Harlan, as she prepared to back down the steep rocky slide.
CHAPTER XXIX
THE SECRET OF THE CLIFFS
As she felt herself going down step by step, Jean kept her eyes
resolutely shut. She steadied herself with outstretched arms and hands
just touching each wall of the cleft. The rope tightened about her, as
inch by inch Gregg let it out from above. Gradually as all went well,
curiosity overcame her fear and she opened her eyes. At that instant
there came a whirr and a flapping of wings that set her heart thumping
again, and out from the overhanging tundra on top of the cliff an
astonished sea-parrot flew, so close that the tip of his wing stung her
cheek. She could hear other birds below and about her beating their
wings and hurling themselves in alarm from their resting places. Far
beneath the billows detoned against the crags. With hands and feet now
she clung to the rough juttings of rock as she was being lowered.
Harlan's voice, shouting encouragement, gradually became fainter. At
last she felt her feet strike the flat of the ledge.
With a gasp of relief she straightened and turned to look about her.
She stood high on a narrow shelf thrust out from the sheer-rising
cliff. Before her face swarms of birds fanned the air, their wrangle
and jangle sounding almost in her ears. The wind stirred the acrid
smells about her. At her feet were several crude nests of sticks.
They contained eggs smaller than hen's eggs and of a pale greenish
color. They were the first she had seen for nine months and the sight
sent a thrill through her. With a little laugh at her own enthusiasm
she untied the bucket at her waist and carefully worked her way from
nest to nest as she gathered them.
Jean, not being one of those who find themselves affected by heights,
quickly became accustomed to her perilous shelf above the sea. After
tucking a large silk handkerchief about the eggs to insure their
safety, she sat down on the ledge to look about her. Every nook and
cranny in the surrounding rocks was alive with birds. Close to her,
long-necked shags on wide-spread wings balanced with dusky gracefulness
before sailing away through the myriad screaming gulls. Dignified
murres, their backs to the sea, sat soldier-like in the crevices like
plumb-bobs from their perches. Huge-beaked sea-parrots squatted with
comical solemnity or flapped quickly away toward the outer reaches of
the ocean where thousands of their kind floated on the water like a
black cloud. These were the love-days in bird-land--the mating time
for all feathered things. Sitting there, the girl felt a sudden
kindred friendliness for all these small creatures--a feeling of
at-one-ness and sympathy with their little lives and nest-making
ambitions.
As she became more at home on her ledge she began to look about her
with a view to exploring further. She lay flat on the rock and peered
down. Below her on the floor of the sea, now exposed by the falling
tide, she saw dozens of the strange, perfectly round boulders that had
become so familiar to all on Kon Klayu. They were of assorted sizes,
and where they lay thickest there was no seaweed or kelp. . . . After
some minutes she became aware that from one end of her ledge where it
joined the cliff, and running parallel to it, rough, out-jutting rocks
slanted downward in a crude, natural stairway, almost to the beach.
With care, she told herself, after a long scrutiny, she might make the
descent. The rope about her she knew could not reach to the bottom of
the cliff. She would untie it and trust entirely to her clinging hands
and prehensile moccasined feet. She stood up, suddenly confident of
her own powers in this element. Cupping her hands about her mouth she
shouted to Harlan informing him of her intention. Evidently he did not
hear her, or else she could not hear his answer. After waiting a few
minutes she untied the rope from about her and cautiously began the
descent.
Very slowly and carefully she lowered herself, her feet and hands
clinging tenaciously. The keen salt wind ballooned her ragged skirts
about her. Occasionally when her foot slipped and showers of loosened
particles rolled down startling birds from their perches in screaming
clouds, she could feel the blood pounding in her temples in momentary
fright. At first she marveled at her own daring--then she reveled in
it.
As she descended she began to experience that thrill which comes to
those who tread where no other human foot has trodden, who look on
scenes no other human eye has visioned. She felt sure she was the
first to visit this part of Kon Klayu, for the steep cliffs at the
south were inaccessible both from the east and from the west side of
the Island, even at the lowest tide. And in all the tales of Kon Klayu
she had heard, no one had ever mentioned the chasm down which she had
come to the ledge. In this section of tidal waves and occasional heavy
earthquakes, it was possible that the cleft had opened up recently.
At last she felt her feet on the beach below. She straightened and
turned to face the ocean. The waters were sewn with jagged rocks and
long-running reefs. Sleek-haired seals bobbed up to look humanly at
her. A thin, high-rising jet of water afar out bespoke the presence of
a whale. Back of her loomed the precipitous wall of the cliff. She
gasped at her own daring as her eye followed the rough stairway down
which she had descended. A moment she wondered, with dismay, if she
could possibly climb back again; a moment she pictured her plight
should she be caught here when the tide came in and covered the narrow
beach; then her attention was drawn by that which lay farther along.
She ran forward, wending her way in and out between the giant balls of
stone that lay about her.
At the base of the precipice just ahead of her, and level with the sea
floor, she saw a huge opening. As she approached, it widened, grew
higher, until she round herself peering into the yawning mouth of a sea
cavern fifty feet wide and half that in height. Like monster peas in a
giant's open mouth lay the spherical boulders on the bottom of the cave.
She was frightened, yet fascinated by her discovery. She hesitated a
moment then advanced slowly into the cool dampness of the place. As
far ahead as her eye could pierce the dimness, the balls of stone lay
catching the light on their rounded surfaces. The walls closed in
about her, as she walked. Water dripped on her. Her feet splashed
through puddles in the uneven, hard bottom, but here there was no trace
of the seaweed that draped the rocks in all other parts of the Island.
The sound of breakers booming against the reefs came to her in the
cavern with a strange reverberating effect. The underground way ran on
apparently with an upward slant as far as she could see. She longed
for a light so that she might explore further. . . . After some
minutes advance into the deepening gloom, a feeling of timidity began
to assail her. She paused leaning against a lobsided boulder. The
absence of life, the stillness, the Stygian darkness ahead seemed
suddenly ominous. She turned and saw the mouth of the cavern far back
of her. Like an oblong frame it enclosed a small bright picture of
beach and sunlit sea. Undoubtedly, she thought, when the tide was
full, the ocean rushed in along the floor of the cave. Perhaps, when
it was stormy, it rolled the giant balls of stone backward and forward.
Once more she glanced toward the unknown inner recesses of the cavern;
then, with a little shiver, began making her way back toward the light
again.
Her foot went down with a quick splash into a water-filled depression,
and in shaking the drops from her moccasin she noted that the strings
were untied. She stooped to fasten them; her eyes now perfectly
accustomed to the dim light, caught a dull gleam at the edge of the
pool. She was conscious of a wild thumping of her heart--an eager
trembling of the hand she instinctively reached forward.
"No, no! It _can't_ be," she temporized aloud, as if to fortify
herself against disappointment. She forced herself to finish tying her
moccasin, and even looked to the security of the other one before she
hesitantly reached over and put her fingers on the object that had
attracted her. She held it up to the light.
"Gold! Oh, it _is_ gold!" she breathed.
In her hand lay a flat piece of yellow metal, smaller than the nugget
Lollie had found, but of the same character. She dropped to her knees
and with unsteady eagerness searched the bottom of the shallow pool for
other nuggets. Her trembling fingers encountered another one, and
still another! Then her luck seemingly came to an end.
The floor of the cave was strangely worn and filled with numerous
depressions into which the sand had settled. Jean finally dipped her
hands into the pool again and brought up perhaps a cupful. She ran
with it out to the beach and spread it out over a boulder. It was
black, showing tiny garnet-like particles, and here and there the sun
glinted on colors of gold!
She gathered the precious sand together again and stuffed it into the
pocket of her shirt, then swiftly set off toward the spot where she
could ascend the cliff.
Suddenly she remembered Gregg waiting for her at the top. She gasped,
dismayed by the knowledge that she had been totally unconscious of the
passage of time. Had she been gone an hour, two--or perhaps more?
What was he thinking? Perhaps he had tried to descend the cleft after
her and had fallen. Perhaps he was even now lying on the ledge
broken--dead.
Trying to shut out these unwelcome thoughts which took away all the joy
of her discovery, she hastily began her scrambling ascent of the steep
incline.
She had gone only a few feet when a shout halted her. Glancing up she
saw Gregg's relieved face above her.
"Thank heaven, your're safe, Jean!" he shouted, and with reckless
disregard of consequences he began to slide from the ledge toward her.
"I thought you'd fallen down the precipice, when I pulled on the rope
and found you not there!"
He landed on the beach at her feet. The tense look on his face faded
as his eyes devoured her.
"Lord, girl, what ever made you do such a thing! I rushed back toward
Skeleton Rib and met Kayak Bill coming this way. He let me down to the
ledge--for I couldn't get down any other way. He's up there now
waiting for us. Doggone you, anyway, you little rascal!"--he laughed
shakily, grasping her by the shoulders,--"you nearly scared me to
death!"
"But just see what I've found!" Jean opened her hand suddenly, and
with the three nuggets lying on it raised it toward his eyes. Then
without waiting for him to look at them, she thrust them into his hand
and began to drag him toward the mouth of the cave.
Half an hour later two wild, troglodytic figures were giving vent to
their joy by capering and dancing about the floor of the cavern.
"Jean, you've struck it rich! You've found the source of the gold of
Kon Klayu!" Harlan shouted for the fifth time. "It's better than beach
mining! It's better than Shane ever dreamed! I know enough to venture
that this whole blessed little isle must have a base of igneous rock
and the formation of this south end, especially, is impregnated with a
network of gold-bearing dykes! Why, anyone could see that by the walls
of this cave!" He bent, scooped up a handful of sand, and with eager,
shining eyes watched while he spread it over his palm.
"Just imagine this hollow during one of our terrific sou'westers,
Jean," he went on, looking about him. "The monster billows crashing
into this cavern, rolling the boulders along the bottom, grinding them
along this gold-bearing formation! By Jove, the action is the same as
that in a stamp mill, almost! The gold is freed, becomes mixed with
the sands, and sooner or later is carried out and concentrated along
certain zones on the Island."
"But away goes all the mystery of our Island, too, Gregg!" Jean's
voice carried a hint of regret. "That accounts for the strange,
rolling sounds we used to hear during the storms, and for the giant
balls of stone, and for everything!"
They filled their pockets with samples of the sand to take home to
Shane, and ascended to the ledge. From thence, with the assistance of
Kayak Bill and the rope they mounted one after the other to the top of
the precipice.
The old man listened to their story of the cavern in silence, though
his eyes were glowing.
"By . . . hell, from what yore a-tellin' 'o me, children, you sure have
struck it rich!" he drawled at the end.
Jean threw her arms impulsively about his neck and landed a kiss on his
ear.
"We all have struck it rich, you old dear! We'll stake the whole
little Island of Kon Klayu, and if we can ever get to the States to get
an outfit, we'll come back here and work it."
Jean knew that any show of affection caused Kayak acute, wriggling
embarrassment. He backed away from her now, his cheeks fiery red. To
cover his momentary confusion his hazel eye impaled Harlan's ragged
back, which was showing the effects of his rapid slide down the cliff.
"Young man," he declared with slow solemnity. "The bosom o' yore pants
is showing conside'ble wear an' tear." Gregg whirled to face him, but
before he could utter a word, Kayak, now master of himself once more,
drawled on: "It never rains but it pours, I reckon. I plumb forgot to
tell you, Gregg, that just a-fore you drug me up here this afternoon,
me and Boreland was a-mouchin round just south of Skeleton Rib and
durned if we didn't come across the old whaleboat, high and dry with
celery bushes a-growin' up around her. She's stove in some, but we can
fix her--and I reckon we'll be settin' sail for the mainland in a
couple o' weeks!"
CHAPTER XXX
THE PIGEON'S FLIGHT
Wonderful as it was, the discovery of the gold took second place with
the finding of the whaleboat. Gold had no more value than sand on Kon
Klayu, unless the adventurers were rescued, and the whaleboat meant at
least a chance of rescue, provided it could be made tight enough to
float. It is true that with summer coming on there would be an
abundance of eggs, sea-parrots and later on berries, for already the
north end of the Island was white with strawberry blossoms--but flour
and coffee were now all that remained of the supplies, and the flour
was low in the barrel. Help must come before another winter set in.
Ellen, in her first joy over the discovery of the whaleboat, had joined
eagerly in the plans which the three men discussed at the cabin. She
saw herself freed at last from the terrible necessity of summoning Paul
Kilbuck. The pigeon could fly--she had tested it. In another week she
would have sent it with the message that meant life to her family, but
death to her own peace and happiness. But now--in her relief the last
vestige of her illness fell from her. She felt strong again, ready to
take up her work about the cabin. She found herself, for the first
time, able to look normally on the smoke-grey creature, seeing it as a
bird, and not as a hated, yet horribly cherished representative of the
White Chief of Katleean.
It was slow work putting the old and battered whaleboat in repair.
Ellen had not seen the craft since its recovery, but Shane had told her
that every seam needed recalking. There was no oakum for the purpose,
so she tore up some garments that neither she nor Jean could spare. He
spoke casually of a cracked plank or two that would be strengthened by
tacking pieces of canvas and tin both inside and out.
After several days Ellen noticed that Harlan and Kayak Bill ceased to
talk of the proposed trip, although Shane still kept up a brave front
and spoke confidently, in her presence at least, of landing at
Katleean. She began to feel vaguely uneasy.
One morning when Jean and Lollie had gone off to gather gull eggs,
which were now found in small quantities, Ellen decided to take lunch
to the men who were working on the whaleboat a mile and a half away.
As she approached the spot she saw the upturned hull of the boat lying
upon the sand. No one was in sight. She gasped as she saw the
battered condition of the craft. One end seemed splintered and a
jagged hole showed plainly in the bottom. Three other holes had been
mended with tin. The next instant she was aware that the three men
were sitting on the other side of the whaleboat, resting probably.
Their voices floated out to her distinctly.
"We mout as well face the music, boys," Kayak Bill was saying. "We're
up against the damn'dest bit o' coast in Alasky, and in a rotten tub
like this it's a ten to one chance we're takin' but----"
At this point, to Ellen's vexation, the paper containing the lunch
burst apart letting half a dozen gull eggs, which formed the principal
part of it, fall to the sand. Instinctively she stooped to gather
them. The next words that came to her told her that Shane and Kayak
were discussing the unwritten law of the North--the law of the cache.
In a land where food is the god supreme, this law has made itself.
White and native alike bow before it. It means life. The food cache,
no matter where found, is inviolate. Than robbing a cache there is no
more foul or cowardly crime. And ranked with the cache robber is the
man who goes back on his promise, or fails, through neglect, to furnish
food to those who depend on him. Death, Ellen knew, is the penalty for
both crimes in the remote places of Alaska. As she went forward she
heard the White Chief's name and some words that were unintelligible to
her. Then Shane came to his feet. He was speaking in a voice
toneless, dispassionate, but weighted with finality.
"I'll do it, but I don't need a gun, by God!" From his pocket he drew
his revolver which he had taken that morning in the hope of getting a
seal. He laid it across his other palm. "I have five shots left--but
I'm going to do it with my hands on his throat!"
As he finished speaking Harlan and Kayak Bill stood up also. The young
man turned and saw Ellen coming toward them. There was a moment's
dissembling as Shane returned the pistol to his pocket, then he greeted
her with a cheeriness which in no way deceived her.
She said nothing that might betray her comprehension of the situation,
but as soon as she could, retraced her steps to the cabin.
She knew now that while it was in her power to prevent it she could
never allow her men to put to sea in the unseaworthy whaleboat. One
chance in ten, Kayak had said. Even during the best weather they had
known on Kon Klayu she herself had seen a gale blow up in two hours.
One chance in ten. The words repeated themselves in her brain. And if
they did make the mainland--what then? "I don't need a gun. . . .
I'll do it with my hands on his throat!" . . . The clash between Shane
and the White Chief was inevitable now, no matter how the meeting came
about. She was enough of a frontier woman to appreciate this. She
would summon Kilbuck at once, before her men had a chance to risk their
lives, and when she had sent her message, she would tell Shane her
whole miserable story beginning with the night of the Potlatch dance.
He might lose faith in her; he might despise her, but she knew that he
would fight for her.
She took out pen and paper and sat before the table to write her
message to the White Chief. She must make it so urgent that he would
come at once before the whaleboat was launched again. She wrote
several, but discarded them. At last she was satisfied. Folding the
paper tightly she slipped it into the little finger of a thin kid glove
she had cut off for the purpose. Then she went out to the pigeon's
cage.
With the fluttering bird in her arms, she ascended the trail to the
Lookout. At the top the home-made flag flung its tatters out in the
sunshine. Ellen noted that it blew toward Katleean. The wind, then,
was favorable. The trader should have her message by morning. And in
two more days--she shook her head, not permitting herself to think
further.
A few minutes she stood looking seaward. Then she held the bird out in
both hands and with all her strength tossed it into the air.
Fluttering wildly, it recovered its balance, circled narrowly, rose a
few feet and--settled down on the tundra before her. It took a few
limping steps. Ellen was puzzled at its behavior. Perhaps she had
tied the message too tightly about its leg. She would readjust it and
urge the bird to flight again.
With outstretched hands she advanced toward it and tried to imprison it
between her hands, but the pigeon flapped along ahead of her just out
of reach. After some minutes' running back and forth over the short
grass she caught it, and with her back to the flagpole, sat down on a
piece of firewood to loosen the string about the creature's leg. So
intent was she on her work that she did not at once hear the sound of
approaching footsteps. When she did turn her head quickly it was to
look up into the anger-lighted eyes of her husband.
He reached roughly across her shoulder and with one hand grasped the
pigeon by the legs. With the other he thrust toward her two pieces of
thin writing paper.
"Now, perhaps, you will explain these!" he said in a voice that
fluctuated strangely from his intense effort to control himself.
Dazed by the unexpected turn of affairs Ellen rose and mechanically
took the sheets. They were two half completed notes to the White
Chief--notes she had discarded. She must have overlooked them when she
burned the others. What had she said in her anxiety to bring Kilbuck
immediately to Kon Klayu? What had she said to arouse Shane's sleeping
devil of jealousy which she had known often during the first years of
their married life? "Paul Kilbuck,"--the words stood out black in her
large handwriting. As she read the words she slipped the other paper
over them. "I want you now----"
"So you want him _now_, do you?" Mocking fury sounded in Shane's
voice. "You want him now, this fine, squaw-man lover of yours who left
you to starve! God, what a blind fool I've been--but I can see it all
now. I remember his whisperings to you that day we left Katleean--"
He snatched the papers from her hand and thrust them into his pocket
with a bitter laugh. "I'll deliver your loving message myself just
before I choke--him----"
"Stop, Shane!" Suddenly Ellen was herself again. She knew nothing
that had happened between her and the White Chief was one tenth as
dishonorable as the things Shane's jealous imagination pictured. She
stepped over to him and laid a hand on his trembling arm. "I _can_
explain these half written notes," she said quietly. "I can explain
everything, Shane."
She looked up into his tense, passionate face. He must have seen
something in her blue eyes that claimed him, for he asked more
reasonably:
"Tell me, then."
Beginning with her distrust of the trader she did tell him. She ended
with her attempt that afternoon to send the pigeon with a message
urgent enough to bring the White Chief to their rescue before Shane and
his partners had sailed away in the leaky whaleboat.
When she finished Shane made no comment. She waited. Was it possible
he did not believe her? A long minute went by . . . and then another.
. . . Obeying an impulse she did not understand she swiftly took the
pigeon from him and tossed it once more into the air.
It readjusted itself and rose confidently. There was a swift movement
as Shane whipped his revolver from his pocket. Before the bird had
flown twenty feet he fired. The first shot missed, but the second
brought the smoke-grey pigeon to the ground.
A moment later Ellen felt her husband's arms about her.
"God love you, little fellow." There was tenderness, contrition and a
great relief in his tones as he laid his cheek against her hair.
"Sure, nothing matters now that I know it's myself you're still in love
with and not that damnable blackguard in Katleean!" . . .
For an hour they sat on the log below the flagpole, explaining,
mutually forgiving, planning. Shane, with Irish logic, chose to see in
the death of the pigeon, a riddance to all adverse circumstances. He
seemed suddenly endowed with a new faith concerning the trip in the
whaleboat and succeeded in imparting some of his enthusiasm to his wife.
"Luck is with me, El. I tell you I can feel it in my bones. The devil
himself can't keep me from making Katleean now," he declared
confidently as they walked hand in hand toward the trail that led down
to the cabin.
As if fortune had at last decided in their favor, the days went sunnily
by. Gulls began to lay by the thousands. Loll was relieved of his
hated task of killing sea-parrots, for Harlan discovered that when the
birds began to lay, he could urge them from their tunnel nests with a
long stick, and capture them. The whaleboat, repaired and recalked,
was launched and brought down to the beach before the cabin. All was
in readiness, at last, for the journey.
The evening before they were to set sail Jean went up the hill to the
Lookout to help with the last signal fire she and Gregg would build
together. The night air, soft and scented, was like a caress to the
senses. Sea and sky were luminous with the rose and amethyst tinting
of Alaskan nights. The three plaintive descending notes of the
golden-crown sounded from the alders along the crest of the hill.
When she reached the top she found a camp-fire glowing above the ashes
of past flames. Gregg had preceded her and at her coming he tossed his
old blanket coat to the tundra for her to sit upon. He took his place
beside her. Their usual gay exchange of badinage had failed them
tonight. For a time they sat silent, with arm-clasped knees, looking
into the vermilion heart of the fire. All day the shadow of
approaching separation had weighed the spirits of each with heartache
and anxiety. Yet each knew that in this hour tonight there was some
potent quality, some indefinable magnetic thing that seemed to charge
the air with sweetly mysterious emotions.
People of the cities, worn with the artificialities of civilization
feel the need of some powerful stimulus to arouse emotion: Love is
often born of the wine cup and a dusky, cushioned corner; of music; of
the dance. When the glamour of these is removed--love dies. But
inborn in the heart of every man is a love-dream--a dream of some day
finding that mate who shall battle cheerfully side by side with him
against environment; that mate whose courage, whose understanding,
whose faith shall enable him to laugh at the buffetings of Fate and go
unafraid down the years with the light of dreams in his eyes.
Perhaps with Jean and Gregg it was the subconscious knowledge of the
fulfillment of this universal dream that kept them happy during all the
lean months on Kon Klayu. They had shared elemental things; together
they had hunted food that they might live, battled against storms,
endured hardships. Together they had sung and laughed and made a
playtime of it all, and slowly there had grown up between them a love
as clean and wholesome as the summer winds that swept the tundra of
their Island. Hitherto they had felt no need of caresses or words to
express their joy in one another. They had been happy as children are
happy, with no thought of tomorrow. They had parted each night knowing
that morning would bring them together again. But now . . .
Jean, looking into the flame of the fire, dropped her chin in her
cupped hands. Incongruously, it seemed to her, at that instant there
flashed into her mind the memory of a day on an Island trail, when she
and Gregg had come suddenly on a sea vista of heart-stopping beauty.
His eyes had sought hers in quick, silent appreciation of it. She
could not tell why this simple incident should suddenly seem so
intangibly beautiful, but she knew now that it was a moment out of life
that they two would share forever. There had been other times when
they had sung together under the golden winter stars--fleeting,
rapturous spaces when she had been conscious that not only their
voices, but in some way their spirits blended. But now . . . he was
going away into the gravest danger--into death perhaps. . . .
She overcame a quick impulse to reach out, to feel him under her hands,
to hold him back.
Gregg rose to place another log on the fire. He brushed his hands one
against the other and thrust them deep into his pockets. She felt his
dark eyes compelling her own, and raised her face from her hands.
Neither spoke, but for a long tempestuous moment they looked at each
other. Something perilously sweet and magnetic drew her. Even as she
rose Gregg was at her side. She felt his arms close about her with
eager tenderness. She stood against him within his hold, tremulous,
thrilling to his nearness, yet even in the ecstasy of it, realizing
that their separation was now made more poignantly unbearable.
"Jean . . ." a little hoarsely he said her name, and she was aware that
his heart was beating as wildly as her own. "Jean, you--you are so
dear to me! When I come back, could you--will you marry me?"
His arms tightened about her as his head bent to hers. In answer she
raised her face to his, and in the first joyous enchantment of young
love met his kiss.
Two hours later she lay in her little bunk steeped in glad tumultuous
memories of those last moments on the Lookout. Her spirit fared forth
on the wings of her love into the future--a future made beautiful
beyond her girlish dreams. She told herself it was not possible that
other men and women loved as she and Gregg; not Ellen and Shane, . . .
not anyone. . . . All at once she became conscious that in the
living-room her sister and brother-in-law were still talking, though
everyone else had long since gone to bed. The indistinct murmur of
their voices mingled with the metallic clicking sound that informed her
Shane was again oiling his revolver. Then his words came to her with
low distinctness:
"El, I'm going to leave this with you. There are three cartridges left
in it, and if--if--I don't come back and no help comes to you before
another winter . . . you know--little fellow--you know what to do."
CHAPTER XXXI
THE JUSTICE OF THE SEA
Because there is no night in the Northland in June, dawn on Kon Klayu
was but a tender merging of golden twilight into amber and rose and
blue, with the sun reappearing within an hour of his setting, kissing
the summer sea into sparking sheets of silver and jade. The little
green Island with its girdle of creaming surf had never seemed so
beautiful as in the early morning of the day Shane and Kayak and Harlan
sailed away in search of help. The electricity of adventure, of hope
was in the air, and the wind was as soft and balmy as a breath from
tropic seas.
After the last good-bye had been said, Ellen, Jean and Loll stood on
the beach below the cabin watching the little whaleboat riding the
long, gentle swells just outside the line of breakers. The tin patches
on the frail sides glinted bravely in the sunshine, the mended old
Christopher Columbus sail caught the breeze, and slenderly outlined
against it were the forms of Shane and Harlan waving a cheerful
farewell to the watchers. Kayak Bill, his hand on the tiller and his
face turned resolutely away, headed the pathetic craft out into the
treacherously smiling North Pacific and laid his course for Katleean.
The boat was slowly lost in the sunny silver distance, and the sisters,
arm in arm, turned and listlessly followed the trail back to the cabin.
Lollie walking on ahead, brushed the tears from his eyes and squared
his narrow shoulders as if already he had assumed the responsibilities
of the man of the family.
The door of the cabin stood open and the sun made a great rectangle of
light on the floor. It was very quiet--and lonely. The loneliness was
new to both women and it hurt like a pain in their souls. It seemed
impossible that nowhere on the Island were the men to whom they were so
accustomed.
Ellen began picking up the dishes which were standing as she had left
them after the early breakfast. Jean helped her. When the work was
over there seemed nothing left but the aching emptiness of waiting.
The long day wore away at last. Tomorrow, if the wind held favorable
and all went well, Ellen and Jean assured each other repeatedly, the
whaleboat would reach Katleean, and in two more days a ship might come
for them.
At twilight Jean climbed alone to the Lookout. The sunny day had faded
in a grey mist. Afar down toward the south cliffs the tree so like a
waiting woman stood out against it in weird, life-like appeal. The
flat desolation of the plateau was marked by the tundra trail that led
across the Island to the Hut--the trail along which Gregg had so often
come to meet her. She had not dreamed that life could hold so much of
emptiness nor that longing for a loved one could be so intense as to be
almost a physical pain. She sank down beside the dull ashes of last
night's fire. The loneliness was almost unbearable.
From the pocket in her blouse she took a folded paper. Gregg had
pressed it into her hand as he left that morning. She unfolded it. It
was a verse from some poet unknown to her. "Read it when I am gone,"
he had whispered to her.
"When I am standing on a mountain crest,
Or hold the tiller in the dashing spray,
My love of you leaps foaming in my breast,
Shouts with the winds and sweeps to their foray;
. . . I laugh aloud for love of you,
Glad that our love is fellow to rough weather--
No fretful orchid hothoused from the dew,
But hale and hardy as the highland heather,
Rejoicing in the wind that stings and thrills,
Comrade of the ocean, playmate of the hills."
Before Jean had finished, her shoulders had straightened. She felt
strangely comforted, lifted out of herself. Surely, she thought,
nothing but happiness could come of a love like this. Even the
elements must be kind to one who loved so. Back in her little bunk she
thought of him out on the dark sea in an open boat with only the night
for a covering, and to calm her fears she repeated over and over again
the words of the verse he had left her.
Her faith was sorely tried the next morning when she woke to the old
familiar roar of wind and wave, and felt the cabin trembling in the
blasts of a gale. She saw, with alarm, that Ellen was not in her bed.
On investigating, Jean found her out on the beach standing bareheaded
while the wind wound her garments about her, loosening the strands of
her braided hair and pelting her with rain and flying spray. Ellen was
gazing, in a fascination of dread, at the green-back waves humping
their backs like fearful monsters, chasing one another in to the line
of foaming breakers that spent themselves at her feet.
Jean slipped her hand into her sister's and drew her back to the cabin.
When they entered Loll was up making a fire in the Yukon stove.
The day wore on. The storm increased, though it never became as
violent as some they had experienced during the winter. The direction
of the wind was favorable to their sailors. Both women knew that no
make-shift craft could live in such a sea, yet they hoped with an
intensity akin to despair that Shane had made the shelter of Katleean
Bay before the full fury of the storm was reached.
Night came on darker than usual, low scudding clouds and flying
wavetops seeming to mingle. Waves sheeted with foam faded ghost-like
into the tossing greyness. Drifts of rain blew stingingly in from the
sea. Cruel and cold the waters appeared now to Jean's anxious eyes,
and she found herself repeating again the lines of Gregg's verse, as if
it had become the tenets of her faith.
The second day of the storm passed as did the first, except that
evening brought a surcease of rain. The clouds in the west began to
lift. The sisters drawn closer by their common, mounting dread, slept
together that night, one on each side of Loll.
It was long before sleep visited Jean. But presently she was dreaming
that she dangled at the end of a rope over the cliff above the cavern,
trying to snatch nuggets from the rocky ledges. The wind blew her body
hither and thither, as she clutched the jutting crags. She tried
vainly to secure a foot or hand-hold. From above Gregg's voice was
calling, calling her plaintively, weirdly. She tried to make out his
words but could not. The wind blew them far away, and only a faint,
wild "Awh-hoo-oo-oo-oo!" came to her. Then her rope began to slip and
she was falling, falling interminably past the face of the precipice,
past shags' nests, past thousands of flapping birds who shrieked
tauntingly at her. With a convulsive movement she tried to spring to
the rock shelf below her--tried so hard that she woke trembling and in
a cold perspiration of dream-fear, with her heart pumping so loudly
that she could hear it.
The wind had died down and only the muffled beating of the great
combers on far seaward bars was audible, but--of a sudden she was bolt
upright in bed, listening with every sense alert. On the island, where
they three were the only human beings, someone, _something_ was
calling. Above the sound of the sea it came--the haunting, long-drawn
cry of her dream:
"Awh-oo-oo-oo! Awh-oo-oo-oo!"
But this was no dream. The cry came again, one minute apparently from
the depths of the ocean, then from the Lookout above the cabin. It
came nearer, growing more appalling, more mysterious in its
possibilities. It filled her with fearful, inchoate imaginings. . . .
In an agony of terror she reached out and shook her sister's shoulder.
"Ellen! Ellen!" she whispered tensely. "Listen! Some one is calling!"
Ellen awakened out of a belated sleep, raised on her elbow and tossed
the long loose hair from her face.
Again came the unearthly: "Awh-hoo-oo-oo!" rising thin and high and
dying away on the falling inflection.
Ellen's face went paler as she listened. She lingered a moment, then
sprang out of bed. Slipping her hand beneath her pillow she drew forth
the revolver and started for the door. Jean crawled gently over the
sleeping Lollie and followed.
They stood on the porch in the freshness of the dawn searching the
familiar landscape for some sign of life. The storm had cleared away
and long scarf-like clouds streaked the intense blue above. Once out
in the open Jean's mind was cleared of its phantoms. But a sudden
shock went through her when, from just over the bank, the call came
again.
Almost immediately there appeared in the trail the strange, tottering
form of a man. He advanced haltingly as if spent from some long
struggle, his bare, black head sunk on his chest, his damp garments
clinging to him.
"Stop!" Ellen's voice rang out. "Tell me who you are and where you are
from!"
The man raised his head. At the sight of the two women standing in
their white robes, their loose hair floating about them, a spasm of
mortal terror crossed his dark face.
"_Kus-ta-ka_! _Kus-ta-ka_!" [1] he yelled, at the same time throwing
up his arms and turning to run weakly down the trail.
Ellen covered the staggering figure with her revolver, but Jean caught
her hand. "Don't, El! Be careful!" she cried breathlessly. "Can't
you see--it's our old friend! It's Swimming Wolf from Katleean!"
She sprang along the trail after him calling: "Wolf! Oh, Swimming
Wolf! Don't run away from us! Don't you know your friends?"
The man terrified by something, she knew not what, kept up his feeble
running gait. She overtook him and grasped his shirt. The big Indian
collapsed on the sand. His hand closed painfully over her arm while
his wild black eyes searched her face. At the touch his look gave
place to one of relief.
"Ugh! Little squaw with white feet!" he gasped. "Swimming Wolf think
you all the same dead--think all you people dead. Long time you have
no grub." He pinched her arm again as if to reassure himself that she
was flesh and blood and not the _kus-ta-ka_, the ghost he had thought
her. He continued: "Long time now, Swimming Wolf no grub too." He
opened his mouth and pointed a shaking finger down his throat. "No
grub, no water, no sleep, t'ree day." He held up three fingers turning
his head slowly from side to side. "T'ree day lost. Plenty tired."
His voice was weary, plaintive, as only an Indian voice can be. Jean
wondered how she had for one instant attributed his Indian cry to
supernatural powers--she who had often heard him calling to members of
his tribe along the shores of Katleean.
Noting his weak condition, the girl checked the eager questions that
rose to her lips, and when Ellen came up, between them they managed to
get the worn man to the cabin. They fed him bread and hot sea-parrot
broth. He ate ravenously as much as Ellen thought good for him, but
when she tried to induce him to lie down in Kayak Bill's bunk, he shook
his head, and started unsteadily for the door.
"No, no!" he said sharply. "You come along. Other man with Swimming
Wolf."
They followed him down the trail to the beach and turned with him
toward Sunset Point. He paid no attention to their eager questions,
but suddenly stopped and pointed ahead. In the maw of the surf inside
the Point a whaleboat was churning. At the sight of it cries of alarm
broke from the women's throats, but again the Indian shook his head.
"Him not there," he assured them. "Him up _there_!" He indicated the
high-tide-line. He lurched along beside them, intent on taking them to
where his friend lay.
They saw the still dark form lying prone on the edge of the rice-grass
where Swimming Wolf had dragged it. Ellen, with a bottle of water and
some bread in her hand, ran forward toward the prostrate man. Within a
few feet of him, Jean saw her check herself and shrink back. Then,
reluctantly the girl thought, she went on. Jean quickened her pace.
As she approached Ellen turned swiftly to her.
"Jean!" she said hardly above her breath. "Look!"
Jean gazed with incredulous eyes into the face on the sand. The black
beard was matted with seawater. Below the bandaged forehead two weary
grey eyes opened. A moment a faint look of surprise crept into them.
Then they closed again and the man lay still as death.
"Oh-o-o!" Jean's voice held an uncontrollable quiver. "Oh-o-o! It's
the White Chief of Katleean!"
[1] Ghost.
CHAPTER XXXII
BENEATH THE BLOOD-RED SUN
A week had gone by since the day the White Chief and Swimming Wolf had
been cast up on the shores of Kon Klayu. The women, with the help of
the Indian, had lifted the inert form of the dazed man to a mattress at
the spot where they had found him, and dragged it literally inch by
inch along the beach to the cabin. They put him to bed in Kayak's bunk
in the little room off the living-room.
For Ellen and Jean the days were filled with intangible doubt and
mounting fear, for no sail whitened off Kon Klayu. Added to the acute
anxiety in regard to their men was now the problem of the White Chief
of Katleean. What queer twist of Fate had tossed the trader, helpless
and without food, on the Island where his very life depended on those
he had left to starve? And, if their men were lost at sea, what would
happen to them when Kilbuck recovered his strength?
Gradually, from the disjointed utterances of the superstitious Indian
and from their own knowledge of the trader, they were able to piece
together the story of the White Chief's mishap,--not the story as
Swimming Wolf knew it, tinged with eerie Thlinget superstition and
mystery--but the prosaic version of the white man, who sees everything
through logical eyes, and is ever explaining away all that is
mysterious in life and much that is interesting.
The White Chief, sometimes going for months without liquor, had, as
they knew, periods when he drank as no other man in all Alaska.
Curiously enough, he never gave way to his desire while at Katleean,
but with one faithful native to attend him, he would go aboard some
visiting vessel, and there sink himself into the oblivion brought about
by quantities of hootch.
It was in the latter part of May that a schooner, the _Silver Fox_,
came to anchor in the Bay of Katleean. The owner and captain was a
German, bound for Cook's Inlet with a load of gasoline and enough
equipment to start an illicit still at Turn-again-arm. Paul Kilbuck,
after nearly a year of abstinence, succumbed to his craving, and with
Swimming Wolf, sought the cabin of the _Silver Fox_. After two days of
the German's liquid hospitality, he was ready for any mad adventure.
Doubtless the thought of Ellen and her family must have been with him
during the winter. Perhaps he had some inchoate drunken plan of
seeking her when he put to sea with the potvaliant captain of the
_Silver Fox_; but six hours from the post he collapsed in a stupor on
the captain's bunk.
Tales of the North are replete with instances of the incredible
recklessness of men drunk on the pale liquor of that land--men who,
sailing along the dangerous coast, lash the wheels of their vessels,
and leaving all sail set, go below for a day's carousal; men who drain
the very liquid from the compass to satisfy their burning thirst when
hootch is gone. So it was no surprise to the women to learn that the
storm which swept the Island so soon after the departure of the three
men, had broken upon the _Silver Fox_ when all hands, except the
faithful Swimming Wolf, were too far gone in drink to man the craft.
As he talked, the Indian, with expressive eyes and hands, acted out
each step of his story. He told how the wind increased; how he lashed
the wheel and all alone tried to reef the bellying canvass, letting it
fall as it would at last. With a few words and many dramatic gestures,
he made known how the trader, roused from a two-day stupor by the
pitching of the vessel and the banging of the boom sticks, had
staggered up out of the cabin, and been struck by the heavily swinging
boom of the mainsail.
The captain and the three sailors crawled to the deck soon after, where
the freshness of the rising gale undoubtedly cleared their brains
somewhat. They tried to make things ship-shape to weather the storm.
The captain was just about to cut the tow-line that still bound the
trader's whaleboat to the stern of the _Silver Fox_, when suddenly
volumes of black smoke came pouring out of the cabin.
Swimming Wolf was never able to give a white man's reason which would
explain the fire that started in the hold of the schooner where the
gasoline was stored. He swore it was the _kus-ta-ka_ who kindled the
flame, the _kus-ta-ka_ who knocked the White Chief on the head and made
him fall "all same dead." That he finally got the trader into the
whaleboat and escaped the burning vessel while the crew departed in
their own small boat was evident. There was but one oar, and the craft
was blown hither and thither on the tossing sea at the wind's will. In
the dawn of the third day Swimming Wolf had been able to beach it on
the rocky shore off which he found himself.
The Indian had no idea where he was landing, and when he saw the
white-robed figures appear on the rickety porch of the cabin, it was
not surprising that he thought them ghosts.
Further questioning of Swimming Wolf revealed the fact that at
Katleean, two drunken sailors had run the _Hoonah_ ashore in the lagoon
on one of the highest tides of the fall. Though uninjured, it would
have required some work to get the little craft off again; so there,
evidently, she had remained.
"But Swimming Wolf, why didn't the White Chief get another boat and
come with our provisions? Why didn't the Indians come for us? Didn't
anyone care whether we starved or not?"
The Wolf looked at Ellen with that stolid, blank expression an Indian
assumes when he does not wish to be questioned.
"Me dun know. Me dun know." He shook his head. "Indian have no boat.
Kilbuck, he Big Chief. He all time say: 'Mind you business or Indian
get no grub. Tomorrow I go.' He all time say 'Tomorrow.'"
Tomorrow! From the lips of Kayak Bill who knew his Alaska, Ellen and
Jean knew what tragedies lie behind that word. From waiting on wind
and tide and the next steamer to go someplace, from waiting on summer
or winter to do something, from waiting on an indifferent government to
act on something, people of the North have found that Alaska has become
essentially a Land of Tomorrow! A month in Alaska becomes as a day in
the States.
Humanity demanded that the two women do their best for the man who had
brought about their present perilous situation, though he had forfeited
all claim to womanly sympathy. Ellen could not bring herself to go
near the White Chief after he was placed in Kayak's bunk, but she
directed Swimming Wolf, who nursed and fed him. At first Kilbuck lay
in a stupor, but suddenly, at the end of twenty-four hours, he came out
of his daze. Jean, going into his room, encountered his narrow grey
eyes looking up at her with their normal expression.
He recovered quickly from the blow on the head, and on a diet of bread
and broth rapidly regained his strength. The women avoided him
whenever possible, but Loll, on whom once more they were dependent for
sea-parrots, found time to sit beside him, asking about his friends at
Katleean, and in turn telling the trader all his small affairs of the
day. As time went by he must have given the man a fair idea of the
struggle for existence during the winter on Kon Klayu.
Kilbuck, for the most part, was silent. He made no effort to explain
his failure to keep his promises. His strange, grey eyes, whenever it
was possible, followed the movements of Ellen and Jean. Sometimes the
women could hear him, indistinctly, questioning Lollie.
The fourth day Swimming Wolf assisted him to the porch where he sat
looking a long time at the sun-kissed sea. The fifth day, with the
Indian's help, he took a walk on the beach. What he thought of the
situation Ellen and Jean had no means of knowing, but as they watched
him rapidly regaining his old arrogant manner, vague fears crept
insiduously into their minds. At the end of the week he was issuing
his orders to Swimming Wolf with all the ease and certainty of one in
supreme command.
One afternoon Ellen sat on the porch trying to piece together the
remnants of a little shirt for Loll. Jean and the boy were off with
Swimming Wolf gathering food. The White Chief had gone to his room
some time before. Ellen's heart was heavy with anxiety for her
husband. If he were alive, he should by now have returned to her. If
he were dead. . . . For some minutes she was oblivious to all about
her as she strove to thrust this thought from her mind. The incipient
menace of the White Chief's presence hovered about her, though so far
he had never by word or look betrayed any sentimental interest in her
since his advent on the Island. Perhaps by now, she told herself
hopefully, time and his illness had changed him for the better.
Perhaps----
Something caused her to turn her head toward the cabin door back of
her. Against the portal stood the White Chief. His hand was hooked
beneath his scarlet belt in the old familiar manner. His narrow, pale
eyes were fastened upon her in a way she had known in Katleean. She
felt suddenly that he had taken in every detail of her appearance--her
heavy braided hair, her worn and faded blouse, her short ragged skirt,
and her feet incased in home-made moccasins of canvas. She felt a rush
of hot blood rising to her hair. He noted it and smiled, his sardonic,
thin-lipped smile. The peculiar warmth that crept into his eyes caused
Ellen's heart to contract with a realization of appalling
possibilities. A small, inward panic took possession of her.
She rose abruptly and ran swiftly up the hillside trail to the Lookout.
She knew now that she was not dealing with a sick man. She and her
sister were practically at the mercy of Paul Kilbuck.
She resolved to keep her suspicions from Jean as long as possible, but
that evening as they were sitting together in the living-room, after
Lollie had climbed into bed, the girl kept glancing apprehensively
toward the closed door that shut off the sleeping place of the trader.
"Ellen," she said, hardly above a whisper. "I don't think he's as ill
now as he would have us believe." She nodded toward the closed door.
"We ought to ask him to move over to the Hut with Swimming Wolf
now. . . . Ellen--I'm growing dreadfully afraid of him. . . . Oh!"
She started nervously at a sound from the other room.
"I wish we had some way of locking that door." In a low voice Ellen
thus admitted her own uneasiness, while her gaze wandered about the
room. "We might put the table in front of it, and then if he did try
to come through in the night, we would hear him."
Cautiously the two women lifted the table and placed the inadequate
barrier across the door.
"From now on, Jean, only one of us will sleep, while the other
watches--just to be ready, you know. If he makes one suspicious
move--" she broke off and patted almost lovingly the revolver she had
drawn from an inside pocket of her blouse.
Noting the look of fear that had crept into Jean's eyes since her
suspicions had been confirmed, Ellen added: "But it won't be much
longer, Jeanie, this waiting. Surely Shane will come in a day or two.
It's nearly the twenty-first of June."
The twenty-first of June, the longest and most beautiful day of the
year in the North, was also the anniversary of Ellen's wedding. Never
during the last ten years had Shane forgotten it. Never had he failed
to bring her some little surprise, to arrange some extra pleasure for
her. For the past two weeks this thought had been with Ellen
constantly, comforting her, promising her. By some complex, womanish
process she had come to believe that on the twenty-first of June Shane,
if alive, _must_ come to her. As she and Jean lay awake whispering
during the long, light nights, she had instilled some of her faith into
the girl's mind. If they could but keep the trader from any untoward
action until then, they both felt that all would be well.
During the days that followed the sisters never left each other's side.
Swimming Wolf and Lollie procured the food. The Wolf chopped the wood
and attended to other like duties about the cabin. The White Chief did
nothing, except lounge on Kayak's bunk. In response to Ellen's
suggestion that he move to the Hut on the other side of the Island he
had merely looked into her eyes and smiled.
Since recovering his strength he had begun to take long walks about the
beaches. Ellen feared that sometime he might come upon their cavern
and learn the secret of the gold of Kon Klayu, but Jean assured her
that there was no approach from either side of the precipice. The only
way to the cave lay by way of the cleft.
As time dragged on the strain of uncertainty became almost more than
the women could bear. Sometimes as they sat about the table eating the
wild food which was their only sustenance now, Ellen could hardly
control her impulse to hurl at the enigmatic man opposite her the
questions that rose to her lips. Why was he so silent? For what was
he waiting? What did he think of their situation? What did he mean to
do with them?
She realized that they could not go on indefinitely as they were now.
_Something_ must happen to relieve the tension. She had reached a
point where any word, any action that might give her a clew to the
trader's intentions, was welcome. She began to long intensely that he
might do something which would give her an excuse to use the revolver
she carried constantly beneath her blouse.
But beyond looks and an occasional cryptic smile, he did nothing to
alarm either of the women. Yet his very silence and inaction were more
ominous than threats. He instilled in them a crawling dread, a growing
terror and uncertainty that was worse than anything they had hitherto
known.
The twenty-first of June dawned beautiful and clear. It had been
Ellen's turn to watch all night and she was a-stir early, happier and
more cheerful than she had been for months. Today--today Shane must
come. She was sure he would come. He had never failed her, She woke
Jean and Loll, and with that undying instinct which prompts every true
woman to make a feast for her returning man, Ellen prepared an extra
amount of the poor fare at her command: gumboot hash, boiled eggs and
sea-parrot.
Shortly after the mid-day meal the White Chief, now fully recovered,
went off with Swimming Wolf in the direction of the south cliffs.
Ellen with her sister and Lollie climbed hopefully to the Lookout to
begin their watching.
In the bright sunshine the sea below heaved gently and stretched away
to the horizon where, today, the dim outline of the amethyst range
showed. Afar out the smoke of a west-bound steamer smudged the sky
faintly, lending a suggestion of human nearness to the scene that
cheered the waiting ones. Nearly three weeks had gone by since the men
had left the Island, and the weather, with the exception of the one
storm, had been calm. Today, certainly, Shane would come--if he were
alive.
Eagerly, hopefully they talked of his arrival as they sat scanning the
ocean toward Katleean. The soft breeze died away. The sea took on the
smooth shimmer of undulating satin. From afternoon down to sunset the
day grew in beauty.
Time went by and the passing of each hour lessened somewhat the measure
of their blind faith and hope. Their talk became desultory. The blue
and silver of afternoon gave way to the blue and gold of approaching
evening. The tide came in and the amber sky took on the luminous tints
of rose and jade, cobalt and orange. The heaving, chameleon sea,
unruffled by a breath of wind, gave back the colors quivering,
burnished, opalescent, like the bowl of an abalone shell. They, on the
Lookout, felt themselves alone inside the tinted bubble of the world.
Ellen's day was waning in an enthralling splendor that rendered the
watchers speechless; it numbed them by its exquisite beauty so
incongruous with their own growing sense of hopelessness. Ellen's day
was waning, and yet there was no sign of Shane.
From the pole on the Lookout the home-made flag hung in pathetic
bleached tatters, like lifeless grey hair down the back of an old
woman. Beneath it, on driftwood left over from the signal fires, sat
the watchers. A faint breath from the dead ashes mingled with the
freshness of the evening air and added an indefinable touch of
loneliness. Little Loll, tired out from his long, vain watching,
curled up against Ellen's knee and went to sleep. Shags, dark and
witch-like against the glowing sky, flew in long, low lines toward the
cliffs. There was no sound except the eternal murmur of the surf.
The opal tints deepened, . . . then faded to a dull amethyst. Just
above the line of the sea the blood-red sun stood out against the haze
like an immense weirdly-luminous balloon. The women watched it
sinking, . . . sinking. It seemed pregnant with awesome, universal
mysteries--this dully-growing crimson ball of the sun whose descent
marked the close of the day.
"Oh, Jeanie, Jeanie!" Suddenly the low cry quivered on the hush of the
night. Ellen's brave spirit had succumbed at last to the awful,
beautiful, loneliness. She sank her head on her sister's shoulder and
clasping her arms about Jean, vainly tried to still the surge of grief
that shook her.
"Jeanie!" she sobbed. "He's dead. Shane--my husband--is dead! If--if
he were living--he would have come--to me--today!"
The tattered flag on the pole above stirred to an awakening
breeze. . . . The midnight sun touched the rim of the sea, and
lingered to kiss with blood-red lips the cruel waters that have taken
many men. . . . Then it doubled back on its track and slowly,
perceptibly, rose again, as if reluctant to lose sight of the lonely
Lookout where Lollie, fully awake now, was trying to gather two sobbing
women into his thin, little-boy arms.
CHAPTER XXXIII
ANCHORS WEIGHED
An hour later, Ellen, worn out by the vigil of the night before and the
long watching on the Lookout, lay on the blankets of her bed fully
dressed. Lollie slumbered beside her, his tumbled red head in the
crook of his arm. It was Jean's night to watch, and she sat before the
table, the revolver ready to her hand. Her shoulders drooped and her
eyes were heavy-lidded and swollen from weeping. She rested her elbows
on the table and dropped her face in her hands. Numbed by their grief
and disappointment, both women for the time being had relaxed their
caution, and for the first time in days, the table had not been placed
across the closed door of the White Chief's room.
For an hour the girl sat immovable. . . . Then she glanced up at the
clock. It had stopped. Ellen had forgotten to wind it. Jean wondered
dully how they were now to tell the time. There was no other timepiece
on the Island. But time didn't matter. Nothing mattered now. She
dropped her face again in her hands. . . . Her head was very
heavy. . . . Her arms slipped slowly until they rested on the
table. . . . Her head settled forward until it lay upon them. . . .
There came a long, tired sigh, and then the regular breathing of the
sleeper. . . .
The sun of late morning was streaming in through the little north
window when the door off the living-room softly opened. The tall
figure of the White Chief stood a moment as he looked in at the quiet
forms before him. A gleam of triumph showed in his narrow eyes as they
came to rest on the pistol lying before the dark bowed head of the girl
at the table. His nostrils twitched and his lip lifted in his wolfish
smile. He tip-toed cautiously until his avid hand closed on the weapon.
In the middle of the room he paused, and with an air of satisfaction
turned it over and over in his hands. There was a movement on the bed
in the corner, and abruptly Ellen sat upright, her wide gaze on the man
before her.
"Good morning!" He smiled at her derisively. His instinct for
effective poses asserting itself, he began showing off his aptitude
with the revolver. He twirled it, with elaborate carelessness, on his
trigger finger, and with one movement of his wrist, stopped it, at the
same time drawing a bead on the shining gold-scales above the window.
"I've been trying to get my hands on this for days," he said
conversationally, turning to her again. "Your aim is a little too sure
for me to take any chances." He looked at the weapon in his hand.
"You know, my dear, I have never really believed in that popular
fallacy concerning women and force--that a club and long hair go
together. Still, you never can tell. . . . As a persuader this is a
bit better than a club, but--" he shrugged his shoulders
contemptuously, "I'll not need it--here." He extracted the three
cartridges from the revolver and tossed it easily to the bed.
"Oh-o-o Ellen!" Jean's despairing voice struck through the room as she
woke and found the pistol gone.
The trader glanced from one to the other. "I am indeed a fortunate
man," he laughed, "to be cast upon an island with two charming women.
Some might think it an embarrassment of riches--but I. . . ." He
allowed a significant silence to sink in.
Ellen had risen from the bed and stood beside her sister, a hand
resting protectingly on the girl's shoulder. The White Chief crossed
to the table and seated himself on the edge of it, one foot swinging
free.
"You're both going to think a lot of me before we're taken off Kon
Klayu," he told them. "Oh, yes, we'll be taken off, my dears, but not
by your husband, Mrs. Boreland." He ignored Ellen's cry and proceeded:
"I was a little afraid the first week that he might, by sheer Irish
luck, have escaped the storm and be turning up here--but it's too late
now. I'll wager you're a widow."
He seemed to be enjoying himself immensely as his pale eyes lingered
first on one and then on the other woman before him.
"The pale white rose, and the dewy red bud," his vibrant voice went on
mockingly. "Oh, do not be alarmed--" as they both shrank back--"I'm
not going to be crude. I have plenty of time--plenty of time-- Oh,
you would, would you!" He broke off with a sudden snarl, as Ellen,
infuriated by his manner, snatched up the empty revolver and hurled it
with all her strength at his head.
He dodged, and with one panther-like movement, leaped at her, his arms
closing like a vice about her shoulders.
As if maddened by her struggles he crushed her to him and pinioning her
wrists in one powerful hand, he embedded the other in her loose hair
and brutally drew her head back until her face was upturned to his. A
moment he bent above her, crouching, feral, then he thrust his dark
bearded face against hers and shut off her screams.
At the first intimation of the man's violence Jean had rushed to her
sister's aid and was beating him with wildly impotent hands, calling
despairingly to Lollie, to Swimming Wolf, even to Gregg. Then like a
young tigress she sprang at him from behind trying to get a hold on his
neck so that she might drag him from Ellen.
But the man was impervious to everything outside the circle of his arms.
"Oh, Swimming Wolf! Oh, help! Help us!" Jean's desperate screams
rang out again as she heard the sound of hasty footsteps on the porch
outside.
She leaped for the door, but before her hand touched the latch it was
flung open and against the blinding sunshine loomed the tall figure of
Shane Boreland.
With one bound he crossed the living-room. There came the sound of a
blow, . . . struggling, . . . a sudden choked cry, and Shane's gasping
words:
"God . . . you cur . . . come . . . in the open . . . I'll kill you!"
Two writhing, panting figures reeled about the living-room. . . . They
broke. . . . Shane, livid with rage, side-stepped, and with the
agility of a wild-cat leaped again at his adversary. His arm encircled
and tightened about the trader's neck. Kilbuck turned in the grip and
chest to chest they swayed, strained, their tentative blows rendered
impotent by their very nearness to each other. With twistings of legs
and sudden saggings of bodies they sought to get each other prostrate.
The hot breath whistling from their gaping mouths made the only human
sounds. Wheeling, lurching they fought swiftly about the room,
knocking over chairs, . . . the table . . . sweeping the stove from its
foundation. Then Shane's ankle turned as his foot encountered the
fallen revolver, and he lost his balance.
In that instant the trader had him down--was upon him, slugging
viciously with both fists. From the first there was no science in the
fight. Both men inflamed--one with a long-denied passion for revenge,
the other with hatred for one he had wronged, had reverted to the
primitive lust to gouge, to claw, to kill with bare hands. They rolled
about the floor, first one on top, then the other, striking, tearing at
each other's throats, their very blind fury defeating their
purpose. . . . Again a turn found them on their feet, and like
snarling beasts they bounded back to the attack. Shirts were torn from
their backs, warm, gummy blood on their sweating bared bodies rendered
their grips insecure. . . . After what seemed to the watchers a
frenzied eternity, their efforts began slowly to slacken. Their grips
became more feeble, their hoarse rasping gasps for breath more
labored. . . . The Chief attempted groggily to dodge a blow. Shane
recovered his balance, rushed him low, and closed. A moment they
swayed together, then slowly the trader was lifted off his feet; a
sudden twist of Shane's shoulders, a heave, and the Chief was slammed
against the edge of the overturned table, his arm striking heavily.
Even as he went down Shane was on top of him, his hands fastened in a
death grip about Kilbuck's throat. The man's face began to turn
purple, his pale narrow eyes widened slowly, horribly until they seemed
starting from the sockets.
Then Jean screamed.
"Gregg! Kayak! Stop him! Don't let him commit murder!"
The sound of the girl's voice broke the spell that had bound the
spectators standing in the doorway. Kayak Bill and Harlan strode into
the cabin and between them tore Boreland from his enemy and placed him
on the bed in the corner, where Ellen and Lollie took charge of him.
The insensible White Chief was carried into the next room and put in
Kayak's bunk. Breathing heavily from exertion Kayak Bill stepped back
to look at him.
"That lyin' skunk's so crooked he cain't lay straight in bed, Gregg. I
was honin' somethin' powerful to horn in on that little shindy--but I
reckon Shane's bunged him up conside'ble," he drawled with immense
satisfaction, as he leaned over and felt the trader's arm. "'Pears
like he's got a busted flipper, and I know his noggin is sure addled.
Get some water, Gregg. I mout as well bring the durned squaw-pirate
back to life, 'cause when he's well again, I aim to knock hell outen
him myself----"
Kayak turned to find that his remarks had fallen on the empty air, for
Gregg and Jean, standing amid the ruins of the dish cupboard, were
oblivious to all the world except each other. His hazel eyes roved to
the bed where Ellen and Loll were welcoming Shane as if he had returned
from the dead. Kayak stood a moment.
"'Pears like I'm playin' a lone hand here," he said wistfully as he
started for the water that was to revive the White Chief.
"Oh, Kayak! Kayak!" came Lollie's shout as he burrowed out from
between his parents. "It's your turn now to get some lovin'. Wait a
minute!" And the little fellow sprang from one end of the bed into
Kayak's arms. A second later both Ellen and Jean were welcoming him
with a warmth of affection that sent his new sombrero flying and made
his old hair-seal waistcoat slip half-way off his shoulders. Delighted
but unprepared for such demonstrations, Kayak was at a loss how to meet
them. His cheeks turned fiery red, and though his eyes were glowing he
backed away the moment they released him and began earnestly to
readjust his worn waistcoat.
"By he--hen, Lady," he managed to say with some semblance of his old
nonchalance, as he fumbled with a torn buttonhole. "I--I--" he glared
accusingly at the hair-seal garment, "I believe this durned thing
is--is--is a-sufferin' from poverty o' the buttons, or--or maybe
enlargement o' the buttonholes!" And in the laughter that greeted his
statement he went off to care for the White Chief.
Joy in the reunion and an hour's rest put Shane on his feet again.
While the women gathered up their few belongings, they learned how the
old whale-boat in which the men had left Kon Klayu had held together,
seemingly by a miracle, during the first part of the storm, but later
had been driven out of its course. When Shane finally landed at a
cannery fifty miles from Katleean the boat was abandoned and they were
taken to the trading post in the canoes of some fishing Indians. There
they learned of the White Chief's trip on the _Silver Fox_ and set
about getting the _Hoonah_ off the beach at the lagoon. The tides of
June being higher than usual they had little trouble, but it took days
to calk the seams and put the schooner in shape for the trip.
"We were within fifty miles of here yesterday when the wind died down,
El," Shane told his wife, "and myself doing my best to make it on our
wedding anniversary! I knew you'd be expecting me, little fellow." He
patted her hand. "Well," he continued after some strictly personal
remarks, "I suppose we'll have to take Kilbuck to a doctor before we go
to Katleean--damn him, I ought to kill him, though. There's an M.D. at
the cannery this summer. I want the blackguard fixed up so I can
settle with him later." He drew a new corn cob from his pocket and
cramming it with tobacco, lit it. "But I tell you, girls," he went on
between puffs of the keenest enjoyment, "Kayak and I had the biggest
surprise of our lives the day before we left Katleean!" He turned to
Gregg and made a ludicrous confidential attempt to wink a swollen eye.
"A cannery steamer put in and landed no less person than his royal
nibs--the president of the Alaska Fur and Trading Company!"
This announcement was received with no particular enthusiasm by either
of his listeners. He went on:
"We got close as paving bricks right off the reel, and he's going to
finance the mining of Kon Klayu!" He stopped to note the effect of
this statement. "We left him at the post looking into the business
methods of the White Chief. The cannery steamer will be back in ten
days and we'll all strike out for San Francisco together and get our
outfit. We'll be back here at Kon Klayu this fall to begin
operations." There was a dismayed exclamation from Ellen; a delighted
one from Jean. "Oh, cheer up, El," he said to his wife. "You and I
won't have to come unless we want to. We've already appointed the old
man's son resident manager. He wants the job--is crazy about it in
fact. Turn around girls, and I'll present him to you--Mr. Gregg
Harlan, ladies!" With a grand flourish Shane indicated the flushing
young man. "Why he chose to keep it a secret all these months, he
hasn't told us yet, but--perhaps Jean will find out!" Laughing at the
incredulous look on Ellen's face he limped out to the shed where Kayak
Bill was doing up samples of ore to take aboard the _Hoonah_ lying just
off the bluff.
At midnight the schooner was rippling gently over the long swells into
an atmosphere of golden sunset light that flooded the sky and crinkled
along the wavetops in shimmering, mellow orange. Up in the bow of the
_Hoonah_ silhouetted against the glow, old Kayak Bill stood alone. In
his hazel eyes was the wistful look that crept there sometimes when he
watched the domestic happiness of those about him. A-top the cabin by
the mainmast Jean and Gregg stood looking back over the lengthening
stretch of water. Kon Klayu lay, an oblong of jade in the amber light,
ringed with a wreath of foam. A single gull winnowed across the vision
calling a wistful question, and from the Lookout the tattered flag
flung itself out on the breeze as if in farewell. Jean's happy voice
came to him from where she snuggled in the circle of Harlan's arm.
Kayak Bill let his gaze wander to the stern where Shane and Ellen stood
together at the wheel: Despite Boreland's battered countenance his chin
was up in his old jaunty and debonaire manner. The wind ruffled the
hair on his bare head. One hand managed the steering gear. The other
arm lay across his wife's shoulders.
Kayak, watching shook his head gently.
"I always hearn tell," he spoke softly to himself, "that the only
difference a-tween happy marriages and unhappy ones is that the happy
ones keeps their bickerin's private like--but I don't know, . . . I
don't know . . ."
A moment more he looked at the prospector and his wife, then he turned
away and his old eyes gazed out across the tinted ocean spaces to that
something which had always seemed to beckon him from beyond the sunset
glow. Lost in his dreaming the old man did not hear Shane's eager
voice as he released the wheel a moment and pointed off the bow to
where, beyond the rim of the sea, lay the northwest coast of Alaska.
"It's up there in the Valley of the Kuskokwim, El! They've made a
brand new strike and are getting ten dollars to the pan!" He looked
down at her and went on in his most coaxing Irish way. "Darlin', when
we get Loll in school, and Jean and Gregg and Kayak safely settled on
Kon Klayu . . ." he hesitated, then finished eagerly, "Sure El, it
would do us the world of good to go up there, little fellow, . . . just
to take a bit of a look. . . ." He straightened, his eyes alight with
the old questing expression, his face turned to the northwest, his
spirit already faring forth across sea and land to the beckoning Valley
of the Kuskokwim.