CHAPTER XXI

THE SECRET OF THE GREAT STUMP

It was two hours before the beginning of Christmas festivities, when the tree trimming came to an end.

“Let’s take a walk,” Speed suggested to Mary. “This is enchanted land. Think of it, Christmas Eve in Eskimo-land.”

“Yes, let’s walk,” Mary agreed.

“Boo! Such a coldness!” she exclaimed as they stepped outside.

“Snow fog’s drifted in too,” Speed surveyed the landscape. “Two hundred foot ceiling and growing less. Good thing we’re in.”

They had walked over the half mile of ice-covered beach to the foot of the mountain and had turned back when Speed, stopping dead in his tracks, exclaimed:

“Listen!”

Mary, listening with all her ears, at last caught a faint drumming sound.

“An airplane!” she looked at Speed.

“Sure is! In such a place and such a time! Mountain there. Sea over there! All I can say is, I wish them a happy landing.”

For a full quarter hour, all unmindful of the cold, of the dinner that awaited, and of the glowing Christmas tree, they stood there listening to the drone of the motor that now rose in volume and now faded away.

“They’re lost,” was Speed’s decision. “Looking for a landing.” Once, when the echo of the motor’s roar was thrown back as from the mountain, he gripped the girl’s arm hard. What was he waiting for? A crash? It did not come. Instead, the motor sounded out a mad burst of speed, then began again that slow droning.

“Well,” Speed shuddered, “they know where the mountain is now.”

“Listen!” a moment later he gripped her arm once more. “They—they’re going to try for a landing. Who knows where? We’d better—”

If he had any notion of flight, it was futile, for at that instant, far down the line, not twenty yards from the schoolhouse, a gray mass emerged from the snow-fog.

“Good boy! He’ll make it!” Speed exclaimed.

Calmly they awaited the coming of the plane as it bumped, bumped again, then taxied slowly forward.

“Mary! Look at that plane!” Speed became greatly excited. “Did you ever see it before?”

Mary made no answer. Perhaps she was too excited to hear. One thing was sure, her heart gave a great leap when, as the plane came to a standstill, a large girl dressed in a fur parka jumped from the plane.

“Florence!” she cried. “What are you doing here?”

“Mary!” Florence stood staring at her as if she were a ghost.

“To tell the truth,” Dave Breen, the pilot, who now climbed from his place, said, “we don’t quite know why we’re here. We don’t know where we are, but we’re mighty glad we have arrived.” At this they all laughed.

The story of Florence and her party was soon told. After completing their work at the mine, they had packed their belongings, including three moose-hide sacks of gold, in the plane and had sailed away.

“We got caught in a snow-fog,” Dave Breen concluded. “We flew for hours looking for a landing. At last, in desperation, we took a chance and here we are. But tell me, where are we?”

“Cape Prince of Wales, the very heart of Eskimo-land,” was Mary’s happy reply. “And this is Christmas Eve. What could be finer?”

At that moment Florence caught the sound of many Eskimo voices. Then the chorus ceased and she heard the familiar voice of Mr. Il-ay-ok. He continued alone. He was speaking slowly, earnestly. Florence saw a sober look come over each face. In the end, when Mr. Il-ay-ok had finished, they exclaimed in a low chorus: “Ke-ke! (go ahead) All right. All right. We bring ’em.”

“What was he saying?” Florence asked the teacher, who arrived at that moment.

“Il-ay-ok is telling of his airplane ride and how much it was going to cost,” he explained. “They are really quite business-like, these Eskimos. Il-ay-ok told them, since their reindeer had been saved, they must contribute one silver fox, three cross foxes or four white foxes each.”

“And will they?” Florence was interested.

“Sure. Didn’t you hear them say, ‘All right’?”

“But truly there is no need.” Florence was struck with a sudden thought. “There is money in the bank at Nome, enough I am sure. It’s the part earned by Il-ay-ok’s team when I won the dog race. Tell them about it, will you?”

There was little need of telling them in Eskimo, not a man of them but understood about money, even when told in English. But, like every other people, Eskimo love to be told in their own language. So the teacher told them.

If Florence needed any reward for her honesty and fair dealing, it came to her from the change of looks and the sudden exclamations of the natives as they heard the rare news.

“Mat-na! Ah-ne-ca!” they exulted. Then, “Na-goo-va-ruk Along-meet!” (Good for the white one) rose like a grandstand cheer.

“It’s all right,” Florence laughed. “I had my share and a lot of fun besides. And Merry Christmas to you all.”

“Il-a-can-a-muck! Il-a-can-a-muck!” (Thank you! Thank you!) they shouted in a chorus.

It goes without saying that the entire party attended the Christmas tree festival and all enjoyed it to the full. Surely nothing could have been more delightful than the privilege of watching the eyes of a hundred Eskimo children as they saw the tree for the first time.

“See!” Mary heard little No-wad-luk exclaim to her small friend. “See! There are all the little people who can walk and talk and go to sleep.”

“Didn’t I tell you?” was Kud-lucy’s proud reply. “They _did_ come. They _did_ walk all the way miles and miles. And they _did_ get here just in time.”

Florence and Mary were scarcely expecting presents. They got them all the same. They were long, slim socks made of fur taken from the legs of a spotted reindeer fawn and they were filled with gold nuggets. On Florence’s was a tag saying “From a long-lost grandfather,” and on Mary’s “To little Miss Santa Claus.” Never, I am sure, had there been a merrier Christmas Eve than this.

Christmas morning broke bright and clear. After bidding their new-found friends good-bye and listening to the Eskimos’ “A-lin-a-muck” (Good-bye) and “Il-a-can-a-muck” (We thank you) the happy party sailed away for Nome, where they enjoyed a late evening feast of roast venison, wild cranberry sauce, plum pudding and all the trimmings.

Three days later Mary and Florence were back in the rustic cabin on Rainbow Farm. Florence had urged her grandfather to accompany her to the valley. He had refused, one airplane ride had been quite enough, and then, when one has lived in the far north thirty-five years—ah, well, perhaps next spring he would come down on the boat and they would buy a claim in her happy valley, who could tell? So she had left him, happy in the realization that his dream of a lifetime had at last come true.

And now since they had used up their tickets to adventure, a long winter in a peaceful valley lay before them.

But there was still Madam Chicaski to wonder about.

On a wintry morning, three days after her last happy landing, chancing to look out of the kitchen window, Florence, to her unbounded surprise, saw the powerful Madam Chicaski wielding Bill’s pick in a most surprising manner. What was more surprising still, she was executing a vigorous attack upon the great stump over which bright flowers had cascaded all summer long.

“Stop! Stop! Don’t do that!” These words were on her lips. She did not say them. Something appeared to hold her back.

A moment more and she was glad they had not been spoken, for after one powerful swing of the pick, a dark spot had appeared beneath the stump.

“A cavity!” she whispered breathlessly. “A hollow place beneath the stump.”

Then, like a flash it came to her. This tree had not grown there. The stump had been hauled there, probably on a stone-boat, for the purpose of concealing something. But what did it conceal?

Fascinated, the girl continued to stare as the woman picked untiringly at the base of the great stump. When at last the Russian woman seized a stout pole, and using it as a pry, tipped the stump on its side to uncover a broad, deep cavity, the girl’s curiosity got the better of her and she ran into the yard to exclaim:

“Madam! Madam! What _are_ you doing?”

“See!” On the woman’s face was a glorious smile. “See! All my beautiful things! All safe after these long years.”

Florence did see and her astonishment grew. The great copper kettle was there and the seven golden—well, perhaps they were only gold plated—candlesticks, and many other things as well. A curious old copper teakettle, a set of beautiful blue dishes which, by instinct, the girl knew were very old and valuable, and many other things were there.

Slowly, carefully, they removed each piece. Then, quite overcome with emotion, the aged woman sat down upon the ground.

“This,” she said after a long silence, pointing a thumb at the hole in the ground, “was our cellar. The ground is always frozen there. It keeps everything cool, everything. Ivan, my husband, hauled down the stump to make a place for my flowers. When we left we said, ‘We will hide everything in the cellar,’ it was a secret cellar, no one knew. ‘Then we will put on the stump. No one will guess.’”

“And no one ever did.” Florence laughed gaily, happy for the other’s sake.

The final chapter to this little mystery was, if anything, stranger, more happy than all the rest. Both Mary and her mother had always loved fine and truly rare china. Massive copper pots and pans had always fascinated them as well.

That night, as supper time approached, Madam Chicaski insisted that candles should be put in the golden candlesticks and that they should be set, all flickering and alight, three upon the mantel and four upon the table.

“Just as Ivan and I used to do,” she added with a happy sigh.

Supper was to be cooked in her copper pots and pans and served upon the beautiful blue dishes that made Florence tremble every time she touched one of them, lest she drop it.

It was a memorable meal. A little Indian girl had, that very afternoon, brought in a great salmon and had received for it a sack of potatoes. The baked salmon rested on a blue platter. It was surrounded by golden-brown potatoes, sweet butter and tall heaps of biscuits fresh from the oven.

When this repast was over, the Russian woman sat for a long time staring at the flickering candles and the marvelous blue dishes.

“No,” she murmured at last, “they shall not go. They have been here long. They shall remain forever, all these beautiful things. You all are good. You have been kind to an old woman whom you did not know. I am not a fairy godmother,” she laughed. “I am not God. I am only an old woman, Madam Chicaski. And this was my home. Yes, you shall have all these. They belong here. Even dishes and copper pots may be happy. They will be happy with you.”

Mary heard her every word. Yet she could not believe in their great good fortune. All these beautiful dishes, those rare pieces of copper, the seven golden candlesticks to remain in their humble cabin? Impossible.

Then came another wave of emotion that brought her to her feet.

“But, Madam!” she protested. “You will need them!”

“I need them?” Madam laughed again. “Did I not tell you? But no. I have not told. We are rich, Ivan and I. Ivan’s uncle died. He left all to Ivan. That is why we went away so fast. That is why we never came back.

“Tomorrow,” her tone changed, “I shall go back to Ivan. He is not strong, Ivan. He could not come. But I—” she sighed. “It was necessary that I come to see once more. Now I have come. I have seen. And I am, oh, so very happy!” She heaved a great sigh of joy, then moving to her place beside the fire, took up, perhaps for the last time, her peaceful dreams of those days that had passed, never to return. Next day, after bidding them farewell, she was to go trudging away toward the railway station.

“Well,” Florence whispered to herself as she crept beneath the covers in her loft-bed that night, “life can be strange and beautiful. It can be peaceful as well. Here in this happy valley one might find peace. But do I want peace? Mystery, adventure, the, long, long trail.” At that she fell asleep.

Did she accept peace or did she again take up the long, long trail? You will find the answer to that in the book called _Third Warning_.

Transcriber’s Notes

--Copyright notice provided as in the original printed text—this e-text is public domain in the country of publication.

--Silently corrected palpable typos; left non-standard spellings and dialect unchanged.

--In the text versions, italic text is delimited by _underscores_.