Tales of the Klondyke | Page 6

do not know, but below there are Russians, many Russians. Which is
neither here nor there. You may go on and see for yourself; you may go
back to your brothers; but up the Koyukuk you shall not go while the
priests and fighting men do my bidding. Thus do I command, I,
Baptiste the Red, whose word is law and who am head man over this
people."
"And should I not go down to the Russians, or back to my brothers?"
"Then shall you go swift-footed before your god, which is a bad god,
and the god of the white men."
The red sun shot up above the northern skyline, dripping and bloody.
Baptiste the Red came to his feet, nodded curtly, and went back to his
camp amid the crimson shadows and the singing of the robins.

Hay Stockard finished his pipe by the fire, picturing in smoke and coal
the unknown upper reaches of the Koyukuk, the strange stream which
ended here its arctic travels and merged its waters with the muddy
Yukon flood. Somewhere up there, if the dying words of a
ship-wrecked sailorman who had made the fearful overland journey
were to be believed, and if the vial of golden grains in his pouch
attested anything,--somewhere up there, in that home of winter, stood
the Treasure House of the North. And as keeper of the gate, Baptiste
the Red, English half-breed and renegade, barred the way.
"Bah!" He kicked the embers apart and rose to his full height, arms
lazily outstretched, facing the flushing north with careless soul.
II
Hay Stockard swore, harshly, in the rugged monosyllables of his
mother tongue. His wife lifted her gaze from the pots and pans, and
followed his in a keen scrutiny of the river. She was a woman of the
Teslin Country, wise in the ways of her husband's vernacular when it
grew intensive. From the slipping of a snow- shoe thong to the
forefront of sudden death, she could gauge occasion by the pitch and
volume of his blasphemy. So she knew the present occasion merited
attention. A long canoe, with paddles flashing back the rays of the
westering sun, was crossing the current from above and urging in for
the eddy. Hay Stockard watched it intently. Three men rose and dipped,
rose and dipped, in rhythmical precision; but a red bandanna, wrapped
about the head of one, caught and held his eye.
"Bill!" he called. "Oh, Bill!"
A shambling, loose-jointed giant rolled out of one of the tents, yawning
and rubbing the sleep from his eyes. Then he sighted the strange canoe
and was wide awake on the instant.
"By the jumping Methuselah! That damned sky-pilot!"
Hay Stockard nodded his head bitterly, half-reached for his rifle, then
shrugged his shoulders.
"Pot-shot him," Bill suggested, "and settle the thing out of hand. He'll
spoil us sure if we don't." But the other declined this drastic measure
and turned away, at the same time bidding the woman return to her
work, and calling Bill back from the bank. The two Indians in the
canoe moored it on the edge of the eddy, while its white occupant,
conspicuous by his gorgeous head-gear, came up the bank.

"Like Paul of Tarsus, I give you greeting. Peace be unto you and grace
before the Lord."
His advances were met sullenly, and without speech.
"To you, Hay Stockard, blasphemer and Philistine, greeting. In your
heart is the lust of Mammon, in your mind cunning devils, in your tent
this woman whom you live with in adultery; yet of these divers sins,
even here in the wilderness, I, Sturges Owen, apostle to the Lord, bid
you to repent and cast from you your iniquities."
"Save your cant! Save your cant!" Hay Stockard broke in testily.
"You'll need all you've got, and more, for Red Baptiste over yonder."
He waved his hand toward the Indian camp, where the half-breed was
looking steadily across, striving to make out the newcomers. Sturges
Owen, disseminator of light and apostle to the Lord, stepped to the
edge of the steep and commanded his men to bring up the camp outfit.
Stockard followed him.
"Look here," he demanded, plucking the missionary by the shoulder
and twirling him about. "Do you value your hide?"
"My life is in the Lord's keeping, and I do but work in His vineyard,"
he replied solemnly.
"Oh, stow that! Are you looking for a job of martyrship?"
"If He so wills."
"Well, you'll find it right here, but I'm going to give you some advice
first. Take it or leave it. If you stop here, you'll be cut off in the midst
of your labors. And not you alone, but your men, Bill, my wife--"
"Who is a daughter of Belial and hearkeneth not to the