CHAPTER XV
THE FROZEN NORTH
A bitter wind swept the snowy prairie and the cold was arctic when Clarke, shivering in his furs, came into sight of his homestead as he walked back from Sweetwater. He had gone there for his mail, which included an English newspaper, and had taken supper at the hotel. It was now about two hours after dark, but a full moon hung in the western sky, and the cluster of wooden buildings formed a shadowy blur on the glittering plain. There was no fence, not a tree to break the white expanse that ran back to the skyline, and it struck Clarke that the place looked very dreary.
He walked on, with the fine, dry snow the wind whipped up glistening on his furs. On reaching the homestead, he went first to the stable—built of sod, which was cheaper and warmer than sawed lumber—and, lighting a lantern, fed his teams. The heavy Clydesdales and lighter driving horses were all valuable, for Clarke was a successful farmer and had found that the purchase of the best animals and implements led to economy; though it was said that he seldom paid the full market price for them. He had walked home because it was impossible to keep warm driving; and he now felt tired and morose. The man had passed his prime and was beginning to find the labor he had never shirked more irksome than it had been. He dispensed with a hired hand in winter, when there was less to be done, for Clarke neglected no opportunity 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, where he had spent some time, it was depressing to come back to the empty dwelling, and he was glad that he had saved himself the task of getting supper. Shaking the snow from his furs, he lighted the lamp and filled up the stove before he sat down wearily. The small room was not a cheerful place in which to spend the winter nights alone. Walls and floor were uncovered and were roughly boarded with heat-cracked lumber; the stove was rusty, and gave out a smell of warm iron, while a black distillate had dripped from its pipe. There were, however, several well-filled bookcases and one or two comfortable chairs,
Clarke lighted his pipe and, drawing his seat as near the stove as possible, opened the English newspaper, which contained some news that interested him. A short paragraph stated that Captain Bertram Challoner, then stationed at Delhi, had received an appointment which would shortly necessitate his return from India. This, Clarke imagined, might be turned to good account; but the matter demanded thought, and for a long time he sat motionless, deeply pondering. His farming had prospered, though the bare and laborious life had tried him hard; and he had made some money by more questionable means, lending to unfortunate neighbors at extortionate interest and foreclosing on their possessions. No defaulter got any mercy at his hands, and shrewd sellers of seed and implements took precautions when they dealt with him.
His money, however, would not last him long if he returned to England and attempted to regain a footing in his profession, and he had daringly schemed to increase it. Glancing across the room, his eyes rested with a curious smile on one of the bookcases. It contained works on hypnotism, telepathy, and psychological speculations in general; he had studied some of them with ironical amusement and others with a quickening of his interest. Amid much that he thought of as sterile chaff he saw germs of truth; and once or twice he had been led to the brink of a startling discovery. There the elusive clue had failed him, though he felt that strange secrets might be revealed some day.
After all, the books had served his purpose, as well as kept him from brooding when he sat alone at nights while the icy wind howled round his dwelling. He passed for a sage and something of a prophet with the primitive 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 London willing to venture a few hundred pounds on his scheme; but the amount was insufficient and the terms were exacting. It would pay him better to get rid of his associates. He was growing old; it would be too late to return to his former life unless he could do so soon; but he must make a fair start with ample means. The man had no scruples and no illusions; money well employed would buy him standing and friends. People were charitable to a man who had something to offer them; and the 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 the venture was put on the market. He had failed to extort any from Challoner; but he might be more successful with his son. The man who was weak enough to allow his cousin to suffer for his fault would no doubt yield to judicious pressure. It was fortunate that Bertram Challoner was coming to England, where he could more easily be reached. This led Clarke to think of Blake, for he realized that Challoner was right in pointing out that the man was his greatest difficulty. If Blake maintained that the fault was his, nothing could be done; it was therefore desirable that he should be kept out of the way. There was another person to whom the same applied. Clarke had preyed on Benson's weakness; but if the fellow had overcome it and should return to farm industriously, his exploitation would no longer be possible. On the other hand, if he failed to pay off his debts, Clarke saw how he could with much advantage seize his possessions. Thus both Blake and Benson were obstacles; and now that they had ventured into the icy North it would be better if they did not reappear.
Clarke refilled his pipe, and his face wore a sinister look as he took down a rather sketchy map of the wilds beyond the prairie belt. After studying it keenly, he sank into an attitude of concentrated thought. The stove crackled, its pipe glowing red; driving snow lashed the shiplap walls; and the wind moaned drearily about the house. Its occupant, however, was oblivious to his surroundings. He sat very still in his chair, with pouches under his fixed eyes and his lips set tight. He looked malignant and dangerous. Perhaps his mental attitude was not quite normal; for close study and severe physical toil, coupled with free indulgence, had weakened him; there were drugs to which he was addicted; and he had long been possessed by one fixed idea. By degrees it had become a mania; and he would stick at nothing that might help him to carry out his purpose.
When at last he got up, with a shiver, to throw wood into the stove, he thought he saw how his object could be secured.
A month before Clarke spent the evening thinking about them, Blake and his comrades camped at sunset in a belt of small spruces near the edge of the open waste that runs back to the Polar Sea. They were worn and hungry, for the shortage of provisions had been a constant trouble, and such supplies as they obtained from Indians, who seldom had much to spare, soon ran out. Once or twice they had feasted royally after shooting a big bull moose, but the frozen meat they were able to carry did 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 close beside a fire, with their ragged blankets wrapped round them, they could not keep warm. Harding and Benson were openly dejected, but Blake had somehow preserved his cheerful serenity. As usual after finishing their scanty supper, they began to talk, for during the day conversation 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 the forests of Michigan. Guess there's something wrong with my theory about the effects of extreme cold." He took a larger lump from a neat leather case. "This is the genuine article, and it's certainly the product of a coniferous tree. The fellow I got it from said it was found in the coldest parts of North America. Seems to me we have tried all the varieties of the firs, but we're as far from finding what we want 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 was in India I once got some incense which was brought down in small quantities from the Himalayas, and, I understood, came from near the snow-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 smell I thought I ought to know when I brought Clarke out of the tepee. I know 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; and
I guess he's struck it."
"Then he's lucky; but his good fortune doesn't concern us, and we have other things to think about. What are you going to do, now that we don'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 grit to tell her we're poorer than when I left. She wouldn't complain; but when you have to live on a small commission that's hard to make, it's the woman who meets the bill."
Blake made a sign of sympathy. He had never shared Harding's confidence in the success of his search, and had joined in it from love of adventure and a warm liking for his comrade.
"Well," he said, "I have no means except a small allowance which is so tied up that it's difficult to borrow anything on it; but it's at your disposal, 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 on my 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't take your offer when you first made it, and I can't do so now that my plan's a failure. Anyway, we're doing some useless talking, because I don't see how we're to go on prospecting, or get south again, when we have only three or four days' food in hand."
He stated an unpleasant truth which the others had characteristically shirked, for Blake was often careless, and Benson had taken the risks of the journey with frank indifference. After nearly starving once or twice, they had succeeded in getting fresh supplies; but now their hearts sank: as they thought of the expanse of frozen wilderness that lay between them and the settlements.
"Well," said Blake, "there's a Hudson Bay factory somewhere to the east of 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 are furs to be got. There will no doubt be Indians trapping in the neighborhood, 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 out with a short laugh.
This was undeniable, and neither of his companions answered. They were unkempt, worn out, and ragged; and in the past week they had traveled a long way through fresh snow on short rations. Ahead of them lay a vast and almost untrodden desolation; behind them a rugged wilderness which there seemed no probability of their being able to cross. Lured by the hope of finding what they sought, they had pushed on from point to point; 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 country they generally haunt. The sooner we look for one, the better; so I may as well start at once. There'll be a moon to-night."
He threw off his blanket and, picking up a Marlin rifle, which was their only weapon, strode out of camp; and as he was a good shot and tracker they let him go. It was getting dark when he left the shelter of 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, its whiteness changed to a soft blue-gray. In the distance scattered bluffs rose in long dark smears; but there was nothing to indicate which way Blake should turn, and he had no reason to believe there was a caribou near the camp. As a matter of fact, they had found the larger deer remarkably scarce.
Blake was tired, after breaking the trail since sunrise, and the snow was loose beneath his big net shoes, but he plodded toward the farthest bluff, feeling that he was largely to blame for the party's difficulties. Knowing something of the country, he should have insisted on turning back when he found they could obtain no dog teams to transport their supplies. Occasionally Hudson Bay agents and patrols 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 now he supposed that he must take the consequences. This did not daunt him badly. After all, life had not much to offer an outcast; he had managed to extract some amusement from it, but he had nothing to look forward to. There was no prospect of his making money—his talents were not commercial—and the hardships he could bear now would press on him more heavily as he grew older.
These considerations, however, were too philosophical for him to dwell on. He was essentially a man of action, and was feeling unpleasantly hungry, and he quickened his pace, knowing that the chance of his getting a shot at a caribou in the open was small.
The moon had not risen when he reached the bluff, but the snow reflected a faint light and he noticed a row of small depressions on its surface. Kneeling down, he examined them, but there had been wind during the day and the marks were blurred. He felt for a match, but his fingers were too numbed to open the watertight case, and he proceeded to measure the distance between the footprints. This was an unreliable test, as a big deer's stride varies with its pace, but he thought the tracks indicated a caribou. Then he stopped, without rising, and looked about.
Near in front the trees rose in a shadowy wall against the clear blue sky; there was no wind, and it was oppressively still; the darkness of the woods was impenetrable and its silence daunting. The row of tracks was the only sign of life Blake had seen for days.
While he listened, a faint howl came out of the distance, and was followed 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 flesh crept as he wondered whether, they were on his trail. On the whole, it did not seem likely, though they might get scent of him. Rising to his feet, he felt that the rifle magazine was full before he set off at his highest speed.
The snow was loose, however, and his shoes packed and sank; his breath got shorter, and he began to feel distressed. There was no sound behind him; but that somehow increased his uneasiness, and now and then he anxiously turned his head. Nothing moved on the sweep of blue-gray shadow; and he pressed on, knowing how poor his speed was compared with that the wolves were capable of making. At last, with keen satisfaction, he saw a flicker of light break out from the dark mass of a bluff ahead, and a few minutes later he came, breathing hard, into camp.
"You haven't stayed out long," Benson observed. "I suppose you saw nothing?"
"I heard wolves," Blake answered dryly. "You had better gather wood enough to keep a big fire going, because I've no doubt they'll pick up my trail. However, it's a promising sign."
"I guess we could do without it," Hording broke in. "I've no use for wolves."
"They must live on something," Blake said. "Since they're here, there are probably moose or caribou in the neighborhood. I'll have another try to-morrow."
"But the wolves!"
"They're not so bold in daylight. Anyway, it seems to me we must take some 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.