Part 43 (1/2)

”'What's their name?' says she, as we walked along.

”'Davis,' says I; an' mercy to heaven! I didn't know I was tellin' a lie.

”All of a sudden she laughed out loud--the awfullest laugh. It sounded as harrable mo'rnful as a sea-gull just before a storm.

”'_Husband!_' she flings out, jeerin'; '_I_ had a husband once. I wors.h.i.+pped the ground he trod on. _I_ thought the sun raised an' set in _him_. He carried me on two chips for a while, but I didn't have any children, an' I took to worryin' over it, an' lost my looks an' my disposition. It goes deep with some women, an' it went deep with me. Men don't seem to understand some things. Instid of sympathizin' with me, he took to complainin' an' findin' fault an' finally stayin' away from home.

”'There's no use talkin' about what I suffered for a year; I never told anybody this much before--an' it wa'n't anything to what I've suffered ever since. But one day I stumbled on a letter he had wrote to a woman he called Ruth. He talked about her red wavy hair an' blue eyes an' baby mouth an' the way she smiled like an angel. They were goin' to run away together. He told her he'd heard of a place at the end of the earth where a man could make a lot of money, an' he'd go there an' get settled an' then send for her, if she was willin' to live away from everybody, just for him. He said they'd never see a human soul that knew them.'

”She stopped talkin' all at once, an' we walked along. I was scared plumb to death. I didn't know the woman's name, for he always called her 'dearie,' but the baby's name was Ruth.

”'You've got to feelin' bad now,' says I, 'an' maybe we'd best not go on.'

”'I'm goin' on,' says she.

”After a while she says, in a different voice, kind of hard, 'I put that letter back an' never said a word. I wouldn't turn my hand over to keep a man. I never saw the woman; but I know how she looks. I've gone over it every night of my life since. I know the shape of every feature. I never let on, to him or anybody else. It's the only thing I've thanked G.o.d for, since I read that letter--helpin' me to keep up an' never let on. It's the only thing I've prayed for since that day. It wa'n't very long--about a month. He just up an' disappeared. People talked about me awful because I didn't cry, an' take on, an' hunt him.

”'I took what little money he left me an' went away. I got the notion that he'd gone to South America, so I set out to get as far in the other direction as possible. I got to San Francisco, an' then the chance fell to me to come up here. It sounded like the North Pole to me, so I come.

I'm awful glad I come. Them sea-gulls is the only pleasure I've had--since; an' it's been four year. That's all.'

”Well, sir, when we got up close to the cabin, I got to s.h.i.+verin' so's I couldn't brace up an' go in with her. It didn't seem possible it _could_ be the same man, but then, such darn queer things do happen in Alaska!

Anyhow, I'd got cold feet. I remembered that the cannery the man worked in was shut down, so's he'd likely be at home.

”'I'll go back now,' I mumbles, 'an' leave you womenfolks to get acquainted.'

”I fooled along slow, an' when I'd got nearly to the settlement I heard her comin'. I turned an' waited--an' I G.o.d! she won't be any ash-whiter when she's in her coffin. She was steppin' in all directions, like a blind woman; her arms hung down stiff at her sides; her fingers were locked around her thumbs as if they'd never loose; an' some nights, even now, I can't sleep for thinkin' how her eyes looked. I guess if you'd gag a dog, so's he couldn't cry, an' then cut him up _slow_, inch by inch, his eyes 'u'd look like her'n did then. At sight of me her face worked, an' I thought she was goin' to cry; but all at once she burst out into the awfullest laughin' you ever heard outside of a lunatic asylum.

”'Lord G.o.d Almighty!' she cries out--'where's his mercy at, the Bible talks about? You'd think he might have a little mercy on an ugly woman who never had any children, wouldn't you--especially when there's women in the world with wavy red hair an' blue eyes--women that smile like angels an' have little baby girls! Oh, Lord, what a joke on me!'

”Well, she went on laughin' till my blood turned cold, but she never told me one word of what happened to her. She went back to California on the first boat that went, but it was two weeks. I saw her several times; an' at sight of me she'd burst out into that same laughin' an' cry out, 'My Lord, what a joke! Did you ever see its beat for a joke?' but she wouldn't answer a thing I ast her. The last time I ever see her, she was leanin' over the s.h.i.+p's side. She looked like a dead woman, but when she see me she waved her hand and burst out laughin'.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Copyright by E. A. Hegg, Juneau Courtesy of Webster & Stevens, Seattle

A FAMOUS TEAM OF HUSKIES]

”'Do you hear them sea-gulls?' she cries out. 'All they can scream is _Kar_-luk! _Kar_-luk! _Kar_-luk! You can hear'm say it just as plain.

_Kar_-luk! I'll hear 'em when I lay in my grave! Oh, my Lord, what a joke!'”

CHAPTER x.x.xIII

Our progress up Karluk River in the barge was so leisurely that we seemed to be ”drifting upward with the flood” between the low green sh.o.r.es that sloped, covered with flowers, to the water. The clouds were a soft gray, edged with violet, and the air was very sweet.

The hatchery is picturesquely situated.

A tiny rivulet, called Shasta Creek, comes tumbling noisily down from the hills, and its waters are utilized in the various ”ponds.”

The first and highest pond they enter is called the ”settling” pond, which receives, also, in one corner, the clear, bubbling waters of a spring, whose upflow, never ceasing, prevents this corner of the pond from freezing. This pond is deeper than the others, and receives the waters of the creek so lightly that the sediment is not disturbed in the bottom, its function being to permit the sediment carried down from the creek to settle before the waters pa.s.s on into the wooden flume, which carries part of the overflow into the hatching-house, or on into the lower ponds, which are used for ”ripening” the salmon.

There are about a dozen of these ponds, and they are terraced down the hill with a fall of from four to six feet between them.