The Honor of the Big Snows

by James Oliver Curwood

  CHAPTER XXIV

  THE RESCUE

  On the first snow came young Dixon from Fort Churchill. Jean de Gravoismet him on the trail near Ledoq's. When the Englishman recognized thelittle Frenchman he leaped from his sledge and advanced withoutstretched hand, his face lighting up with pleasure.

  "Bless me, if it isn't my old friend, Jean!" he cried. "I was justthinking of you, Gravois, and how you trimmed me to a finish twowinters ago. I've learned a lot about you people up here in the snowssince then, and I'll never do anything like that again." He laughedinto Jean's face as they shook hands, and his voice was filled withunbounded sincerity. "How is Mrs. Gravois, and the little Gravois--andMelisse?" he added, before Jean had spoken.

  "All well, M'seur Dixon," replied Jean. "Only the little Gravois havealmost grown into a man and woman."

  An hour or so later he said to Iowaka:

  "I can't help liking this man Dixon, and yet I don't want to. Why isit, do you suppose?"

  "Is it because you are afraid that Melisse will like him?" asked hiswife, smiling over her shoulder.

  "Blessed saints, I believe that it is!" said Jean frankly. "I hateforeigners--and Melisse belongs to Jan."

  "She did, once, but that was a long time ago, Jean."

  "It may be, and yet I doubt it, ma bien aimee. If Jan would tell her--"

  "A woman will not wait always," interrupted Iowaka softly. "Jan Thoreauhas waited too long!"

  A week later, as they stood together in front of their door, they sawDixon and Melisse walking slowly in the edge of the forest. The womanlaughed into Jean's face.

  "Did I not say that Jan had waited too long?"

  Jean's face was black with disapprobation.

  "Then you would have taken up with some foreigner if I had remained inthe Athabasca country another year or two?" he demanded questioningly.

  "Very likely," retorted Iowaka mischievously, running into the cabin.

  "The devil!" said Jean sourly, stalking in the direction of the store.

  He was angered at the coolness with which Jan accepted the situation.

  "This Dixon is with Melisse afternoon and evening, and they walktogether every day in the bush," he said to him. "Soon there will be awedding at Lac Bain!"

  "Melisse deserves a good man," replied Jan, unmoved. "I like Dixon."

  Deep down in his soul he knew that each day was bringing the end of itall much nearer for him. He did not tell Melisse that he had returnedto Lac Bain to be near her once more, nor did he confide in Jean. Hehad anticipated that this winter at the post would be filled with acertain painful pleasure for him--but he had not anticipated Dixon. Dayafter day he saw Melisse and the Englishman together, and while theyawakened in him none of the fiery jealousy which might have rankled inthe bosom of Jean de Gravois, the knowledge that the girl was at lastpassing from him for ever added a deeper grief to that which wasalready eating at his heart.

  Dixon made no effort to conceal his feelings. He loved Melisse. Franklyhe told this to Jean one day, when they were on the Churchill trail. Inhis honest way he said things which broke down the last of Jean'shereditary prejudices, and compelled him to admit that this was adifferent sort of foreigner than he had ever known before.

  "Diable, I like him," he said to himself; "and yet I would rather seehim in the blessed hereafter than have him take Melisse from Jan!"

  The big snow decided.

  It came early in December. Dixon had set out alone for Ledoq's early inthe morning. By noon the sky was a leaden black, and a little later onecould not see a dozen paces ahead of him for the snow. The Englishmandid not return that day. The next day he was still gone, and Gravoisdrove along the top of the mountain ridge until he came to theFrenchman's, where he found that Dixon had started for Lac Bain thepreceding afternoon. He brought word back to the post. Then he went toMelisse.

  "It is as good as death to go out in search of him," he said. "We canno longer use the dogs. Snowshoes will sink like leaden bullets bymorning, and to go ten miles from the post means that there will bebones to be picked by the foxes when the crust comes!"

  It was dark when Jan came into the cabin. Melisse started to her feetwith a little cry when he entered, covered white with the snow. A lightpack was strapped to his back, and he carried his rifle in his hand.

  "I am going to hunt for him," he said softly. "If he is alive, I willbring him back to you."

  She came to him slowly, and the beating of Jan's heart sounded to himlike the distant thrumming of partridge-wings. Ah, would he ever forgetthat look? The old glory was in her eyes, her arms were reaching out,her lips parted. Jan knew how the Great Spirit had once appeared toMukee, and how a white mist, like a snow-veil, had come between thehalf-breed's eyes and the wondrous Thing he beheld. That same veildrifted between Jan and the girl. As in a vision, he saw her face sonear to him that he felt the touch of her sweet breath, and he knewthat one of his rough hands was clasped in both of her own, and thatafter a moment it was crushed tightly against her bosom.

  "Jan, my hero--"

  He struggled back, almost sobbing, as he plunged out into the nightagain. He heard her voice crying after him, but the wild wailing of thespruce, and the storm in his brain, drowned its words. He had seen theglorious light of love in her eyes--her love for Dixon! And he wouldfind him! At last he, Jan Thoreau, would prove that the old love wasnot dead within him; he would do for Melisse this night--to-morrow--thenext day, and until he fell down to die--what he had promised to do ontheir sledge-ride to Ledoq's. And then--

  He went to Ledoq's now, following the top of the mountain, and reachedhis cabin in the late dawn. The Frenchman stared at him in amazementwhen he learned that he was about to set out on a search for Dixon.

  "You will not find him," he said slowly in French; "but if you aredetermined to go, I will hunt with you. It is a big chance that we willnot come back."

  "I don't want you to go," objected Jan. "One will do as much as two,unless we search alone. I came your way to find if it had begun to snowbefore Dixon left."

  "An hour after he had gone, you could not see your hand before yourface," replied Ledoq, preparing his pack. "There is no doubt but thathe circled out over Lac Bain. We will go that far together, and thensearch alone."

  They went back over the mountain, and stopped when instinct told themthat they were opposite the spruce forests of the lake. There theyseparated, Jan going as nearly as he could guess into the northwest,Ledoq trailing slowly and hopelessly into the south.

  It was no great sacrifice for Jan, this struggle with the big snows forthe happiness of Melisse. What it was to Ledoq no man ever guessed orknew, for it was not until the late spring snows had gone that thepeople at Lac Bain found what the foxes and the wolves had left of him,far to the south.

  Fearlessly Jan plunged into the white world of the lake. There wasneither rock nor tree to guide him, for everywhere was the heavyghost-raiment of the Indian god. The balsams were bending under it, thespruces were breaking into hunchback forms, the whole world was twistedin noiseless torture under its increasing weight. Out through the stillterror of it all Jan's voice went in wild, echoing shouts. Now and thenhe fired his rifle, and always he listened long and intently. Theechoes came back to him, laughing, taunting, and then each time fellthe mirthless silence of the storm.

  Day came, only a little lighter than the night. He crossed the lake,his snow-shoes sinking ankle-deep at every step, and once eachhalf-hour he fired a single shot from his rifle. He heard shots to thesouth, and knew that it was Ledoq; each report coming to him morefaintly than the last, until they had died away entirely.

  Across the lake he struck the forest again, and his shouts echoed infutile inquiry in its weird depths. About him there was no sign oflife, no sound except the faint fluttering of falling snow. Under fivefeet of this snow the four-footed creatures of the wilderness weresnugly buried; close against the trunks of the spruces, shelteredwithin their tent-like coverings, the birds waited like lifeless thingsfor the break
ing of the storm.

  At noon Jan stopped and ate his lunch. Then he went on, carrying hisrifle always upon his right shoulder, so that the steps of his rightleg would be shortened, and he would travel in a circle, as he believedDixon had done.

  The storm thickened with the falling of night, and he burrowed himselfa great hole in the soft snow and filled it with balsam boughs for abed. When he awakened, hours later, he stood up, and thrust out hishead, and found himself buried to the arm-pits. With the aid of hisbroad snow-shoes he drew himself out, until he stood knee-deep in thesurface.

  He lifted his pack. As he swung it before him, one arm thrust through astrap, he gave a startled cry. Half of one side of the pack was eatenaway! He thrust his hands through the breach, and a moan of despairsobbed on his lips when he found that his food was gone. A thin trickleof flour ran through his fingers upon the snow. He pulled out a gnawedpound of bacon, a little tea--and that was all.

  Frantically he ripped the rent wider in his search, and when he stoodup, his wild face staring into the chaos about him, he held only thebit of bacon in his hand. In it were the imprints of tiny teeth--sharplittle razor-edged teeth that told him what had happened. While he hadslept a mink had robbed him of his food!

  With one of his shoes he began digging furiously in the snow. He torehis balsam bed to pieces. Somewhere--somewhere not very far away--thelittle animal must have cached its theft. He dug down until he came tothe frozen earth. For an hour he worked and found nothing.

  Then he stopped. Over a small fire he melted snow for tea and broiled aslice of the bacon, which he ate with the few biscuit crumbs he foundin the pack. Every particle of flour that he could find he scraped upwith his knife and put into one of the deep pockets of his cariboucoat. After that he set cut in the direction in which he thought hewould find Lac Bain.

  Still he shouted for Dixon, and fired an occasional shot from hisrifle. By noon he should have struck the lake. Noon came and passed;the gloom of a second night fell upon him. He built himself a fire, andate two-thirds of what remained of the bacon. The handful of flour inhis pocket he did not disturb.

  It was still night when he broke his rest and struggled on. His firstfears were gone. In place of them, there filled him now a grim sort ofpleasure. A second time he was battling with death for Melisse. Andthis, after all, was not a very hard fight for him. He had feared deathin the red plague, but he did not fear the thought of this death thatthreatened him in the big snows. It thrilled him, instead, with astrange sort of exhilaration. If he died, it would be for Melisse, andfor all time she would remember him for what he had done.

  When he ate the last bit of his bacon, he made up his mind what hewould do when the end came. In the stock of his rifle he would scratcha few last words to Melisse. He even arranged the words in hisbrain--four of them--"Melisse, I love you." He repeated them to himselfas he staggered on, and that night, beside the fire he built, he beganby carving her name.

  "To-morrow," he said softly, "I will do the rest."

  He was growing very hungry, but he did not touch the flour. For sixhours he slept, and then drank his fill of hot tea.

  "We will travel until day, Jan Thoreau," he informed himself, "andthen, if nothing turns up, we will build our last camp, and eat theflour. It will be the last of us, for there will be no meat above thissnow for days."

  His snow-shoes were an impediment now, and he left them behind, alongwith one of his two blankets, which had grown to be like lead upon hisshoulders. He counted his cartridges--ten of them. One of these hefired into the air.

  Was that an echo he heard?

  A sudden thrill shot through him. He strained his ears to catch arepetition of the sound. In a moment it came again--clearly no echothis time.

  "Ledoq!" he cried aloud.

  He fired again.

  Back to him came the distant, splitting crack of a rifle. He forced hisway toward it. After a little he heard the signal again, much nearerthan before, and he fired in response. A few hundred yards farther onhe came to a low mountain ridge, and lifted his voice in a loud shout.A shot came from just over the mountain.

  Waist deep in the light snow he began the ascent, dragging himself upby the tops of the slender saplings, stopping every few yards tohalf-stretch himself out in the soft mass through which he wasstruggling, panting with exhaustion. He shouted when he gained the topof the ridge. Up through the white blur of snow on the other side therecame to him faintly a shout; yet, in spite of its faintness, Jan knewthat it was very near.

  "Something has happened to Ledoq," he told himself, "but he surely hasfood, and we can live it out until the storm is over."

  It was easier going down the ridge, and he went quickly in thedirection from which the voice had come, until a mass of huge bouldersloomed up before him. There was a faint odor of smoke in the air, andhe followed it in among the rocks, where it grew stronger.

  "Ho, Ledoq!" he shouted.

  A voice replied a dozen yards away. Slowly, as he advanced, he made outthe dim shadow of life in the white gloom--a bit of smoke climbingweakly in the storm, the black opening of a brush shelter--and then,between the opening and the spiral of smoke, a living thing that camecreeping toward him on all fours, like an animal.

  He plunged toward it, and the shadow staggered upward, and would havefallen had it not been for the support of the deep snow. Another step,and a sharp cry fell from Jan's lips. It was not Ledoq, but Dixon, whostood there with white, starved face and staring eyes in the snow gloom!

  "My God, I am starving--and dying for a drink of water!" gasped theEnglishman chokingly, thrusting out his arms. "Thoreau, God bepraised--"

  He staggered, and fell in the snow. Jan dragged him back to the shelter.

  "I will have water for you--and something to eat--very soon," he said.

  His voice sounded unreal. There was a mistiness before his eyes whichwas not caused by the storm, a twisting of strange shadows thatbothered his vision, and made him sway dizzily when he threw off hispack to stir the fire. He suspended his two small pails over theembers, which he coaxed into a blaze. Both he filled with snow; intoone he emptied the handful of flour that he had carried in hispocket--into the other he put tea. Fifteen minutes later he carriedthem to the Englishman.

  Dixon sat up, a glazed passion filling his eyes. He drank the hot teagreedily, and as greedily ate the boiled flour-pudding. Jan watched himhungrily until the last crumb of it was gone. He refilled the pailswith snow, added more tea, and then rejoined the Englishman. New lifewas already shining in Dixon's eyes.

  "Not a moment too soon, Thoreau," he said thankfully, reaching over togrip the other's hand.

  "Another night and--" Suddenly he stopped. "Great Heaven, what is thematter?"

  He noticed for the first time the pinched torture in his companion'sface. Jan's head dropped weakly upon his breast. His hands were icycold.

  "Nothing," he murmured drowsily, "only--I'm starving, too, Dixon!" Herecovered himself with an effort, and smiled into Dixon's startledface. "There is nothing to eat," he continued, as he saw the otherdirect his gaze toward the pack. "I gave you the last of the flour.There is nothing--but salt and tea." He rolled over upon the balsamboughs with a restful sigh. "Let me sleep!"

  Dixon went to the pack. One by one, in his search for food, he took outthe few articles that it contained. After that he drank more tea,crawled back into the balsam shelter, and lay down beside Jan. It wasbroad day when he awoke, and he called hoarsely to his companion whenhe saw that the snow had ceased falling.

  Jan did not stir. For a moment Dixon leaned over to listen to hisbreathing, and then dragged himself slowly and painfully out into theday. The fire was out. A leaden blackness still filled the sky; deep,silent gloom hung in the wake of the storm.

  Suddenly there came to Dixon's ears a sound. It was a sound that wouldhave been unheard in the gentle whispering of a wind, in the swaying ofthe spruce-tops; but in this silence it fell upon the starving man'shearing with a distinctness that drew his musc
les rigid and set hiseyes staring about him in wild search. Just beyond the hanging pails amoose-bird hopped out upon the snow. It chirped hungrily, its big,owl-like eyes scrutinizing Dixon. The man stared back, fearing to move.Slowly he forced his right foot through the snow to the rear of hisleft, and as cautiously brought his left behind his right, workinghimself backward step by step until he reached the shelter. Just insidewas his rifle. He drew it out and sank upon his knees in the snow toaim. At the report of the rifle, Jan stirred but did not open his eyes;he made no movement when Dixon called out in shrill joy that he hadkilled meat. He heard, he strove to arouse himself, but something morepowerful than his own will seemed pulling him down into oblivion. Itseemed an eternity before he was conscious of a voice again. He felthimself lifted, and opened his eyes with his head resting against theEnglishman's shoulder.

  "Drink this, Thoreau," he heard.

  He drank, and knew that it was not tea that ran down his throat.

  "Whisky-jack soup," he heard again. "How is it?"

  He became wide-awake. Dixon was offering him a dozen small bits of meaton a tin plate, and he ate without questioning. Suddenly, when therewere only two or three of the smallest scraps left, he stopped.

  "Mon Dieu, it was whisky-jack!" he cried. "I have eaten it all!"

  The young Englishman's white face grinned at him.

  "I've got the flour inside of me, Thoreau--you've got the moose-bird.Isn't that fair?"

  The plate dropped between them. Over it their hands met in a great,clutching grip, and up from Jan's heart there welled words which almostburst from his lips in voice, words which rang in his brain, and whichwere an unspoken prayer--"Melisse, I thank the great God that it isthis man whom you love!" But it was in silence that he staggered to hisfeet and went out into the gloom.

  "This may be only a lull in the storm," he said. "We must lose no time.How long did you travel before you made this camp?"

  "About ten hours," said Dixon. "I made due west by compass until I knewthat I had passed Lac Bain, and then struck north."

  "Ah, you have the compass," cried Jan, his eyes lighting up. "M'seurDixon, we are very near to the post if you camped so soon! Tell mewhich is north."

  "That is north."

  "Then we go south--south and east. If you traveled ten hours, firstwest and then north, we are northwest of Lac Bain."

  Jan spoke no more, but got his rifle from the shelter and put only thetea and two pails in his pack; leaving the remaining blanket upon thesnow. The Englishman followed close behind him, bending weakly underthe weight of his gun. Tediously they struggled to the top of theridge, and as Jan stopped to look through the gray day about him, Dixonsank down into the snow. When the other turned toward him he grinned upfeebly into his face.

  "Bushed," he gasped. "Don't believe I can make it through this snow,Thoreau."

  There was no fear in his eyes; there was even a cheerful ring in hisvoice.

  A sudden glow leaped into Jan's face.

  "I know this ridge," he exclaimed. "It runs within a mile of Lac Bain.You'd better leave your rifle behind."

  Dixon made an effort to rise and Jan helped him. They went on slowly,resting every few hundred yards, and each time that he rose from theseperiods of rest, Dixon's face was twisted with pain.

  "It's the flour and water anchored amidships," he smiled grimly."Cramps--Ugh!"

  "We'll make it by supper-time," assured Jan cheerfully.

  Dixon leaned heavily on his arm.

  "I wish you'd go on alone," he urged. "You could send help--"

  "I promised Melisse that I would bring you back if I found you,"replied Jan, his face turned away. "If the storm broke again, you wouldbe lost."

  "Tell me--tell me--" he heard Dixon pant eagerly, "did she send you tohunt for me, Thoreau?"

  Something in the Englishman's voice drew his eyes to him. There was anexcited flush in his starved cheeks; his eyes shone.

  "Did she send you?"

  Jan struggled hard to speak calmly.

  "Not in words, M'seur Dixon. But I know that if I get you safely backto Lac Bain she will be very happy."

  Something came in Dixon's sobbing breath which Jan did not hear. Alittle later he stopped and built a fire over which he melted more snowand boiled tea. The drink stimulated them, and they went on. A littlelater still and Jan hung his rifle in the crotch of a sapling.

  "We will return for the guns in a day or so," he said.

  Dixon leaned upon him more heavily now, and the distances they traveledbetween resting periods became shorter and shorter. Three times theystopped to build fires and cook tea. It was night when they descendedfrom the ridge to the snow-covered ice of Lac Bain. It was pastmidnight when Jan dragged Dixon from the spruce forest into the openingat the post. There were no lights burning, and he went with hishalf-conscious burden to the company's store. He awakened Croisset, wholet them in.

  "Take care of Dixon," said Jan, "and don't arouse any of the peopleto-night. It will be time enough to tell what has happened in themorning."

  Over the stove in his own room he cooked meat and coffee, and for along time sat silent before the fire. He had brought back Dixon. In themorning Melisse would know. First she would go to the Englishman,then--then--she would come to him!

  He rose and went to the rude board table in the corner of his room.

  "No, Melisse must not come to me in the morning," he whispered tohimself. "She must never again look upon Jan Thoreau."

  He took pencil and paper and wrote. Page after page he crumpled in hishand and flung into the fire. At last, swiftly and despairingly, heended with half a dozen lines. What he said came from his heart, inFrench:

  "I have brought him back to you, my Melisse, and pray that the good Godmay give you happiness. I leave you the old violin, and always when youplay, it will tell you of the love of Jan Thoreau."

  He folded the page and sealed it in one of the company's envelopes.Very quietly he went from his room down into the deserted store.Without striking a light he found a new pack, a few articles of food,and ammunition. The envelope, addressed to Melisse, he left whereCroisset or the factor would find it in the morning. His dogs werehoused in a shack behind the store, and he called out their namessoftly and warningly as he went among them. As stealthily as theirmaster they trailed behind him to the edge of the forest, and closeunder the old spruce that guarded the grave Jan stopped, and silentlyhe stretched out his arms to the little cabin.

  The dogs watched him. Kazan, the one-eyed leader, glared from him intothe dimness of the night, whining softly. A low, mourning wind sweptthrough the spruce tops, and from Jan's throat there burst sobbinglywords which he had heard beside this same grave more than seventeenyears before, when Williams' choking voice had risen in a last prayerfor the woman.

  "May the great God care for Melisse!"

  He turned into the trail upon which Jean de Gravois had fought theEnglishman, led his dogs and sledge in a twisting path through thecaribou swamp, and stood at last beside the lob-stick tree that leanedout over the edge of the white barrens. With his knife he dug out thepapers which he had concealed in that whisky-jack hole.

  It was near dawn when he recovered the rifle which he had abandoned onthe mountain top. A little later it began to snow. He was glad, for itwould conceal his trail.

  For thirteen days he forced his dogs through the deep snows into thesouth. On the fourteenth they came to Le Pas, which is the edge ofcivilization. It was night when he came out of the forest, so that hecould see the faint glow of lights beyond the Saskatchewan.

  For a few moments, before crossing, he stopped his tired dogs andturned his face back into the grim desolation of the North, where theaurora was playing feebly in the skies, and beckoning to him, andtelling him that the old life of centuries and centuries ago would waitfor him always at the dome of the earth.

  "The good God bless you, and keep you, and care for you ever more, myMelisse," he whispered; and he walked slowly ahead of his dogs, acrossthe river, a
nd into the Other World.