Part 21 (1/2)
”I went to school at the mission on the Mackenzie. I went there for a good many years, and I worked hard, for I like to study. And books! I love to read books. I read all they had, and some of them many times. Do you love books?”
”Why yes,” answered Brent, ”I used to. I haven't read many since I came North.”
”Why did you come North?”
”I came for gold.”
”For gold!” cried the girl, her eyes s.h.i.+ning, ”That is why we are here!
Wananebish says there is gold here in the barrens. Once many years ago she found it--but we have tried to find the place again, and we cannot.”
”Who is Wananebish?”
”Wananebish is my mother. She is an Indian, and she has tried to keep the band together through many years, and to keep them away from the hooch, but, they will not listen to her. It was hard work to persuade them to come away from the river. And, have you found gold?”
”Yes,” answered Brent, ”Way over beyond the mountains that lie to the westward of the Mackenzie, I found much gold. But I lost it.”
”Lost it! Oh, that was too bad. Did it fall off your sled?”
”Well, not exactly,” answered the man dryly. ”In my case, it was more of a toboggan.”
”Couldn't you find it again?”
”No. Other men have it, now.”
”And they won't give it back!”
”No, it is theirs. That part of it is all right--only I would give anything in the world to have it--now.”
”Why do you want it now? Can you not find more gold? I guess I do not understand.”
Brent shook his head: ”No, you do not understand. But, sometime you will understand. Sometime I think I shall have many things to tell you--and then I want you to understand.”
The girl glanced at him wonderingly, as she threw a handful of tea into the pan. ”You must sharpen some green sticks and cut pieces of meat,”
she said, ”And we will eat our supper.”
A silence fell upon them during the meal, a silence broken only by the roar of the wind that came to them as from afar, m.u.f.fled as it was by its own freighting of snow. Hardly for a moment did Brent take his eyes from the girl. There was a great unwonted throbbing in his breast, that seemed to cry out to him to take the girl in his arms and hold her tight against his pounding heart, and the next moment the joy of her was gone, and in its place was a dull heavy pain.
”Now, I know why I like you,” said the girl, abruptly, as she finished her piece of venison.
”Yes?” smiled Brent, ”And are you going to tell me?”
”It is because you are good.” She continued, without noting the quick catch in the man's breath. ”Men who hunt for gold are good. My father was good, and he died hunting for gold. Wananebish told me. It was years and years ago when I was a very little baby. I know from reading in books that many white men are good. But in the North they are bad.
Unless they are of the police, or are priests, or factors. I had sworn to hate all white men who came into the North--but I forgot the men who hunt gold.”
”I am glad you remembered them,” answered Brent gravely. ”I hope you are right.”
”I am sleepy,” announced the girl. ”We cannot both sleep in this robe, for we have only one, and to keep warm it is necessary to roll up in it.
One of us can sleep half the night while the other tends the fire, and then the other will sleep.”