Category: Adventure

The Triumph of John Kars: A Story of the Yukon

Murray McTavish was seated at a small table, green-baized, littered with account-books and a profusion of papers. But he was not regarding these things. Instead, his dark, intelligent eyes were raised to the smallish, dingy window in front of him, set in its deep casing of cen...

Chapters

27. Chapter 27

The dark of night was creeping up the gorge. A gray sky, still heavy with the smoke of the forest fire, made its progress easy and rapid. The black walls nursed its efforts, yie...

29. Chapter 29

He looked like a disreputable image carved in mahogany, and arrayed in the sittings of a rag-picker's store. He was seated on the earthen door-sill of the hut where Kars was sle...

22. Chapter 22

So the day came when the outfit of John Kars "pulled out." There had been no change in his plans as the result of Alec Mowbray's murder. There could be no change in them, so lon...

10. Chapter 10

Two men moved about slowly, deliberately. They were examining, with the closest scrutiny, every object that might afford a clue to the devastation about them. A third figure, in...

30. Chapter 30

Kars stood on the embankment watching the receding form of the aged chief, Thunder-Cloud, taking his departure with his escort. It was an outfit to inspire ridicule, were it not...

25. Chapter 25

Awe was the dominating emotion. Wonder looked out of eyes that have long become accustomed to the crude marvels of nature to be found in the northland. The men of Kars' expediti...

20. Chapter 20

The prompt action of John Kars looked as if it would achieve the desired result. His plan had been without any depth of subtlety. It was characteristic of the man, in whom energ...

26. Chapter 26

Kars was asleep. He was in the deep slumber of complete weariness in the shanty which had been erected for his quarters, and was shared by Bill. The bed was a mere pile of blank...

17. Chapter 17

Leaping Horse was a beacon which reflected its ruddy light upon the night sky, a sign, a lure to the yearning hearts at distant points, toiling for the wage with which to pay fo...

14. Chapter 14

Murray McTavish was standing before the glowing wood stove when Alec entered the room. The factor was gazing down at the iron box of it with his fat, strong hands outspread to t...

18. Chapter 18

The mists hung drearily on snow-crowned, distant hilltops. The deadly gray of the sky suggested laden clouds bearing every threat known to the elements. They were traveling fast...

6. Chapter 6

Seven months of dreadful winter had passed. Seven months since the mutilated body of Allan Mowbray had been packed home by dog-train to its last resting place within the storm-s...

16. Chapter 16

It was the second day after the arrival of John Kars and his outfit. The noon meal at Ailsa Mowbray's house had been shared by the visitors. The river was busy with the life of...

23. Chapter 23

It was a moment of intensity such as rarely fails to leave a landmark in the lives of those concerned. For Murray McTavish it was as though every fear that had ever haunted him...

24. Chapter 24

Fort Mowbray was enveloped in a black cloud of tragedy. Its simple life flickered on. But it seemed to have been robbed of all its past reality, all its quiet strength, all that...

21. Chapter 21

All that had been feared by the two men in the box had come to pass. It had come with a swiftness, a sureness incomparable. It had come with a mercilessness which those who knew...

19. Chapter 19

Kars was early abroad. He left his apartment on the first floor of the same apartment house which furnished Bill Brudenell with his less palatial quarters, and sauntered down th...

9. Chapter 9

For a whole week Ailsa Mowbray was given no further opportunity of dwelling upon the possibilities of the situation between Jessie and Murray McTavish. John Kars pervaded the Mi...

32. Chapter 32

The passage of time for John Kars had never been so swift, so feverish in the rush of poignant events. Four months had passed since he had landed like a shadow in the night on t...

7. Chapter 7

Jessie Mowbray left the Mission House as the last of the small crowd of copper-hued pappooses bundled pell-mell in the direction of the teepees and cabins of their dusky parents.

11. Chapter 11

Peigan Charley's belief in his white boss's lack of sanity was characteristic of Indian regard for the reckless. The reason, the driving power of his chief's character was lost...

5. Chapter 5

The living-room in Ailsa Mowbray's home was full of that comfort which makes life something more than a mere existence in places where the elements are wholly antagonistic. The...

4. Chapter 4

It was an old log shanty. Its walls were stout and aged. Its roof was flat, and sloped back against the hillside on which it stood. Its setting was an exceedingly limited platea...

13. Chapter 13

The fall trade of the post was in full swing, and gave to the river, and the approaches of the Fort, an air of activity such as it usually lacked. Murray McTavish seemed to blos...

2. Chapter 2

A haunting silence prevails in the land beyond the barrier of the Yukon watershed. It is a world apart, beyond, and the other land, the land where the battle of civilization sti...

31. Chapter 31

For Kars the lure of it all was broken, broken beyond repair. The wide expanses of the northland had become a desert in which life was no longer endurable. The wind-swept crests...

28. Chapter 28

The sun rose on a scene of great activity. It was the garnering of the harvest of battle. The light of day smiled down on this oasis on a barren foreshore of Bell River and sear...

12. Chapter 12

The fire spluttered just beyond the door of the tent. Its cheerful light supported the efforts of the kerosene lamp within. Peigan Charley squatted over its friendly warmth, his...

8. Chapter 8

North, south, east, west. There was, perhaps, no better known name in the wide northern wilderness than that of John Kars. In his buoyant way he claimed for himself, at thirty-t...

15. Chapter 15

It was a startled community that awoke next morning at Fort Mowbray. The news was abroad at the earliest hour, and it reached Jessie Mowbray in the kitchen, as she made her appe...

1. Chapter 1

Murray McTavish was seated at a small table, green-baized, littered with account-books and a profusion of papers. But he was not regarding these things. Instead, his dark, intel...

3. Chapter 3

Ailsa Mowbray tore off the fastening which secured the outer cover of discolored buckskin. Inside was a small sheet of folded paper. She opened it, and glanced at the handwritin...