A Daughter of the Aurora
"You--what you call--lazy mans, you lazy mans would desire me tohaf for wife. It is not good. Nevaire, no, nevaire, will lazymans my hoosband be."Thus Joy Molineau spoke her mind to Jack Harrington, even as shehad spoken it, but more tritely and in his own tongue, to LouisSavoy the previous night."Listen, Joy--""No, no; why moos' I listen to lazy mans? It is vaire bad, youhang rount, make visitation to my cabin, and do nothing. How youget grub for the famine? Why haf not you the dust? Odder manshaf plentee.""But I work hard, Joy. Never a day am I not on trail or up creek.Even now have I just come off. My dogs are yet tired. Other menhave luck and find plenty of gold; but I--I have no luck.""Ah! But when this mans with the wife which is Indian, this mansMcCormack, when him discovaire the Klondike, you go not. Oddermans go; odder mans now rich.""You know I was prospecting over on the head-reaches of theTanana," Harrington protested, "and knew nothing of the Eldoradoor Bonanza until it was too late.""That is deeferent; only you are--what you call way off.""What?""Way off. In the--yes--in the dark. It is nevaire too late. Onevaire rich mine is there, on the creek which is Eldorado. Themans drive the stake and him go 'way. No odddr mans know what ofhim become. The mans, him which drive the stake, is nevaire nomore. Sixty days no mans on that claim file the papaire. Thenodder mans, plentee odder mans--what you call--jump that claim.Then they race, O so queek, like the wind, to file the papaire.Him be vaire rich. Him get grub for famine."Harrington hid the major portion of his interest."When's the time up?" he asked. "What claim is it?""So I speak Louis Savoy last night," she continued, ignoring him."Him I think the winnaire.""Hang Louis Savoy!""So Louis Savoy speak in my cabin last night. Him say, 'Joy, I amstrong mans. I haf good dogs. I haf long wind. I will bewinnaire. Then you will haf me for hoosband?' And I say to him,I say--""What'd you say?""I say, 'If Louis Savoy is winnaire, then will he haf me forwife.'""And if he don't win?""Then Louis Savoy, him will not be--what you call--the father ofmy children.""And if I win?""You winnaire? Ha! ha! Nevaire!"Exasperating as it was, Joy Molineau's laughter was pretty tohear. Harrington did not mind it. He had long since been brokenin. Besides, he was no exception. She had forced all her loversto suffer in kind. And very enticing she was just then, her lipsparted, her color heightened by the sharp kiss of the frost, hereyes vibrant with the lure which is the greatest of all lures andwhich may be seen nowhere save in woman's eyes. Her sled-dogsclustered about her in hirsute masses, and the leader, Wolf Fang,laid his long snout softly in her lap."If I do win?" Harrington pressed.She looked from dog to lover and back again."What you say, Wolf Fang? If him strong mans and file thepapaire, shall we his wife become? Eh? What you say?"Wolf Fang picked up his ears and growled at Harrington."It is vaire cold," she suddenly added with feminine irrelevance,rising to her feet and straightening out the team.Her lover looked on stolidly. She had kept him guessing from thefirst time they met, and patience had been joined unto hisvirtues."Hi! Wolf Fang!" she cried, springing upon the sled as it leapedinto sudden motion. "Ai! Ya! Mush-on!"From the corner of his eye Harrington watched her swinging downthe trail to Forty Mile. Where the road forked and crossed theriver to Fort Cudahy, she halted the dogs and turned about."O Mistaire Lazy Mans!" she called back. "Wolf Fang, him say yes--if you winnaire!"But somehow, as such things will, it leaked out, and all FortyMile, which had hitherto speculated on Joy Molineau's choicebetween her two latest lovers, now hazarded bets and guesses as towhich would win in the forthcoming race. The camp divided itselfinto two factions, and every effort was put forth in order thattheir respective favorites might be the first in at the finish.There was a scramble for the best dogs the country could afford,for dogs, and good ones, were essential, above all, to success.And it meant much to the victor. Besides the possession of awife, the like of which had yet to be created, it stood for a mineworth a million at least.That fall, when news came down of McCormack's discovery onBonanza, all the Lower Country, Circle City and Forty Mileincluded, had stampeded up the Yukon,--at least all save thosewho, like Jack Harrington and Louis Savoy, were away prospectingin the west. Moose pastures and creeks were stakedindiscriminately and promiscuously; and incidentally, one of theunlikeliest of creeks, Eldorado. Olaf Nelson laid claim to fivehundred of its linear feet, duly posted his notice, and as dulydisappeared. At that time the nearest recording office was in thepolice barracks at Fort Cudahy, just across the river from FortyMile; but when it became bruited abroad that Eldorado Creek was atreasure-house, it was quickly discovered that Olaf Nelson hadfailed to make the down-Yukon trip to file upon his property. Mencast hungry eyes upon the ownerless claim, where they knew athousand-thousand dollars waited but shovel and sluice-box. Yetthey dared not touch it; for there was a law which permitted sixtydays to lapse between the staking and the filing, during whichtime a claim was immune. The whole country knew of Olaf Nelson'sdisappearance, and scores of men made preparation for the jumpingand for the consequent race to Fort Cudahy.But competition at Forty Mile was limited. With the camp devotingits energies to the equipping either of Jack Harrington or LouisSavoy, no man was unwise enough to enter the contest single-handed. It was a stretch of a hundred miles to the Recorder'soffice, and it was planned that the two favorites should have fourrelays of dogs stationed along the trail. Naturally, the lastrelay was to be the crucial one, and for these twenty-five milestheir respective partisans strove to obtain the strongest possibleanimals. So bitter did the factions wax, and so high did theybid, that dogs brought stiffer prices than ever before in theannals of the country. And, as it chanced, this scramble for dogsturned the public eye still more searchingly upon Joy Molineau.Not only was she the cause of it all, but she possessed the finestsled-dog from Chilkoot to Bering Sea. As wheel or leader, WolfFang had no equal. The man whose sled he led down the laststretch was bound to win. There could be no doubt of it. But thecommunity had an innate sense of the fitness of things, and notonce was Joy vexed by overtures for his use. And the factionsdrew consolation from the fact that if one man did not profit byhim, neither should the other.However, since man, in the individual or in the aggregate, hasbeen so fashioned that he goes through life blissfully obtuse tothe deeper subtleties of his womankind, so the men of Forty Milefailed to divine the inner deviltry of Joy Molineau. Theyconfessed, afterward, that they had failed to appreciate thisdark-eyed daughter of the aurora, whose father had traded furs inthe country before ever they dreamed of invading it, and who hadherself first opened eyes on the scintillant northern lights.Nay, accident of birth had not rendered her less the woman, norhad it limited her woman's understanding of men. They knew sheplayed with them, but they did not know the wisdom of her play,its deepness and its deftness. They failed to see more than theexposed card, so that to the very last Forty Mile was in a stateof pleasant obfuscation, and it was not until she cast her finaltrump that it came to reckon up the score.Early in the week the camp turned out to start Jack Harrington andLouis Savoy on their way. They had taken a shrewd margin of time,for it was their wish to arrive at Olaf Nelson's claim some daysprevious to the expiration of its immunity, that they might restthemselves, and their dogs be fresh for the first relay. On theway up they found the men of Dawson already stationing spare dogteams along the trail, and it was manifest that little expense hadbeen spared in view of the millions at stake.A couple of days after the departure of their champions, FortyMile began sending up their relays,--first to the seventy-fivestation, then to the fifty, and last to the twenty-five. Theteams for the last stretch were magnificent, and so equallymatched that the camp discussed their relative merits for a fullhour at fifty below, before they were permitted to pull out. Atthe last moment Joy Molineau dashed in among them on her sled.She drew Lon McFane, who had charge of Harrington's team, to oneside, and hardly had the first words left her lips when it wasnoticed that his lower jaw dropped with a celerity and emphasissuggestive of great things. He unhitched Wolf Fang from her sled,put him at the head of Harrington's team, and mushed the string ofanimals into the Yukon trail."Poor Louis Savoy!" men said; but Joy Molineau flashed her blackeyes defiantly and drove back to her father's cabin.Midnight drew near on Olaf Nelson's claim. A few hundred fur-cladmen had preferred sixty below and the jumping, to the inducementsof warm cabins and comfortable bunks. Several score of them hadtheir notices prepared for posting and their dogs at hand. Abunch of Captain Constantine's mounted police had been ordered onduty that fair play might rule. The command had gone forth thatno man should place a stake till the last second of the day hadticked itself into the past. In the northland such commands areequal to Jehovah's in the matter of potency; the dum-dum as rapidand effective as the thunderbolt. It was clear and cold. Theaurora borealis painted palpitating color revels on the sky. Rosywaves of cold brilliancy swept across the zenith, while greatcoruscating bars of greenish white blotted out the stars, or aTitan's hand reared mighty arches above the Pole. And at thismighty display the wolf-dogs howled as had their ancestors of oldtime.A bearskin-coated policeman stepped prominently to the fore, watchin hand. Men hurried among the dogs, rousing them to their feet,untangling their traces, straightening them out. The entries cameto the mark, firmly gripping stakes and notices. They had goneover the boundaries of the claim so often that they could now havedone it blindfolded. The policeman raised his hand. Casting offtheir superfluous furs and blankets, and with a final cinching ofbelts, they came to attention."Time!"Sixty pairs of hands unmitted; as many pairs of moccasins grippedhard upon the snow."Go!"They shot across the wide expanse, round the four sides, stickingnotices at every corner, and down the middle where the two centrestakes were to be planted. Then they sprang for the sleds on thefrozen bed of the creek. An anarchy of sound and motion brokeout. Sled collided with sled, and dog-team fastened upon dog-teamwith bristling manes and screaming fangs. The narrow creek wasglutted with the struggling mass. Lashes and butts of dog-whipswere distributed impartially among men and brutes. And to make itof greater moment, each participant had a bunch of comrades intenton breaking him out of jam. But one by one, and by sheerstrength, the sleds crept out and shot from sight in the darknessof the overhanging banks.Jack Harrington had anticipated this crush and waited by his sleduntil it untangled. Louis Savoy, aware of his rival's greaterwisdom in the matter of dog-driving, had followed his lead andalso waited. The rout had passed beyond ear-shot when they tookthe trail, and it was not till they had travelled the ten miles orso down to Bonanza that they came upon it, speeding along insingle file, but well bunched. There was little noise, and lesschance of one passing another at that stage. The sleds, fromrunner to runner, measured sixteen inches, the trail eighteen; butthe trail, packed down fully a foot by the traffic, was like agutter. On either side spread the blanket of soft snow crystals.If a man turned into this in an endeavor to pass, his dogs wouldwallow perforce to their bellies and slow down to a snail's pace.So the men lay close to their leaping sleds and waited. Noalteration in position occurred down the fifteen miles of Bonanzaand Klondike to Dawson, where the Yukon was encountered. Here thefirst relays waited. But here, intent to kill their first teams,if necessary, Harrington and Savoy had had their fresh teamsplaced a couple of miles beyond those of the others. In theconfusion of changing sleds they passed full half the bunch.Perhaps thirty men were still leading them when they shot on tothe broad breast of the Yukon. Here was the tug. When the riverfroze in the fall, a mile of open water had been left between twomighty jams. This had but recently crusted, the current beingswift, and now it was as level, hard, and slippery as a dancefloor. The instant they struck this glare ice Harrington came tohis knees, holding precariously on with one hand, his whip singingfiercely among his dogs and fearsome abjurations hurtling abouttheir ears. The teams spread out on the smooth surface, eachstraining to the uttermost. But few men in the North could lifttheir dogs as did Jack Harrington. At once he began to pullahead, and Louis Savoy, taking the pace, hung on desperately, hisleaders running even with the tail of his rival's sled.Midway on the glassy stretch their relays shot out from the bank.But Harrington did not slacken. Watching his chance when the newsled swung in close, he leaped across, shouting as he did so andjumping up the pace of his fresh dogs. The other driver fell offsomehow. Savoy did likewise with his relay, and the abandonedteams, swerving to right and left, collided with the others andpiled the ice with confusion. Harrington cut out the pace; Savoyhung on. As they neared the end of the glare ice, they sweptabreast of the leading sled. When they shot into the narrow trailbetween the soft snowbanks, they led the race; and Dawson,watching by the light of the aurora, swore that it was neatlydone.When the frost grows lusty at sixty below, men cannot long remainwithout fire or excessive exercise, and live. So Harrington andSavoy now fell to the ancient custom of "ride and run." Leapingfrom their sleds, tow-thongs in hand, they ran behind till theblood resumed its wonted channels and expelled the frost, thenback to the sleds till the heat again ebbed away. Thus, ridingand running, they covered the second and third relays. Severaltimes, on smooth ice, Savoy spurted his dogs, and as often failedto gain past. Strung along for five miles in the rear, theremainder of the race strove to overtake them, but vainly, for toLouis Savoy alone was the glory given of keeping Jack Harrington'skilling pace.As they swung into the seventy-five-mile station, Lon McFanedashed alongside; Wolf Fang in the lead caught Harrington's eye,and he knew that the race was his. No team in the North couldpass him on those last twenty-five miles. And when Savoy saw WolfFang heading his rival's team, he knew that he was out of therunning, and he cursed softly to himself, in the way woman is mostfrequently cursed. But he still clung to the other's smokingtrail, gambling on chance to the last. And as they churned along,the day breaking in the southeast, they marvelled in joy andsorrow at that which Joy Molineau had done.Forty Mile had early crawled out of its sleeping furs andcongregated near the edge of the trail. From this point it couldview the up-Yukon course to its first bend several miles away.Here it could also see across the river to the finish at FortCudahy, where the Gold Recorder nervously awaited. Joy Molineauhad taken her position several rods back from the trail, and underthe circumstances, the rest of Forty Mile forbore interposingitself. So the space was clear between her and the slender lineof the course. Fires had been built, and around these men wagereddust and dogs, the long odds on Wolf Fang."Here they come!" shrilled an Indian boy from the top of a pine.Up the Yukon a black speck appeared against the snow, closelyfollowed by a second. As these grew larger, more black specksmanifested themselves, but at a goodly distance to the rear.Gradually they resolved themselves into dogs and sleds, and menlying flat upon them. "Wolf Fang leads," a lieutenant of policewhispered to Joy. She smiled her interest back."Ten to one on Harrington!" cried a Birch Creek King, dragging outhis sack."The Queen, her pay you not mooch?" queried Joy.The lieutenant shook his head."You have some dust, ah, how mooch?" she continued.He exposed his sack. She gauged it with a rapid eye."Mebbe--say--two hundred, eh? Good. Now I give--what you call--the tip. Covaire the bet." Joy smiled inscrutably. Thelieutenant pondered. He glanced up the trail. The two men hadrisen to their knees and were lashing their dogs furiously,Harrington in the lead."Ten to one on Harrington!" bawled the Birch Creek King,flourishing his sack in the lieutenant's face."Covaire the bet," Joy prompted.He obeyed, shrugging his shoulders in token that he yielded, notto the dictate of his reason, but to her charm. Joy nodded toreassure him.All noise ceased. Men paused in the placing of bets.Yawing and reeling and plunging, like luggers before the wind, thesleds swept wildly upon them. Though he still kept his leader upto the tail of Harrington's sled, Louis Savoy's face was withouthope. Harrington's mouth was set. He looked neither to the rightnor to the left. His dogs were leaping in perfect rhythm, firm-footed, close to the trail, and Wolf Fang, head low and unseeing,whining softly, was leading his comrades magnificently.Forty Mile stood breathless. Not a sound, save the roar of therunners and the voice of the whips.Then the clear voice of Joy Molineau rose on the air. "Ai! Ya!Wolf Fang! Wolf Fang!"Wolf Fang heard. He left the trail sharply, heading directly forhis mistress. The team dashed after him, and the sled poised aninstant on a single runner, then shot Harrington into the snow.Savoy was by like a flash. Harrington pulled to his feet andwatched him skimming across the river to the Gold Recorder's. Hecould not help hearing what was said."Ah, him do vaire well," Joy Molineau was explaining to thelieutenant. "Him--what you call--set the pace. Yes, him set thepace vaire well."
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