Part 14 (2/2)
”Oh, you will, will you?” snorted Fraser, indignantly. ”So, after me getting well on purpose to make this trip, you want to dump me here with this fat man. I'll stand as much as anybody, but I won't stand for no deal like that. No, sir! You said I could go, and I'm going. Why, I'd rather drown than stick in this burgh with that greasy Russian porpoise. Gee!
this is a s.h.i.+ne village.”
”Then take your medicine like a man, and quit kicking.”
”If you prefer to swallow your groans, you do it. I like to make a fuss when I suffer. I enjoy it more that way.”
Again Petellin called them at daylight, and they were off; this time with better success, for the waves had abated sufficiently for them to venture beyond the partial shelter of the bay. All three knew the desperate chance they were taking, and they spoke little as they made their way out into the Straits. Their craft was strange to them, and the positions they were forced to occupy soon brought on cramped muscles. The bidarka is a frail, narrow framework over which is stretched walrus skin, and it is so fas.h.i.+oned that the crew sits, one behind the other, in circular openings with legs straight out in front. To keep themselves dry each man had donned a native water garment--a loose, hooded s.h.i.+rt manufactured from the bladders of seals. These s.h.i.+rts--or kamlikas, as they are called--are provided with draw-strings at wrists, face, and bottom, so that when the skirt is stretched over the rim of the c.o.c.kpit and corded tight, it renders the canoe well-nigh waterproof, even though the decks are awash.
The whole contrivance is peculiarly aboriginal and unsuited to the uses of white men; and, while unusually seaworthy, the bidarka requires more skill in the handling than does a Canadian birch bark, hence the wits of the three travellers were taxed to the utmost.
Out across the lonesome waste they journeyed, steadily creeping farther from the village, which of a sudden seemed a very safe and desirable place, with its snug store, its blazing fires, and its warm beds. The sea tossed them like a cork, coating their paddles and the decks of the canoe with ice, which they were at great pains to break off. It wet them in spite of their precautions, and its salt breath searched out their marrow, regardless of their unceasing labors; and these labors were in truth unceasing, for fifty miles of open water lay before them; fifty miles, which meant twelve hours of steady paddling. Gradually, imperceptibly, the mountain sh.o.r.es behind them shrank down upon the gray horizon. It seemed that for once the weather was going to be kind to them, and their spirits rose in consequence. They ate frequently, food being the great fuel of the North, and midday found them well out upon the heaving bosom of the Straits with the Kodiak sh.o.r.es plainly visible. Then, as if tired of toying with them, the wind rose. It did not blow up a gale--merely a frigid breath that cut them like steel and halted their progress. Had it sprung from the north it would have wafted them on their way, but it drew in from the Pacific, straight into their teeth, forcing them to redouble their exertions. It was not of sufficient violence to overcome their efforts, but it held them back and stirred up a nasty cross sea into which the canoe plunged and wallowed. In the hope that it would die down with the darkness, the boatmen held on their course, and night closed over them still paddling silently.
It was nearly noon on the following day when the watchman at the Uyak cannery beheld a native canoe creeping slowly up the bay, and was astonished to find it manned by three white men in the last stages of exhaustion--so stiff and cramped and numb that he was forced to help them from their places when at last they effected a landing. One of them, in fact, was unconscious and had to be carried to the house, which did not surprise the watchman when he learned whence they had come. He did marvel, however, that another of the travellers should begin to cry weakly when told that the mail boat had sailed for Kodiak the previous evening. He gave them stimulants, then prepared hot food for them, for both Bait and Emerson were like sleep-walkers; and Fraser, when he was restored to consciousness, was too weak to stand.
”Too bad you didn't get in last night,” said the care-taker, sympathetically. ”She won't be back now for a month or more.”
”How long will she lie in Kodiak?” Big George asked.
”The captain told me he was going to spend Christmas there. Lefs see--to- day is the 22nd--she'll pull out for Juneau on the morning of the 26th; that's three days.”
”We must catch her,” cried Emerson, quickly. ”If you'll land us in Kodiak on time I'll pay you anything you ask.”
”I'd like to, but I can't,” the man replied. ”You see, I'm here all alone, except for Johnson. He's the watchman for the other plant.”
”Then for G.o.d's sake get us some natives. I don't care what it costs.”
”There ain't any natives here. This ain't no village. There's nothing here but these two plants, and Johnson or me da.s.sent leave.”
Emerson turned his eyes upon the haggard man who sprawled weakly in a chair; and Fraser, noting the appeal, answered, gamely, with a forced smile on his lips, though they were drawn and bloodless:
”Sure! I'll be ready to leave in the morning, pal!”
The old Russian village of Kodiak lies on the opposite side of the island from the canneries, a bleak, wind-swept relic of the country's first occupation, and although peopled largely by natives and breeds, there is also a considerable white population, to whom Christmas is a season of thanksgiving and celebration. Hence it was that the crew of the Dora were well content to pa.s.s the Yuletide there, where the girls are pretty and a hearty welcome is accorded to every one. There were drinking and dancing and music behind the square-hewn log walls, and the big red stoves made havoc with the salt wind. The town was well filled and the merrymaking vigorous, and inasmuch as winter is a time of rest, during which none but the most foolhardy trust themselves to the perils of the sea, it caused much comment when late on Christmas afternoon an ice-burdened canoe, bearing three strange white men, landed on the beach beside the dock--or were they white men, after all? Their faces were so blackened and split from the frost they seemed to be raw bleeding masks, their hands were cracked and stiff beneath their mittens. They were hollow-eyed and gaunt, their cheeks sunken away as if from a wasting illness, and they could not walk, but crept across the snow-covered s.h.i.+ngle on hands and knees, then reaching the street hobbled painfully, while their limbs gave way as if paralyzed. One of them lacked strength even to leave the canoe, and when two sailors ran down and lifted him out, he gabbled strangely in the jargon of the mining camp and the gambling table. Of the other two, one, a great awkward shambling giant of a creature, stumbled out along the dock toward the s.h.i.+p, his head hung low and swinging from side to side, his shoulders drooping, his arms loose-hinged, his knees bending.
[Ill.u.s.tration: OUT ACROSS THE LONESOME WASTE THEY JOURNEYED]
But the third voyager, who had with difficulty won his way up to the level of the street, presented the strangest appearance. There was something uncanny about him. As he gained the street, he waved back all proffered a.s.sistance, then paused, with his swaying body propped upon widespread legs, staring malignantly into the north. From their deep sockets his eyes glittered like live coals, while his blackened, swollen lips split in a grimace that bared his teeth. He raised his arms slowly and shook his clenched fists defiantly at the Polar skies, muttering unintelligible things, then staggered after his companions.
CHAPTER VIII
WHEREIN BOYD ADMITS HIS FAILURE
A week later Boyd and George were watching the lights of Port Townsend blink out in the gloom astern. A quick change of boats at Juneau had raised their spirits, enabling them to complete the second stage of their journey in less than the expected time, and the southward run, out from the breath of the Arctics into a balmier climate, had removed nearly the last trace of their suffering from the frost.
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