Where the Sun Swings North | Page 5

of the wild
chorus.

[1] Name by which the States is designated in the North.
[2] Newcomer.
CHAPTER II
THE CHEECHAKO
He was young and tall and slight, with a touch of recklessness in his
bearing that was somehow at variance with the clean-cut lines of his
face. He stood unsteadily on the threshold, hands thrust deep in the
pockets of his grey tweed trousers, chin up-tilted from a strong, bare
throat that rose out of his open shirt. As the singing inside the cabin
ceased, he shook back the tumbled mass of his brown hair and alone his
mellow baritone continued the whaler's song:
"Up into the Polar Seas, Where the greasy whalers be, There's a strip of
open water Reaching north to eighty-three----"
The White Chief, with his eyes on the singer, spoke to Kayak Bill.
"Our gentleman-bookkeeper takes to your liquid dynamite like an
Eskimo to seal oil, Kayak. He's been at Katleean three months now,
and I'll be damned if he's been sober three times since he landed. Seems
to be hitting it up extra strong now that the Potlatch is due--" Kilbuck
lowered his voice--"I want nothing said to him of the prospector and his
white wife, understand?"
At the dictatorial tone flung into the last sentence there came a
narrowing of the old hootch-maker's eyes. It was seldom that Paul
Kilbuck spoke thus to Kayak Bill.
The singer was crossing the courtyard now with steps of exaggerated
carefulness. Suddenly he paused. His dark eyes, in vague, alcoholic

meditation, sought the distant peaks stained with the blush-rose of
sunset. The evening-purple of the hills fringed the bay with mystery.
Gulls floated high on lavender wings, their intermittent plaint
answering the Indian voices that drifted up from the beach where the
canoes were landing.
Kayak Bill moved over on the step, indicating the space beside him.
"Come along side o' me, son, and get yore bearin's!" he called.
"Yes, Harlan, stop your mooning and come here. I want to talk to you."
Gregg Harlan turned, and the smile that parted his lips, though born in
a liquor-fogged brain, was singularly winning.
"Chief," his words came distinctly but with careful deliberation, "an
outsider would think--that I am--a--fellow of rare--judgment and
s-sound phil-os-ophy from the way--you're always--wanting to
talk--to--me."
He advanced and seated himself on the steps near the base of the
flag-pole, leaning heavily against it. The gay recklessness that is the
immediate effect of the fiery native brew of the North was evidently
wearing away, and preceding the oblivion that was fast coming upon
him, stray glimpses of his past, bits of things he had read or heard, and
snatches of poetry flashed on the screen of his mind.
"It doesn't go with me--Chief. Don't--bring on--your--little
forest--maiden--Naleenah--again. Tired--hearing about--her.
Know--what you say: Up here--my people--never know. Me--a squaw
man! Lord! What do I want--with--a squaw?" He laughed as at some
blurred vision of his brain. "It's not that--I'm so damned virtuous, Chief.
But I'm--fas-fas-tid-ious. That's it--fastidious----"
Paul Kilbuck's eyes flashed a cold steel grey. "We'll see how fastidious
you'll be a year from now." His lip lifted on one side exposing a long,
pointed tooth. "That'll be enough, now, Harlan."

"Sure, 's enough--for me, Chief," admitted the young man with drowsy
good nature, as his tousled head sought a more comfortable place
against the flagpole. "Pardon--casting aspersions--on your--taste in
women, Chief. Wouldn't do--it--if sober. Hate to be sober. Makes me
feel--re-responsible for so--many things. . . . Hence flowing bowl.
'Member old Omar--unborn Tomorrow and dead--Yesterday. . . . Why
fret 'bout it--if--if--today--be--sweet." His voice trailed off in a murmur
and his boyish chin with its look of firmness despite his dejection, sank
slowly on his breast.
The canoes had made a landing. A dozen or more Thlinget women
came straggling up the beach laden with the fruits of their afternoon
labors: gay-colored baskets of wild strawberries, red and fragrant from
the sand-dunes along the lagoon. From the Indian Village, a short
distance down the curve of the beach where the smokes of evening fires
were rising, a welcoming buck or two came to accompany the softly
laughing squaws.
Slightly in advance of the shawled figures moving toward the group on
the steps walked one whose slenderness and grace marked her from the
rest. A scarlet shawl splashed the cream of her garments. Unlike the
other women, she wore no disfiguring handkerchief on her head. Her
face, oval and creamy-brown, was framed by two thick braids that fell
over her shoulders. In the crook of her arm rested a basket of berries.
At her side, rubbing against her now and then, came a powerful huskie,
beautiful with the lean grace of the wolf and paw-playing as a kitten.
"Mush on,[1] Kobuk! Mush--you!" She laughed, pushing him aside