Chapter I
I
The great spring rush down the Black Elk River to the gold-fields of Discovery had begun.
From the town of Nugget, where they had passed the winter, a great host of fortune-seekers, lured thither by the call of Greed from the four corners of the earth, was now on the move. The surface of the river was white with their sails, black with their hulls. Hector, commanding the Mounted Police in Black Elk Territory, sat on a hill above Nugget and watched the fleet set out. Like Moses, he meditated over his innumerable flock of tenderfeet as they passed in review below him.
The backbone, veins, arteries, in fact the whole organism of the Territory centred in the Black Elk River. Rising at Lake Nugget, near the city of that name, the Black Elk ran into Lake Fortune, a fair day's sail to the north, bumped down a half-dozen dangerous rapids, swept through several sword-cut canyons, eased to a jog-trot, broadening comfortably the while and so, becoming ever more placid, ever more imposing, tumbled itself at last into Northern seas, a thousand miles away. Four hundred miles from Nugget, Discovery Creek contributed its quota of waters to the majestic river and at the mouth of the creek stood Discovery City. A chain of gigantic mountains, cleft on the coast side only by a single entrance, Hopeful Pass, walled in the Black Elk country from the Western sea and threw almost insuperable obstacles in the way of any attempt to reach the Territory by land from the civilized Canada to the south, while the country between the mountains and the coast, wherein lay the town of Prospect, on the sea-board, belonged to the United States. So Hector was isolated in the Black Elk country; with Hopeful Pass as his Thermopylae.
Two classes of people inhabited this tremendous Territory: the original prospectors or pioneers, and the fortune-hunters or newcomers. The pioneers were a mere handful, long established, grown old and seared in the service of the North, some firmly settled in the new gold area, the rest working claims or seeking strikes in ones and twos all over the Territory. The newcomers, the tenderfeet, outnumbering the old hands by hundreds, the adventurers now on their way to the gold-fields or struggling up through Hopeful Pass In the rear-guard of the advance—these were the people with whom Hector had most to deal.
Only a strong, stern, sane administration could guide and govern such a crowd as this. It represented every nationality, creed and race on earth. When the Archangel blows his trumpet to summon all men to judgment on the Last Day, he will simply reproduce, on a larger scale, the gathering then in progress in Black Elk Territory. There was in this gigantic mob no harmony, no discipline, no uniformity. It was one only in its arrogance, its greed and its ignorance. Hector knew its weaknesses well. He had seen it swindled, robbed and murdered by the Prospect gangsters. He had watched it fighting to make headway on the trail to Hopeful Pass, with dogs it could not drive, pack-horses it could not pack, tools it could not handle. He had seen it freezing in scanty clothing, starving on luxuries that should have been necessities, dying of weakness and disease, quarreling for precedence, fighting for life with 'six-guns' against thugs who made an end of the fight when it pleased them. He had heard it shout for joy when it won at last to the Mounted Police post on the summit of the Pass, sighted the Union Jack and scarlet coats which symbolized Law and Order, put away its weapons as no longer necessary and pushed on through the entry as though it went through the pearly gates, from Hell to Heaven. He had watched it settling down to spend its miserable winter. And, last of all, that morning, when the ice was finally departed, he had seen it embark—men, women in tights, children, dogs, ponies, cattle, goats, equipment and supplies—and rejoicingly set sail on the closing leg of its desperate journey.
With his men, he had played father, mother and big brother to this extraordinary conglomeration through all the winter, from the moment of their entry into Canadian country. He had now to see them safely to Discovery and to safeguard their interests and the country's interests when they got there.
For this engaging task, he had at his command unlimited authority and two hundred men—two hundred men among thirty thousand, two hundred men in a territory the size of France; unlimited authority, his own ability, two hundred men and the prestige of the Mounted Police.
He mentally ran over the dispositions he had made:
At Hopeful Pass, holding the keys to Heaven against all Hell, one Corporal St. Peter surnamed Dunsmuir with a dozen wingless buck policemen; at Pioneer Lake and Lake Miner—in the mountain chain cutting off Black Elk Territory from the civilized Canada to the south—at Nugget City and the town of Lucky, north of Lake Nugget, and at Discovery Creek—to name the more important points—were other detachments; posts at intervals along the Black Elk above and below Discovery City; and, in barracks at Discovery City, headquarters, the jail and what was left of his two hundred.
Their duties: general maintenance and enforcement of the law, with all it meant; imposition of punishments; arbitration of any dispute, from a fight involving life and death to one involving the possession of a can-opener; care of the sick and destitute; burial of the dead; collection of taxes, Government royalty on gold, and of customs at Hopeful Pass; relaying the mails from post to post or escorting them by steamer to the seagoing vessel at Prospect; guarding and escorting gold deposits; and running the boats of the ignorant herd through the rapids so that no lives might be lost.
The detachments, in order to carry out all these jobs, must travel immense distances in the heat of summer or depth of winter, take their lives in their hands at least once a day and, for the rest of the time, enjoy the delights of camping in leaking, wind-swept tents, flooded inches deep, pitched in the trough of sunless valleys or on the bleak flanks of frozen mountains; while they received, for their pains, an average stipend of under a dollar a day and were not allowed to stake claims.
The command was no task for a weakling. Hector remembered what the Commissioner had said in sending him to take that command six months before: 'It's the last bit of true pioneering this country will see, Adair. Carry it through, and you'll have played a part in the whole show, from the settlement of the North-West to the end. It will be a big job—one of the biggest we've ever done—this job I'm giving you; but it will be a splendid thing in the way of a crowning achievement to all you've done already. Make it a credit to yourself and Canada.'
The 'big job' was now at hand. The spring rush marked its advent. The winter had been only the prelude. Hector, watching the boats from the hill above Nugget, sensed the coming battle.
Tomorrow he would return to Discovery, there to fight it out.
Dusk hiding the fleet at last from his eyes, he walked down to the rough shanty in Nugget where Cranbrook had his headquarters.
"Corporal Dunsmuir reports a distinguished visitor arrived at Hopeful Pass, sir." Cranbrook greeted him as he reached the door. "At present he's taking a breather but will move on to Discovery in a few days."
"Who is it?" asked Hector.
"Molyneux—the M.P.," answered Cranbrook.
II
"Major Adair, this is Mr. Steven Molyneux," said the Lieutenant-Governor of Black Elk Territory. "I think you've met before, haven't you?"
A week had passed since Hector had watched the commencement of the great spring rush. In the Lieutenant-Governor's office in Discovery City, he shook hands with his enemy.
The Lieutenant-Governor offered chairs and cigars. There was an awkward pause. Gentleman as he was, he hastened to fill it.
"Mr. Molyneux had a pretty tough time on the way up here, Adair," he said.
"I tell you, Mr. Lancaster," the member for Broncho agreed, "I was never so glad to see the Old Flag as when I got to the top of Hopeful Pass. That place Prospect is beyond description. Everything was wide open and, while I was there, gun-fights through the streets every hour of the twenty-four. I saw fellows lying dead by the roadside with their pockets turned inside out. If it hadn't been for your Police being with me, I'd have been robbed sure. What a contrast between here and there! They say that Greasy Jones just runs Prospect. He must be a corker."
"He is."
"Don't let him in here."
"Don't worry," said Hector. "He daren't cross the line."
"There's some pretty tough birds in Discovery, all the same. Can you handle 'em?"
The Lieutenant-Governor put in his oar.
"I'm sure we can leave that to Major Adair," he said. "There'll be no reproductions of Prospect in Canadian territory while he's here."
"Excuse me, Major Adair." The politician smiled. "I don't mean to be critical. I guess my nerves have been scraped the wrong way in the past few days, that's all."
Hector answered diplomatic smile with smile.
"That's all right, Mr. Molyneux. How long are you here for? We must try to make your stay as pleasant as possible."
"Oh, don't worry about me, Major. I'm here for a good long time. I'm just making a private visit, of course—going to have a look 'round and size things up in this wonderful country. I might try to get in on a good thing if I see it, needless to add."
"Quite naturally," said Hector.
The conversation languished. The Lieutenant-Governor, to enliven it a little, went into the next room in search of liquid refreshment.
Hector was alone with Welland for the first time in many, many months.
"This gives me a good opportunity, Adair," said the politician, as soon as Lancaster had gone, "to say something I've been wanting to say ever since I got here. I really am up here just to look around. I've not come up here to spy on you—or worry you. I know just what a hell of a job you have before you and I'm not going to make it harder for you. I've every confidence in your ability to run this show right. I want bygones to be bygones. I guess I was wrong in the past. It's a hard pill for me to swallow, this. I'm a proud man, but—well, what d'you say?"
This halting declaration surprised Hector.
"You can rely on me to play the straight game, Molyneux," he answered. "My duty up here is to look after the interests of the country and community—nothing else. I've no quarrel with any man who keeps the law."
The Lieutenant-Governor returned before they could say more.
"I hope you don't think I was indiscreet, Adair?" Lancaster queried anxiously, when the visitor had taken his departure. "I know all about Molyneux's efforts to knife you in the past; but you see——"
"Well, we had to meet some time," Hector soothed him. "So why not under your roof? Where better?"
"Exactly," said Lancaster, much relieved. "And he can't hurt you here, Adair—while I'm around."
"Oh, that's all over now," Hector replied. "We've just cried quits."
"Splendid!" exclaimed the Lieutenant-Governor.
III
At three o'clock in the morning, when Hector was able for the first time to spare a thought to Welland, he pondered awhile.
His enemy's arrival in Black Elk Territory was a serious thing. Though Welland's attempt to crush him through the Whitewash Bill affair had failed at the eleventh hour, he knew very well that the Commissioner had sent him to the gold area not merely in order to promote him, but mainly to safeguard him against any further attacks. Hector's successful handling of Whitewash Bill had made Welland a laughing-stock and the Commissioner had feared that the result would mean further and greater danger for Hector. He had never dreamt that Mr. Steven Molyneux, M.P., would follow Hector to such a remote point. And Mr. Molyneux—well, here he was!
His purpose? To size up things, to get in on the gold claims, to look around—decidedly, yes. To make Hector's administration—already difficult, as he had admitted—as difficult as possible, or at least to watch that administration, gather together all observations tending to injure Hector, and then to use them at Ottawa for his removal—again, yes; and a thousand times, yes! Hector had not been deceived by the friendly overtures of the afternoon. His enemy had come to Discovery to plot his ruin. Hector was certain of that. After all, why should Welland quit at this stage? If he had desired to revenge himself on Hector or put him out of the way before, he was far more likely to have that desire now. Hector had forced him to eat humble-pie before all Canada. Yet Welland, by this time, had become a dominating figure in Western Canadian politics. Hector was isolated in Black Elk Territory and unable to move from it, while Welland could go to Ottawa when he wished and there bring about his downfall. Welland had never been in a better position to fight the fight, never in a better position to win the fight, than he was at this moment.
At the same time, Hector could have found no better arena for the last struggle than that of Black Elk Territory. Why? Because, in Black Elk Territory he was a power on a far superior footing to Welland, whose status was only that of a private individual. With the Lieutenant-Governor, his firm friend, he held an almost absolute authority. Even Welland, so long as he remained in the Territory, was entirely dependent on Hector for protection—an ironical situation for one who had so often attacked the Police! If Hector went down here, he was doomed to go down anywhere!
What were Welland's real plans? Time would soon tell.
At this point Hector went to sleep on it.