North

Skookum raised his head, pricked his ears, and pointing his muzzle up the creek, gave voice to a low throaty growl. Lou Gordon glanced down at the dog, and continued to throw dried fish over the fence of the pole-and-stake dog corral. When she had tossed the last fish, she smiled: “Who is it, Skookum? We don’t have many visitors nowadays, do we?”

The dog stood silent, immovable save for a scarcely perceptible quiver of the nostrils, staring into the twilight.

The girl laughed: “Only one man, eh? And no dogs. And he’s someone you know, and approve of. Oh, you see I can understand you as well as you can understand me! See, here he comes! Why, it’s Pete Enright!”

The girl stepped forward, a smile of welcome upon her face: “Klahowya six!” she greeted.

“Kahta mika?” He smilingly returned her greeting in the jargon, and switched into English. “Well, well, Miss Lou, an’ how’s yer Pa? Still figgerin’ on his b’iler, I s’pose. Lord, what a passel of dogs! How many you goin’ to have to sell this trip?”

“I’ll have six dogs, and dad’s well. He’ll be home in a few minutes. It’s nearly time for supper. Swing off your pack. Yes, dad’s still figuring on his boiler.” Her face clouded for a moment. “And I’m afraid he’s got almost dust enough saved up to get it.”

Enright laughed: “Afraid? Why, you talk like you ain’t got no faith in the b’iler to put Myrtle on the map agin.”

She made a gesture of impatience. “And neither have you, nor anyone else but dad. He’s thought and thought about that old boiler until he can’t think or talk about anything else.” She was silent for a moment, and a smile parted her lips as she continued: “I don’t mean what I said. That is, of course I want him to have the boiler because I know he will never be happy until he gets it. But—it seems like an awful lot of money just thrown away.”

Enright nodded: “Yup, Miss Lou, that’s jist what it is—throw’d away. An’ no chanct of gittin’ it back. It’s too bad, but he’s that set on havin’ it they ain’t no mortal use tryin’ to auger him out of it, I s’pose.”

The girl shook her head: “Not the slightest. Anyway it’s his money.” She smiled and drew a step closer. “Do you know that I am making almost as much as he is. He don’t know it. He never thinks of me as grown up, and really doing anything that’s of any use. ‘Putterin’ wi’ the dogs,’ he calls it, and he never pays any attention to them. I’ve got quite a lot of money saved up, and maybe it’s mean, when he’s so set on getting his boiler, but I have never let him know I have it. You see, if he does put everything he’s got into the boiler, an’ then finds it won’t make him rich right away, it’s going to almost kill him. He’s not as young as he was, and I don’t think he’d have the heart to start all over again. So, when it comes to that, I’ll have the dog money for us to live on.”

Pete Enright’s mittened hand patted the girl’s shoulder and his big voice rumbled with approbation: “Don’t you never figger fer a minute that it’s mean. It’s good common sense, that’s what it is. You’ve got the head fer the two of you. You’re the only one on the Koyukuk that seen they was any money in raisin’ an’ breakin’ good dogs, an’ the result is you get twict as much fer your dogs as anyone else does, an’ they’re worth it. Most everyone thinks a dog is just a chunk of the devil wropped up in fur an’ put into the world to be kicked an’ pounded, and swore at, an’ starved, an’ worked till he can’t stand up no longer, an’ then to be cut out of the traces an’ left to die, an’ his place filled in with another chunk of the devil. You seen how dogs was mighty near human, an’ you treat ’em human, an’ results is, your dogs is dogs! An’ that’s what I come down to see about, in a way—is dogs.”

“Do you want to buy a team?”

“No, but you won’t have no trouble sellin’ the six yer goin’ to fetch up to Nolan. They’re sold already. An’ a couple of more, too, if you had ’em. Joe McCorkill, he’s in need of four to fill out his team, an’ the mail carrier needs two, an’ so does Johnny Atline. They’s plenty dogs fer sale around the camp, but they won’t none of ’em have no dogs but yourn. An’, say, let me give you a tip, hold out fer a hundred apiece fer ’em. You’ll git it. They all kin afford to pay it, an’ they’d ruther pay it fer the kind of dogs they’ll be gittin’, than to pay twenty or twenty-five fer mongrels or Siwash dogs.”

“And, did you mush all the way down here to tell me that?” smiled the girl.

“No, that ain’t the p’int—not altogether. The facts is, Nolan’s figgerin’ to pull off a reg’lar celebration this Chris’mus. A sort of winter carnival, they call it, an’ they’ll be contests of every kind we kin think up, an’ prizes fer the winner of each one. Everyone has kicked in an’ doneated what he could afford to, an’ we’ve got quite a sight of dust fer prize money. They’ll be wrastlin’, an’ boxin’, which owin’ to the facts that there ain’t no boxin’ gloves on the Koyukuk, is looked fer to produce a bloody pastime. Then, they’ll be snowshoe an’ ski races, a football game between the Kobuk Eskimos an’ the Injuns, whirlin’ down contests, an’ a dog race—mebbe.”

“A dog race!” cried the girl, her eyes lighting with sudden interest. “Oh, I wonder if I could enter my team?”

Enright smiled: “That’s what I come to see about—that, an’ the trimmin’s.”

“The trimmings?” asked the girl, with a puzzled frown.

“Yeh, you see, Miss Lou, they’s a little bit more to this here race than jist runnin’ the dogs. Sort of a little—what you might call politics.”

The girl’s face darkened: “You mean—you don’t mean that there’s going to be anything crooked about it? That a certain team will be allowed to win?”

“No, no! Nothin’ like that! Why, Miss Lou, you ort to know we wouldn’t stand for nothin’ like that on the Koyukuk.”

“Of course I do! But, what in the world do you mean?”

“Hello! Here comes yer pa. We kin talk it over after supper an’ then I’ll mush on to my old cabin up the crick.”

“Indeed you’ll do nothing of the kind!” laughed the girl. “We’ve got plenty of room right here. You bunk with dad. I’ve got a room of my own all curtained off.”

Gordon gained the top of the low bank, and came toward them in the gloom. “Dad,” called the girl. “Here’s Pete Enright come to make us a visit!”

The old man quickened his step and extended his hand: “Aye, Pete, lad, ye’re welcome back on Myrtle. How’s thing’s up river? An’ have ye seen Burr MacShane?”

“No, Burr MacShane ain’t be’n saw nor heard tell of on the Koyukuk, fer it’s goin’ on four year or better. Nolan’s all right. They’s talk of a strike on Hammond River, further up the Koyukuk.”

“They’re fools an’ daft, wi’ their runnin’ hither an’ yon after new strikes. Continually runnin’ after strange gods, as the Gude Book says. But, wait till I get my b’iler, an’ start steam thawin’! Next summer—next summer if the dump sluices out big, Pete Enright, ye’ll see Nolan, an’ Wiseman, an’ this new Hammond River, stampedin’ back to Myrtle, an’ every one of ’em that can afford it, wi’ a b’iler on his claim.”

“Well, mebbe—mebbe, Gordon. I ain’t sayin’ they won’t, an’ I ain’t sayin’ they will. Personal, I ain’t got no faith in no b’iler fer gold diggin’.”

“It’s because ye don’t know no better! Why, man, look here! Don’t it stand to reason—” and Gordon launched into his favorite theme with enthusiasm that a thousand repetitions had not dampened, and while Enright listened in tolerant silence, Lou slipped into the cabin and began the preparation of supper.

The meal over, Gordon showed signs of renewing his discussion of “b’ilers,” but was forestalled by Enright: “About this here dog race, Miss Lou, that I was speakin’ of——”

“Dog race? Dog race?” queried the old man, “What foolishness is this about a dog race?”

“It won’t be foolishness none whatever fer the winner,” replied Enright. “We figgered on puttin’ up a prize of about twenty-five ounces. That’s four hundred dollars, an’ not so bad fer a day’s work, neither. That is, that’s what we figger to put up if Miss Lou will enter her team. If she won’t they won’t be no dog race whatever.”

“Why, how ridiculous!” cried the girl. “What possible difference can it make whether or not I enter? Surely, with a prize of twenty-five ounces, you can get plenty of teams in the race.”

“Yeh, quite a considerable of ’em—if it wasn’t fer Jake Dalzene. But, that ain’t the p’int. I’ll kind of give you a line on how things is, an’ the way the boys thinks up the river, an’ you kin jedge fer yerself.

“They’s a low down skunk of a hooch-runnin’ squaw man, name of Jake Dalzene that lives down to Rampart on the Yukon. You know they ain’t no Rampart no more, she’s plumb abandoned all but the native village, an’ this here party lives there with the Injuns, you know the kind. That is, he lives there when he ain’t off somewheres else peddlin’ hooch to the Injuns off the river. He’s plum kultus—has him a new squaw ’bout every full moon, an’ kicks ’em an’ beats ’em like he handles his dogs. Well, this here party is up to Nolan, him an’ his pardner. Worked along up the river with a couple sled loads of hooch, an’ got red of it tradin’ with the Injuns fer fur. When he heard the talk about pullin’ a big hurrah around Chris’mus, he begun to talk dog race, an’ dog fight. He’s claimed to be one of the hardest men on dogs in Alaska, but he’s always got a good team. Either he figgers he kin haul more hooch with good dogs, or else he needs ’em to git away from the marshals, I don’t know which, but anyway, he’s got good dogs.

“First off, his dog race talk wasn’t looked on none favorable. The boys figgerin’ that their teams wouldn’t stand no show again his’n. Then he pulls out a roll of cash money, in big bills, an’ starts in wantin’ to bet. He’s got the money all right, rolls of bills big enough to choke a moose in every pocket an’ plenty of dust besides. You see, bein’ in the business he’s in he don’t dare to trust no one with his money, never knowin’ when he’ll have to light out, nor how far he will have to go, so he packs it with him. Well, as I said, he flashes his roll an’ brags on his team an’ offers to bet the hull or any part of it on his dogs on any race from a mile to a hundred mile. ’Course he don’t git no takers, an’ so he heaves in some more hooch, an’ every time he takes a drink his dogs looks better to him, an’ every one else’s looks poorer. So he gits to offerin’ odds—two-to-one at first, an then three to one, an’ when I left camp it had got up to five-to-one that he could beat anything on the Koyukuk.

“Well we’d got kind of tired of hearin’ him shootin’ off his mouth an’ so some of us got to kind of figgerin’ if we couldn’t bunch our dogs an’ pick us out a winnin’ team from the lot, seein’ how the odds was gittin’ pretty promisin’. But when we come to try ’em out we seen it wasn’t no go. The dogs wouldn’t work good together, the best ones bein’ mostly leaders that wouldn’t work nowheres but in the lead.

“Then I thinks of you all. When I mentions your team they was a whoop from the boys, an’ every one of ’em agrees that if you’ll enter your team we could make a cleanin’ an’ at the same time learn that skunk a lesson not to come hornin’ in on the Koyukuk where folks like him ain’t wanted.”

Old Man Gordon snorted contemptuously and knocked the ashes from his pipe against the stove: “If ye’re expectin’ me to risk gude gold on the outcome of a dog race, Pete Enright, ye’ve had ye’re trip fer nothin’. ’Twas better than eight year agone that Burr MacShane taught me the folly of riskin’ gude money on a thing that ain’t sure certain, an’ I’m savin’ my dust fer my b’iler.”

“Sure, I know, Gordon. An’ we ain’t askin’ you to put up a cent. It’s like this, some of the boys says how Old B’iler Gordon wouldn’t allow no dogs of his’n to be run agin money, not even fer a prize, bein’ he’s plum religious, that way. But, I know’d better. I says to ’em, I says, ‘You all don’t know B’iler Gordon like I know him. Religious he is,’ I says, ‘an’ it’s a credit to him. If we all had more religion onto us than what we’ve got it wouldn’t hurt us none whatever. But, along with his religion B’iler has got a lot of common sense. If we put up a prize enough to make it worth while I bet he’ll not have no ’bjection to runnin’ his dogs, on account it ain’t gamblin’ when he don’t put up nothin’ agin the prize. It’s jist simply earnin’ the money by honest work.’ Ain’t I right, Gordon?”

The old man nodded affirmation: “Ye’re right. A prize in any contest is fair earnt as long as the outcome ain’t decided by luck alone. ’Tis what I told Burr MacShane.”

“That’s the idee,” agreed Enright, emphatically, “I know’d you well enough to be sure you’d take the sensible way of seein’ it. So I says to the boys, ‘I’ll jist slip down to Gordon’s an’ find out fer sure if they’ll be up fer Chris’mus, and if he’ll let his dogs enter the race.’ You see, this here Dalzene party, he don’t know nothin’ about Miss Lou’s team, an’ he thinks he’s saw the general run of Koyukuk dogs, an’ he knows it’s too late fer us to run in any reg’lar racin’ team from over Nome way, an’ that’s why he’s bettin’ so high.”

Enright paused, filled his pipe, and blowing a cloud of blue smoke ceilingward, continued: “Now, here’s where the politics comes in. We all know that big ten team of Miss Lou’s ain’t never be’n raced, but we’ve got the hunch that they kin clean up anything this side of Nome. Us not bein’ religious, an’ not havin’ no scruples about bettin’ a little now an’ then, jist by way of amusement, you might say, we’ll jist cover Dalzene’s pile, an’ if we kin clean him out—bust him, it’ll be a plumb religious move, ’cause he won’t be able to get holt of so much hooch to peddle to the pore Injuns. Ain’t that right, Gordon?”

“Aye, ye’re right,” affirmed the old man, judicially, “Don’t it tell in the Gude Book how the Lord overturned the tables of the money changers, an’ scourged them wi’ scourges? He done it because they was ungodly men, an’ a generation of vipers, so any act that will be as a scourge to the ungodly will be counted as righteousness. Ye’ve more religion between ye than I thought, Pete Enright.”

“Sure we have, B’iler—a damn sight more than we thought, ourselves. But, it’s like the itch, if you’ve got it, it’ll show up, sometime. But, as I was sayin’, the way to work it is like this: I’ll take the six dogs that Miss Lou’s goin’ to fetch up to sell, an’ pull out fer Nolan in the mornin’.”

“Oh, not those dogs!” cried the girl, “They’re good dogs, but they haven’t worked together long enough. They couldn’t win a race against a team that knew how to work together.”

“Jist so,” agreed Enright, “That’s what I figgered. However, it ain’t no harm in me takin’ ’em along up fer you, is they, to save you the trouble? I’ll see they’re well took care of. Without sayin’ nothin’ I’ll hit town with these here six dogs an’ begin runnin’ ’em up an’ down on the ice. The boys’ll crowd down there to watch ’em run an’ then they’ll begin to take bets offen Dalzene. Of course it might be such a thing that Dalzene will come down along with the rest an’ he might somehow git the idee that this here was the team we was hangin’ our dust onto. An’ he might figger, him knowin’ dogs a little, that his’n could beat ’em without half tryin’. It’s ten days yet, till Chris’mus, an’ every day I’ll work them dogs out on the ice, an’ every day we kin kind of cover more an’ more of Dalzene’s money, till we’ve got it all covered. Then the day before Chris’mus you come along an’ hearin’ how they’s a race you enter your team. Meanwhile all these here bets has be’n made, the money is up, an’ Dalzene has bet agin’ the whole field fer his team to win. That’s what he’s offerin’, his team agin the field, an’ accordin’ to his way of seein’ it, it’s as good a bet as any, ’cause he says he don’t care if they’s a dozen teams or one, he’s only got to beat the best of ’em anyhow, an’ he ain’t worryin’ none but what he kin do it.

“Now, the boys thinks that if we all make a clean-up on this here ungodless party from Rampart, on account of your team winnin’ this here race, it wouldn’t be no more than fair to add ten percent of our winnin’s to the prize. What do you say to that?”

Gordon’s eyes rested upon the face of his daughter. “What do ye say, lass? The dogs are yours, you’ve raised ’em an’ fooled wi’ ’em an’ broke ’em, an’ if we win the money’s yours.”

“Oh, I’d love to do it!” cried the girl, her eyes shining. “And I believe we can win, too. But what if he backs down when he sees my team? What if he won’t race?”

“We aim to fix that. We all will lay our bets with the understandin’ that if he backs out he loses. He’s got to race an’ win to take the money.”

“How many miles shall we race?” she asked eagerly.

Enright considered: “Dalzene he’s made his crack that he’ll run anywheres from one mile to a hundred. The boys kind of left it to you fer to name the distance. As I said, them dogs of Dalzene’s looks good an’ fit. But they’s only seven of ’em, agin’ your ten. An’ besides, his sled is a heavy, rough ice proposition, built more fer freightin’ than speed.”

“But, so is mine,” interrupted the girl.

“Sure, I know. But the mail carrier’s ain’t. An’ bein’ as he’ll have all the dust he kin scrape together invested in this here scheme for Christianizin’ Jake Dalzene, it ain’t goin’ to be none hard whatever, fer to borrow that sled off him. So, takin’ it all in all, as the feller says, I guess we better make it a middlin’ long drag. Say, anyways forty or fifty mile. The longer it is, the heavier the pull is goin’ to be on Dalzene’s dogs.”

“Why not go the whole hundred?” cried the girl.

Enright laughed: “I wondered if you’d say that. It’ll sure tickle the boys when I tell ’em. It shows yer heart’s right, an’ yer game, an’ you got belief in yer dogs—not that we didn’t know you was game all right, Miss Lou,” he hastened to add, “’Cause there ain’t a man on the Koyukuk that wouldn’t go plumb to hell for you.” He paused, floundering awkwardly, “I mean, in a way of speakin’, as the feller says,” and encountering the twinkle of amusement in the eyes of the girl, proceeded: “But, they’s two or three reasons why a fifty mile race would be better. First an’ foremost of which is that they’s a hard-packed trail from Nolan to Johnny Atline’s cabin, twenty-five mile up the river. Beyond Johnny’s the trail peters out an’ they’d be a lot of trail breakin’ ahead of the dogs. If you run to Johnny’s an’ back it’s fifty mile, an’ a ridin’ trail all the way. That’ll be to your advantage, ’cause Dalzene he weighs goin’ on two hundred an’ a quarter, an’ it’ll be so much more drag on his dogs. Then, agin, we don’t want it so long that folks’ll lose interest. You see, it ain’t like the Alaska Sweepstakes over to Nome. They run better than four hundred mile, but it’s the biggest race in the world, an’ folks jist nach’ly can’t lose interest. You’d ort to make it to Johnny’s an’ back in ten or twelve hours——”

“Ten or twelve hours!” exclaimed the girl, “With a good riding trail, and a light sled if I can’t make it in less than nine hours I ought to lose!”

Enright whistled: “D’ye really think you kin beat ten hours? You got to remember yer team ain’t broke to race.”

Lou Gordon smiled: “Not now, they aren’t—but you must remember it’s ten days till Christmas.”