Blake's Burden

"The fellow's gone and taken some provisions with him," he said. "He left this for us."

It was a strip of paper, apparently torn from a pocket-book, with a few lines written on it. Benson said he regretted having to leave them in such an unceremonious fashion, but they had given him no choice, and added that he would leave the horse, hobbled, at a spot about two days' ride away.

"He seems to think he's showing us some consideration in not riding the beast down to the settlement," Blake remarked with a dubious smile, feeling strongly annoyed with himself for not taking more precautions. With the cunning which the lust for drink breeds in its victims Benson had outwitted him by feigning acquiescence. "Anyhow," he added, "I'll have to go after him. We must have the horse, for one thing, but I suppose we'll lose four days. This is rough on you."

"Yes," agreed Harding, "you must get after him, but don't mind about me. The man's a friend of yours and I like him; he wasn't quite responsible last night. I wouldn't feel happy if we let him fall back into the clutches of that cunning brute. Now we'll get breakfast; you'll need it."

They made a hasty meal and during it Blake said, "If you don't mind waiting, I'll follow him half way to Sweetwater if necessary. You see I haven't much expectation of overtaking him before he leaves the horse. It's the faster beast and we don't know when he started."

"That's so," said Harding. "Still, you're tough, and I guess the first hard day's ride will be enough for your partner."

Five minutes later Blake was picking his way as fast as possible through the wood. It was a cool morning, and when he had gone a few miles the ground was fairly clear. By noon he was in more open country, where there were long stretches of grass, and after a short rest he pushed on fast. Bright sunshine flooded the waste that now stretched back to the south, sprinkled with clumps of bush that showed a shadowy blue in the distance. In those he passed the birch and poplar leaves glowed in flecks of vivid lemon among the white stems, but Blake rode hard, his eyes turned steadily on the misty skyline. It was only broken by clusters of small trees; nothing moved on the wilderness he pushed across.

He felt tired when evening came, but he must find water before he camped, and he pressed on. Benson was a weak fool, who would, no doubt, give them further trouble, but they had taken him in hand, and Blake had made up his mind to save him from the rogue who preyed upon his failings. It was getting late when he saw a faint trail of smoke curl up against the sky from a distant bluff, and on approaching it he checked the jaded pony. Later he dismounted and picketing the animal moved cautiously round the edge of the wood. Passing a projecting tongue of smaller brush, he saw, as he had expected, Benson sitting beside a fire, and stopped a moment to watch him. The man's face was weary, his pose was slack, and it was obvious that the life he had led had unfitted him for a long, hard ride. He looked forlorn and dejected, but he started as Blake moved forward and his eyes had an angry gleam.

"So you have overtaken me; I thought myself safe from you," he said.

"You were wrong," Blake replied. "If it had been needful, I'd have gone after you to Clarke's. But I'm hungry and I'll cook my supper at your fire." He glanced at the provisions scattered about. "You haven't had much of a meal."

"It's a long drink I want," said Benson, looking steadily at him.

Blake, who let this pass, prepared his supper and offered the other a portion.

"Try some of that," he said, indicating the light flapjacks fizzling among the pork in the frying-pan. "It strikes me as a good deal more tempting than the stuff you have been eating."

Benson thrust the food aside, and Blake finished it before he took out his pipe. "Now," he said, "you can go to sleep when you wish. I expect you're tired, and it's a long ride back to camp."

"You seem to count upon my going back with you," Benson remarked mockingly.

"I do; don't you mean to come?"

"Do you suppose it's likely after I've ridden all this way?"

Blake laid down his pipe and looked hard at the man. "You force me to take a line I'm not cut out for. Think a moment! You have land and stock worth a good deal of money which my partner believes can be saved from the rogue who's stealing it from you. You are a young man, and if you pull yourself together and pay off his claims, you can sell out and look for another opening wherever you like, but you know what will happen if you go on as you are doing a year or two longer. Have you no friends and relatives in England you owe something to? Is your life worth nothing, that you're willing to throw it away?"

"It's all true," Benson admitted moodily. "Do you think I can't see where I'm drifting? The trouble is that I've gone too far to stop."

"Try," said Blake. "It's very well worth while."

Benson was silent for a few moments, and then looked up with a curious expression. "You're wasting time, Dick. I've sunk too far. Go back in the morning and leave me to my fate."

"When I go back you are coming with me."

Benson's nerves were on edge and his self-control broke down. "Confound you!" he cried; "let me alone! You have reached the limit; once for all, I'll stand no more meddling."

"Very well," Blake answered quietly, "You have left me only one recourse, and you can't blame me for taking it."

"What's that?"

"Superior strength. You're a heavier man than I am and ought to be a match for me, but you have lost your nerve and grown soft and flabby with drink. It's your own doing, and now you have to take the consequences. If you compel me, I'll drag you back to camp with the pack lariat."

"Do you mean that?" Benson's face grew flushed and his eyes glittered.

"Try me and see."

Savage as he was, Benson realized that his companion was capable of making his promise good. The man looked hard and very muscular, and his expression was determined.

"This is insufferable!" he cried.

Blake coolly filled his pipe. "There's no other remedy. Before I go to sleep I'll picket the horses close beside me and if you steal away on foot during the night, I'll ride you down a few hours after daybreak. I think you understand me, and there's nothing more to be said."

He tried to talk about other matters and found it hard, for Benson, tormented by his craving, made no response. Darkness crept in about them and the prairie grew shadowy. The leaves in the bluff rustled in a faint, cold wind, and the smoke of the fire drifted round the men. For a while Benson sat moodily watching his companion, and then, wrapping his blanket round him, lay down and turned away his head. It was now very dark outside the flickering light of the fire, and by and by Blake, who felt the strain of the situation, strolled towards the horses and chose a resting-place beside their pickets.

Waking in the cold of daybreak, he saw Benson asleep, and made breakfast before he called him. They ate in silence and then Blake led up the pony.

"I think we'll make a start," he said as cheerfully as he could.

For a moment or two Benson hesitated, standing with hands clenched and baffled desire in his face, but Blake looked coolly resolute, and he mounted.

CHAPTER XI

HARDING GROWS SUSPICIOUS

Benson gave Blake no further trouble, and when they rode up to the camp, apparently on good terms with one another, Harding made no reference to what had occurred. He greeted them pleasantly and soon afterwards they sat down to a meal he had been cooking. When they had finished and lighted their pipes Benson said, "A remark was made the other night which struck me as quite warranted. It was pointed out that I had contributed nothing to the cost of this trip."

"It was very uncivil of Harding to mention it," Blake answered with a grin. "Still, you see, circumstances rather forced him."

"They did. You might have put it more harshly with truth. But I want to suggest that you let me take a share in your venture."

"Sorry," said Harding, "I can't agree to that."

Benson sat smoking in silence for the next minute or two. Then he said, "I think I understand and can't blame you. You haven't much cause for trusting me."

"I didn't mean – " Harding began, but Benson stopped him.

"I know. It's my weakness you're afraid of. However, you must let me pay my share of the provisions and any transport we may be able to get. That's all I insist on now; if you feel more confidence in me later, I may reopen the other question." He paused and added: "You are two very good fellows. I think I can promise not to play the fool again."

"Perhaps we'd better talk about something else," Blake suggested.

They broke camp early next morning, and Benson struggled manfully with his craving during the next week or two which they spent in pushing farther into the forest. It was a desolate waste of small, stunted trees, many of which were dead and stripped of half their branches, while wide belts had been scarred by fire. Harding found the unvarying sombre green of the needles strangely monotonous, but the ground was comparatively clear, and the party made progress until at length, when the country grew more broken, they fell in with three returning prospectors.

"If you'll trade your horses, we might make a deal," said one when they camped together. "You can't take them much farther – the country's too rough – and we could sell out to one of the farmers near the settlements."

Blake was glad to come to terms, and afterwards another of the men said, "We've been out two months on a general prospecting trip. It's the toughest country to get through I ever struck."

His worn and ragged appearance bore this out, and Harding asked: "Are there minerals up yonder? We're not in that line; it's a forest product we're looking for."

"We found indications of gold, copper, and one or two other metals, besides petroleum, but didn't see anything that looked worth taking up. Considering the cost of transport, you want to strike it pretty rich before what you find will pay as a business proposition."

"So I should imagine. Petroleum's a cheap product to handle when you're a long way from a market, isn't it?"

"Give us plenty of it and we'll make a market. It's an idea of mine that there's no part of this country that hasn't something worth working in it if you can get cheap fuel. Where the land's too poor for farming you often find minerals, and ore that won't pay for transport can be reduced on the spot, so long as you have natural resources that can be turned into power. With an oil well in good flow we'd soon start some profitable industry and put up a city that would bring a railroad in. Show our business men a good opening and you'll get the dollars, while there are folks across the frontier who have a mighty keen scent for oil."

"Have you done much prospecting?" Harding asked.

The other smiled. "Whenever I can get dollars enough for an outfit I go off on the trail. There's a fascination in the thing that gets hold of you – you can't tell what you may strike and the prizes are big. However, I allow that after seven or eight years of it I'm poorer than when I started at the game."

Blake made a sign of comprehension. He knew the sanguine nature of the Westerner and his belief in the richness of his country, and he had felt the call of the wilderness. There was, in truth, a fascination in the silent waste that drew the adventurous into its rugged fastnesses, and that a number of them did not come back seldom deterred the others.

"We want to get as far north as the timber limit, if we can," he said. "I understand there are no Hudson's Bay factories near our line, but we were told we might find some Stony Indians."

"There's one bunch of them," the prospector replied. "They ramble about after fish and furs, but they've a kind of base-camp where a few generally stop. They're a mean crowd and often short of food, but if they've been lucky you might get supplies. Now and then they put up a lot of dried fish and kill some caribou."

He told Blake roughly where the Indian encampment lay, and after talking for a while they went to sleep. Next morning the prospectors, who took the horses, started for the south, while Blake's party pushed on north with loads that severely tried their strength. After a few days' laborious march they reached a stream and found a few Indians who were willing to take them some distance down it. It was a relief to get rid of the heavy packs and rest while the canoe glided smoothly through the straggling forest, and the labour of hauling her across the numerous portages was light compared with the toil of the march. Blake, however, had misgivings; they were making swift progress northwards, but it would be different when they came back. Rivers and lakes would be frozen then, which might make travelling easier, if they could pick up the hand sledges they had cached, but there was a limit to the provisions they could transport, and unless fresh supplies could be obtained they would have a long distance to traverse on scanty rations in the rigours of the Arctic winter.

After a day or two the Indians, who were going no farther, landed them and they entered a belt of very broken country across which they must push to reach a larger stream. The ground was rocky, pierced by ravines, and covered with clumps of small trees. There were stony tracts they painfully picked their way across, steep ridges to be clambered over, and belts of quaggy muskeg they must skirt, and the day's march grew rapidly shorter. Benson, however, gave them no trouble; the man was getting hard and was generally cheerful, while when he had an occasional fit of moroseness as he fought with the longing that tormented him they left him alone. Still at times they were daunted by the rugged sternness of the region they were steadily pushing through, and the thought of the long return journey troubled them.

One night when it was raining they sat beside their fire in a desolate gorge. A cold wind swept between the thin spruce trunks that loomed vaguely out of the surrounding gloom as the red glare leaped up, and wisps of acrid smoke drifted about the camp. There was a lake up the hollow, and now and then the wild and mournful cry of a loon rang out. The men were tired and somewhat dejected as they sat about the blaze with their damp blankets round them, but by and by Blake, who had been feeling drowsy, looked up.

"What was that?" he asked.

The others could hear nothing but the sound of running water and the wail of the wind. Since leaving the Indians they had seen no sign of life and believed they were crossing uninhabited wilds. Blake could not tell what had suddenly roused his attention, but in former days he had developed his perceptive faculties by close night watching on the Indian frontier, where any relaxing of his vigilance might have cost his life. Something, he thought, was moving in the bush and he felt uneasy. Then he rose as a stick cracked, and Harding called out as a shadowy figure appeared on the edge of the light. Blake laughed, but his uneasiness did not desert him when he recognized Clarke. The fellow was not to be trusted and had come upon them in a startling manner. Moving coolly forward, he sat down by the fire.

"I suppose you were surprised to see me," he remarked.

"That's so," Harding answered and added nothing further, while Benson, whose face wore a curious strained expression, did not speak.

"Well," said Clarke, who filled his pipe, "I daresay I made a rather dramatic entrance, falling upon you, so to speak, out of the dark."

"I've a suspicion that you enjoy that kind of thing," Harding rejoined. "You're a man with the dramatic feeling; guess you find it useful now and then."

Clarke's eyes twinkled, but it was not with wholesome humour. They were keen, but he looked old and forbidding as he sat with the smoke blowing about him and the ruddy firelight on his face.

"There's some truth in your remark and I take it as a compliment, but my arrival's easily explained. I saw your fire in the distance and curiosity brought me along."

"What are you doing up here?"

"Going on a visit to my friends the Stonies. Though it's a long way, I look them up now and then."

"From what I've heard of them they don't seem a very attractive lot," Blake interposed. "But we haven't offered you any supper. Benson, you might put on the frying-pan."

"No thanks," said Clarke. "I'm camped with two half-breeds a little way back. The Stonies, as you remark, are not a polished set, but we're on pretty good terms and it's their primitiveness that makes them interesting. You can learn things civilized folk don't know much about from these people."

"In my opinion it's knowledge that's not worth much to a white man," Harding remarked contemptuously. "Guess you mean the secrets of their medicine-men? What isn't gross superstition is trickery."

"There you are wrong. They have some tricks, rather clever ones, though that's not unusual with the professors of a more advanced occultism; but living, as they do, in direct contact with Nature in her most savage mood, they have found clues to things that we regard as mysteries. Anyhow, they have discovered a few effective remedies that aren't generally known yet to medical science."

He spoke with some warmth and had the look of a genuine enthusiast, but Harding laughed.

"Medical science hasn't much to say in favour of hoodoo practices, so far as I know. But I understand you are a doctor."

"I was pretty well known in London."

"Then," said Harding bluntly, "what brought you to Sweetwater?"

"If you haven't heard, I may as well tell you, because the thing isn't a secret at the settlement." Clarke turned and his eyes rested on Blake. "I'm by no means the only man who has come to Canada under a cloud. There was a famous police-court affair I figured in, and though nothing was proved against me my practice afterwards fell to bits. As a matter of fact, I was absolutely innocent of the offence I was charged with. I had acted without much caution out of pity and laid myself open to an attack that was meant to cover the escape of the real criminal."

Blake, who thought he spoke the truth, felt some sympathy, but Clarke went on: "In a few weeks I was without patients or friends; driven out from the profession I loved and in which I was beginning to make my mark. It was a blow I never altogether recovered from, and the generous impulse which got me into trouble was the last I yielded to."

His face changed, growing hard and malevolent, and Blake now felt strangely repelled. It looked as if the man had been soured by his misfortunes and turned into an outlaw who found a vindictive pleasure in making such reprisals as he found possible upon society at large. This conclusion was borne out by what Blake had learned at the settlement.

Nobody made any comment, and there was silence for a few minutes while the smoke whirled about the group and the drips from the dark boughs above fell upon the brands. Then Clarke asked Benson a question or two and afterwards talked casually with the others until he rose to go.

"I shall start at daybreak and your way lies to the east of mine," he said. "You'll find travelling easier when the snow comes; I wish you good luck."

Though the loneliness of the wilds had now and then weighed upon them, they felt relieved when he left, and soon afterwards Benson went to sleep, but Blake and Harding continued talking for a time.

"That's a man I have no use for," the American remarked. "I suppose it struck you that he made no attempt to get your friend back?"

"I noticed it. He may have thought it wouldn't succeed and didn't wish to show his hand. Benson already looks a different man; I saw the fellow studying him."

"He could have drawn him away by the sight of a whisky flask or a hint of a jag in camp. My opinion is that he didn't want him."

"That's curious," said Blake. "He seems to have stuck to Benson pretty closely, no doubt with the object of fleecing him, and you think he's not altogether ruined yet."

"If what he told me is correct, there are still some pickings left on him."

"I don't suppose the explanation is that Clarke has some conscience and feels he has robbed him enough."

Harding laughed. "He has as much pity as a hungry wolf; in fact, to my mind, he's the more dangerous brute, because I've a feeling that he delights in doing harm. There's something cruel about the man; getting fired out of his profession must have warped his nature. Then there was another point that struck me; why's he going so far to stay with those Indians?"

"It's puzzling," Blake said thoughtfully. "He hinted that he was interested in their superstitions, and I think there was some truth in it. Meddling with these things seems to have a fascination for neurotic people, and as the fellow's a sensualist he may find some form of indulgence that wouldn't be tolerated near the settlements. All this, however, doesn't quite seem to account for the thing."

"I've another idea," said Harding. "Clarke's known as a crank and takes advantage of it to cover his doings. At first, I thought of the whisky trade, but taking up prohibited liquor would hardly be worth his while, though I daresay he has some with him to be used for gaining his Indian friends' good will. He's on the trail of something and it's probably minerals. What the prospector told us suggested it to me."

"You may be right. Anyway, it doesn't seem to concern us."

"Well," said Harding gravely, "I'm troubled about his leaving Benson alone, when one could have understood his trying to take him away. The fellow had some good reason – I wish I knew."

He rose to throw more wood upon the fire and they changed the subject.

CHAPTER XII

THE MUSKEG

It was a fortnight later when the party entered a hollow between two low ranges. The hills receded as they progressed, the basin widened and grew more difficult to traverse, for the ground was boggy and thickly covered with small, rotting pines. Every here and there some had fallen and lay in horrible tangles among pools of mire. A sluggish creek wound through the hollow and the men had often to cross it, while as they plodded through the morass they found their loads intolerably heavy. Still Clarke's directions had plainly indicated this valley as their road, and they stubbornly pushed on, camping where they could find a dry spot.

They were generally wet to the waist and their temper began to give way under the strain, while Blake was annoyed to find his sleep disturbed when he lay down in damp clothes beside the fire at nights. Sometimes he was too hot and sometimes he lay awake shivering, for hours. He had, however, suffered from malarial fever in India without having it badly, and supposed that it had again attacked him now that he was feeling the hardships of the march. Saying nothing to his companions, he patiently trudged on, though his head throbbed and he was conscious of a depressing weakness; and the ground grew softer as they proceeded. The creek no longer kept within its banks but spread in shallow pools, the rotting trees were giving place to tall grass and reeds. The valley had turned into a very wet muskeg, but, after making one or two attempts, they failed to find a better road among the hills that shut it in. The rocky sides of the knolls were seamed by ravines and covered with banks of stones and short brush, through which it was very difficult to force a passage. Then one day, Blake, who felt his head reel, staggered and sat down heavily.

"I'm sorry I can't keep on my feet," he said. "Think it's malaria I've got."

For a moment or two his companions gazed at him in dismay. His face was flushed, his eyes glittered, and moving feebly he sank further down with his back against a stone. He looked seriously ill, but Harding, realizing that the situation must be grappled with, resolutely pulled himself together.

"You can't lie there; the ground's too wet," he said. "It's drier on yonder hummock and we'll have to get you across to it. If you can stand up and lean on us we'll fix you comfortably in camp in a few minutes."

When Blake had shakily risen they unstrapped his pack and afterwards with much trouble helped him to reach a small, stony knoll, where they made a fire and spread their blankets on a bundle of reeds for him to lie on.