THE TRAGEDY OF THE WILD
"Aim-sa! Aim-sa! I come!"
The cry rings against the mountainsides, shuddering and failing; then it
is lost in the vastness, like the sound of a pebble pitched into rushing
waters. The woodland chorus takes it up in its own wolfish tongue, and
it plunges forth again, magnified by the din of a thousand echoes.
High up to the lair of the mountain lion it rises; where the mighty
crags, throne-like, o'ershadow the lesser woods; where the royal beast,
lording it over an inferior world, stealthily prowls and lashes its
angry tail at the impudence of such a disturbance in its vast domain.
Its basilisk stare looks out from its furtive, drooping head, and its
commands ring out in a roar of magnificent displeasure.
Even to loftier heights still the cry goes up; and the mighty grey eagle
ruffles its angry feathers, shakes out its vast wings, and screams
invective in answer to this loud-voiced boast of wingless creatures.
Then, in proud disdain, it launches itself out upon the air, and with a
mighty swoop downwards, screaming defiance as its outstretched pinions
brush the sleek coat of the mountain lion, it passes on over the
creaking tree-tops to learn the real cause of the hubbub.
Down the valley, away to the east, the timid deer gather, snuffing at
the breeze, fearful, protesting, yet fascinated. The caribou pauses in
his headlong race to listen; only, a moment later, to speed on the
faster.
"Aim-sa! Aim-sa! Wait, I come!"
The cry is more muffled. The dark canopy of forest deadens it, till the
sound is like a voice crying out from the depths of the earth. For the
man is travelling with the fierce directness of one who is lured on by
the haunting vision of that which is his whole desire. The riven
mountains have no meaning for him. He looks straight out, nor
tree-trunk, nor bush, nor jutting rock bars his vision; there beyond,
ever beyond, is that which alone he seeks. It moves as he moves;
beckoning, calling, smiling. But always, like a will-o'-the-wisp, it
eludes him, and draws forth the cry from his throat. The sweet, mocking
face; the profound blue eyes, sparkling with laughter or brooding in
perfect seriousness; the parted lips about the glistening teeth so
luscious in their suggestion; the dark flowing hair, like a soft curtain
of wondrous texture falling in delicate folds upon rounded
shoulders--these things he sees. Always ahead the vision speeds, always
beyond. The man's efforts avail nothing.
The wolves upon his trail lope slowly over the forest bed of oozing
vegetation; with careless stride, but with relentless intent, the
creatures openly seek their prey. For blood is upon the air, and they
come with the patter of thousands of feet, singing their dolorous chorus
with all the deep meaning of the savage primordial beast. But the man
heeds them not. He is deaf to their raucous song as he is blind to the
mighty encompassing hills. What cares he if the earth links up with the
blue heavens above him? What cares he for the everlasting silence of
those heights, or the mute Spirits which repose upon the icy beds of the
all-time glaciers? He is beyond the knowledge of Storm or Calm. He knows
nought of the meaning of the awesome voice of Nature. The vision is all
to him, and he gazes upon it with hungry, dreadful eyes. His heart is
starving; his mind is empty of all but the pangs of his all-mastering
desire. If need be he will pursue to the ends of the earth. He has been
to the depths of hell for her; he has felt the withering blast of
satanic fires. There is nought for him but possession; possession of the
woman he seeks.
To his distraught fancy, his cries receive answer, and he stumbles
blindly on. Meanwhile the wolves draw ever nearer and nearer, as their
courage rises in response to the voice of their famished bellies. So the
strange pursuit goes on, on; over hills and through valleys, now scaling
barren, snow-clad rocks, now clambering drearily down jagged rifts of
earth; over Nature's untrodden trails, or along beaten paths made by the
passage of forest beasts. Through clearing and brake, and over the
rotting ice which fills the bed of the mountain torrent. On, on into
Nature's dim recesses, where only the forest creatures lord it, and the
feet of man have never been set.
At length the forests disappear and the magnificent heights rear their
snowy crests thousands of feet skywards. The valleys are left, and
behind him and below the forests form but a dark shadow of little
meaning. The greatness is about him; the magnitude of the higher
mountain world. As he faces the unfathomed heights he again treads the
snow, for the warm embrace of Spring has not yet enfolded the higher
lands, and the gracious influence of the woods is no longer to be felt.
He pauses, breathing hard, and the expression of his wounded face is not
pleasant. The flesh is blue, and the eyes are as fierce as the crouching
puma's. He looks about him as one in a daze. The baying of the wolves
comes up from below. They still dog him, for the blood trail holds them
fast. A ledge stretches away, winding upwards; a mass of tumbled rocks
foot one towering, solitary pine, and beyond is blank snow.
For the moment he is lost, his vision has deserted him. It may be that
weariness has overcome the power of his illusion, for he stares vacantly
about. He looks back, and the breadth of what he sees conveys no
meaning. The woods, with the sound of life coming up to him in deadly
monotony of tone; the hills, beyond, rising till the sun, like a ball of
deep red fire, seems to rest upon their now lurid glacial fields, but is
powerless to break their icy bondage; these things he sees but heeds
not. Beyond, far into the hazy distance, stretch hills in their
hundreds; incalculable, remote, all bearing the ruddy tint of sunset; a
ghostly array, chaotic, overwhelming to the brain of man. But the scene
has no significance to him. His eyes are the eyes of a man dead to all
but the illusion of a disordered brain. He sees as one partially blinded
by the sun.
Suddenly he starts. A sound such as he craves has come to him again. He
wheels to the right, whither the ledge winds round the crag. He peers
out; again he sees, and with a cry he rushes on. A moving figure is upon
the road; a smiling figure, a beckoning figure.
Up rises the way, a toilsome path and rugged; slippery and biting to the
unshod feet. He feels no pain; there is the figure. He presses on; and
the hungry legions move out from the forest below and follow boldly upon
his trail.
He rounds the bend. The call trembles down the mountainside, and its
music is strangely soothing and sweet to his ears. Quite abruptly a
broad plateau spreads out before him. It is edged on one side by a sheer
drop to unimaginable depths, on the other the uprising crags overhang in
horrible menace. The plateau is strewn with bleaching bones, and from
beneath the overhanging rocks comes a fetid stench. Now the figure is
lost again, and the dreadful straining eyes search vainly for the fair
face and beckoning hand. His heart labours and great pain is in his
chest. For he is high up in the mountain air, and every breath is an
effort.
Nor does he see the crouching object to his right, lying low to the
ground, with muscles quivering and eyes shooting green fire upon him.
There is no movement in the savage body but the furious, noiseless
lashing of the tail, and the bristling of the hair at its shoulders. But
suddenly a strange thing happens. The creature shrinks back, and draws
slowly away. Its awful eyes are averted as though in a fear it is
powerless to contend with. Its anger is lost in an arrant cowardice, and
the beast slinks within a low-mouthed cavern. What is it that has power
to put fear into the heart of the monarch of the mountainside, unless it
is the madness which peers out of the man's dreadful eyes.
And the man moves on unconscious of any lurking danger. As he passes,
the spell of his presence passes also. A roar comes from the depths of
the cavern, and is answered by the wolves as they crowd up to the edge
of the plateau. But though their reply is bold they hesitate to advance
further. For they know who dwells where the broken, bleaching bones lie,
and fear is in their hearts. They snuff at the air with muzzles
up-thrown, and their mangy coats bristle with sullen anger. The crowd
increases, the courage of the coward begins to rise within them. A
fierce argument arises, and the debate takes the form of a vicious
clipping of huge fangs. A mighty roar interrupts them, seeming to quell
their warlike spirit. For a moment silence reigns.
Then as if by chance, one great dog-wolf is driven out upon the
battleground. He is a leader, high of shoulder, broad of chest, with
jaws like the iron fangs of a trap, and limbs that are so lean that the
muscles stand out upon them like knots of rope. And his action is a
signal to the crowd of savage poltroons behind. With one accord they
send their fierce battle-cry out upon the still air, and leap, like the
rush of an avalanche, to the lair of the mountain lion. Out from his
shelter springs the royal beast, and close upon his heels comes his
mate. Side by side they stand, ready for the battle though the odds be a
million to one against them.
Their sleek bodies are a-quiver with rage, their tails whip the earth in
their fury, while their eyes, like coals of green fire, shine with a
malevolence such as no words can describe.
Again the wolves hesitate. Their outstretched tails droop and are
pressed between their legs; their backs are hunched, and they turn their
long, narrow heads from the green glitter of the two pairs of terrible
eyes. But the pause is brief, and the noise has died only for a second.
One wolf moves a step forward, hunger overpowering his fears. As before,
it is a signal. The whole pack leap to the fray; struggling, howling,
fighting as they come ripping at comrade and foe alike. The battle is
swift; so swift that it is almost impossible to realize that it is over.
The pack, leaping and baying, pass on, following the blood trail of the
man, leaving more bones upon the plateau, more blood upon the trodden
snow; and the royal dwellers of that little plain have vanished as
though they had never been.
The path has taken a downward slope and the man looks ahead for the fair
face, hungrily, feverishly. Again it has vanished. His heart cries out
bitterly, and his despairing voice echoes through the barren hills.
As he advances the path declines lower and lower, till out of the
shadowy depths the tree-tops seem climbing to meet him. The air he
breathes is denser now, and respiration is easier. As the path declines
its mountainous sides rise higher and higher until overhead only a
narrow streak of sky is revealed, like a soft-toned ribbon set in a
background of some dun-coloured material. Ahead is a barrier of snow and
ice, while below him, down in the depths of the gorge, the earth is
clear of the wintry pall and frowns up in gloomy contrast. The sparse
vegetation, too, has changed its appearance. Here towers the silent,
portentous pine, but of a type vaster than can be seen in any other
corner of the earth. The man hastens on with all the speed his weary
limbs will permit, stumbling as he goes, for the frost of the high
altitudes has entered his bones, and he cannot now feel the touch of the
broken earth. But his yearning heart is ceaseless in its despairing cry.
Where--where is She? The trees come up higher and higher and the gloom
closes in upon him as he reaches the barrier.
Now he pauses under a mighty archway. Below, it is black with age and
full of crowding shadows; the superstructure alone is hung with snowy
frost curtains, and these help to emphasize the forbidding nature of the
dark, narrow under-world. Down, down he goes, as though he were
journeying to the very bowels of the earth, heedless of the place,
heedless of all but the phantom he seeks. Again his surroundings have
changed. The barrenness is emphasized by skeleton-like trees of such
size as no man has ever seen before. High up aloft there is foliage upon
them, but so meagre, so torn and wasted as to suggest a wreck of
magnificent life. These gigantic trunks are few in number, but so huge
that the greatest elm would appear a sapling beside them, and yet their
wondrous size would not be properly estimated. They are the primordial
pines, survivors from an unknown period. They shelter nothing but
barrenness, and stand out alone like solemn sentries, the watchmen for
all time of the earth's most dim and secret recesses, where storms
cannot reach, and scarcely the forest beasts dare penetrate.
Again the poor benighted brain finds relief. Down beside these monsters
his eyes are gladdened once more with the fleeting vision. He sees the
figure moving ahead, but slowly now; no longer is she the gay laughing
creature he has hitherto followed, she moves wearily, as though
exhausted by the journey she has taken. His heart thrills with hope and
joy, for now he knows that he is overtaking her. Her face is hidden from
him, and even her fair form has taken on something of the hue of her
dark surroundings.
"Aim-sa! Aim-sa!" he cries aloud. And again "Aim-sa!"
The gorge rings solemnly with the hoarse echoes, and the place is filled
with discordant sounds which come back to his straining ears mingling
with the cries of the wolves that still follow on his trail.
The figure pauses, looks round, then continues her slow-paced movement;
but she does not answer. Still he sees her, she is there. And now he
knows that he must come up with her. He toils on.
He talks to himself, muttering as he goes; and a train of incoherent
thought passes through his brain. He tells himself that the journey is
over. She has brought him to the home which shall be theirs. The heart
of the wild, where the mountains rise sheer to the sky above; where no
man comes, where a dark peace reigns, and has ever reigned. Where snow
is not, and summer and winter are alike. It is the fitting home for a
tortured spirit.
The figure no longer moves now, but turns and faces him. The sweet
familiar features seem to bend toward him out of the deep shadows and
the grim surroundings. He shakes back his shaggy hair; he holds himself
proudly erect as he approaches the woman he loves. He summons all his
failing strength. His knees forget their weariness, his torn feet are
unconscious of their injuries. The haunting cry of the wolves comes down
to him from behind, but he heeds only the beckoning phantom.
Every trailing stride lessens the distance between them.
He sees her stoop as though to adjust her moccasin. She moves again, but
she does not stand erect. A half-articulate cry breaks from him. She is
coming to him. Now he sees that her head is bowed as though in deep
humility. A cry breaks from him, then all is silent. Suddenly she lifts
her head and her tall figure stands erect, gazing upon him with sombre,
steady eyes, eyes which seem to have caught something of the dull hue of
that awesome gorge. His heart leaps with joy. How tall she is; what a
superb form. She moves toward him, her body swaying gracefully to the
rhythm of her gait. Her arms are stretched out appealingly; and he sees
that she is clad in the rich furs of the North, clad as though for a
journey. He tells himself, with a thrill of mad desire, that she is
ready for their journey, the journey of life they will travel together.
Now the wolf cries come louder and more fierce. If he is deaf to them
the woman is not. Her head turns sharply and a fierce light leaps into
her eyes. The change is lost upon the man. He stretches out his arms and
staggers towards her. They come together, and he feels the soft touch of
her fur robes upon his face and hands. Her arms close about him and her
warm breath fans his fevered cheek, as he is drawn, willingly, closer
and closer to her bosom.
But what is this? The embrace draws tight, tighter and yet tighter; he
becomes rigid in her arms, he cannot breathe, and life seems to be going
from him. He feels his ribs cracking under the pressure; he cannot cry
out; he cannot struggle. Now comes the sound of something ripping, of
flesh being torn by ruthless claws. A quiver of nerves, a sigh, and the
man is still.
Down the path of that woful gorge in a headlong rush comes the
wolf-pack. A great figure with lolling body looks up. Its broad head and
short muzzle are poised alertly. So it stands, and under its merciless
fore paws is the mangled corpse of Nick Westley. It is a monstrous
grizzly, monstrous even for its kind. It turns from its victim with
shambling but swiftly moving gait, growling and snarling with terrible
ferocity as it goes, but never hesitating. This shaggy monarch is no
coward, but he is cunning as any fox, and, unlike the mountain lion,
knows the limitation of his powers. He knows that even his gigantic
strength could not long make stand against the oncoming horde. What he
leaves behind will check the fanged legions while he makes good his
escape.
The pack pours like a hideous flood over the spot where the last act of
Nick Westley's tragedy has been played out. A brief but fiendish tumult,
and little remains to tell of the sorry drama. The impassive mountains,
unmoved spectators, give no sign. The stupendous reticence of the
wilderness, like the fall of a mighty curtain, closes over the scene,
taking the story into its inviolable keeping.
THE END.