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LONDON: CHAPMAN & HALL, Ld. 1896 [A^i rights resen'ed] m^ < m i I f n u ll mi i wd i. W \\ Rlchaiu) Cla,y & Sons, Limited, London & Bungay. i ! CONTENTS PROLOGUE— THE STRAMGEK's COMING THE SILVER CHAiMBER . , THE LITTLE FUR SEAL. . THE ARREST OF DEERFOOT THE BURIED TREASURE . THE END OF THE WORLD THE GULF STREAM PANIC THE blackguard's BROTHER . TH£ CUESA Of WOUNDED WRIST THE CAT FACTORY THE TRAGEDY OF THE 'SKABIRD* A COWBOY ON 'change . . . EPILOGUE— DAYBREAK .... 9AC.B I i6 27 40 50 62 76 87 124 133 148 163 ,j.i, iJKm mim i| 'i k i ^^^•••..{••■•...••••...•••...••'•...••••..••"••.••"••.••••••.••••••.••"••.••"••.••••••.••"••rf*"*j,'****v''9U y V* X After a long ride, or when cold or '/ V fatigued, take a cup of boiling water, '/ V stir in a little I Liebig I Company^s • • _ 5 Extract of SBeef V and season to taste. You will find V it very refreshing, satisfying, and \) invigorating. GENUINE ONLY WITH FACSIMILE OF J. V. LIEBIQ'8 SIGNATURE IN BLUE ACROSS THE LABEL, THUS : V Y Y \ f \ y The Company's Extract does not waste y V nor go bad however long yon keep it. y it/i.'., -.".. ..•••■ .•••'■ .-••'.,.'••■. .•"'. .•••'. .'••»..•"'.. ••••.■.•"•.■.•"'...•"•...■•••...•"'...••3lg H-. THE ARCTIC NIGHT am PROLOGUE THE stranger's COMING TOLD BY BILLY We must have been playing for nearly fifteen hours when I got up from the table dead broke, with just enough interest left in the world to keep me lounging behind the Tenderfoot, while he staked his last ounce, and lost. Jim Rallantyne, who sat opposite, threw down that greasy remnant our *deck' of cards, yawned, stretched himself, and was gathering together his bags of dust and nuggets stacked breast-high on the table, when the youngster laid hands on the dice. " Stay, Jim," said he. " What does it matter which of us win or lose? What can anything matter in Scurvy Gulch ? " B i afr^m? ^9P>^PP^P«"il ■PMBH mf^i^mimmmmtmmim m THE ARCTIC NIGHT 1 1 ' i I- ^■ I- " That's so," said Jim wearily. " Then, if you're game for high stakes, I'll set my nickel watch against your pile, Jim Ballantyne ! " It was just like the Tenderfoot's cheek, offering to stake his cheap Waterbury against as much gold as a man could carry ; but though we knew his little ways we stared, even the Captain found strength to crawl to the edge of his bunk, while not one of us ventured a remark. We could not see the Tender- foot's eyes because of the black shadows, but his face was ghastly white, save where the stove cast a brand of red-hot light across his forehead. I remember a sense of awe in the silent cabin while the dice rattled harshly, and the youngster laughed at us in a nasty hollow, despairing way. *' Yes, you fellows, my watch, ticking yonder by the bunk, is the only living thing in Scurvy Gulch that feels like home; but just for fun, Jim, at three throws— that watch against your pile ! '' " Well," said Jim, " I dunno as I care ; '' then, after a long yawn, " Bring on your watch." But as the youngster took his time- t PROLOGUE Tn'Tair' I I I ii H i i iii f iiPi piece from its peg on the log-wall, a strange thing happened : he gave a sudden start, which caused the watch to slip from between his fingers, and fall with a clash on the hearth-stone before the fire. Hoping that only the glass was broken, I picked it up, but there was an ominous click of loose wheels — the watch was past mending. " Boys," I said, laying it on the table before them, "until the sun comes up again next spring we have nothing to measure the time." The Captain fell back in his bunk, covering his face with the blanket, but neither he, nor Jim, nor I could reproach the boy, because this thing was serious. At last the old sailor broke the silence. *' Forty years come June I have been at sea, thirty-one years I have been a navi- gator, but I never was lost before. No latitude, no longitude, six months of arctic night, with no medicine to fight the scurvy, no Bible, no 'baccy, no hope, and not a blessed thing to measure the hours ! " Jim Ballantyne left his gold heaped up on the table, and rolled into his bunk ; I i*mpin>|iiji I III! Ill iWiT'ir 'ys SB tl t' f i" II \ 4 THE ARCTIC NIGHT made a noise with the fire, because the Kid might be crying ; but his voice sounded eager, even cheerful, as he asked me to come out with him for a spell. So, leaving our two partners to sleep, the Kid and I put on our beaver caps and mittens, in addition to which I made him tie a sack about his neck by way of a scarf, before we went out of doors. * This cabin of ours, lost somewhere in the wastes of Arctic America, marked the outlet of Scurvy Gulch. Here, all the summer, we had been digging in an ancient watercourse for gold, slowly, because the hard-frozen gravel would turn our picks like basalt, and had to be thawed out with fires. So rich was the ground at bed-rock, that we had panned out gold enough to make us all prosper- ous, yet not content worked on until the winter made us prisoners. Now we would have bartered the gold for a bottle of lime-juice, because all our decoctions of willow-bark and twigs had failed to save Pierre du Plessis from death by scurvy ; the Captain was too weak to leave his bunk; Jim Ballantyne was fighting ,\ m PROLOGUE gamely against a growing languor ; the Tenderfoot and I were making pitiful pretences to cheat each other into the hope that all was well. We had plenty of frozen venison and musk-ox beef to last until sunrise, fish we speared by torchlight at our water-hole in the river, driftwood was abundant for the stove ; but we knew that without some acid everything we ate was a slow poison, and the willow twigs had failed. The cabin was only a roof of driftwood built over one of our pits in the frozen gravel ; but we kept the gables clear of snow so that our windows of oiled skin might serve as a beacon to guide us home when we strayed — indeed, otherwise we might often have passed by the place and been lost, for there was nothing else to mark this mound of snow in the wide waste of the tundras. I do not know how cold it was, because in a dry climate one feels little difference beyond forty degrees Fahrenheit below zero. Many a starlight night, on the Saskatchewan Plains, I have walked about warm and comfortable while the Govern- ment thermometers stood at sixty-five or ■pmp 6 THE ARCTIC NIGHT more degrees below zero. No wind blows when the mercury is frozen, the air is so still that one can hear a man's voice for two miles, so dry that the electric tension stimulates every nerve, sets the blood racing, and makes one feel strong as a horse. So, as the kid and I v/alked briskly up and down, we began to forget how miserable we had been in the cabin, and if we had net exhausted every possible topic we should have talked. The white auroral arches raced up one after another out of the north. That was the usual thing, varied with the courses of the moon or an occasional storm ; but now there were portents in the sky, for the lights were changing to a chill green, then brigades of scarlet lances, serried lines of opalescent spears, army after army of the celestial hosts, charged reel- ing across the heavens, while at times we felt in the awful silence a low rustling sound like the flutter of the robes of angels. At last the pageant melted away, leaving the clear sky encrusted with millions of stars, like a vast dial upon which the Great Bear was swinging round the Pole — the hour-hand of Time, ,ii PROLOGUE " Look, Kid," — I took hold of his arm, to which he promptly objected, — "while we poor midgets have been fretting over your broken watch, we forgot the clock up yonder, that keeps time for the Universe." He chuckled — "You're getting maudlin, Billy, old boy/' " Youngster," said I, " you're going to the dejce." "What odds?" " Pretty heavy odds. The memory of a nice girl who is fond of you, against the bad angel who set you to play that game." " There's precious little of angels here — good, bad, or indifferent. They keep away south, where it is warm." " Hope, then, playing with Despair for your soul." "That's all rot," said the Tenderfoot frankly. " There's nothing hereabouts but cold and scurvy." "A month ago that gold meant the winning of the girl yonder at Home." " This isn't a month ago — one would think I was cold enough already, without ' m %»-«'iA.l'' 8 THE ARCTIC NIGHT being preached at. Some fellow's sure to find us. Bones always looms up to scare people sooner or later — and he'll see a letter I wrote this week — or last — I've lost count. He'll find it between my ribs — that's the Devil's post-box ; and perhaps be good enough to deliver it in some English graveyard." " You ought to be ashamed of yourself." "Because I say what you think? My nose is freezing.*' He rubbed it with some snow powder until it reddened. " You know jolly well," he went on, " that this scurvy will finish off the last of us before sunrise." I could not answer that, and yet, look- ing up at the great Dial in the sky, the finger of the Almighty — " I say ! " — the boy struck at my ribs like a young battering-ram — "don't go to sleep. You're as solemn as a boiled owl with a frozen ear." While I chafed out the frost which had suddenly stung my ear like a hot needle, I could not refrain from laughing a little, knowing that the loneliness of the last few minutes must have frightened even the Tenderfoot for once. PROLOGUE 9 " Well ? " " Do you know," he asked, " what made me drop that watch ? " " I saw you start." "Yes,"— he spoke scornfully, — "you'd have started too if you'd heard what I did— a gun-shot." What nonsense ! — fancy a gun-shot there! "No games. Kid. You heard a log in the wall cracked by the frost. I heard it too." " Hush ! " whispered the youngster. " Listen ! " Then there came up out of the dark- ness a faint, faint sound, drowned pre- sently by the loud beating of our hearts. " What is it ? " " Hush ! " A minute later came the sound again, soft as the footfall of some animal. Again it came, but my foot scrunched in the powdery snow, and the Tenderfoot swore. Then I felt a breath of air out of the darkness bearing the steady Tf/^/V^-whish, w>^/j^-whish, of snow-shoes. We ran forward, yelling ; a loud call answered out of the night ; a shadow loomed up against the snow-fields j we iv^jm^''Vm i,«w.^" ■iJ^ii^nF*7'i™»"i 1 1 . I'l-P ■ lo THE ARCTIC NIGHT . i heard a voice speaking — and found our- selves face to face with a man ! There he stood, reeling upon his snow- shoes like a drunkard, and reaching out his hands, as though for help, said, with a feeble chuckle — " Good-evening, gentlemen ! " Taking off the man's snow-shoes, I put my arm about him, so as to lead him gently up the rough path from the river ; but the Tenderfoot ran on ahead, aroused Jim Ballantyne, tended the stove, and shook down his blanket in the empty bunk. Our guest seemed to be light-headed from want of sleep, for presently, when he was warming himself beside the stove, he said such queer things that the Kid could hardly be kept from laughing. " Gentlemen," the Stranger began, " my name is Giggleswick — Colonel Hiram W. Giggleswick, at your service.'* With much gravity I introduced the Captain, Jim Ballantyne, and myself, then explained that the youngster was a Tenderfoot — the Honourable Larry Wych- Bradwardine, now busy chopping the viXQ^t, " We're prospectors/' I went on ; PROLOGUE II "struck a fairly good placer; then got snowed up for our pains." " Happy to make your acquaintance, gentlemen. Wall, I may say that I ain't exactly travelling for my health — started, in fact, from the Arctic coast with a band of Esquimaux, which the Ex- cuse my sarcasms ; they've deserted me. We were hunting for mammoth ivory. Neaouw, you don't happen to have noticed a herd of mammoth meandering around here ? " " I bagged a large buck unicorn last Friday," sai^ the Kid. " Little boy,'' answered the Stranger, " when you grow up you may develop the faculty of reason. Until then, ta-ta ! *' The Tenderfoot had to be removed. " As I was saying," quoth the Stranger, " my mammoth have, I presume, gotten by this time into the God-forsaken Hills, where we'll round 'em up next spring. Extinct animal? Wall, neaouw, do you imagine I'd be mosing around here after ghosts ? Do you estimate me as a man likely to waste six months of time, worth ten dollars a day, in the pursuit of a dod- ^asted hallucination.'* No, siree. Hun^y? 12 THE ARCTIC NIGHT L i"'' Wall, now you mention it, I am kinder sharp set. Sort of cramp in my legs, too — which — which '^ His eyes rolled in their sockets, then settled upon me with a glassy stare ; he clutched at the table, missed, and pitched over on the floor in a dead faint. Of course we soon brought him to ; but as to what he was pleased to describe as * cramp,' our worst fears were realized, for under his frozen wet moccasins, and three pairs of frozen wet socks, his feet were like hard white marble. The * cramp ' had been the torment of partial thawing, which is like burning with live fire, but fortunately we were experienced in dealing with frost-bite ; so by keeping his feet in iced water for some nine hours, we managed to thaw them, without pain or any injury to the skin. It was the Tenderfoot who was finally deputed to break the news to our guest that he must lie patiently on his back until further orders. "Why, bless you, child," said the Stranger, patting the Kid's bronzed cheek, " you must go and teach your granny to suck eggs. But I feel real bad to see a PROLOGUE 13 youngster like you with the marks of scurvy. What have you all been taking — willow twigs? Well, follow back along my trail three miles, and you'll find the top twigs of some bushes, with red and yellow leaves, just out of the snow. Yes, it's a cranberry swamp, low bush cran- berries, the best anti-scorbutic known. Dig down a foot or two, and you'll find all the berries dead ripe, cured by the frost, hard as bullets ; a dish of them berries will set you all to rights. See " — to our delight he produced a silver watch — "take this along to time the distance with." *' Hold on ! " for we were so roused by this sudden glimmer of hope that there was no waiting. " I guess them berries will keep. Hold down your hair, gentle- men, until I get through talking. I sur- mise that I had the honour to be intro- duced to the Honourable Which What- d'ye Galium.'* He reached to an inner pocket very feebly. " I got this letter, when I was down south in the fall, to Fort Silence, and it's for an Honourable Which Something-or-other — I hope— *'Hope!" yelled the Tenderfoot. }> '",!', ■J'f'W I i*iiivp«vi'*'" '.I* [rvf^m,^* 1 ^.' I I U THE ARCTIC NIGHT " Hope ! " He seized upon the letter. " Gummy ! Boys, it's from Home ! " Should Colonel Giggleswick ever hap- pen to read this book, I hope he will pardon the liberty which I have taken in presenting the little foibles and tricks of speech which endeared him to us during that long night in Rupert's-land. If we were of some service to him, the obligation is far outweighed by his advice about the cranberries, which undoubtedly saved us all from a horrible death by scurvy. But that is only part of our great debt. Men who are shut up as we were that winter become unhealthy, quarrelling viciously over trifles, lapse into dark moods, ending in hysterical outbreaks, for which it would go hard with one to be held responsible. The Colonel seemed to have the knack of smoothing our ruffled fur ; the tact, the cool humour which puts a bad temper to shame. " Boys," he said once, very soon after his coming, " you've seen considerable of the world.'' Anybody else would have excepted the Tenderfoot, but the Colonel won the lad's confidence from that moment. "You've all got yarns to tell, qpMipp ^mF^f^r •mm PROLOGUE IS and — well, I'm accounted considerable of a liar myself. Now, why shouldn't we submit to hear one another's stories? Gentlemen, I move that this house be resolved into a committee of the whole. Eh.'*" There was a general laugh of derision. " Carried unanimously. I pro- pose that the Captain be invited to take the chair. Seconded by Billy. Carried. I now rise to a resolution that the Chair- man be empowered to command any member of this committee to report his experiences, on pa-'i of bucking three days' firewood. Seconded by Billy. Carried. *' Order ! The Chairman is now wishful to begin the exercises." sss;s mmmm I THE SILVER CHAMBEH TOLD BY THE STRANGER "Mining?" queried the Stranger, — "mining? Wall, now I claim to be posted on mining. Didn't I take a hold of the * Let Her Go Gallagher' silver mine when the stock was down at nothing with the bottom knocked out, and make that same property hum ? Never heard of the claim ? Why, Gallagher stock has been flummoxing round on London 'Change since 1880. A pretty straight silver pro- position was the Let Her Go Gallagher. An American miner would have stocked her at a hundred thousand dollars, and made dividends. But, — pshaw ! — what can you expect from a gang of Britishers ! A company-promoter picked her up cheap from the assigns of a busted Jew, got up a syndicate, with Lord John Guineapig for President, and, times being so-so, 16 ■aHe silver chamber »7 palmed off a million dollars' worth of stock on the Mugginses. Then he invested the plunder in his wife's name, went smash, and got v'hitewashed in Bankruptcy. *' So there was the Let Her Go Gal- lagher, like a white elephant, on the hands of Lord Guineapig and his Mug- ginses. What was they going to do — work the mine .'* Well, you see Lord Guineapig's younger brother was a mining expert, and the Mugginses — mostly preachers and widows — were proud to be humbugged by a Lord, so the end of it was that the Directors levied an assess- ment, and started to work developing. " Now, as I said, an American mining- man with one hundred thousand dollars would have made the mine pay ; but it needs thundering big profits to distribute a dividend on a million dollars. These Tenderfeet began operations by renting a big place in the City ; built a quarter- million-dollar granite building for offices in Denver, Colorado ; put u j the wrong kind of mill, the wrong kind of smelter, and the wrong kind of works ; then, to show how much they didn't know, gave the management to the Honourable c ■•■^H^iiPP"^™ ■PWi i8 THE ARCTIC NIGHT Augustus Guineapig. At the City offices there were clerks and flunkeys ; at the Denver office, managers, clerks, type- writers, and flunkeys ; at the mine assayers, experts, managers, clerks, type- writers, and flunkeys. Moreover, they all had their horses, their dogs, their guns, their eye-glasses, and their horse-cloth overcoats. Every time the assayer sent home a button of silver there was a champagne luncheon for the Directors ; every manager's report went as a puff to the newspapers, and the official photo- grapher used to send large groups of the staff" in their working clothes. " On 'Change the stock wobbled up and wobbled down with every letter from Colorado — why even the head of an elk sent home by the Honourable Augustus sent it up three points ; but at last all the capital was spent, no ore was in sight worth a cuss, and the shares were hard to sell in the City at three for a shilling. That's when I met Lord John Guineapig in Denver — blue as vitriol — for he'd got to report to his shareholders that they'd been sold again, poor suckers, and must make an assignment. ■1 IP THE SILVER CHAMBER 19 " * Look-a-here,' says I, ' have you any perticular hankering after Liquidation?' " * What do you mean, sir ? ' " ' Well, sir, seems to me that now you're in a nasty hole it 'd be superfluous to wallow around in it. S'pose I take a hold of your mine and make it pay, what'll you do for me in ihe way of shares ? ' "'Oh, I'll leave you our assayer, Mr. Gneissmann, Mr. Smift' our accountant, the Honourable Angus ' " 'Take 'm away and bury 'em,' says I, ' them, their lordships, their horses, their dawgs, their guns, their blawsted eye- glasses, and their horse-cloth ulsters. I want your dead mine, but I ain't having no truck with the long procession of mourners. I want five thousand down, absolute power, and a third of the profits.' " That's how I became the manager of the Let Her Go Gallagher Mine. " Takes a well-educated liar to manage a mine. Most bosses when they get into a pay-streak cable home ' Great Bonanza — immense returns coming ! ' Of course, the stock goes up flying. Then when the 20 THE ARCTIC NIGHT engines bust, or a few men get smashed, they wire ' Dreadful catastrophe ! ' so that the shares go down, down, down, till the bottom drops out. Now when I struck it rich, I kept my mouth shut till I'd filled up the safe against a rainy day, then I'd be able to have all sorts of smash-ups without their being any the wiser in the London Market. Not that I did have much trouble beyond an occasional shoot- ing scrap on a pay-day. Fact is, my life was straight bliss save for one thing — and that was a Britisher. It was Smiff, Lord Guineapig's old accountant, who knew no more of mining than a Friburg expert ; but the creature, having lots of wealth, had bought the mine next to ours, the Gallagher's Daddy. Now I ain't pre- judiced to speak of, but I never had any use for an English la-di-da son of a lord in checked pants and gaiters. It hated me, too, worse than pizen — blast its cheek ! Not that I wasted my business hours hating, for I just kept my head shut unless I could give a chance smack in the eye to the Gallagher's Daddy. Well, one night who should come into my office but a young woman. Pretty as THE SILVER CHAMBER 21 a picture she was, all wet and shivering, but her mouth was — gummy. Cry? Cried fit to break her little heart. Mr. Smiff, she said, was a beast — a horrid little beast. Yes, that's what she said. Smiff had sent for her all the way from England as his clerk and typewriter, then when she showed up at the mine, coolly informed her that he had since written countermanding the order — wouldn't take her in out of the rain ! Mad .'* I'd have killed the Thing, but that being mid- summer game was plumb out of season. " Pretty ? A perfect little witch of a woman— black hair, black eyes that snapped, and a thin, oval, winsome sort of face that bowled me right out. She had the cunningest, cutest little ways you ever seen, and a real lady every inch. I took her right on my books as secretary, walked her over to the landlady at our boarding shack, and had a cabin fixed up regardless. Oh, clerk, smart as busy, eager to learn, sharp as a steel-trap with the books. -She'd take down my letters in shorthand, whisk them off on a typewriter, keep the letter-book indexed but she was a ripping a stock-broker, always mm 22 THE ARCTIC NIGHT up to the minute, run the postage stamps — why I got so used to her in a week that I barely took the trouble to sign what she wrote, much less see if it was correct. Fact is, I gave over my heart, the keys of the safe, and the books ; she ran me, she ran the office, and if she liked she was free to run the mine. How she did hate the Thing — that horrid, nasty Smiff ! " Bit by bit she put me up to the Scheme — Httle by little she led me on — I just burning to get quits with the Thing, if only for her sake. At last she showed me how I could fairly knock the stuffing out of the Gallagher's Daddy. You see he'd struck it rich — lit on to a bonanza that was the talk of Colorado, the Silver Chamber they called it — a mass of sul- phurets and ruby silver big as a church, running two thousand dollars a ton. It was right at my end of the ledge, within a few feet of the end of my third level drift, which had been rich to the very edge of my * claim.' * Grab on to it,' said the sly little puss. * Trouble? Never fear. If you've got the pluck,' says she, * I'll supply the brains. Now,' says she, *I'll go around and begin by squaring ■wppp ^MP THE SILVER CHAMBER 23 Smifif's engineer — get around him in a jiffy — and we'll take such a rise out of old Smiff that he'll think he's sat down on dynamite.' "Of course she twisted me round her little finger before I'd time to think — don't suppose I'd have run full tilt at a whole code of laws in my natural senses. We bribed Smifif's engineer, who dis- abled his hoisting gear in such a way that the mine had to be closed down while he sent away to Denver for skilled hands. While Smifif's men were laying around we bought them up till there weren't six left on his pay-roll, while I was making double shifts on the third east drift. Now both mines were worked with shafts because there was no slope around worth tunneling from ; moreover, they were both wet as Niagara ; so you see the pumps were about the heaviest part of the machinery. At that little cat's instigation I took some carpenters by night to the Daddy's shaft. Lowering men with ropes we got three solid brackets fixed to the timbering, say forty feet down. Then we lowered a tank of well-tarred lumber, which fitte4 r PIMP 24 THE ARCTIC NIGHT neatly on the brackets, and filled up the shaft. Finally we put in three feet of water and stole away. Next morning the Thing came sauntering down to the works, and when it looked down the shaft there was the black water within a few feet of the top. * Bai Jaove — what a beastly shame ! ' it wailed, * the mine's all full of water ! Oh dear ! Come, you men — you beastly engineer fellah — wig up the pump ! ' " But the beastly engineer fellah couldn't wig up the pump because the said pump was busted. Work? How we worked ! Double shifts — double time — Sundays — holidays, hoisting out the bonanza sulphurets of the Gallagher's Daddy. The Silver Chamber — why the name's pigwash to the reality. I never in all my mining experience saw such a haul. Think that Smiff fretted? Think he found out and had deputy-sheriffs around my ears ? Not a bit of it ; the Critter went off fishing — yes, sir, fishing, and was the laughing-stock of Colorado while I hustled. " Ye gods, I was the blindest ass ever born. Never found it out till I'd worked THE SILVER CHAMHER 25 the Silver Chamber down to the last ton — never till the last ounce was consigned to the Smelting Company down in Denver. I was down there for a holiday, when I met the manager of the Great Dinde Smelting Syndicate, and he greeted me with a regular horse-laugh — "*Well, Mr. Philanthropist,' says he, * how goes it .'" " ' Philanthropist ! What do you mean ? ' " * Why, ain't you been working double shifts for the last three months, and con- signing every blessed dollar of your bullion to the credit of the Gallagher's Daddy ? ' " * You're fooling ! ' says I. " * Well, Fve been thinking it was you who'd gone locoed — unless you've mort- gaged body and soul to Mr. Smiff.' " A light broke in on me. ^ Let's see the books,' I howled, * and my letters.' *' Yes, it was the cold paralyzed truth. Pd been victimized— horribly victimized, by that little she-cat. While I signed letters without glancing at them, she'd written strict orders, from me, that all bullion was to be credited to Smiff of the Gallagher's Daddy. 1,1 , ) 1 1 \wiffit^i^imf^ \MfHM\tm9mn)jifp 26 THE ARCTIC NIGHT "Whilehewas away fishing, with scarcely six men to go on his pay-roll, I'd been working his mine at the expense of my company, and handing over the whole proceeds to his bankers. It was a horrible put-up job. That she-fiend of a secretary had been sent down by the Critter in re- venge. She was his wife, newly out from England — Mrs. Smiff of the Gallagher's Daddy Mine. ** Can you ask ? Can you torture the heart-strings of a ruined man? I skipped the country that night, and the Let Her Go Gallagher Silver-mining Syndicate Limited is a busted community." I > THE LITTLE FUR SEAL CONTRIBUTED BY THE CAPTAIN Being the translation by Ivan Gregorovitch at Avatcha Bay, of an old letter discovered with many others in the wreck of the St, Peter aiid St. Paul. This vessel, cast away about the year 1807, was found and searched in 1856 by Captain Kendrick of the brig- antine Dolly, on his touching at one of the Aleutian Islands for water. St. Petr, Kadiak Island, Alaska, July 10, 1806. To His Excellency Colonel Alexes TschirikofT, Governor of Eastern Siberia, Irkutsk. Venerable Brother,— In the name of the saints, send me some brandy. I languish on salmon and Indians, inhaling the latter, for, so far, I have been merci- fully delivered from the necessity of eating any. They are more suffocating than our own dear Russians. I pray you salute 27 28 THE ARCTIC NIGHT the Immaculate Ruin, our aunt, or kiss her for me when you can spare time. Thus I shall have done my duty, and yet not suffered. Oh for the delights of Her Excellency's ball-room and a clean shirt ! How I envy you the very least of the perquisites and assumptions of money that flow into your treasury, pickings worthy of a Minister of State. But at least I am solvent, for so long as I can blow my own trumpet I shall never be destitute, having Her Excellency, your- self, and the Immaculate Ruin to borrow from, and, in default of roubles, I can repay, as you perceive, in compliments. Baronoff, as you know, spent last summer in extending the Company's operations to a point a thousand miles or so from here, and about three hundred miles eastward of Mount St. Elias. I was with him in the SL Pau/y my present command, and he had all the natives that could be mustered, in some three hundred skin canoes. Most of them, by the way, were drowned in Icy Bay. We founded a post in the country of the Sitka tribes, and called it Neffski Arkangelsk. On THE LITTLE FUR SEAL «9 our return westward we left behind some twenty-three men as garrison, but they have foolishly allowed themselves to be done to death somehow ; so we sail in a few days to massacre the Indians, about the only amusement there is to look forward to at present. Meanwhile I have put in for repairs at St. Petr ; and, beyond some little diver- sion, of which it is the purport of this writing to inform you, I have little to Ju except play cards with the priest, a " listen to the oddest lot of legends that ever came out of a monastery. I don't suppose that you care ♦^o hear about the condition of the country and the fur trade, or I would regale you with an account of all the hunters drowned, stabbed, or starved since I last wrote. Nay, I will not weary you with such commonplace matters, for it is enough that men like ourselves, of the first fashion, are con- demned to be bored all day with the affairs of the canaille, without letting them intrude upon our private correspond- ence. Verily our reverend grandparent de- served to be exterminated and heavily fined for his idiotcy in discovering such a country. I m 30 THE AUCTIC NIGHT As a matter of fact, however, I am not writing to amuse either myself or you, but to tell you how I managed to quarrel with Baronoff. As the insolent old fool has written to Golovnin and others to have me sent home in disgrace, I want you to have his paws burnt. How such a base-born, red-haired, shop-keeping, bald-headed, shrivelled-up he-beai came to be Governor of Russian America I cannot imagine. Early in June I arrived at Ounalashka, in the Aleutian Islands, with supplies from Petropavlovsk ; found the Governor there, and began to unload. From the first I heard little else but the charms of Olga— the Little Fur Seal, they called her— daughter of a big Aleut chief from Oumnack. I enterttfcined this old gentle- man on board the Sf. Paul^ until he grew mellow with my own particular whisky. Olga sat in one corner with her big dark eyes fixed on me, her red lips just a little parted, and her black hair streaming down her back : only a savage, ^ut not among all the Court ladies in Petersburg could there be found any to surpass her in beauty. When I thought the chief was THE LITTLE FUR SEAL 31 in a sufficiently good humour, I asked him how many skins he required for his daughter ; to which he rephed that all my skins wouldn't buy her, for Baronoff wanted a wife. Now the Governor has more skins than I have hairs ; but I have wisdom, and wisdom is better than many skins ; so I told him that if he would give me Olga I would tell him all about every- thing. You know I picked up ventrilo- quism at college, so that when the old man began to deride me, voices were heard laughing at him from under his chair, out of the whisky-bottles, in the beams overhead, and all over the cabin. He said I was a great doctor, and knew everything; but how could he give me Olga. when he had already promised her to Ivan, a young chief in the village? Moreover, she was in love with a fourth party. I told him that I was very wise, and that I loved Olga. To make a long story short, I disposed of the fourth party by giving him an old cocked hat and a sword, along with the Degree of Sublime Exaltation in the Ancient and Mystical Order of Heredi- tary Gluttons. The initiation was a most hi ■MM 32 THE ARCTIC NIGHT imposing ceremony. I read the ritual from a big medicine-book, and in token of the ancient hide-bound traditions of the Order, encased his head in plaster of Paris, and painted his nose red. After marching thrice round the cabin on all- fours, we concluded the ceremony with an oath, wherein he was bound to present himself in person at Irkutsk, and there to deliver letters-credential to His Excel- lency the Venerable and Supreme Grand Master of the Order, who would take him into his arms, rub noses in token of amity and joyfulness, and appoint him Minister of Stolen Goods in the Government of the province. He sailed in the ship of my little Dutch friend, Hans Schlitz, and I hereby commend him to your most brotherly c?re. As to Ivan, the third party, I sent him to Baronofif in the dead of night to ask why he had red hair ; but instead of having his mind enriched with the important revelations which were to have been uttered by the Governor on hearing this mystical password, my poor friend had his body decorated with quite another k'nv: of enrichment, and was found next morning on the top of an mmi m THE LITTLE FUR SEAL 33 inaccessible rock, with one eye and three fingers missing, and his nose knocked out cl all recognition. Baronoff is inclined to be a little playful at times ! The fourth party being placed under your Excellency's care, and the third party having been ignominiously rejected as damaged goods by the Little One, I had now to compensate her father for the loss of Baronoff's skins. Wherefore, I proceeded to instil the most subtle wisdom into the head of my future father-in-law. I taught him a little sleight of hand and some tricks at cards, showed him how to run a sword through his body by weanr»2" ^ hollow belt of tin, invented for him a beautiful system of fortune-telling, and gave him my speaking-trumpet, with which to bellow at the people through his big medicine-mask. I showed him the persuasive effects of phosphorus on the face at night, and how white people would turn black if they painted themselves with nitrate of silver. But the most polite of all the accomplishments I instilled into him was ventriloquism — a trick which he has now raised to the dignity of a fine art. Sufifice it to say that I qualified that D mm' •aiR 34 THE ARCTIC NIGHT %. man to become such an intolerable nuis- ance that he is to-day the recognized terror of all Alaska, and possesses, as an in- direct result, more skins than even Baro- noff could have offered for his daughter. But, alas for all my virtue and discre- tion! ! Just as I had won the Little Fur Seal, for whose sake Baronoff was piling up his skins in vain, the young Aleut chief slowly undergoing repairs, and the fourth party proceeding on his way to rub noses with your Excellency at Irkutsk, the old chief came to me, crouched down on the floor of the cabin, and began to wail. I took him by the neck, rattled him, and ordered him to speak. " She's gone ! " he moaned — " gone away in the night ; left her poor old father all alone ! " In response, I shook five teeth down his throat, hiuled him on deck by the nose, kicked him overboard, and went to Baronoff. Our sorrows had made us brethren, and we wept. We were samp- ling a small keg of brandy, to assuage our anguish, when in came Ivan, with his nose bandaged up, to mourn with us. m THE LITTLE FUR SEAL 3S We gave him some of the brandy, in proof of our sympathy, and as we sat together, mingling tears with our spirits, a little boy entered and laughed at us. He said Olga was his sister, and had whispered to him last night, before she went away, that any one wJio wanted Fur Seal would have to hunt. She said also that she was going to St. Petr, on Kadiak Island, but bade him tell no one of the fact, particularly Captain Tschirikoff. Baronofif rose from his chair with a most absurd assumption of dignity, and said : — " Captain Tschirikoff, you will at once beach the .S7. Paul for repairs in the east cove, and superintend the work in person. Ivan, you will report to me at nine o'clock this evening, and receive dispatches for Attoo Island. Boy, consider yourself entered on the books of the company as my body-servant, and be ready by to- morrow morning to go with me to Kadiak Island." Dismissing Ivan and the boy, I told Baronoff that I intended to beach my ship for repairs, not here, but at St. Petr, Where there were greater facilities. He 36 T'HE ARCtlC NiGHf at once ordered me under arrest. I replied that I was not accustomed to indignities at the hands of a tradesman ; that as a naval officer I was responsible to no civilian, and only refrained from challenging him because he was not a gentleman. Leaving him speechless with rage, I boarded my vessel, slipped and buoyed my cable, and s(]uared away for Kadiak Island. A Russian does not sleep when he is out wife-hunting, and you have only to hold in remembrance the black eyes of my Little Fur Seal to realize that I was not many days in reaching her hiding- place. I landed at St. Petr with my whole larboard watch, and proceeded to search the village. Just as one of my men entered a house he called to me, but I reached the front door only in time to see a skirt flutter out at the back. Giving chase, I had the Little Fur Seal safe in my arms within a hundred yards of the house. We have hunted bears together, oh ! my brother, and faced them when they were defending their cubs ; but a she-bear in the spring is a lamb com- pared to Olga. She scratched, bit, kicked, THE LITTLE FUR SEAL 37 screamed ; she tried to plunge a long knife into me, and when I took that from her, clutched at my hair. Wherefore, I beseech you to send for a wig to Peters- burg—just a little wig, with a becoming queue, in the latest make, in size about the same as your own. Have this con- signed to me, care of Captain Schlitz, at Pctropavlovsk. When I got her down to the boat the Little One began to sulk ; and, except for some scratching and struggling as we were getting her over the ship's side, she sulked on consistently till supper-time. I felt like a brute as, after a solitary meal in the cabin, I smoked a pipe before turn- ing in. I was conscious all the time of the glare of her black eyes. Whenever I tried to make friends, they flashed upon me like twin stars ; while once in my bunk, I had an uncomfortable presenti- ment that, finding me asleep presently, she would cut me ofT in the flower of my youth with a big butcher's knife. But reflecting that it is much wiser to sleep than to remain awake imagining vain things, and greatly solaced by the memory TT^^ 38 THE. ARCTIC NIGHT \ of having seen old BaronofTs vessel beat- ing her way up the harbour, I partly closed my eyes and dozed a little. As luck would have it, I was just suffi- ciently awake to note that the Little One, believing me to be asleep, was stirring. I snored comfortably, and, unsuspected by her, watched every movement. Silently she rose to her feet. How pretty she looked as she stood in the faint glow of the candle-light, and then moved slowly towards me almost imperceptibly, and as softly as a panther ! Picture to yourself, Alexes, the geiitle swaying of her limbs, the tangled mass of shadowy hair, the brilliant eyes, the full red lips. Outside I could hear BaronofPs crew taking in sail and letting go the anchor. I thought also, with a strange sense of pleasure, of Ivan stealing slowly along the coast in his canoe towards us. Then, Alexes, con- ceive my delight as I saw her creep past the chest upon which lay the knife with- out even stretching out her hand toward it. A moment later I felt that she was bending over me ; her breath played upon my face, her lips drew closer and closer, THE LITTLE FUR SEAL 39 until at last they rested upon my cheek, leaving there the imprint of the sweetest, small, round kiss that ever sent a thrill of joy to the heart of man. The Little Fur Seal was mine ! Your affectionate brother, NiCHOLAL THE ARREST OF DEERFOOT TOLD BY BILLY I'm only a Blackfoot squaw, Major, and you're a chief of the Mounted PoHce ; but the little voice of Truth lives in my mouth and it shall be heard. I alone know the story ; so what's the good of your trial unless I talk? And don't let me catch this new interpreter telling lies out of my mouth. Major, your prisoner there is as inno- cent as a prairie-dog. Be still, Beef Hardy ; I will be heard, in spite of you ! Look at him, Major ; big Beef Hardy, your Mounted Police scout and interpre- ter — the handsomest white man on the Plains — he swears to you that he killed Dried Meat, my husband. I tell you that he lies ! I say, in the presence of the Big Spirit, I, and I alone, killed Dried Meat ! Come, I am yours : take 40 THE ARREST OF DEERFOOT 41 me — kill me ! I deserve to die ; but that man shall go free ! Dried Meat bought me for his wife last year. My father told me that he was very wise, waited for in council, the best scholar at the Agency — yes, like a paper book full of black marks. I can't read : and, oh, how I hated him ! He sat in the lodge all day and gave orders : his very presence more than I could bear; his voice rasping my ears like a file ; and his sneer made me want his blood. Not for days and weeks, but for years, he was to be my master ; not wearing oft' like a sickness, or killing mc like the plague, but always there in the tent, making my little life as bitter as frozen berries, till my hour of death. He'd no more soul than a stretched skin ; no tears, no laughter. He would not love me, nor could I fight with him. He didn't care for me so much as the dogs he beat, the colts he broke, the stones he threw at the crows. Can a woman bear that? Oh, I would rather have been chained to the dead ! — I — I, who loved — another man ! He had one virtue : he could run. No 42 THF ARCTIC NIGHT pony could beat him in a fair race. They called him Deerfoot, after our great Indian runner. He used to keep a paper in the tepee— a printed paper, many moons old — to sa- ' it Deerfoot was to race with a white inan in the Calgary Rink. He was proud of being called after him, especially as both had Dried Meat for their birth-name ; and — set my words down on a white skin with ink — they were sometimes mistaken for one another. My master had been taken for the great hero : for him who, on the Iron Trail, stood off three Mounted i^olicemen with an axe ; for ' nn whose hands are red, so t'lat the G *nment offers great money for his body , for him who stands alone in all the world and defies the white man's might ! I was travelling last week with Dried Meat. We were taking a band of colts from our Blackfoot Agency to the Blood Reserve. You know Willow Creek, Major — the little coulee where Wade-the- Coward keeps a trading store. It was there we camped on the flat by the Creek where the wind had whisked away the snow and left grass for pasture. There THE ARREST OF DEERFOOT 43 was nothing to eat all night ; there'd been nothing to eat all day, and we were hungry. Perhaps our hearts had grown evil for the want of food. I had a little dog, Major — ^just a wee scrap of a thing that whisked about the camp and loved me. That day a horse had kicked him and he was lame. Poor little trembling, crying thing ! gazing into my face, licking my cheek, trying to bear the pain. Dried Meat found me in the tent ; and in his cold, calm, scornful way said : " Here, squaw, cook that little brute for my sup- per : don't you sec I'm famishing.'*'' My tongue was stiff with anger. I could not speak ; I had not time to carry my pet away. His knife struck straight into its throbbing heart ; its life-blood fouled my dress ; and before I could get at Dried Meat's throat, I was alone. It lay in my arms dead — the one creature I cared for in the world ; and there in the dusk I swore by the Big Ghost above : Blow for blow — blood for blood — life for life! A minute before I'd seen from Wade's corral a horse tied to the door of the trading house. I had noticed the brand, 44 THE ARCTIC NIGHT the clipped tail, the big saddle : it was a horse of the Mounted Police. The owner of that animal must know of the search for Deerfoot, and of the great money offered for his capture. My master had sometimes been mistaken for the Black- foot hero. I took his running shoes and wrapped them in the old printed paper which is all about Deerfoot. What if I took them so wrapped and sold them to Wade for food — would not the soldier see ? Suppose my master resisted arrest and were shot ! I stole out of the tepee and found that Dried Meat was away among the horses. I crept to Wade's door unseen, knocked, was let in. Major, the owner of the horse was not the red-coat I expected ; he was not one of the Police, but big Beef Hardy, the interpreter — your prisoner ! I tried to run away, but Wade held me. I screamed and struggled to escape. Major, I wanted to be saved from my master, but not by this man — not by Beef Hardy. Do you think Pd give him the chance.'* No; I — I hate him! I hate him to tlie death, because — I hate him ! Why do I ? What's that got to do with THE ARREST OF DEERFOOT 45 it, Major ? If you don't like my witness talk, say so, and I'll go. I wouldn't speak : they couldn't make me speak. Beef asked me why I had Deerfoot's shoes ; how I got Deerfoot's paper ; if I was Deerfoot's wife ? " No," I told him, " I'm not his wife. My man is Dried Meat," I said ; "a young Piegan brave, camped on the flat by the corral." Hardy looked into my eyes. He knows me ; he believes all my words, and let me go like a man. Then I saw Wade-the- Coward sneer at him for being taken in ; and I heard Wade-the-Coward say that Dried Meat is Deerfoot's birth-name — that the little squaw had lied. I never slept that night ; I never spoke to Dried Meat, and I ate nothing. Beef would not try to arrest him before day- light ; for no living man would attempt to take the great Deerfoot in the dark. At dawn my master awakened ; ordered me to take down the tepee, and ran out to gather his horses for the march. At that instant a voice rang out in the cold air—" Halt ! " I looked out of the tent, and found Beef Hardy and Wade coming from the house. Both had rifles, but 4/" W,/' »•*»"*« 46 THE ARCTIC NIGHT Beef was in cowboy clothes ; and there was nothing in the look of the men to make Dried Meat think of the police. He seemed surprised, and went up to find out what was wanted. I saw Beef take something from a paper packet. Now I know that this was Deerfoot's picture ; but the two men are so like that this seemed only one more fact against my master. Beef said nothing, wondering, I thought, that Deer- foot should be so careless about meeting white men ; and while he hesitated, Dried Meat, thinking to show off his famous running before the strangers, set off to round up his herd. His feet seemed to leave no mark on the crisp snow ; he ran like a young antelope, and no mounted cowboy could have been quicker in gathering a band of horses. He came back trotting behind the colts ; and then, blushing and smirking with conceit, went back to hear his skill praised by the white men. The name Dried Meat, the shoes, the printed paper, had been bad against him — but the running settled all doubt. Beef laid his hand on my master's shoulder. THE ARREST OF DEERFOOT 47 *' Are you Deerfoot ? " he said. Dried Meat smiled at the pretty com- pliment, and answered ** Yes." Beef held tight, Wade covered him with his rifle ; and the three moved away towards the house. I began to fear that Dried Meat would submit to the arrest like a coward ; but I suppose he didn't understand at first what had happened. The moment he saw the police horse in the corral he knew all. With a sudden twisting wrench, he slid from the white man's grasp, left the blanket in his hand, and, naked, came down like a deer towards the camp. " Quick, squaw, my rifle ! " he yelled, as he neared the tent. The evil was in my heart, the gun was in my hand. There were cartridges, and as I ran I made pretence of pumping them into the magazine. He snatched the empty rifle from my hand, took Willow Creek with a bound, and in an instant was on top of the cut bank, and behind a fallen tree. Beef Hardy and the Coward came blun- dering after him, then stood on the bank in the smoke of their empty revolvers, looking up at Dried Meat's ambush with 48 THE ARCTIC NIGHT the frozen creek between. The cut bank was steep and of frozen gravel ; the rifle was like a little blue eye looking over the log, they could hear the clicking trigger, and expected death. Wade took aim with his Winchester and shouted, " I'll finish the brute from here ! " But Beef turned, looked straight at the Coward and said, " Down with that gun." The giant, the beautiful white giant, stood waiting there for his death ; and the Coward sneaked away. Beef Hardy looked straight into the rifle's eye, and never flinched — I tell you I saw him charge straight up the bank believing that Deerfoot's first shot would strike him down. There might be a charge in that rifle— a cartridge I'd left by mis- take — my hero was in danger ; I nearly died of fear. I heard the click of my master's empty gun, saw him leap to his feet, and knew that he was praying to the Great Ghost for help. Beef Hardy had stumbled on the frozen gravel and was scrambling helplessly up the bank. The rifle barrel flashed in Dried Meat's hands, the butt swung round his head— and he THE ARREST OF DEER FOOT 49 waited, flourishing the weapon, till the white man's head should come within his reu.Cii. I dared not see, my eyes seemed blinded, my brain was reeling — then — then it was all clear ! I stole behind Wade-the- Coward, I sprang, I struck him down with an axe ! I lifted Wade's rifle as Dried Meat prepared to strike ; but still Beef Hardy was scrambling on the stones and did not see. Wade's weapon was in my hands, alive in my clutch — it pointed at Dried Meat's head— and dashed his eyes with blood ! He leaped in the air, and floundered — and fell — but my hero was saved alive ! What have I said? Major, I lied! Didn't I tell you I hate this Mounted Police scout to the death ? Hands off. Beef Hardy ! Hands off, I say, or I'll kill you ! What — you will ! Of course I did — of course I saved you from the brute— my hero ! My master ! My love ! E ■r'Jf ■"■'■Hf'A.M ■»• I I I ■ I THE BURIED TREASURE • TOLD BY THE STRANGER " What ! " cried the Stranger ; " you don't believe in buried treasure? Wall, I swar ! Ain't such things ? Cost more to find than they're worth? Why, the greatest stake I ever played was for buried treasure. ** Where shall I begin, now — let's see. Wall, I was in love — right in up to the neck. She was a nurse in the hospital ; I was a useless orphan gump, with a thousand a year of my own. Says Alick, * I'm a pro in this here hospital, earning twenty dollars a year. What are you ? ' * Three saloons,' says I — * livery stable, and mortgage on the First Baptist Church.' 'What d'ye do?' says she. *Hang around,' says I. *Then don't hang around me,' says she. Tell you that was a sickener. However, I tried 50 i .' THE BURIED Treasure S* again the next year. Says Alick, * I'm a staff nurse in this here hospital and boss of the surgical ward. What are you ? ' *I love you,' says I. 'Well/ says she, * staff nurses ain't to be had at the price. Sheer off ; go and do something.' I just went around back streets, and kicked myself home. "That night I was packing up to go West, when I came across a sheaf of Pa's old letters, and began to bum 'em one at a time in the stove. Presently I lit on a document writ by my grandmother, Sa- phira Burns, * being a narrative dictated by my husband, Zachariah P. Burns, of Millstoneville, Connecticut, a retired pirate, late deceased, having been run over and killed by an omnibus in New York, and lyeth in Greenwood Cemetery, for which the said omnibus company disclaimeth liability, having been in- toxicated, and now waiteth in confident expectance of a glorious hereafter. Given under my hand.' " Well, you bet, I pricked up my ears 'specially when I seen that the whole bloomin' yarn was about a buried treasure. Grandpa Zachariah must have 52 THE ARCTIC NIGHT been a double-barrelled terror. Why, at nineteen, being third mate of a whaler, he mutinied, made his own cousin by marriage. Captain Eliphalet W. Siiggs, walk the plank, swore in the crew over a Russian almanack and a bloody dagger, hoisted the black flag, and started up in businesss as a buccaneer. At first he scuttled coasters in a small way along the Chilanean coast ; afterwards, when he had lost his ship on the Gallipagoes, took to annexing whalers when they put in for water. Altogether, what with marooning, ransoms, and deep-sea captures, he was making a pretty good stake, when, as luck would have it, trade slackened, money got tight, dividends down to nothing — in short, the crew got up on their ear and mutinied. "When the ringleaders found Zach, he was sitting in the middle of the cabin on a barrel of gunpowder, armed with dozens of pistols. They told him to come down off that barrel. **' rU be hanged if I do,' says Zach. " * That's so,' said the ringleader, who was a truthful man. " * Now,' says Zach, * I'm bossing this THE BURIED TREASURE 53 show. You're going to head her for Panama — nor-nor-east-b-east — and if you ain't dropped anchor by seven bells of the morning watch, I'll blow her up, by George, and this time to-morrow you'll be arranging for your lodgings down below ! ' " With a compass in the beams over- head, water and food within reach, why he'd got the dead immortal cinch on the whole outfit ! The crew chuckled on deck, thinking how they'd carve up Zach when he started for to go ashore ; and Zachariah chuckled in the cabin, for when they anchored at Panama Bay he wouldn't quit his barrel unless the new Captain wr^s given up to him as hostage, till such time as he reached the dry land. " With a pistol in each of the leader's ears he marched upon deck, and went down into the boat. While all the crew hung gaping over the bulwarks, while a slow match fizzed in the cabin, Zachariah P. Burns went safely ashore with his hostage. Yes, there he stood on the beach till the new Captain went back aboard ; he saw him welcomed by the crew on deck, he saw the boat hauled 7'«.\.r 54 THE ARCTIC NIGHT up then bang went the ship, and for some minutes the air was plumb full of hurtling scraps of pirate.. Zachariah re- membered that he was a Connecticut man, and felt quite pleased with Connecticut. " Ever hear of Lafitte — the Pirate of the Gulf? No? Then you'd oughter. Zach found him at Colon, anyway, out- fitting for the fall trade ; joined on, shipped as his second mate ; and I ' tell you they made things hum in the Mexi- can Gulf ! Business was booming ; why they got so proud that when they spent a Sunday afternoon shark-fishing, nothing would satisfy 'em for bait but live Jesuit missionaries ! Mind you, Lafitte was dead nuts on theology — listen by the hour to any sky pilot as happened along — but as he said, ^ Romans is pizen ! ' " Well, during the war of 1812, old man Zachariah must needs fall out with Lafitte. British General — Pakenham his name was — wanted the Captain to come along and help capture New Orleans. Zach's eyes fairly glittered when he thought of all the loot. " * It's a great scheme ! ' says he. " * Won't work, Zach,' says Lafitte, * th^ THE BURIED TREASURE 55 bloomin' Britisher's jolly well going to get licked. I'm going to turn patriot and help give him beans. I'm after a free pardon from the Yanks — you bet.' " 'Patriotism be blowed ! ' says Zacha- riah. " On the way to New Orleans they had to put in for water at the Bayou Teche. Soon as they dropped anchor, and the people were away with the water breakers, Captain Lafitte calls away the jolly-boat and starts out with Zachariah and two ordinary seamen on a little picnic. After some miles they pulled over to an island, where they spent the whole night landing a thundering big iron chest full of gold and jewels. Enough to make your mouth water. Chalices and crucibles, patens without end, snufif-boxes, chains of rolled gold, with eighteen-carat fixings, earrings, necklets, tararas, dimonds, candlesticks — and — etc. Buried it in the beach — yes, of course above high-water mark, smoothed the place over, and murdered the ordinary seamen — which had been selected as the two most useless men aboard. " * Now,' says Lafitte, * we can go on to New Orleans with a clear conscience,' 56 THE ARCTIC NIGHT ** Next morning when they were about a mile or so at sea, the Captain sent Zachariah aloft to do some kind of mon- key business with the fore-royal yard-arm. When Zach got to the place, he found the foot-rope cut neatly away at the outer end till it hung by a thread. * I see,* says Zachariah. " Now you must understand that they were in a shallow bay, about a mile and a half out, a big eddy swirling along-shore. While Zach was taking it all in, the Cap- tain sung out : ** * You goin' to stay there all day ? Why don't you get a hump on, you darned old wreck of a purser's pig — you brass- mounted, brazen - headed jackass — you— I—!—!' " * Ay, ay, keep your shirt on, governor ! ' So saying Zach stepped on the foot-rope. "*Man overboard !' yelled the Captain. Zach came down with an awful shriek in the water. " The sly old fox ! While Lafitte lay- to lowering away the boats, Zachariah let himself float gently with the '^urrent till they could barely ? ' j he was. Then, kicking .-L Ls, he sud- THE BURIED TREASURE 57 i denly let out a piercing yell, waved his arms like a windmill, and sank. He was never seen again from the pirate ship. " Drowned ? Drowned nothin' ! He was simply swimming under water, putting up his nose when he needed a sniff of air. In half-an-hour he landed at the point of the bay, hauled ashore like a seal, and hung himself out to dry. Lafitte had called in the boats and squared away for New Orleans. '* * Nothing like trusting your friends,' says Zachariah. " Dig up the treasure ? No ; went straight to Mobile, Alabama. There, while he was hiring a sloop to carry the spoil away, the old man must needs fall in love. The lady was young, pretty, widow, four hundred a year — married within a month, and off to New York for the honeymoon. " Happily ever after ? No, he was run over and killed by an omnibus. " No omnibuses there ? Sir ! Well, tell the story yourself ! Then shut up ! There — gone — slams the door, of course — and a good riddance. ** Lafitte ? Ran the Britishers out of S8 THE ARCTIC NIGHT New Orleans — free pardon from Legis- lature and a vote of thanks — got religion, and went into the slave trade. *' Treasure ? Now if it had been pork and molasses, I guess — well, he'd have done well in the corner* grocery line ; but diamonds and jewels — no. I guess, stranger, that down in Louisiana swamps they're hungering more after religion and quinine than any earthly gauds. " Dead and gone this long time ? Yes. Lafitte lived at his island years and years. Nights he used to go down with a spade and lantern, dig up the treasure, gloat awhile, say his prayers to it, and bury it in again. Never fed himself — couldn't afford it. They say he died of want. " But his ghost keeps up the old regular habits. Yes, sir, every night Lafitte comes down the beach — tall, thin, clammy, with lantern and shovel — to dig there for hours in the sand. You don't believe? Wall, now I do, for I've seen him ! "Yes, you're right. I took Grandma Saphira's document, Zachariah's map, the proceeds of my three saloons, mortgage, and livery stable, and started out within a W^ek for Louisiana. Not that I believed I THE BURIED TREASURE 59 in the treasure. No, but with a broken heart one must hustle around and do something, or there's danger of whatd'ye- callum setting in. So at Mobile, Ala- bama, I chartered a sloop and started out with two hired mien, fishing. Yes, camped on an island near the Bayou Teche, and fished. Talk— talk— talk. I thought those two idiots would never quit jawing. Why, it was nearly midnight before they curled up in their blankets. At last they talked themselves to sleep. My chance was come. I stole away, crossed the island, then followed along the shore till I found my bearings. Dark as a coyote's throat, I could just make out the two rocks up by the timber, when suddenly the moon broke out, and, as I live, there was a man — a tall, dark man — with a lantern and spade digging. " My teeth rattled. I was perspiring like a pitcher of iced lemonade. I was gone in the knees, something horrible crawling down my back. For there he was, with a face like a death's-head and bony hands digging away in the sand, as though he'd never come to the bottom. At last he struck the chest. I could hear 6o i THE ARCTIC NIGHT the cling of his shovel on the lid. He heaved up the top, rummaged around, took something out, which he wrapped in what looked like a shroud. Then the great lid came down with a clang. I could stand no more, but lit out along the beach like all possessed, and crawled back, limp as a rag, to camp. "Next day I let my men into the secret, for I was ready to share up now, if only for the sake of human company. Moike said : " * It's all my oi. Oi'm an American citizen. Can't take me in wid ghosts av ould wives' tales, begorra ! ' " As to Hans, he'd have no truck mit der teufel aind it. Nod much — no. " Howbeit, for five hundred dollars apiece they helped me out, seeing that I was a friend. We waited till eleven o'clock, liquored up, and crossed over to the place. Yes, there he was, digging, just as I'd seen before. We watched him open the chest and take something out. Again the great heavy top of the chest came down with a clang. Then we waited till the sand was filled in, and the ghost stole back to the woods. * Now,' says I, THE BURIED TREASURE 6l * is all this granny's tales ? ' There wasn't a word from the Irishman, for he'd skipped the country ; but the Dutchman lay grovelling. * Der teufel ! ' he yelled, * dake me home.' " I couldn't stand it. The whole thing was a regular swindle. This treasure — mine by rights — was being stolen away piecemeal night after night by a pirate's ghost. I dragged the Dutchman up, shook him, and filled him with whisky. We came down out of the woods with a whoop and a yell ; we dug up the sand with our nails ; we lifted the heavy chest out of its hole, and had started to drag it away, when a voice rang out of the woods that knocked me cold : " * Say, there, what in thunder and blazes are you doing with my meat-safe .'* Can't a man bury his food away from a tropical sun without being plundered by white trash ? Hands up, you all-fired idiots, or I'll shoot ! ' » '«^^-■^,^•tJi's*;v«.^^^f^'J^!;5«IP!lpw " <•!,■ THE END OF THE WORLD TOLD BY JIM BALLANTYNE A MiLLERlTE saint was prophesying, with half the farmers of our section gathered around him, in Old Man Johnson's barn ; the street was full of women pray- ing and crying ; the storekeepers were putting up their shutters ; the kids had all broken away from the school ma'am to hide their poor little bodies in the woods. Yes, the whole town was crazy with religion and hysterics except down around Jim Dogpole's smithy, where a score '>f men lounged against the hitch- ing posts chewing tobacco, while they swore vengeance agin the fanatics who'd gotten up all the fuss. As to that woman, my Step-ma, she was something awful to look at, standing on a buggy right up by the 'Piscopal Church, with her arms going around like a mill, and her sallow 62 w w»7*!'"*www!'''i!"''^'^ V';-!'- v^^mm-i THE END OF THE WORLD 63 homely face flecked with the foam from her mouth as she prophesied. Her hair was down, her dress draggled with mud, her eyes glaring blue fury ! " Repent ! " screamed Seraphina — " re- pent ! " I could hear her yelling all the way up from Jim Dogpole's. "Repent, while there is yet time, for the Judgment is at hand, the Eleventh Hour is come — and woe unto them as haven't joined the Church I Woe ! Woe to the inhabitants of the Earth ! Get out your robes, all ye Elect — prepare I tell ye — make ready yer hearts — Prepare ! " Scared almost to death, I came up to poor Dad, and gripped on to his hands for the comfort of touching him. Now I ain't partial to blasphemy, and there are things which Step-ma said that I'd blush to repeat. Many a better man than me has lost his Faith through mountebank prophets such as Seraphina ; but at that time I believed all I was told, took that woman's bogies for gospel truth, and had gotten half-crazed with fright. So Dad drew me in under shelter of his overcoat ; then, thinking nobody was taking notice, he gave me a great kiss ri i mil g*' p ^Trr^T 1^'' '^'-X*:'^ 64 THE ARCTIC NIGHT ■ f- which sent him blushing I guess, and me whimpering. " Cheer up, Sam," he whis- pered, "keep a stiff upper lip until the end, for the world can't last much longer." Step-ma was prophesying again, her voice all broke up from long shrieking ; but with Dad's coat for warmth and his arm around me, I didn't care how soon we went to Judgment. " Prepare ! I tell ye, prepare ! for the very day is come. The End of all things, right on time according to prophecy ! The Last Judgment is due this year, this month, this week, at three o'clock to- morrow morning sharp ! The Last Vigil begins at 8.15 this eve ! Beware — beware lest you be found in slumber when the trumpet sounds ! " I heard her let out a great deep groan, I saw her sway from side to side with her eyes like glass, then fall headlong from the buggy in an epileptic fit. It was only the usual thing when she got ex^cited ; so Dad and I just got the neighbours to help to take her over to our house, where we laid her on the parlour sofa and let her be. They stole away scared at her awful straight blank stare, her bands ^ m^^ THE END OF THE WORLD 6s lifted stiff and rigid clutching at nothing, her thin lips drawn apart showing the teeth ; so we were left alone with her in the room — to watch. Poor Father didn't seem to care — or I very much, because you see three years had made us used to that awful woman. He flung open the windows to let in the rain and wind rather than be shut up with Step-ma ; but pre- sently settled down to light his corncob, as usual, with me on his knees. "Dad," says I, "weren't you plumb crazy to marry a prophetess like her? She's killing us — ain't she ? " "Like enough," he muttered, "but keep your mouth shut, old man. You see she may be shamming, and we wouldn't like to hurt her feelings, would we, Sam ? " He stroked my head with his big brown hands, and tickled me as I snuggled up closer to him. I asked if I hadn't ought to watch by her till she woke. " Yes, laddie, keep an eye on her yon- der while I get a whifif or two here by the window. Seems like days since I had a smoke." I went over to watch. Presently he turns round out of the F iij ■ r-«.T^;fr-«^)^-, fw^'mmimimf li ** 66 THE ARCTIC NIGHT draught. " Sam," he called, in a sort of stage whisper, "what do they say now down at Dogpoles' ? " "They 'low that if this Judgment busi- ness is facts, she's booked for the hottest corner," I sniggered, and so did he. " But, Dad, I heard them arguing that if it ain't proved true by to-morrow morn- ing, they'll — say, what do they mean by a necktie social ? " He turned white as a sheet, but said never a word. The clock was ticking loud on the kitchen wall, the night was closing in blacker and blacker, the rain was sousing down in the empty street. Somehow Dad never thought about sup- per There was nothing in the house anyway, because Seraphina had made out we'd sup in Paradise. She'd made Dad give away his down-east home, the stock, the furniture, and half his tools — for you see he was a carpenter by trade. My clothes had gone too and most of his, as a sign, she said, of Faith ; but mercifully there was a little property locked up in trust for me, which Dad had never spoken about since his second marriage. Here in the hired house there was no IRPii jinmip^,^.^\' > ', ■ ■i«i^^vi^v