THE CALL OF YOUTH
The fur fort was a relic of ancient days, when the old-time traders of
the North sent their legions of pelt hunters from the far limits of
the northern ice-world to the sunny western slopes of the great
American continent. It was at such a place as this, hemmed in amidst
the foot-hills, that they established their factor and his handful of
armed men; lonely sentries at the gates of the mountain world, to levy
an exorbitant tax upon the harvest of furs within.
Here, within the ponderous stockade, now fallen into sore decay,
behind iron-bound doors secured by mighty wooden locks, and barred
with balks of timber, sheltered beneath the frowning muzzles of half a
dozen futile carronades, they reveled in obscene orgies and committed
their barbaric atrocities under the name of Justice and Commerce. Here
they amassed wealth for the parent companies in distant lands, and
ruthlessly despoiled the wild of its furry denizens.
These were the pioneers, sturdy savages little better than the red man
himself, little better in their lives than the creatures upon which
they preyed. But they were for the most part men, vigorous, dauntless
men who not only made history, but prepared the way for those who were
to come after, leaving them a heritage of unsurpassable magnificence.
Now, this old-time relic afforded a shelter for two lonely men, whose
only emulation of their predecessors was in the craft that was theirs.
In all else there remained nothing in common, unless it were that
common asset of all pioneers, a sturdy courage. They certainly lacked
nothing of this. But whereas the courage of their predecessors,
judging them by all historical records, in quality belonged largely to
the more brutal side of life, these men had no such inspiration. Their
calling was something in the nature of a passionate craving for the
exercise of wits and instincts in a hard field where the creatures of
the wild meet the human upon almost equal terms.
Isolation was nothing new to these men. The remotenesses of the back
world had been their life for years. They understood its every mood,
and met them with nerves in perfect tune. The mountains filled their
whole outlook. They desired nothing better, nothing more.
Yet it seemed strange that this should be. For the Padre had not
always lived beyond the fringes of civilization. He was a man of
education, a man of thought and even culture. These things must have
been obvious to the most casual observer. In Buck's case it was easier
to understand. He had known no other life than this. And yet he, too,
might well have been expected to look askance at a future lost to all
those things which he knew to lay beyond. Was he not at the threshold
of life? Were not his veins thrilling with the rich, red tide of
youth? Were not all those instincts which go to make up the sum of
young human life as much a part of him as of those others who haunted
the banks of Yellow Creek? The whole scheme was surely unusual. The
Padre's instinct was to roam deeper and deeper into the wild, and
Buck, offered his release from its wondrous thrall, had refused it.
Thus they embraced this new home. The vast and often decaying timbers,
hewn out of the very forests they loved, cried out with all the old
associations they bore and held them. The miniature citadel contained
within the trenchant stockade, the old pelt stores, roofless and
worm-eaten, the armory which still suggested the clank of half-armored
men, who lived only for the joy of defying death. The factor's house,
whence, in the days gone by, the orders for battle had been issued,
and the sentence of life and death had been handed out with scant
regard for justice. Then there were the ruined walls of the
common-room, where the fighting men had caroused and slept. The scenes
of frightful orgies held in this place were easy to conjure. All these
things counted in a manner which perhaps remained unacknowledged by
either. But nevertheless they were as surely a part of the lure as the
chase itself, with all its elemental attraction.
They had restored just as much of the old factor's house as they
needed for their simple wants. Two rooms were all they occupied, two
rooms as simple and plain as their own lives. Buck had added a new
roof of logs and clay plaster. He had set up two stretchers with
straw-stuffed paillasses for beds. He had manufactured a powerful
table, and set it upon legs cut from pine saplings. To this he had
added the removal of a cook-stove and two chairs, and their own
personal wardrobe from the farm, and so the place was complete. Yet
not quite. There was an arm rack upon the wall of the living-room, an
arm rack that had at one time doubtless supported the old flintlocks
of the early fur hunters. This he had restored, and laden it with
their own armory and the spare traps of their craft; while their only
luxury was the fastening up beside the doorway of a frameless
looking-glass for shaving purposes.
They required a place to sleep in, a place in which to store their
produce, a place in which to break their fast and eat their meal at
dusk. Here it lay, ready to their hand, affording them just these
simple necessities, and so they adopted it.
But the new life troubled the Padre in moments when he allowed himself
to dwell upon the younger man's future. He had offered him his
release, at the time he had parted with the farm, from a sense of
simple duty. It would have been a sore blow to him had Buck accepted,
yet he would have submitted readily, even gladly, for he felt that
with the passing of the farm out of their hands he had far more
certainly robbed Buck of all provision for his future than he had
deprived himself, who was the actual owner. He felt that in seeking to
help the little starving colony he had done it, in reality, at Buck's
expense.
Something of this was in his mind as he pushed away from their frugal
breakfast-table. He stood in the doorway filling his pipe, while Buck
cleared the tin plates and pannikins and plunged them into the boiler
of hot water on the stove.
He leant his stalwart shoulders against the door casing, and stared
out at the wooded valley which crossed the front of the house. Beyond
it, over the opposite rise, he could see the dim outline of the crest
of Devil's Hill several miles away.
He felt that by rights Buck should be there--somewhere there beyond
the valley. Not because the youngster had any desire for the wealth
that was flowing into the greedy hands of the gold-seekers. It was
simply the thought of a man who knows far more of the world than he
cares to remember. He felt that in all honesty he should point out the
duties of a man to himself in these days when advancement alone
counts, and manhood, without worldly position, goes for so very
little. He was not quite sure that Buck didn't perfectly understand
these things for himself. He had such a wonderful understanding and
insight. However, his duty was plain, and it was not his way to shrink
from it.
Buck was sprinkling the earth floor preparatory to sweeping it when
the Padre let his eyes wander back into the room.
"Got things fixed?" he inquired casually.
"Mostly." Buck began to sweep with that practiced hand which never
raises a dust on an earthen floor.
The Padre watched his movements thoughtfully.
"Seems queer seeing you sweeping and doing chores like a--a hired
girl." He laughed presently.
Buck looked up and rested on his broom. He smilingly surveyed his
early benefactor and friend.
"What's worryin'?" he inquired in his direct fashion.
The Padre stirred uneasily. He knocked the ashes from his pipe and
pressed the glowing tobacco down with the head of a rusty nail.
"Oh, nothing worrying," he said, turning back to his survey of the
valley beyond the decaying stockade. "The sun'll be over the hilltops
in half an hour," he went on.
But the manner of his answer told Buck all he wanted to know. He too
glanced out beyond the valley.
"Yes," he ejaculated, and went on sweeping. A moment later he paused
again. "Guess I can't be out at the traps till noon. Mebbe you ken do
without me--till then?"
"Sure." The Padre nodded at the valley. Then he added: "I've been
thinking."
"'Bout that gold strike? 'Bout me? You bin thinkin' I ought to quit
the traps, an'--make good wi' them. I know."
The elder man turned back sharply and looked into the dark eyes with a
shrewd smile.
"You generally get what I'm thinking," he said.
"Guess you're not much of a riddle--to me," Buck laughed, drawing the
moist dust into a heap preparatory to picking it up.
The Padre laughed too.
"Maybe you know how I'm feeling about things, then? Y' see there's
nothing for you now but half the farm money. That's yours anyway. It
isn't a pile. Seems to me you ought to be--out there making a big
position for yourself." He nodded in the direction of Devil's Hill.
"Out of gold?"
"Why not? It's an opportunity."
"What for?" Buck inquired, without a semblance of enthusiasm.
"Why, for going ahead--with other folks."
Buck nodded.
"I know. Goin' to a city with a big pile. A big house. Elegant
clothes. Hired servants. Congress. Goin' around with a splash of big
type in the noospapers."
"That's not quite all, Buck." The man at the door shook his head. "A
man when he rises doesn't need to go in for--well, for vulgar display.
There are a heap of other things besides. What about the intellectual
side of civilization? What about the advancement of good causes? What
about--well, all those things we reckon worth while out here? Then,
too, you'll be marrying some day."
Buck picked up the dust and carefully emptied it into the blazing
stove. He watched it burn for a moment, and then replaced the round
iron top.
"Marryin' needs--all those things?" he inquired at last.
"Well, I wouldn't say that," returned the other quickly. He knew
something was lying behind Buck's quiet manner, and it made him a
little uncomfortable. "Most men find a means of marrying when they
want to--if they're men. Look here," he went on, with a sudden
outburst of simple candor, "I want to be fair to you, and I want you
to be fair to yourself. There's an opportunity over there"--he pointed
with his pipe in the direction of Devil's Hill--"an opportunity to
make a pile, which will help you to take a position in the world. I
don't want you to stay with me from any mistaken sense of gratitude or
duty. It is my lot, and my desire, to remain in these hills. But
you--you've got your life before you. You can rise to the top if you
want to. I know you. I know your capacity. Take your share of the farm
money, and--get busy."
"An' if I don't want to--get busy?" Buck's dark eyes were alight with
a curious, intense warmth.
The Padre shrugged and pushed his pipe into the corner of his mouth.
"There's nothing more to be said," he replied.
"But ther' is, Padre. There sure is," cried Buck, stepping over to him
and laying one hand on the great shoulder nearest him. "I get all you
say. I've got it long ago. You bin worryin' to say all this since ever
you got back from sellin' the farm. An' it's like you. But you an' me
don't jest figger alike. You got twenty more years of the world than
me, so your eyes look around you different. That's natural. You're
guessin' that hill is an opportunity for me. Wal, I'm guessin' it
ain't. Mebbe it is for others, but not for me. I got my opportunity
twenty years ago, an' you give me that opportunity. I was starvin' to
death then, an' you helped me out. You're my opportunity, an' it makes
me glad to think of it. Wher' you go I go, an' when we both done, why,
I guess it won't be hard to see that what I done an' what you done was
meant for us both to do. We're huntin' pelts for a livin' now, an'
when the time comes for us to quit it, why, we'll both quit it
together, an' so it'll go on. It don't matter wher' it takes us. Say,"
he went on, turning away abruptly. "Guess I'll jest haul the drinkin'
water before I get."
The Padre turned his quiet eyes on the slim back.
"And what about when you think of marrying?" he asked shrewdly.
Buck paused to push the boiler off the stove. He shook his head and
pointed at the sky.
"Guess the sun's gettin' up," he said.
The Padre laughed and prepared to depart.
"Where you off to this morning?" he inquired presently.
"That gal ain't got a hired man, yet," Buck explained simply, as he
picked up his saddle. Then he added ingenuously, "Y' see I don't guess
she ken do the chores, an' the old woman ain't got time to--for
talkin'."
The Padre nodded while he bent over the breech of his Winchester. He
had no wish for Buck to see the smile his words had conjured.
Buck swung his saddle on to his shoulder and passed out of the hut in
the direction of the building he had converted into a barn. And when
he had gone the Padre looked after him.
"He says she's handsome, with red-gold hair and blue eyes," he
murmured. Then a far-away look stole into his steady eyes, and their
stare fixed itself upon the doorway of the barn through which Buck had
just vanished. "Curious," he muttered. "They've nicknamed her
'Golden,' which happened to be a nickname--her father gave her."
He stood for some moments lost in thought. Then, suddenly pulling
himself together, he shouldered his rifle and disappeared into the
woods.