Part 55 (2/2)

Home and friends seem far away. If every soul that one loves were at death's door, one could not get home in time to say farewell--so why not banish care and enjoy each hour as it comes?

This is the same reckless spirit which, greatly intensified, possessed desperate men when they went to the Klondike ten years ago. There was no telegraph, then, and mails were carried in only once or twice a year.

Letters were lost. Men did not hear from their wives, and, discouraged and disheartened, decided that the women had died or had forgotten; so they went the way of the country, and it often came to pa.s.s that Heartbreak Trail led to the Land of Heartbreak.

In the morning we learned that the boat for Dawson was not yet ”in,”

and, even if it should arrive during the day,--which seemed to be as uncertain as the opening of the river in spring,--would not leave until some time during the night; so at nine o'clock we took the Skaguay train for the Grand Canyon.

One ”oldest” resident of White Horse told us that it was only a mile to the canyon; another oldest one, that it was four miles; still another, that it was five; all agreed that we should take the train out and walk back.

”There's a tram,” they told us, ”an old, abandoned tram, and you can't get lost. You've only to follow the tram. Why, a _goose_ couldn't get lost. Norman McCauley built the tram, and outfits were portaged around the canyon and the rapids two seasons; then the railroad come in and the tram went out of business.”

We took our bundles of mosquito netting and boarded the train. In summer the travel is all ”in,” and we were the only pa.s.sengers. When the White Pa.s.s Railway Company was organized, stock was worth ten dollars a share; now it is worth six hundred and fifty dollars, and it is not for sale.

Freight rates are five cents a pound, one hundred dollars a ton, or fifty in car-load lots, from Skaguay to White Horse. Pa.s.senger rates are supposed to be twenty cents a mile. We paid seventy-five cents to return to the canyon which we pa.s.sed the previous day. This rate should make the distance four miles, and we barely had time to arrange our mosquito veils, according to the instructions of the conductor, when the train stopped.

We were told that we might not see a mosquito; and again, that we might not be able to see anything else.

We were put off and left standing ankle-deep in sand, on the brink of a precipice, four miles from any human being--in the wilds of Alaska. At that moment the trainmen looked like old and dear friends.

”The path down is right in front of you,” the collector called, as the train started. ”Don't be afraid of the bears! They will not harm you at this time of the year.”

Bears!

We had considered heat, mosquitoes, losing our way, hunger, exhaustion,--everything, it appeared, except bears. We looked at one another.

”I had not thought of bears.”

”Nor had I.”

We looked down at the bushes growing along the canyon; little heat-worms glimmered in the still atmosphere.

”Perhaps it is an Alaskan joke,” I suggested feebly.

We stood for some time trying to decide whether we should make the descent or return to White Horse, when suddenly the matter was decided for us. I was standing on the brink of the sandy precipice, down which a path went, almost perpendicularly, without bend or pause, to the bank of the river several hundred yards below.

The sandy soil upon which I stood suddenly caved and went down into the path. I went with it. I landed several yards below the brink, gave one cry, and then--by no will of my own--was off for the canyon.

The caving of the brink had started a sand and gravel slide; and I, knee-deep in it, was going down with it--slowly, but oh, most surely.

There was no pausing, no looking back. I could hear my companion calling to me to ”stop”; to ”wait”; to ”be careful”--and all her entreaties were the bitterest irony by the time they floated down to me. So long as the slide did not stop, it was useless to tell me to do so; for I was embedded in it halfway to my waist. We kept going, slowly and hesitatingly; but never slowly enough for me to get out.

It was eighty in the shade, and the sand was hot. I was wearing a white waist, a dark blue cheviot skirt, and patent-leather shoes; and my appearance, when I finally reached level ground and cool alder trees, may be imagined. Furthermore, our trunks had been bonded to Dawson, and I had no extra skirts or shoes with me.

My companion, profiting by my misfortune, had armed herself with an alpenstock and was ”tacking” down the slope. It was half an hour before she arrived.

I have never forgiven her for the way she laughed.

We soon forgot the bears in the beauty of the scene before us. We even forgot the comedy of my unwilling descent.

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