Part 9 (1/2)

”'You are Sitka Charley,' she says I get up quick and roll blankets so snow does not get inside 'I go to Dawson,' she says

'I go in your canoe - how much?'

”I do not want anybody in my canoe I do not like to say no So I say, 'One thousand dollars' Just for fun I say it, so woman cannot come with me, much better than say no She look at ht away Then she says all right, she will give me one thousand dollars

”What can I say? I do not want the woiven my word that for one thousand dollars she can come I am surprised Maybe she make fun, too, so I say, 'Letwoman, all alone on the trail, there in the snow, she take out one thousand dollars, in greenbacks, and she put them in my hand I look at money, I look at her What can I say? I say, 'No, h She says, 'I areat traveller This is my outfit' She kick one small pack in the snow It is two fur robes, canvas outside, some woman's clothes inside I pick it up Maybe thirty- five pounds I am surprised She take it away from me She says, 'Come, let us start' She carries pack into canoe What can I say? I put my blankets into canoe We start

”And that is the way I saw the woman first time The as fair I put up small sail The canoe went very fast, it flew like a bird over the high waves The woman was much afraid 'What for you coh, but she is still h rapids to Lake Bennett Water very bad, and woo down Lake Bennett, snow, ice, wind like a gale, but woht we make camp at Windy Arm Woman sit by fire and eat supper I look at her She is pretty She fix hair There is old in the firelight, when she turn her head, so, and flashes coe and brown, sometimes warht like broken ice when sun shi+nes upon it When she smile - how can I say? - when she smile I knohite man like to kiss her, just like that, when she smile She never do hard work Her hands are soft, like baby's hand She is soft all over, like baby She is not thin, but round like baby; her ar, her muscles, all soft and round like baby Her waist is small, and when she stand up, when she walk, or move her head or arm, it is - I do not know the word - but it is nice to look at, like - ood canoe, just like that, and when she h still water or leaping through water when it is white and fast and angry It is very good to see

”Why does she come into Klondike, all alone, with plenty of h and says: 'Sitka Charley, that is none of your business I give you one thousand dollars take me to Dawson That only is your business' Next day after that I ask her what is her nah, then she says, 'Mary Jones, that is my name' I do not know her name, but I know all the time that Mary Jones is not her name

”It is very cold in canoe, and because of cold soood and she sing Her voice is like a silver bell, and I feel good all over like when I go into church at Holy Cross Mission, and when she sing I feel strong and paddle like hell Then she laugh and says, 'You think we get to Dawson before freeze-up, Charley?' So far away, her eyes like that, all empty She does not see Sitka Charley, nor the ice, nor the snow She is far away Very often she is like that, thinking far away Soood to see It looks like a face that is angry, like the face of one man when he want to kill another man

”Last day to Dawson very bad Shore-ice in all the eddies, mush- ice in the streaet to shore There is o down Yukon in the ice That night there isstop 'Let us go to shore,' the wo start down-streaain There is ht, everything stop At one o'clock everything start again At three o'clock everything stop Canoe is sshell, but is on top of ice and cannot sink I hear dogs howling We wait We sleep By and bycome There is no more snow It is the freeze-up, and there is Dawson Canoe sht at Dawson Sitka Charley has come in with two thousand letters on very last water

”The woman rent a cabin on the hill, and for one week I see her no more Then, one day, she come to me 'Charley,' she says, 'how do you like to work for s, make ca letters She says, 'Charley, I will pay you et fifteen dollars a day in the mines She says, 'That is four hundred and fifty dollars a month' And I say, 'Sitka Charley is no pick-and-shovel ive you seven hundred and fifty dollars each o to work for her

I buy for her dogs and sled We travel up Klondike, up Bonanza and Eldorado, over to Indian River, to Sulphur Creek, to Dominion, back across divide to Gold Bottom and to Too Much Gold, and back to Dawson All the ti, I do not knohat I ah 'You look for gold?' I ask She laugh Then she says, 'That is none of your business, Charley' And after that I never ask any more

”She has a small revolver which she carries in her belt Soh 'What for you laugh, Charley?' she ask 'What for you play with that?' I say 'It is no good It is too set back to Dawson she ask ood revolver for her I buy a Colt's 44 It is very heavy, but she carry it in her belt all the time

”At Dawson comes the man Which way he come I do not know Only do I know he is CHECHA-QUO - what you call tenderfoot His hands are soft, just like hers He never do hard work He is soft all over At first I thinkAlso, they ht He is maybe twenty years old His eyes blue, his hair yellow, he has a little mustache which is yellow His name is John Jones Maybe he is her brother I do not know I ask questions no more Only I think his name not John Jones Other people call him Mr Girvan I do not think that is his name I do not think her name is Miss Girvan, which other people call her I think nobody know their naht I as ready; we start' No s ready and we start We go down the Yukon It is night- time, it is November, and it is very cold - sixty-five below She is soft He is soft The cold bites They get tired They cry under their breaths to themselves By and by I say better we stop and o on Three times I say better to o on After that I say nothing All the tiet stiff and sore They do not understand ger like drunken people, they cry under their breaths; and all the tio on!'

”They are like crazy people All the tio on? I do not know Only do they go on What are they after? I do not know They are not after gold There is no stampede Besides, they spend plenty of o on and on, because I areatly paid

”We make Circle City That for which they look is not there I think now that ill rest, and rest the dogs But we do not rest, not for one day do we rest 'Coo on We leave the Yukon We cross the divide to the west and swing down into the Tanana Country There are new diggings there But that for which they look is not there, and we take the back trail to Circle City

”It is a hard journey Deceone The days are short It is very cold Oneit is seventy below zero 'Better that we don't travel to-day,' I say, 'else will the frost be unwars After that ill have bad cough, andwill come pneumonia' But they are CHECHA-QUO They do not understand the trail They are like dead people they are so tired, but they say, 'Let us go on' We go on The frost bites their lungs, and they get the dry cough They cough till the tears run down their cheeks When bacon is frying they h half an hour in the snow They freeze their cheeks a little bit, so that the skin turns black and is very sore

Also, the man freezes his thue thumb on his mitten to keep it warm And sometimes, when the frost bites hard and the thumb is very cold, he s next to the skin, so that the thuain

”We limp into Circle City, and even I, Sitka Charley, aood time, for to-morrow is Christmas Day and ill rest But no It is five o'clock in theI am two hours asleep The man stand by s We start'

”Have I not said that I ask questions no more? They pay me seven hundred and fifty dollars each month They are my masters I am their man If they say, 'Charley, cos, and snap the whip, and start for hell So I harness the dogs, and we start down the Yukon Where do we go? They do not say Only do they say, 'On! on! We will go on!'

”They are very weary They have travelled many hundreds of miles, and they do not understand the way of the trail Besides, their cough is very bad - the dry cough that o on Every day they go on Never do they rest the dogs Always do they buy new dogs At every cae, do they cut out the tired dogs and put in fresh dogs They have much money, money without end, and like water they spend it They are crazy? Sometimes I think so, for there is a devil in them that drives them on and on, always on What is it that they try to find? It is not gold Never do they dig in the ground I think a long time Then I think it is a man they try to find But what man? Never do we see the man Yet are they like wolves on the trail of the kill But they are funny wolves, soft wolves, baby wolves who do not understand the way of the trail They cry aloud in their sleep at night In their sleep they roan with the pain of their weariness And in the day, as they stagger along the trail, they cry under their breaths They are funny wolves

”We pass Fort Yukon We pass Fort Haone The days are very short At nine o'clock coht And it is cold And even I, Sitka Charley, ao on forever this ithout end? I do not know But always do I look along the trail for that which they try to find There are few people on the trail Son of life It is very quiet There is no sound Sohosts Sometimes it is clear, and at midday the sun looks at us for a hts flas dance, and the air is filled with frost-dust

”I a man I was born on the trail, and all my days have I lived on the trail And yet have these two baby wolves lad of reatly weary Yet ever are we hitting the trail in the dark before daylight, and still on the trail does the dark after nightfall find us These two baby wolves! If I am lean like a starved cat, they are lean like cats that have never eaten and have died Their eyes are sunk deep in their heads, bright sometimes as with fever, dim and cloudy sometimes like the eyes of the dead Their cheeks are hollow like caves in a cliff Also are their cheeks black and raw fro who says, 'I cannot get up I cannot move Let me die' And it is the o on' And they go on And soet up, and the wo they do, and always do, is to go on Always do they go on

”Soet letters

I do not knohat is in the letters But it is the scent that they follow, these letters theives them a letter I talk with hiives him the letter, a man who travels fast down the Yukon That is all But I know that the baby wolves are after the man with the one eye

”It is February, and we have travelled fifteen hundredSea, and there are stor I do not know, but I think sure they get a letter at Anvig, for they are o on' But I say we ht and fast Also, they say that we can get grub at Charley McKeon's cabin Then do I know that they take the big cut-off, for it is there that Charley McKeon lives where the Black Rock stands by the trail

”Before we start, I talkYes, there is a one by and who travels fast And I know that for which they look is the rub, and travel light and fast There are three fresh dogs bought in Anvig, and we travel very fast The , we travel later at night I look sometimes to see theo on and on When the dry cough take hold of theainst their stoh They cannot walk, they cannot talk Maybe for ten h, hten up, the tears fro frozen on their faces, and the words they say are, 'Coreatly weary, and I think seven hundred and fifty dollars is a cheap price for the labor I do We take the big cut-off, and the trail is fresh The baby wolves have their noses down to the trail, and they say, 'Hurry!' All the tis We have not roeak Also, they must work hard The woman has true sorrow for them, and often, because of them, the tears are in her eyes But the devil in her that drives her on will not let her stop and rest the dogs

”And then we come upon the man with the one eye He is in the snow by the trail, and his leg is broken Because of the leg he hason his blankets for three days and keeping a fire going When we find hi He swears like hell Never have I heard a lad Now that they have found that for which they look, ill have rest But the woman says, 'Let us start Hurry!'

”I am surprised But the rub You will get rub at McKeon's cabin to-o on' Here is another wolf, an old wolf, and he, too, thinks but the one thought, to go on So we give hirub, which is not est dogs and go on We left the man with one eye there in the snow, and he died there in the snow, for McKeon never went back for him And who that man was, and why he careatly paid by the man and the woman, like ht we had nothing to eat, and all next day we travelled fast, and eak with hunger Then we came to the Black Rock, which rose five hundred feet above the trail It was at the end of the day Darkness was cory, and in thelooked for the cabin It was not there, which was a strange thing, for everybody knew that McKeon lived in a cabin at Black Rock We were near to the coast, where the wind blows hard and there is much snow Everywhere there were small hills of snohere the wind had piled it up I have a thought, and I dig in one and another of the hills of snow Soon I find the walls of the cabin, and I dig down to the door

I go inside McKeon is dead Maybe two or three weeks he is dead A sickness had come upon him so that he could not leave the cabin The wind and the snow had covered the cabin He had eaten his grub and died I looked for his cache, but there was no grub in it

”'Let us go on,' said the wory, and her hand was upon her heart, as with the hurt of so inside She bent back and forth like a tree in the wind as she stood there 'Yes, let us go on,' said the man His voice was hollow, like the KLONK of an old raven, and he was hunger-mad His eyes were like live coals of fire, and as his body rocked to and fro, so rocked his soul inside And I, too, said, 'Let us go on' For that one thought, laid upon me like a lash for every mile of fifteen hundred miles, had burned itself into my soul, and I think that I, too, was rub And ent on, giving no thought to the man with the one eye in the snow

”There is little travel on the big cut-off Sooes by The snow had covered the trail, and there was no sign that one that way All day the wind blew and the snow fell, and all day we travelled, while our storeeaker with every step they took Then the woan to fall Then the ht ht is the end of February I kill three ptaran with the woain But the dogs have nothing to eat They try to eat their harness, which is of leather and walrus-hide, and Iall the harness in a tree And all night they howl and fight around that tree But we do not et up like dead people out of their graves and go on along the trail

”ThatI see the first sign of that after which the baby wolves are in search It is clear weather, and cold The sun stay longer in the sky, and there are sun-dogs flashi+ng on either side, and the air is bright with frost-dust The snow falls no s and sled There is one man with that outfit, and I see in the snow that he is not strong He, too, has not enough to eat The young wolves see the fresh sign, too, and they are much excited 'Hurry!' they say All the time they say, 'Hurry! Faster, Charley, faster!'

”We make hurry very slow All the time the man and the wos are too weak, and the dogs fall down Besides, it is so cold that if they ride on the sled they will freeze It is very easy for a hungry man to freeze When the woman fall down, the man help her up Sometimes the woet up, and I et up and will die there in the snow This is very hard work, for I as, and the th in their bodies So, by and by, I, too, fall down in the snow, and there is no one to help et up by o on

”That night I get one ptarht the man says to me, 'What tihost I say, 'All the time you make start at five o'clock' 'To-h in great bitterness, and I say, 'You are dead man' And he says, 'To-morroill start at three o'clock'

”And we start at three o'clock, for I am their man, and that which they say is to be done, I do It is clear and cold, and there is no wind When daylight co way off And it is very quiet We can hear no sound but the beat of our hearts, and in the silence that is a very loud sound We are like sleep- walkers, and alk in dreaet up, and we see the trail onceof our hearts

Soe thoughts Why does Sitka Charley live? I ask ry, and have all this pain? For seven hundred and fifty dollars a month, I make the answer, and I know it is a foolish answer Also is it a true answer And after that never again do I care for reat light, and I saw clear, and I knew that it was not for money that a ive, or buy, or sell, and that is beyond all value of allwe coht camp of the man who is before us It is a poor cath On the snow there are pieces of blanket and of canvas, and I knohat has happened His dogs have eaten their harness, and he has made new harness out of his blankets The man and woman stare hard at what is to be seen, and as I look at theainst the skin Their eyes are toil-er-mad, and burn like fire deep in their heads Their faces are like the faces of people who have died of hunger, and their cheeks are black with the dead flesh of o on,' says the hs and falls in the snow It is the dry cough where the frost has bitten the lungs For a long tirave she crawls to her feet The tears are ice upon her cheeks, and her breath o on'

”We go on And alk in dreah the silence And every time alk is a dream and we are without pain; and every ti, and we see the snow and the mountains and the fresh trail of the ain We co way over the snow, and that for which they look is before them A mile away there are black spots upon the snow The black spots move My eyes are dim, and I s and a sled The baby wolves see, too They can no longer talk, but they whisper, 'On, on Let us hurry!'