THE FINISH
At three-thirty in the afternoon, with the other events of the
celebration out of the way, all Nolan once more collected upon the
river. Great bonfires of spruce tops and loppings were built upon the
ice behind the finish line. For a half-mile or more up river, the first
and the last half-mile of the race trail, the ice was bare of snow,
or rather, the snow had become incorporated into the ice by reason of
a great overflow which had taken place several days before. It was an
ideal stretch for the finish, broad as the river itself, and with a
surface smooth, but not the glassy smoothness of glare ice.
It was a scene not soon to be forgotten. The Arctic darkness of the
middle of the afternoon dispersed by the yellow-red glare of the flames
that crackled and roared as they leaped high above the heaps of dry
spruce, which sent showers of red sparks skyward with each addition
of fuel. The tense, excited faces of the men and women grouped about
the fires. The quick, nervous laughter. The curious blending of hoarse
voices. The continuous short journeyings to the outer rim of the
firelight, and the intent peering up river toward a spot a mile and a
half away where the stream narrowed between two cut-banks. For it was
from that point that the first tidings of the race would be flashed.
A man had been stationed on top of each cut bank, each with a heap
of dry wood waiting for a touch of the match to make it spring into
flame. Should Gordon be first to sweep through the cut only one fire
would be lighted. If Dalzene was leading two fires would blaze out
simultaneously.
Lou Gordon did not mingle with the crowd about the fires. Out in front
of the finish line, well without the circle of the firelight, she stood
straining her eyes up river. Now and then, to overcome the chill,
for the thermometer registered thirty below zero, she paced back and
forth upon the ice, but always her eyes stabbed the outer darkness for
the first glimmer of light that would tell of the race. Beside her,
Enright, scarcely less vigilant, sought to relieve the tense strain
that gripped the girl to the very soul. Inside those heavy mittens, the
man knew that the girl’s nails were biting into the flesh of her palms.
“Four o’clock, Miss Lou,” he announced. “I didn’t figger he’d make it
as quick as you did. But he don’t need to. Dalzene’s best time was nine
hours an’ ten minutes. That’s what he bragged on. It might be an hour
or more yet, before they show up. You run along back to the fires an’
mix with the folks a little. It’ll do you good, I’ll wait here an’
beller out the news jist the second I git the first flash.”
But the girl would have none of it, as with tight-pressed lips she
answered with a shake of her head. Back and forth, back and forth she
paced with quick, nervous strides, or standing motionless as a carved
statue, sought vainly to pierce the outer dark.
“Half past four,” announced Enright, “They’ll be showin’ up soon, now.
Another half-hour an’ we’ll know.”
But, in another half-hour they did not know. It was quarter past five,
and still no flash from up river. The girl’s tense excitement had
communicated itself to the others. There was no murmur of hoarse voices
now--and no laughter. The outer rim of firelight was crowded, and the
deserted fires, flared feebly with now and then a flash of brilliance
as a spruce top fell into the embers. The sound of breathing could be
heard, and the soft rasp of moccasins and mukluks upon the ice.
Suddenly there was a sound, a quick swishing sound that was a sharp
in-gasping of breath.
“_Look!_” The voice of a dance hall girl cut shrill and thin with
excitement. Men and women stood frozen in their tracks, as far away in
the depths of the blackness a tiny flare of light appeared. Seconds
passed--tense fraught seconds--seconds of silence, absolute, profound,
as hundreds of eyes focused upon that single ever increasing flare of
flame.
“_One fire! It’s Gordon!_” With a bellow the voice of Enright shattered
the unnatural silence. Instantly, a pandemonium of sound blared forth.
Men seemed to go crazy. Caps and mittens flew into the air. Men grabbed
dancing girls and whirled them over the ice in a mad waltz. Others
locked arms and jumped foolishly up and down, howling like beasts. In
the pandemonium the voices of the judges were drowned as they charged
frantically up and down trying to drive the crowd behind the line.
“Go back! Git back! Dammit, you’re in front of the line!” Gradually
other men helped, and within a few minutes the crowd was being forced
slowly back, howling and dancing like demons.
Then, suddenly came a great calm. Once more every eye was staring into
the dark. Where only a moment before a single fire had burned, two
fires now flared.
“God!” cried a man hoarsely, close to Lou Gordon’s side, “Two fires!
Dalzene!”
A low murmur, sullen, growling, swept the crowd. The excitement was
gone. Slowly, muttering, they receded toward the dying fires.
“What--what does it mean?” faltered Lou Gordon, who paused at the line
to stare at the two distant fires.
“I’m ’fraid it means, Miss Lou, that Dalzene’s leadin’. But the race
ain’t over yet.”
“But--the signal!” cried the girl, in a voice that faltered and broke.
“Surely--it--was--one--fire. And now--two.”
“I s’pose one of ’em had trouble lightin’ his fire, an’ the other one
got the start,” explained Enright. “We’d ort to be seein’ the dogs
presently.”
Together they stood and strained to catch the first dim blur of motion.
Behind them the crowd hugging the fires, seemed suddenly to have lost
all interest in the race.
Lou sprang forward: “Look! Look! I can see them! It’s--it’s Dalzene!
But--Oh, look! Look! Dad’s right behind! Here they come!” With a wild
cry that broke into a sob, the girl leaped forward. Behind her the
crowd came to life as from an electric shock. As a man, they crowded
the finish line, peering into the gloom.
Lou Gordon was running toward the oncoming dogs.
Voices roared from the crowd: “Come on, Gordon!”
“Whip ’em! Whip ’em!”
“Gordon!”
“Gordon!”
A shrill whistle cut the air. Enright leaped to the line where the
judges already waited expectantly. “_Shut up!_” his voice bellowed like
thunder, causing a momentary silence, during which the voice of Lou
Gordon out on the ice could be heard:
“Hi, Skookum!” Again the shrill, peculiar whistle, followed by words of
encouragement.
“Skookum! Skookum! Mush-u, Skookum! Hi, mush! Mush!”
Suddenly the girl turned and ran for the finish line. Hardly more than
a hundred yards away Dalzene’s dogs were running straight for the line.
His voice could be heard howling at the dogs, and his arm rose and fell
like a flail as he whipped.
A wild yell broke from the crowd which watched with bulging eyes.
Gordon’s dogs seemed suddenly to have sprung into being side by side
with Dalzene’s. Fifty yards, now! Again that shrill whistle. Gordon’s
arm rose and fell. There was a sudden swerve of the great leader as he
seemed to spring at Dalzene’s lead dog. Shrill and loud the whistle
from the lips of the girl once more cut the air. The leader swerved
again--away from Dalzene’s team. A loud cry forced itself from a
hundred throats. Gordon’s light sled was on its side. His dogs were
plunging neck and neck with Dalzene’s!
“He’s draggin’! He’s holdin’ on!”
“Hold on, Gordon!”
“Fer God’s sake! Git out of the way!”
“Here they come!”
“Give ’em room!”
“Hold on!”
“Hooray! Gordon! Gordon! Gordon!” Once again the crowd went wild.
“Plumb clean crazy wild,” as Enright later described it. “Fer, By God,
them dogs with eyes a-shinin’, and a-glarin’, an’ their muscles fair
bulgin’ their hides, _drug_ Old Man Gordon acrost the finish half a
length ahead of Dalzene! Yessir drug him holdin’ on to the handle bars,
face down--a-ridin’ on his whiskers!”