Smoke Bellew by Jack London (chrome ebook reader txt) đ
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âGood-bye, avuncular,â he said.
John Bellew looked at him and swore in his surprise.
âDonât forget, my nameâs Smoke,â Kit chided.
âBut what are you going to do?â
Kit waved his hand in a general direction northward over the storm-lashed lake.
âWhatâs the good of turning back after getting this far?â he asked. âBesides, Iâve got my taste of meat, and I like it. Iâm going on.â
âYouâre broke,â protested John Bellew. âYou have no outfit.â
âIâve got a job. Behold your nephew, Christopher Smoke Bellew! Heâs got a job! Heâs a gentlemanâs man! Heâs got a job at a hundred and fifty per month and grub. Heâs going down to Dawson with a couple of dudes and another gentlemanâs manâcamp-cook, boatman, and general all-around hustler. And OâHara and The Billow can go to the devil. Good-bye.â
But John Bellew was dazed, and could only mutter: âI donât understand.â
âThey say the baldface grizzlies are thick in the Yukon Basin,â Kit explained. âWell, Iâve got only one suit of underclothes, and Iâm going after the bear-meat, thatâs all.â
II. THE MEAT
Half the time the wind blew a gale, and Smoke Bellew staggered against it along the beach. In the gray of dawn a dozen boats were being loaded with the precious outfits packed across Chilkoot. They were clumsy, home-made boats, put together by men who were not boat-builders, out of planks they had sawed by hand from green spruce-trees. One boat, already loaded, was just starting, and Kit paused to watch.
The wind, which was fair down the lake, here blew in squarely on the beach, kicking up a nasty sea in the shallows. The men of the departing boat waded in high rubber boots as they shoved it out toward deeper water. Twice they did this. Clambering aboard and failing to row clear, the boat was swept back and grounded. Kit noticed that the spray on the sides of the boat quickly turned to ice. The third attempt was a partial success. The last two men to climb in were wet to their waists, but the boat was afloat. They struggled awkwardly at the heavy oars, and slowly worked off shore. Then they hoisted a sail made of blankets, had it carry away in a gust, and were swept a third time back on the freezing beach.
Kit grinned to himself and went on. This was what he must expect to encounter, for he, too, in his new role of gentlemanâs man, was to start from the beach in a similar boat that very day.
Everywhere men were at work, and at work desperately, for the closing down of winter was so imminent that it was a gamble whether or not they would get across the great chain of lakes before the freeze-up. Yet, when Kit arrived at the tent of Messrs. Sprague and Stine, he did not find them stirring.
By a fire, under the shelter of a tarpaulin, squatted a short, thick man smoking a brown-paper cigarette.
âHello,â he said. âAre you Mister Spragueâs new man?â
As Kit nodded, he thought he had noted a shade of emphasis on the MISTER and the MAN, and he was sure of a hint of a twinkle in the corner of the eye.
âWell, Iâm Doc Stineâs man,â the other went on. âIâm five feet two inches long, and my nameâs Shorty, Jack Short for short, and sometimes known as Johnny-on-the-Spot.â
Kit put out his hand and shook. âWere you raised on bear-meat?â he queried.
âSure,â was the answer; âthough my first feedinâ was buffalo-milk as near as I can remember. Sit down anâ have some grub. The bosses ainât turned out yet.â
And despite the one breakfast, Kit sat down under the tarpaulin and ate a second breakfast thrice as hearty. The heavy, purging toil of weeks had given him the stomach and appetite of a wolf. He could eat anything, in any quantity, and be unaware that he possessed a digestion. Shorty he found voluble and pessimistic, and from him he received surprising tips concerning their bosses and ominous forecasts of the expedition. Thomas Stanley Sprague was a budding mining engineer and the son of a millionaire. Doctor Adolph Stine was also the son of a wealthy father. And, through their fathers, both had been backed by an investing syndicate in the Klondike adventure.
âOh, theyâre sure made of money,â Shorty expounded. âWhen they hit the beach at Dyea, freight was seventy cents, but no Indians. There was a party from Eastern Oregon, real miners, thatâd managed to get a team of Indians together at seventy cents. Indians had the straps on the outfit, three thousand pounds of it, when along comes Sprague and Stine. They offered eighty cents and ninety, and at a dollar a pound the Indians jumped the contract and took off their straps. Sprague and Stine came through, though it cost them three thousand, and the Oregon bunch is still on the beach. They wonât get through till next year.
âOh, they are real hummers, your boss and mine, when it comes to sheddinâ the mazuma anâ never mindinâ other folksâ feelinâs. What did they do when they hit Linderman? The carpenters was just putting in the last licks on a boat theyâd contracted to a âFrisco bunch for six hundred. Sprague and Stine slipped âem an even thousand, and they jumped their contract. Itâs a good-lookinâ boat, but itâs jiggered the other bunch. Theyâve got their outfit right here, but no boat. And theyâre stuck for next year.
âHave another cup of coffee, and take it from me that I wouldnât travel with no such outfit if I didnât want to get to Klondike so blamed bad. They ainât hearted right. Theyâd take the crape off the door of a house in mourning if they needed it in their business. Did you sign a contract?â
Kit shook his head.
âThen Iâm sorry for you, pardner. They ainât no grub in the country, and theyâll drop you cold as soon as they hit Dawson. Men are going to starve there this winter.â
âThey agreedââ Kit began.
âVerbal,â Shorty snapped him short. âItâs your say-so against theirs, thatâs all. Well, anyway, whatâs your name, pardner?â
âCall me Smoke,â said Kit.
âWell, Smoke, youâll have a run for your verbal contract just the same. This is a plain sample of what to expect. They can sure shed mazuma, but they canât work, or turn out of bed in the morning. We should have been loaded and started an hour ago. Itâs you anâ me for the big work. Pretty soon youâll hear âem shoutinâ for their coffeeâin bed, mind you, and them grown men. What dâye know about boatinâ on the water? Iâm a cowman and a prospector, but Iâm sure tenderfooted on water, anâ they donât know punkins. What dâye know?â
âSearch me,â Kit answered, snuggling in closer under the tarpaulin as the snow whirled before a fiercer gust. âI havenât been on a small boat since a boy. But I guess we can learn.â
A corner of the tarpaulin tore loose, and Shorty received a jet of driven snow down the back of his neck.
âOh, we can learn all right,â he muttered wrathfully. âSure we can. A child can learn. But itâs dollars to doughnuts we donât even get started to-day.â
It was eight oâclock when the call for coffee came from the tent, and nearly nine before the two employers emerged.
âHello,â said Sprague, a rosy-cheeked, well-fed young man of twenty-five. âTime we made a start, Shorty. You andââ Here he glanced interrogatively at Kit. âI didnât quite catch your name last evening.â
âSmoke.â
âWell, Shorty, you and Mr. Smoke had better begin loading the boat.â
âPlain Smokeâcut out the Mister,â Kit suggested.
Sprague nodded curtly and strolled away among the tents, to be followed by Doctor Stine, a slender, pallid young man.
Shorty looked significantly at his companion. âOver a ton and a half of outfit, and they wonât lend a hand. Youâll see.â
âI guess itâs because weâre paid to do the work,â Kit answered cheerfully, âand we might as well buck in.â
To move three thousand pounds on the shoulders a hundred yards was no slight task, and to do it in half a gale, slushing through the snow in heavy rubber boots, was exhausting. In addition, there was the taking down of the tent and the packing of small camp equipage. Then came the loading. As the boat settled, it had to be shoved farther and farther out, increasing the distance they had to wade. By two oâclock it had all been accomplished, and Kit, despite his two breakfasts, was weak with the faintness of hunger. His knees were shaking under him. Shorty, in similar predicament, foraged through the pots and pans, and drew forth a big pot of cold boiled beans in which were imbedded large chunks of bacon. There was only one spoon, a long-handled one, and they dipped, turn and turn about, into the pot. Kit was filled with an immense certitude that in all his life he had never tasted anything so good.
âLord, man,â he mumbled between chews, âI never knew what appetite was till I hit the trail.â
Sprague and Stine arrived in the midst of this pleasant occupation.
âWhatâs the delay?â Sprague complained. âArenât we ever going to get started?â
Shorty dipped in turn, and passed the spoon to Kit. Nor did either speak till the pot was empty and the bottom scraped.
âOf course we ainât been doinâ nothing,â Shorty said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. âWe ainât been doinâ nothing at all. And of course you ainât had nothing to eat. It was sure careless of me.â
âYes, yes,â Stine said quickly. âWe ate at one of the tentsâ friends of ours.â
âThought so,â Shorty grunted.
âBut now that youâre finished, let us get started,â Sprague urged.
âThereâs the boat,â said Shorty. âSheâs sure loaded. Now, just how might you be goinâ about to get started?â
âBy climbing aboard and shoving off. Come on.â
They waded out, and the employers got on board, while Kit and Shorty shoved clear. When the waves lapped the tops of their boots they clambered in. The other two men were not prepared with the oars, and the boat swept back and grounded. Half a dozen times, with a great expenditure of energy, this was repeated.
Shorty sat down disconsolately on the gunwale, took a chew of tobacco, and questioned the universe, while Kit baled the boat and the other two exchanged unkind remarks.
âIf youâll take my orders, Iâll get her off,â Sprague finally said.
The attempt was well intended, but before he could clamber on board he was wet to the waist.
âWeâve got to camp and build a fire,â he said, as the boat grounded again. âIâm freezing.â
âDonât be afraid of a wetting,â Stine sneered. âOther men have gone off to-day wetter than you. Now Iâm going to take her out.â
This time it was he who got the wetting and who announced with chattering teeth the need of a fire.
âA little splash like that!â Sprague chattered spitefully. âWeâll go on.â
âShorty, dig out my clothes-bag and make a fire,â the other commanded.
âYouâll do nothing of the sort,â Sprague cried.
Shorty looked from one to the other, expectorated, but did not move.
âHeâs working for me, and I guess he obeys my orders,â Stine retorted. âShorty, take that bag ashore.â
Shorty obeyed, and Sprague shivered in the boat. Kit, having received no orders, remained inactive, glad of the rest.
âA boat divided against itself wonât float,â he soliloquized.
âWhatâs that?â Sprague snarled at him.
âTalking to myselfâhabit
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