THE MAKING OF A MAN
Wakota, consisting of the mud-house of a Galician homesteader who
owned a forge and did blacksmithing for the colony in a primitive
way, they left behind half an hour before nightfall, with ten miles
of bad going still before them. The trail wound through bluffs and
around sleughs, dived into coulees and across black creeks, and only
the most skilful handling could have piloted the bronchos through.
It was long after dark when they reached the ravine of the Night Hawk
Creek, through which they must pass before arriving at the Lake. Down
the sides of this ravine they zigzagged, dodging trees and boulders
till they came to the last sharp pitch, at the foot of which ran the
Creek. During this whole descent Kalman sat clinging to the back and
side of the seat, expecting every moment to have the buckboard turn
turtle over him, but when they reached the edge of the final pitch,
were it not for sheer shame, he would have begged permission to
scramble down on hands and knees rather than trust himself to the
swaying, pitching vehicle. A moment French held his bronchos steady,
poised on the brink of this rocky steep, and then reaching back, he
seized the hind wheel and, holding it fast, used it as a drag, while
the bronchos slid down on their haunches over the mass of gravel and
rolling stones till they reached the bed of the Creek in safety. A
splash through the water, a scramble up the other bank, a long climb,
and they were out again on the prairie. A mile of good trail and they
were at home, welcomed by the baying of two huge Russian wolf hounds.
Through the dim light Kalman could discover the outlines of what
seemed a long heap of logs, but what he afterwards discovered to
be a series of low log structures which did for house, stable and
sheds of various kinds.
"Down! Bismark. Down! Blucher. Hello there, Mac! Where in the world
are you?"
After some time Mackenzie appeared with a lantern, a short,
grizzled, thick-set man, rubbing his eyes and yawning prodigiously.
"I nefer thought you would be coming home to-night," he said.
"What brought ye at this time?"
"Never mind, Mac," said French. "Get the horses out, and Kalman
and I will unload this stuff."
In what seemed to be an outer shed, they deposited the pork, flour,
and other articles that composed the load. As Kalman seized the
straw-packed case to carry it in, French interfered.
"Here, boy, I'll take that," he said quickly.
"I'll not break them," said Kalman, lifting the case with great care.
"You won't, eh?" replied French in rather a shamed tone. "Do you know
what it is?"
"Why, sure," said Kalman. "Lots of that stuff used to come into our
home in Winnipeg."
"Well, let me have the case," said French. "And you needn't say
anything to Mac about it. Mac is all right, but a case of liquor
in the house makes him unhappy."
"Unhappy? Doesn't he drink any?"
"That's just it, my boy. He is unhappy while it's outside of him.
He's got Indian blood in him, you see, and he'd die for whiskey."
So saying, French took up the case and carried it to the inner
room and stowed it away under his bed.
But as he rose up from making this disposition of the dangerous stuff
Mac himself appeared in the room.
"What are you standing there looking at?" said French with unusual
impatience.
"Oh, nothing at all," said Mackenzie, whose strong Highland accent
went strangely with his soft Indian voice and his dark Indian face.
"It iss a good place for it, whatefer."
French stood for a moment in disgusted silence, and then breaking into
a laugh he said: "All right, Mac. There's no use trying to keep it
from you. But, mind you, it's fair play in this thing. Last time, you
remember, you got into trouble. I won't stand that sort of thing again."
"Oh, well, well," said Mackenzie cheerfully, "it will not be for long
anyway, more's the peety."
"Now then, get us a bite of supper, Mackenzie," said French sharply,
"and let us to bed."
Some wild duck and some bannock with black molasses, together with
strong black tea, made a palatable supper after a long day on the
breezy prairie. After supper the men sat smoking.
"The oats in, Mac?"
"They are sowed, but not harrowed yet. I will be doing that to-morrow
in the morning."
"Potato ground ready?"
"Yes, the ground is ready, and the seed is over at Garneau's."
"What in thunder were you waiting for? Those potatoes should have been
in ten days ago. It's hardly worth while putting them in now."
"Garneau promised to bring them ofer," said Mackenzie, "but you cannot
tell anything at all about that man."
"Well, we must get them in at once. We must not lose another day.
And now let's get to bed. The boy here will sleep in the bunk,"
pointing to a large-sized box which did for a couch. "Get some
blankets for him, Mac."
The top of the box folded back, revealing a bed inside.
"There, Kalman," said French, while Mackenzie arranged the blankets,
"will that do?"
"Fine," said the boy, who could hardly keep his eyes open and who
in five minutes after he had tumbled in was sound asleep.
It seemed as if he had been asleep but a few moments when he was
wakened by a rude shock. He started up to find Mackenzie fallen
drunk and helpless across his bunk.
"Here, you pig!" French was saying in a stern undertone,
"can't you tell when you have had enough? Come out of that!"
With an oath he dragged Mackenzie to his feet.
"Come, get to your bed!"
"Oh, yes, yes," grumbled Mackenzie, "and I know well what you will
be doing after I am in bed, and never a drop will you be leaving
in that bottle." Mackenzie was on the verge of tears.
"Get on, you beast!" said French in tones of disgusted dignity,
pushing the man before him into the next room.
Kalman was wide awake, but, feigning sleep, watched French as he
sat with gloomy face, drinking steadily till even his hard head
could stand no more, and he swayed into the inner room and fell
heavily on the bed. Kalman waited till French was fast asleep, then
rising quietly, pulled off his boots, threw a blanket over him, put
out the lamp and went back to the bunk. The spectre of the previous
night which had been laid by the events of the day came back to
haunt his broken slumber. For hours he tossed, and not till morning
began to dawn did he quite lose consciousness.
Broad morning wakened him to unpleasant memories, and more
unpleasant realities. French was still sleeping heavily. Mackenzie
was eating breakfast, with a bottle beside him on the table.
"You will find a basin on the bench outside," observed Mackenzie,
pointing to the open door.
When Kalman returned from his ablutions, the bottle had vanished,
and Mackenzie, with breath redolent of its contents, had ready for
him a plate of porridge, to which he added black molasses. This,
with toasted bannock, the remains of the cold duck of the night
before, and strong black tea, constituted his breakfast.
Kalman hurried through his meal, for he hated to meet French as
he woke from his sleep.
"Will he not take breakfast?" said the boy as he rose from the table.
"No, not him, nor denner either, like as not. It iss a good thing
he has a man to look after the place," said Mackenzie with the
pride of conscious fidelity. "We will just be going on with the
oats and the pitaties. You will be taking the harrows."
"The what?" said Kalman.
"The harrows."
Kalman looked blank.
"Can you not harrow?"
"I don't know," said Kalman. "What is that?"
"Can you drop pitaties, then?"
"I don't know," repeated Kalman, shrinking very considerably in his
own estimation.
"Man," said Mackenzie pityingly, "where did ye come from anyway?"
"Winnipeg."
"Winnipeg? I know it well. I used to. But that was long ago. But
did ye nefer drive a team?"
"Never," said Kalman. "But I want to learn."
"Och! then, and what will he be wanting with you here?"
"I don't know," said Kalman.
"Well, well," said Mackenzie. "He iss a quare man at times, and
does quare things."
"He is not," said Kalman hotly. "He is just a splendid man."
Mackenzie gazed in mild surprise at the angry face.
"Hoot! toot!" he said. "Who was denyin' ye? He iss all that,
but he iss mighty quare, as you will find out. But come away and
we will get the horses. It iss a peety you cannot do nothing."
"You show me what to do," said Kalman confidently, "and I'll do it."
The stable was a tumble-down affair, and sorely needing attention,
as, indeed, was the case with the ranch and all its belongings.
A team of horses showing signs of hard work and poor care, with
harness patched with rope and rawhide thongs, were waiting in the
stable. Even to Kalman's inexperienced eyes it was a deplorable
outfit.
There was little done in the way of cultivation of the soil upon
the Night Hawk Ranch. The market was far away, and it was almost
impossible to secure farm labour. The wants of French and his
household were few. A couple of fields of oats and barley for his
horses and pigs and poultry, another for potatoes, for which he
found ready market at the Crossing and in the lumber camps up among
the hills, exhausted the agricultural pursuits of the ranch.
Kalman concentrated his attention upon the process of hitching the
team to the harrows, and then followed Mackenzie up and down the
field as he harrowed in the oats. It seemed a simple enough matter
to guide the team across the ploughed furrows, and Kalman, as he
observed, grew ambitious.
"Let me drive," he said at length.
"Hoot! toot! boy, you would be letting them run away with you."
"Aw, cut it out!" said Kalman scornfully.
"What are you saying? Cut what?"
"Oh, give us a rest!"
"A rest, iss it? You will be getting tired early. And who is
keeping you from a rest?" said Mackenzie, whose knowledge of
contemporary slang was decidedly meagre.
"Let me drive once," pleaded the boy.
"Well, try it, and I will walk along side of you," said Mackenzie,
with apparent reluctance.
The attempt was eminently successful, but Kalman was quick both
with hands and head. After the second round Mackenzie allowed the
boy to go alone, remaining in the shade and calling out directions
across the field. The result was to both a matter of unmixed
delight. With Kalman there was the gratification of the boy's
passion for the handling of horses, and as for Mackenzie, while on
the trail or on the river, he was indefatigable, in the field he
had the Indian hatred of steady work. To lie and smoke on the grass
in the shade of a poplar bluff on this warm shiny spring day was to
him sheer bliss.
But after a time Mackenzie grew restless. His cup of bliss still
lacked a drop to fill it.
"Just keep them moving," he cried to Kalman. "I will need to go to
the house a meenit."
"All right. Don't hurry for me," said Kalman, proud of his new
responsibility and delighted with his new achievement.
"Keep them straight, mind. And watch your turning," warned
Mackenzie. "I will be coming back soon."
In less than half an hour he returned in a most gracious frame
of mind.
"Man, but you are the smart lad," he said as Kalman swung his team
around. "You will be making a great rancher, Tommy."
"My name is Kalman."
"Well, well, Callum. It iss a fery good name, whatefer."
"Kalman!" shouted the boy.
Mackenzie nodded grave rebuke.
"There is no occasion for shouting. I am not deef, Callum, my boy.
Go on. Go on with your harrows," he continued as Kalman began to
remonstrate.
Kalman drew near and regarded him narrowly. The truth was clear to
his experienced eyes.
"You're drunk," he exclaimed disgustedly.
"Hoot, toot! Callum man," said Mackenzie in tones of grieved
remonstrance, "how would you be saying that now? Come away,
or I will be taking the team myself."
"Aw, go on!" replied Kalman contemptuously. "Let me alone!"
"Good boy," said Mackenzie with a paternal smile, waving the boy on
his way while he betook himself to the bluff side and there supine,
continued at intervals to direct the operation of harrowing.
The sun grew hot. The cool morning breeze dropped flat, and as the
hours passed the boy grew weary and footsore, travelling the soft
furrows. Mackenzie had long ceased issuing his directions, and had
subsided into smiling silence, contenting himself with a friendly
wave of the hand as Kalman made the turn. The poor spiritless
horses moved more and more slowly, and at length, coming to the
end of the field, refused to move farther.
"Let them stand a bit, Callum boy," said Mackenzie kindly.
"Come and have a rest. You are the fine driver. Come and sit down."
"Will the horses stand here?" asked Kalman, whose sense of
responsibility deepened as he became aware of Mackenzie's
growing incapacity.
Mackenzie laughed pleasantly. "Will they stand? Yes, and that
they will, unless they will lie down."
Kalman approached and regarded him with the eye of an expert.
"Look here, where's your stuff?" said the boy at length.
Mackenzie gazed at him with the innocence of childhood.
"What iss it?"
"Oh, come off your perch! you blamed old rooster! Where's your
bottle?"
"What iss this?" said Mackenzie, much affronted. "You will be
calling me names?"
As he rose in his indignation a bottle fell from his pocket. Kalman
made a dash toward it, but Mackenzie was too quick for him. With a
savage curse he snatched up the bottle, and at the same time made a
fierce but unsuccessful lunge at the boy.
"You little deevil!" he said fiercely, "I will be knocking your
head off!"
Kalman jibed at him. "You are a nice sort of fellow to be on a job.
What will your boss say?"
Mackenzie's face changed instantly.
"The boss?" he said, glancing in the direction of the house.
"The boss? What iss the harm of a drop when you are not well?"
"You not well!" exclaimed Kalman scornfully.
Mackenzie shook his head sadly, sinking back upon the grass. "It iss
many years now since I have suffered with an indisposeetion of the
bowels. It iss a coalic, I am thinking, and it iss hard on me. But,
Callum, man, it will soon be denner time. Just put your horses in
and I will be following you."
But Kalman knew better than that.
"I don't know how to put in your horses. Come and put them in
yourself, or show me how to do it." He was indignant with the man
on his master's behalf.
Mackenzie struggled to his feet, holding the bottle carefully in his
outside coat pocket. Kalman made up his mind to possess himself of that
bottle at all costs. The opportunity occurred when Mackenzie, stooping
to unhitch the last trace, allowed the bottle to slip from his pocket.
Like a cat on a mouse, Kalman pounced on the bottle and fled.
The change in Mackenzie was immediate and appalling. His smiling
face became transformed with fury, his black eyes gleamed with the
cunning malignity of the savage, he shed his soft Scotch voice with
his genial manner, the very movements of his body became those of
his Cree progenitors. Uttering hoarse guttural cries, with the quick
crouching run of the Indian on the trail of his foe, he chased Kalman
through the bluffs. There was something so fiendishly terrifying in
the glimpses that Kalman caught of his face now and then that the
boy was seized with an overpowering dread, and ceasing to tantalize
his pursuing enemy, he left the bluffs and fled toward the house,
with Mackenzie hard upon his track. Through the shed the boy flew
and into the outer room, banging the door hard after him. But
there was no lock upon the door, and he could not hope to hold
it shut against his pursuer. He glanced wildly into the inner room.
French was nowhere to be seen. As he stood in unspeakable terror,
the door opened slowly and stealthily, showing Mackenzie's face,
distorted with rage and cunning hate. With a silent swift movement
he glided into the room, and without a sound rushed at the boy.
Once, twice around the table they circled, Kalman having the
advantage in quickness of foot. Suddenly, with a grunt of
satisfaction, Mackenzie's eye fell upon a gun hanging upon the
wall. In a moment he had it in his hand. As he reached for it,
however, Kalman, with a loud cry, plunged headlong through the open
window and fled again toward the bluffs. Mackenzie followed swiftly
through the door, gun in hand. He ran a few short steps after the
flying boy, and was about to throw his gun to his shoulder when
a voice arrested him.
"Here, Mackenzie, what are you doing with that gun?"
It was French, standing between the stable and the house,
dishevelled, bloated, but master of himself. Mackenzie stopped
as if gripped by an unseen arm.
"What are you doing with that gun?" repeated French sternly.
"Bring it to me."
Mackenzie stood in sullen, defiant silence, his gun thrown into
the hollow of his arm. French walked deliberately toward him.
"Give me that gun, you dog!" he said with an oath, "or I'll kill
you where you stand."
Mackenzie hesitated but only for a moment, and without a word
surrendered the gun, the fiendish rage fading out of his face, the
aboriginal blood lust dying in his eyes like the snuffing out of a
candle. In a few brief moments he became once more a civilized man,
subject to the restraint of a thousand years of life ordered by law.
"Kalman, come here," French called to the boy, who stood far off.
"Mackenzie," said French with great dignity as Kalman drew near,
"I want you to know that this boy is a ward of a dear friend, and is
to me like my own son. Remember that. Kalman, Mackenzie is my friend,
and you are to treat him as such. Where did you get that?" he
continued, pointing to the bottle which Kalman had kept clutched
in his hand through all the exciting pursuit.
The boy stood silent, looking at Mackenzie.
"Speak, boy," said French sharply.
Kalman remained still silent, his eyes on Mackenzie.
"It iss a bottle myself had," said Mackenzie.
"Ah, I understand. All right, Kalman, it's none of your business
what Mackenzie drinks. Now, Mackenzie, get dinner, and no more of
this nonsense."
Without a word of parley or remonstrance Mackenzie shuffled off
toward the field to bring in the team. French turned to the boy
and, taking the bottle in his hand, said, "This is dangerous stuff,
my boy. A man like Mackenzie is not to be trusted with it, and of
course it is not for boys."
Kalman made no reply. His mind was in a whirl of perplexed
remembrances of the sickening scenes of the past three days.
"Go now," said French, "and help Mackenzie. He won't hurt you any
more. He never keeps a grudge. That is the Christian in him."
During the early part of the afternoon Mackenzie drove the harrows
while French moved about the ranch doing up odds and ends. But
neither of the men was quite at ease. At length French disappeared
into the house, and almost immediately afterwards Mackenzie left
his team in Kalman's hands and followed his boss. Hour after hour
passed. The sun sank in the western sky, but neither master nor man
appeared, while Kalman kept the team steadily on the move, till at
length the field was finished. Weary and filled with foreboding,
the boy drove the horses to the stable, pulled off the harness as
best he could, gave the horses food and drink and went into the
house. There a ghastly scene met his eye. On the floor hard by the
table lay Mackenzie on his face, snoring heavily in a drunken sleep,
and at the table, with three empty bottles beside him and a fourth
in his hand, sat French, staring hard before him with eyes bloodshot
and sunken, and face of a livid hue. He neither moved nor spoke when
Kalman entered, but continued staring steadily before him.
The boy was faint with hunger. He was too heartsick to attempt to
prepare food. He found a piece of bannock and, washing this down
with a mug of water, he crept into his bunk, and there, utterly
miserable, waited till his master should sink into sleep. Slowly
the light faded from the room and the shadows crept longer and
deeper over the floor till all was dark. But still the boy could
see the outline of the silent man, who sat without sound or motion
except for the filling and emptying of his glass from time to time.
At length the shadowy figure bowed slowly toward the table and
there remained.
Sick with grief and fear, the boy sprang from his bunk and sought
to rouse the man from his stupor, but without avail, till at last,
wearied with his ineffectual attempts and sobbing in the bitterness
of his grief, he threw a blanket over the bowed form and retreated
to his bunk again. But sleep to him was impossible, for often
throughout the night he was brought to his feet with horrid dreams,
to be driven shivering again to his bunk with the more horrid
realities of his surroundings.
At length as day began to dawn he fell into a dead, dreamless
slumber, waking, when it was broad day, to find Mackenzie sitting
at the table eating breakfast, and with a bottle beside him. French
was not to be seen, but Kalman could hear his heavy breathing from
the inner room. To Kalman it seemed as if he were still in the grip
of some ghastly nightmare. He rubbed his eyes and looked again at
Mackenzie in stupid amazement.
"What are you glowering at yonder, Callum, man?" said Mackenzie,
pleasantly ignoring the events of the previous day. "Your breakfast
iss ready for you. You will be hungry after your day's work. Oh,
yes, I haf been seeing it, and it iss well done, Callum, mannie."
Somehow his smiling face and his kindly tone filled Kalman with
rage. He sprang out of his bunk and ran out of the house. He hated
the sight of the smiling, pleasant-voiced Mackenzie. But his boy's
hunger drove him in to breakfast.
"Well, Callum, man," began Mackenzie in pleasant salutation.
"My name is Kalman," snapped the boy.
"Never mind, it iss a good name, whatefer. But I am saying we will
be getting into the pitaties after breakfast. Can ye drop pitaties?"
"Show me how," said Kalman shortly.
"And that I will," said Mackenzie affably, helping himself to the bottle.
"How many bottles of that stuff are there left?" asked Kalman
disgustedly.
"And why would you be wanting to know?" enquired Mackenzie
cautiously. "You would not be taking any of the whiskey yourself?"
he added in grave reproof.
"Oh, go on! you old fool!" replied the boy angrily. "You will never
be any good till it is all done, I know."
Kalman spoke out of full and varied experience of the ways of men
with the lust of drink in them.
"Well, well, maybe so. But the more there iss for me, the less
there iss for him," said Mackenzie, jerking his head toward the
inner door.
"Why not empty it out?" said Kalman in an eager undertone.
"Hoot! toot! man, and would you be guilty of sinful waste like yon?
No, no, never with Malcolm Mackenzie's consent. And you would not
be doing such a deed yourself?" Mackenzie enquired somewhat anxiously.
Kalman shook his head.
"No," he said, "he might be angry. But," continued the boy, "those
potatoes must be finished to-day. I heard him speaking about them
yesterday."
"And that iss true enough. They are two weeks late now."
"Come on, then," cried Kalman, as Mackenzie reached for the bottle.
"Come and show me how."
"There iss no hurry," said the deliberate Mackenzie, drinking his
glass with slow relish. "But first the pitaties are to be got over
from Garneau's."
Again and again, and with increasing rage, Kalman sought to drag
Mackenzie away from his bottle and to his work. By the time the
bottle was done Mackenzie was once more helpless.
Three days later French came forth from his room, haggard and
trembling, to find every bottle empty, Mackenzie making ineffective
attempts to prepare a meal, and Kalman nowhere to be seen.
"Where is the boy?" he enquired of Mackenzie in an uncertain voice.
"I know not," said Mackenzie.
"Go and look for him, then, you idiot!"
In a short time French was summoned by Mackenzie's voice.
"Come here, will you?" he was crying. "Come here and see this thing."
With a dread of some nameless horror in his heart, French hurried
toward the little knoll upon which Mackenzie stood. From this
vantage ground could be seen far off in the potato field the
figure of the boy with two or three women, all busy with the
potatoes.
"What do you make that out to be?" enquired French.
"Who in the mischief are they? Go and see."
It was not long before Mackenzie stood before his master with
Kalman by his side.
"As sure as death," said Mackenzie, "he has a tribe of Galician
women yonder, and the pitaties iss all in."
"What do you say?" stammered French.
"It iss what I am telling you. The pitaties iss all in, and this
lad iss bossing the job, and the Galician women working like naygurs."
"What does this mean?" said French, turning his eyes slowly upon
Kalman. The boy looked older by years. He was worn and haggard.
"I saw a woman passing, she was a Galician, she brought the others,
and the potatoes are done. They have come here two days. But," said
the boy slowly, "there is nothing to eat."
With a mighty oath French sprang to his feet.
"Do you tell me you are hungry, boy?" he roared.
"I could not find much," said Kalman, his lip trembling in spite
of himself.
"What are you standing there for, Mackenzie?" roared French.
"Confound you for a drunken dog! Confound us both for two drunken
fools! Get something to eat!"
There was something so terrible in his look and in his voice that
Mackenzie fairly ran to obey his order. Kalman stood before his
master pale and shaking. He was weak from lack of food, but more
from anxiety and grief.
"I did the best I could," he said, struggling manfully to keep his
voice steady, "and--I am--awful glad--you're--better." His command
was all gone. He threw himself upon the grass while sobs shook his
frame.
French stood a moment looking down upon him, his face revealing
thoughts and feelings none too pleasant.
"Kalman, you're a good sort," he said in a hoarse voice. "You're a
man, by Jove! and," in an undertone, "I'm hanged, if I don't think
you'll make a man of me yet." Then kneeling by his side, he raised
him in his arms. "Kalman," he said, "you are a brick and a
gentleman. I have been a brute and a cad."
"Oh, no, no, no!" sobbed the boy. "You are a good man. But I
wish--you would--leave--it--alone."
"In God's name," said French bitterly, "I wish it too."