The Land of Frozen Suns Part 9

The sun slid clear of the skyline, and a long shaft of light brushed over the unreckoned miles of gra.s.sland till it fell caressingly on our b.u.t.te. Hollows and tiny threads of creeks nursed deep, black shadows that shrank and vanished as the sun-rays sought them out. Away beyond, to the west, the snow-tipped Rockies stood boldly out in their robe of misty blue. And as the yellow glare bathed the sea of land that ringed the lone pinnacle I saw why the Flats were so named.

Impa.s.sive, desolate, vast in its sweep, the plain took on a weird look at the sun's kiss. Barren of tree or shrub so far as the eye could reach, naked even of shriveled blades of gra.s.s, when the last, least shadow was gone it spread before us like a painted floor; red to its outermost edges, a sullen dried-blood red. A strange colored soil, as if it were a huge bed of dull-glowing coals.

"Blood Flats! There is no incongruity in the name," Barreau vouchsafed.

"This is almost beautiful. Yet I have seen the sun strike it of a morning-and felt a foolish, oppressive dread. Just after a rain, I remember, once. Then it lay like a lake of blood. The light played on pools here and there, pools that glowed like great rubies. Fancy it!

Ninety miles square of that blood-stained earth. A monster shambles, it has often seemed to me. It breeds strange thoughts when one faces it alone. Or take it on a day of lowering clouds. Then it almost voices a threat of evil. It is so void of life, so malevolent in its stillness.

The psychology of environment is a curious thing. How is it that mere inanimate earth, a great magnitude of s.p.a.ce, a certain color scheme, can affect a man so? Sometimes I wonder if we inherit past experiences from our primitive ancestors along with the color of our eyes or the cast of our features. Our surroundings work upon our emotions as the temperature affects a thermometer, and we cannot tell why. Even the hard-headed bull-whackers hate this stretch of country."

He made himself another cigarette, and sat quiet for a time, staring off across the red waste.

"We may as well go back to camp," he said, rising abruptly. "There is no sign of men, mounted, afoot, or otherwise, that I can see."

Back by our saddles and pack layout, Barreau divided the blankets and showed me how to fold mine to make the most of them. Thankfully I bedded myself in a shaded place, but he, before following my example, unslung from his saddle the rifle he had procured of Montell. He looked it over, snapped the lever forward and back, slid another cartridge or two into the magazine. This done, he laid it by his blankets.

"I grudge the Police my two good nags, and my Winchester," he remarked, as he drew off his boots. "What extra weapons Montell had were stowed in a wagon, and I had no time to hunt for them. So we will have to make s.h.i.+ft with one rifle-for a while, at least. For that matter, unless we run foul of some young bucks prowling for a scalp, one gun will serve as well as two. If you elect to take a different trail, the best I can give you will be an ancient derringer and a scant number of cartridges. But I am inclined to think we will not part company, yet a while."

He sat upon his blankets, regarding me with a measuring air; and I, from my comfortable position, answered drowsily:

"I have a full stomach, a clear conscience, and a tired body; and I am going to sleep right now, if I never travel another trail."

He laughed softly. Whether he said anything further, I do not know. I was too near worn out to care. My last, faint impression was of him sitting cross-legged on his blankets, emitting sporadic puffs of smoke, and looking at me with his black brows drawn together. And the next thing I remember was a tang of wood-smoke in my nostrils. I sat up and stared about, puzzled at first, for I had slept like a dead man.

Twilight wrapped the b.u.t.te. Barreau was bent over a small fire, cooking supper.

"Oh," he said, looking around, "you've come alive, at last. I was about to wake you. The chuck's ready."

I washed in the trickle of water that ran away from the spring, and felt like a new man. As to eating, I was little short of ravenous. Never had food made such an appeal to my senses. When the meal was over Barreau settled back against his saddle.

"There will be a moon somewhere near midnight," he declared. "We'll move then. After to-night we can travel without cover of the dark. Meantime, lend me your ears, Robertus. Let us see where we stand."

"Fire away," I replied. "I am pretty much in the dark-in more ways than one."

"Exactly," he responded. "And I imagine you have little taste for walking blindfolded. So we will spread our hands on the board. First, let us look a few facts cold-bloodedly in the eye. Here are two of us practically outlawed. I-well, it should be obvious to you that I am a very much-wanted man in these parts. My capture-especially now-would be the biggest feather any Policeman could stick in his cap. There are others who would cheerfully shoot me in the back for what it would bring them. Hence, the sooner I get out of this part of the country, the better I will be suited. You have killed a man for a starter. That--"

"But I had to," I broke in. "It was forced on me. You know it was.

There's a limit to what a man can stand."

"I know all that," he replied quietly. "I'm not sitting in judgment on you, Bob. I'm merely setting forth what has happened, and how we are affected thereby. Tupper got no more than he deserved, and he did not get it soon enough-from my point of view. But, as I said, you killed a man, and the killing has taken on a different color in the minds of others, since you are also accused of theft."

"Do you believe that infernal lie?" I interrupted again. It galled me to hear him enumerate those ugly details in that calm, deliberate manner.

"It makes little difference what _I_ believe," he answered patiently.

"If it is any comfort to you, I can hardly conceive of you plundering the _Moon's_ cabin. But voicing our individual beliefs is beside the point. Certain things are laid to us. Certain penalties are sure as the rising and setting of the sun, if either of us is caught and convicted.

And"-he pinched his eyebrows together until little creases ran up and down his forehead, but his voice was cold, matter of fact-"if we were clean-handed as a babe unborn, we have forever d.a.m.ned ourselves before Canadian courts, by breaking jail. You see where we are? Forgetting these other things that we may or may not have done, of this one crime we are guilty. We can't dodge it, if we are taken. It is a felony in itself."

"If I were a free agent," he went on, after a momentary pause, "I would have made no attempt to escape; or having escaped, I would quit this d.a.m.ned country by the shortest route. But I can't. I have got into a game that I must play to a finish. Further, I have given my word to do certain work, and in the doing of it I am bucking elements that I cannot always cope with alone. I need help. I want some one whom I can trust absolutely if he gives his word; a man I can depend upon to stick by me in a pinch. That," he turned his gaze squarely on me, "is princ.i.p.ally why I took long chances to get you out of the guardhouse, last night. It seemed to me I could help myself best by helping you. I will be frank.

My motive was not purely altruistic. Men's motives seldom are."

"You flatter me," I commented bitterly. "Considering that I have shown myself more or less weak-kneed every time I've got in a tight place, your remark about some one who would stick by you in a pinch savors of irony. I hardly see how you could put absolute faith in me, when I have so little faith in myself. Besides, I do not know what your program calls for. I don't seem to have the faculty of holding my own in a rough game; nor the right sort of nerve-if I have any. My instinct seems to be to give ground until I'm cornered. I'd rather be at peace with the world. I don't like war of the personal sort."

"Nor does any man, any normal man," he responded soberly. "But there are times, as you have seen, when we cannot escape it. So far as your capacity for holding your own is concerned, let me be judge of that. I know men more or less well-by bitter experience. Under certain conditions I could probably guess what you would do, better than yourself. You may be sure I wouldn't ask you to accept certain risks and hards.h.i.+ps with me if I thought a yellow streak tinged your make-up. So we will not argue along that line.

"What I need your help in is a legitimate enterprise; clean enough of itself-though I have acquired a dirty reputation in the way of it. I'll give you a few details, and you can judge for yourself. Four years ago chance sent me north to a Hudson's Bay post on the Saskatchewan. From there I drifted farther-to the Great Slave Lake country, almost. I've known more or less of the fur trade all my life. My father was in it.

And so I was quick to see how the Hudson's Bay Company holds the North trade in the hollow of its hand. It was a revelation to me, Bob.

Fortunes gravitate to their posts by the simplest process in the world.

They barter a worthless muzzle-loading gun and a handful of powder and ball for a hundredfold its worth in pelts. From one year's end to another, yes, from generation to generation, the tribes have been kept in debt to the Company. They make a scanty living from the Company, and the Company builds colossal fortunes out of them. You and I would call it robbery. To the Company it is merely 'trade.'

"Ever since the granting of its charter, close on two centuries ago, the Company has lorded it over the North, barring out the free trader, guarding jealously against compet.i.tion. Only the Northwest Fur Company ever held its own with the Hudson's Bay, and the two combined when the Northwest established itself. The others, lone traders, partners.h.i.+ps, the Company fought and intimidated till they withdrew. Technically, it is a free country, has been since '69, but north of the Saskatchewan the Company still holds forth in the ancient manner, making its own law, recognizing no higher authority than itself. It is a big country, the North, and the Canadian government has its hands full in the east and south. A white man takes his own risks north of lat.i.tude 54.

"All this I knew very well. But like many another purse-broken man, I wanted a fling at the trade. I saw that a man could get in touch with the tribes, give them fair exchange for their furs-give them treble the Hudson's Bay rate of barter-and still make a fortune. I needed the fortune, Bob; I am still on the trail of it. But I had too little capital to play a lone hand. So I hied me to St. Louis and broached the scheme to Montell. I have known him all my life. He also is an old hand in the trade. He had the capital I lacked."

Barreau stopped for a minute, digging at the earth with his heel. The fire had dwindled to a few coals. I could not see his face. But his voice had changed, a note of resentment had crept into it, when he began again.

"Montell jumped at the plan. Later I learned things that led me to believe he was near the end of his rope, financially, at the time. So my scheme was in the nature of a G.o.dsend to him. I had a little money, and every dollar I could raise I put in. It was to be an equal partners.h.i.+p: my knowledge of the country and the conditions to offset his extra capital.

"The first year we made expenses, and a little over. But we were getting known among the Indian hunters, convincing them that we would treat them better than the Hudson's Bay. Secure in their established grip on the tribes, the Company pa.s.sed us up. The second year we made money. Then the Company woke up and fought us tooth and nail. Not openly; that is not their way. They fought us, nevertheless. There were reprisals. The brunt of it fell on me. They seemed to guess that with my teeth drawn their fight was won. So they carried the war systematically into the open country. Our jail-breaking last night took its inception in that struggle for and against a monopoly.

"This year, if things do not go awry, we stand to clear more than a hundred thousand dollars. And it will be the last. No individual trader can break lances with the Company on its own ground. They are lords of the North beyond gainsaying. At the best we can but take a slice and leave the loaf to them. Next spring sees the last of our trading. This fall there will be fierce work to do, tramping here and there, issuing guns and powder and foodstuffs, bargaining with the hunters for the winter's take of pelts. A hundred lodges have promised to trade with us this season, and an Indian rarely breaks his word, once given in good faith. We will get others, in spite of the Company runners. But we must be on the alert; we cannot sit in our posts and wait for these things to come about of themselves. And that brings me to the point.

"If I had only the Hudson's Bay Company to contend with, I would have little fear for the outcome. With them it is largely a question of strategy. If there is any violence it will come from some zealot in their service, and we can hold our own against such. But Montell is an eel. He looms more threatening than the Company. In these three years I have had no accounting with him. I have done the dirty work, while he holed up at the post, or looked after the St. Louis end. I have more than once come near tripping him up in petty tricks. Secretly he hates me, for at bottom he is an arrogant old freebooter. And for all his grovelling last night, he is a dangerous man. By one means and another I know that he has made up his mind to put me in the lurch once this winter's trade is turned. Without me, he can do little in the way of getting furs. Otherwise, I would be cooling my heels in MacLeod guardhouse yet. You may have guessed that he was the spirit which moved Blackie to pa.s.s in the knife and saw.

"But once full arrangements are made, and the pelts begin to come in with spring, why, then-I don't know what he will do, how he will engineer his plan to eliminate my interest in the profits. He has some card up his sleeve. Half of everything is mine, but I have nothing to show it. There is nothing between us but his word! and that, I have learned at last, is a thing he can twist to suit the occasion. He has begun shaping things to suit himself on this trip. He cut a bit of the ground from under my feet back there in MacLeod. I'll pay him for that, though; and he knows it. The finis.h.i.+ng touch will come this winter, or in the spring. He hates me, just as he hates any man whom he cannot lead by the nose, and he will move like the old fox he is. There's money in it-for him. And money and power are Simon Montell's twin G.o.ds.

"Between these cross-fires, I will have my hands more than full. I can only be in one place at a time. There is not a man with the bull-train, or among the few that remain in the North, but is under Montell's thumb.

Most of them could not understand if I told them. The thing is too subtle for their simple, direct minds. For that reason, I sought for some one I could trust to keep a clear eye open, and his ears c.o.c.ked; for whatever Montell does he will do by stealth. That evening we fell in together at the foot of the Sweet Gra.s.s I was headed for the Sanders ranch, thinking to get Walt to come North with me. He would have enjoyed this sort of thing. You know how we fared that night. And you can see why, when the Police raid put him beyond my helping, I turned to you. I had you in mind all the while we lay in the guardhouse, but I hesitated to drag you into it, until I learned of the robbery charged to you. Then I went back for you, judging that of the two evils you would choose the one I offered.

"That is the way of it, Bob. If you help me play the game this winter, you accomplish two things with tolerable cert.i.tude. You will be safe from the Police and those Benton idiots; and you will get to St. Louis in the spring. Montell himself will see to that, when he learns who you are. He knew your father slightly, and he has all of a guttersnipe's sn.o.bbish adulation of wealth and family. So you are doubly safe. On the other hand, if you are minded to work out your own salvation I will share with you what I have, set you in the right direction, and wish you good luck. Don't be hasty about deciding. Think the thing over."

But I had already made up my mind. How much the lure of a strange land and stirring things to be done bore upon my decision I cannot say. How much, at the moment, George Barreau's personality dominated me I cannot quite compute. Individual psychology has never been a study of mine, but I know that there is no course of reasoning, no mental action, no emotion, that has not its psychic factors. Whatever these were in my case, I lost sight of them. I think that what influenced me most was his way of putting it man to man, so to speak. Unconsciously that restored to me, in a measure, the self-respect I had nearly lost in those brutal days on the _Moon_, and the skulking and imprisonment which followed.

Here was a man before whom I had seen other strong men cringe asking me in a straightforward way for help. I had no wish to refuse; I felt a thrill at the opportunity. For the time I forgot that Montell's daughter had called him a thief and a murderer, and he had not denied. I took him at his face value, as he took me, and we shook hands on the bargain, and cemented it further with the bottle of port so unwillingly relinquished by Montell.

"I'm with you," said I, "till the last dog is hung. But if I weaken in a pinch, don't say you weren't forewarned."

He laughed.

"Don't underestimate yourself. A man doesn't need to be overloaded with nerve to play a man's part in this world. In fact, the fellow who hunts trouble for the sake of showing off his nerve, is generally some d.a.m.ned fool with a yellow streak in him that he's deadly afraid some one may uncover. After all," he reflected, "there may be nothing more to cope with than the dreary monotony of s...o...b..und days, and nights when the frost bites to the bone. Your part will merely be to keep tab on Mr.

Simon Montell when I am not about. He's afraid of me. If he can't attain his purpose by underhand methods, he may consider the risk of open hostility too great. But that we cannot foresee. Our problem, now, is to reach the Sicannie River as soon as we can. There we need never fear meeting a scarlet jacket. It stands us in hand to be shy of those gentlemen, for some time to come."

"Amen to that," I responded sincerely.

We lay back in the shadows, smoking, speaking a few words now and then, till the moon came peeping up from below the horizon, shedding its pale light on the strange, red sweep of the Blood Flats. Then we saddled and packed and bore away from the lone b.u.t.te, holding a course slightly west of the North Star.

CHAPTER XI-A TRICK OF THE "TRADE."

A certain consecutive number of days-weeks, to be more exact-ensued, of which there is little to relate, save that we travelled steadily northward, seeing no human except from afar. Once or twice we came in sight of Hudson's Bay posts, but these Barreau was careful to avoid. It was not the season when Indians were abroad in the forests, he told me when I wondered that in all that vast land not a single lodge appeared.