But here, on the frozen muskeg, was no sound--only the dead, unearthly silence that pressed upon them like an all-pervading _thing_. Closer and closer it pressed, until their lungs breathed, not air--but _silence_--the dreaded, surcharged silence of the void--the uncanny silence that has caused strong men to leap, screaming and shrieking, upon it and, bare-handed, seek to wring its awful secrets from its heart--and then to fall back upon the snow and maunder and laugh at the blood stains where the claw-like nails have bitten deep into their palms--but they feel no pain and gloat foolishly--for to their poor, tortured brains this blood is the heart"s blood of the Silence of the North.
On the fourth day the ground rose slightly from the low level of the muskeg. All day they traversed long, low hills--which were not hills at all, but the roll of the barren ground, and in the evening came upon the bank of the river, but whether above or below the fork they could not tell.
"We"ll follow it down--nawthwahd--fo" that"s what the map says, an" if we do miss the _cache_, we"ll strike the Ignatook camp in two mo" days.
We got grub enough if a stawm don"t hit us. I sho" am glad we-all didn"t get catched out yondeh." The man"s eyes swept the wide expanse of barrens that lay between them and the distant peaks. "It"s a good hund"ed an" fifty mile acrost them flats--we sho" was lucky!"
The ice-locked river upon which they found themselves was a stream of considerable size which flowed north, with a decided trend to the eastward. The muskeg and tundra had given place to the rocky formation of the barren lands which cropped out upon the banks of the river in rock reefs and ledges. Scrub trees and bushes in sickly patches fringed the banks, their leafless branches rattling in the wind.
An hour"s travel on the snow-covered ice of the river brought them to a sharp bend where a river flowed in from the eastward, and there, almost at the confluence of the two streams, stood the solitary rock cairn, a monument some seven feet in height and five feet in diameter at its base.
"He didn"t _cache_ no great sight of meat heah," observed Waseche as, one by one, they removed the stones of the cairn. "We got a plenty, but I counted on this fo" the dawgs." Even as he spoke, they came upon a flat stone midway of the pile, which required their combined strength to displace. With a harsh, grating sound it slid sidewise into the snow, disclosing a considerable cavity, in the centre of which lay, not the expected _cache_ of caribou meat, but a human skull, whose fleshless jaws grinned into their startled faces in sardonic mockery. Beside the skull lay a leaf torn from Carlson"s notebook, and in Carlson"s handwriting the words:
FOL. RIV. 2d N to CREEK OF STEAM. FOL. UP CREEK 2m. CAMP W BANK IN OLD MINE TUNNEL. DISCOVERY 100ft. E. TUNNEL MOUTH. 1 ABOVE CLAIM--STAKED FOR PETE MATEESE. LOOK OUT FOR WHITE INJUNS.
"Ol" mine tunnel! White Injuns!" exclaimed Waseche. "I tell yo" what, son: so fah, Carlson"s maps has. .h.i.t out, but when he begins writin"
about white Injuns an" ol" mine tunnels, an" _cachin"_ skull bones, "stead of meat! It"s jest as I tol" yo"! We-all got to keep on now, but I sho" wisht we"d neveh found Carlson an" his crazy maps."
"Whose skull do you suppose it is? And why did he _cache_ it, I wonder?"
asked Connie, as he handled gingerly the gruesome object.
"Seahch me!" said the man, glancing at the weather blackened skull.
"Come on, le"s mush."
As they advanced the surface of the surrounding land became more broken and the river descended rapidly in a series of falls, enclosed by the freezing spray, in huge irregular ma.s.ses of green-hued ice, which impeded their progress and taxed to the utmost the skill of the drivers and the tricks of the trail-wise dogs in preventing the sleds from being dashed to pieces upon the slope of the ice domes, from whose hollow interiors came the m.u.f.fled roar of the plunging falls.
The dogs were again on half ration, and even this was a serious drain upon the supply of meat. The walls of the river became higher until, on the second day, they were threading a veritable canyon. At noon the light dimmed suddenly, and the two gazed in surprise at the sun which glowed with a sickly, vapoury glare, while all about them the air was filled with tiny glittering frost flakes, which lay thick and fluffy under their feet and collected in diamond flashing cl.u.s.ters on the rocks and bushes of the canyon walls.
"It"s snowing!" cried Connie, excitedly. "Snowing at forty below!"
""Tain"t snow, son. It"s frozen fog, an" I cain"t sense it. I c"n see how it might thick up an" snow, even at forty below, but fog! Doggone it! It takes wahm weatheh to _make_ fog--_an" it ain"t wahm!_"
Toggling the lead dogs, they selected a spot where the wall of the canyon was riven by the deep gash of a small feeder and climbed laboriously to the top for a better view of the puzzling phenomenon.
Scarcely a quarter of a mile ahead a great bank of fog ascended, rolling and twisting toward the heavens. Slowly it rose from out of the snow, spreading into the motionless air like a giant mushroom of glittering diamond points which danced merrily earthward, converting the whole landscape into a mystic tinsel world. Far to the westward the bank extended, winding and twisting like some great living monster.
"It"s the creek of the steam!" cried Waseche Bill. "It"s theah wheah Carlson"s camp is." But, so entranced was the boy with the weird beauty of the scene, that he scarcely heard. He pointed excitedly toward a low hill whose sides were wooded with the scrub timber of the country, where each stunted tree, each limb and spiney leaf curved gracefully under its weight of flashing rime. Towers, battlements, and spires glinted in the brilliant splendour, for, out of the direct line of the fog bank that hung above the course of the narrow creek, the sun shone as clear and bright as the low-hung winter sun of the sub-Arctic ever does shine, and its slanting rays flashed sharply from a billion tiny facets.
"It"s the frozen forest that he wrote about!" exclaimed the delighted boy. "It"s the most beautiful thing in the world! Now, aren"t you glad you came?" But Waseche Bill shook his head dubiously, and began the descent to the canyon.
"Why! Where are the dogs!" cried the boy, who was first upon the surface of the river. Waseche hurried to his side; sure enough, neither dogs nor sleds were in sight and the man leaped forward to examine the thick carpet of rime.
[Ill.u.s.tration: "The two partners stared open-mouthed at the apparition.
_The face was white!_"]
"It"s Injuns!" he announced. "Nine or ten of "em, an" they headed nawth!" And, even as he spoke, a grotesquely feathered, beaver-topped head appeared above a frost-coated rock, almost at his elbow, and the two partners stared open-mouthed at the apparition. _The face was white!_
CHAPTER XIII
O"BRIEN
Surprise held Connie Morgan and Waseche Bill spellbound as they stood ankle-deep in the glittering frost spicules that carpeted the surface of the ice-locked river, and gazed speechless into the face that stared at them over the top of the rime-crusted rock.
The spell broke. From behind other rocks appeared other faces surmounted by odd beaver-skin caps, edged with the feathers of the blue, and snow goose, and of the great white Arctic owl. The partners glanced from one to the other of these strange, silent faces that regarded them through wide-set, in-slanting eyes. The faces were white--or rather, through the winter"s acc.u.mulation of grease and blubber soot, they showed a light brownish yellow that, in comparison with the faces of other Indians, would easily pa.s.s for white. And they were so nearly alike that a stranger would have been at his wits" end to have distinguished one from another--all except the first one, the man whose face appeared so suddenly almost at Waseche Bill"s side. He was taller than the others, his nose longer and thinner, and his whole lower face was concealed behind a luxurious growth of flaming red whiskers, while through the soot and grease his skin showed ruddy, rather than yellow, and his small, deep-set eyes were of a peculiar greenish hue.
"j.a.ps an" Irish!" exclaimed Waseche Bill. "Carlson was right--even to his frozen fohest an" white Injuns!"
He addressed the company with a comprehensive wave of his arm:
"Good evenin", gents. How they comin"?"
His words were greeted with stony-faced stares as meaningless and void of expression as the stare of a frozen fish. Waseche tried again:
"It"s a right smaht spell o" weatheh we"re havin", ain"t it? An" how"s all the folks? Don"t all talk to onct, now, till I get through welcomin"
yo" into me an" the kid"s midst--oah else tellin" yo" how glad we-all ah to find ouhselves amongst yo"--owin" to who"s givin" the pahty." He glanced from face to face, but, as before, all were stolid as graven images. Suddenly he turned upon the bewhiskered one of the green eyes:
"Hey, yo" red chinchilly! Cain"t yo" talk none? An" cain"t yo" yelleh perils, heah, ondehstand no language? I cain"t talk no laundry, myself, but besides American, I"m some fluent in Chinook, Metlakat", Tlinkit, an" Athapascan. As fo" yo", yo" look to me like the Tipperary section of a Patrick"s Day parade! Come on, now--loosen up! If yo" an" Injun, so"m I--only I"ve done moulted my feathehs, an" washed my face since the Fo"th of July!"
Directly addressed, the man stepped from behind his rock, and the lid of the left green eye dropped in a decided wink. The others immediately followed, crowding close about the newcomers. Squat, full-bodied men, they were, fur-clad from top to toe, and all armed with short, copper-tipped harpoons which they leaned upon as they stared. Waseche grinned into their wide, flat faces, as he of the red whiskers elbowed to the fore and spoke in a singsong voice with a decided Hibernian accent:
"Which me name"s...o...b..ien," he began, "an" ut"s both sorry an" glad Oi am to see ye. But, phwere"s th" shtampede?" He glanced anxiously up the river.
"What stampede?" asked Waseche, in surprise.
"Phy, th" shtampede! Th" shtampede to th" Ignatook, th" creek yondher--th" creek that biles."
"Sea"ch me! Me an" the kid"s all theah is--an" yo" wouldn"t hahdly call us a stampede."
"But, Car-rlson! An" th" breed, Pete Mateese! Didn"t they nayther wan git t"rough? Ilse, how"d ye come to be follyin" th" back thrail?" The man"s anxiety increased, and he waited impatiently for an answer.
"No. Carlson didn"t get through. We come onto his last camp about ten days back. He died huntin" the Tatonduk divide. But, how come yo"-all to be heah? Who"s yo" friends? An" wheah"s ouh outfit?"
"Hivin hilp th" bunch av us!" wailed the Irishman. "No shtampede, afther all--an" we"ll all be dead befoor we live to git out av this!" The man gazed far out into the gathering gloom, wringing his hands and muttering to himself. Suddenly his eyes lighted, and he questioned the two eagerly:
"D"yez know about Flor-ridy?" he asked, "phwere they say a man kin be war-rum? An" how man-ny quar-rts av nuggits w"d ut take f"r th"
car-r-fare, an" to buy, me"be ut"s a bit av a tobaccy shtor-re on th"
sunny soide av th" shtrate, wid a bit av a gar-rdin behint, an" a pig in his pin in th" yar-rud?
"An", shpykin" av tobaccy, hav" yez a bit to shpare? Ut"s niver a shmoke Oi"ve had in goin" on six year--an" kin ye lind me th" loan av a match?"
Waseche tossed the man his tobacco and eyed him sharply as he lighted the short, black cutty pipe that he produced from a pocket of his thick caribou-hide shirt.
"They"ve took th" outfit to th" village," O"Brien said. "But, about Flor-ridy, now----"
"We"ll talk that oveh lateh. Let"s be mushin", I don"t want them sleds too fah in th" lead."