CHAPTER XV
THE FROZEN NORTH
A bitter wind swept the snowy prairie and the cold was arctic whenClarke, shivering in his furs, came into sight of his homestead as hewalked back from Sweetwater. He had gone there for his mail, whichincluded an English newspaper, and had taken supper at the hotel. Itwas now about two hours after dark, but a full moon hung in the westernsky, and the cluster of wooden buildings formed a shadowy blur on theglittering plain. There was no fence, not a tree to break the whiteexpanse that ran back to the skyline, and it struck Clarke that theplace looked very dreary.
He walked on, with the fine, dry snow the wind whipped up glistening onhis furs. On reaching the homestead, he went first to thestable--built of sod, which was cheaper and warmer than sawedlumber--and, lighting a lantern, fed his teams. The heavy Clydesdalesand lighter driving horses were all valuable, for Clarke was asuccessful farmer and had found that the purchase of the best animalsand implements led to economy; though it was said that he seldom paidthe full market price for them. He had walked home because it wasimpossible to keep warm driving; and he now felt tired and morose. Theman had passed his prime and was beginning to find the labor he hadnever shirked more irksome than it had been. He dispensed with a hiredhand in winter, when there was less to be done, for Clarke neglected noopportunity to save a dollar.
When he had finished in the stable, he crossed the snow to the house,which was dark and silent. After the bustle and stir of London, wherehe had spent some time, it was depressing to come back to the emptydwelling, and he was glad that he had saved himself the task of gettingsupper. Shaking the snow from his furs, he lighted the lamp and filledup the stove before he sat down wearily. The small room was not acheerful place in which to spend the winter nights alone. Walls andfloor were uncovered and were roughly boarded with heat-cracked lumber;the stove was rusty, and gave out a smell of warm iron, while a blackdistillate had dripped from its pipe. There were, however, severalwell-filled bookcases and one or two comfortable chairs,
Clarke lighted his pipe and, drawing his seat as near the stove aspossible, opened the English newspaper, which contained some news thatinterested him. A short paragraph stated that Captain BertramChalloner, then stationed at Delhi, had received an appointment whichwould shortly necessitate his return from India. This, Clarkeimagined, might be turned to good account; but the matter demandedthought, and for a long time he sat motionless, deeply pondering. Hisfarming had prospered, though the bare and laborious life had tried himhard; and he had made some money by more questionable means, lending tounfortunate neighbors at extortionate interest and foreclosing on theirpossessions. No defaulter got any mercy at his hands, and shrewdsellers of seed and implements took precautions when they dealt withhim.
His money, however, would not last him long if he returned to Englandand attempted to regain a footing in his profession, and he haddaringly schemed to increase it. Glancing across the room, his eyesrested with a curious smile on one of the bookcases. It containedworks on hypnotism, telepathy, and psychological speculations ingeneral; he had studied some of them with ironical amusement and otherswith a quickening of his interest. Amid much that he thought of assterile chaff he saw germs of truth; and once or twice he had been ledto the brink of a startling discovery. There the elusive clue hadfailed him, though he felt that strange secrets might be revealed someday.
After all, the books had served his purpose, as well as kept him frombrooding when he sat alone at nights while the icy wind howled roundhis dwelling. He passed for a sage and something of a prophet with theprimitive Dubokars; his Indian friends regarded him as medicine-man;and both unknowingly had made easier his search for the petroleum.Then, contrary to his expectations he had found speculators in Londonwilling to venture a few hundred pounds on his scheme; but the amountwas insufficient and the terms were exacting. It would pay him betterto get rid of his associates. He was growing old; it would be too lateto return to his former life unless he could do so soon; but he mustmake a fair start with ample means. The man had no scruples and noillusions; money well employed would buy him standing and friends.People were charitable to a man who had something to offer them; andthe blot on his name must be nearly forgotten.
First of all, however, the richest spot of the oil field must be found,and money enough raised to place him in a strong position when theventure was put on the market. He had failed to extort any fromChalloner; but he might be more successful with his son. The man whowas weak enough to allow his cousin to suffer for his fault would nodoubt yield to judicious pressure. It was fortunate that BertramChalloner was coming to England, where he could more easily be reached.This led Clarke to think of Blake, for he realized that Challoner wasright in pointing out that the man was his greatest difficulty. IfBlake maintained that the fault was his, nothing could be done; it wastherefore desirable that he should be kept out of the way. There wasanother person to whom the same applied. Clarke had preyed on Benson'sweakness; but if the fellow had overcome it and should return to farmindustriously, his exploitation would no longer be possible. On theother hand, if he failed to pay off his debts, Clarke saw how he couldwith much advantage seize his possessions. Thus both Blake and Bensonwere obstacles; and now that they had ventured into the icy North itwould be better if they did not reappear.
Clarke refilled his pipe, and his face wore a sinister look as he tookdown a rather sketchy map of the wilds beyond the prairie belt. Afterstudying it keenly, he sank into an attitude of concentrated thought.The stove crackled, its pipe glowing red; driving snow lashed theshiplap walls; and the wind moaned drearily about the house. Itsoccupant, however, was oblivious to his surroundings. He sat verystill in his chair, with pouches under his fixed eyes and his lips settight. He looked malignant and dangerous. Perhaps his mental attitudewas not quite normal; for close study and severe physical toil, coupledwith free indulgence, had weakened him; there were drugs to which hewas addicted; and he had long been possessed by one fixed idea. Bydegrees it had become a mania; and he would stick at nothing that mighthelp him to carry out his purpose.
When at last he got up, with a shiver, to throw wood into the stove, hethought he saw how his object could be secured.
A month before Clarke spent the evening thinking about them, Blake andhis comrades camped at sunset in a belt of small spruces near the edgeof the open waste that runs back to the Polar Sea. They were worn andhungry, for the shortage of provisions had been a constant trouble, andsuch supplies as they obtained from Indians, who seldom had much tospare, soon ran out. Once or twice they had feasted royally aftershooting a big bull moose, but the frozen meat they were able to carrydid not last long, and again they were threatened with starvation.
It was a calm evening, with a coppery sunset flaring across the snow,but intensely cold; and though the men had wood enough and sat closebeside a fire, with their ragged blankets wrapped round them, theycould not keep warm. Harding and Benson were openly dejected, butBlake had somehow preserved his cheerful serenity. As usual afterfinishing their scanty supper, they began to talk, for during the dayconversation was limited by the toil of the march.
"No good," Harding said, taking a few bits of resin out of a bag."It's common fir gum, such as I could gather a carload of in theforests of Michigan. Guess there's something wrong with my theoryabout the effects of extreme cold." He took a larger lump from a neatleather case. "This is the genuine article, and it's certainly theproduct of a coniferous tree. The fellow I got it from said it wasfound in the coldest parts of North America. Seems to me we have triedall the varieties of the firs, but we're as far from finding what wewant as when we started."
"Hard luck!" Benson remarked gloomily.
Harding broke off a fragment and lighted it.
"Notice the smell. It's characteristic."
"The fellow may have been right on one point," said Blake. "When I wasin India I once got some incense which was brought down in smallquantities from the Himalaya
s, and, I understood, came from near thesnow-line. The smell was the same; one doesn't forget a curious scent."
"That's so. Talking about it reminds me that I was puzzled by a smellI thought I ought to know when I brought Clarke out of the tepee. Iknow now what it was; and the thing's significant. It was gasoline."
"They extract it from crude petroleum, don't they?"
"Yes; it's called petrol on your side. Clarke's out for coal-oil; andI guess he's struck it."
"Then he's lucky; but his good fortune doesn't concern us, and we haveother things to think about. What are you going to do, now that wedon't seem able to find the gum?"
"It's a difficult question," Harding answered in a troubled voice."I'd hate to go back, with nothing accomplished and all my money spent.Marianna's paying for this journey in many ways, and I haven't the gritto tell her we're poorer than when I left. She wouldn't complain; butwhen you have to live on a small commission that's hard to make, it'sthe woman who meets the bill."
Blake made a sign of sympathy. He had never shared Harding'sconfidence in the success of his search, and had joined in it from loveof adventure and a warm liking for his comrade.
"Well," he said, "I have no means except a small allowance which is sotied up that it's difficult to borrow anything on it; but it's at yourdisposal, as far as it goes. Suppose we keep on with our prospecting."
"If Clarke's mortgage doesn't stop me, I might raise a few dollars onmy farm," Benson volunteered. "I'll throw it in, with pleasure,because I'm pretty deep in your debt."
"Thanks," Harding responded. "I'm sorry I can't agree; but I wouldn'ttake your offer when you first made it, and I can't do so now that myplan's a failure. Anyway, we're doing some useless talking, because Idon't see how we're to go on prospecting, or get south again, when wehave only three or four days' food in hand."
He stated an unpleasant truth which the others had characteristicallyshirked, for Blake was often careless, and Benson had taken the risksof the journey with frank indifference. After nearly starving once ortwice, they had succeeded in getting fresh supplies; but now theirhearts sank: as they thought of the expanse of frozen wilderness thatlay between them and the settlements.
"Well," said Blake, "there's a Hudson Bay factory somewhere to the eastof us. I can't tell how far off it is, though it must be a long way,but if we could reach it, the agent might take us in."
"How are you going to find the place?"
"I don't know; but a Hudson Bay post is generally fixed where there arefurs to be got. There will no doubt be Indians trapping in theneighborhood, and we must take our chances of hitting their tracks."
"But we can't make a long march without food," Benson objected.
"The trouble is that we can't stay here without it," Blake pointed outwith a short laugh.
This was undeniable, and neither of his companions answered. They wereunkempt, worn out, and ragged; and in the past week they had traveled along way through fresh snow on short rations. Ahead of them lay a vastand almost untrodden desolation; behind them a rugged wilderness whichthere seemed no probability of their being able to cross. Lured by thehope of finding what they sought, they had pushed on from point topoint; and now it was too late to return.
Presently Blake got up.
"Our best chance is to kill a caribou, and this is the kind of countrythey generally haunt. The sooner we look for one, the better; so I mayas well start at once. There'll be a moon to-night."
He threw off his blanket and, picking up a Marlin rifle, which wastheir only weapon, strode out of camp; and as he was a good shot andtracker they let him go. It was getting dark when he left the shelterof the trees, and the cold in the open struck through him like a knife.The moon had not yet risen and the waste stretched away before him, itswhiteness changed to a soft blue-gray. In the distance scatteredbluffs rose in long dark smears; but there was nothing to indicatewhich way Blake should turn, and he had no reason to believe there wasa caribou near the camp. As a matter of fact, they had found thelarger deer remarkably scarce.
Blake was tired, after breaking the trail since sunrise, and the snowwas loose beneath his big net shoes, but he plodded toward the farthestbluff, feeling that he was largely to blame for the party'sdifficulties. Knowing something of the country, he should haveinsisted on turning back when he found they could obtain no dog teamsto transport their supplies. Occasionally Hudson Bay agents andpatrols of the North-West Police made long journeys in arctic weather;but they were provided with proper sleds and sufficient preserved food.Indeed, Blake was astonished that he and his comrades had got so far.He had given way to Harding, who hardly knew the risks he ran, and nowhe supposed that he must take the consequences. This did not daunt himbadly. After all, life had not much to offer an outcast; he hadmanaged to extract some amusement from it, but he had nothing to lookforward to. There was no prospect of his making money--his talentswere not commercial--and the hardships he could bear now would press onhim more heavily as he grew older.
These considerations, however, were too philosophical for him to dwellon. He was essentially a man of action, and was feeling unpleasantlyhungry, and he quickened his pace, knowing that the chance of hisgetting a shot at a caribou in the open was small.
The moon had not risen when he reached the bluff, but the snowreflected a faint light and he noticed a row of small depressions onits surface. Kneeling down, he examined them, but there had been windduring the day and the marks were blurred. He felt for a match, buthis fingers were too numbed to open the watertight case, and heproceeded to measure the distance between the footprints. This was anunreliable test, as a big deer's stride varies with its pace, but hethought the tracks indicated a caribou. Then he stopped, withoutrising, and looked about.
Near in front the trees rose in a shadowy wall against the clear bluesky; there was no wind, and it was oppressively still; the darkness ofthe woods was impenetrable and its silence daunting. The row of trackswas the only sign of life Blake had seen for days.
While he listened, a faint howl came out of the distance, and wasfollowed by another. After the deep silence, the sound was startling.Blake recognized the cry of the timber wolves, and knew his danger.The big gray brutes would make short work of a lonely man. His fleshcrept as he wondered whether, they were on his trail. On the whole, itdid not seem likely, though they might get scent of him. Rising to hisfeet, he felt that the rifle magazine was full before he set off at hishighest speed.
The snow was loose, however, and his shoes packed and sank; his breathgot shorter, and he began to feel distressed. There was no soundbehind him; but that somehow increased his uneasiness, and now and thenhe anxiously turned his head. Nothing moved on the sweep of blue-grayshadow; and he pressed on, knowing how poor his speed was compared withthat the wolves were capable of making. At last, with keensatisfaction, he saw a flicker of light break out from the dark mass ofa bluff ahead, and a few minutes later he came, breathing hard, intocamp.
"You haven't stayed out long," Benson observed. "I suppose you sawnothing?"
"I heard wolves," Blake answered dryly. "You had better gather woodenough to keep a big fire going, because I've no doubt they'll pick upmy trail. However, it's a promising sign."
"I guess we could do without it," Hording broke in. "I've no use forwolves."
"They must live on something," Blake said. "Since they're here, thereare probably moose or caribou in the neighborhood. I'll have anothertry to-morrow."
"But the wolves!"
"They're not so bold in daylight. Anyway, it seems to me we must takesome risks."
This was obvious; and when they had heaped up a good supply of wood,Harding and Blake went to sleep, leaving Benson to keep watch.