SNOWDRIFT RETURNS TO THE BAND
As Snowdrift plodded mile after mile, in her flight from the mission,
her brain busied itself with her problem, and the first night beside her
little campfire she laid her plans for the future. In her heart was no
bitterness against old Wananebish--only compassion that resolved itself
into an intense loyalty and a determination to stay with her and to
lighten the burden that the years were heaping upon her. For she knew of
the old woman's intense love for her, and the hardships she willingly
endured to keep her in school at the mission. The blame was the white
man's blame--the blame of the man who was her father.
Her face burned hot and her eyes flashed as her hatred of white men grew
upon her. Gladly would she have opened her veins and let out the last
drop of white blood that coursed the length of them. At least she could
renounce the white man's ways--his teachings, and his very language.
From now on she was Indian--and yet, again came that fleeting, elusive
_memory_--always, ever since she had been a little girl there had been
the _memory_, and when it came she would close her eyes, and press her
hands to her head and try and try in vain to grasp it--to bring the
picture clean-cut to her mind. Then the _memory_ would fade away--but it
would return again, in a month--a year--always it would return--a log
cabin--wind-tossed waters--a beautiful white woman who held her close--a
big man with a beard upon his face like McTavish, the factor. At first
she had told Wananebish of the _memory_, but she had laughed and said
that it was the wives of the different factors and traders at the posts
who were wont to make much of the little girl when the band came to
trade. The explanation never quite satisfied Snowdrift, but she accepted
it for want of a better. Was it a flash of memory from another
existence? There was the book she had borrowed from Father Ambrose, the
peculiar book that she did not understand, and that Father Ambrose said
he did not understand, and did not want to understand, for it was all
about some heathenish doctrine. She wondered if it could not be possible
that people lived over and over again, as the book said, and if so, why
couldn't they remember? Maybe last time she had been a white girl, and
this time she was a half-breed, and the next time she would be an
Indian--she wouldn't wait till next time! She was an Indian now. She
hated the white men.
And so it went as hour on hour she worked her plans for the future. She
knew that Wananebish was getting old, that she was losing her grip on
the band. Many of the older ones had died, and many of the younger ones
had deserted, and those who were left were dissatisfied, and always
grumbling. There were only eighteen or twenty of them all told, now, and
they preferred to hang about along the rivers, trapping just enough fur
to make a scanty living and pay for the hooch that the free-traders
brought in. They were a degenerate lot and old Wananebish had grown
weary in trying to get them back into the barrens where there was gold.
They scoffed at the gold. There had been so little of it found in so
many years of trying--yet she had not been able to get them to leave the
vicinity of the river. But, now, to the river had come news of the great
gold strike beyond the mountains to the westward. Snowdrift reasoned
that if there were gold to the westward there would be gold also to the
eastward, especially as Wananebish knew that it was there--had even
found some of it long years ago. Maybe they would go, now--far back into
the barrens, far, far away from Henri of the White Water.
Upon the fourth day after her departure from the mission, the girl
walked into the camp of the little band of non-treaty Indians. Straight
to the tepee of Wananebish, she went--to the only mother she had ever
known. The old squaw received her with open arms, and with much
wondering, for upon her last visit to the mission the good Sister
Mercedes had told her that Snowdrift would go and continue her studies
at the great convent in the far away land of the white man. It was the
thing she had most feared to hear, yet, by not so much as the flicker of
an eyelash did she betray her soul-hurt. All the long years of
deception, during which MacFarlane's note book had lain wrapped in its
waterproof wrappings and jealously guarded in the bottom of the moss bag
had gone for naught. For it was to guard against the girl's going to the
land of the white man that the deception had been practiced. None but
she knew that no drop of Indian blood coursed through the veins of the
girl, and she knew that once firmly established among her own people she
would never return to the North. At that time she had almost yielded to
the impulse to tell the truth to them, and to spread the proofs before
them--almost, but not quite, for as long as the girl believed herself to
be half Indian there was a chance that she would return, and so the
squaw had held her peace, and now here was the girl herself--here in the
tepee, and she had brought her all her belongings. Wananebish plied her
with questions, but the girl's answers were brief, and spoken in the
Indian tongue, a thing that greatly surprised and troubled the old
woman, for since babyhood, the girl had despised the speech of the
Indians.
The two prepared supper in silence, and in silence they ate it. And for
a long time they sat close together and silent beside the mosquito
smudge of punk and green twigs. The eyes of the old squaw closed and she
crooned softly from pure joy, for here beside her was the only being in
the world that she loved. Her own baby, the tiny red mite she had
deposited that day upon the blanket in the far away post at Lashing
Water, had died during that first winter. The crooning ceased abruptly,
and the black, beady eyes flashed open. But why was she here? And for
how long? She must know. Why did not the girl speak? The silence became
unbearable even to this woman who all her life had been a creature of
silence. Abruptly she asked the question: "Are you not going to the land
of the white men?"
And quick as a flash came the answer in the Indian tongue: "_I hate the
white men!_" The suppressed passion behind the words brought a low
inarticulate cry to the lips of the squaw. She reached for the sheath
knife at her belt, and the sinews upon the back of the hand that grasped
it stood out like whip cords. The black eyes glittered like the eyes of
a snake, and the lips curled back in a snarl of hate, so that the yellow
fangs gleamed in the wavering light of a tiny flame that flared from the
smouldering fire.
Words came in a hoarse croak: "Who is he? I will cut his heart out!"
Then the hand of the girl was laid soothingly upon her arm, and again
she spoke words in the Indian tongue: "No, no, not that."
The old squaw's muscles relaxed as she felt the arm of the girl steal
about her shoulders. The knife slipped back into its sheath, as her body
was drawn close against the girl's. For a long time they sat thus in
silence, and then the girl rose, for she was very tired. At the door of
the tepee she paused: "There are some good white men," she said, "Tell
me again, was my father a good white man?"
Still seated beside the fire the old squaw nodded slowly, "A good white
man--yes. He is dead."
The eyes of the girl sought with penetrating glance the face beside the
fire. Was there veiled meaning in those last words? Snowdrift thought
not, and entering the tepee she crept between her blankets.
When the sound of the girl's breathing told that she slept old
Wananebish stole noiselessly into the tepee and, emerging a moment later
with the old moss bag, she poked at the fire with a stick, and threw on
some dry twigs, and seated herself in the light of the flickering
flames. She thrust her hand into the bag and withdrew a packet from
which she undid the wrappings. Minutes passed as she sat staring at the
notebook of MacFarlane, and at the package of parchment deer-skin still
secure in its original wrapping. For never had the squaw touched a
dollar of the money left in her care for the maintainance and education
of the girl. Poor as she was Wananebish had kept Snowdrift in school,
had clothed and fed her solely by her own efforts, by the fruits of her
hunting and trapping. All during the years she had starved, and saved,
and driven shrewd bargains that the girl might receive education, even
as she herself had received education.
And, now, tonight, she knew that the girl had been suddenly made to
realize that she was one of those born out of wedlock, and the shame of
it was heavy upon her. The old woman's heart beat warm as she realized
that the girl held no blame for her--only an intense hatred for the
white men, one of whose race had wrought the supposed wrong.
For a long time Wananebish sat beside the fire her heart torn by
conflicting emotions. She knew right from wrong. She had not the excuse
of ignorance of the ethics of conduct, for she, too, had been an apt
pupil at the mission school. And for nearly nineteen years she had been
living a lie. And during those years right had struggled against love a
thousand times--and always love had won--the savage, selfish love that
bade her keep the object of her affections with her in the Northland.
Upon the death of her baby soon after the visit of MacFarlane, her whole
life centered upon the tiny white child. In the spring when the band
moved, she had left false directions in the caribou skull beside the
river, and instead of heading for Lashing Water to deliver the babe to
old Molaire, she had headed northward, and upon the third day had come
upon the remains of a sled, and a short distance farther on, a rifle,
and a sheath knife--the same that now swung at her own belt, and which
bore upon its inside surface, the legend "Murdo MacFarlane." A thousand
times she had been upon the point of telling the girl of her parentage,
and turning over to her the packet, but always the fear was upon her
that she would forsake the North, and seek the land of her own people.
Years before, when she had entered the girl at the mission, she had
smothered the temptation to tell all, and to deliver the packet to the
priest. But instead, she invented the story of her illegitimate birth
and accepted the shame. She knew from the first that Sister Mercedes
doubted the tale, that she believed the girl to be white, but she
stoutly held to her story, nor deviated from it so much as a hair's
breadth, during years of periodical questioning.
But now? What should she do now that the girl herself was suffering
under the stigma of her birth? Should she tell her the truth and deliver
to her the packet of her father? If she did would not the girl turn upon
her with hatred, even as she had turned against the people of her own
race? Should she remain silent, still living the lie she had lived all
these years, and thus keep at her side the girl she loved with the
savage mother love of a wild beast? Was it not the girl's right to know
who she was, and if she so willed, to go among her own people, and to go
among them with unsullied name? Clearly this was her right. Wananebish
admitted the right, and the admission strengthened her purpose. Slowly
she rose from the fire and with the packet and the notebook in her hand,
stepped to the door of the tepee and stood listening to the breathing of
the sleeping girl. She would slip the packet beneath the blankets, and
then--and then--she, herself would go away--and stay until the girl had
gone out of the North. Then she would come back to her people. Her eyes
swept the group of tepees that showed dimly in the starlight--back to
her people! A great wave of revulsion and self-pity swept over her as
she saw herself, old and unheeded, working desperately for the
betterment of the little band of degenerates, waging almost single
handed the losing battle against the whiskey runners. Suddenly she
straightened, and the hand clutched tightly the packet. If Snowdrift
stayed, might not the band yet be saved? What is it the white men say
when they seek excuse for their misdeeds? Ah, yes, it is that the end
justifies the means. As she repeated the old sophistry a gleam of hope
lighted her eyes and she returned again to the fire. At least, the girl
would remain at her side, and would care for her in her old age--only a
few more years, and then she would die, and after that-- Carefully she
rewrapped the packet and returned it to the moss bag. As always before
the savage primal love triumphed over the ethics, and with a great
weight lifted from her mind, the old squaw sought her blankets.
Heart and soul, during the remaining days of the summer, Snowdrift threw
herself into the work of regenerating the little band of Indians. News
of the great gold strike on the Yukon had reached the Mackenzie and
these rumors the girl used to the utmost in her arguments in favor of a
journey into the barrens. At first her efforts met with little
encouragement, but her enthusiasm for the venture never lagged and
gradually the opposition weakened before the persistence of her
onslaughts.
When the brigade passed northward, Henri of the White Water had promised
the Indians he would return with hooch, and it was in anticipation of
this that the young men of the band were holding back. When, in August,
word drifted up the river that a patrol of the mounted from Fort Simpson
had come upon a certain _cache_, and that Henri of the White Water was
even then southward bound under escort, the last of the opposition
vanished. Without hooch one place was as good as another and if they
should find gold--why they could return and buy much hooch, from some
other whiskey runner. But, they asked, how about debt? Already they were
in debt to the company, and until the debt was paid they could expect
nothing, and a long trip into the barrens would call for much in the way
of supplies.
McTavish, the bearded trader at Fort Good Hope, listened patiently until
the girl finished her recital, and then his thick fingers toyed with the
heavy inkstand upon his desk.
"I do' no' what to say, to ye, lass," he began, "The Company holds me to
account for the debt I give, an' half the band is already in my debt.
Ye're mither, auld Wananebish is gude for all she wants an' so are you,
for ye're a gud lass. Some of the others are gud too, but theer be some
amongst them that I wad na trust for the worth of a buckshot. They've
laid around the river too lang. They're a worthless, hooch-guzzlin'
outfit. They're na gude."
"But that's just why I want debt," cried the girl, "To get them away
from the river. There's no hooch here now, and they will go. I, myself,
will stand responsible for the debt."
The Scotchman regarded the eager face gravely: "Wheer wad ye tak them?"
he asked.
"Way to the eastward, beyond Bear Lake, there is a river. The trapping
is good there, and there is gold----"
"The Coppermine," interrupted McTavish, "Always theer has been talk of
gold on the Coppermine--but na gold has been found theer. However, as ye
say, the trappin' should be gude. Yer Injuns be na gude along the river.
They're lazy an' no account, an' gettin' worse. Theer's a bare chance ye
can save 'em yet if ye can get 'em far into the barrens. I'm goin' to
give ye that chance. If ye'll guarantee the debt, I'll outfit 'em--no
finery an' frippery, mind ye--just the necessities for the winter in the
bush. Bring 'em along, lass, an' the sooner ye get started the better,
for 'tis a lang trail ye've set yerself--an' may gude luck go with ye."
And so it was that upon the first day of September, the little band of
Indians under the leadership of Snowdrift and Wananebish, loaded their
goods into canoes and began the laborious ascent of Hare Indian River.