WINTER QUARTERS
"Slow her down, Clay, slow her down," pleaded Case. "Slow her down,"
shouted Alex from the bow. "I can't do much with her going so fast."
It was a different scene from that, in which we last saw the boys. Long
gone were the golden days when they had journeyed leisurely up the river
with Mrs. Mason nursing Case and the Esquimau lad back to speedy health.
Gone also were that exhilaration of shooting the rapids, and gone were
the pleasant nights when, with a bad stretch of water ahead of them, the
steamer and the _Rambler_ had tied up together at the bank and all had
made merry by the light of big fires, singing, talking, and even dancing
on the rough, uneven ground. Gone were the pleasant loitering days in
gold-mad Dawson, mingling with the old timers, eager to lend a hand
wherever needed and gaining in return many new quaint facts of the
country and the trail. They had hardly noted the growing keenness in the
air until the Kid, anxious still in his love affair, whispered to them
that it was time for them to go, that much ice was already bubbling up
in the smaller streams, and, knowing the Kid as they did, they had
followed his advice. It was an exciting race with winter at their heels,
but the _Rambler_ driving ahead with the current at a speed of from
twenty-five to twenty-eight miles an hour, kept ahead of the big cold.
At the Indian village they had stopped to get their dogs and buy furs
from the Shaman who, fat and sleek, by artful trading, had acquired
nearly all the furs from the hunters who were drifting in from the long
hunt one by one. To the hunger-pinched poor folks, they gave the
provisions Ike had suggested. They also gave them freely of their
trinkets that they might not be tempted to trade off the precious food
for the Shaman's worthless baubles.
Short as their stay had been, they were surprised at the change in the
river. Much ice was bubbling to the surface like yeast. It was not the
same Yukon upon which they had ridden up so pleasantly in summer. It was
tempestuous with white-capped waves that battered against the
_Rambler's_ bow and sent icy showers of spray aft. By midday the fierce
wind had died away and thin cakes of ice were floating on the surface.
Slow her down, Clay," Alex begged. "I can't help much at the rate she's
going." He was leaning over the bow, boat hook in hand, trying vainly to
thrust to one side the blocks of ice that impeded the _Rambler's_
progress. While Case, well once more, was standing at the wheel, his
alert eyes picking out the channels of open water freed from ice throes.
Down in the cabin, Ike was already beginning the evening meal and
talking gravely to Abe, whose wan face had filled out amazingly and who
was clumsily trying to help fadder with the cooking.
"Slow her down, can't you?" Alex yelled again.
Clay left the motor and made his way forward. "Do you see that mountain
ahead where the river seems to make a bend? I noticed it when we were
going up. Just beyond it is a snug little cove with a shelving beach.
Just the place to winter in, it struck me. Now the shores here are not
fit for a winter camp. They are too wind-swept. We have just got to make
that cove. We simply can't stop. The river will be frozen over by
morning and when the ice breaks up in the spring, the _Rambler_ would be
crushed into splinters between the floes. At this rate we can not make
the cove before night. I don't want the responsibility all on myself.
But I think now is the time to make a break for it. The ice is thin yet
and the _Rambler_ has got plenty of power and we know she has not got an
unsound plank in her. I vote to try for the cove. What do you fellows
say?"
"I'm for it," said Case, knocking his ice-cold hands against his body to
take away the numbness. "Anything is better than this."
"The cove or bust," Alex exclaimed, as he threw the boat hook up on the
cabin top. "This spearing off ice floes is like bobbing for apples, only
more so. One just gets wet and tired without getting any apples."
"All right," Clay agreed. "Pick out the smoothest course you can, Case,
and hold her to it."
He went back to the motor and slowly shoved the timer ahead. The
_Rambler_, which before had been barely moving, suddenly gathered speed
and leaped forward at the ice field ahead. She struck with a crash, and,
scarcely pausing, darted forward to meet the next, leaving behind a
rapidly closing wake filled with shattered ice.
Clay, leaning out of her motor hold, grinned with delight. "She eats
them, eats them up alive," he exulted.
But it was a dearly bought victory for the little boat, for when at last
she reached the cove, her bow post was a mass of splinters, while long
streamers of wood hung from her bruised sides, and showed where the
sharp ice had torn streaks out of her oak planking.
"Another victory like that would be a defeat," remarked Case, as from
the shore he viewed her wrecked appearance.
A portion of the brief Arctic day remained, and it's dim twilight glow
was too precious to be wasted. Alex cut down a dead cottonwood tree and
chopped it up for the Yukon stove, which they had bought at Dawson, on
the Kid's advice. While he was thus engaged, Ike, leaving Abe to look
out for the cooking supper, came on deck to render his assistance. A
thick layer of spruce boughs were cut and laid ahead of the boat, and,
by use of rollers and block and tackle, the three managed to pull the
_Rambler_ out on her springy bed.
"That will help to keep her warmer inside in winter," Clay said with
satisfaction. "We could never have kept her warm with her bottom resting
on the ice. Now the next thing is to fix up the sides and cabin top so
as to protect them from the stinging cold."
Long poles were cut and placed rafterwise from the peak of the pitched
cabin roof to the ground. On these rafters they piled layer upon layer
of small spruce boughs and banked up around the sides with a generous
supply of the fragrant limbs. It was almost dark when their task was
completed and they stood back and viewed the result with satisfaction.
"A house inside a house," Case said. "All it needs is a good fall of
snow to fill up the chinks and we will be as snug as a bug in a rug."
They were all tired, cold, and hungry and it was a joy to descend into
the brightly lit cabin where a merry fire crackled in the Yukon stove
and a savory supper fresh from the fire, steamed on the table.
"I wonder when we will see the Yukon Kid again," said Case musingly,
during a lull in the supper chatter. "He was due to leave St. Michael's
yesterday and I bet he started on time, for he's fairly crazy to get
back to his lady fair in Dawson."
Alex snorted in disgust. "Looks like all you fellows can think of is
girls," he sneered, and his companions shifted sheepishly in their
chairs, expecting and dreading a storm of ridicule from his sharp little
tongue. But Alex remained silent after his outburst. In truth, he was
picturing for himself a dull and sombre future. As the others wandered
on to other topics he sat thinking gloomily. Here was the Yukon Kid,
mightiest of the mighty men of the North, hanging to the apron strings
of a mere slip of a girl. Clay and Case both had girls in Chicago, he
knew; they would soon be getting old enough to marry and then the fine
long cruises would stop, for their wives would not let them go unless
they went with them. Case's red headed girl wouldn't, he was certain.
There would be no more trips. Only he and Ike would be left to talk over
alone the glory of this trip. A horrible suspicion flashed into his
mind, perhaps even Ike had a girl.
"Ike," he demanded, suddenly. "Where does Rebecca work?"
"She works in a shirt waist factory. By and by she be forewoman," Ike
said proudly, caught unawares.
A roar of laughter from the boys awoke him to the slip he had made. His
face reddened and he resolutely closed his mouth and refused to commit
himself further in reply to Alex's adroit question.
"It's all right, Alex," he said stoutly. "Maybe you got one little laugh
on me now, you understand. But some day I get big laugh on you because I
laugh last."
"Fadder," interrupted Abe, "you better put mukluks by the fire to dry."
It was a rule of the trail, the Kid had tried to impress upon them, to
always dry out their footwear after the day's work, but it needed the
grave voice of the child to recall it to them. Abe was born on the trail
and he was learned in its dangers.
"If Abe says so we had better do it and turn in," Clay remarked, and
soon five sets of footwear were ranged around the stock and the five
boys were sound asleep in their bunks.
It was Clay's cheery "Get up, grub's ready," that awakened his sleeping
companions.
"What do you mean by having breakfast at such an unearthly hour?"
grumbled Alex, tumbling out of his bunk and fumbling for his trousers.
"Why, the cabin's as dark as pitch."
Clay snapped on the electric lights. "We are late getting up this
morning. Remember, young man, this is the season when the days grow
short and we've got to make every minute of daylight count. Get up and
thank your lucky star that you've got a partner good enough to get up
before you, warm the cabin up, fry ham and eggs, and cook coffee for
you."
The mention of food sent Alex tumbling into his clothes, an example his
companions were not slow to follow.
By the time they had finished eating, a wan light was stealing into the
cabin windows. The last mouthful swallowed, they hurried up for a look
at the river. It was a sheet of solid white from shore to shore. They
all felt a feeling of gratitude that they had won to the little cove and
were not penned up out there in that desolate waste exposed to the full
fury of every gale. They now had time to note more closely the place in
which their winter was to be passed. It was a tiny cove well protected
from wintry blasts. On one side of them rose the big mountain; on the
other side lofty crumbling cliffs protected them from the raw west
winds, while back of them the ground rose in a gradual slope, densely
covered by cottonwoods and spruces.
"The first thing to do is to get out our snow shoes and practice
breaking trails," Clay declared. "We have got to harden our muscles and
get used to it before we start out on the trading trips."
All of the boys, but Ike, had had on snow shoes before, but this task of
breaking trail for the dogs was a new trick to them and they could not
quite get the hang of it until the little Esquimau lad gravely strapped
on a pair and showed them how the big webbed shoe must be lifted
carefully up, straight up, until it cleared the surface, so that no snow
should be tumbled into the packed place, then how it must be shoved
cautiously ahead while the same careful uplifting must be repeated by
the other foot. Ike's first experiment plunged him into a snow drift,
leaving only his big snow shoes waving madly above the surface.
"Fadder, fadder," cried Abe in delight. "If you want to walk on your
hands tie the shoes on them."
Clay and Case grinned at each other. It was the first time either of
them had heard the lad laugh. Clearly, under the nourishing food and
kind treatment he was receiving, Abe was certainly picking up.
The unaccustomed trail breaking brought into play muscles the boys never
dreamed they possessed, and after a few hours' practice, Clay called a
halt. "We don't want to try it too long at a time. Tomorrow we will do a
little more and keep it up that way until we can do an all-day stunt.
Then we will be fit to start out on our trading trips."
About noon the Yukon Kid hove in sight and with but little pressure, was
induced to stay to dinner and rest up his tired dogs, which he had
evidently been pushing hard.
"I've got a bit of news for you," he said between mouthfuls. "Got the
true story of Bill and Jud. Got it straight from an old timer who lived
in the same part of Ohio that Bill came from. Bill and Jud are brothers,
but no more alike than a rotten egg is like a fresh laid one. Jud, he
stuck to the farm and grew up big, strong, and honest, though I guess he
would have done that anywhere. Bill hit for the city, and the village
folks said they hoped he would never come back for he'd always been
mean, lying and thieving, although Jud was always mighty fond of him and
was always making excuses for him and claiming that it was only Bill's
high spirits that got him into mischief. Well, Bill got a job in a store
and mighty proud of it Jud was, always telling people that Bill was
getting along fine in the city Pretty soon the store people found out
that their cash was turning up short every night and they traced it to
Bill. He confessed and Jud put a mortgage on the farm and went up and
settled with the store folks so that Bill wouldn't be prosecuted, but
the lesson didn't do Bill any good, he kept getting lower and lower
until he got to be a common holdup man and burglar. Then Jud up and sold
his interest in the farm, and bid good-bye to the village folks, telling
them that he was going to get Bill away from the bad fellows who were
always leading him into trouble all the time. He made good his word
evidently, for here they are up here on the Yukon with Jud looking out
for Bill and keeping him as straight as he can. Funny ain't it, how a
good man like Jud will let himself be forced into bad ways just to keep
a worse man from doing worse things. I reckon Jud would kill any one who
tried to hurt his brother. Reckon that's what the Good Book calls
brotherly love, but I don't take much stock in that kind of love myself,
it's too one-sided."
The Kid did not pause for much more conversation and the boys did not
attempt to detain him, for they knew he was eager to be off for Dawson.
"I'll have more time to stay with you on my way back," he shouted back
to them as his rested team swung into line. "Oh! by the way. Bill and
Jud are on the Yukon now somewhere. Heard they left Nome with two boats
and a small outfit, but I haven't passed them on the river."