Chapter XII: FUR

Quite early in the morning, Loseis, issuing out of her house, was greatly astonished to see the door of the little fur warehouse standing open, and the bales of fur being carried out by Gault’s Crees. This warehouse flanked the store on the left hand side as you faced the river; on the other side there was a similar building for the storage of flour. Loseis’ breast grew hot at the sight; and without more ado, she marched across. Gault was not in sight; Moale was directing the Crees.

“What does this mean?” demanded Loseis.

Moale turned his flat, inscrutable black eyes to the girl’s face. The dash of Indian blood lent a touch of mystery to Moale’s olive face. It was a comely face; but so expressionless it was impossible to tell the man’s age. “I beg your pardon?” he said in his pleasant voice.

“You heard me!” said Loseis in a passion. “By what authority have you broken into my warehouse, and helped yourself to my fur?”

It was quite true that Moale had opened one of the bales for no reason except the pleasure of seeing and stroking the marvelous pelts of the black foxes. He was a connoisseur. He said smoothly: “Mr. Gault’s orders, Miss. I thought you knew.”

“I did not know,” said Loseis, “and I will trouble you to have the fur carried back again, and the door locked.”

Moale scratched his head. “I’d be glad if you’d talk it over with Mr. Gault,” he said.

Loseis imperiously beckoned to the nearest Cree. “Man!” she said, “tell Gault that I would be glad to have a few words with him.”

While they waited for Gault, Moale busied himself with tying up the opened bale. He did not speak; but he looked at Loseis curiously and wistfully, when she was not aware of it.

Gault was presently to be seen approaching from the men’s house. He did not hurry himself. “Good morning,” he said, raising his hat. His manner had changed. He was still polite, but it was an insolent politeness. His eyes were as hard as glass.

Loseis welcomed the change. It permitted her to come out into the open. “Why did you give orders to get out my fur?” she asked.

“It must be sent outside without further delay,” said Gault coolly.

“Am I not to be consulted?” asked Loseis, running up her eye-brows.

“It did not seem worth while to do so,” said Gault. “You have set yourself in opposition to me at every point. Just the same I have a responsibility towards you that I am obliged to fulfill.”

“I am the mistress here,” said Loseis in a rage.

“You are not of age,” said Gault coolly.

“Well, you are not my guardian!”

“No. But whoever may take your affairs in charge, will look to me as the only man on the spot, for an accounting. If the fur is not sent out at once you would lose the market for an entire season.”

Loseis turned away biting her lip. Whenever he began to talk in this vein with glib use of legal and business terms, she was helpless. Her instinct told her that he was merely cloaking his evil intentions in smooth words, but she had not experience enough to be able to strike through to the truth.

“Besides,” Gault went on, “if we do not get the fur to the Crossing, Gruber will get tired of waiting for it.”

Loseis caught at this. “So,” she said, “you are sending it to Gruber, then?”

“I expect to,” said Gault cautiously, “but I must reserve myself full freedom of action. He has got to satisfy me that he can dispose of it to the best advantage of your interests.”

“When does it go?” asked Loseis.

“To-morrow morning.”

“By the usual route?”

“No. I am sending it to Fort Good Hope; and thence by my launch to the Crossing.”

Loseis felt that here was a point she could stick on. “I would rather have it go by pack train as usual, direct to the Crossing over the prairie,” she said.

“That would take two weeks longer.”

“Just the same, I request you to send it in that manner.”

“I must decline.”

The red flags flew in Loseis’ cheeks. “You have said that it was my fur,” she said. “Very well, I order you to send it out as I desire.”

Gault, cool and hard; frankly enjoying the spectacle of her anger, said: “And I decline to do so.”

Loseis observing that she was furnishing him with enjoyment, contrived by a miracle to control herself. “Thank you very much,” she said coolly. “I was just trying to find out where I stood. Shall you accompany the consignment?”

“No,” said Gault darkly, “I remain here to look after you.”

Loseis bowed, and marched back to her own house. Gault looked after her, rubbing his lip. His thin mouth was twisted with anger and bitterness. By God! there was a spirit in the girl! Never had she seemed so desirable to him as at that moment. Moale too, looked after her with a deep wistfulness in his mysterious eyes. The tang of red blood cut him off from any hopes in that direction.

Loseis put her feet down like a little princess; but her eyes were stinging with tears. She conducted an orderly retreat, while her heart was bursting with mortification. It was intolerable to be so proud and so helpless. Helpless! Helpless! Her sex, her loneliness, her ignorance delivered her three times over into the power of this man. She was certain now that he intended to rob her, and she could do nothing!

During the whole day the preparations went on. The pack-saddles were got out; and the fur was divided into lots of a suitable size for a horse load. Gault sent Moale to the Women’s House with a polite message requesting Loseis to come to the store to issue the necessary grub. She proudly handed over the key, telling them to take what they required, and leave a memorandum of it.

In the afternoon the horses were rounded up. As many were put into the corral as it would hold, and the rest picketed in the square. Upwards of seventy horses were required for the entire outfit. To make any sort of progress between twelve and fifteen men would be needed to pack and unpack the horses twice a day. Moale and two of the Crees were going, while the other two remained to wait upon Gault. Loseis observed that Ahchoogah, Mittahgah and others of the Slavis who had accompanied the fur train on other years, were working willingly enough with the horses. This started a train of thought in her mind.

Gault is too strong for me, she told herself; why shouldn’t I trick him if I can?

With the passing of danger, the three Slavi girls had come sidling back into the kitchen of the Women’s House, and Loseis indifferently took them in, partly because she was accustomed to having them wait on her; and partly because they furnished a useful link with the Slavi village below. She now called Mary-Belle to her.

“Can it be true,” she asked, “that Ahchoogah, Mittahgah, and other men are going to Fort Good Hope? That place is dangerous for Slavi men.”

“Wah! they would not go to that place!” said Mary-Belle with a look of terror. “There is bad medicine in that place! Gault has said if they will drive the horses as far as the red spring, the water of which makes men and horses sick and well again, he will give each man a Stetson hat and a mouth-organ. Blackburn never had mouth-organs in his store. The red spring is half way between the two rivers. Gault says for the Slavis to leave the horses there and come home. Musqua (one of the Crees) is riding fast to bring the Crees from Fort Good Hope. Moale and Watusk (the other Cree) will watch the horses and the fur at the red spring until they come. So there is no harm.”

Loseis let the subject drop.

After supper, choosing a moment when she believed that Gault and Moale were still at the table, she went over to the store. Fastening the door behind her, she climbed through the back window, and making her way down to the creek shore, followed it down to the Slavi village. Of course if Gault happened to look out of the end window of his house, he could see her amongst the Slavis; but then it would be too late to interfere with her purpose.

The air was still full of a pleasant warmth, and the Slavis having just eaten, were squatting in groups outside the tepees, laughing and chatting in their ceremonious way. It is only in the presence of a white man that the Indian is taciturn. By this time the men had thrown off the alcoholic poison which had made them sick for days, and a general feeling of well-being was in the air. Fathers fondled their little sons, and abused their womenfolk; and the latter accepted it with equanimity.

At the approach of Loseis a dread silence fell upon them, and they drew a walled look over their dark faces. It was the first time she had visited them since that terrible night, and they expected the worst. But Loseis was bent on playing a part to-night. Her face was as smooth as their own, and much blander. Allowing them to suppose that she had forgotten what had happened, she addressed this one and that by name with grave politeness; promised a mother medicine for her sick child, and handed out peppermint lozenges to the little boys who were the idols of the tribe. Nobody would have thought of giving the little girls candy.

Loseis sat down on an overturned dug-out, with the manner of one who is prepared to hold agreeable discourse. The Slavis began to gather round, but always with that absurd pretense of not letting their left hands know what their right hands were doing. Loseis was very wonderful to them, too wonderful to inspire affection; awe was nearer the word.

At first she talked of the stage of water in the river; the promise of a full crop of berries; the scarcity of rabbit; all subjects of first-rate importance to the Slavis. Ahchoogah, the oldest man present, in order to prove how bold he was, undertook to answer her politely to her face. When Loseis perceived that she had gathered the audience she wanted, she went on casually:

“The wind is from the setting sun. There will be no rain. It is well. The men who are going to-morrow will see Fort Good Hope in five sleeps.”

A tremor of uneasiness passed through her listeners. “No, no!” said Ahchoogah. “We are not going to Fort Good Hope. At the red spring we will turn back.”

“That is Gault’s talk,” said Loseis courteously. “All know that Gault’s talk hides a snare. When you get to the red spring you will not want to turn back. Gault’s medicine will draw you on. It is very strong medicine. It’s name is electricity. I know it, because Gault brought me a little piece of it when he came here. The girls at my house have told you that. It opens its eye in the dark.”

Loseis paused to allow this to sink in. She fancied that she perceived fear behind the blank masks of the Slavis; but could not be sure. None spoke.

“I have heard of many strange things at Fort Good Hope,” she went on with an air of indifference that the Slavis could not outdo. “Men say that Gault is Old Man’s partner. Old Man say to Gault; I lend you my strong medicine, but when you die you must be a dog to my sledge. Gault thinks he will cheat Old Man, by going away to the white man’s country to die. Maybe so. I do not know such things. I hear them told.”

She paused again. The men looked down their noses. A woman crept to Loseis’ feet, and twitched her skirt.

“Loseis, tell my son not to go,” she said tremulously.

“If he wants to go, what is that to me?” said Loseis with an air of surprise. “He will see strange things. When Gault claps his hands—Wah! there is light. Gault catches the voices of the air on his wires and brings them into his room. He did that in my father’s house and I made him stop, because I did not want the Powerful Ones to fix their eyes on me! Etzooah has told you these things. At Fort Good Hope Gault keeps great beasts fastened to the earth. They have fire in their bellies and they do his bidding. When they open their mouths you can see the fire, and steam hisses through their nostrils as from many kettles in one. When they are hungry they scream so that a man falls flat on the ground to hear it. These fiery beasts eat men too, and Gault is always worried because he has no men to spare. So he is glad when strangers come to Fort Good Hope.”

Loseis rose, feeling that she could hardly better this conclusion. She held out her hand in turn to Ahchoogah, to Mittahgah, to Mahtsonza and the others there that she knew were going next day. “Good-by. . . . Good-by. You are good hunters. You bring me plenty of fur. I am sorry that you go.”

She returned home. It was impossible to tell how the Slavis would react next day; but she had done her best.

* * * * *

Early next morning Loseis was at her window. Nothing was changed. The horses were still picketed in the square; and the Crees were lounging about the doorway of the men’s house. The lordly Crees had no notion of bestirring themselves while there were Slavis to do the hard work. By and by Gault appeared in the doorway, and with vigorous pantomime of anger evidently demanded to know why nothing had been started. He was told; whereupon Etzooah was dispatched down to the Slavi village in a hurry.

From the other window Loseis watched Etzooah haranguing the Slavis, and expostulating with them. It was all in vain. He was finally obliged to return cringing to Gault, shrugging, spreading out his hands in significant by-play. Gault’s face turned black, and he aimed a furious kick at Etzooah, that the wily redskin dodged. Gault went inside; while Etzooah slipped around the house. Gault reappeared carrying an ugly quirt. Summoning his Crees with a jerk of the head, he set off down the rise. The tall redskins followed with cruel grins of anticipation.

Back at the end window, Loseis saw the miserable little Slavis driven like sheep by the five tall men. But sheep were never used so brutally. The sneaking Etzooah, reappearing from the creek-bed, pointed out the wanted ones, who were driven up the rise with incontinent kicks and cuffs, and the furious lashing of the whip. Squeezing their bodies together to offer as small a mark as possible, the diminutive savages darted this way and that, to find that they could only escape punishment by running straight ahead. The Crees yelled with laughter. The Slavis, cowering, made haste to start packing the horses, and Loseis made up her mind that she had lost.

Oscillating between the two windows, she presently saw that the Slavis below were striking their tepees, and piling everything pell-mell into the canoes, and she took heart again. She knew the Slavis better than Gault did. Either Gault did not notice what the people were about, or he disdained them. There was no interference with them. They presently set off in a cloud up-river, paddling as if the devil were behind them. So precipitate was their departure that a small boy who had gone down amongst the willows to set muskrat snares, returned to find his village wiped off the flat. After prowling around to see if by chance any scraps of food had been overlooked, the child set off composedly up-river by the horse-track.

Soon afterwards Loseis perceived that Gault was having trouble with his gang. In the process of saddling the pack-horses, some of the Slavis had disappeared. The four Crees were sent off in different directions to round them up. This was a fatal move, because Gault and Moale could not possibly watch all the others, and Etzooah would always play double. The Slavis, on their part, have an uncanny faculty of choosing the moment when no eye is upon them to fade away silently: to slip behind a building, to roll down the creek bank, to lose themselves in the bush of the hillside. In spite of Gault’s whip, and his terrible voice, his crew literally melted away before his eyes. After making long detours, they would rejoin their people somewhere above. Even weakness is not without its resources.

When the Crees returned empty-handed, the Slavis were reduced to five. These were all but surrounded; nevertheless, it was presently discovered that there were but four, without anybody being able to say what had become of the fifth. In any case it would have been impossible for such a small number of men to pack and unpack seventy horses twice a day. Gault gave up. The remaining Slavis were dismissed with kicks, and the trader, doubtless in a hellish rage, strode back to his house. Near the door, the grinning Etzooah spoke to him. For an instant Gault showed a murderous face in Loseis’ direction; then went inside. Loseis experienced a feeling of the sweetest triumph.

However, within an hour, two of the Crees with their bedding and grub set off on the easterly trail, and her heart sunk again. In four or five days they would be back with a swarm of Crees from Fort Good Hope. What good would four days do her? She had only succeeded in prolonging the agony.

Seeing the last of their people disappear, the Slavi girls exhibited the frantic, unreasoning fear of half-broken horses deserted by the herd. Loseis scornfully let them go. They slipped around behind the Women’s House, and were not seen again.

The pack-horses had been turned out again; and the fur carried back into the little warehouse. The lock of the warehouse had been forced out of respect to Gault’s pretense that the key was sealed up in Blackburn’s desk, and no other lock was put on. The door was held shut by a propped pole.

Meanwhile Gault had not returned the key to the store; and after waiting a few hours, Loseis sent Mary-Lou across the square with a polite request for it. The girl returned without it, and bearing a message equally polite, to the effect that henceforward Gault would relieve Miss Blackburn of the trouble of attending upon the store. Until her duly constituted representative arrived, he would administer it together with the rest of her property.

Loseis was never the one to take this lying down. She instantly marched over to the store. The door was fastened with a padlock through staples. Loseis bethought herself that there were crow-bars somewhere about the post. However she found an easier way. Gault had overlooked the fact that the little back window was out. Loseis climbed through, and obtaining a file and a new lock from the store, returned to the front of the building and set to work. It was a long job in her inexperienced hands; but she was supported by the agreeable thought that Gault was watching her. By the end of the afternoon she found herself inside. Putting in the rear window, she fastened the new lock, and returned to her house to supper dangling the keys from thumb and forefinger.

After supper Moale came over. Loseis received him at the outer door. Whatever his private feelings may have been did not appear. He said in an impassive voice:

“Mr. Gault instructs me to say that you and your girl must prepare to go out to Fort Good Hope when the fur goes in four or five days’ time. He can no longer take the responsibility of keeping you here while the Slavis are in open rebellion.”

Loseis laughed scornfully. “He can always find respectable-sounding words, can’t he?” she said. “You’re a white man, aren’t you? I should think you would feel ashamed to be the carrier of such lying words.”

Moale’s face changed not a muscle. Some secret feeling made him proof against her scorn. He was not altogether white. He had not looked directly in her face.

Loseis’ temper got the better of her. “You tell Gault, I shan’t go!” she cried.

In his even voice Moale said: “I am instructed to say that Mr. Gault is prepared for that.”

Loseis shut the door.

During the hours that followed she walked up and down her room, half beside herself with balked rage. What possible answer was there to this latest threat of Gault’s. He had hinted at using force. He intended to lay hands on her. To Loseis’ flaming blood there were only two possible answers: to kill herself or to kill Gault. The first alternative she immediately rejected; that was the counsel of weakness. Nothing would please Gault better than for her to kill herself. She would kill Gault then, before he should lay hands on her. But ah! _dared_ she take the life of a white man? She had had so vivid an experience of death taking a man in his strength.

Besides there were three other men. She could not hope to shoot them all before she was seized. She would be carried out anyhow. She visualized the horrors of a trial of which she knew so little; she imagined the cloud of lies that would beat her down. She had no one to speak for her but Mary-Lou; and Mary-Lou would never be allowed to speak. And if she were, the simple red girl would be struck dumb with terror. Disgraced! Disgraced! thought Loseis. Parted from Conacher without hope in this life. She buried her face in her hands. I must not kill him! she thought in terror. I must not let myself kill him. . . . But how can I help it if he lays hands on me!

If Gault had come over without warning to seize her, Loseis would have snatched up a gun, and shot him without thinking about it. But with devilish cunning he had sent to tell her of his intention. He was giving her four days in which to go mad with trying to find a way out when there was none.

Mary-Lou was terrified by the expression on her mistress’ face. She held out her arms imploringly. “Please . . . please to go to bed,” she whispered. “You will sleep. To-morrow you feel better.”

“Sleep!” cried Loseis. “I shall never sleep again!”

“Please . . . please,” persisted Mary-Lou. “Please stop walking.”

“Go to bed, you,” said Loseis angrily. “Let me be by myself. Close the door after you.”

Mary-Lou went sadly out.

Loseis pressed her knuckles against her temples. I must be quiet! she told herself. I must think what I am doing! . . . Quiet! The only thing that would quiet me would be to go across and call him to the door and shoot him! Ah, then I could sleep! . . . I must not think such things! I must not! I must always be telling myself it would not end things to kill him; it would only begin worse things! . . . But what is the use? I know I shall suddenly kill him! If he lays hands on me! . . . If I were a man he would not dare! She flung her arms above her head. “O God! why didn’t you make me a man! It is too hard to be a girl!”

* * * * *

It had been dark for some time. To-night the silence was even more complete, for no child whimpered in the tepees, and no Slavi dog barked. Loseis was pulled up all standing by hearing a gentle tapping on the glass of the window alongside the kitchen door. These nights the inside shutters were always closed. She instinctively flew to her gun which was standing in the corner; but put it down again, smiling scornfully at herself. It was not in this manner that an attack would be made.

Returning to the window, she said firmly: “Who is there?”

A whisper came winging back: “Conacher.”

Loseis’ heart failed her; her legs wavered under her; she struggled to get her breath. Then in a flash life and joy came crowding back until she felt as if she would burst. She clapped a hand over her mouth to hold in the rising scream of joy. Gault must not know! “Oh, Paul! . . . Oh, Paul!” she murmured, fumbling blindly for the latch of the door.