_By James B. Hendryx_
The Promise
The Gun Brand
The Texan
The Gold Girl
Prairie Flowers
North
Connie Morgan in Alaska
Connie Morgan with the Mounted
Connie Morgan in the Lumber Camps
Connie Morgan in the Fur Country
NORTH
BY
JAMES B. HENDRYX
AUTHOR OF “THE PROMISE,” “SNOWDRIFT,”
“CONNIE MORGAN IN ALASKA,” ETC.
[Illustration]
G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS
NEW YORK AND LONDON
The Knickerbocker Press
1923
Copyright, 1923
by
James B. Hendryx
[Illustration]
Made in the United States of America
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I.--BURR MACSHANE 3
II.--IN THE BIG CAMP 13
III.--CHRISTMAS 27
IV.--A GAME OF CRIBBAGE 37
V.--NORTH 53
VI.--CAMILLO BILL AVERTS A STAMPEDE 62
VII.--THE GORDONS HIT THE TRAIL 70
VIII.--COLDFOOT 78
IX.--ON THE KOYUKUK 85
X.--ENRIGHT PAYS A VISIT 100
XI.--DISAPPOINTMENT 114
XII.--“TWENTY MINUTES TO FOUR” 127
XIII.--THE START 134
XIV.--THE FINISH 147
XV.--“MINER’S MEETIN’” 154
XVI.--OFF THE RIVER 171
XVII.--SKOOKUM 190
XVIII.--ON THE LONG SNOW-TRAIL 202
XIX.--ON DEATH VALLEY HILL 212
XX.--MAN OF THE FAR NORTH 227
XXI.--THE PLOTTING OF JAKE DALZENE 244
XXII.--POISON 254
XXIII.--“I DRIVE THOSE DOGS” 265
XXIV.--THE ALASKA SWEEPSTAKES 274
XXV.--HULOIMEE TILAKUM 284
XXVI.--EYES IN THE DARK 293
XXVII.--THE WORTH OF GOLD 305
XXVIII.--SUNRISE 318
NORTH
NORTH
CHAPTER I
BURR MacSHANE
It was just before Christmas, and into Dawson, a straggling camp of
tents and log cabins, the sourdoughs were drifting from the outlying
creeks and washes. It was in that portentous year of the Yukon when in
August, Henderson’s strike on Gold Bottom was followed immediately by
Carmack’s strike on Bonanza, and the men of Fortymile and of Circle
looked into the blowers and saw coarse gold that had been panned from
the grass roots. Whereupon, claims paying “better than wages” were
abandoned, outfits hastily thrown together, and in poling boats and
in canoes, the sourdoughs stampeded up river. The traders, the saloon
keepers, and the girls from the dance halls followed the gold hunters
and on the flat in the shadow of Moosehide Mountain the camp of Dawson
was born of the life blood of Circle and Fortymile.
But, from the first the new camp differed essentially from the older
camps where it had been the wont of the sourdoughs to foregather
for a winter of idleness and revelry. For, close upon the discovery
of gold in the upper country, came the discovery of the process of
“burning in,” and in that year the Yukon saw the first winter mining
of her history. These were the days of the unspoiled Yukon, before the
stampede from the outside filled the valleys and the creek beds with
its hordes of tin-horns and _chechakos_--the days when a man’s word was
as good as his pile and a card would be turned unquestionably upon a
finger bet for thousands.
But with Christmas hard upon them, despite the fact of the new found
winter mining, and despite the fact that the sourdoughs were gouging
in gravel richer by far than the gravel of their fondest dreams, one
by one the fires were allowed to die out in the shafts along the creek
beds. The sourdoughs were drifting into the new camp. For Christmas
is Christmas--and what is a week or two of work, when the bulk of the
winter is still ahead, and when each test pan shows coarse gold and
more of it than the luckiest of them had ever taken from many test
pans? And what is a week or two of work when the white lights are
calling--the clang of the dance hall piano, the feel of a woman held
close, the smooth purr of the wheel, the run of the cards at the poker
tables, the warm grip and glow of the liquor, and the comradery of men
who thudded heavy sacks onto the bar from the mouths of which coarse
gold was shaken onto the scales?
There had been no prearranged plan for a general celebration at
Christmas--no looking forward in anticipation of a grand hurrah. But
the spirit of Christmas was in the air. And each sourdough, independent
of his neighbor, harnessed his dogs and silently hit the trail, knowing
instinctively that at the end of the trail he would find his neighbor.
For man is by instinct gregarious, and he will travel far to answer
the primordial call of his kind. For a month, a year--longer, he may
remain alone. But the passive act of remaining is a distinct effort of
will, a continued and continuous throttling of desire, until at last
the time comes when desire may no longer be throttled. A man may remake
himself, may completely change the sequence of act, the sequence of
thought, that has differentiated him from other men, he may thus change
what men are pleased to call his nature. But, the fundamental law that
has decreed him a social animal he cannot change--and remain a man.
The fugitive from justice, though he know himself to be beyond thought
of capture in some far fastness of the wilderness will, when the time
comes, count prison bars, and even the hangman’s noose, as naught, and
will deliberately risk capture in seeking the society of his kind. And
the man of the far North will brave the hardships of the long trail,
will laugh at the strong cold, will bore through the blinding blizzard,
will risk thin ice, and uncomplaining accept the gruelling labor of
the snow-trail for no other thing than that he may intermingle with
his own kind. It is the law. Men have broken the law and have paid
the fullness of its fearsome penalty. The brain that makes man man
explodes, and the man of a moment before is a raving insentient brute
which in a fume of unreasoning fury seeks only to destroy until in a
final paroxysm of malignity he destroys himself. Or, the dissolution
of the brain may come gently and the breaker of the law of kind,
maundering, and prattling, and babbling, may live on, and on, and on.
A short distance above the mouth of a dry wash that emptied into the
wide valley of Bonanza, Burr MacShane threw the last shovelful of
gravel onto his dump and methodically kindled his fire on the iron-hard
gravel at the bottom of his shallow shaft. An enormous malamute turned
with a sneeze of disgust from his contemplation of the shaft as the
acrid smoke filled his nostrils, and MacShane laughed: “Surprised as
hell, ain’t you, Highball, that fire gives off smoke? Every day you
stand there an’ get a noseful, an’ then down goes your tail an’ you
sneeze out the smoke. You act like a fool pup--an’ you the best trail
dog in the North!” At the words the tail of the great dog snapped
erect, and rearing upward he placed two large forefeet upon the man’s
chest. The ensuing tussle during which each tried to put the other
in the snow was interrupted by the tiny tinkle of bells. Man and dog
paused to watch an outfit pass the mouth of the wash far out on the
trail. MacShane grinned: “Headin’ for Dawson,” he confided to the dog,
“That’s the sixth one in three days, an’ the Lord knows how many that
we didn’t see. An’ in a week or so they’ll be headin’ out again. Ain’t
men fools, Highball? They ought to stay with the gravel.”
That afternoon MacShane cut cordwood and from the vantage point of the
rim saw three more outfits pull by. When it was too dark to see he
descended to the cabin, built a roaring fire in the stove and proceeded
to fill a tin boiler that had originally been a petrol can, with ice.
“Kind of like to hear how the rest of ’em are makin’ it,” he muttered
to himself while the ice melted. “I’d kind of like to know if any of
’em have struck bed rock. That’s what’s goin’ to tell the story of this
strike: What’s on bed rock? This shallow gravel is sure shot full, but
the real stuff will lay where it can’t work down any farther.”
The ice melted, he added more, and when the tin boiler was half full
of water he stepped outside and carried in a piece of old tarpaulin
onto which he had shoveled a hundred pounds or so of gravel from the
morning’s digging. The gravel was frozen into a solid mass and he set
it beside the stove while he stripped off his clothing and took a bath,
using the water sparingly. Dressing himself, he proceeded to wash his
discarded underclothing, shirt and socks in the boiler. Hanging these
garments on the drying rack, he produced a pan and when the gravel had
thawed sufficiently, dumped in a batch and filled the pan from his wash
water. Squatting upon the floor close beside the lamp which he moved
to the edge of the table, he began to work the pan with a peculiar
circular motion that threw the lighter dross splashing over the edge
onto the floor. The coarser gravel he removed with his hands, tossing
it aside. As the gravel and water lowered in the pan he examined the
residue carefully until with a final flirt he ridded the pan of the
last remaining bit of muddy water. Then he turned the contents onto a
piece of wrapping paper spread out to receive it, and sorted the gold
from the remaining dross. Flour gold, dust, and nuggets, that single
pan weighed in at one hundred and forty dollars! MacShane rose, carried
the tarpaulin with the remaining gravel out to the dump and with the
water that remained in the boiler he washed his floor. Crossing to his
bunk he withdrew from beneath the blankets a buckskin pouch and pouring
its contents onto the paper, sat for a while and looked at the yellow
pile. He consulted a memorandum book, and added a notation.
“That makes close to eight thousand dollars out of the test pans,” he
figured, “an’ at that rate there’s over a hundred thousand on the dump,
an’ God knows how much on down. This is sure some strike! Wait till the
news of it gets outside! I would like to have a dance or two. I guess
most of the girls have hit the new camp by now. This new strike sure
raised hell with Circle an’ Fortymile!” As the words unbidden expressed
his trend of thought, the man’s fingers abstractedly separated the
larger nuggets from the little pile of gold. He returned a handful to
the sack and dumped the coarse gold and the dust in after them. Then he
prepared his supper and as he ate it he cooked up a meal of tallow and
rice for his seven dogs.
“I expect Horse Face Joe come up along with the rest,” he mused as he
washed and dried his dishes, “He sure is a doleful bird, but he can
make the piano talk. Reminds a fellow of--I don’t know--sort of just
lifts him up an’ out of it all. From about the fourth drink on, he’s a
wonder. It’s a gift--music like he makes is. When he’s feelin’ right
he can just play on an’ on, makin’ it up as he goes, an’ all of it’s
better than anything that’s be’n wrote down--somehow it gets right to
a man.” He apportioned the dog food into seven separate dishes and
carried them out the door, then he returned and lighted his pipe.
“Noticed the tea was gettin’ a little low, an’ another hundred of flour
wouldn’t hurt. She was two dollars a pound when I come in, chances are
she’ll go an ounce to the pound by spring.” Ensued a silence during
which MacShane’s pipe went out. “That mitten I burnt the end of ain’t
goin’ to last long either. Horse Face would be just about hittin’ his
gait by now.” He stepped to the door and glanced toward the mouth of
his shaft where the red glow proclaimed that it was time to throw on
more wood. Closing the door he put on cap and mittens, but instead of
going to the shaft he pulled off his mittens, filled his pipe and sat
down. “They’re sayin’ that this is the last big strike,” he mused,
“That when this peters out there won’t be any more poor man’s gold--but
hell! There’s always another strike. There always has be’n, an’ there
always will be.” He jerked the cap from his head and tossed it onto
his bunk. “To hell with the fire! I’ll pull in the mornin’. Got to get
that tea, an’ flour, an’ another pair of mittens. You can’t trust burnt
moosehide.” He fired up the stove and put on another batch of dog food.
“I’ll hit the trail early tomorrow, an’ I’ll burn her up!” While the
dog food cooked, MacShane sat and stoked the fire and thought. Most
men would have passed the time by reading, but not Burr MacShane. He
preferred to think, to envision long trails--trails he had mushed alone
with his dogs, and trails no man had ever mushed.
Just turned thirty years old, he was chiefest among all the sourdoughs
of the mighty North. And he knew the North as no other man ever
knew it. Cabin boy on a whaler, he deserted at the age of fourteen
at St. Michaels, and for several years he knocked about the Russian
settlements and the Eskimo villages of the lower Yukon, gradually
widening his circle of adventure until in the eighties, and early
nineties, men who thought they were exploring virgin territory were
continually crossing his trail. Indians who had seen no other white
man knew him by name, and little, isolated tribes there were who years
afterward still called all white men Burrmacshane, believing it to be
the name of the whole white race. He was the first white man to explore
the Kuskokwim, and the first to traverse the mighty waste eastward from
Kotsebue Sound up the Kobuk and down the Koyukuk to the Yukon. Always
he played a lone hand, and among the sourdoughs he was regarded as a
super man. No boasting of adventure where men foregathered but what
some adventure of Burr MacShane out-topped them all. Yet, of these
adventures MacShane, himself, never talked. For no adventure could
there be in the North of which MacShane had not tasted the fullness.
He had fought starvation, strong cold, blizzard, thin ice, rotten ice,
fire, famine, water, and disease, and always he had won. By the very
force and indomitable nerve of him he had won, and by the strength of
his iron-hard frame. Every camp in the gold country had at some time
or other boasted his habitat, but none had boasted for long. The wild,
restless spirit of him forever goaded him on. The long trail beckoned,
and he would hit the long trail. The strong cold descending upon a camp
would drive men to the shelter of their fires, and MacShane, defying
the strong cold, would throw his outfit together and mush a thousand
miles. Men whispered that every safe in Alaska and in the Canadian
Yukon held some of MacShane’s gold. But not for his gold was he held
in regard, for no man ever thought of MacShane as rich. His deeds
outshadowed his gold--in a land where gold is God.
So MacShane mused, half dozing by the fire while the dog food cooked.
“She’s a great strike, all right, but she ain’t the last great
strike--by a damn sight. An’ next year this country won’t be fit
to live in. When the news gets outside there’ll be fifty thousand
_chechakos_ pilin’ in here. The damned fools! Most of ’em will go
broke, an’ a lot of ’em will die, an’ a few will take out some
dust--but what good will it do ’em? They’ll go back outside an’ buy ’em
a chicken ranch. The big country will never get to ’em. They’ll think
they’re _skookum_, but it’ll all be luck. The strike’s be’n made, an’
all they got to do is shovel out the gravel. I’d rather be a Siwash
than the best of ’em--a Siwash has got a chance to see something new,
to follow a trail that ain’t packed, to tear his meat from the teeth
of the land, an’ not buy it at the tradin’ company’s store. Damn
_chechakos_! But I won’t be here to see ’em. There ain’t anyone tried
the Colville river yet, an’ even the Koyukuk ain’t be’n scratched. God,
but she’s bleak up there, with the long night, an’ the strong cold. But
she ain’t b’en scratched, an’ combed, an’ raked, an’ the cricks ain’t
be’n punched full of holes. I’ve got a hunch. North, it says. North!”
and with a smile on his lips the man removed the dog food, blew out his
light, and rolled between his blankets.