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Page 50
Morganson yearned towards the delayed bottle and gulped dryly.
"I did the chopping before the scurvy got bad," he said. "Then I got a
moose right at the start. I've been living high all right. It's the
scurvy that's run me down."
He filled the glass, and added, "But the spruce tea's knocking it, I
think."
"Have another," the barkeeper said.
The action of the two glasses of whisky on Morganson's empty stomach and
weak condition was rapid. The next he knew he was sitting by the stove
on a box, and it seemed as though ages had passed. A tall,
broad-shouldered, black-whiskered man was paying for drinks. Morganson's
swimming eyes saw him drawing a greenback from a fat roll, and
Morganson's swimming eyes cleared on the instant. They were
hundred-dollar bills. It was life! His life! He felt an almost
irresistible impulse to snatch the money and dash madly out into the
night.
The black-whiskered man and one of his companions arose.
"Come on, Oleson," the former said to the third one of the party, a
fair-haired, ruddy-faced giant.
Oleson came to his feet, yawning and stretching.
"What are you going to bed so soon for?" the barkeeper asked
plaintively. "It's early yet."
"Got to make Selkirk to-morrow," said he of the black whiskers.
"On Christmas Day!" the barkeeper cried.
"The better the day the better the deed," the other laughed.
As the three men passed out of the door it came dimly to Morganson that
it was Christmas Eve. That was the date. That was what he had come to
Minto for. But it was overshadowed now by the three men themselves, and
the fat roll of hundred-dollar bills.
The door slammed.
"That's Jack Thompson," the barkeeper said. "Made two millions on
Bonanza and Sulphur, and got more coming. I'm going to bed. Have
another drink first."
Morganson hesitated.
"A Christmas drink," the other urged. "It's all right. I'll get it back
when you sell your wood."
Morganson mastered his drunkenness long enough to swallow the whisky,
say good night, and get out on the trail. It was moonlight, and he
hobbled along through the bright, silvery quiet, with a vision of life
before him that took the form of a roll of hundred-dollar bills.
He awoke. It was dark, and he was in his blankets. He had gone to bed in
his moccasins and mittens, with the flaps of his cap pulled down over
his ears. He got up as quickly as his crippled condition would permit,
and built the fire and boiled some water. As he put the spruce-twigs
into the teapot he noted the first glimmer of the pale morning light. He
caught up his rifle and hobbled in a panic out to the bank. As he
crouched and waited, it came to him that he had forgotten to drink his
spruce tea. The only other thought in his mind was the possibility of
John Thompson changing his mind and not travelling Christmas Day.
Dawn broke and merged into day. It was cold and clear. Sixty below zero
was Morganson's estimate of the frost. Not a breath stirred the chill
Arctic quiet. He sat up suddenly, his muscular tensity increasing the
hurt of the scurvy. He had heard the far sound of a man's voice and the
faint whining of dogs. He began beating his hands back and forth against
his sides. It was a serious matter to bare the trigger hand to sixty
degrees below zero, and against that time he needed to develop all the
warmth of which his flesh was capable.
They came into view around the outjutting clump of trees. To the fore
was the third man whose name he had not learnt. Then came eight dogs
drawing the sled. At the front of the sled, guiding it by the gee-pole,
walked John Thompson. The rear was brought up by Oleson, the Swede. He
was certainly a fine man, Morganson thought, as he looked at the bulk of
him in his squirrel-skin _parka_. The men and dogs were silhouetted
sharply against the white of the landscape. They had the seeming of two
dimension, cardboard figures that worked mechanically.
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