The Gaunt Gray Wolf Part 30

"Your lips smile. Did you see the glory of heaven as you pa.s.sed from us--a thousand times more beautiful than the brilliant aurora or the gorgeous sunsets that glorify the skies of this land of awful desolation where you existed? Did you see the light of the Eternal City shining through its gates when they were opened to receive you?"

As though in answer to Shad's question the last rays of the setting sun dropped through the open top of the lodge and rested upon the upturned face of the dead Indian maiden in a bright, illuminating glow.

"Manikawan, you sacrificed your life to duty and to human sympathy.

You died a Christ-like death, and your sacrifice shall not be wasted.

Your body is dead, but your spirit still lives.

"So long as the breath of life is in me, Manikawan, I shall never forget your example of patience and encouragement and self-effacement.

It has built for me new ideals. It has taught me that there are other things to live for than the mere attainment of pleasure and the gratification of selfish desires.

"You were an Indian, Manikawan, and the world would have called you a pagan and a savage. But you have pointed out to me the way to a n.o.bler and better life."

Shad arose and resumed his seat. He had spoken in a voice of tense earnestness, and for a little while all sat in awed silence. Then Ed Matheson began to sing, and the others joined him:

"Rock of Ages, cleft for me, Let me hide myself in thee."

With the last notes of the grand old hymn they all knelt, while big d.i.c.k Blake, in a voice shaken with emotion, offered a short but fervent prayer.

Manikawan's body was wrapped tightly in deerskin robes, and in the darkening twilight of the cold winter evening it was reverently borne to the newly erected platform among the spruce trees. Here it was to lie exposed to winds and storms, but beyond the reach of marauding animals, until the next summer's sun should warm and soften the earth sufficiently to permit Mookoomahn and the trappers to dig a grave and lay it in its final resting-place.

XXVIII

TROWBRIDGE AND GRAY, TRADERS

At the end of a week, when the supply of provisions which the trappers had brought with them was running low, Shad suggested that he was quite able to make the journey to the river tilt. His knee was now so far improved that it caused him but slight inconvenience to walk, and he was rapidly regaining strength.

He was anxious indeed to return to the tilt. He thought of it much as one thinks of home; and the thought carried with it visions of rest and comfort. The others could ill afford a longer absence from their trails, and it was therefore with a sense of deep satisfaction to all that the camp on the sh.o.r.e of the Great Lake was broken.

Travelling slowly, with Shad following in the well-packed trail which the others made, they arrived at their destination on an afternoon five days later, and were welcomed by Bill Campbell and Mookoomahn.

How deeply or how lightly Mookoomahn felt when he learned of Manikawan's death, none knew. He listened in stoical silence while Bob related to him in detail the circ.u.mstances of her going and the subsequent happenings in the lodge and in the camp at the Great Lake; but throughout the recital Mookoomahn made no comments, and his countenance betrayed nothing of his sensations.

Mookoomahn was recovering rapidly. He was pa.s.sing, indeed, quite beyond Bill Campbell's control; and not satisfied now with the limited portions of food which Bill, religiously adhering to the advice he had received from d.i.c.k Blake and Ed Matheson, doled out to him, he had the day before the return of the travellers stolen away to the willows along the river bank below the tilt, killed some ptarmigans on his own account, and gorged himself upon the flesh to his temporary satisfaction; but nature balanced her account with him in the hours of subsequent agony which he suffered for his indiscretion.

Fully a month elapsed after their return before Shad could eat a meal with any a.s.surance that it would not be followed by distress. His normal appet.i.te, however, had begun to return before they broke camp on the Great Lake, and had quickly developed into a highly abnormal appet.i.te.

No sooner was one meal finished than his mind was centred upon the next. At night his last thought was his next morning's breakfast, and when he awoke breakfast was still on his mind. Eating during this period of recuperation was to him the all-important object in life.

It was nearly a month after his return to the river tilt that Shad first learned of Bob's loss of fortune. It was upon the occasion of the fortnightly rendezvous, when Ed Matheson remarked:

"Th' next round's about th' last we can make. Th' fur's 'most too poor t' take, now, an' when I comes back I'll strike up my traps. An' it's been a wonderful poor hunt."

"Aye, wonderful poor, an' wonderful disappointin'," sighed Bob.

"Th' worst I ever see," continued Ed. "If 'tweren't for you, Bob, clearin' d.i.c.k's an' my old debts, we'd be in a bad way gettin' next fall's debt from th' Company. An' now your losin' all your money, th'

bad furrin' comes hard on you--wonderful hard. I'm fearin' th' new debt we'll all have t' start off next season with'll be a big un."

"What money did you lose, Bob? I hadn't heard of it," asked Shad, as Ed pa.s.sed out of the tilt to join d.i.c.k and Bill, who were cleaning the snow from the roof of the tilt in antic.i.p.ation of an early thaw.

"Th' money I has in th' bank t' St. Johns," explained Bob. "When Ed comes back from th' Bay he brings me a letter from Mother sayin' th'

bank broke an' th' money's gone."

"That's bad!" Shad sympathised. "How much was there?"

"About twelve thousand dollars. But 'tain't so bad. We has th' traps, an' th' new trails laid."

"But that was the capital you were to begin trading on?"

"Aye, but we'll have t' give th' tradin' up now. I'm thinkin' th' Lard weren't wantin' us t' go tradin' or t' have th' money, an' I'm not complainin', though I were wonderful disappointed when I hears of un first."

Shad asked many questions, in the course of which he drew from Bob a description of the air castles which Bob had been building, and which had been so unceremoniously knocked down about his ears by his mother's letter; of the poverty-stricken condition of the Bay folk, which Bob in his big-hearted and youthful enthusiasm had hoped to relieve; and of many other things which he had planned to do with his fortune.

Though all this was of the past, and of little importance now, he had intended to keep it a secret. But he and Shad had grown very close together, and somehow Shad had a way of drawing from him even his most sacred thoughts--and before Bob realised it he had bared his heart to his friend.

"An' I were thinkin'," said Bob, after the sum-total of his shattered plans had been disclosed, "when we was up on th' Great Lake, what a rare fine thing 'twould ha' been for th' Injuns, if I hadn't ha' lost th' money, t' make a tradin' station an' a cache o' grub up th' other end o' th' Great Lake--seventy or eighty miles in from where Manikawan dies--so when another bad year comes th' Injuns down that way could get grub t' carry un out t' th' Ungava post. If they'd been a cache there this winter, Manikawan wouldn't ha' died, an' a lot o' th' other poor Injuns as must ha' died would ha' got out."

"That's so," agreed Shad. "What an amount of suffering it would have saved! And the poor little Indian girl wouldn't have been sacrificed."

The others returned at this point, and conversation drifted into other channels--the striking up of the traps--the probability of an early break-up--the hard times that the present season's failure was certain to cause among the people of the Bay.

"Bob, if you're going to strike up and make this next trip your last one of the season, I'm going over the trail with you," said Shad, the following day. "I want to see again the trail I helped you lay, and the tilts we built together. It seems a long while ago, and the memory of it is already a pleasant one."

So on Monday morning they started on the last round of traps for the season. The days were long now, and the sun was still high when they reached the tilt on the first lake--the tilt where Manikawan had found Bob's rifle, and the first of the series of tilts Bob and Shad had built.

They cooked and ate their supper, and then lounged back upon their bunks to chat of their first exploration of the trail, their visit to the falls, and of Manikawan's unexpected appearance when they were on the island.

Finally they lapsed into silence, Shad sitting on the edge of his bunk, his elbows on his knees, and his chin in his palms; Bob lying back, his hands folded under his head, his eyes studying the ceiling, but his thoughts far away with the loved ones at home and with Emily at school.

Suddenly Shad broke the silence and Bob's thoughts with the question:

"How would you like me for a partner, Bob?"

"A trappin' partner, Shad? 'Twould be fine, now!" exclaimed Bob, coming back to himself and his surroundings. "But I was thinkin' you'd be weary o' th' trails, Shad, after what you've been through."

"No, Bob, a trading partner;" and Shad sat up. "You were going into business, Bob, but your loss, you tell me, has made it impossible, because you have no capital. I'd like to be let in on your plans, for they appeal to me. Such a trading operation as you outlined to me should prove not only profitable, but at the same time would be a practical method of relieving a vast amount of suffering. It would give the Bay people independence and bring them a good many comforts of life they've never enjoyed.

"And if your suggestion were carried out to establish two or three trading stations with provision caches attached, up here in the Indian hunting country, there could be no repet.i.tion of this year's horrible experience.

"Now, Bob, you know the people and their needs, and you're an expert in judging furs, but you haven't the funds to carry out your plan. I don't know much about these things, but I have the funds. Let's come together--your experience and knowledge against my cash--and form a partnership. What do you say?"

"Oh, Shad! 'Twould be--'twould be th' grandest thing in th' world, Shad!" and Bob's face flushed with excitement; and then, suddenly, he continued: "But I couldn't do it, Shad. 'Twouldn't be fair for me t'

be partners, for I hasn't any money t' put in for a share."

"Don't be foolish, now, Bob. Don't talk nonsense. Money without a knowledge of the people and their needs isn't enough. I haven't the knowledge, and I'd make a failure of it alone. But with your knowledge and my money we'd be successful.

"You've said a good many times that things don't happen by chance, but are brought about by the direction of the Lord; haven't you, Bob?"