Читать книгу The Way of the Strong - Cullum Ridgwell - Страница 4

Leo gazed about him as he left the woodland shadows behind. All sign of the recent blizzard had passed. The world was white, cold, and bathed in the gleaming sunlight of the northern winter. The air was warmer than it had been for days, an unusual phenomenon after such a storm.

For a moment his unexpressive eyes lifted to the shining sky. There was nothing to suggest anything in the nature of one of those rapid changes of weather so much a feature of winter in this region, and the prospect seemed to satisfy him. From the sky his glance drifted to the jagged horizon, and here it searched closely in every direction. For a long time he stood studying every rise and depression in the glacial ocean of hills and valleys; then, slowly, his interest began to wane.

Now a definite disappointment became apparent in the frown that depressed his strong brows. He moved out from the edge of the woods and skirted them until a fresh vista of bald, snow-clad hills presented themselves to his searching eyes. For a time his scrutiny lacked something of its original interest. Then, quite suddenly, it became fixed on one spot, a deep depression, shadowed, and definitely marked, an almost black patch in the white setting of the surrounding world.

In a moment all his interest had revived, and he concentrated all his efforts to read the meaning of that which he beheld.

"He wasn't lying, after all," he muttered at last. And his words gave a key to his recent moments of waning interest.

He knew that the black patch he was looking at was a bluff of woods lying in the narrow valley between two high hills, a bluff of woods such as those which lay behind him. Whether they were larger, or just a small, isolated cluster of trees did not concern him. He was watching a spiral of thin smoke, a faint shadow against the dark backing, as it floated upwards and drifted away, quite invisible after it broke the sky line. He knew that this was the smoke Si-wash had told him of. He knew, as Si-wash had known, that it was the smoke of a camp fire. He wondered whose, and, wondering, he moved out without any hesitation in its direction, determined to ascertain whose hand had lit the fire; a matter which had seemed all unnecessary to the Indian's mind.

Just for a moment he glanced again at the sun, and took his bearings. Si-wash had said three miles at most. Three miles; it was little enough to concern himself about. He knew that unless he encountered unlooked-for difficulties he would be able to cover the distance, and make the return journey in less than four hours.

So he set off, adopting a course much as the crow might fly. That was his way in all things. He rarely sought to spare himself by seeking the easier route in anything. His goal always assumed a definite point straight ahead of him, so why make the journey longer for the sake of a little ease? Time enough for such deviations when stress of circumstances demanded.

His way took him down a long, easy slope, where, at moments, banks of snow mounted up to many feet in height, and at others the earth lay bare, swept clear by the force of the recent storm. Then it was possible for him to travel swiftly, nor was he put to inconvenience from the fact that he was without his snowshoes.

The depression was quickly passed and terminated in the abrupt rise of a low bald hill whose base was surrounded by a low, shabby scrub. At first glance the hill had a curious resemblance to a monk's shaven crown, but a closer inspection revealed that here was one of those broken hills suggesting the ruin of a one-time magnificent mountain, which must have succumbed under the fierce blastings of one of Nature's passionate moments. The bald crown was a broken sea of torn and riven rocks, which might well have been the result of gigantic operations with dynamite.

The obstruction gave him no pause. Again deviation never entered his head. With infinite purpose he attacked the ascent which amounted to a laborious and even perilous struggle. There was no faltering, and soon he was so far involved that any thought of yielding to the difficulties he encountered became quite out of the question. To return would have been far more difficult than to continue the advance.

The ascent occupied an hour of great physical effort, but at last he stood at the summit breathing hard from his exertions. Here he paused and surveyed the distance. Again was it characteristic of him that he had no longer interest in his immediate surroundings, or the difficulties he had already surmounted. His whole thought was for that which lay ahead, for those difficulties which still remained to be overcome.

The descent of the hill, though it appeared to be no mean accomplishment, was far shorter, and far less abrupt than the upward climb had been. Nor was he sorry for the respite, while still there was no shrinking in him from whatever hazard Nature might have chosen to offer. He had calculated that such was the case, for the whole trend of the land was upward, bearing on up to the crystal peak between which the crowding woodland ahead lay pinched. His eyes wandered on with his thoughts which carried him out in the direction of the tiny ribbon of smoke, still gently rising from the heart of the woods to vanish in the sparkling air above.

He remained for one brief moment while he made a rough estimate of the distance he had yet to go; then, without wasting a precious moment, he dropped upon the first rugged step of the descent. The work was harder than might have been expected, far harder. And the rope he had brought with him frequently stood him in good stead while making those big drops, which, from the distance, seemed so insignificant and easy. But it was never his way to consider difficulties seriously until he found himself in their midst. At all times the needs of the moment were sufficient, and he was firm in the belief that there was no difficulty in human life where an advantageous way out did not lay waiting for the seeker. His mood was the dogged persistence which urges a man on without consideration or thought for anything else in the world but his own all-mastering purpose.

It was this mood which had first driven him to the northern wilderness, where he hoped to acquire the necessary foundations for his fortune in the least possible time. It was this intensity of purpose which had blinded him to the possibilities of burdening himself with the care of a woman. It was this crude driving force which, in face of stupendous difficulties, not to say impossibilities, had decided him to return on foot to Sixty-mile Creek. These things were part of the man. He could not help them.

So it was in the case of his search for this mysterious camp. He was urged to make it, irresistibly urged, and he could have given no definite reasons for his actions.

Slowly there came a change in the man's whole attitude. It was a subtle change, and one wholly unrealized by himself. As he gained way over the broken path before him a strange eagerness became apparent in all his movements, in his expression, in the quick, searching glance of his eyes. The deliberate manner in which he had made the ascent now gave way to an impatient eagerness which frequently placed him at considerable risk, and even peril. Often, where the slower process of the rope's assistance would have been safest, he trusted to hands and feet, and even to a jump, with a considerable uncertainty as to where he was going to land. But he took the risks, urged on by this strange, unacknowledged desire to reach his destination quickly.

The broken hill was left behind him after less than an hour's hard struggle; and when, at last, he stood upon the comparatively smooth upland, with the distant fringe of woodlands high up above him, he realized that his estimate, as had been Si-wash's, of the distance, was considerably at fault. He had still full three miles to go amidst the hills and valleys made by snow banks swept up by the storm, before the mystery of that thread of smoke could be fully solved.

But the way was easy, and he hurried on. The brief day was passing rapidly. Strangely enough all thought of time had passed from him. It no longer occurred to him that he had to return to his own camp to make his preparations for his contemplated journey back to the creek. He had become solely absorbed with the quest in hand. That, and that alone, seemed to matter.

Half an hour's tramping brought him within full and intimate view of the edge of the woods; and, as he drew near, a further change crept into his manner. Once he paused, more than half hidden by a snow bank, and gazed up at the towering crests of the aged pines. He was impressed. These woods were of far greater extent than those which had served him as a shelter from the storm. They towered dizzily, and spread out an immense distance along the sides of the two mountains, between which they had seemed so pinched; and somehow their immensity depressed him with a feeling of the smallness of human life.

It was from this moment that the fresh change in him took place. He left the shelter of the snow bank with a curious crouching gait, and eyes furtively watchful. The reason of the change was quite unapparent, even to himself. He knew that he was searching for a sight of fellow-creatures; but what he did not know was that it was inspired by an active instinct to avoid contact.

He crept on from the shelter of one snow bank to the shelter of another. He moved along over the shallows of snow so that his moccasined feet gave out no sound. And his whole progress bespoke an almost frantic desire that his approach should not be witnessed from the woods.

Nearer and nearer he drew, and, as the shadows came down toward him, his pace increased almost to a run. Finally the last sheltering snow bank was left behind and a low broken scrub replaced it. He breathed a deep sigh; the sigh of a man who is relieved beyond words. The gray, familiar gloom of the forest overshadowed him, and he was content. Just for a few moments he paused for breath. Then his restless spirit urged him on, and, plunging forward, the solemn twilight of the forest swallowed him up.

For quite a while he hurried on like a flitting shadow in the midst of a world of shadows. Then, finally, he paused listening. The grave-like silence was quite unbroken by any sign of life. Nothing came to him stirring the echoes of that ages-old world. He strained hard for some familiar sound that might guide him to the spot where the mysterious camp lay. But no such sound was forthcoming.