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"Are we on fire?"
"How-do." He handed Father Wills a piece of dirty paper.
"Hah! Yes. All right. Andrew!"
Andrew needed no more. He bustled away to harness the dogs. The white
men were staring up at the sky. "What's goin' on in heaven, Father?
S'pose you call this the Aurora Borealis--hey?"
"Yes," said the priest; "an... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
The others trooped down-hill, dogs, sleds, and all. There was a great
hand-shaking and good-byeing.
Nicholas whispered:
"You come Pymeut?"
"I should just pretty nearly think I would."
"You dance heap good. Buttons no all done." He put four little ivory
crows into the Boy's hands. They were rudely but cleverly carved, ... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
For three days the Boy growled and played games with Kaviak, going
about at first chiefly on hands and knees.
On the fifth day after the Blow-Out, "You comin' long to Pymeut this
mornin'?" he asked the Colonel.
"What's the rush?"
"_Rush!_ Good Lord! it's 'most a week since they were here. And it's
stopped snowin', and... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
The Boy stopped and hesitated; it was a sore temptation to climb up and
see what they had in that cache. There was an inviting plank all ready,
with sticks nailed on it transversely to prevent the feet from
slipping. But the Boy stopped at the rude ladder's foot, deciding that
this particular mark of interest on the p... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"My sister--this one," he explained.
"Oh-h!" The Boy joined in the laugh, and pulled off his Arctic cap with
a bow borrowed straight from the Colonel.
"Princess Muckluck, I'm proud to know you."
"Name no Muckluck," began Nicholas; "name Mahk----"
"Mac? Nonsense! Mac's a man's name--she's Princess Muckluck. Only,
how's... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Me tell you: he heap good friend. You ketch um tobacco?" he inquired
suddenly of his guest. Fortunately, the Boy had remembered to "ketch"
that essential, and his little offering was laid before the
council-men. More grunts, and room made for the visitor on the
sleeping-bench next the post that supported one of the l... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Father Wills come." Nicholas took up the tale afresh. "Shamán come.
Father Wills heap mad. He no let Shamán stay."
"No; him say, 'Go! plenty quick, plenty far. Hey, you! _Mush!_'"
They smoked awhile in silence broken only by coughs.
"Shamán say, 'Yukon Inua plenty mad.'"
"Who is Yukon Inua? Where does he live?"
"Unne... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
The Boy was glad to see approaching, at last, a human figure. It came
shambling through the snow, with bent head and swaying, jerking gait,
looked up suddenly and sheered off, flitting uncertainly onward, in the
dim light, like a frightened ghost.
"Who is that?"
"Shamán. Him see in dark all same owl. Him know you whit... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
Nicholas understood, at least, that politeness was being offered, and
he grinned.
"I've got a sister myself. I'll show you her picture some day. I care
about her a lot. I've come up here to make a pile so that we can buy
back our old place in Florida."
He said this chiefly to the Princess, for she evidently had profit... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"So you're a Catholic, then?"
"Oh yes."
"You speak the best English I've heard from a native."
"I love Sister Winifred. I want to go back--unless"--she regarded the
Boy with a speculative eye--"unless I go your country."
The sick man began to talk deliriously, and lifted up a terrible old
face with fever-bright eyes g... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
With imagination full of sick people turned out to perish, the Boy
started up as a long wail came, muffled, but keen still with anguish,
down through the snow and the earth, by way of the smoke-hole, into the
dim little room.
"Oh, Nicholas! what was that?"
"What?"
"Wait! Listen! There, that! Why, it's a child crying."... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
The Boy, feeling he would need an interpreter, signed to Muckluck to
come and sit by him. Grave as a judge she got up, and did as she was
bid.
"That the Shamán?" whispered the Boy.
She nodded. It was plain that this apparition, however hideous, had
given her great satisfaction.
"Any more people coming?"
"Got no more n... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Tell him I'm all right, and he can give this to Yukon Inua with my
respects."
Muckluck explained and held up the shining object, blades open,
corkscrew curling attractively before the covetous eyes of the Shamán.
When he could endure the temptation no longer his two black claws shot
out, but Nicholas intercepted the ... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"What's he doing now?" the Boy ventured to whisper under cover of the
devil's sudden loud remonstrance, the sick man at this point breaking
into ghastly groans.
"He puts on the Kamlayka. Sh!"
The Shamán, still enveloped head and body, began to beat softly,
keeping time with the eagle's feather. You could follow the fa... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
The Boy was for shielding Muckluck from the crazy flinging out of legs
and arms; but she leaned over, breathless, to catch what words might
escape the Shamán during the fit, for these were omens of deep
significance.
When at last the convulsive movements quieted, and the Shamán lay like
one dead, except for an occasio... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Light! make a light!" he commanded. Nicholas got up, dazed but
obedient, and lit the seal-oil lamp.
The voice of the white man, the call for light, reached the Shamán. He
seemed to shiver and shrink under the folds of the Kamlayka. But
instead of getting up and looking his enemy in the face, he wriggled
along on his ... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
CHAPTER VI
A PENITENTIAL JOURNEY
"... Certain London parishes still receive £12 per annum
for fagots to burn heretics."--JOHN RICHARD GREEN.
The Boy slept that night in the Kachime beside a very moody, restless
host. Yagorsha dispensed with the formality of going to bed, and seemed
bent on doing what he could t... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"You savvy?" said Nicholas to his guest. "Brother Paul go plenty soon.
You wait."
I'll have company back to camp, was the Boy's first thought, and
then--would there be any fun in that after all? It was plain Brother
Paul was no such genial companion as Father Wills.
And so it was that he did not desert Nicholas, altho... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"You think we can explain it all away, hey?" He made a gesture of happy
clearance. "Shamán and everything, hey?"
"Me no can," returned Nicholas, with engaging modesty. "_You_--" He
conveyed a limitless confidence.
"Well, I'll be jiggered if I don't try. How far is it?"
"Go slow--one sleep."
"Well, we won't go slow. We... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Don't know as I call that cheap."
"Yes," said Nicholas. "St. Michael, him fifty dollah."
The Boy looked doubtful.
"I saw a parki there at the A. C. Store about like this for twenty."
"A. C. parki, peeluck," Nicholas said contemptuously. Then patting the
one his father held out, "You wear _him_ fifty winter."
"Lord fo... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"This way, too." She illustrated how anyone embarrassed by the
possession of more than one pencil could range them in tiers on the
ivory horns above the head of the Woeful One.
"I call that scrumptious! And he looks as if he was saying he was sorry
all the time."
She nodded, delighted that the Boy comprehended the sub... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"How far's he comin'?" asked the Boy, astonished.
"All the way," said Muckluck. "He want to be _sure_."
Several bucks came running down from the Kachime, and stood about,
coughed and spat, and offered assistance or advice. When at last Ol'
Chief was satisfied with the way the raw walrus-hide was laced and
lashed, Nich... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Six sables," said the monarch.
* * * * *
It was a comfort to sight a settlement off there on the point.
"What's this place?"
"Fish-town."
"Pymeuts there?"
"No, all gone. Come back when salmon run."
Not a creature there, as Nicholas had foretold--a place built wilfully
on the most exposed... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
No, it was no fun camping with the temperature at thirty degrees below
zero--better to be trotting after those expensive and dinnerless dogs;
and he was glad when they started again.
But once beyond the scant shelter of the cottonwood, it was evident the
wind had risen. It was blowing straight out of the north and int... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Me gottah drive, you gottah push. Dogs heap tired."
Nicholas spoke severely. The Boy stared a moment at what he mentally
called "the nerve of the fella," laughed, and took hold, swallowing
Nicholas's intimation that he, after all, was far more considerate of
the dogs than the person merely sentimental, who had been w... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Funny thing for an Agnostic," he admitted to himself, "but I'm right
glad to see a Christian sign." And as he knocked at the door of the big
two-story log-house on the left he defended himself. "It's the
swing-back of the pendulum after a big dose of Pymeut and heathen
tricks. I welcome it as a mark of the white man.... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"It's easily done."
Such scorn you would hardly expect from a follower of the meek
Galilean.
"No, not easily done, a penance like this. I know, for I've just
travelled that thirty miles with 'em over the ice from Pymeut."
"You? Yes, it amuses you."
The sombre eyes shone with a cold, disconcerting light.
"Well, to tell... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"And yet you nursed the old man and were kind to him, I believe, after
the offense."
"I--I thought you had killed him. But even you must see that we cannot
have a man received here as Nicholas was--the most favoured child of
the mission--who helps to perpetuate the degrading blasphemies of his
unhappy race. It's nothi... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Oh, Brother Paul! you are wanted--wanted quickly. I think Catherine is
worse; don't wait, or she'll die without--" And as suddenly as she came
the vision vanished, carrying Brother Paul in the wake of her streaming
veil.
The Boy sat down by the stove, cogitating how he should best set about
finding Nicholas to explai... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"What is it, what is it?"
The Father Superior spoke a little sharply, and himself sat down in the
wooden armchair he before had placed for his white guest.
The three culprits stood in front of him on a dead level of iniquity.
"You see, Father Brachet, Ol' Chief has been very ill--"
"I know. Much as we needed him here,... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"He is here."
"But no! Wiz zose ozzers?"
"No, I think they took the dogs and deserted him. He's just been
brought in by our boys; they are back with the moose-meat. Sore heart
worse. He will die."
"Who's looking after him?"
"Brother Paul"; and he padded out of the room in his soft native shoes.
"Then Brother Paul has ... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
The Father nodded.
"We've had to turn ze schools into wards for our patients," he
explained to the stranger. "We do little now but nurse ze sick and
prepare ze dying. Ze Muzzer Superieure has broken down after heroic
labours. Paul, I fear, is sickening too. Yes, it's true: ze disease
came to us from Pymeut."
In the Fa... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
Ol' Chief wiped his eyes pathetically. Nicholas, the picture of
despair, turned in a speechless appeal to his despised ambassador.
Before anyone could speak, the door-knob rattled rudely, and the big
bullet-head of a white man was put in.
"Pardon, mon Père; cet homme qui vient de Minóok--faudrait le coucher
de suite--... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"And I ought to take back 'afraid.' But I'm telling you the truth when
I say there never were honester penitents than the Pymeuts. The whole
Kachime's miserable. Even the girl, Ol' Chief's daughter she cried like
anything when she thought Sister--"
"Winifred?"
"Sister Winifred would be disappointed in her."
"Ah, yes; ... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
The priest grasped the offering with an almost convulsive joy, and
instantly turned his back that the Pymeuts might not see the laugh that
twisted up his humorous old features. The penitents looked at each
other, and telegraphed in Pymeut that after all the Boy had come up to
time. The Father had refused the valuable ... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Yes."
"Well, I can do it now."
"I am glad."
"I've brought you the papers. That's why--I--_had_ to come. Will
you--take them--out of my--"
The priest unbuckled a travel-stained buckskin miner's belt and laid it
on the floor. All the many pockets were empty save the long one in the
middle. He unbuttoned the flap and to... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Ha! How long have you been making the trip?"
"Since August."
The wild flame of enterprise sunk in the heart of the hearer.
"Since _August_?"
"No cash for steamers; we had a canoe. She went to pieces up by--" The
weak voice fell down into that deep gulf that yawns waiting for man's
last word.
"But there is gold at Min... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
Even with the plague and Brother Paul raging at the mission--even with
everyone preoccupied by the claims of dead and dying, the Boy would
have been glad to prolong his stay had it not been for "nagging"
thoughts of the Colonel. As it was, with the mercury rapidly rising and
the wind fallen, he got the Pymeuts on the... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Oh, you think so?" The rejoinder came a little sharply.
"Yes, sir, I just do. I think I'd be bigoted not to admit it."
"So, you'll be thick as peas in a pod with the priests now?"
"Well, I'm the one that can afford to be. They won't convert _me!_ And,
from my point o' view, it don't matter what a man is s' long's he'... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Yes, I know. We'll probably owe our lives to the fact that we
haven't."
It suddenly occurred to the Boy that, although he had just done a
pretty good tramp and felt he'd rather die than go fifty feet further,
it was the Colonel who was most tired.
"How's everybody?"
"Oh, I s'pose we might all of us be worse off."
"Wh... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
The elder man nodded. "Big game, big stakes. It's all right."
Eventless enough after this, except for the passing of an Indian or
two, the days crawled by.
The Boy would get up first in the morning, rake out the dead ashes, put
on a couple of back-logs, bank them with ashes, and then build the fire
in front. He broke ... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
It was the base Byron, tipping the wink to Mac out of the back of the
bunk, that betrayed Kaviak.
It became evident that "Farva" began to take a dour pride in the Kid's
perseverance. One morning he even pointed out to the camp the strong
likeness between Kaviak and Robert Bruce.
"No, sah; the Scottish chief had to hav... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
But, for the most part, as winter darkened round them, they lounged
from morning till night about the big fireplace, and smoked, and
growled, and played cards, and lived as men do, finding out a deal
about each other's characters, something about each other's opinions,
and little or nothing about each other's history.... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
Once in a while, when for hours no word had been spoken except some
broken reference to a royal flush or a jack-pot, or O'Flynn had said,
"Bedad! I'll go it alone," or Potts had inquired anxiously, "Got the
joker? Guess I'm euchred, then," the Boy in desperation would catch up
Kaviak, balance the child on his head, or... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
The best thing about Kaviak was that his was no craven soul. He was
obliged to steal the sugar because he lived with white people who were
bigger than he, and who always took it away when they caught him. But
once the sugar was safe under his shirt, he owned up without the
smallest hesitation, and took his smacking li... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"What you rubber-neckin' about?" Mac snapped at the Boy as he came back
with the fresh supply. This unprovoked attack was ample evidence that
Mac was uneasy under the eyes of the camp, angry at his own weakness,
and therefore the readier to dare anybody to find fault with him.
"How can I help watchin' you?" said the B... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"'Johnny, get your gun,' and we'll go out."
In these December days, before the watery sun had set, the great,
rich-coloured moon arose, having now in her resplendent fulness quite
the air of snuffing out the sun. The pale and heavy-eyed day was put to
shame by this brilliant night-lamp, that could cast such heavy shad... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
Just before dinner the next day the Boy called out:
"See here! who's spilt the syrup?"
"Spilt it?"
"Syrup?"
"No; it don't seem to be spilt, either." He patted the ground with his
hand.
"You don't mean that new can--"
"Not a drop in it." He turned it upside down.
Every eye went to Kaviak. He was sitting on his cricket ... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"I b'lieve we're on the right track. He's remembering. Think again. You
are a tip-top man at finding sugar, aren't you?"
"Yes, fin' shugh." Kaviak modestly admitted his prowess in that
direction.
"And you get hungry in the early morning?"
Yes, he would go so far as to admit that he did.
"You go skylarkin' about, and y... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
Kaviak, recalled from internal communing, studied "Farva" a moment, and
then retreated to the cricket, as to a haven now, hastily and with
misgiving, tripping over his trailing coat. Mac stood up.
"Wait, old man." The Colonel stooped his big body till he was on a
level with the staring round eyes. "Yo' see, child, yo'... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Hey?"
"Nothin'."
Ten minutes--a quarter of an hour went by.
"Funny Mac don't come for his dinner, isn't it? S'pose I go and look
'em up?"
"S'pose you do."
Not far from the door he met Mac coming in.
"Well?" said the Boy, meaning, Where's the kid?
"Well?" Mac echoed defiantly. "I lammed him, as I'd have lammed Robert
... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Coming! coming! Hold on tight! Coming, Kaviak!"
They made straight for the big open fish-hole. Farther away from the
Little Cabin, and nearer the bank, was the small well-hole. Between the
two they noticed, as they raced by, the water-bucket hung on that heavy
piece of driftwood that had frozen aslant in the river. M... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Run and get whiskey. Run like hell!"
When he got back with the Colonel and the whiskey, O'Flynn floundering
in the distance, Potts was feebly striking his breast with his arms,
and Mac still bent above the motionless little body.
They tried to get some of the spirit down the child's throat, but the
tight-clenched tee... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"What do you mean?"
"When he asked me to hand it to him I nearly stuck fast to it. It's all
over syrup; and we don't wear furs at our meals."
"Tchah!" The Colonel stopped with a face of loathing.
"Yes, he was the only one of us that didn't bully the kid to-day."
"Couldn't go _that_ far, but couldn't own up."
"Potts is... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Fine lot o' pelts you have there," said the Colonel.
Benham didn't answer. He seemed to be a close-mouthed kind of a chap.
As the Indian sorted and piled the stuff in the corner, Potts said:
"Got any furs you want to sell?"
"No."
"Where you takin' 'em?"
"Down to the _Oklahoma_."
"All this stuff for Cap'n Rainey?"
Ben... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
Mac couldn't keep his eyes off the little coat. Finally, to enable him
to forget it, as it seemed, he got up and opened Father Wills' letter,
devoured its contents in silence, and flung it down on the table. The
Colonel took it up, and read aloud the Father's thanks for all the
white camp's kindness to Kaviak, and now... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Oh, well, I suppose I can get another made for Rainey before the first
boat goes down."
"Then is it on account o' the bread," the Colonel was saying, "that the
old-timer calls himself a Sour-dough?"
"All on account o' the bread."
They crowded out after Benham.
"Coming?" The Boy, who was last, held the door open. Mac ... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
Then, as Mac made no sign, he sighed again, and held out two little
shaky hands to the blaze.
Mac gave out a sound between a cough and a snort, and wiped his eyes on
the back of his hand.
Kaviak had started nervously.
"You cold?" asked Mac.
Kaviak nodded.
"Hungry?"
He nodded again, and fell to coughing.
Mac got up and... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"We're goin' to lay ourselves out on this entertainment," said the Boy,
with painful misgivings as to the "bang-up dinner."
Every time the banquet was mentioned somebody was sure to say, "Well,
anyhow, there's Potts's cake," and that reflection never failed to
raise the tone of expectation, for Potts's cake was a beau... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"You oughtn't to let yourself get into a state like this," said Mac,
thinking ruefully of these strangers' obvious inability to travel for a
day or two, and of the Christmas dinner, to which Benham alone had been
bidden, by a great stretch of hospitality.
"That's all very well," said the stranger, who shouted when he ... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
The moment Kaviak was ascertained to be asleep, O'Flynn displayed the
mucklucks. No mistake, they were dandies! The Boy hung one of them up,
by its long leg, near the child's head at the side of the bunk, and
then conferred with O'Flynn.
"The Colonel's made some little kind o' sweet-cake things for the tree.
I could s... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Thank you," says the Boy, "but we're not takin' any bundles to-day."
"Call next door," advised the Colonel.
"You think we're tryin' to jolly you, but just go out and see for
yourself--"
"No, sir, you've waked the wrong passenger!"
"They're tryin' it on _us_," said Potts, and subsided into his place at
the breakfast-t... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
But that gentleman pulled up his hood and stood his ground.
"How did it get on the roof, in the name o' the nation?" asked the
Colonel, stamping his feet.
"Never hear of Santa Claus? Didn't I tell you, Kaviak, he drove his
reindeer team over the roofs?"
"Did you hear any dogs go by in the night?"
"I didn't; Nicholas b... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
The great rapture of that moment did not, however, prevent O'Flynn's
saying under his breath:
"Did ye be chanct, now, think of bringin' a dtrop o'--hey?"
"No," says Benham a little shortly.
"Huh! Ye say that like's if ye wuz a taytotlerr?"
"Not me. But I find it no good to drink whiskey on the trail."
"Ah!" says Salmo... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Nothin' th' matter with moose, hey?"
"Nop! Bet your life."
The "Salmi of ptarmigan" appeared as a great wash of gravy in which
portions of the much cut-up bird swam in vain for their lives. But the
high flat rim of the dish was plentifully garnished by fingers of
corn-bread, and the gravy was "galoppshus," so Potts s... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"I'd spent the five thousand dollars my father left me, and I'd cleaned
up just forty-two dollars sixty cents in my three years' mining."
The announcement fell chill on the company.
"I was dead broke and I had no credit. I went home."
"But"--Mac roused himself--"you didn't stay--"
"No, you don't stay--as a rule;"--Mac... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"What's the matter with Wall Street?"
"'Tisn't such a pretty game, and they don't play for their lives. I
tell you it's love of gambling brings men here, and it's the splendid
stiff game they find going on that keeps them. There's nothing like it
on earth."
His belated enthusiasm deceived nobody.
"It don't seem to hav... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
The Colonel made the punch. O'Flynn drained his cup without waiting for
the mockery of that first toast--_To our Enterprise_--although no one
had taken more interest in the programme than O'Flynn. Benham talked
about the Anvik saw-mill, and the money made in wood camps along the
river. Nobody listened, though everyone... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
The noise outside grew louder, the air was rent with howls of rage and
defiance.
"Sounds as if there's 'bout a million mad dogs on your front stoop,"
says Schiff, knowing there must be a great deal going on if any of it
reached his ears.
"You set still." His pardner pushed him down on his stool. "Mr. Benham
and I'll s... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"These gentlemen," says the Boy, shaking with excitement as he ushered
them in, "are Mr. John Dillon and General Lighter. They've just done
the six hundred and twenty-five miles from Minóok with dogs over the
ice! They've been forty days on the trail, and they're as fit as
fiddles. An' no yonder, for Little Minóok has... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
It was the other man--the western towns are full of General
Lighters--who did the talking. An attorney from Seattle, he had come up
in the July rush with very little but boundless assurance, fell in with
an old miner who had been grubstaked by Captain Rainey out of the
_Oklahoma's_ supplies, and got to Minóok before t... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Because the A. C. and N. A. T. and T. boats got frozen in this side of
Dawson. They know by the time they get there in June a lot of stuff
will have come in by the short route through the lakes, and the town
will be overstocked. So there's flour and bacon to burn when you get up
as far as Minóok. It's only along the ... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Look here, we'll set the tree up where you can see it better." He put
an empty bucket on the table, and with Mac's help, wedged the spruce in
it firmly, between some blocks of wood and books of the law.
The cabin was very crowded. Little Mr. Schiff was sitting on the
cricket. Kaviak retired to his old seat on Elephas... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Look here, didn't you hear me saying it was Christmas?"
"You been sayin' that for twenty-four hours. Been keepin' Christmas
right straight along since yesterday mornin." But the General had gone
out to unpack the whisky. "He knocked up the mission folks, bright and
early yesterday, to tell 'em about the Glad News Tid... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Look here!" he shouted across to Mac, "I'll give you a lay on my best
claim for two thousand down and a small royalty."
Mac stuck out his jaw.
"I'd like to take a look at the country before I deal."
"Well, see here. When will you go?"
"We got no dogs."
"_We_ have!" exclaimed Salmon P. and Scruff with one voice.
"Well... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
The General smacked his lips, and set down the granite cup.
"_That's_ the argument," he said. "Got a noospaper?"
The Colonel looked about in a flustered way for the tattered San
Francisco _Examiner_; Potts and the Boy hustled the punch-bowl on to
the bucket board, recklessly spilling some of the precious contents.
O'F... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Where's your bitch?" said Dillon calmly.
"Bitch?"
"Haven't you got a condensed milk can with some bacon grease in it, and
a rag wick? Makes a good enough light."
But the fire had been poked up, and the cabin was full of dancing
lights and shadows. Besides that, the Boy was holding a resinous stick
alight over the tab... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Let me look at it a minute," begged the Boy.
"Hand it round," whispered Schiff.
It was real. It was gold. Their fingers tingled under the first
contact. This was the beginning.
The rude bit of metal bred a glorious confidence. Under the magic of
its touch Robert Bruce's expensive education became a simple certainty.
... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"You ain't got it all," whispered Schiff hurriedly.
"Oh, I'm leavin' the fox-face for luck," Dillon nodded at the Colonel.
But Schiff pointed reverently at the tear in the paper, as Dillon only
went on pushing his sack deep down in his pocket, while Mac lifted the
_Examiner_. All but the two millionaires bent forward ... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
Dillon went out and roused up the dogs, asleep in the snow, with their
bushy tails sheltering their sharp noses.
"See you later?"
"Yes, 'outside.'"
"Outside? No, sir! _Inside_."
Dillon swore a blood-curdling string of curses and cracked his whip
over the leader.
"Why, you comin' back?"
"Bet your life!"
And nobody who ... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"After all, _they_ can do it."
"So can we if we've a mind to," said Mac.
"Come on, then."
The camp tried hard to dissuade them. Naturally neither listened. They
packed the Boy's sled and set off on the morning of the third, to
Kaviak's unbounded surprise and disgust, his view of life being that,
wherever Mac went, he ... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Then, badly off as we are here," says the Colonel to the Boy, "it's
lucky for us we didn't join the procession."
When Mac and the Boy brought the sled home a couple of days later, it
was found that a portion of its cargo consisted of a toy kyak and two
bottles of hootchino, the maddening drink concocted by the native... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
So presently another council was called, and the Colonel resigned his
office, stipulating that each man in turn should hold it for a week,
and learn how ungrateful it was. Moreover, that whoever was, for the
nonce, occupying the painful post, should be loyally upheld by all the
others, which arrangement was in force t... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
But the Colonel himself lost his temper two days later when O'Flynn
broached the seal set months before on the nearly empty demijohn. For
those famous "temperance punches" the Colonel had drawn on his own
small stock. He saw his blunder when O'Flynn, possessing himself of the
demijohn, roared out:
"It's my whisky, I t... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"I begin to understand," says the Colonel to the Boy, under cover of
the others' talk, "why it's said to be such a devil of a test of a
fellow's decency to winter in this infernal country."
"They say it's always a man's pardner he comes to hate most," returned
the Boy, laughing good-humouredly at the Colonel.
"Natural... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"I came out here a Communist--" said the Boy one day to the Colonel.
"And an agnostic," smiled the older man.
"Oh, I'm an agnostic all right, now and for ever. But this winter has
cured my faith in Communism."
Early February brought not only lengthening daylight, but a radical
change in the weather. The woodsmen worke... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
Then the Colonel would give a little start, turn about, lift his
double-bitter, and swing it frontier fashion, first over one shoulder,
then over the other, striking cleanly home each time, working with a
kind of splendid rhythm more harmonious, more beautiful to look at,
than most of the works of men. This was, perha... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
* * * * *
But a few days sufficed to wear the novelty off the new wood camp for
most of the party. Potts and O'Flynn set out in the opposite direction
one morning with a hand-sled, and provisions to last several days. They
were sick of bacon and beans, and were "goin' huntin'." No one cou... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"You can't help that," Mac chopped out.
"Say Mac," said Potts in a drunken voice, "I'm talkin' to you like a
friend. You want to get a move on that kid."
"Kaviak's goin' won't make any more difference than a fly's."
The other two grumbled incoherently.
"But I tell you what _would_ make a difference: if you two would q... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"No."
"He says there's another stampede on."
"Where to?"
"Koyukuk this time."
"Why didn't he come in?"
"Awful hurry to get to somebody that sent for him. Funny fellas these
Jesuits. They _believe_ all those odd things they teach."
"So do other men," said the Colonel, curtly.
"Well, I've lived in a Christian country al... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
The Colonel stumbled down the bank in the snow, and soon stood by the
shape. The Boy was dressed for a journey. His Arctic cap was drawn down
over his ears and neck. The wolf-skin fringe of his parki hood stood
out fiercely round the defiant young face. Wound about one of his
seal-skin mittens was the rope of the new ... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Tired of life!" The young eyes flashed in that weird aureole of long
wolf-hair. "Tired of life! Well, I should just pretty nearly think I
wasn't."
"H'm! Then if it isn't Christianity, it must be because you're young."
"Golly, man! it's because I'm hungry--HUNGRY! Great Jehosaphat! I could
eat an ox!"
"And you leave y... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"That religion of yours is makin' you morbid, Colonel." The Boy spoke
with the detached and soothing air of a sage.
"You don't know what you're talking about." He turned sharply away. The
Boy relapsed into silence. The Colonel in his renewed prowling brought
up against the wooden crane. He stood looking down into the ... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
And the Boy obeyed without a word.
Two days after, three men with a child stood in front of the larger
cabin, saying good-bye to their two comrades who were starting out on
snow-shoes to do a little matter of 625 miles of Arctic travelling,
with two weeks' scant provisioning, some tea and things for trading,
bedding, ... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"Good-bye; meet you in the Klondyke!"
"Good-bye. Hooray for the Klondyke in June!"
"Klondyke in June! Hoop-la!"
The two travellers looked back, laughing and nodding, as jolly as you
please. The Boy stooped, made a snow-ball, and fired it at Kaviak. The
child ducked, chuckling, and returned as good as he got. His loose... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
They believed they had hearkened well to the counsel that bade them
"travel light." "Remember, every added ounce is against you." "Nobody
in the North owns anything that's heavy," had been said in one fashion
or another so often that it lost its ironic sound in the ears of men
who had come so far to carry away one of ... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
That they did not cover more ground that first day was a pure chance,
not likely to recur, due to an unavoidable loss of time at Pymeut.
Knowing the fascination that place exercised over his companion, the
Colonel called a halt about seven miles off from the Big Chimney, that
they might quickly despatch a little cold ... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"I tell you the omens are good! This expedition's goin' to get there."
Then, with the involuntary misgiving that follows hard upon such
boasting, he laughed uneasily and added, "I mean to sacrifice the first
deer's tongue I don't want myself, to Yukon Inua; but here's to the
south wind!" He turned some corn-bread crum... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
The Boy's predominant feeling had been one of intense surprise. He
looked round, and a hideous misgiving seized him.
"Anything the matter with you, Colonel?" His tone was so angry that, as
they stared at each other, they both fell to laughing.
"Well, I rather thought that was what _I_ was going to say"; and
Kentucky h... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 | |
"I didn't like--bein' in--that blow-hole. (Do you know--it was so
cold--it burnt!) But I'd rather--be--in a blow-hole--than--br-r-r!
Blow-hole isn't so s-s-melly as these s-s-kins!'
"You better be glad you've got a whole skin of your own and ain't
smellin' brimstone," said the Colonel, pouring a little more whisky
dow... | The Magnetic North | Robins, Elizabeth | 1862 | 1952 | ['en'] | 22 | {'Yukon -- Fiction'} | PG10038 |
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