CHAPTER XVI
MACNAIR GOES TO JAIL
The silence in the little room became almost painful. MacNair uttered no word as his glance strayed from the flushed, excited face of the girl to the figure of Corporal Ripley, who stood hat in hand, gazing from one to the other with eyes plainly troubled by doubt and perplexity.
"Well, why don't you do something?" cried the girl, at length. "It seems to me if I were a man I could think of something to do besides stand and gape!"
Corporal Ripley cleared his throat. "Do I understand," he began stiffly, "that you intend to prefer certain charges against MacNair—that you demand his arrest?"
"I should think you would understand it!" retorted the girl. "I have told you three or four times."
The officer flushed slightly and shifted the hat from his right to his left hand.
"Just step inside, MacNair," he said, and then to the girl: "I'll listen to you now, if you please. You must make specific charges, you know—not just hearsay. Arresting a man in this country is a serious matter, Miss Elliston. We are seven hundred miles from a jail, and the law expects us to use discretion in making an arrest. It don't do us any good at headquarters to bring in a man unless we can back up our charge with strong evidence, because the item of transportation of witnesses and prisoner may easily run up into big money. On the other hand it's just as bad if we fail or delay in bringing a guilty man to book. What we want is specific evidence. I don't tell you this to discourage any just complaint, but only to show you that we've got to have direct and specific evidence. Now, Miss Elliston, I'll hear what you've got to say."
Chloe sank into a chair and motioned the others to be seated. "We may as well sit down while we talk. I will try to tell you only the facts as I myself have seen them—only such as I could swear to on a witness stand." The officer bowed, and Chloe plunged directly into the subject.
"In the first place," she began, "when I brought my outfit in I noticed in the scows, certain pieces with the name of MacNair painted on the burlap. The rest of the outfit, I think, consisted wholly of my own freight. I wondered at the time who MacNair was, but didn't make any inquiries until I happened to mention the matter to Mr. Lapierre. That was on Slave River. Mr. Lapierre seemed very much surprised that any of MacNair's goods should be in his scows. He examined the pieces and then with an ax smashed them in. They contained whiskey."
"And he destroyed it? Can you swear it was whiskey?" asked the officer.
"Certainly, I can swear it was whiskey! I saw it and smelled it."
"Can you explain why Lapierre did not know of these pieces, until you called his attention to them?"
Chloe hesitated a moment and tapped nervously on the table with her fingers. "Yes," she answered, "I can. Mr. Lapierre took charge of the outfit only that morning."
"Who was the boss scowman? Who took the scows down the Athabasca?"
"A man named Vermilion. He was a half-breed, I think. Anyway, he was a horrible creature."
"Where is Vermilion now?"
Again Chloe hesitated. "He is dead," she answered. "Mr. Lapierre shot him. He shot him in self-defence, after Vermilion had shot another man."
The officer nodded, and Chloe called upon Big Lena to corroborate the statement that Lapierre had destroyed certain whiskey upon the bank of Slave Lake. "Is that all?" asked the officer.
"No, indeed!" answered Chloe. "That isn't all! Only last week, I went to visit MacNair's fort on Snare Lake in company with Mr. Lapierre and Lena, and four canoemen. We got there shortly after dark. Fires had been built on the beach—many of them almost against the walls of the stockade. As we drew near, we heard loud yells and howlings that sounded like the cries of animals, rather than of human beings. We approached very close to the shore where the figures of the Indians were distinctly visible by the light of the leaping names. It was then we realized that a wild orgy of indescribable debauchery was in progress. The Indians were raving drunk. Some lay upon the ground in a stupor—others danced and howled and threw fire-brands about in reckless abandon.
"We dared not land, but held the canoe off shore and watched the horrible scene. We had not long to wait before the inevitable happened. The whirling fire-brands falling among the cabins and against the walls of the stockade started a conflagration, which soon spread to the storehouse. And then MacNair appeared on the scene, rushing madly among the Indians, striking, kicking, and hurling them about. A few sought to save themselves by escaping to the timber. And, jerking a rifle from the hand of an Indian, MacNair fired twice at the fleeing men. Two of them fell and the others escaped into the timber."
"You did not see any whiskey in the possession of these Indians?" asked Corporal Ripley. "You merely surmised they were drunk by their actions?"
Chloe nodded. "Yes," she admitted, "but certainly there can be no doubt that they were drunk. Men who are not drunk do not——"
MacNair interrupted her. "They were drunk," he said quietly, "very drunk."
"You admit that?" asked the officer in surprise. "I must warn you, MacNair, that anything you say may be used against you." MacNair nodded.
"And, as to the killing of the men," continued Chloe, "I charge MacNair with their murder."
"Murder is a very serious charge, Miss Elliston. Let's go over the facts again. You say you were in a canoe near the shore—you saw a man you say was MacNair grab a rifle from an Indian and kill two men. Stop and think, now—it was night and you saw all this by firelight—are you sure the man who fired the shots was MacNair?"
"Absolutely!" cried the girl, with a trace of irritation.
"It was I who shot," interrupted MacNair.
The officer regarded him curiously and again addressed the girl. "Once more, Miss Elliston, do you know that the men you saw fall are dead? Mere shooting won't sustain a charge of murder."
Chloe hesitated. "No," she admitted reluctantly. "I did not examine their dead bodies, if that is what you mean. But MacNair afterward told me that he killed them, and I can swear to having seen them fall."
"The men are dead," said MacNair.
The officer stared in astonishment. Chloe also was puzzled by the frank admission of the man, and she gazed into his face as though striving to pierce its mask and discover an ulterior motive. MacNair returned her gaze unflinchingly and again the girl felt an indescribable sense of smallness—of helplessness before this man of the North, whose very presence breathed strength and indomitable man-power.
"Was it possible," she wondered, "that he would dare to flaunt this strength in the very face of the law?" She turned to Corporal Ripley, who was making notes with a pencil in a little note-book. "Well," she asked, "is my evidence specific enough to warrant this man's arrest?"
The officer nodded slowly. "Yes," he answered gravely. "The evidence warrants an arrest. Very probably several arrests."
"You mean," asked the girl, "that you think he may have—an accomplice?"
"No, Miss Elliston, I don't mean that. In spite of your evidence and his own words, I don't think MacNair is guilty. There is something queer here. I guess there is no doubt that whiskey has been run into the territory, and that it has been supplied to the Indians. You charge MacNair with these crimes, and I've got to arrest him."
Chloe was about to retort, when the officer interrupted her with a gesture.
"Just a moment, please," he said quietly; "I'm not sure I can make myself plain to you, but you see in the North we know something of MacNair's work. Of what he has done in spite of the odds. We know the North needs men like MacNair. You claim to be a friend of the Indians. Do you realize that up on Snare Lake, right now, are a bunch of Indians who depend on MacNair for their existence? MacNair's absence will cause suffering among them and even death. If his storehouse has been burned, what are they going to eat? On your statements I've got to enter charges against MacNair. First and foremost the charge of murder. He will also be charged with importing liquor, having liquor in prohibited territory, smuggling whiskey, and supplying liquor to the Indians.
"Now, Miss Elliston, for the good of those Indians on Snare Lake I want you to withdraw the charge of murder. The other offences are bailable ones, and in my judgment he should be allowed to return to his Indians. Then, when his trial comes up at the spring assizes, the charge of murder can be placed against him. I'll bet a year's pay, MacNair isn't to blame. In the meantime we will get busy and comb the barrens for the real criminals. I've got a hunch. And you can take my word that justice shall be done, no matter where the blow falls."
Suddenly, through Chloe's mind flashed the memory of what Lapierre had told her of the Mounted. She arose to her feet and, drawing herself up haughtily, glared into the face of the officer. When she spoke, her voice rang hard with scorn.
"It is very evident that you don't want to arrest MacNair. I have heard that he is a law unto himself—that he would defy arrest—that he has the Mounted subsidized. I did not believe it at the time. I regarded it merely as the exaggerated statement of a man who justly hates him. But it seems this man was right. You need not trouble yourself about MacNair's Indians. I will stand sponsor for their welfare. They are my Indians now. I warn you that the day of MacNair is past. I refuse to withdraw a single word of my charges against him, and you will either arrest him, or I shall go straight to Ottawa. And I shall never rest until I have blazoned before the world the whole truth about your rotten system! What will Canada say, when she learns that the Mounted—the men who have been held up before all the world as models of bravery, efficiency, and honour—are as crooked and grafting as—as the police of New York?"
Corporal Ripley's face showed red through the tan, and he started to his feet with an exclamation of anger. "Hold on, Corporal." The voice of MacNair was the quiet voice with which one sooths a petulant child. He remained seated and pushed the Stetson toward the back of his head. "She really believes it. Don't hold it against her. It is not her fault. When the smoke has cleared away and she gets her bearings, we're all going to like her. In fact, I'm thinking that the time is coming when the only one who will hate her will be herself. I like her now; though she is not what you'd call my friend. I mean—not yet."
Corporal Ripley gazed in astonishment at MacNair and then very frigidly he turned to Chloe. "Then the charge of murder stands?"
"Yes, it does," answered the girl. "If he were allowed to go free now there would be three murders instead of two by the time of the spring assizes or whatever you call them, for he is even now upon the trail of a man he has threatened to kill. I can give you his exact words. He said: 'I have taken the man-trail… and at the end of that trail will lie a dead man—myself or Pierre Lapierre!'"
"Lapierre!" exclaimed the officer. "What has he got to do with it?" He turned to MacNair as if expecting an answer. But MacNair remained silent. "Why don't you charge Lapierre with the crimes you told me he was guilty of?" taunted the girl. Again she saw that baffling twinkle in the grey eyes of the man. Then the eyes hardened.
"The last thing I desire is the arrest of Lapierre," he answered. "Lapierre must answer to me." The words, pronounced slowly and distinctly, rasped hard. In spite of herself, Chloe shuddered.
Corporal Ripley shifted uneasily. "We'd better be going, MacNair," he said. "There's something queer about this whole business—something I don't quite understand. It's up to me to take you up the river; but, believe me, I'm coming back! I'll get at the bottom of this thing if it takes me five years. Are you ready?"
MacNair nodded.
"I can let you have some Indians," suggested the girl.
"What for?"
"Why, for a guard, of course; to help you with your prisoner."
Ripley drew himself up and answered abruptly: "The Mounted is quite capable of managing its own affairs, Miss Elliston. I don't need your Indians, thank you."
Chloe glanced wrathfully into the boyish face of the officer. "Suit yourself," she answered sweetly. "But if I were you, I'd want a whole regiment of Indians. Because if MacNair wants to, he'll eat you up."
"He won't want to," snapped Ripley. "I don't taste good."
As they passed out of the door, MacNair turned. "Good-by, Miss Elliston," he said gravely. "Beware of Pierre Lapierre." Chloe made no reply and as MacNair turned to go, he chanced to glance into the wide, expressionless face of Big Lena, who had stood throughout the interview leaning heavily against the jamb of the kitchen door. Something inscrutable in the stare of the fishlike, china-blue eyes clung in his memory, and try as he would in the days that followed, MacNair could not fathom the meaning of that stare, if indeed it had any meaning. MacNair did not know why, but in some inexplainable manner the memory of that look eased many a weary mile.
CHAPTER XVII
A FRAME-UP
News, of a kind, travels on the wings of the wind across wastes of the farther land. Principalities may fall, nations crash, and kingdoms sink into oblivion, and the North will neither know nor care. For the North has its own problems—vital problems, human problems—and therefore big. Elemental, portentous problems, having to do with life and the eating of meat.
In the crash and shift of man-made governments; in the redistribution of man-constituted authority, and man-gathered surplus of increment, the North has no part. On the cold side of sixty there is no surplus, and men think in terms of meat, and their possessions are meat-getting possessions. Guns, nets, and traps, even of the best, insure but a bare existence. And in the lean years, which are the seventh years—the years of the rabbit plague—starvation stalks in the teepees, and gaunt, sunken-eyed forms, dry-lipped, and with the skin drawn tightly over protruding ribs, stiffen between shoddy blankets. For even the philosophers of the land of God and the H.B.C. must eat to live—if not this week, at least once next week.
The H.B.C., taking wise cognizance of the seventh year, extends it credit—"debt" it is called in the outlands—but it puts no more wool in its blankets, and for lack of food the body-fires burn low. But the cold remains inexorable. And with the thermometer at seventy degrees below zero, even in the years of plenty, when the philosophers eat almost daily, there is little of comfort. With the thermometer at seventy in the lean years, the suffering is diminished by the passing of many philosophers.
The arrest of Bob MacNair was a matter of sovereign import to the dwellers of the frozen places, and word of it swept like wildfire through the land of the lakes and rivers. Yet in all the North those upon whom it made the least impression were those most vitally concerned—MacNair's own Indians. So quietly had the incident passed that not one of them realized its importance.
With them MacNair was God. He was the law. He had taught them to work, so that even in the lean years they and their wives and their babies ate twice each day. He had said that they should continue to eat twice each day, and therefore his departure was a matter of no moment. They knew only that he had gone southward with the man of the soldier-police. This was doubtless as he had commanded. They could conceive of MacNair only as commanding. Therefore the soldier-policeman had obeyed and accompanied him to the southward.
With no such complacency, however, was the arrest of MacNair regarded by the henchmen of Lapierre. To them MacNair was not God, nor was he the law. For these men knew well the long arm of the Mounted and what lay at the end of the trail. Lean forms sped through the woods, and the word passed from lip to lip in far places. It was whispered upon the Slave, the Mackenzie, and the Athabasca, and it was told in the provinces before MacNair and Ripley reached Fort Chippewayan. Along the river, men talked excitedly, and impatiently awaited word from Lapierre, while their eyes snapped with greed and their thoughts flew to the gold in the sands of the barren grounds.
In the Bastile du Mort, a hundred miles to the eastward, Lapierre heard the news from the lips of a breathless runner, but a scant ten hours after Corporal Ripley and MacNair stepped from the door of the cottage. And within the hour the quarter-breed was upon the trail, travelling light, in company with LeFroy, who, fearing swift vengeance, had also sought safety in the stronghold of the outlaws.
Chloe Elliston stood in the doorway and watched the broad form of Bob MacNair swing across the clearing in company with Corporal Ripley. As the men disappeared in the timber, a fierce joy of victory surged through her veins. She had bared the mailed fist! Had wrested a people from the hand of their oppressor! The Snare Lake Indians were henceforth to be her Indians! She had ridded the North of MacNair! Every fibre of her sang with the exultation of it as she turned into the room and encountered the fishlike stare of Big Lena.
The woman leaned, ponderous and silent, against the jamb of the door giving into the kitchen. Her huge arms were folded tightly across her breast, and, for some inexplicable reason, Chloe found the stare disconcerting. The enthusiasm of her victory damped perceptibly. For if the fish-eyed stare held nothing of reproach, it certainly held nothing of approbation. Almost the girl read a condescending pity in the stare of the china-blue eyes. The thought stung, and she faced the other wrathfully.
"Well, for Heaven's sake say something! Don't stand there and stare like a—a billikin! Can't you talk?"
"Yah, Ay tank Ay kin; but Ay von't—not yat."
"What do you mean?" cried the exasperated girl, as she flung herself into a chair. But without deigning to answer, Big Lena turned heavily into the kitchen, and closed the door with a bang that impoverished invective—for volumes may be spoken—in the banging of a door. The moment was inauspicious for the entrance of Harriet Penny. At best, Chloe merely endured the little spinster, with her whining, hysterical outbursts, and abject, unreasoning fear of God, man, the devil, and everything else. "Oh, my dear, I am so glad!" piped the little woman, rushing to the girl's side: "we need never fear him again, need we?"
"Nobody ever did fear him but you," retorted Chloe.
"But, Mr. Lapierre said——"
The girl arose with a gesture of impatience, and Miss Penny returned to MacNair. "He is so big, and coarse, and horrible! I am sure even his looks are enough to frighten a person to death."
Chloe sniffed. "I think he is handsome, and he is big and strong. I like big people."
"But, my dear!" cried the horrified Miss Penny. "He—he kills Indians!"
"So do I!" snapped the girl, and stamped angrily into her own room, where she threw herself upon the bed and gave way to bitter reflections. She hated everyone. She hated MacNair, and Big Lena, and Harriet Penny, and the officer of the Mounted. She hated Lapierre and the Indians, too. And then, realizing the folly of her blind hatred, she hated herself for hating. With an effort she regained her poise.
"MacNair is out of the way; and that's the main thing," she murmured. She remembered his last words: "Beware of Pierre Lapierre," and her eyes sought the man's hastily scribbled note that lay upon the table where he had left it. She reread the note, and crumpling it in her hand threw it to the floor. "He always manages to be some place else when anything happens!" she exclaimed. "Oh, why couldn't it have been the other way around? Why couldn't MacNair have been the one to have the interest of the Indians at heart? And why couldn't Lapierre have been the one to browbeat and bully them?"
She paced angrily up and down the room, and kicked viciously at the little ball of paper that was Lapierre's note. "He couldn't browbeat anything!" she exclaimed. "He's—he's—sometimes, I think, he's almost sneaking, with his bland, courtly manners, and his suave tongue. Oh, how I could hate that man! And how I—" she stopped suddenly, and with clenched fists fixed her gaze upon the portrait of Tiger Elliston, and as she looked the thin features that returned her stare seemed to resolve into the rugged outlines of the face of Bob MacNair.
"He's big and strong, and he's not afraid," she murmured, and started nervously at the knock with which Big Lena announced supper.
When Chloe appeared at the table five minutes later she was quite her usual self. She even laughed at Harriet Penny's horrified narrative of the fact that she had discovered several Indians in the act of affixing runners to the collapsible bathtubs in anticipation of the coming snow.
Chloe spent an almost sleepless night, and it was with a feeling of distinct relief that she arose to find Lapierre upon the veranda. She noted a certain intense eagerness in the quarter-breed's voice as he greeted her.
"Ah, Miss Elliston!" he cried, seizing both her hands. "It seems that during my brief absence you have accomplished wonders! May I ask how you managed to bring about the downfall of the brute of the North, and at the same time win his Indians to your school?"
Under the enthusiasm of his words the girl's heart once more quickened with the sense of victory. She withdrew her hands from his clasp and gave a brief account of all that had happened since their parting on Snare Lake.
"Wonderful," breathed Lapierre at the conclusion of the recital. "And you are sure he was duly charged with the murder of the two Indians?"
Chloe nodded. "Yes, indeed I am sure!" she exclaimed. "The officer, Corporal Ripley, tried to get me to put off this charge until his other trial came up at the spring assizes. He said MacNair could give bail and secure his liberty on the liquor charges, and thus return to the North—and to his Indians."
Lapierre nodded eagerly. "Ah, did I not tell you, Miss Elliston, that the men of the Mounted are with him heart and soul? He owns them! You have done well not to withdraw the charge of murder."
"I offered to furnish him with an escort of Indians, but he refused them. I don't see how in the world he can expect to take MacNair to jail. He's a mere boy."
Lapierre laughed. "He'll take him to jail all right, you may rest assured as to that. He will not dare to allow him to escape, nor will MacNair try to escape. We have nothing to fear now until the trial. It is extremely doubtful if we can make the murder charge stick, but it will serve to hold him during the winter, and I have no doubt when his case comes up in the spring we will be able to produce evidence that will insure conviction on the whiskey charges, which will mean at least a year or two in jail and the exaction of a heavy fine.
"In the meantime you will have succeeded in educating the Indians to a realization of the fact that they owe allegiance to no man. MacNair's power is broken. He will be discredited by the authorities, and hated by his own Indians—a veritable pariah of the wilderness. And now, Miss Elliston, I must hasten at once to the rivers. My interests there have long been neglected. I shall return as soon as possible, but my absence will necessarily be prolonged, for beside my own trading affairs and the getting out of the timber for new scows, I hope to procure such additional evidence as will insure the conviction of MacNair. LeFroy will remain with you here."
"Did you catch the whiskey runners?" Chloe asked.
Lapierre shook his head. "No," he answered, "they succeeded in eluding us among the islands at the eastern end of the lake. We were about to push our search to a conclusion when news reached us of MacNair's arrest, and we returned with all speed to the Yellow Knife."
Somehow, the man's words sounded unconvincing—the glib reply was too ready—too like the studied answer to an anticipated question. She regarded him searchingly, but the simple directness of his gaze caused her own eyes to falter, and she turned into the house with a deep breath that was very like a sigh.
The sense of elation and self-confidence inspired by Lapierre's first words ebbed as it had ebbed before the unspoken rebuke of Big Lena, leaving her strangely depressed. With the joy of accomplishment dead within her, she drove herself to her work without enthusiasm. In all the world, nothing seemed worth while. She was unsure—unsure of Lapierre; unsure of herself; unsure of Big Lena—and, worst of all, unbelievable and preposterous as it seemed in the light of what she had witnessed with her own eyes, unsure of MacNair—of his villainy!
Before noon the first snow of the season started in a fall of light, feathery flakes, which gradually resolved themselves into fine, hard particles that were hurled and buffeted about by the blasts of a fitful wind.
For three days the blizzard raged—days in which Lapierre contrived to spend much time in Chloe's company, and during which the girl set about deliberately to study the quarter-breed, in the hope of placing definitely the defect in his make-up, the tangible reason for the growing sense of distrust with which she was coming to regard him. But, try as she would, she could find no cause, no justification, for the uncomfortable and indefinable something that was gradually developing into an actual doubt of his sincerity. She knew that the man had himself well in hand, for never by word or look did he express any open avowal of love, although a dozen times a day he managed subtly to show that his love had in no wise abated.
On the morning of the fourth day, with forest and lake and river buried beneath three feet of snow, Lapierre took the trail for the southward. Before leaving, he sought out LeFroy in the storehouse.
"We have things our own way, but we must lie low for a while, at least. MacNair is not licked yet—by a damn' sight! He knows we furnished the booze to his Indians, and he will yell his head off to the Mounted, and we will have them dropping in on us all the winter. In the meantime leave the liquor where it is. Don't bring a gallon of it into this clearing. It will keep, and we can't take chances with the Mounted. There will be enough in it for us, with what we can knock down here, and what the boys can take out of MacNair's diggings. They know the gold is there; most of them were in on the stampede when MacNair drove them back a few years ago. And when they find out that MacNair is in jail, there will be another stampede. And we will clean up big all around."
LeFroy, a man of few words, nodded sombrely, and Lapierre, who was impatient to be off to the rivers, failed to note that the nod was far more sombre than usual—failed, also, to note the pair of china-blue, fishlike eyes that stared impassively at him from behind the goods piled high upon the huge counter.
Once upon the trail, Lapierre lost no time. As passed the word upon the Mackenzie, where the men who had heard of the arrest of MacNair waited in a frenzy of impatience for the signal that would send them flying over the snow to Snare Lake. Day and night the man travelled; from the Mackenzie southward the length of Slave and up the Athabasca. And in his wake men, whose eyes fairly bulged with the greed of gold, jammed their outfits into packs and headed into the North.
At Athabasca Landing he sent a crew into the timber, and hastened on to Edmonton where he purchased a railway ticket for a point that had nothing whatever to do with his destination. That same night he boarded an east-bound train, and in an early hour of the morning, when the engine paused for water beside a tank that was the most conspicuous building of a little flat town in the heart of a peaceful farming community, he stepped unnoticed from the day coach and proceeded at once to the low, wooden hotel, where he was cautiously admitted through a rear door by the landlord himself, who was, incidentally, Lapierre's shrewdest and most effective whiskey runner.
It was this Tostoff: Russian by birth, and crook by nature, whose business it was to disguise the contraband whiskey into innocent-looking freight pieces. And, it was Tostoff who selected the men and stood responsible for the contraband's safe conduct over the first stage of its journey to the North.
Tostoff objected strenuously to the running of a consignment in winter, but Lapierre persisted, covering the ground step by step while the other listened with a scowl.
"It's this way, Tostoff: For years MacNair has been our chief stumbling-block. God knows we have trouble enough running the stuff past the Dominion police and the Mounted. But the danger from the authorities is small in comparison with the danger from MacNair." Tostoff growled an assent. "And now," continued Lapierre, "for the first time we have him where we want him."
The Russian looked sceptical. "We got MacNair where we want him if he's dead," he grunted. "Who killed him?"
Lapierre made a gesture of impatience. "He is not dead. He's locked up in the Fort Saskatchewan jail."
For the first time Tostoff showed real interest. "What's against him?" he asked eagerly.
"Murder, for one thing," answered Lapierre. "That will hold him without bail until the spring assizes. He will probably get out of that, though. But they are holding him also on four or five liquor charges."
"Liquor charges!" cried Tostoff, with an angry snort. "O-ho! so that's his game? That's why he's been bucking us—because he's got a line of his own!"
Lapierre laughed. "Not so fast, Tostoff, not so fast. It is a frame-up. That is, the charges are not, but the evidence is. I attended to that myself. I think we have enough on him to keep him out of the cold for a couple of winters to come. But you can't tell. And while we have him we will put the screws to him for all there is in it. It is the chance of a lifetime. What we want now is evidence—and more evidence.
"Here is the scheme: You fix up a consignment, five or ten gallons, the usual way, and instead of shooting it in by the Athabasca, cut into the old trail on the Beaver and take it across the Methye portage to a cache on the Clearwater. Brown's old cabin will about fill the bill. We ought to be able to cache the stuff by Christmas.
"In the meantime, I will slip up the river and tip it off to the Mounted at Fort McMurray that I got it straight from down below that MacNair is going to run in a batch over the Methye trail, and that it is to be cached on the bank of the Clearwater on New Year's Day. That will give your packers a week to make their getaway. And on New Year's Day the Mounted will find the stuff in the cache. There will be nobody to arrest, but they will have the evidence that will clinch the case against MacNair. And with MacNair behind the bars we will have things our own way north of sixty."
Tostoff shook his head dubiously.
"Bad business, Lapierre," he warned. "Winter trailing is bad business. The snow tells tales. We haven't been caught yet. Why? Not because we've been lucky, but because we've been careful. Water leaves no trail. We've always run our stuff in in the summer. You say you've got the goods on MacNair. I say, let well enough alone. The Mounted ain't fools—they can read the sign in the snow."
Lapierre arose with a curse. "You white-livered clod!" he cried. "Who is running this scheme? You or I? Who delivers the whiskey to the Indians? And who pays you your money? I do the thinking for this outfit. I didn't come down here to ask you to run this consignment. I came here to tell you to do it. This thing of playing safe is all right. I never told you to run a batch in the winter before, but this time you have got to take the chance."
Lapierre leaned closer and fixed the heavy-faced Russian with his gleaming black eyes. He spoke slowly so that the words fell distinctly from his lips. "You cache that liquor on the Clearwater on Christmas Day. If you fail—well, you will join the others that have been dismissed from my service—see?"
Tostoff's only reply was a ponderous but expressive shrug, and without a word Lapierre turned and stepped out into the night.
CHAPTER XVIII
WHAT HAPPENED AT BROWN'S
It was the middle of December. Storm after storm had left the North cold and silent beneath its white covering of snow. A dog-team swung across the surface of the ice-locked Athabasca, and took the steep slope at Fort McMurray on a long slant.
Leaving the dogs in care of the musher, Pierre Lapierre loosened the thongs of his rackets, and, pushing open the door, stamped noisily into the detachment quarters of the Mounted and advanced to the stove where two men were mending dog-harness. The men looked up.
"Speaking of the devil," grinned Constable Craig, with a glance toward Corporal Ripley, who greeted the newcomer with a curt nod. "Well, Lapierre, where'd you come from?"
Lapierre jerked his thumb toward the southward. "Up river," he answered. "Getting out timber for my scows." Removing his cap and mittens, the quarter-breed loosened his heavy moose-hide parka, beat the clinging snow from the coarse hair, and drew a chair to the stove.
"Come through from the Landing on the river?" asked Ripley, as he filled a short black pipe with the tobacco he shaved from a plug. "How's the trail?"
"Good and hard, except for the slush at the Boiler and another stretch just below the Cascade." Lapierre rolled a cigarette. "Hear you caught MacNair with the goods at last," he ventured.
Ripley nodded.
"Looks like it," he admitted. "But what do you mean, 'at last'?"
The quarter-breed laughed lightly and blew a cloud of cigarette-smoke ceilingward. "I mean he has had things pretty much his own way the last six or eight years."
"Meanin' he's been runnin' whiskey all that time?" asked Craig.
Lapierre nodded. "He has run booze enough into the North to float a canoe from here to Port Chippewayan."
It was Ripley's turn to laugh. "If you are so all-fired wise, why haven't you made a complaint?" he asked. "Seems like I never heard you and MacNair were such good friends,"
Lapierre shrugged. "I know a whole lot of men who have got their full growth because they minded their own business," he answered. "I am not in the Mounted. That's what you are paid for."
Ripley flushed. "We'll earn our pay on this job all right. We've got the goods on him this time. And, by the way, Lapierre, if you've got anything in the way of evidence, we'll be wanting it at the trial. Better show up in May, and save somebody goin' after you. If you run onto any Indians that know anything, bring them along."
"I will be there," smiled the other. "And since we are on the subject, I can put you wise to a little deal that will net you some first-hand evidence." The officers looked interested, and Lapierre continued: "You know where Brown's old cabin is, just this side of the Methye portage?" Ripley nodded. "Well, if you should happen to be at Brown's on New Year's Day, just pull up the puncheons under the bunk and see what you find."
"What will we find?" asked Craig.
Lapierre shrugged. "If I were you fellows I wouldn't overlook any bets," he answered meaningly.
"Why New Year's Day any more than Christmas, or any other day?"
"Because," answered Lapierre, "on Christmas Day, or any other day before New Year's Day, you won't find a damned thing but an empty hole—that is why. Well, I must be going." He fastened the throat of his parka and drew on his cap and mittens. "So long! See you in the spring. Shouldn't wonder if I will run onto some Indians, this winter, who will tell what they know, now that MacNair is out of the way. I know plenty of them that can talk, if they will."
"So long!" answered Ripley as Lapierre left the room. "Much obliged for the tip. Hope your hunch is good."
"Play it and see," smiled Lapierre, and banged the door behind him.
Moving slowly northward upon a course that paralleled but studiously avoided the old Methye trail, two men and a dog-team plodded heavily through the snow at the close of a shortening day. Ostensibly, these men were trappers; and, save for a single freight piece bound securely upon the sled, their outfit varied in no particular from the outfits of others who each winter fare into the North to engage in the taking of fur. A close observer might have noted that the eyes of these men were hard, and the frequent glances they cast over the back-trail were tense with concern.
The larger and stronger of the two, one Xavier, a sullen riverman of evil countenance, paused at the top of a ridge and pointed across a snow-swept beaver meadow. "T'night we camp on dees side. T'mor' we cross to de mout' of de leetle creek, and two pipe beyon' we com' on de cabin of Baptiste Chambre."
The smaller man frowned. He, too, was a riverman, tough and wiry and small. A man whose pinched, wizened body was a fitting cloister for the warped soul that flashed malignantly from the beady, snakelike eyes.
"Non, non!" he cried, and the venomous glance of the beady eyes was not unmingled with fear. "We ke'p straight on pas' de beeg swamp. Me—I'm no lak' dees wintaire trail." He pointed meaningly toward the marks of the sled in the snow.
The other laughed derisively. "Sacré! you leetle man, you Du Mont, you 'fraid!"
The other shrugged. "I'm 'fraid, Oui, I'm lak' I ke'p out de jail. Tostoff, she say, you com' on de cabin of Brown de Chrees'mas Day. Bien! Tostoff, she sma't mans. Lapierre, too. Tostoff, she 'fraid for de wintaire trail, but she 'fraid for Lapierre mor'."
Xavier interrupted him. "Tra la, Chrees'mas Day! Ain't we got de easy trail? Two days befor' Chrees'mas we com' on de cabin of Brown. Baptiste Chambre, she got de beeg jug rum. We mak' de grand dronk—one day—one night. Den we hit de trail an com' on de Clearwater Chrees'mas Day sam' lak' now. Tostoff, de Russ, she nevair know, Lapierre, she nevair know. Voilà!"
Still the other objected. "Mebe so com' de storm. What den? We was'e de time wit' Baptiste Chambre. We no mak' de Clearwater de Chrees'mas Day—eh?"
Xavier growled. "De Chrees'mas Day, damn! We no mak' de Chrees'mas Day, we mak' som' odder day. Lapierre's damn' Injuns com' for de wheeskey on Chrees'mas Day, she haf to wait. Me—I'm goin' to Baptiste Chambre. I'm goin' for mak' de beeg dronk. If de snow com' and de dog can't pull, I'm tak' dees leetle piece on ma back to the Clearwater."
He reached down contemptuously and swung the piece containing ten gallons of whiskey to his shoulder with one hand, then lowered it again to the sled.
"You know w'at I'm hear on de revair?" he asked, stepping closer to Du Mont's side and lowering his voice. "I'm hearin' MacNair ees een de jail. I'm hearin' Lapierre she pass de word to hit for Snare Lake, for deeg de gol'."
"Did Lapierre tell you to deeg de gol', or me? Non. He say, you go to Tostoff." The snakelike eyes of the smaller man glittered at the mention of gold. He clutched at the other's arm and cried out sharply:
"MacNair arres'! Sacré! Com', we tak' de wheeskey to de Clearwater an' go on to Snare Lake."
This time it was Xavier's eyes that flashed a hint of fear. "Non!" he answered quickly. "Lapierre, she——"
The other silenced him, speaking rapidly. "Lapierre, she t'ink she mak' us w'at you call, de double cross!" Xavier noted that the malignant eyes flashed dangerously—"Lapierre, she sma't but me—I'm sma't too. Dere's plent' men 'long de revair lak' to see de las' of Pierre Lapierre. And plent' Injun in de Nort' dey lak' dat too. But dey 'fraid to keel him. We do de work—Lapierre she tak' de money. Sacré! Me—I'm 'fraid, too." He paused and shrugged significantly. "But som' day I'm git de chance an' den leetle Du Mont she dismees Lapierre from de serveece. Den me—I'm de bos'. Bien!"
The other glanced at him in admiration.
"Me, I'm goin' 'long to Snare Lake," he said, "but firs' we stop on Baptiste Chambre an' mak' de beeg dronk, eh!" The smaller man nodded, and the two sought their blankets and were soon sleeping silently beside the blazing fire.
A week later the two rivermen paused at the edge of a thicket that commanded the approach to Brown's abandoned cabin on the Clearwater. The threatened storm had broken while they were still at Baptiste Chambre's cabin, and the two days' debauch had lengthened into five.
Chambre's jug had been emptied and several times refilled from the contents of Tostoff's concealed cask, which had been skilfully tapped and as skilfully replenished as to weight by the addition of snow water.
The effect of their protracted orgy was plainly visible in the bloodshot eyes and heavy movements of both men. And it was more from force of long habit than from any sense of alertness or premonition of danger that they crouched in the thicket and watched the smoke curl from the little iron stovepipe that protruded above the roof of the cabin.
"Dem Injun she wait," growled Xavier. "Com' on, me—I'm lak' for ketch som' sleep." The two swung boldly into the open and, pausing only long enough to remove their rackets, pushed open the door of the cabin.
An instant later Du Mont, who was in the lead, leaped swiftly backward and, crashing into the heavier and clumsier Xavier bowled him over into the snow, where both wallowed helplessly, held down by Xavier's heavy pack.
It was but the work of a moment for the wiry Du Mont to free himself, and when he leaped to his feet, cursing like a fiend, it was to look squarely into the muzzle of Corporal Ripley's service revolver, while Constable Craig loosened the pack straps and allowed Xavier to arise.
"Caught with the goods, eh?" grinned Ripley, when the two prisoners were seated side by side upon the pole bunk.
The sullen-faced Xavier glowered in surly silence, but the malignant, beady eyes of Du Mont regarded the officer keenly. "You patrol de Clearwater now, eh?"
Ripley laughed. "When there's anything doin' we do."
"How you fin' dat out? Dem Injun she squeal? I'm lak' to know 'bout dat."
"Well, it wasn't exactly an Indian this time," answered Ripley; "that is, it wasn't a regular Indian. Pierre Lapierre put us on to this little deal."
"Pierre—LAPIERRE!"
The little wizened man fairly shrieked the name and, leaping to his feet, bounded about the room like an animated rubber ball, while from his lips poured a steady stream of vile epithets, mingled with every curse and gem of profanity known to two languages.
"That's goin' some," enthused Constable Craig, when the other finally paused for breath. "An' come to think about it, I believe you're right. I like to hear a man speak his mind, an' from your remarks it seems like you're oncommon peeved with this here little deal. It ain't nothin' to get so worked up over. You'll serve your time an' in a couple of years or so they'll turn you loose again."
At the mention of the prison term the burly Xavier moved uneasily upon the bunk. He seemed about to speak, but was forestalled by the quicker witted Du Mont.
"Two years, eh!" asked the outraged Metis, addressing Ripley. "Mebe so you mak' w'at you call de deal. Mebe so I'm tell you who's de boss. Mebe so I'm name de man dat run de wheeskey into de Nort'. De man dat plans de cattle raids on de bordair. De man dat keels mor' Injun dan mos' men keels deer, eh! Wat den? Mebe so den you turn us loose, eh?"
Ripley laughed. "You think I'm goin' to pay you to tell me the name of the man we've already got locked up?"
"You got MacNair lock up," Du Mont leered knowingly. "Bien! You t'ink MacNair run de wheeskey. But MacNair, she ain't run no wheeskey. You mak' de deal wit' me. Ba Gos'! I'm not jus' tell you de name, I'm tell you so you fin' w'at you call de proof! I no fin' de proof—you no turn me loose. Voilà!"
Corporal Ripley was a keen judge of men, and he knew that the vindictive and outraged Metis was in just the right mood to tell all he knew. Also Ripley believed that the man knew much. Therefore, he made the deal. And it is a tribute to the Mounted that the crafty and suspicious Metis accepted, without question, the word of the corporal when he promised to do all in his power to secure their liberty in return for the evidence that would convict "the man higher up."
Corporal Ripley was a man of quick decision; with him to decide was to act. Within an hour from the time Du Mont concluded his story the two officers with their prisoners were headed for Fort Saskatchewan. Both Du Mont and Xavier realized that their only hope for clemency lay in their ability to aid the authorities in building up a clear case against Lapierre, and during the ten days of snow-trail that ended at Athabasca Landing each tried to outdo the other in explaining what he knew of the workings of Lapierre's intricate system.
At the Landing, Ripley reported to the superintendent commanding N Division, who immediately sent for the prisoners and submitted them to a cross-examination that lasted far into the night, and the following morning the corporal escorted them to Fort Saskatchewan, where they were to remain in jail to await the verification of their story.
Division commanders are a law unto themselves, and much to his surprise, two days later, Bob MacNair was released upon his own recognizance. Whereupon, without a moment's delay, he bought the best dog-team obtainable and headed into the North accompanied by Corporal Ripley, who was armed with a warrant for the arrest of Pierre Lapierre.