Chapter VIII: Heavenly Music

At noon of the fourth day after his setting-out, Gault’s messenger returned from Fort Good Hope driving several laden pack-horses before him. The horses were unpacked at the door of Blackburn’s House, and the goods carried in. From their windows opposite, Loseis and the four Marys full of curiosity, watched and speculated on the contents of the various packages. The natural consequence of Blackburn’s having forbidden all traffic across the height of land was that Fort Good Hope loomed in the imagination of his people as a sort of fabulous place. Anything might come from there.

By and by Gault was seen coming across the grass accompanied by a breed with a canvas duffle bag over his shoulder.

“More presents for you!” cried Mary-Lou clasping her hands.

Loseis permitted all the girls to be present while the bag was unpacked. Gault disregarded them. Thrusting his arm into the bag, he produced the various articles with a tender and proprietary smile upon Loseis. The Princess at such a moment was like any other young thing; breathless with anticipation, all her difficulties and dangers forgotten. First came several packages of novels, and an exclamation of pleasure escaped her. Novels had been forbidden her; and she had had no more than tantalizing tastes of their contents in the installments appearing in the magazines which drifted to Blackburn’s Post from time to time. Next came boxes of chocolates and other candies specially packed in tin. Next bottles of perfumes of various sorts, and boxes of strongly-scented soaps. As soon as Gault was out of the way, Loseis distributed these amongst her hand-maids. Next a box of elegant writing paper; pink, with gold edges.

“For you to write to me upon when I am gone,” said Gault with his fond smile.

(May that be soon! thought Loseis.) Aloud she said: “How pretty!”

The most astonishing present came, as was most fitting, from the bottom of the bag. From a little card-board box Gault took a shining nickel cube, having a sort of cup at one end, covered with glass. When you pressed a spring in the cube, light most miraculously appeared behind the glass. Loseis took it gingerly in her hands, gazing at it with wide and wondering eyes. The four red girls drew back, a little afraid.

“Of course you can’t get the full effect of it until dark,” said Gault.

“This is the electric light of which I have read,” said Loseis in a hushed voice. “How strange and beautiful!”

“There’s a box of extra batteries when it gives out,” said the trader.

Batteries meant nothing to Loseis. The gleaming torch had laid a spell upon her imagination. She switched it on and off. How strange, how strange this little light that she summoned and dismissed with a touch of her finger, like a fairy servant!

“If you went through the Slavi village some night with that in your hand it would create a sensation,” said Gault laughing.

His laughter jarred on Loseis. “No use frightening them for nothing,” she said. “I might need it some time.”

In the beginning it would have irked Loseis very much to receive these presents from Gault, but now she felt no qualms. He is counting on getting it back many times over, she thought.

During the course of the afternoon, Loseis and her girls were astonished to see Gault’s men climbing to the roof of Blackburn’s House. Alongside the chimney they affixed a tall pole. When it was up, wires were strung from it to the top of the flagpole in the middle of the little plaza. Loseis’ curiosity could no longer contain itself. She went across to ask what they were doing.

“Wait until to-night,” said Gault, smiling. “You are dining with me to-night. Afterwards there is to be a surprise.”

That dinner was full of new things for Loseis. A crowning touch was supplied by a potted geranium in the center of the table, bearing three scarlet blossoms. Never before had that flower bloomed at Blackburn’s Post. A cry of admiration broke from Loseis.

“The parson’s sister sent it to you with her compliments,” said the trader. “She has them blooming all winter in her parlor.”

Loseis’ heart suddenly went out to this unknown sister of her own color. “What is she like?” she asked shyly.

“Oh, just what you’d expect a parson’s sister to be,” he said indifferently.

The food was strange to Loseis; but for the most part highly agreeable. First there was a queer, spicy soup. Mulligatawney, Gault called it, and Loseis laughed at the ridiculous-sounding word. It must have come out of a can, she reflected. This was followed by a great roast of beef which is extraordinarily esteemed as an article of food up North, simply because it is so hard to come by. (“A steer was slaughtered at Fort Good Hope expressly for you,” said Gault to Loseis with a bow.) With the roast beef were served potatoes and stewed tomatoes, both novel dishes at Blackburn’s Post. For dessert came on a plum pudding, likewise out of a can; and this Loseis considered the best thing she had ever tasted. There were, besides, small dishes containing olives which the guest did not like; and salted almonds which she did.

Pride forbade Loseis to betray any further curiosity concerning the “surprise” but with every mouthful she took, she was thrillingly conscious of an oblong box that rested on a small table at the side of the room, covered by a cloth. That must be the surprise of course. It had a most exciting shape.

After the table had been cleared, Gault sought to tease her, by lighting up his cigar in leisurely fashion, while he talked of indifferent matters. But he didn’t get any change out of Loseis, who sat quietly with her hands in her lap, looking at the fire.

Finally he said: “Wouldn’t you like to know what is under that cloth?”

“Whenever you are ready,” said Loseis politely.

Gault laughed, and jerked the cloth away. Loseis beheld a beautiful box of a polished red wood, having in the front of it several curious black knobs with indicators and dials above them. The whole apparatus was suggestive of magic. Gault began to turn the knobs, and Loseis, holding her breath, prepared herself for anything to happen; red and green flames perhaps, with a Jinn springing up in the middle.

When it came, it let her down suddenly from that awful suspense. It was not startling at all, but sweet. Music mysteriously filled the room, coming, not from that box, but from an unknown source. It melted the heart with its sweetness. It resembled the music of a violin with which Loseis was familiar, but infinitely fuller and richer, with strange, deep undertones that caused delicious shivers to run up the girl’s spine.

“Oh, what is it? What is it?” she murmured.

“Music from Heaven,” said Gault grinning.

For a moment she believed him. Closing her eyes, she gave herself up to the entrancing sounds. It was too beautiful, too beautiful to be of this earth. Yet it was not strange; it seemed like something she had always been waiting for; it satisfied a longing. It caused her to think of her father and of her lover. The thoughts of death and of love became intermingled in her mind, intolerably sweet and bitter. The tears swelled under her eyelids.

Then Gault destroyed the spell that he himself had evoked. “It’s coming through fine, to-night,” he remarked to Moale. “No interference.”

Loseis dropped down to earth. A recollection came to her. “It is the radio,” she said quietly. “I have read of that, too.”

It was a music of many voices, now loud, now soft; one voice then another spoke above them all; then all were raised together. Shrill, merry voices running up and down like laughter; voices as plaintive as the laughter of loons at dusk; deep, sonorous voices that suggested courage and endurance. Loseis tried in vain to pick out the tune. It had a meaning; but one could not grasp it. It was like listening to the whole world.

“What makes such music?” she whispered.

“Orchestra,” he said.

Loseis had met with this word in books; but she did not know the meaning. She would not ask.

“A whole crowd of instruments together,” said Gault. “Little fiddles, medium size fiddles, and big fiddles; wooden horns and brass horns of every size and shape; and a row of drums.”

“Where is it coming from?” she asked.

“From the station in Calgary.”

Loseis was lifted up on the wings of wonder again. From Calgary! A thousand miles away! She visualized the long ten miles ride to the Lake; and tried to imagine a hundred times ten miles. It was too much; the mind could not take it in. She thought of the night outside, and suddenly it became clear to her why the silence of Northern nights was so profoundly disturbing. It was not a silence at all; the night was full of these voices from all over the world, winging through the sky, and the heart was sensible to them, though the ears were deaf.

“How do you do it? How do you do it?” murmured Loseis.

“Oh, it would take old Marconi to explain that,” said the trader laughing.

Ah! will Paul and I ever listen to such music together? thought Loseis.

The music came to an end. After a pause a man began to speak. This affected Loseis even more strangely than the music. A man speaking to them in a quiet, friendly voice, as if he was there beside them! And he was not there. A spirit was amongst them without its body. Awe gripped Loseis. She shivered, and looked over her shoulder. Gault watching her, chuckled, and she shrank sharply into herself again.

The man was giving a humorous account of how he went with his wife to buy a hat. He spoke of the crowds of people in the streets, and the gayly decorated shop windows. Loseis was too much filled with wonder of the voice to pay heed to the story. He said: “I met her at the Palliser Hotel this afternoon.” Yet he was a thousand miles away! He said: “I took her into the restaurant, and when she said she wasn’t hungry, I prepared myself for the worst.” Gault and Moale laughed, and Loseis looked at them in surprise. A thousand miles! A thousand miles.

It was a jolly, friendly voice that reassured the child’s heart of Loseis. And it was clear that he was speaking to others whom he knew to be as honest and kind as himself. Loseis had a sudden vision of the populous, kindly world lying outside, and her breast yearned over it. The friendly voice seemed to bring her so close, to admit her to that world. But a realization of her loneliness swept over her. There was that thousand miles of prairie, muskeg and forest lying between. Alone! Alone! worse than alone, for she was hedged about with false and lying men who wished her ill. Ah! If she could only communicate with the honest people, they would not let her come to harm. Drawn quite out of herself, Loseis rose to her feet, stretching out her arms.

“Oh, if I could only speak to him!” she murmured.

Gault laughed heartily. “That would require a whole transmitting station,” he said. “Quite a different matter from getting it.”

Loseis dropped back in her chair. She glanced at the trader with involuntary dislike. What a coarse animal under his fine manners! she thought.

When the concert came to an end, Gault said: “To-morrow night, we’ll get the Slavis into the kitchen, and spring it on them,” he said laughing. “Lordy! what a scatteration there will be!”

Loseis got up to go. “You will do what you like, of course,” she said coldly. “But do not expect me to come.”

“But why?” asked the surprised Gault.

“It’s a beautiful, wonderful thing,” said Loseis, looking wistfully at the red box. “I should not care to see it made a mock of.”

“Oh, well, in that case,” said Gault quickly, “no Slavis! I brought this over solely to give you pleasure, Princess!”