacked both sheets, after
which the canoe drove away at what seemed to Frank an astonishing pace.
As a matter of fact, she was traveling very fast, for a narrow,
shallow-bodied craft of that kind is very speedy so long as the wind is
more or less behind her.
Sitting with his back against her hove-up weather side he noticed rather
uneasily that the opposite one was almost level with the brine. Then he
glanced astern at the combers that followed them, and was by no means
comforted by the sight. They were unlike the short, tumbling waves he
had seen already in land-locked water, for they were larger and longer,
and swept up with a kind of stately swing until they broke into seething
foam. Their rise and fall seemed measured, and they rolled on in their
ceaseless march in well-ordered ranks. It struck him that the canoe was
carrying a dangerous press of sail, but nobody else appeared disturbed,
and he admitted that the Indians probably knew how much it was safe to
spread.
"Isn't she making a great pace?" he asked of Mr. Oliver, who sat nearest
him.
"Yes," was the answer, "I've made two or three trips in these canoes,
but I never saw one driven quite so hard. These fellows are probably
afraid the breeze will freshen up, and want to get as far as possible
before it does."
They ran on for a couple of hours, seeing nothing but the ranks of
tumbling combers, except at intervals when the haze thinned a little and
they made out a shadowy mass which might have been high and rocky land
over the port side. In the meanwhile the seas were steadily getting
bigger, and a good deal of water came in at irregular intervals. By and
by, the boys were kept busy bailing it out, and the Indian who was not
steering held the sheet of the larger sail.
At length, when the tops of two or three seas splashed in over the
foam-washed stern in quick succession, the helmsman raised his hand and
there was a wild thrashing as his companion loosened the after-sheet.
Rolling the sail together he flung the mast down, and the canoe ran on
with only the forward one set, which seemed to Frank quite sufficient.
The sea was on her quarter, and each comber that came up boiled about
her in a great surge of foam, and heaved her up before it left her to
sink dizzily into the hollow. Each time she did so Frank was conscious
of a curious and unpleasant feeling in his interior.
He had, however, no difficulty in eating his share of the crackers and
canned provisions Mr. Oliver presently handed around, and after that he
was kept too busy bailing to notice anything until late in the afternoon
when he heard the two Indians muttering to one another. The result of
the discussion was that one of them pulled the sprit out, and folding
down the peak left only a small three-cornered strip of sail. Frank
understood the cause for this when he glanced at the seas, which looked
alarmingly big. It was disconcerting to realize that they could take no
more sail off the canoe unless they lowered the mast altogether, and
where the beach was he could not tell. He had seen no sign of it for the
last two hours, and it was now raining viciously hard.
Nobody seemed inclined to talk, and there was only the roar and splash
of the combers behind them as they drove wildly on, until when dusk was
close at hand the dim shadow of a hill rose up suddenly on one side of
them. Then the Indian hauled the sheet, and presently when the water
became smoother, called to his companion, who thrust the sprit up again.
After that the canoe put her lee side in every now and then, but very
soon a foam-fringed point stretched out ahead. They swept around it, and
after skirting a half-seen, rocky beach ran with spritsail thrashing
into a little basin down to which there crept rows of mist-wrapped
trees.
Frank was thankful to get out when the helmsman ran her ashore, and the
work of assisting the Indians to chop branches and make a fire put a
little warmth into him. They made supper when darkness closed down, and
afterward the Indians erected a rude branch-and-bark shelter, while the
white men and the boys huddled together in the tent. It was better than
sitting in the foam-swept canoe, but Frank longed for the sloop's
low-roofed cabin.
He went to sleep, however, wet as he was, and after an early breakfast
next morning they started again, with both spritsails up in torrential
rain. The water was comparatively smooth, though the doleful moaning of
the firs fell from the half-seen hills, and Mr. Oliver announced that
the entrance to the canal they had come down was not far away. Frank had
learned that on the Pacific Slope canal generally means a natural arm
of the sea.
They reached its entrance presently, sailing close-hauled, and on
stretching across it the canoe plunged viciously on a short,
white-topped sea. The wind was blowing straight down the deep rift in
the hills, and Frank remembered with regret that Alberni stood a long
way up at the head of the inlet. They came back on the other tack,
making almost nothing, and the Siwash pulled the masts down before one
of them spoke to Mr. Oliver.
"I suppose they can't get the canoe to windward?" suggested Mr. Barclay.
"He says we'll have to paddle," Mr. Oliver answered. "There seem to be
four paddles in her and that will leave two of us to relieve the rest in
turn."
Harry and Frank took the first spell with the Indians, and they had had
enough of it before an hour had passed. The wind was dead ahead of them,
and though they crept in close with the beach they were met by little,
spiteful seas. It was necessary to fight for every fathom, thrashing her
slowly ahead by sheer force of muscle. Frank's hands were soon sore and
one knee raw from pressing it against the craft's bottom. He got hot and
breathless, the rain was in his face, and his side began to ache, and it
was a vast relief to him when Mr. Oliver finally took his place.
The mists were thinning when he sat down limply in the bottom of the
craft, and great rocky hills and dusky firs crawled slowly by, except
when now and then a fiercer gust swept down, whitening all the inlet,
and they barely held their own by desperate paddling. Then as it dropped
a little they forged ahead again. It was dreary as well as very arduous
work, but there was no avoiding it, for their provisions were almost
gone and there was no trail of any kind through the bush. Frank felt
that even paddling into a strong head wind was better than smashing
through continuous thorny brakes and floundering over great fallen logs.
One hand commenced to bleed when he next took his turn, but that was, as
he realized, not a matter of much importance. They had to reach Alberni
sometime next day, and his chief concern was how it could be done. Then
the pain in his side set in again and became rapidly worse, and he set
his lips tight as he swung gasping with each stroke of the splashing
blade. They won a foot or so each time the paddles came down, and it was
somewhat consoling to recognize it. He felt that if he had been called
upon to do this kind of thing after sleeping wet through upon the ground
when he first came out he would have immediately collapsed, but he was
steadily acquiring the power to disregard bodily fatigue.
There was no change as the day slipped by. It rained pitilessly, and the
wind continually headed them as they labored on wearily with set, wet
faces and straining muscles. The stroke must not slacken, for the moment
it grew feebler the canoe would drive astern. They kept it up until
nightfall, and then beaching the canoe lay down once more in the tent,
which strained in the wind. They were aching all over when they rose
next morning, and the work was still the same, but they reached Alberni,
worn out, early in the evening. It was a very small place then, though
it afterward sprang up into a mining town. Two or three ranch houses
stood in their clearings beside a crystal river, and a few more
buildings clustered at the head of the inlet half hidden in the bush.
There was a store and a frame hotel among them, and Mr. Oliver, who took
up quarters in the latter, told the boys that the stage would start on
the following morning. The Indians were given shelter in one of the
outbuildings, and the hotelkeeper insisted on locking up the dog, who
growled at everybody about the place.
"I'm not scared of dogs," he explained, "but that one of yours won't let
me get about my own house. Besides, I guess he'd eat some of those
Chinamen before morning if you leave him loose."
They were standing near a window, and Mr. Oliver glanced at one or two
blue-clad figures lounging under the dripping trees.
"You seem to have a number of them about," he remarked. "I saw another
lot as I came in. What are they doing here?"
"Stopping for the night," was the answer. "They're camping in a barn of
mine and going on to the gold creek at sun-up, though they may start
earlier if the rain stops. Quite a few of them have come in over the
trail lately."
"Then there must be a regular colony in the bush," broke in Mr. Barclay,
who had strolled up.
"No," replied the hotelkeeper, "that's the curious thing. They keep on
coming in by threes and fours, but Blake from the ranch higher up the
river was through that way not long ago, and he said he didn't see many
of them yonder. About two dozen, he figured, but more than that have
come through here to my certain knowledge."
"It looks as if the gold-washing didn't pay and the rest had gone on
somewhere," Mr. Barclay suggested carelessly.
The hotelkeeper looked bewildered. "Well," he said, "this is the only
trail to the settlements, and they certainly haven't come back this way.
It's mighty rough traveling through the bush, as you ought to know."
Mr. Barclay smiled ruefully as he glanced down at his torn clothing and
badly damaged boots. "That's a sure thing. Besides, they'd have their
truck to pack along, which would make it more difficult. Those fellows
generally bring a lot of odds and ends with them."
"Oh, yes," assented the hotelkeeper. "Most of them have their slung
baskets on poles. Anyway, I've no fault to find with them. They make no
trouble."
He walked off, and when Mr. Barclay and Mr. Oliver went out, Harry gave
a triumphant glance at Frank.
"Now," he said, "you see what our friend has found out without giving
himself away. The question is, where do those Chinamen who don't stay
with the gold-washing get to?"
Frank laughed. "I expect Barclay could give you an answer. There's
another thing he could probably guess at, and that's what they've got in
some of those slung baskets."
Then they moved back toward the lighted stove, for the rain drove
against the frame walls and it was damp and chilly in the big bare
room.