"If she can fall, what about the sled?"
The Indian"s reply was full of the philosophy of his race.
"Sure," he cried. "It easy."
The whiteman"s next act spoke far more than any words could tell. He dropped back to the tail of the sled to guard his precious possessions.
His first, his only consideration amidst the perils of that road was his gold. The woman bearing the burden of her devotion to him, must fight for herself.
Each pa.s.sing moment brought added perils. The path up here was shorn of its loose covering of snow, swept away to the depths below by the all-mastering gale. The surface left was little better than a sheet of glare ice, hummocky and studded with roughnesses caused by broken ice frozen upon its surface. The snowshoes of the travelers left them fairly secure from slipping, but the wretched dogs had no such help.
They fought for foothold till their weary feet were left torn and bleeding.
But the hill was pa.s.sed and the track was no longer an ascent, and at this alt.i.tude the snow fog had lightened to gray mist which left the Indian less troubled. His silent blasphemy against the powers that ruled the storm ebbed gently. Its flood had pa.s.sed. That was his way.
The wall on his right was a sure guide, and at the end of it lay the haven where he hoped to eat and sleep. So long as he could see he had no fear whatsoever of the country to which he was born.
But with all this confidence the dangers were no less. The track sloped perilously towards the edge of the precipice on the left. It narrowed, too, so that there was no room for more than two people abreast. Leo understood these things, as only a man can whose mind is beset with dread for the safety of his possessions. Therefore there was something fierce and threatening in his sudden shout at the man who was leading the dogs. There was something else in it, too. There was a terrible fear, which sounded strangely in a man of his strength of purpose.
"Stop! Curse you, stop the dogs!" he cried wildly.
The shout brought the dogs to a stand, and the Indian dropped back.
"What is?" he demanded. But he needed no answer.
The tail of the sled was at the very brink of the precipice, supported only by the thrust of Leo"s gee-pole, to which he clung with all the strength of his great body.
The Indian and the woman flung themselves to the rescue, and, in a few moments, the sled was resting safely at the inner side of the path.
Then the Indian, as though imparting pleasant intelligence, a.s.sured his comrade.
"It more skid, bimeby," he observed confidently. "It worse--bimeby," he added, turning again to the dogs. "Mush on, you devils!" he cried.
"Maybe we freeze."
There was no longer any ease of mind for the whiteman. Time and again the sled skidded, and each time he saved it from destruction only by inches. That stretch of level became a nightmare to him, and only the pa.s.sionate endeavor of his labor made his nervous tension bearable. His pole was at work every foot of the way, guiding, staying, holding that incessant skid.
So they struggled on, floundering their way yard by yard, the dumb burden bearers fighting for a foothold at every step. It almost seemed as if they, too, understood their own danger from the skid, and were driven by their apprehension to unaccustomed efforts. They tore at the unyielding surface of ice with claws broken and bleeding, and, by sheer tenacity, ground out a purchase.
The drop to the woodland valley below was nearing. Si-wash called a warning to the man behind.
"We near come by end," he shouted. "Then him go down lak h.e.l.l."
With this brief information the whiteman had to be content, for Si-wash promptly returned to his dogs, and finally took his place at the head of the sled. Presently the sled jolted. It tilted forward as the leading dogs of the team vanished down the slope. Then, in a moment, the run began.
The change came all too suddenly. The sled gained a furious impetus.
Leo dashed forward to thrust a brake at its head. Si-wash was already there with his pole thrust deep in the snow. The two men joined forces, and, for a moment, the pace was steadied.
Then something happened. It was disaster; the worst disaster that could have befallen at such a moment. Leo"s pole, strained possibly by the work it had already done, bent. It cracked; and broke off short. In a moment he was left behind sprawling in the snow. Before Si-wash could readjust his pole to the center of the nose of the sled the vehicle swung out stern first. It swept on at a great speed, and the dogs raced to keep out of its way. In another moment its impetus carried it to the brink of the precipice. It swept on, half poised in mid-air. Then, with a clatter and scrunch, it fell over the side, almost sweeping the heavy dogs from their feet.
It was a desperate situation. The straining dogs held for the moment by reason of their great weight, and in that moment the Indian and the woman were able to reach them and throw their own weight into the balance. Even then it was a desperate uncertainty. Could they hold it?
Could they recover the fallen vehicle carrying such an enormous weight?
But the problem solved itself in its own way. Just as the great figure of Leo loomed up on the scene of the disaster, the strain on the traces slackened, and the dogs were left standing still. There was no longer need to struggle.
Si-wash rose from the ground and released his hold.
"Wot is"t?" he asked, in a stupid way.
Leo was leaning over the edge of the precipice, gazing down with eyes that strained to behold the safety of that which he most prized in all the world. He made no answer.
Si-wash came to his side. He dropped upon his stomach and peered down at the gray depths beneath. For a long while he was silent. Then, at last, as his companion stirred, he spoke in the curiously indifferent manner of his kind.
"The pack. Him haf gone. Him drop long way."
Leo was on his feet before he had finished speaking. He turned away and looked out into the gray fog. Presently he glanced down at the man beside him. Then his eyes rested on the dogs. Audie, watching him, saw a strained, dreadful expression growing in his eyes. There was a subtle fire lighting them; a fire she dreaded to look upon.
Then he began to speak. And as he spoke a wild, untamed, impotent fury swept through his head, sweeping away all thought, all reason. Words, foul, blasphemous, raving, leaped to his tongue and found expression.
He cursed the Indian; he cursed the woman, the dogs, the sled. He cursed the storm and the country. He cursed furiously, impotently every form of life that came within the range of his distorted vision. He cursed his G.o.d.
CHAPTER III
THE DRIVING FORCE
Through the tattered pinewood branches the northern sun"s cold rays sought to light the gloomy aisles below. It was like the furtive peeping of curious eyes into mysteries forbidden. On the ragged outskirts its staring light had power; but within the dim recesses it was swallowed up, devoured by the impenetrable gloom of ages, where the woodland depths refused to yield their secrets.
Yet these woods were the haven of many a weary traveler. Since ever the foot of man had trod the watershed, none had failed to seek shelter amid these stately shadows; and at all times they lent a sure retreat before winter"s storms to the lesser animal life. No storm could search the deepening valleys; no blizzard could more than stir the mighty canopy; no roar of wind could break the grave-like silence, just as no sunlight had ever yet solved the riddle of its impenetrable heart.
Two men and a woman sat huddled over a crackling fire, at a spot where dozens of fires had burned before. It was cold, bitterly cold, even here where the fierce winds had scarcely power to stir the air. But, even so, the cold could not add one iota to the icy misery of, at least, two of those who watched the miserable effort of the fire to achieve where ages of sunlight had failed.
Beyond the rays of the firelight the meager paraphernalia of a camp loomed up in the twilight. A low tent of rough-tanned hides had been carefully pitched. It was a stout enough shelter of crude Indian workmanship, and it doubtless served its purpose well in a land of storm such as these northern heights of the world. Near by was an up-turned sled in the course of repair, and again the stout crudeness of workmanship bespoke the Indian hand. The long, rawhide traces were strung out upon the bed of pine-cones and needles which covered the ground, just where the harness had been flung from the shoulders of the weary dogs, who squatted about between their human masters, staring and blinking at the pleasant warmth of the fire with luxurious confidence.
The men were silent, and the woman watched one of them with anxious, troubled eyes. She was longing to speak, to say something that might salve the wounded heart of her lover. But there was nothing, nothing, she knew, that would ease his pain, and restore to his burning, despairing eyes their wonted look of masterful confidence. She knew that, for the time, at least, hope had been hurled from its high pedestal in his heart, and it was beyond her puny woman"s strength to restore it to its setting. She yearned to comfort as only a loving woman can, but she was far too well versed in the curiosities of Leo"s dominant, almost violent nature, not to realize the futility of such an effort.
So she watched him with hopeless gaze. She saw the fixed stare of his bloodshot eyes boring unseeingly into the pitiful embers of fire. She saw the thick veins standing out upon his temples, and understood the pa.s.sionate regret and resentment driving him; and as she watched these things, estimating them in her own timid way, she wondered and marveled at the power of gold upon the human heart, and at the terrible effect its loss could have on a strong man"s mind.
While she watched the brooding figure her mind went back to the moment of disaster when the sled had fallen. For just as long as she lived those moments would remain vividly in her memory. When Leo had discovered that half the load had torn itself from its fastenings, and had been swallowed up by yawning depths below he went suddenly demented. She knew it. Never in her life had she witnessed so dreadful a change in anybody. Even now the impotent, almost idiotic ravings and cursings of the man rang in her ears. It was terrible. She shuddered at the recollection. Then what followed was no less horrible to one who had always known her lover for a sober-minded, purposeful man. In the midst of the storm, with the wind raging about them, and the gray fog blinding their eyes, he had stood by threatening her, and refusing to raise a hand in the task of saving the wreck with its remaining half of the cargo.
The toil of those hours. The weary hopeless toil. And it had been accomplished by the Indian and herself under the shadow of this man"s insane threats against them both. Once during their struggle, just when the sled was almost within reach of safety she had been driven in self-defence, and in defence of the faithful Si-wash, to hold the maniac at bay under cover of a revolver, whilst the task was completed.
Her life had been strangely checkered, she had pa.s.sed through many adventures that rarely befall a woman belonging to the life of civilized communities, but the worst moments she had ever known were incomparable with that struggle on the brink of, for all she knew, an unfathomable chasm.
The shadow of that struggle was still upon her. She could not shake it off. She was dreading every pa.s.sing moment, longing to hear the calm tones of her lover she was used to, but fearing lest the insanity inspired by the loss of his gold had not yet pa.s.sed.
So she waited, watching, watching for the sign that was to tell her of the easing of the straining brain, watching the dreadful stare of his eyes, as they gazed upon nothing of what they beheld, with a brain lost in a terrible contemplation of the hideous thoughts pa.s.sing behind them.
Si-wash was silent, too. But that was his way, the way of his race. His impa.s.sive face yielded no indication of what was pa.s.sing behind it. If he feared his companion"s mood he gave no sign. Possibly he did not.
Possibly he realized that here, here on the wild, chaotic trail he was master; certainly that his chances were equal with the other.
The fire burned low. Si-wash kicked the embers together with his moccasined foot. Then he rose and shuffled to the wood pile and replenished it. For a moment he watched the flicker of the flames as they licked round the dead, inflammable bark, and in desperation Audie broke the awful silence.