The Gold Hunters - James Oliver Curwood (great novels of all time .txt) 📗

gold," continued Rod.
"No, I had not thought of that," said Wabi. Suddenly he rose to his feet and joined Mukoki out in the gloom of the chasm.
Rod was puzzled. Something in his companion's voice, in his face and words, disturbed him. What had Wabigoon meant?
The young Indian soon rejoined him, but he spoke no more of John Ball.
When the two boys went to their blankets Mukoki still remained awake. For a long time he sat beside the fire, his hands gripping the rifle across his knees, his head slightly bowed in that statue-like posture so characteristic of the Indian. For fully an hour he sat motionless, and in his own way he was deeply absorbed in thought. Soon after their discovery of the first golden bullet Wabigoon had whispered a few words into his ear, unknown to Rod; and to-night out in the gloom of the chasm, he had repeated those same words. They had set Mukoki's mind working. He was thinking now of something that happened long ago, when, in his reasoning, the wilderness was young and he was a youth. In those days his one great treasure was a dog, and one winter he went with this faithful companion far into the hunting regions of the North, a long moon's travel from his village. When he returned, months later, he was alone. From his lonely hunting shack deep in the solitudes his comrade had disappeared, and had never returned. This all happened before Mukoki met the pretty Indian girl who became his wife, and was afterward killed by the wolves, and he missed the dog as he would have missed a human brother. The Indian's love, even for brutes, is some thing that lives, and more than twenty moons later--two years in the life of a man--he returned once again to the old shack, and there he found Wholdaia, the dog! The animal knew him, and bounded about on three legs for joy, and because of the missing leg Mukoki understood why he had not returned to him two years before. Two years is a long time in the life of a dog, and the gray hairs of suffering and age were freely sprinkled in Wholdaia's muzzle and along his spine.
Mukoki was not thinking of Wholdaia without a reason. He was thinking of Wabigoon's words--and the mad hunter. Could not the mad hunter do as Wholdaia had done? Was it possible that the bad-dog man who shot golden bullets and who screamed like a lynx was the man who had lived there many, many years ago, and whom the boys called John Ball? Those were the thoughts that Wabi had set working in his brain. The young Indian had not suggested this to Rod. He had spoken of it to Mukoki only because he knew the old pathfinder might help him to solve the riddle, and so he had started Mukoki upon the trail.
The next morning, while the others were finishing their breakfast, Mukoki equipped himself for a journey.
"Go down chasm," he explained to Rod "Fin' where get out to plain. Shoot meat."
That day the gold hunters were more systematic in their work, beginning close to the fall, one on each side of the stream, and panning their way slowly down the chasm. By noon they had covered two hundred yards, and their only reward was a tiny bit of gold, worth no more than a dollar, which Rod had found in his pan. By the time darkness again compelled them to stop they had prospected a quarter of a mile down stream without discovering other signs of John Ball's treasure. In spite of their failure they were less discouraged than the previous evening, for this failure, in a way, was having a sedative and healthful effect. It convinced them that there was a hard and perhaps long task ahead of them, and that they could not expect to find their treasure winnowed in yellow piles for them.
Early in the evening Mukoki returned laden with caribou meat, and with the news that the first break in the chasm walls was fully five miles below. The adventurers now regretted that they had chopped down the stub, for it was decided that the next work should be in the stream above the fall, which would necessitate a ten-mile tramp, five miles to the break and five miles back. When the journey was begun at dawn the following morning several days' supplies were taken along, and also a stout rope by means of which the gold hunters could lower themselves back into their old camp when their work above was completed. Rod noticed that the rocks in the stream seemed much larger than when he had first seen them, and he mentioned the fact to Wabigoon.
"The floods are going down rapidly," explained the young Indian. "All of the snow is melted from the sides of the mountains, and there are no lakes to feed this chasm stream. Within a week there won't be more than a few inches of water below the fall."
"And that is when we shall find the gold!" declared Rod with his old enthusiasm. "I tell you, we haven't gone deep enough! This gold has been here for centuries and centuries, and it has probably settled several feet below the surface of the river-bed. Ball and the Frenchmen found twenty-seven pounds in June, when the creek was practically dry. Did you ever read about the discoveries of gold in Alaska and the Yukon?"
"A little, when I was going to school with you."
"Well, the richest finds were nearly always from three to a dozen feet under the surface, and when a prospector found signs in surface panning he knew there was rich dirt below. Well find our gold in this chasm, and near the fall!"
Rod's confidence was the chief thing that kept up the spirits of the treasure seekers during the next few days, for not the first sign of gold was discovered above the fall. Yard by yard the prospectors worked up the chasm until they had washed its sands for more than a mile. And with the passing of each day, as Wabigoon had predicted, the stream became more and more shallow, until they could wade across it without wetting themselves above their knees. At the close of the fourth day the three lowered themselves over the face of the rock into the second chasm. So convinced was Rod in his belief that the gold was hidden deep down under the creek bed that he dug a four-foot hole by torch-light and that night after supper washed out several pans of dirt in the glow of the camp-fire. He still found no signs of gold.
The next day's exertions left no room for doubt. Beyond two or three tiny flecks of gold the three adventurers found nothing of value in the deeper sand and gravel of the stream. That night absolute dejection settled on the camp. Both Rod and Wabigoon made vain efforts to liven up their drooping spirits. Only Mukoki, to whom gold carried but a fleeting and elusive value, was himself, and even his hopefulness was dampened by the gloom of his companions. Rod could see but one explanation of their failure. Somewhere near the cataract John Ball and the Frenchmen had found a rich pocket of gold, and they had worked it out, probably before the fatal tragedy in the old cabin.
"But how about the mad hunter and his golden bullets?" insisted Wabi, in another effort to brighten their prospects. "The bullets weighed an ounce each, and I'll stake my life they came from this chasm. He knows where the gold is, if we don't!"
"Come back soon!" grunted Mukoki. "Watch heem. Fin' gol'!"
"That's what we'll do!" cried the young Indian, jumping suddenly to his feet and toppling Rod backward off the rock upon which he was sitting. "Come, cheer up, Rod! The gold is here, somewhere, and we're going to find it! I'm heartily ashamed of you; you, whom I thought would never get discouraged!"
Rod was laughing when he recovered from the playful mauling which Wabi administered before he could regain his feet.
"That's right, I deserve another licking! We've got all the spring and summer before us, and if we don't find the gold by the time snow flies we'll come back and try it again next year! What do you say?"
"And bring Minnetaki with us!" added Wabi, jumping into the air and kicking his heels together. "How will you like that, Rod?" He nudged his comrade in the ribs, and in another moment both were puffing and laughing in one of their good-natured wrestling bouts, in which the cat-like agility of the young Indian always won for him in the end.
In spite of momentary times like this, when the natural buoyancy and enthusiasm of the young adventurers rose above their discouragement, the week that followed added to their general depression. For miles the chasm was explored and at the end of the week they had found less than an ounce of gold. If their pans had given them no returns at all their disappointment would have been less, for then, as Wabi said, they could have given up the ghost with good grace. But the few precious yellow grains which they found now and then lured them on, as these same grains have lured other hundreds and thousands since the dawn of civilization. Day after day they persisted in their efforts; night after night about their camp-fire they inspired each other with new hope and made new plans. The spring sun grew stronger, the poplar buds burst into tiny leaf and out beyond the walls of the chasm the first promises of summer came in the sweetly scented winds of the south, redolent with the breath of balsam and pine and the thousand growing things of the plains.
But at last the search came to an end. For three days not even a grain of gold had been found. Around the big rock, where they were eating dinner, Rod and his friends came to a final conclusion. The following morning they would break camp, and leaving their canoe behind, for the creek was now too shallow for even birch-bark navigation, they would continue their exploration of the chasm in search of other adventures. The whole summer was ahead of them, and though they had failed in discovering a treasure where John Ball and the Frenchmen had succeeded, they might find one farther on. At least the trip deeper into the unexplored wilderness would be filled with excitement.
Mukoki rose to his feet, leaving Rod and Wabi still discussing their plans. Suddenly he turned toward them, and a startled cry fell from his lips, while with one long arm he pointed beyond the fall into the upper chasm.
"Listen--heem--heem!"
The old warrior's face twitched with excitement, and for a full half minute he stood motionless, his arm still extended, his black eyes staring steadily at Rod and Wabigoon who sat as silent as the rocks about them. Then there came to them from a great distance a quavering, thrilling sound, a sound that filled them again with the old horror of the upper chasm--the cry of the mad hunter.
At that distant cry Wabigoon sprang to his feet, his eyes leaping fire, his bronzed cheeks whitening in an excitement even greater than that of Mukoki.
"Muky, I told you!" he cried. "I told you!" The young Indian's body quivered, his hands were clenched, and when he turned upon Rod the white youth was startled by the look in his face.
"Rod, John Ball is coming back to his gold!"
Hardly had he spoken the words when the tenseness left his body and his hands dropped to his side.
The words shot from him before he could control himself enough to hold them back.