Part 10 (2/2)
Graham gave them a supper of gray trout and bannocks and they afterward sat talking while the half-breed went fis.h.i.+ng. The rain had ceased, though the mist still drifted heavily down the gorge, and the aromatic smell of wood-smoke mingled with the scent of the pines.
Somewhere in the shadows a loon was calling, its wild cry piercing through the roar of water.
”A rugged and beautiful country,” Graham remarked. ”Is this your first visit to it, Mr. Allinson?”
”No,” Andrew replied. ”I was once some distance north, looking for caribou. I'm glad of an opportunity for seeing it again. It gets hold of one.”
”So you know that; you have felt the pull of the lonely North! Curious how it draws some of us, isn't it?”
”Have you been up there?”
”Oh, yes; as a young man I served the Hudson Bay. I've been through most of the barrens between Churchill and the Mackenzie. Perhaps that's the grimmest, hardest country white men ever entered; but it's one you can't forget.”
”It's undoubtedly hard,” said Andrew. ”We scarcely reached the fringe of it, but I was dressed in rags and worn very thin when we struck Lake Manitoba. I suppose you live at the Landing now?”
”I've been there twenty years; built my house myself when there was only a shack or two and a Hudson Bay store. The railroad has changed all that.”
”Mr. Graham is treasurer for the sawmill,” Carnally explained.
”Didn't you find it tamer than serving the fur company?” Andrew asked.
A curious smile crept into Graham's eyes.
”One can't have everything, Mr. Allinson. I've been content, a willing slave of the desk, only seeing the wilds for a week or two in summer.
But I've thought I might make another trip before I get too old.”
”I think I understand,” Andrew replied; ”if I've a chance, I'm going before I return home. There's so much up yonder that impresses me--the caribou, the timber wolves, the lake storms, and the break up of the rivers in the spring. What a tremendous spectacle the last must be!--six-foot ice, piled up in wild confusion, thundering down the valleys. I've only followed the track of it in summer, but I've seen the wreckage of rubbed-out b.u.t.tes and islands, and boulders smashed to rubble.”
”It is grand,” said Graham quietly.
”I wonder if you'd mind telling Mr. Allinson about the silver lode you found?” Carnally suggested. ”I guess he'd be interested.”
Graham needed some persuasion before he began his tale.
”It happened a long time ago and I seldom mention it now; in fact, I'll confess that the lode is looked upon as a harmless illusion of mine. My friends call it my Dream Mine. When I was a young man I was stationed at a Hudson Bay factory about four hundred miles north of here and was despatched with two half-breeds and a canoe to carry stores to a band of Indians. No doubt you know that the great Company held sovereign authority over the North for a very long time and the Indians depended on it for their maintenance. Well, we set off with the canoe, paddling and portaging up rivers and across the height of land, toward the south.”
”Then you were working across country toward the headwaters of this river,” Andrew remarked.
”We didn't get so far, but I did my errand, and one day when crossing a divide we nooned beside a little creek. As I filled the kettle I noticed something peculiar about the pebbles and picked up a few. They were unusually heavy and dully l.u.s.trous, which made me curious.
Following the creek back, I found a vein of the same material among the rocks. I filled a small bag with specimens and took the bearings of the spot, though we had to get on without loss of time because the rivers would soon be freezing up. On reaching the fort I showed the agent the specimens. I can remember his look of disgust. He was a grim old Scot.
”Just pebbles; I'm no saying but they might be pretty,' he remarked, and opening the door threw them out. 'Ye'll think nae mair o' them.
The Company's no collecting precious stones, and ye should ken a souter's expected to stick till his last.'”
”I wonder,” said Andrew, ”which of you hailed from the Border.”
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