Frona waved her hand to Andy and swung out on the trail. Fastened
tightly to her back were her camera and a small travelling satchel. In
addition, she carried for alpenstock the willow pole of Neepoosa. Her
dress was of the mountaineering sort, short-skirted and scant, allowing
the greatest play with the least material, and withal gray of color and
modest.
Her outfit, on the backs of a dozen Indians and in charge of Del
Bishop, had got under way hours before. The previous day, on her
return with Matt McCarthy from the Siwash camp, she had found Del
Bishop at the store waiting her. His business was quickly transacted,
for the proposition he made was terse and to the point. She was going
into the country. He was intending to go in. She would need somebody.
If she had not picked any one yet, why he was just the man. He had
forgotten to tell her the day he took her ashore that he had been in
the country years before and knew all about it. True, he hated the
water, and it was mainly a water journey; but he was not afraid of it.
He was afraid of nothing. Further, he would fight for her at the drop
of the hat. As for pay, when they got to Dawson, a good word from her
to Jacob Welse, and a year's outfit would be his. No, no; no
grub-stake about it, no strings on him! He would pay for the outfit
later on when his sack was dusted. What did she think about it,
anyway? And Frona did think about it, for ere she had finished
breakfast he was out hustling the packers together.
She found herself making better speed than the majority of her fellows,
who were heavily laden and had to rest their packs every few hundred
yards. Yet she found herself hard put to keep the pace of a bunch of
Scandinavians ahead of her. They were huge strapping blond-haired
giants, each striding along with a hundred pounds on his back, and all
harnessed to a go-cart which carried fully six hundred more. Their
faces were as laughing suns, and the joy of life was in them. The toil
seemed child's play and slipped from them lightly. They joked with one
another, and with the passers-by, in a meaningless tongue, and their
great chests rumbled with cavern-echoing laughs. Men stood aside for
them, and looked after them enviously; for they took the rises of the
trail on the run, and rattled down the counter slopes, and ground the
iron-rimmed wheels harshly over the rocks. Plunging through a dark
stretch of woods, they came out upon the river at the ford. A drowned
man lay on his back on the sand-bar, staring upward, unblinking, at the
sun. A man, in irritated tones, was questioning over and over,
"Where's his pardner? Ain't he got a pardner?" Two more men had
thrown off their packs and were coolly taking an inventory of the dead
man's possessions. One called aloud the various articles, while the
other checked them off on a piece of dirty wrapping-paper. Letters and
receipts, wet and pulpy, strewed the sand. A few gold coins were
heaped carelessly on a white handkerchief. Other men, crossing back
and forth in canoes and skiffs, took no notice.
The Scandinavians glanced at the sight, and their faces sobered for a
moment. "Where's his pardner? Ain't he got a pardner?" the irritated
man demanded of them. They shook their heads. They did not understand
English. They stepped into the water and splashed onward. Some one
called warningly from the opposite bank, whereat they stood still and
conferred together. Then they started on again. The two men taking
the inventory turned to watch. The current rose nigh to their hips,
but it was swift and they staggered, while now and again the cart
slipped sideways with the stream. The worst was over, and Frona found
herself holding her breath. The water had sunk to the knees of the two
foremost men, when a strap snapped on one nearest the cart. His pack
swung suddenly to the side, overbalancing him. At the same instant the
man next to him slipped, and each jerked the other under. The next two
were whipped off their feet, while the cart, turning over, swept from
the bottom of the ford into the deep water. The two men who had almost
emerged threw themselves backward on the pull-ropes. The effort was
heroic, but giants though they were, the task was too great and they
were dragged, inch by inch, downward and under.
Their packs held them to the bottom, save him whose strap had broken.
This one struck out, not to the shore, but down the stream, striving to
keep up with his comrades. A couple of hundred feet below, the rapid
dashed over a toothed-reef of rocks, and here, a minute later, they
appeared. The cart, still loaded, showed first, smashing a wheel and
turning over and over into the next plunge. The men followed in a
miserable tangle. They were beaten against the submerged rocks and
swept on, all but one. Frona, in a canoe (a dozen canoes were already
in pursuit), saw him grip the rock with bleeding fingers. She saw his
white face and the agony of the effort; but his hold relaxed and he was
jerked away, just as his free comrade, swimming mightily, was reaching
for him. Hidden from sight, they took the next plunge, showing for a
second, still struggling, at the shallow foot of the rapid.
A canoe picked up the swimming man, but the rest disappeared in a long
stretch of swift, deep water. For a quarter of an hour the canoes
plied fruitlessly about, then found the dead men gently grounded in an
eddy. A tow-rope was requisitioned from an up-coming boat, and a pair
of horses from a pack-train on the bank, and the ghastly jetsam hauled
ashore. Frona looked at the five young giants lying in the mud,
broken-boned, limp, uncaring. They were still harnessed to the cart,
and the poor worthless packs still clung to their backs, The sixth sat
in the midst, dry-eyed and stunned. A dozen feet away the steady flood
of life flowed by and Frona melted into it and went on.
The dark spruce-shrouded mountains drew close together in the Dyea
Canyon, and the feet of men churned the wet sunless earth into mire and
bog-hole. And when they had done this they sought new paths, till
there were many paths. And on such a path Frona came upon a man spread
carelessly in the mud. He lay on his side, legs apart and one arm
buried beneath him, pinned down by a bulky pack. His cheek was
pillowed restfully in the ooze, and on his face there was an expression
of content. He brightened when he saw her, and his eyes twinkled
cheerily.
"'Bout time you hove along," he greeted her. "Been waitin' an hour on
you as it is."
"That's it," as Frona bent over him. "Just unbuckle that strap. The
pesky thing! 'Twas just out o' my reach all the time."
"Are you hurt?" she asked.
He slipped out of his straps, shook himself, and felt the twisted arm.
"Nope. Sound as a dollar, thank you. And no kick to register,
either." He reached over and wiped his muddy hands on a low-bowed
spruce. "Just my luck; but I got a good rest, so what's the good of
makin' a beef about it? You see, I tripped on that little root there,
and slip! slump! slam! and slush!--there I was, down and out, and the
buckle just out o' reach. And there I lay for a blasted hour,
everybody hitting the lower path."
"But why didn't you call out to them?"
"And make 'em climb up the hill to me? Them all tuckered out with
their own work? Not on your life! Wasn't serious enough. If any
other man 'd make me climb up just because he'd slipped down, I'd take
him out o' the mud all right, all right, and punch and punch him back
into the mud again. Besides, I knew somebody was bound to come along
my way after a while."
"Oh, you'll do!" she cried, appropriating Del Bishop's phrase. "You'll
do for this country!"
"Yep," he called back, shouldering his pack and starting off at a
lively clip. "And, anyway, I got a good rest."
The trail dipped through a precipitous morass to the river's brink. A
slender pine-tree spanned the screaming foam and bent midway to touch
the water. The surge beat upon the taper trunk and gave it a
rhythmical swaying motion, while the feet of the packers had worn
smooth its wave-washed surface. Eighty feet it stretched in ticklish
insecurity. Frona stepped upon it, felt it move beneath her, heard the
bellowing of the water, saw the mad rush--and shrank back. She slipped
the knot of her shoe-laces and pretended great care in the tying
thereof as a bunch of Indians came out of the woods above and down
through the mud. Three or four bucks led the way, followed by many
squaws, all bending in the head-straps to the heavy packs. Behind came
the children burdened according to their years, and in the rear half a
dozen dogs, tongues lagging out and dragging forward painfully under
their several loads.
The men glanced at her sideways, and one of them said something in an
undertone. Frona could not hear, but the snicker which went down the
line brought the flush of shame to her brow and told her more forcibly
than could the words. Her face was hot, for she sat disgraced in her
own sight; but she gave no sign. The leader stood aside, and one by
one, and never more than one at a time, they made the perilous passage.
At the bend in the middle their weight forced the tree under, and they
felt for their footing, up to the ankles in the cold, driving torrent.
Even the little children made it without hesitancy, and then the dogs
whining and reluctant but urged on by the man. When the last had
crossed over, he turned to Frona.
"Um horse trail," he said, pointing up the mountain side. "Much better
you take um horse trail. More far; much better."
But she shook her head and waited till he reached the farther bank; for
she felt the call, not only upon her own pride, but upon the pride of
her race; and it was a greater demand than her demand, just as the race
was greater than she. So she put foot upon the log, and, with the eyes
of the alien people upon her, walked down into the foam-white swirl.
She came upon a man weeping by the side of the trail. His pack,
clumsily strapped, sprawled on the ground. He had taken off a shoe,
and one naked foot showed swollen and blistered.
"What is the matter?" she asked, halting before him.
He looked up at her, then down into the depths where the Dyea River cut
the gloomy darkness with its living silver. The tears still welled in
his eyes, and he sniffled.
"What is the matter?" she repeated. "Can I be of any help?"
"No," he replied. "How can you help? My feet are raw, and my back is
nearly broken, and I am all tired out. Can you help any of these
things?"
"Well," judiciously, "I am sure it might be worse. Think of the men
who have just landed on the beach. It will take them ten days or two
weeks to back-trip their outfits as far as you have already got yours."
"But my partners have left me and gone on," he moaned, a sneaking
appeal for pity in his voice. "And I am all alone, and I don't feel
able to move another step. And then think of my wife and babies. I
left them down in the States. Oh, if they could only see me now! I
can't go back to them, and I can't go on. It's too much for me. I
can't stand it, this working like a horse. I was not made to work like
a horse. I'll die, I know I will, if I do. Oh, what shall I do? What
shall I do?"
"Why did your comrades leave you?"
"Because I was not so strong as they; because I could not pack as much
or as long. And they laughed at me and left me."
"Have you ever roughed it?" Frona asked.
"No."
"You look well put up and strong. Weigh probably one hundred and
sixty-five?"
"One hundred-and seventy," he corrected.
"You don't look as though you had ever been troubled with sickness.
Never an invalid?"
"N-no."
"And your comrades? They are miners?"
"Never mining in their lives. They worked in the same establishment
with me. That's what makes it so hard, don't you see! We'd known one
another for years! And to go off and leave me just because I couldn't
keep up!"
"My friend," and Frona knew she was speaking for the race, "you are
strong as they. You can work just as hard as they; pack as much. But
you are weak of heart. This is no place for the weak of heart. You
cannot work like a horse because you will not. Therefore the country
has no use for you. The north wants strong men,--strong of soul, not
body. The body does not count. So go back to the States. We do not
want you here. If you come you will die, and what then of| your wife
and babies? So sell out your outfit and go back. You will be home in
three weeks. Good-by."
She passed through Sheep Camp. Somewhere above, a mighty glacier,
under the pent pressure of a subterranean reservoir, had burst asunder
and hurled a hundred thousand tons of ice and water down the rocky
gorge. The trail was yet slippery with the slime of the flood, and men
were rummaging disconsolately in the rubbish of overthrown tents and
caches. But here and there they worked with nervous haste, and the
stark corpses by the trail-side attested dumbly to their labor. A few
hundred yards beyond, the work of the rush went on uninterrupted. Men
rested their packs on jutting stones, swapped escapes whilst they
regained their breath, then stumbled on to their toil again.
The mid-day sun beat down upon the stone "Scales." The forest had
given up the struggle, and the dizzying heat recoiled from the
unclothed rock. On either hand rose the ice-marred ribs of earth,
naked and strenuous in their nakedness. Above towered storm-beaten
Chilcoot. Up its gaunt and ragged front crawled a slender string of
men. But it was an endless string. It came out of the last fringe of
dwarfed shrub below, drew a black line across a dazzling stretch of
ice, and filed past Frona where she ate her lunch by the way. And it
went on, up the pitch of the steep, growing fainter and smaller, till
it squirmed and twisted like a column of ants and vanished over the
crest of the pass.
Even as she looked, Chilcoot was wrapped in rolling mist and whirling
cloud, and a storm of sleet and wind roared down upon the toiling
pigmies. The light was swept out of the day, and a deep gloom
prevailed; but Frona knew that somewhere up there, clinging and
climbing and immortally striving, the long line of ants still twisted
towards the sky. And she thrilled at the thought, strong with man's
ancient love of mastery, and stepped into the line which came out of
the storm behind and disappeared into the storm before.
She blew through the gap of the pass in a whirlwind of vapor, with hand
and foot clambered down the volcanic ruin of Chilcoot's mighty father,
and stood on the bleak edge of the lake which filled the pit of the
crater. The lake was angry and white-capped, and though a hundred
caches were waiting ferriage, no boats were plying back and forth. A
rickety skeleton of sticks, in a shell of greased canvas, lay upon the
rocks. Frona sought out the owner, a bright-faced young fellow, with
sharp black eyes and a salient jaw. Yes, he was the ferryman, but he
had quit work for the day. Water too rough for freighting. He charged
twenty-five dollars for passengers, but he was not taking passengers
to-day. Had he not said it was too rough? That was why.
"But you will take me, surely?" she asked.
He shook his head and gazed out over the lake. "At the far end it's
rougher than you see it here. Even the big wooden boats won't tackle
it. The last that tried, with a gang of packers aboard, was blown over
on the west shore. We could see them plainly. And as there's no trail
around from there, they'll have to camp it out till the blow is over."
"But they're better off than I am. My camp outfit is at Happy Camp,
and I can't very well stay here," Frona smiled winsomely, but there was
no appeal in the smile; no feminine helplessness throwing itself on the
strength and chivalry of the male. "Do reconsider and take me across."
"No."
"I'll give you fifty."
"No, I say."
"But I'm not afraid, you know."
The young fellow's eyes flashed angrily. He turned upon her suddenly,
but on second thought did not utter the words forming on his lips. She
realized the unintentional slur she had cast, and was about to explain.
But on second thought she, too, remained silent; for she read him, and
knew that it was perhaps the only way for her to gain her point. They
stood there, bodies inclined to the storm in the manner of seamen on
sloped decks, unyieldingly looking into each other's eyes. His hair
was plastered in wet ringlets on his forehead, while hers, in longer
wisps, beat furiously about her face.
"Come on, then!" He flung the boat into the water with an angry jerk,
and tossed the oars aboard. "Climb in! I'll take you, but not for
your fifty dollars. You pay the regulation price, and that's all."
A gust of the gale caught the light shell and swept it broadside for a
score of feet. The spray drove inboard in a continuous stinging
shower, and Frona at once fell to work with the bailing-can.
"I hope we're blown ashore," he shouted, stooping forward to the oars.
"It would be embarrassing--for you." He looked up savagely into her
face.
"No," she modified; "but it would be very miserable for both of us,--a
night without tent, blankets, or fire. Besides, we're not going to
blow ashore."
She stepped out on the slippery rocks and helped him heave up the
canvas craft and tilt the water out. On either side uprose bare wet
walls of rock. A heavy sleet was falling steadily, through which a few
streaming caches showed in the gathering darkness.
"You'd better hurry up," he advised, thanking her for the assistance
and relaunching the boat. "Two miles of stiff trail from here to Happy
Camp. No wood until you get there, so you'd best hustle along.
Good-by."
Frona reached out and took his hand, and said, "You are a brave man."
"Oh, I don't know." He returned the grip with usury and looked his
admiration.
A dozen tents held grimly to their pegs on the extreme edge of the
timber line at Happy Camp. Frona, weary with the day, went from tent
to tent. Her wet skirts clung heavily to her tired limbs, while the
wind buffeted her brutally about. Once, through a canvas wall, she
heard a man apostrophizing gorgeously, and felt sure that it was Del
Bishop. But a peep into the interior told a different tale; so she
wandered fruitlessly on till she reached the last tent in the camp.
She untied the flap and looked in. A spluttering candle showed the one
occupant, a man, down on his knees and blowing lustily into the
fire-box of a smoky Yukon stove.