The 8th Western Novel

by Dean Owen

  “That’s exactly what I was thinking, Dad.”

  “It was old Hugh Ludlow, young Hugh’s father, who did most of that ugly destroyin’. Marl Casper ain’t that way, exactly. I mind the time when that whole big valley yon was jest like Little Saghelia now, as purty as a dream. That’s what Saghelia means in Siwash—the purty land, er paradise. The trail up Big Saghelia usta be called Paradise Trail by us old ’uns.”

  “Why, were you here in the early days?”

  “I was that. I come up Paradise Trail on my daddy’s back, I did. My daddy lit out from Bella Coola when the first news come about this Saghelia strike; and spite of havin’ a woman and little shaver to lug along, he got here miles ahead of the big rush.”

  “What brought the rush, this hard-rock?”

  Old Nat snorted. “People wouldn’t look at hard-rock in them days. Hard-rock takes machinery and money. It was a placer find, b’y.” He pointed up Big Saghelia to a range of blue headwater mountains. “The field was up there. It’s all worked out now and dead and fergot about; but in its time it was a lively ’un—as excitin’ as anything I seen in the Klondike, and a pile rougher’n tougher’n the Klondike.”

  “You went away from this country then, after the Saghelia rush?”

  “Fer quite a spell—thirty, forty years.”

  Gary nodded. In that “thirty, forty year” he heard overtones of long wandering, up and down the Rocky backbone of the continent, on the prospector’s lonely trail. Old Nat’s speech, as variegated as his patched clothes, seemed to have been picked up haphazardly all the way from Tuba City to White Horse.

  “Then you came back,” he asked, “and—how long have you been here on Little Saghelia, Dad?”

  “Twenty-five year.”

  “Lord, my whole lifetime and a year longer!” Gary exclaimed. “If it’s any of my business, what’re you prospecting for in here? Hard-rock or placer stuff?”

  “Well, neither ’un, exactly.” He paused, cleared his throat. “They’s a cave in this valley with a cache of gold in it, and that’s what I’m a-huntin’ fer.”

  Gary sat bolt upright. “A cave, with a cache of gold?”

  “That’s how it is, lad. A pack of men hid that gold in here seventy-odd year ago; and short of the dead aririn’ and walkin’ and takin’ it away, it’s right here yit.”

  Gary forgot his tiredness and the tempting berries. “If it’s not a secret, d’you mind telling me about this cache?”

  With his eyes on those blue headwater mountains, as though he was looking back across the misty years to the roaring golden days of Saghelia, old Nat told him the story.

  It was a little saga of those distant times when British Columbia, New Caledonia then, was a raw wild region, its whole interior almost an unknown land. On its southeastern plains the buffalo herds still roamed; in its foothills Blackfeet warred with Piegan, and the whisky ranchers preyed on both; and along the Pacific Coast the Cossack promy-shletiiki (fur collectors) still extorted tribute from the hapless Siwash for the Little White Father in far-off Moscow. The country was lawless and full of evil men, for Colonel French and his band of red-coated Shagalasha had not yet come riding across the plains from old Fort Garry, bringing order and justice to the North-West Territories.

  During the heyday of the Saghelia rush—old Nat recounted—a band of killers, five of them, began operating in this region. Miners with rich pokes would leave their “diggings,” yonder in the headwater mountains, and start down the valley trail for the Coast; and they never were seen again. From some cave-rendezvous here in Little Saghelia, this bandit pack would lie in ambush along Paradise Trail, pick their victims off, plunder and murder them. The leader of those five was a man called Chilcote Rusk.

  “He was a frightful ’un, Chilcote was,” old Nat reminisced, drawing imaginary smoke from his unlighted corncob. “They said he et raw bear and killed grizzlies with a belt ax. He could drink up a half gallon of bush-whisky in two, three zwoops, and ’stead of shavin’ he singed off his whiskers with birch paper. I mind seein’ him with my own eyes when they brung him in dead that mornin’. They had him hog-tied with chains even though he was cold dead—that’s how a-feared people was of Chilcote.”

  The repeated slayings, old Nat went on, roused the miners to fury and Vigilant posses scoured Little Saghelia in search of that hidden cave. Failing to find it, they set a shrewd trap for the pack, using a living man as their bait. The bandits fell for the ruse, waylaid the man, and were surrounded and shot down, all five of them.

  In dust and nuggets the bandits had taken nearly half a million from their victims; and so, before the sun set on the day of their annihilation, a hundred men were combing up and down Little Saghelia on a feverish hunt for that cache of gold.

  Mementos of the pack were found in plenty—their footprints along the creek; places where they had shot and flensed animals for food; abandoned possessions of the miners whom they had murdered; and even the lookout station from which they had watched the valley trail.

  But the cave where they had lived and where their gold lay cached remained a blank mystery.

  In the decades since then all sorts of individuals and organized parties had tried to crack that secret open; but no trace of the cave had ever been found.

  “But that gold is right in this valley,” old Nat concluded. “It’s a-layin’ in here, somewhere, jest like Chilcote and his men left it.”

  Gary sat silent when the story was finished. It was a good yarn, this frontier epic of the fearsome Chilcote, and undoubtedly part of it was fact; but he took no stock in that cache of gold. The size of the booty, the various hunts for it, the semi-legendary character of it, made him put the story down as just another of those ubiquitous yarns about pirate gold and hidden treasure.

  At first thought he was inclined to pity old Nat for spending twenty-five long years chasing a will-o’-the-wisp as nonexistent as the pot of gold at the rainbow’s end. But then, as he gazed at the beautiful valley, so virginal and wild that Jinny inhabited with billy goats, his pity ebbed.

  “Dad,” he said, presently, “I personally think that you’re a hornswoggling old hypocrite and deceiver, I swear I do.”

  Old Nat was mildly thunderstruck. “Why, lad, what call have you got to go a-throwin’ all them hard names at me? What’m I any hyppercrite about?”

  “That cave of gold! You really don’t believe that, any more than I do.”

  “I don’t? Why don’t I? Ain’t I been here twenty-five year a-huntin’ fer it?”

  “That’s just the point! You wanted to live here—and it’s the prettiest place I ever saw in my life; you felt you ought to have some excuse for putting in your time, so you took up with that old Chilcote yarn. You know doggone well there’s no cache of gold in this valley.”

  “Is that so? Well, mebbe you think I’m the only ’un who b’lieves in that cache.” He motioned up valley; and Gary, looking where he pointed, made out a thin spiral of blue smoke standing above the pines of the valley bottom, two miles north. “That’s young Hugh Ludlow’s outfit, camped there; and you can’t call him no old fool, like mebbe you’re thinkin’ of me.”

  Gary started a little. “That camp—Hugh Ludlow’s? D’you mean he’s got an outfit hunting for this cache?”

  “That’s how it is, And young Hugh is gamblin’ mighty heavy on findin’ this gold. They’s a big war on atween old Hugh Ludlow and Marl Casper—I don’t know jest what it’s all about, but they’re a-cuttin’ each other’s throats hog-up—and young Hugh is out to git this half a million.”

  As Gary looked thoughtfully at that distant thread of smoke, an uneasiness stirred in him. He had little idea what this Casper-Ludlow war was about, and he cared less, feeling that it would never touch himself. But the news that young Hugh Ludlow, his enemy yonder in Saghelia, was here in this valley jarred him considerably. They had clashed at their first encounter
, and now back in this wild isolated fastness, they would be living within sight of each other.

  “Why, hell,” he thought, “maybe that’s what Sergeant Rhodes was smiling about! I’ll bet he was thinking that young Ludlow and I were sure to tangle. Well, he’ll miss his guess. I’m not tangling with anybody. The ice I’m skating on is too cussed thin. But I wish that Ludlow wasn’t in here. I just didn’t like that fellow’s looks…”

  * * * *

  In the soft owl-dusk of ten o’clock they trudged out of a pine drogue into a tiny level prairillon; and ahead of them, nestling in a stance of balsam and spruce, Gary saw old Nat’s cabin.

  It was no hasty shack, as he had been expecting, but a permanent and carefully built place—a person’s home. A large two-room structure of logs and stone, it was prettily whitewashed, comfortable looking, its windows netted, a spiral of blue smoke curling up from the roof pipe. Neat paths bordered with white rocks led away from it; and the window ledges held boxes of wild flowers, as though all the bewildering riot of flowers in the meadow and surrounding woods was not enough.

  Its location, too, was superbly well chosen. It was safe from avalanches, sheltered from winter woolly-whippers, high enough that the air had a vigorous tang, and down across the leagues of forestry a person had a splendid front-door vista. Just back of the cabin a sizable torrent, stair-stepping down the mountain, provided not only water but an endless slumber song for tired evenings.

  The whole place resurrected, in Gary’s mind, a dim childhood memory of a similar cabin in the Colorado mountains, where he once had lived through a summer season, in that happy time when his father and mother were still alive and vacations were not an undreamed-of luxury.

  In the middle of the prairillon the truant Jinny was calmly pasturing. Her pack, or what had been left of it when she got home, had been taken off. Gary thought this odd. He was also surprised at a candleglow in the cabin.

  But he gave little thought to that just then, as he looked around at the meadow and woods and log building. He was thinking how fine a refuge this place would be till the manhunt storm kicked over—if no disaster struck. Whatever happened, this cabin was trail-end for him. From here he might be dragged back to Winnipeg, condemned and hopeless; to the gallows and noose and black hood. Or he might live here safely, till the autumnal snows drifted over the ranges and he could venture on. The trail which he had walked this evening would indeed be paradise trail for him—or the road to death.

  CHAPTER THREE

  As they trudged across the tiny meadow, Gary heard someone whistling in the cabin ahead. Decidedly it was no man’s whistle but the hit-or-miss efforts of a girl.

  “Heavens!” he breathed, thoroughly surprised. Not one word had old Nat told him about any girl at this place. “What the devil am I running into now?”

  Without having to be told, he knew that this girl was no transient visitor but was living here. She was the explanation of those flower boxes and the prettiness of old Nat’s home.

  But who was she? And why was she living back in this isolated mountain valley?

  Through the window netting, as they drew near, he saw her inside the cabin, moving from stove to table as she prepared supper. By the candlelight he had a glimpse of auburn hair, blue corduroy dress, moccasins and a little nosegay of primulas pinned jauntily at her breast. At the footsteps on the gravel path she came hurrying to the door.

  “Dads! Where’ve you been so long?” she scolded. “Jinny came home hours ago, and I was beginning to think that something had happened—”

  Then she caught sight of the strange man with old Nat, and stared sharply at Gary, questioning who he was.

  In her manner, as she stood there in the doorway, Gary detected an unmistakable shyness, and, back of that, a quick-springing hostility toward him.

  Old Nat awkwardly introduced them. “Gary, this is Leedy Barton. Her home was in Saghelia, but she’s sorta stayin’ with me’n Jinny this summer.”

  “How d’you, uh, do,” Gary stammered. Wondering who on earth she could be, he stared at her, aware that his gaze was rude but unable to take his eyes from her. In a wild-Indian way, what with her moccasins and rainbow belt and the deep tan of her face and hands, she was extraordinarily pretty, with delicately chiseled features and a body as graceful as a dancing girl’s. The glow of health and splendid vitality about her suggested that she must spend most of her time loping the woods and mountains of Little Saghelia. She seemed to have all the proverbial fire of a red-head; and that, on top of her exceptional young beauty, made him put her down as the most unforgettable girl he had met in a long time. Leda acknowledged the introduction with a curt nod, not speaking; and Gary knew then, positively, that in her eyes he was definitely unwelcome here.

  “Come in, lad,” Nat invited. Leda’s hostility toward his guest was entirely lost on him. “The way you was a-eatin’ them berries, you must be hungrier’n a young spring silver-tip.” Ill at ease, Gary followed him inside.

  The cabin was very crudely furnished. Chairs, tables and the bunk in the far corner were hand-made, of unbarked wood; the floor was carpeted with worn deerskins; and the “hall-tree” was a pair of caribou horns. There was hardly ten dollars’ worth of furniture in the whole place.

  But the cabin was spotlessly clean and tidy, and its harshness had been softened by the deft touches of a woman’s hand. The center table was covered with white oilcloth; the battered old stove had been polished till it glistened; the chairs had cushions on them; the entire cabin was sweet-scented from half a dozen birchbark vases of flowers. A doorway, curtained off by two deerskins, led into a second, smaller room.

  Gary put his grub sacks on the wall bench and turned around, feeling his unwelcome keenly. By the supper table Leda was glancing from Nat to him, waiting for old Nat to explain. The candlelight, shimmering softly in her auburn hair, shone full on her face, and Gary took another good look at her.

  She was hardly out of her teens—he judged her twenty or twenty-one at the most. With a touch of pity he noticed that her dress was patched and worn, her sweater old and badly frayed. There was a wistfulness in her eyes which hinted that this girl had seen her share, and more, of hard lines; and he had the impression that she had led a knockabout life on her own, pretty much like himself.

  The silence was so awkward that even old Nat, hanging his hat on the caribou horns, became aware of it at last and tried to break the ice.

  “I run onto Gary down in town, Leedy,” he explained. “Gary come in from the outside, but he couldn’t find no work or nothin’ in Saghelia, so I figgered it might mebbe be nice fer him to come up here with me’n you. I thought mebbe he might be comp’ny fer you, bein’ a young person. Me’n Jinny ain’t much, I know.”

  Leda’s hazel eyes opened widely. “Do you mean,” she demanded, “that he’s going to stay here?”

  For the first time old Nat realized that something was wrong. In his mild way he inquired, “Why, Leedy, what’s the matter?”

  “Oh, Dads! You’re always doing impossible things like this. Why didn’t you stop to think? Don’t you know that he and I can’t both live here?”

  “Why, uh, why not, honey? We can make out fer room somehow—”

  “It isn’t that; it’s what people would say!”

  “You b’lieve they’d talk?”

  “Talk? They’d—they’d boil! All the idle tongues in Saghelia would start wagging.” In angry vexation she stamped her moccasined foot. “I tell you, it’s impossible!”

  Old Nat’s face was a picture of bewilderment and dismay. He pulled at his beard and looked blankly from Gary to Leda, trying to see some way out of this predicament.

  “But after invitin’ Gary and bringin’ him up here,” he objected, hesitantly, “why, we can’t hardly turn him out, Leedy. That ’ud be mean as polecats.”

  Gary intervened. He felt no resentment toward Leda Barton. He
r main point was perfectly clear and dead-right: for two young people to live together in this tucked-away cabin might easily stir talk in Saghelia. And she was a girl. Gossip could damage her severely.

  “I had no idea,” he said to Leda, in quiet tones, “that anybody else was staying with Nat or that I’d be barging into any arrangement. I’m sorry.” He picked up his hat. “I’ll be going back. The moon’s bright enough. This was just a mistake, so don’t think anything about it at all.”

  His quiet offer to efface himself hurt Leda visibly, and her hostility fled. She checked Gary, her hand on his arm.

  “Don’t go. Please. I won’t drive you away from here.” She looked up and met his gaze, and Gary saw that she was very close to tears—of self-reproach, of helplessness in this situation. How candid her hazel eyes were! And how swift-changing her moods, like an April sky. “I haven’t got anything against you. How could I have? It’s just that if we both stay here, it might put me in an awf’ly bad light, down there in Saghelia. It might seem like proof of all the slander and lies they’ve ever said about me.”

  Gary wondered what in the name of heaven she meant by this “slander and lies.” Her words implied that she and Saghelia were having a private little war of some sort.

  “I don’t see no call fer either ’un of you to go,” old Nat put in. “Leedy, they can’t say anything more about you than what they’ve already said, can they?”

  A color flew into Leda’s cheeks, and she hung her head, ashamed. As Gary regarded her, he realized that it was this “talk” which had caused her to leave the town and take refuge with guileless old Higgens. Though he knew nothing about the indictment which Saghelia had brought against this honest-eyed girl, he felt an instinctive sympathy for her, as from one outcast to another.

  After a time Leda looked up. “You’re right, Dads,” she said bitterly. “They can’t possibly say anything worse than they’ve said already. I hadn’t thought of that, but it’s true. It doesn’t really make any difference what I do.” She turned again to Gary. “We won’t either of us leave. We won’t put ourselves out just to kowtow to those people.” A defiant light came into her eyes. “I haven’t knuckled under to those tongue-waggers yet, and I’m not going to start now! You stay right here.”