So the boy swung McDougall's team into the canyon, and his own dogs followed, with O'Brien fast to the tail rope. On and on led the narrow trail—westward, and upward, winding and twisting between its rocky walls—but always westward, and upward. The floor was surprisingly smooth for so narrow a trail, and the outfit made good time, but all three expected that each turn would be the last, and that they would find the runaway dogs huddled against a dead end. Toward midday, the canyon grew lighter, the walls seemed not so high, and the ascent grew steeper. Suddenly, as they rounded a sharp turn, a brilliant patch of sunlight burst upon them, and the next moment they found themselves upon the summit of a long divide.
Never in their lives had any of the three gazed upon so welcome a sight, for there, to the westward, lay an unending chaos of high-flung peaks and narrow valleys, and easily traceable—leading in a broad path of white to the south-westward, was the smooth trail of a river!
"The Kandik!" cried Connie, "and Alaska!"
"H-o-o-r-a-y!" yelled O'Brien, dancing about in the snow, while the tears streamed unheeded from his eyes. "Ut's good-bye Lillimuit, foriver! Av ye wuz pure gold from th' middle av th' wor-rld to th' peak av ye're hoighest hill, Oi w'dn't niver go no closter thin th' furthest away Oi c'd git from ye! A-h-r-o-o! Wid ye're dead min—an' ye're cowld!"
CHAPTER XIX
ON THE KANDIK
To the conqueror of far places comes disaster in many guises—to the sailor who sails the uncharted seas, and to the adventurer who pushes past the outposts into the unmapped land of the long snow trails. For the lone, drear lands are lands of primal things—lands rugged and grim, where life is the right of the strongest and only the fit survive.
Men die when ships, in the grip of the fierce hurricane, are buried beneath crashing waves or dashed against the rocks of a towering cliff; and men die in blizzards and earthquakes and in the belching fire of volcanoes and amid the roar and smoke of burning forests—but these men expect to die. They match their puny strength against the mighty fury of the elements and meet death gladly—or win through to glory in the adventure. Such battles with the giants of nature strike no horror to the hearts of men—they are recounted with a laugh. Not so the death that lurks where nature smiles. Calm waters beneath their sparkling surface conceal sharp fangs of rock that rip the bottom from an unsuspecting ship; a beautiful mirage paints upon the shimmering horizon a picture of cool, green shade and crystal pools, and thirst-choked men are lured farther into the springless desert; the smooth, velvety surface of quicksand pits and "soap-holes" beguiles the unsuspecting feet of the weary traveller; and the warm Chinook wind softens the deep snow beneath a smiling winter sky. In all these things is death—a sardonic, derisive death that lurks unseen and unsuspected for its prey. But the claws of the tiger are none the less sharp because concealed between soft pads. And the men who win through the unseen death never recount their story with a laugh. These men are silent. Or, if they speak at all, it is in low, tense tones, with clenched fists, and many pauses between the words, and into their eyes creeps the look of unveiled horror.
Connie Morgan, Waseche Bill, and O'Brien laboriously worked the outfit down the steep trail that led from the divide to the snow-buried surface of the Kandik. The distance, in an air line, was possibly three miles—by the steep and winding caribou trail it was ten. And each mile was a mile of gruelling toil with axe and shovel and tail-rope and brake-pole, for the snow lay deep upon the trail which twisted and doubled interminably, narrowing in places to a mere shelf high upon the side of a sheer rock wall. At such spots Connie and O'Brien took turns with axe and shovel, heaving the snow into the canyon; for to venture upon the drifts, high-piled upon the edge of the precipice, would have been to invite instant disaster.