THE SECRET OF THE GORGE
Peigan Charley's belief in his white boss's lack of sanity was
characteristic of Indian regard for the reckless. The reason, the
driving power of his chief's character was lost to his primitive mind.
The act was all he had power to judge by, and the act of voluntarily
visiting the headquarters of the Bell River Indians said he was "crazy."
But Kars was by no means "crazy," nor anything like it. He had a
definite purpose to fulfil, and, in consequence, all hazard was
ignored. The man's simple hardihood was the whole of him. He had been
bred in the rough lap of the four winds at his father's side. He would
have smothered under the breath of caution.
He set out from the camp at the moment he had carefully selected. He
set out alone, without a thought for the chances of disaster which the
night might have for him. His eyes were alight with satisfaction, with
anticipation. Invincible determination inspired him as he faced the
hill which had served the Indian earlier in the day. He moved off with
a swing to his great body which said all that his lips had left
unspoken of the confidence which at all times supported him in the
battle with elemental forces.
When he left the camp the blackness of the night had given way to the
jewel-studded velvet of a clearing sky. The spectre lights of the
north were already dancing their sombre measure. There was no moon.
These things all possessed their significance for him.
The shadowy night light, however, only served him in the open, in the
breaks in the deep woodlands he must thread. For the rest his
woodcraft, even his instinct, must serve him. A general line of
direction was in his mind. On that alone he must seriously depend.
His difficulties were tremendous. They must have been insurmountable
for a man of lesser capacity. But the realization of difficulty was a
sense he seemed to lack. It was sufficient that a task lay before him
for the automatic effort to be forthcoming.
He climbed the hill through endless aisles of straight-limbed timber.
His gait was rapid. His deep, regular breathing spoke of an effort
which cost him little. His muscles were as hard as the tree-trunks
with which he frequently collided. And so he came to the barren crest
where the fierce night wind bit deeply into the warm flesh.
He only paused for his bearings. The stars and the dancing lights
yielded him the guidance he needed. He read these signs with the ease
of an experienced mariner. Then, crushing his soft beaver cap low down
over his ears, and buttoning his pea-jacket about his neck, he left the
bitter, wind-swept hilltop and plunged down the terrific slope, at the
far-off bottom of which lay the river, whose very name had cast a spell
of terror over the hearts of the people of the northland.
Again he was swallowed up by the dark bowels of the woods, whose origin
went back to the days before man trod the earth. And curiously enough
a sensation of committing an intrusion stirred as the silence closed
down about him. A dark wall always seemed to confront him, a wall upon
which he was being precipitated.
The steep of the decline was at times terrific. There were moments of
impact with trees which left him bruised and beaten. There were
moments when projecting roots threatened to hurl him headlong to
invisible depths. Each buffet, each stumble, however, only hardened
his resolve. These things were powerless to deter him.
His descent of the approach to the gorge was a serious test. He felt
thankful at least that his plans called for no reascent of the hill
later. Twice he was precipitated into the bed of a spring "washout,"
and, sore and angry, he was forced to a blind scramble from the moist,
soft bed.
Once he only escaped with his life by a margin the breadth of a hair.
On this occasion he recovered himself with a laugh of something like
real amusement. But death had clutched at him with fierce intent. He
had plunged headlong over the edge of a chasm, hewn in the hillside by
a subsidence of the foundations some hundreds of feet below. Six feet
from the brink his great body had been caught in the arms of a bushy
tangle, which bent and crushed under his great weight in a perilous,
almost hopeless fashion. But he clung to the attenuated branches that
supported him and waited desperately for the further plunge below,
which the yielding roots seemed to make inevitable.
But the waiting saved him. Had he struggled while the bush labored
under the shock, maybe his anticipations would have been fulfilled. As
it was the roots definitely held, and, cautiously, he was able to haul
himself up against the weed-grown wall of the precipice, and finally
obtain a foot and hand hold in its soil. The rest was a matter of
effort and nerve, and at last he clambered back to comparative safety.
So the journey went on with varying fortune, his blind groping and
stumblings alternating with the starlit patches where the woods broke.
But it went on deliberately to the end with an inevitability which
revealed the man.
At last he stood in the open with the frowning walls of the great gorge
far above him, like a giant mouth agape in a desperate yawn. At his
feet lay the river, flowing swiftly on to join the great Mackenzie in
its northward rush to swell the field of polar ice.
Here, in the bowels of the great pit, he was no longer blinded by the
darkness, for, in the three hours of infinite effort he had expended,
the moon had risen, and its radiance shone down the length of the gorge
like some dull yellow search-light. The wood-lined walls were lit till
their conformation was vaguely discernible. The swift stream reflected
the yellow rays on the crests of its surging ripples. Then, far in,
beyond the mouth of the canyon, the long low foreshore stood out almost
plainly to his searching eyes.
His task was only at its beginning. He waited just sufficiently long
to deliberate his next move. Then he set off, heading for the heart of
the gorge itself.
It was a scene of deep interest for eyes backed by understanding.
A figure moved slowly about, searching here, probing there. It was a
figure suggesting secret investigation without a sign of real secrecy
in its movements.
The foreshore of the river was wide, far wider than could have been
believed from the heights above. It sloped gradually to the water's
edge, and the soil was loose, gravelly, with a consistency that was
significant to the trained mind. But its greater interest lay in the
signs of intense labor that stood out on every hand. Operations,
crudely scientific, had been carried out to an extent that was almost
staggering. Here, in the heart of a low class Indian territory was the
touch of the white man. It was more than a touch. It was the impress
of his whole hand.
The foreshore was honeycombed with shallow pits, shored, and timbered
with rough hewn timber. Against the mouth of each pit, and there were
dozens of them, a great pile of soil stood up like a giant beehive,
Some of these were in the process of formation. Some were completed,
and looked to have stood thus for many months. Some were in the
process of being demolished, and iron-wheeled trolleys on timbered
pathways stood about them, with the tools of the laborers remaining
just where they had been flung down when the day's work was finished.
Each pit, each "dump" was narrowly scrutinized by the silent figure as
it moved from point to point. Even the examination extended to touch.
Again and again the soil was handled in an effort to test its quality.
But the search extended beyond the "dumps" and pits. It revealed a
cutting hewn out of the great wall of the gorge. It was hewn at a
point well above the highest water level of the spring freshets. And
it was approached by a well timbered roadway of split green logs.
The figure moved over to this, and, as it left the beehive "dumps," a
second figure replaced it. But whereas the first made no secret of its
movements, the second displayed all the furtive movements of the hunter.
The cutting further revealed the guidance of the master mind. It was
occupied by a mountainous dump of the accumulated "dirt" from the
foreshore. It was built up, up, by a system of log pathways, till a
rough estimate suggested the accumulation of thousands upon thousands
of tons.
What was the purpose of this storage?
The question was answered by a glance in a fresh direction. Adjoining
the cutting stood an iron winch. It was a man-power winch, but it
worked an elevated cable trolley communicating with a trestle work
fifty yards away.
Moving swiftly on towards the trestle work the man searched its length.
He peered up, far up the great hillside in the uncertain moonlight,
seeking the limits of its trailing outline in that direction. But its
ascent was gradual. It took the hill diagonally, and quickly lost
itself round a bend in the narrow roadway which had been hewn out of
the primordial forest.
The end of this work in the other direction was far down on the
foreshore, stopping short of the water's edge by, perhaps, fifty yards.
It terminated at what was obviously a great mound of "tailings."
The man moved down to this spot. As he paused by the mound, and gazed
up, the trestle work stood above him more than twice his own height.
Furthermore, here the skeleton work gave place to built-out platforms,
the purpose of which was obvious. A moment later his powerful hands
were gripping the massive stanchions, and he was clambering up to the
platforms.
It was a simple enough task for a man of activity, and he swarmed up
with the rapidity of some great cat. He stood on the topmost platform,
and his gaze ran down the length of the structure.
"A sluice-box and--conduit," he muttered. Then in a tone of deep
appreciation: "Gee, and it's fixed--good!"
He bent down over the sluice-box, and groped with his hands over the
bottom of it. There was a trickle of water flowing gently in its
depths. He searched with his fingers along the riffles. And that
which he found there he carefully and laboriously collected, and drew
up out of the water. He placed the collected deposit in a colored
handkerchief, and again searched the riffles. He repeated the
operation again and again. Then, with great care he twisted up the
handkerchief and bestowed it in an inner pocket of his pea-jacket.
After that he sat himself upon the edge of the sluice-box for some
thoughtful minutes, and his mind traveled back over many scenes and
incidents. But it dwelt chiefly upon Jessie Mowbray and her dead
father. And it struggled in a great effort to solve the riddle of the
man's death.
But, in view of his discoveries, just now it was a riddle that
suggested far too many answers. Furthermore, to his mind, none of them
quite seemed to fit. There were two facts that stood out plainly in
his mind. Here, here was the source of Allan's wealth, and this was
the enterprise which in some way had contrived to leave Jessie Mowbray
fatherless.
He sighed. A wave of intense pity swept over him. Nor was his pity
for the man who had kept his secret so profoundly all these years. It
was for the child, and the widow he had left behind. But more than all
it was for the child.
It was with something like reluctance that he tore himself away from
the magic of the sluice-box. Once on the solid ground, however, he
again turned his eyes to gaze up at the structure. Then he laughed.
It was an audible expression of the joy of discovery.
"What a 'strike'!" he said aloud.
"An' one you ain't gettin' away with!"
John Kars started. He half turned at the sound of the familiar voice.
But his intention remained incompleted. It may have been instinct. It
may have been that out of the corner of his eye he saw the white ring
of the muzzle of a revolver shining in the moonlight close against his
head.
On the instant of the last sound of the man's voice he dropped. He
dropped like a stone. His movement came only the barest fraction of a
second before the crack of the revolver prefixed the whistle of the
bullet which spat itself deeply into the woodwork of the trestle.
Thought and action ran a neck and neck race in Kars at all times. Now
it was never better exampled. His arms flung out as he dropped. And,
before a second pressure of the trigger could be accomplished, the man
behind the gun was caught, and thrown, and sprawled on the ground with
his intended victim uppermost.
For Kars it was chiefly a struggle for possession of the gun. On his
assailant's part it was for the use of it upon his intended victim.
Kars had felled the man by the weight and suddenness of his attack. He
had him by the body, and his own great bulk lay atop of him. But the
man's arms were free. There was a moment's desperate pause as they
fell, and it was that pause which robbed the gunman of his chance of
accomplishing the murder he had designed. Kars knew his man on the
instant. The voice was the voice of Louis Creal, the half-breed who
had warned him of the danger of Bell River. He could have laughed had
not the moment been too desperate.
On the instant of impact with the ground Kars released his hold of the
man's body, and with catlike agility hurled himself at the man's
throat. With the threat of the revolver over him there remained only
one means of defence. He must paralyze all action even if he killed
the man under his hands. Physically his assailant was no match for
him, but the gun leveled things up.
His great hands closed on the man's throat like a vice. It was a
strangle hold that knew no mercy. He reared his body up and his grip
tightened. The Breed struggled fiercely. He flung up his gun arm and
fired recklessly. The first shot flew high into the air but the scorch
of the fire stung the face of the man over him. A second shot came.
It cut its way through the thick muscles of Kars' neck. He winced
under its hot slither, but his grip only further tightened on the man's
throat.
Then came collapse with hideous suddenness. With a choking gurgle the
Breed's arms dropped nervelessly to the ground and the revolver fell
from his relaxed grip. On the instant the white man released his hold.
He caught up the gun and flung it wide.
He had won out. The cost to him did not matter. He stood up and gazed
down at the man on the ground. He was still--quite still. Then he
searched his own pockets for a handkerchief. The only one he possessed
had been set to precious use. He rejected it. So he bent over the
prostrate Breed and unfastened the colored handkerchief about his neck.
This he proceeded to fasten about the flesh wound in his own neck, for
the blood flowing from it was saturating his clothes.
A moment later the half-breed stirred. It was what the white man had
awaited. The sight of the movement brought a sigh of relief. He was
glad he had not been forced to become the slayer of the man.
Five minutes later the dazed half-breed seemed to awaken to realities.
He propped himself on his elbow, and, with his other hand, felt about
his throat, whilst his dark, evil face and beady eyes stared
malevolently up in the moonlight at the man standing over him.
"Feeling better?" the white, man demanded coldly.
As he received no answer he went on.
"Guess you acted foolish trailing up so close on me. Maybe you were
scared you'd miss me in the dark? Anyway, you gave me a chance no real
gunman would have given. Guess you weren't more than a rabbit in my
hands. Say, can you swim? Ah, don't feel like talking," he added, as
the man still kept to his angry silence. "Anyway you'll need to.
You've got off mighty light. Maybe a bath won't come amiss."
He bent down and before the Breed was aware of his intention he seized
him in his arms and picked him up much as he might have picked up some
small child.
Then the struggle began afresh. But it was hopeless from the outset.
Louis Creal, unarmed, was powerless in the bear-like embrace of John
Kars. Struggling and cursing, the half-breed was borne to the water's
edge, held poised for a few seconds, then flung with all the strength
of the white man into the rapid waters of the Bell River.
Kars only waited to see him rise to the surface. Then, as the man was
carried down on the swift tide, swimming strongly, he turned away with
a laugh and hurried from the scene.
John Kars halted abruptly in response to a whistle. The sound came
from the thick scrub with which the low bank of the river beyond the
gorge was deeply overgrown. It was a whistle he knew. It came low and
rose to a piercing crescendo. Then it died away to its original note.
His answer was verbal.
"That you, Charley?" he demanded.
His demand was answered by the abrupt appearance of the figure of his
faithful scout from within the bush.
"Sure, Boss. Charley him wait. Charley him hear much shoot. Boss
kill 'em plenty good?"
Kars laughed.
"Not kill 'em," he said. "Half-breed wash 'em in river."
"Boss no kill 'em?" The Indian's disappointment was pathetic.
"No-o."
Kars passed a hand wearily across his eyes. There was a drag, too, in
his negative. It was almost indifferent.
But the display of weakness was instantly swept aside by an energy
which cost him more than he knew.
"It don't matter anyway," he cried. "We need to make camp--we must
make it quick."
There was irritation in his manner, as well as energy. But then his
neglected wound was causing him infinite pain, and the loss of blood
aggravated it by a feeling of utter weariness.