Chapter 18

Later, he adopted another expedient. Every fifteen minutes he turned his horse at right angles to his course, and galloping far to the right and left searched the snow for human tracks; then, picking up his trail where he left it, he would push a little farther ahead. In this way he could sweep a path about a mile wide on the prairie.

But the hours passed, and the snow deepened, and there was neither sight nor sound of the boy. Garth was not sparing of his bitter self-reproaches then, for having abandoned him. It seemed to poor Garth in his hopelessness, as if his whole course through the country had been marked by a series of hideous blunders.

Less than three hours of daylight now remained to him, and he was all of ten miles from his own base. He dared not push farther away, for, little as he regarded himself, he could take no risks while Natalie's fate still hung in the balance. But before giving up, he determined to make one last sortie back and forth across the prairie. Far to the right, just as hope was expiring, he saw, crossing the white expanse, a crooked, double row of slight depressions, like little moulds, slowly filling with powdery snow.

Flinging himself off his horse, with a beating heart, he hastily scooped out the snow. A man's footprint was clearly revealed. With a shout, he mounted again and jerked his horse's head around. The weary animal balked flatly at facing the storm, but Garth, beside himself, lashed him until he plunged into it. The tracks momentarily grew plainer. While they had strayed far to the left of his own course, he wondered to see that they still held the right direction in the main.

He redoubled his shouting. At last a muffled, indistinguishable sound answered him from ahead; and presently out of the wild whirl of flakes, a spectral figure was slowly resolved--as poignant a symbol of humanity as the last man on earth.

"Charley! Charley!" shouted Garth.

The figure turned uncertainly. Under the snow-laden lashes the eyes were vague.

Garth slipped out of the saddle; and, throwing his arm about the boy's shoulders, caught him to his breast. "Thank God! I was in time!" he cried in a great voice.

"It's really you!" the boy murmured. "I thought I was hearing things."

Garth clapped him between the shoulders. "Buck up, my hearty!" he cried. "It's all right now!"

"Have you got Natalie?" the boy said quickly.

Garth sadly shook his head.

"You shouldn't have come back then," he said dully. "I didn't expect it!"

Garth hugged him anew. "Dear lad!" he cried with a break in his voice. "I couldn't let you die in the snow!"

The kindness brought fuller consciousness back to the boy's eyes. He clung to Garth then; and lowered his head; and whimpered a little. After all he was only seventeen.

Garth hoisted him to the saddle; and headed into the storm again. The horse balked continually, sorely trying his patience. Their progress was very slow. Garth sought to keep Charley up with cheerful speech.

"Bully for you to keep going!" he cried.

"It was because--Natalie might need me," the boy's voice trailed.

"And right on the course!" Garth sang. "How did you keep it?"

"When the snow hid your tracks--I remembered--to keep the wind on my right cheek," he murmured.

That was the last Garth could get out of him. He was presently alarmed to find the boy growing increasingly numb and drowsy; even he knew what this portended in the North. He pulled him out of the saddle; and made him walk; supporting him with one arm, while with the other he led the horse. The animal took advantage of his partial helplessness, to plant his legs and pull back anew. If there was ever an excuse for anger against a dumb beast, surely hard-pressed Garth had it then. The horse was crazed with exhaustion, and terror of the storm; and tugs and kicks were of no avail. Garth could not bring in both boy and horse by main strength; and in the end, with hearty curses, he was obliged to abandon the beast to his fate.

Garth, pulling his hat over his eyes, and drawing the boy's arm across his shoulders, doggedly pushed into the storm. He thus half supported, half dragged his companion, who was, nevertheless, compelled to use his own legs. Charley never spoke except now and then to beg drowsily to be let alone. In Garth's flask was about a gill of precious stimulant, and, when the boy's legs failed him, he doled it out in sips.

They had at least nine miles to cover--and only two hours of daylight left. Try as he would to banish it, the sense of nine miles' distance would roll itself interminably out before Garth's mind's eye. Nine miles into two hours--the sum had no answer. Afterward night and storm on the empty prairie--what was the use? But when he reached this point, he would grit his teeth and take a fresh hold of the boy. If he had any other defined thought besides this painful round, it was to thank God that he was strong; he needed every ounce of it now.

Instead of attempting to pick up his own trail--surely obscured by now in the snow--he shaped his course northwest, trusting to strike the coulée at its nearest point, and travel down until he hit the mark he had set up. It was a little longer so; but the result justified it, for there was some shelter in the coulée; and working down the bottom, they could not miss the mark.

It was half-past four by Garth's watch when they laboriously climbed up the other side; and set their course by compass again for Rina's camp. It grew colder hourly; and the snowflakes became as hard and sharp as grains of coarse powder. Charley was kept going automatically by frequent small doses of the spirit from the flask. Garth dared not spare any of it for himself. It soon began to grow dark; and long before Garth could hope they had nearly covered the distance between the two coulées, it became totally dark; and he could no longer read the face of his compass. Fortunately the wind held steady from the north; he struggled ahead, keeping it on his right cheek as Charley had done before him.

Garth's head became confused; he was no longer sensible of the passage of time. Only his will kept his legs at their work. Drowsiness crept over him; and with it a growing sense of the uselessness of struggling further. He fought it for a while, but with subsiding energy. His knees began to weaken under him; he sank down. With a desperate effort, he struggled up again; and won another painful hundred yards. He was falling again--and this time he did not care--when suddenly the ground fell away from under his feet, he pitched forward, and he and the boy rolled down a steep declivity together.

Garth instantly knew they had reached the second coulée; and the thought cleared his fogged senses like the draught from his flask which he could not spare himself. He poured the last drops between Charley's numb lips; and turned to the right over the stony bed of the watercourse. He remembered Charley had strayed far to the left of his true course when guiding himself by the wind; and he had also observed in himself a tendency to swerve to that side, when working by compass. So he was sure they were somewhere above the poplar bluff--how far he dared not guess.

He was right. Utterly worn out by a seeming interminable struggle through the drifts in the bottom of the coulée, at last a misty, pinkish aura blushed in the snowy night. It was Rina's fire--warmth and shelter! and before it a little animal was roasting on a spit. Garth's senses slipped away in rapture at the smell it sent forth.

XXIII

THE SOLITARY PURSUER

Sometime during the course of the night the snow ceased to fall; and morning broke clear and cold. Garth had turned in, intending to rise at four; but Nature exacted her due, and it was seven before he awoke. The sky was a bowl of palest, fleckless azure; the sun shone gloriously on the field of snow; and the air stung the nostrils like the heady fumes of wine. But he was in no temper to take any delight in morning beauties; he ached in every bone and muscle as if he had been beaten with a club; and at the sight of the mounting sun, he bitterly reproached himself--and Rina, for the lost hours.

As for Charley, a glance at the boy showed that he was quite incapable of further travelling for the present. He suffered as much from the blow on the head as from the exposure in the snow. His mind was hopelessly confused and wandering. In any case they had but a single horse left; and only the one course of action was open to Garth. He instructed Rina to remain where she was and care for the boy, while he pushed ahead.

Even Rina betrayed some surprise. "What you do?" she said. "Three men to shoot, and Mary to watch _her_. You got no chance!"

"I'll find a way!" he said desperately. "This Death River, tell me about it!"

Rina pointed northwest. "Big river, moch water," she said. "Come from mountains. Ver' moch high falls; mak' lak thunder! Above falls, ver' rough rapids, no can cross. Below falls, deep black hole; breeds say bad spirits go there. Only one place to cross, half-mile below falls."

Garth caught the horse, who had fed himself as best he could by pawing the snow off the grass, and packed his blankets and a supply of food, including what was left of the little carcass Rina roasted. He learned it was a lynx; but the flesh was sweet, and he was too thankful for fresh meat to quarrel with the nature of it. He left Rina and Charley with a better will, knowing she could doubtless get others, as she had snared the first.

There was about ten inches of snow on the flat, with deep encumbering drifts in the hollows; and his advance was very slow. The ill-nourished horse wearied immediately; and any pace beyond a walk was out of the question. Had Garth only possessed snow-shoes he could have made much better time on foot. The vast expanse was as empty as a clean sheet of paper; nevertheless, he saw the prairie was not without its busy population, as evidenced by the number of tracks of little furry paws that had crossed his course already since the snow finished falling.

At noon, having made about eleven miles (he figured), he came to the brink of a coulée wider and deeper than any they had crossed hitherto; and which contained a stream in the bottom, running blackly around snow-capped stones. As he refreshed himself, and allowed his horse to drink, he reflected that Grylls would have reached this stream the day before about the time the snow commenced; and that it was likely the outfit had camped on its bank until the storm passed. He determined to search up and down before pushing ahead.

Sure enough, no more than two hundred yards down-stream he began to come upon the tracks of horses and saw the bare patches they had pawed to reach the grass; and a little farther he ran plump upon the fresh remains of the camp; two bare spots where tents had been pitched, the ashes of a fire, and innumerable tracks of men and horses--the whole startlingly conspicuous in the sweep of unbroken snow.

Garth's heart swelled with rage and mortification to think what a little distance had separated them during the night; and how by rising only three hours earlier, he might perhaps have caught them. But presently cooler counsels came to his aid; and when he considered the well-beaten track that led over the hill beyond, he was thankful for so much luck. He knew that at least until more snow should fall, they could never shake him off again; and he rode after with a renewed courage. His horse, too, freed of the entangling drifts, and sensing the other horses ahead, seemed to overcome his weakness for a while; and loped over the beaten trail with a good will.

Beyond this coulée the character of the country began to change. Crossing a height, Garth saw a range of gleaming mountains off to the west at no great distance; his course was heading him obliquely into the foothills. The prairie gradually broke up; the mounds became hills; and the hollows deepened into valleys. With every mile, almost, the hills became higher and more conical; outcroppings of rock began to appear; and the little streams ran in gorges now, instead of coulées.

In the rougher country the horse's access of courage soon failed. His wind was gone, he sobbed for breath; and Garth was presently reduced to the necessity of leading him up every incline. On a wide flat between two ranges, he mounted after a long walk, and urged him into a run over this easy piece. The slack-twisted animal was not equal to the effort; halfway across, his heart broke; and he collapsed in a heap, ploughing up the snow, and flinging his rider over his head. When Garth returned to him, he was stone dead. In the midst of his chagrin the man could spare a glance of pity for the shaggy, misshapen beast. One of the vulgar equine tribe, at his best neither beautiful nor courageous, he had nevertheless given his life to the journey.

Beside the stony watercourse that traversed this little plain, he made a cache of saddle, bridle and what food he could not carry on his back. Over the spot he piled a cairn of stones to mark it, and protect the little store from marauding animals. In addition to blankets, rifle and ammunition, he carried with him food sufficient for about five days. In an hour he was on his way again.

During the rest of the day, and the following day, the character of the country changed only in degree. The trail never carried him directly into the mountains, but skirted among the foothills, which raised strange, abrupt, detached cones on either hand--steep, naked, unreasonable shapes of earth, like nightmare forms. Each day Garth plodded to the limit of his strength, reckless of what lay before him, regarding only the beaten trail which led the way. From various signs it was clear those ahead ever gained on him; but he kept himself up with the thought that they must sooner or later make an extended stop to recuperate their horses. Each night he made his tea with snow-water; and, rolling up in his blankets beside the fire, slept under the stars; and at dawn he was astir again. Hard work was his beneficent sedative.

On the second night as he lay down he heard, or fancied he heard in the stillness, the breath of a far-off, heavy sound. He ascribed it to the roar of the great falls Rina had told him of; and the thought lent new vigour to his limbs next morning. He had another reason to hurry his steps; for each day had waxed a little warmer; and to-day the snow melted fast, threatening at last to obliterate the track he followed.

In the afternoon the going became harder, for the mountains reached down long spurs athwart his path, over which he had to toil. Like the conical hills they were bare of all timber; only the valleys and gulches were wooded. On the first of these ascents, burdened as he was, over-exertion and insufficient sleep began to tell on Garth; and he became conscious, for the first, of a terrible weariness in his back. He crushed it down; he could _not_ fail; he _had_ to keep on. But the next ascent was harder still; and the shape of fear grew in his breast.

The third long climb was nearly his finish. He would not allow himself to pause on the way up, though his heart knocked sickeningly against his ribs, while flames danced in front of his eyes, and there was a roaring in his ears. Gaining the summit at last, he flung himself down, afraid for the moment to look at the obstacles beyond. As he slowly recovered, a real booming disassociated itself from the noises in his head; and he eagerly raised his head. His eyes swept over a far and wide expanse of snow, a dish-like plateau among the hills. His heart leaped; for through the centre of the plateau ran a black fissure, like a crack in the dish; and off to the left a fleecy cloud rose lazily from the gorge, blushing pinkly in the light of the setting sun. This must mark the falls; the Death River lay at his feet.

The excitement of this discovery was immediately superseded by a far greater. In a direct line with him, on the plain beyond the gorge, he presently distinguished a few scattering, black objects like insects on the snow--but insects of the shape of horses. From the gorge itself, perfectly distinct in the crystalline air, rose a thin, blue column of smoke!

The haggard furrows in Garth's face smoothed out; his weary eyes shot forth a quiet glint; and he slowly and grimly smiled. He arose; and instinctively unslinging his gun, examined the mechanism. A goodly warmth diffused itself throughout his veins; and he felt strong again. The end of his journey was in sight.

Darkness had fallen before he reached the lip of the canyon. With bated breath he crawled to the edge and looked over--there was a chance they had escaped him again--but in the bottom of the pit, on the other side of the river, a fire was flickering redly in the darkness; and there was a hint of figures sitting around it. His heart beat strongly at the reassuring sight.

The tracks in the snow led him to the top of the path, which descended into the gorge. This path was steep, narrow, tortuous and slippery; and he knew not what conditions awaited him at the bottom. Prudence counselled him to wait for daylight to reconnoitre; but it was not possible to contain his impatience the night through, with Natalie so near, and he not knowing if she was safe. He started down instantly, feeling his way foot by foot; and ever careful to dislodge no stone that might betray him. Within the gorge the boom of the falls was largely deadened by a bend in the walls above; and lighter sounds became audible: the lapping of the river on the stones; and, as he came nearer, someone breaking sticks for the fire below.

Between him and the fire rolled the river with a deep, swift current. There was no more than a scant fifty yards between wall and wall of the gorge at the bottom. Coming still closer, he saw by the light of the fire that their camp was pitched on a triangle of flat ground, formed where a steep watercourse had made a perpendicular fissure in the opposite wall of the gorge. On one side of the fire was pitched a small "outside" tent--the same tent Garth had watched so long when it stood outside Mabyn's shack--and on the other side stood a tepee. A small raft, half drawn out of the water, explained their means of crossing the river.

The descending path finally landed Garth on a precipitous incline of broken rock at the water's edge; and there, across the stream, so close he could have tossed a pebble into their midst, sat those he had tracked so far, all unsuspicious of his nearness. They were having their evening meal. Natalie was among them, facing him, the firelight strong on her. Her face was set and sad--but still unhumbled; and from this and the obsequious poise of Grylls's head, when he turned to her, Garth knew she was so far safe from him. His heart breathed a still hymn of thankfulness.

Grylls sat on the other side of the fire, with his back against a rock. He still wore the bewrinkled suit of store clothes which had become so hateful in Garth's sight; and the broad-brimmed hat was set at a rakish angle. He was in a jovial humour, judging from the thick unction of his speech; doubtless, though he seldom looked at her, in his own way he was seeking to charm his cold and silent prisoner.

Mabyn's back was turned to Garth; his attitude was furtive; and apparently he spoke little. Garth did not trouble about him; for he knew instinctively that so long as the stronger man was by, Natalie stood in no danger from Mabyn. Mary Co-que-wasa, serving the food, hovered behind the fire, which threw a strange, exaggerated shadow of her hag-like form on the cliff. Nearer Garth, at a little distance from the others, Xavier sat on the ground, busy with his cup and plate.

Garth watched Natalie with a swelling heart. How brave she was! how noble and befitting the air with which she faced her terrible situation! The proud sadness of her face was infinitely more affecting than any extreme of distress could have been. Garth bled inwardly, to think of the torments of mind she must have endured. He yearned mightily to let her know he was near. He crouched at the edge of the water, willing a message of cheer to her; and heartened himself with the assurance that she could not but feel it.

She ate little; and, presently arising, disappeared within the tent. Grylls drew out the inevitable cigars, and, carelessly tossing one to Mabyn, lit his own. Mary went about collecting the dishes. Xavier carried his plate to the river side to wash it. Garth handled his rifle with fingers itching for the trigger. There were the four of them, all unconscious, delivered into his hands, it seemed.

But he spared them for a while. It was not that he shrank from shedding blood now; taking their lives troubled him no more than killing so much vermin. But, close as they were, he could not be sure of nailing them all; a dive outside the firelight, and they were safe. And Natalie was in their hands; and he had no way of crossing the river. He must rescue her first.

Mary went into the tent, which she apparently shared with Natalie; and presently reappeared with a dishtowel. Lifting a pail of hot water from the fire, she prepared to wash the dishes. The fire was dying down, and gathering an armful of brush, she heaped it on to make a light.

Too late Garth appreciated the significance of this act. He turned to escape up the path again; and in his hurry dislodged a heavy stone, which rolled into the water with a splash. He faced about with his rifle ready. Only Xavier, at the water's edge, heard the sound, and looked up. At the same instant the fire sprang into a blaze, filling the canyon with light; and plainly revealing Garth and his shadow behind him on the rock. The breed sprang to his feet with a cry of warning. It was the last sound, save one, that he ever made. The sharp, light bark of Garth's rifle reverberated in the gorge; the breed spun around with a throaty, quenched cry, toppled over backward into deep water, and was swept away.

Before Garth could aim again, Mary Co-que-wasa seized her pail of water, and flung it hissing on the fire. Absolute darkness filled the canyon.

XXIV

IN DEATH CANYON

Garth crouched at the water's edge, striving to pierce the murk with his eyes; but the blackness was like a wall. By and by the outlying embers of the fire began to glow faintly; but there was another splash, and every spark was quenched. Bending his head, he strained his ears. For a long time there was no sound from across the river; then little by little, and softly, he heard them set to work like mice behind a wainscot. There was a singular, measured falling of stones, which at first he could not interpret; then it suddenly occurred to him they were building a barricade across their little terrace; and he took heart; for the act was opposed to any design of immediate flight. But then, he thought, Mary, behind the wall, could easily hold the crossing by daylight, while the two men escaped with Natalie. Somehow, he must get across first.

He searched noiselessly among the stones above the water line for driftwood; and succeeded in picking up a stick here and a branch there. Four of the stouter pieces he tied in a square with the rope that bound his pack; and upon this frame he piled a crib of sticks, of sufficient buoyancy to float his clothes, his pack and his gun. He stripped to the skin and waded cautiously into the water. It was of an icy coldness that bit like a great burn, and forced the breath out of his lungs like a squeezed bellows. But he set his jaws and struck out, towing his little raft with the end of the rope between his teeth.