CHAPTER XVII
THE SNOW TRAIL
The situation faced by Connie Morgan, Waseche Bill, and O'Brien whenthey headed westward across the snow-ridden bench of the Lillimuit, wasanything but encouraging. Before them, they knew, lay Alaska. But howmany unmapped miles, and what barriers of frozen desert andinsurmountable mountains interposed, they did not know; nor did theyknow the location of the Kandik, the river by which Carlson had returnedto the land of men. For Carlson's trail map lay hidden in the pocket ofO'Brien's discarded trousers in an _igloo_ in the village of the WhiteIndians, and upon their own worth must the three win--or die.
There was no turning back now. No returning to the Ignatook to facestarvation and the melting of the snow, for the solitary Indian whowitnessed their departure had dashed to the village, bearing theinformation to his tribe.
If O'Brien were right in his conjecture that the Indians would notventure into the open in a storm, there would, in all probability, beseveral days in which to escape, for Arctic storms are rarely of shortduration. This seeming advantage, however, was offset by the fact that,at best, the storm would seriously impede their own progress, and atworst--well, if the worst happened, it would make no smallest particleof difference whether the White Indians picked up their trail soon, orlate.
After the first fierce rush had passed, the storm lulled and settledinto a steady drive of wind-hurled pellets that cut the thick air inlong, stinging slants. The dry, shot-like particles burned and bit atthe faces of the three, and danced and whirled merrily across the hardsurface of the snow to drift deep against obstructions. The dogs were infine condition, well fed, and thoroughly rested during the days ofinactivity, and they strung out to the pull with a will. The trail wasfast. The hard crust of the old snow gave excellent footing and thethree heavily loaded sleds slipped smoothly and steadily in the wake ofWaseche Bill, who piloted the expedition at a long, swinging trot, withConnie and O'Brien running beside their respective sleds.
It was well past noon when the start was made, and the thick gloom of astarless night settled upon the storm-swept bench as the littlecavalcade reached O'Brien's "bit av a mountain," and swung into theshelter of the thicket upon its lee side. The dogs were unharnessed andfed, a fire lighted, and a snug camp sprang into existence under thedeft movements of the experienced _tillicums_.
"'Tis a foine shtar-rt we've made," said O'Brien, as he poured meltedsuet over the caribou steak upon his tin plate, "but they'll be lookin'f'r us here, f'r they've dhrug me out av th' scrub on this hill a fulldozen av toimes."
"We'll hit the trail at daylight," answered Waseche Bill.
"Ut slues to th' Narth a bit from here. Oi've thr-ravelled th' nixt tinmoile or so, but beyant that Oi've niver be'n able to git."
All night the hard, dry snow fell, and all night the wind swept out ofthe North with a low, monotonous roar. By the light of the flaring firethey breakfasted, and at the first hint of dawn again took the trail. Adreary scene confronted the little party that pulled heavily out of thesheltered thicket. All about them was the whirling, driving whiteness,and beneath their feet the loose, dry snow shifted and they sank ankledeep into the yielding mass. The sleds pulled hard, so that the dogsclawed for footing, and the snowshoes were placed conveniently upon thetop of the packs, for soon the rackets would be necessary in the fastdeepening snow.
O'Brien insisted that the trail "slued to the Narth a bit," and as therewas nothing for it but to follow the Irishman's vague direction,Waseche changed the course, a proceeding that added materially to thediscomfort of the journey, as it forced them to travel more nearly intothe teeth of the wind. At noon a halt was made for luncheon and a briefrest in the shelter of the close-drawn sleds. During the last hour thecharacter of the storm had changed and the wind whipped upon them inveering gusts that struck furiously from every point of the compass atonce. The snow, too, changed, and the hard, dry pellets gave place to afine, powdery snow-dust that filled the eyes and nostrils and workeduncomfortably beneath the clothing. Snow-shoes were fastened on, andwith lowered heads and muffled faces the three headed again into theunknown.
With the coming of darkness, they camped at the fork of a frozen riverwhere a sparse growth of stunted willow gave promise of firewood andscant shelter. They were in a new world, now--a world, trackless andunknown, for during the afternoon they had passed beyond O'Brien'sfarthest venture and the Irishman was as ignorant of what lay beforethem as were Connie and Waseche Bill, who knew only that they were inthe midst of a trackless void of seething snow, with the White Indiansbehind them and Alaska before--and all about them, death, grim andsilent, and gaunt--death that stalked close, ready on the instant totake its toll, as it had taken its toll from other men who had bravedthe Lillimuit and never again returned.
"She's a _reg'lah_ blizzahd, now," remarked Waseche, as he lighted hispipe with a brand from the camp-fire. "Any otheh time, we'd lay by an'wait fo' it to weah down--but, we dastn't stop."
"The Indians will never pick up our trail when this storm quits,"ventured Connie.
"No--'ceptin' they're wise that we-all tuck out this-away, havin'followed O'Brien almost this fah befo'."
"Aye--her-re, or her-re abouts," assented the Irishman, "we nadean-nyways wan mor-re day av thrailin' before we hole up, an' me'be bethat toime th' star-rm will be wor-re out."
On the morning of the third day they again started in the dull grey ofthe dawn. Waseche, with lowered head, bored through the white smotherthat surrounded them like a wall of frozen fog. The dogs, still in goodheart, humped bravely to the pull, and Connie and O'Brien, with handsclutching the tail-ropes of the sleds, followed blindly. On and on theyplodded, halting at intervals only long enough to consult the compass,for with nothing to sight by, they held their course by the aid of theneedle alone.
Suddenly Connie's sled stopped so abruptly that the boy tripped andsprawled at full length beside its canvas-covered pack, while behindhim, Waseche's leaders, in charge of O'Brien, swerved sharply to avoidthe savage fangs of Slasher--for the wolf-dog knew his kind--he knewthat, once down, a man is _meat_, and the moment the boy fell helplessinto the snow, the great, gaunt brute surged back in the traces, jerkingold Boris and Mutt with him, and stood guard over the prostrate form ofhis master, where he growled defiance into the faces of the dogs of thefollowing team. Scrambling hastily to his feet, Connie was joined byO'Brien and together they stumbled forward where McDougall's bigten-team had piled up in a growling, snapping tangle upon the very brinkof a perpendicular precipice. For the leaders had leaped back from theedge so suddenly that they fouled the swing dogs which, with tooth andnail, and throaty growl, were protesting against the indignity.
"Where's Waseche!" The voice of the boy cut high and thin above the roarof the storm-choked wind, and O'Brien ceased abruptly his endeavour tostraighten out the fighting _malamutes_. He stumbled hastily to theboy's side, but Waseche was no place to be seen, and upon the verge ofthe chasm, the overhanging snow-rim was gouged deep and fresh with aman-made scar.
The dogs were forgotten, and for a long moment the two stood peeringover the edge, striving to penetrate the writhing whirl of snow-powderthat filled the yawning abyss--but the opaque mass gave no hint of thedepth or extent of the chasm. Again and again they shouted, but theirvoices were drowned in the bellow of the wind, and to their ears wasborne no faintest answering call.
To Connie Morgan it seemed, at last, he had come to the end of thetrail. A strange numbness overcame him that dulled his senses andparalyzed his brain. His mind groped uncertainly.... Waseche was gone!He had fallen over the edge of the cliff and was lying at thebottom--and they would find him there--the men who were to come--andhimself and O'Brien they would find at the top--and the dogs were alltangled--and it would be better, now, to sleep. No--they must pushon--they were on the trail.... Where were they going? Oh, yes, toAlaska--back to Ten Bow, and the cabin, and the claim! But they couldn'tgo on.... This was the _end_.... They had come to the place where theworld breaks off--and Waseche ha
d fallen over the edge.
The boy gazed stupidly into the milky, eddying chaos. It looked soft,down there--like feathers, or the meringue on pie. It is a good place tofall, he thought, this place where the world stops--you could fall, andfall, and fall, and you wouldn't have to light--and it would be fun. TheLillimuit was a funny place, anyway--"the country where men don't comeback from," Joe had said, that night--back there in the hotel at Eagle.Carlson didn't come back----
"Why, Carlson's dead!" he cried so sharply that, at his side, O'Brienstarted.
"Sur-re, b'y, he's dead--but--" The man's voice aroused him as from adream. His brain cleared, and suddenly he realized that Waseche Bill waslost--was even then lying wounded--probably dead, at the bottom of thecliff. With a low, choking sob, the boy whirled on O'Brien, who jumpedat the sharp word of command:
"Get the ropes! Quick! While I unharness the dogs!" The Irishman sprangto the rear sled where two forty-foot coils of _babiche_ line lay readyfor just such an emergency, while Connie sprang among McDougall'stangled _malamutes_, slashing right and left with his coiled whiplash.At the sudden attack the dogs ceased fighting and cowered whimperingwhile the boy slipped their collars, and by the time O'Brien returnedwith the lines, Connie was ready for the next move.
"Work the sled closer--crossways! _Crossways_--so she'll hold!" hecried, as he knotted the lines securely together and made an end fastabout his body.
"Brace against the sled, now, and lower away!"
"Phwat ye goin' to do?" asked the man, eyeing the line.
"_Do!_ I'm going after Waseche, of course----"
"But, ye don't know how daype ut is--an' th' rope moight bre'k!"
"What difference does _that_ make?" cried the boy. "If the rope won'treach--we'll make it reach! We'll splice on the harness, and theblankets, and the tarps, and the robes, and whatever else we can layour hands on--and if it don't reach then, we'll kill the dogs! I'll getmy pardner out of there if I have to kill every dog in the outfit anduse their hides. And if the rope breaks--I'll be where Waseche is,anyway!"
"Without waiting for a reply, Connie slipped softly overthe edge."]
Without waiting for a reply, the boy seated himself in the snow andslipped softly over the edge. Slowly he descended into the riot ofwhirling snow, while above him, O'Brien, with heels braced against therunners of the heavy sled, carefully paid out the line. Down, down, hewent, scraping and bumping against the wall. It seemed to the impatientboy as though each moment he must reach the end of his rope--surely, hehad descended eighty feet! But on he went, down, down, down--and then,when the suspense was becoming almost unbearable, his feet touchedbottom, and he stood upright upon the snow. And, above, O'Brien felt theline go slack, and heaved a great sigh of relief as he glanced at thescant six feet of rope that remained.
Jagged rock-slivers protruded from the snow, here and there, at the baseof the cliff, and Connie shuddered as he gazed about him. Suddenly hecried out, and plunged to the end of his line, for there, close beside ahuge block of stone, he made out a dark blur on the white surface of thesnow--it was the back of a fur _parka_!
The next instant, the boy was kneeling beside the inert form of WasecheBill. Frantically he pulled and hauled at the man until at length hesucceeded in turning him upon his back, and then it was he noticed theleg doubled curiously beneath him. Very gently Connie laid hold of thefoot and drew it into position beside the other, and as the legstraightened out he could feel the grating rasp of bone on bone--theleg was broken!
His first thought was to arouse the unconscious man, but instead hebegan swiftly to remove the rope from about his own body and fasten itfirmly under Waseche's armpits.
"If I wake him up now, it will hurt like thunder when O'Brien hauls himup," he muttered, as he gave the three quick jerks to the line that hadbeen the agreed signal to "haul away." The next moment the rope wenttaut, and slowly, very slowly, the inanimate form lifted and swung clearof the snow.
O'Brien was a big man--and a strong one. But for the next few minutes hehad his work cut out.
"He's found um!" he panted, as he paused to rest, with the rope wrappedtightly about his arm. "Sur-re, th' b'y's niver as heavy as that--an',be jabbers! Oi belayve th' two av thim's cumin' up to wanst."
At length Waseche's body wedged against the edge of the cliff andO'Brien, making the line fast to the heavy sled, dragged theunconscious form clear, and weighting the line with an ice ax, loweredit into the chasm. Five minutes later the boy scrambled over the rim,and dropped to his knees beside the inert form in the snow.
"Get up the shelter tarp--quick!" he ordered, as he scraped the loosesnow from a wide space near the sled and, rummaging in his pack,produced a quantity of grease-soaked moss and a bundle of dry firewood.
"His leg's broken, and we've got to set it," he explained, as a tinyflame flared in the shelter of the wide tarpaulin, and he proceeded toremove the man's _mukluk_ and heavy socks.
"Ye'll fr-reeze his leg!" exclaimed O'Brien, in alarm.
"Can't help it--we've got to take a chance. He'll die, or be crippledfor life if we don't set it--so here goes!"
The foot was badly swollen, and midway between the ankle and the kneewas a great bluish-green bruise where the leg had struck the rock atthe foot of the cliff. The blow had broken both bones, and theoverlapping ends made an unsightly bunch upon the side of the leg.Deftly and skilfully the boy's fingers explored the hurt.
"We've got to pull 'em by and snap 'em into place," he explained. "Iknow how--we set Newt Boyer's legs, in Ten Bow, when a log rolled onhim."
Again they made the line fast beneath the man's shoulders, and bound himfirmly to the loaded sled. O'Brien seized hold of the foot and, bracinghimself in the snow, pulled for all he was worth, while Connie pressedagainst the bone ends with his palms.
"Pull! _Pull_--can't you!" urged the boy. "Only a quarter of an inchmore and they'll click--and the job will be done!" But O'Brien waspulling, and although he strained and tugged to the very limit of hisstrength, the ends still overlapped. Suddenly the boy leaped to hisfeet.
"Swing those dogs in here!" he cried, pointing to Waseche's team thatremained still harnessed. "A little farther! Woah! That'll do--now,wait!" Swiftly he stooped, and with a few quick turns, bound the injuredfoot tightly to the back of the sled.
"Now, pull up--easy, at first--don't jerk! That's right!" he cried, asthe leg stretched taut, "now, make 'em _pull_!"
Again the boy dropped to his knees and worked rapidly with his fingers,while under O'Brien's urging Waseche's _malamutes_ humped and clawed asthey pulled. There was a slight click, as the bone-ends snapped intoplace, and the Irishman heard the delighted voice of the boy:
"Woah! She's set! She's set! Ease off, now, and hand me the splints!"
The splints, rudely split from pieces of firewood, were applied and heldin place by strips torn from the tarp, a blanket was wrapped about theinjured member, and the patient made as comfortable as possible besidethe fire in the lee of the shelter tarp. But it was an hour laterbefore Waseche Bill opened his eyes and gazed inquiringly about him.
"What happened?" he asked, as a sharp pain caused him to stare insurprise toward his blanket-swathed leg.
"Sur-re, ye walked over th' edge av a clift, an' lit on th' rocks, amather av siventy feet below--an' th' b'y, here, wuz over an' afther yezbefoor ye lit. Yer leg's bruk squar-re in two, but th' lad set ut loikean-ny docther c'd done--an' bether thin most."
"O'Brien helped!" interrupted Connie.
"Aye, a bit. An' so did the dogs. But, th' b'y--he wuz th' captain. Yesh'd o' seed um shlip over th' edge on th' ind av his thread av a loine,into th' whirlin' scather av shnow, when ye c'd see nayther bottom norsoides. 'Oi'm a-goin afther Waseche!' he says--An' he done so."
"O'Brien pulled you up," said the boy, as Waseche leaned over andgrasped the small hand in his own big one. He spoke no word, but in thepressure of the mighty hand-grasp the boy read the man-sign of_tillicums_.