I
Athabasca in the Far North is the scene of this story--Athabasca, one of
the most beautiful countries in the world in summer, but a cold, bare land
in winter. Yet even in winter it is not so bleak and bitter as the
districts southwest of it, for the Chinook winds steal through from the
Pacific and temper the fierceness of the frozen Rockies. Yet forty and
fifty degrees below zero is cold, after all, and July strawberries in this
wild Northland are hardly compensation for seven months of ice and snow,
no matter how clear and blue the sky, how sweet the sun during its short
journey in the day. Some days, too, the sun may not be seen even when
there is no storm, because of the fine, white, powdered frost in the air.
A day like this is called a _poudre_ day; and woe to the man who tempts it
unthinkingly, because the light makes the delicate mist of frost shine
like silver. For that powder bites the skin white in short order, and
sometimes reckless men lose ears or noses or hands under its sharp caress.
But when it really storms in that Far North, then neither man nor beast
should be abroad--not even the Eskimo dogs; though times and seasons can
scarcely be chosen when travelling in Athabasca, for a storm comes
unawares. Upon the plains you will see a cloud arising, not in the sky,
but from the ground--a billowy surf of drifting snow; then another white
billow from the sky will sweep down and meet it, and you are caught
between.
He who went to Athabasca to live a generation ago had to ask himself if
the long winter, spent chiefly indoors, with, maybe, a little trading with
the Indians, meagre sport, and scant sun, savages and half-breeds the only
companions, and out of all touch with the outside world, letters coming
but once a year; with frozen fish and meat, always the same, as the staple
items in a primitive fare; with danger from starvation and marauding
tribes; with endless monotony, in which men sometimes go mad--he had to
ask himself if these were to be cheerfully endured because, in the short
summer, the air is heavenly, the rivers and lakes are full of fish, the
flotilla of canoes of the fur-hunters is pouring down, and all is gayety
and pleasant turmoil; because there is good shooting in the autumn, and
the smell of the land is like a garden, and hardy fruits and flowers are
at hand.
That is a question which was asked William Rufus Holly once upon a time.
William Rufus Holly, often called "Averdoopoy," sometimes "Sleeping
Beauty," always Billy Rufus, had had a good education. He had been to
high-school and to college, and he had taken one or two prizes _en route_
to graduation; but no fame travelled with him, save that he was the
laziest man of any college year for a decade. He loved his little
porringer, which is to say that he ate a good deal; and he loved to read
books, which is not to say that he loved study; he hated getting out of
bed, and he was constantly gated for morning chapel. More than once he had
sweetly gone to sleep over his examination papers. This is not to say that
he failed at his examinations--on the contrary, he always succeeded; but
he only did enough to pass and no more; and he did not wish to do more
than pass. His going to sleep at examinations was evidence that he was
either indifferent or self-indulgent, and it certainly showed that he was
without nervousness. He invariably roused himself, or his professor roused
him, a half-hour before the papers should be handed in, and, as it were,
by a mathematical calculation he had always done just enough to prevent
him being plucked.
He slept at lectures, he slept in hall, he slept as he waited his turn to
go to the wicket in a cricket match, and he invariably went to sleep
afterward. He even did so on the day he had made the biggest score in the
biggest game ever played between his college and the pick of the country;
but he first gorged himself with cake and tea. The day he took his degree
he had to be dragged from a huge grandfather's chair and forced along in
his ragged gown--"ten holes and twelve tatters"--to the function in the
convocation-hall. He looked so fat and shiny, so balmy and sleepy, when he
took his degree and was handed his prize for a poem on Sir John Franklin,
that the public laughed, and the college men in the gallery began
singing--
"Bye O, my baby,
Father will come to you soo-oon!"
He seemed not to care, but yawned in his hand as he put his prize book
under his arm through one of the holes in his gown, and in two minutes was
back in his room, and in another five was fast asleep.
It was the general opinion that William Rufus Holly, fat, yellow-haired,
and twenty-four years old, was doomed to failure in life, in spite of the
fact that he had a little income of a thousand dollars a year and had made
a century in an important game of cricket. Great, therefore, was the
surprise of the college, and afterward of the Province, when, at the
farewell dinner of the graduates, Sleeping Beauty announced, between his
little open-eyed naps, that he was going Far North as a missionary.
At first it was thought he was joking, but when at last, in his calm and
dreamy look, they saw he meant what he said, they arose and carried him
round the room on a chair, making impromptu songs as they travelled. They
toasted Billy Rufus again and again, some of them laughing till they cried
at the thought of Averdoopoy going to the Arctic regions. But an uneasy
seriousness fell upon these "beautiful, bountiful, brilliant boys," as
Holly called them later, when in a simple, honest, but indolent speech he
said he had applied for ordination.
Six months later William Rufus Holly, a deacon in holy orders, journeyed
to Athabasca in the Far North.
On his long journey there was plenty of time to think. He was embarked on
a career which must forever keep him in the wilds; for very seldom indeed
does a missionary of the North ever return to the crowded cities or take a
permanent part in civilized life.
What the loneliness of it would be he began to feel, as for hours and
hours he saw no human being on the plains; in the thrilling stillness of
the night; in fierce storms in the woods, when his half-breed guides bent
their heads to meet the wind and rain, and did not speak for hours; in the
long, adventurous journey on the river by the day, in the cry of the
plaintive loon at night; in the scant food for every meal. Yet what the
pleasure would be he felt in the joyous air, the exquisite sunshine, the
flocks of wild-fowl flying north, _honking_ on their course; in the song
of the half-breeds as they ran the rapids. Of course, he did not think
these things quite as they are written here--all at once and all together;
but in little pieces from time to time, feeling them rather than saying
them to himself.
At least he did understand how serious a thing it was, his going as a
missionary into the Far North. Why did he do it? Was it a whim, or the
excited imagination of youth, or that prompting which the young often have
to make the world better? Or was it a fine spirit of adventure with a good
heart behind it? Perhaps it was a little of all these; but there was also
something more, and it was to his credit.
Lazy as William Rufus Holly had been at school and college, he had still
thought a good deal, even when he seemed only sleeping; perhaps he thought
more because he slept so much, because he studied little and read a great
deal. He always knew what everybody thought--that he would never do
anything but play cricket till he got too heavy to run, and then would
sink into a slothful, fat, and useless middle and old age; that his life
would be a failure. And he knew that they were right; that if he stayed
where he could live an easy life, a fat and easy life he would lead; that
in a few years he would be good for nothing except to eat and sleep--no
more. One day, waking suddenly from a bad dream of himself so fat as to be
drawn about on a dray by monstrous fat oxen with rings through their
noses, led by monkeys, he began to wonder what he should do--the hardest
thing to do; for only the hardest life could possibly save him from
failure, and, in spite of all, he really did want to make something of his
life. He had been reading the story of Sir John Franklin's Arctic
expedition, and all at once it came home to him that the only thing for
him to do was to go to the Far North and stay there, coming back about
once every ten years to tell the people in the cities what was being done
in the wilds. Then there came the inspiration to write his poem on Sir
John Franklin, and he had done so, winning the college prize for poetry.
But no one had seen any change in him in those months; and, indeed, there
had been little or no change, for he had an equable and practical, though
imaginative, disposition, despite his avoirdupois, and his new purpose did
not stir him yet from his comfortable sloth.
And in all the journey west and north he had not been stirred greatly from
his ease of body, for the journey was not much harder than playing cricket
every day, and there were only the thrill of the beautiful air, the new
people, and the new scenes to rouse him. As yet there was no great
responsibility. He scarcely realized what his life must be until one
particular day.
Then Sleeping Beauty waked wide up, and from that day lost the name. Till
then he had looked and borne himself like any other traveller,
unrecognized as a parson or "mikonaree." He had not had prayers in camp
_en route_, he had not preached, he had held no meetings. He was as yet
William Rufus Holly, the cricketer, the laziest dreamer of a college
decade. His religion was simple and practical; he had never had any morbid
ideas; he had lived a healthy, natural, and honorable life, until he went
for a mikonaree, and, if he had no cant, he had not a clear idea of how
many-sided, how responsible, his life must be--until that one particular
day.
This is what happened then.
From Fort O'Call, an abandoned post of the Hudson's Bay Company on the
Peace River, nearly the whole tribe of the Athabasca Indians in
possession of the post now had come up the river, with their chief,
Knife-in-the-Wind, to meet the mikonaree. Factors of the Hudson's Bay
Company, _coureurs de bois_, and _voyageurs_ had come among them at
times, and once the renowned Father Lacombe, the Jesuit priest, had
stayed with them three months; but never to this day had they seen a
Protestant mikonaree, though once a factor, noted for his furious temper,
his powers of running, and his generosity, had preached to them. These
men, however, were both over fifty years old. The Athabascas did not
hunger for the Christian religion, but a courier from Edmonton had
brought them word that a mikonaree was coming to their country to stay,
and they put off their stoical manner and allowed themselves the luxury of
curiosity. That was why even the squaws and papooses came up the river
with the braves, all wondering if the stranger had brought gifts with
him, all eager for their shares; for it had been said by the courier of
the tribe that "Oshondonto," their name for the newcomer, was bringing
mysterious loads of well-wrapped bales and skins. Upon a point below the
first rapids of the Little Manitou they waited with their camp-fires
burning and their pipe of peace.
When the canoes bearing Oshondonto and his _voyageurs_ shot the rapids to
the song of the river,
"En roulant, ma boule roulant,[[y:italic]]
En roulant, ma boule!"[[y:italic]]
with the shrill voices of the boatmen rising to meet the cry of the
startled water-fowl, the Athabascas crowded to the high banks. They
grunted "How!" in greeting, as the foremost canoe made for the shore.
But if surprise could have changed the countenances of Indians, these
Athabascas would not have known one another when the missionary stepped
out upon the shore. They had looked to see a gray-bearded man like the
chief factor who quarrelled and prayed; but they found instead a
round-faced, clean-shaven youth, with big, good-natured eyes, yellow hair,
and a roundness of body like that of a month-old bear's cub. They expected
to find a man who, like the factor, could speak their language, and they
found a cherub sort of youth who talked only English, French, and
Chinook--that common language of the North--and a few words of their own
language which he had learned on the way.
Besides, Oshondonto was so absent-minded at the moment, so absorbed in
admiration of the garish scene before him, that he addressed the chief in
French, of which Knife-in-the-Wind knew but one word, _cache_, which all
the North knows.
But presently William Rufus Holly recovered himself, and in stumbling
Chinook made himself understood. Opening a bale, he brought out beads and
tobacco and some bright red flannel, and two hundred Indians sat round him
and grunted "How!" and received his gifts with little comment. Then the
pipe of peace went round, and Oshondonto smoked it becomingly.
But he saw that the Indians despised him for his youth, his fatness, his
yellow hair as soft as a girl's, his cherub face, browned though it was by
the sun and weather.
As he handed the pipe to Knife-in-the-Wind, an Indian called Silver
Tassel, with a cruel face, said, grimly:
"Why does Oshondonto travel to us?"
William Rufus Holly's eyes steadied on those of the Indian as he replied
in Chinook: "To teach the way to Manitou the Mighty, to tell the
Athabascas of the Great Chief who died to save the world."
"The story is told in many ways; which is right? There was the factor,
Word of Thunder. There is the song they sing at Edmonton--I have heard."
"The Great Chief is the same Chief," answered the missionary. "If you tell
of Fort O'Call, and Knife-in-the-Wind tells of Fort O'Call, he and you
will speak different words, and one will put in one thing and one will
leave out another; men's tongues are different. But Fort O'Call is the
same, and the Great Chief is the same."
"It was a long time ago," said Knife-in-the-Wind, sourly, "many thousand
moon, as the pebbles in the river, the years."
"It is the same world, and it is the same Chief, and it was to save us,"
answered William Rufus Holly, smiling, yet with a fluttering heart, for
the first test of his life had come.
In anger Knife-in-the-Wind thrust an arrow into the ground and said:
"How can the white man who died thousands of moons ago in a far country
save the red man of to-day?"
"A strong man should bear so weak a tale," broke in Silver Tassel,
ruthlessly. "Are we children, that the Great Chief sends a child as
messenger?"
For a moment Billy Rufus did not know how to reply, and in the pause
Knife-in-the-Wind broke in two pieces the arrow he had thrust in the
ground in token of displeasure.
Suddenly, as Oshondonto was about to speak, Silver Tassel sprang to his
feet, seized in his arms a lad of twelve who was standing near, and,
running to the bank, dropped him into the swift current.
"If Oshondonto be not a child, let him save the lad," said Silver Tassel,
standing on the brink.
Instantly William Rufus Holly was on his feet. His coat was off before
Silver Tassel's words were out of his mouth, and, crying, "In the name of
the Great White Chief!" he jumped into the rushing current. "In the name
of your Manitou, come on, Silver Tassel!" he called up from the water, and
struck out for the lad.
Not pausing an instant, Silver Tassel sprang into the flood, into the
whirling eddies and dangerous current below the first rapids and above the
second.