The Boy Scouts on the Yukon Part 3

At the same time he dropped the electric light, which promptly went out as the spring was released, and the hold was in darkness. Jack dared not move for fear of the hatchet, and all he could hear was the loud breathing of the terrified Monkey, who carefully began to grope for the lost lamp. The search was vain, and Jack was slowly backing away from the vicinity toward the ladder, intending to bar Monkey's egress when he heard a movement that seemed to indicate that Monkey was climbing up the piled-up freight. Then there were two loud blows with the hatchet on the deck above them which formed the floor of the steerage quarters.

Scarcely a minute pa.s.sed before a man with another electric light swarmed down the ladder, and Jack was in the hands of the powerful Dublin. At the same moment, Monkey dropped his hatchet and dashed past them to the ladder, where he hung like his simian namesake, calling shrilly for the night watchman. Jack made an effort to twist himself loose from the hands of Dublin, but in vain.

"What are ye doin' down here, ye thief? Tryin' to get at the cargo? Call the quartermaster there, Monkey."

Realizing the trap into which he had fallen, Jack made no further effort to release himself until he reached the deck above, when he jerked away from Dublin and faced the quartermaster and the watchman. There they were joined by Rae and some of the other steerage pa.s.sengers.

"Well, well; if it ain't one o' them boy Scouts; them amateur soldiers.

Where d'ye find him, Monkey?"

"I seen him hanging round this deck and when he slipped down in the hold with a hatchet and a 'lectric light. I followed him. He jumped onto me and I run back to the ladder and yelled for Dublin, and he come and got him."

"How about this, young feller?" asked the quartermaster. "What were you doin' down that hold this time o' night. Ain't ye one of Colonel Snow's party?"

"I am," said Jack, "and this man's story is a straightout falsehood. It was I who followed this boy down into the hold on information that I got"--

A burst of laughter from both Rae and Dublin interrupted Jack's story, and both men swore vehemently that Monkey had been in his berth up to a few minutes before he had called for Dublin. Jack, recognizing his folly in not having notified Colonel Snow and the Captain of the conspiracy, and also the way in which the tables had been turned upon him in his attempt to "go it alone," said:

"I will explain this thing to the Captain; I think he will understand it."

"I guess you'd better," said the puzzled quartermaster; "but we can't wake him up tonight. I'll see ye up to yer stateroom and you can explain in the morning. And you," he said, sharply, turning to Dublin and Monkey, "you be on hand with your story. Meantime," to the watchman, "put on that hatch cover and lock it."

As early the next morning as possible, Jack sought an interview with Col.

Snow and told him the whole story. The latter was greatly interested, but said plainly that Jack should not have undertaken to handle the matter by himself.

The Captain was not so easily pacified. He heard both stories and grinned quietly as both Rae and Dublin tried to make a hero out of Monkey.

"I've told you fellows you're too much in evidence on this boat and I don't want to hear anything more from you until we get to Skagway." Col.

Snow's intercession arranged matters for Jack but he did not get off any too easily.

"I haven't any doubt but that your story has a good foundation, but it would hardly go as evidence in a court of law, and even if the Colonel here thought it worth while, I don't suppose he cares to be bothered with a prosecution in courts that are three years behind with their cases. I shall take occasion to draw the attention of the authorities to this crowd, when we reach Skagway, however.

"I should like to say, however, that in a case like this, your first duty was to have informed me, and let me police my own boat. I am the superior officer here, as you know. I understand you belong to that excellent organization, the Boy Scouts, and if I am not mistaken, there is one little line in the ritual devoted to discipline. Good morning." And despite the rebuke which brought the flush to Jack's face, the captain smiled, and shook hands pleasantly.

The story could not be kept from the chums, who were rather inclined to resent Jack's failure to let them take a hand in the capture of Monkey Rae. They rallied Jack not a little on his grand effort at heroism and Rand even dug up an old schoolbook quotation about an engineer who had been hoist with his own petard. The boys took their disappointment out in various good natured gibes, and mock congratulations to "the Sherlock Holmes of the good steamer Queen" were a daily occurrence until the arrival at Ketchikan and new scenes drove the incident from the boys'

memories. It was to be recalled in much more serious form a little later.

CHAPTER IV.

ON ALASKAN SOIL.

The acquaintance between the Boy Scouts and Swift.w.a.ter Jim, which had begun with Rand's rescue of the old Klondiker, ripened before many days of the voyage had elapsed into something like warm friends.h.i.+p and the miner became a wellspring of joy to the young men in the wealth of adventure narrative that fell from his lips and the quiet humor of his views of life. His removal by Captain Huxley, to the saloon deck on which they were berthed, gave them constant opportunity for meeting him, and as the novelty of the scenery and surroundings gradually wore off, they turned more and more to his companions.h.i.+p and plied him incessantly with cross-examination as to the peculiarities of the new land which they were about to enter.

At one time in command of a whaler in Bering Sea waters, his s.h.i.+p had been one of six crushed in the ice of the Arctic sea, the crews of which had been forced to winter at Point Barrow, the most northerly point of the United States, where the government had established a whaling relief station.

The enormous burden thrown upon this relief station by the influx of so great a number of dependents coming from the whalers, who had no means of getting away, threatened starvation for all and only by the greatest good fortune did word reach the government at Was.h.i.+ngton, which at once took steps for their relief. Lieut. Jarvis of the Revenue Marine Service, who was in the east at the time on furlough, from his s.h.i.+p, a revenue cutter engaged in patroling Bering Sea to protect the seal fisheries, volunteered to make the effort to relieve the starving men, although he was leaving the bedside of a sick wife whom he might never see again. Bering Sea and the Arctic are frozen over six months at a time, and the relief expedition must be made over the frozen tundra and uninhabited snow waste, eighteen hundred miles in extent, from the Seward Peninsula to the "top of the continent," as Swift.w.a.ter Jim termed it.

The problem as to how to transport the food for these men over this great expanse of country, barren of trails and almost impa.s.sible in places, was solved by Lieutenant Jarvis and his aides. By a.s.sembling from the various reindeer stations which the government had established in the Far North, a large herd of reindeer which they drove the entire distance to Point Barrow, they arrived just in time to relieve the hundreds of men who were on the verge of starvation.

"I tell ye," said Swift.w.a.ter Jim, in telling the story to the boys, "I have never seen anything on earth since that looked so good as them deer.

There we was, a dirty, unsightly mob so near to death that we had lost about all resemblance to humanity, and not a single human feelin' left for each other. It was every man for himself and mighty little that he could do, then.

"That feller Jarvis was the man for the job. That relief expedition was received very much as I hear explorers are met by the savagest tribes of Africa, and if it hadn't been for the nerve of those three officers at the head of it, they would have lost their lives and the provision they had brought would not have lasted three weeks. But those fellows took command at once; headed off a mutiny, distributed the provisions daily and for months ran that gang, made up of the off-scourings of the seas, by reg'lar army discipline.

"For the months before the ice broke up, and vessels could come after us, he governed with a mighty stiff hand, and every man who was fed by government relief, and thay wan't nothin' else, was compelled to live up to regulations of cleanliness and daily exercise, which is the only thing that will save a man's health in that deadly Arctic climate where the bill o' fare is only about one line long, and a healthy body is the only thing that will save a man's mind from that deadly depression that ends in insanity. When the s.h.i.+ps come finally, that mob of whaler men was cleaner and healthier than they ever were in their lives before and they had a mighty lot of love and respect for Jarvis and the officers with him.

"It was about the biggest sacrifice a man ever made, that voluntary trip of Jarvis, and I believe that Congress, after thinkin' a long time about it finally acknowledged it by votin' him some kind of a medal. As for me I hain't been able to look a poor little reindeer in the face since."

With his vessel a splintered derelict in the ice of the Arctic sea, Swift.w.a.ter had taken to mining and had covered a good part of Alaska in his wanderings.

Col. Snow had noticed with considerable interest the growing intimacy between his young charges and the miner and had taken occasion himself to have several talks with the ancient "sourdough" as Swift.w.a.ter insisted on calling himself. The Colonel had found among the army officers returning to their posts in the North several old friends of his army days and had taken the opportunity to make some inquiries as to the miner with evidently satisfactory results. These army officers Col. Snow took occasion to introduce to the Boy Scouts and the element of courtesy that is a strong feature of the West Pointers' character showed itself in the consideration given the boys by these grizzled men, several of whom had won their spurs during Indian outbreaks in the West and later learned the stern demands of war in Cuba and the Philippines.

Their journey was enlivened by many a good story of camp and field and incidentally the officers evinced a strong curiosity in the organization of the Boy Scouts about which they asked many questions.

The day the "Queen" arrived at Ketchikan, the first port in Alaska, Col.

Snow, after starting the boys on a sightseeing trip through the town, put in some time in company with Swift.w.a.ter Jim in the office of the United States Commissioner, who is practically a local judge. When all had returned to the steamer that night, Col. Snow called the boys together in the big saloon of the vessel for a talk.

"You know," said the army officer, "that after I have seen you and the machinery disembarked in Skagway, I must leave you to carry out my mission to Controllers Bay and Valdez, and that I shall not be able to join you in the Yukon Country until later in the summer. It has been my purpose, of course, to place you in charge of a competent manager who will really command the expedition the rest of the way until the machinery is installed on the timber land that I intend to exploit. Of course you will be furnished with sufficient expert Indian labor to a.s.sist in navigating the streams over which this freight must be transported, for there are no roads, and water at this season of the year is the only transportation available. What do you think of Swift.w.a.ter Jim for commander-in-chief, guide, philosopher and friend to this expedition?"

"B-b-bully," exclaimed Pepper, adopting the vernacular of an ex-President.

"The very man for the place if I understand what we are to do," commented Rand.

"Faith, now we will see Alaska; and what we don't see, Swift.w.a.ter is the man to tell us about," cried the enthusiastic Gerald.

"Well, if we can get him," said the cautious Don, "there's n.o.body we'd like so well."

"I might as well tell you that it's all arranged," said the Colonel. "He was the best man I could find for the work I want done, and I took the first opportunity to arrange with him; but at the same time I am glad that you are all so well satisfied.

"I must have you understand that Swift.w.a.ter will be the leader of the party and in all things you will be under his direction. I do not think it will be necessary for me to tell you that the discipline will be perhaps a little more strict than it has been in the ranks of the patrol at home, and while it will not be on an unrestricted army basis, there will be some resemblance and I shall trust to your experience as Scouts to induce in you cheerful acquiescence."

"It will be something like a campaign then," suggested d.i.c.k.

"It will be a good deal like a campaign," smilingly replied the Colonel, "and while there will be much that is enjoyable and novel, there won't be much peaches and cream about it. Plunging into a wilderness as you must, you leave behind all the comforts and most of the sanitary safeguards of civilization, and it is absolutely necessary for the preservation of your health that you adopt certain rules of diet and comfort."

"Do we have to diet?" inquired Pepper, doubtfully, whose mind reverted to certain milk and porridge days, imposed after an orgy of green fruit and its consequent painful disturbances.

"I didn't use the word in the sense that you mean, Pepper," said Col.

Snow. "There will be plenty to eat and I hope well prepared, but you must govern yourself as to how you deal with it. Food in most parts of Alaska is a costly proposition, but I guess we shall have enough to go round unless the wild life increases your already healthy appet.i.tes."

"I hae ma doots," said Don, falling into his Gaelic-accented English, as he often did when he seemed to be wrestling with a problem, "if yon appet.i.te of Pepper's can increase much wi'out straining the capacity."

"Look after your own appet.i.te," said Pepper, growing red, "I read once in a book that four thousand years of oatmeal porridge, three times a day, had wiped out every appet.i.te and spoiled every stomach in Scotland."

"There, there," admonished Jack, "that'll be about all of that. You fellows are about even now. The smallest sort of an appet.i.te may prove to be an inconvenience before we get out of Alaska."