THE second spring after Silversheene's mysterious disappearance Richard Henderson had a very bad attack of the wanderlust. He had often been attacked by this strange malady before but never in such violent form. It was this adventurous spirit and a wish to see all parts of the earth that his mother had complained of to Mr. Henderson on that autumn twilight several years before, when Dick had set off down the mountain side to go for the needed part of their automobile.
Mr. Henderson had always supposed that when Dick was older this restlessness would leave him and that he would settle down, but seeing how restless and unhappy he was now, he said, "All right, Dick, my boy. If you must see Alaska, or some other god-forsaken place, go, and have it over with. I guess a year in Alaska will cure you. I can spare you better now than I can when I am older. It is the way with young blood."
So everything had finally been arranged and Richard Henderson had taken the train for Seattle where nearly all of the Alaskan expeditions outfit and sail. He spent several days in this splendid Puget Sound city getting jhis simple outfit, and finally the steamer pointed her nose westward, and they were off for the long trip to Alaska.
He had seen Puget Sound several times before, but Mount Ranier and the surrounding country had never looked more beautiful. Richard did not know, but he was seeing for the first time through the eyes of romance. The spirit of adventure colored all things and made the old world seem full of beauty and wonder.
The run to Victoria was a pleasant one, but it was not until they were well upon their way towards Alaska, going by the inland route, that the marvels of this wonderful trip began to dawn upon the young man.
He had seen the Yosemite valley many times. The Cascade and the coast range mountains were very familiar to him, as were the Rockies. He had visited Yellowstone Park and Glacier Park but this northern trip was even more wonderful than all of these.
The splendid ship wound its way in and out among islands which were like fairyland, yet unspeakably grand and beautiful. Great cedars and pines shot their green spires two hundred feet straight into the heavens. Mighty rivers poured over beetling cliffs into the blue ocean, so near that the mist from the spray wet the passengers on shipboard. Jagged cliffs thrust their hoary heads seaward trying to bar their progress. Seals played upon the partly submerged rocks and seaweed swam on the currents and eddies which swirled and boiled beneath their prow, and sometimes the waters at twilight were like fire because of the phosphorescence. Mountains as high as Mount Washington stood knee deep in the sea.
As they went further northward they saw long low buildings at the mouths of the different rivers, and small villages of Indians and whites clustering about them. These were the salmon canneries.
Finally the Queen Charlotte Islands were reached, and here the ship stopped for coal and to land freight. Still further to the north they saw great glaciers, dazzling in the sunlight, periodically slipping their mountain-like contributions of ice into the sea, It was a most amazing sight to stand upon the deck of the steamer and see these great mountains of ice and sand fall with a splash that sent up a mountain-high wave each few minutes into the troubled sea.
Such rivers, such forests, such trees, such color, such dazzling beauty Dick had never seen before, and this alone paid him for the trip, so he thought, and his adventures had not yet begun.
At Valdez he went ashore and saw the town, once the most important entry port for Alaska. Here he reshipped on a tramp steamer for St. Michael and the far north. Then came more days of wonderful sailing. The icebergs, the seals, the walrus bellowing off shore, and the phosphorescent seas all made a fascinating and ever changing picture. Finally, the ship came to anchor at the mouth of the Yukon river, and the serious part of Dick's adventure began.
At St. Michael, Richard transferred his camping outfit to a small river steamer bound up the Yukon. For the first four hundred miles the Yukon winds its way leisurely through the great tundra. Beveral herds of government reindeer were seen feeding near St. Michael, also small herds belonging to the Eskimos. These domestic reindeer were brought to Alaska by the government about twenty-five years ago, and the numbers have now reached nearly fifty thousand head. The tundra is a vast barren waste, four hundred miles wide, extending all along the coast of Alaska. It is covered with reindeer moss and creeping willow, also many varieties of flowers. The wild caribou were likewise occasionally seen. But for the better part the tundra is a seemingly lifeless waste.
After the tundra had been passed they came into the mountainous country which was heavily timbered. Here the wild roses along the shores of the mighty river were much in evidence. They were small single roses, but very luxuriant.
Richard Henderson wanted no better fun than to sit upon the deck of the steamer and watch this wonderful panorama of nature unfold. It was always a guess as to just what the next bend in the river would diselose. Sometimes the river was broad and deep but often it was turbulent, with dan—gerous rapids. At the mouth of the Tanana river Dick transferred his outfit to a still smaller steamer bound for Fairbluffs. He had intended to look up a companion at Fairbluffs for the rest of his trip, but as none seemed forthcoming he went alone. He "went light," as they say in camping phraseology.
He carried a camping blanket, a frying pan, a coffeepot, a pan for washing out pay dirt, a compass, and, for firearms, a small hunting rifle and a .44 revolver. He did not take any provisions with the exception of coffee, sugar, salt, etc. But he depended upon hunting and fishing for his food. At this time of the year it was not a difficult task to sustain life in that way. The streams swarmed with fish and water-fowl, and game was also plentiful, so that Dick did not go hungry for long.
Midsummer found him well up to the head waters of the Tanana prospecting and washing out pay dirt. His first adventure came one bright day in August. He was bending over a little stream washing out dirt when he heard a slight noise in the underbrush nearby. He felt sure that it was made by an animal of good size and he laid down his pan and reached for his rifle which lay upon the bank nearby. He had barely raised it from the ground when a wolf came out of the thicket in full view. The animal had not seen him but seemed to scent him, for its hackles were up and its lips bared.
Ever since the battle which he and Silversheene had waged with the wolves, Richard had never lost a chance to shoot at a wolf, so he raised the rifle hurriedly and fired. The wolf sprang back into the thicket and disappeared and he did not see it again. Richard did not think any more of the incident until in the middle of the night, when he was awakened by the distant howling of a wolf. It was not the hunting cry, but just a long series of plaintive howls. Then he remembered the wolf that he had shot at. Perhaps he had wounded it, or maybe this was the mate. He had once read of a male wolf howling for its slain mate.
The following day Richard saw no more wolves, but that night at about nine o'clock he again heard the wild plaintive howling. Sometimes it was so far away as to be almost indistinguishable and then again it would be within two or three hundred yards of hiscamp. He heard it off and on for two hours but finally slept so soundly that he did not again notice it.
The following morning, when he arose and stretched himself, he was not much surprised to see a large gray wolf sitting upon a knoll about a hundred yards away, watching him. He reached for his rifle and raised it to his shoulder, but before he could get a bead on the wolf, that wary animal, by a succession of wild leaps, reached the cover and disappeared in the deep woods. The wolf's movements, as soon as he saw the gun, were frantic. He seemed to understand that his only safety was in getting to cover. His movement had been so unexpected, and so clever, that Richard laughed heartily, although he was much perplexed. "Well, I'll be blessed," he said as he laid the rifle on the ground. "That wolf knows a gun about as well as I do." It was strange, here was a gray wolf, scores of miles from any sort of civilization who would leap like a deer when a rifle was raised against him. He was certainly some wolf.
Richard saw nothing more of the wolf that day, but he had a strange sensation that he was being followed. Several times he turned sharply about to see if there was really any one on his trail. Towards night he stopped at the mouth of a small stream that emptied into the Tanana to wash out some likely looking dirt. He finally camped about a score of rods from the place and later went back to the spot for some water. As he stopped to fill his coffeepot he noticed on the bank a fresh wolf track. It had certainly been made since he was there half an hour before. Richard examined the tracks carefully and then turned and looked about him in the thickets on all sides. A wolf had certainly beer there within the past half hour. What did it mean? Was it just an accident, or was a small pack of gray marauders following him? What could be their object? They were natural prowlers. Did they contemplate creeping upon him at night and killing him? He had never heard of such a thing, but it would be well to keep his campfire burning while he slept. That would fix them.
Promptly at nine that evening he again heard the long plaintive howling of the wolf, and, in spite of all he could do, it got on his nerves. So he piled more fagots on the campfire and finally went to sleep. But his last remembrance was of a plaintive, long-drawn howl. The following day he rose early and started for the little stream for more fresh water. He had not gone far from his camp when something on the ground arrested his attention. It was the paw print of a great wolf plainly registered on a last year's dead leaf and near it were other tracks.
"By Godfrey, this is getting exciting," he soliloquized as he went on his way to the stream. "He has been within forty or fifty feet of my camp while I was sleeping. I wonder what he is up to. It is rather creepy. I wish he would quit it. I haven't any use for him."
That day the impression that he was being followed was much stronger than it had been the day before. Probably it was the track that had strengthened the feeling, or so Dick reasoned. He flattered himself that he was not superstitious or given to noticing signs or omens, so he would not be worried by this hobgoblin wolf. He prospected all that day, and much of the time was busy washing out pay dirt. He was thinking of looking for a camping place and was walking leisurely along down a little gulch when he happened to turn about, and, to his astonishment, discovered the gray wolf trotting leisurely after him, about a hundred yards away.
In a sudden fit of anger and disgust, and without waiting for a good aim he raised his rifle and fired. But witha single bound, on seeing his movement, the wolf disappeared in the thicket. Richard had the satisfaction of seeing his bullet kick up a little spirt of dust where the wolf had stood a second before. "Well, I'll be jiggered," he said, talking aloud as is the way of men when in the wilderness, "that darned wolf certainly knows a rifle. But I will get him yet. Guess I frightened him a bit that time. He had a rather close call."
Once more, promptly at nine, the evening wolf serenade began, and this time it was louder and even more plaintive than the nights previous. On the following morning, Richard made a careful examination of the ground about his camp, and was amazed and a bit disconcerted to find fresh wolf tracks within thirty feet of where he had slept. "By Godfrey!" he exclaimed, as he examined the fresh tracks. "He is getting on my nerves. I haven't lost any gray wolf."
Twice that day he surprised the gray wolf following at a distance. Each time he sent a bullet singing at him, but the wolf ran and jumped with such frantic bounds that he missed him. "It's the queerest thing I have ever heard of," he said after the last shot. "Usually if you shoot at a wolf once, that is all he wants of you, but this darned fool wolf seems to like to be shot at. He certainly is clever."
That night he piled the campfire still higher, but even so, once when he awoke he saw a gray shape forty feet away in the edge of the thicket, or thought he did, for everything now looked like a gray wolf. But he could see the outline and the two gleaming eyes. He reached very stealthily for his revolver, but slight as the movement was the animal seemed to detect it and sprang into the thick cover. But Richard sent three bullets singing after the marauder.
The following day the Phantom Wolf, as Richard now called the gray shape, had so gotten on his nerves that he gave up the whole day to hunting it. His method of attack was the ambush. He would go for a mile or two as though starting off across the country, then he would lie in a thicket watching his own trail. The first time this ruse nearly worked. But the wolf seemed to scent him when he came within riflerange and, leaving the fresh trail, followed parallel with it.
It was not until Richard heard the snapping of a dry twig in the thicket behind him that he discovered the ruse. He raised his rifle quickly and took a snapshot at the clever wolf, but missed. So they were playing at the same game. Richard was watching his own trail to shoot the wolf, while the wolf was paralleling the trail to take him unawares.
That evening after Richard had eaten his supper, the gray wolf came out on a bluff about five hundred yards away and lifted up his voice to heaven, howling steadily for an hour. This time Dick did not at first shoot at him, but preferred to watch him
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and see what he would do. Finally the howling got on his nerves and he slyly slunk behind a tree with his rifle, thinking to shoot from cover and so get a clean shot at the gray wolf; but the wolf seemed to read his thought and slunk out of sight before he could shoot.
When he awoke on the following day he discovered more wolf tracks near his campfire, and some of them within twenty feet of where he had slept. The Phantom Wolf was on the cliff where he had seen him the night before. It was a long shot, but he sent one bullet whistling at the wolf before he scurried to cover.
That day he saw him three times and gave up all thought of prospecting. He must shoot that wolf before he could think of anything else. In spite of him it was spoiling his sleep at night and taking away his appetite by day. He had never heard of such a thing. Surely this gray devil meant to tear open his throat some night while he was sleeping. He would do it, too, if he did not look out. He had already been within springing distance. So that night Richard slept only by fits and starts, and kept his rifle close by his side.
The following day he saw the gray wolf twice and got a shot each time, without effect. It is a question how long this game of hide-and-seek might have been kept up but for a mishap that befell Richard on the sixth day after his first seeing the Phantom Wolf.
About eight o'clock in the evening he came to a very turbulent branch of the Tanana, full of rapids and with a fine waterfall about thirty feet in height. The water was very swift above the falls and he did not want to cross there, so he followed it downstream for a quarter of a mile, but it was just one endless mass of seething rapids. Then he went back to the falls and again looked at the river above. It was getting late and he was anxious to make camp so he finally attempted a crossing about fifty feet above the falls. The river was very swift here but he thought he could make it, and began wading carefully across.
The water was up to his waist, and the current was much swifter than he had estimated. Yet even so he would have made it, but just at the middle of the stream his foot slipped on a stone made as smooth as ice by the rapid water, and he fell heavily, striking his head upon another stone which he had been trying to avoid. On land the accident would not have been of much importance, but in the rushing water where he had all he could do to keep his feet, it was fatal, for it stunned him so that he lost his footing completely and was rapidly carried down the stream towards the roaring falls. He had covered nearly half the distance to the fatal plunge when he recovered his senses and realized his terrible plight. Even so, he had just time and presence of mind enough left to catch at a partly covered stone which was immediately in his course. He had saved himself for a minute, perhaps two minutes, or just as long as he could hold on. His head was bleeding profusely from a bad gash in his forehead. This partly blinded his eyes, and also made him faint. It was certainly a hopeless case. Here he was, so far as he knew, fifty miles from any human help. God alone could save him.
He was clinging desperately to a rock as slippery as ice, and the current was pulling at him with a death pull, and his strength was each second waning. He looked about desperately, he saw every detail of the wild scene, the boiling waters, the jagged rocks, the darkling trees, and the distant sky line. He thought of home and Oregon. His chance of ever seeing any of his family again looked very small. It seemed to him that the river each moment increased its pull upon him, but it was his own rapidly waning strength. Finally he began to tremble as he realized that the moment for letting go was near at hand.
But just as he seemed about to reach the end of his endurance and just before he gave up all hope Dick did a very queer thing. One that he himself wondered about. Why should he have done it? Without any premeditated thought he lifted up his voice in an agonized cry for help. Just as an animal will cry out for mercy when death is about to extinguish it. So Dick cried out to the wilderness where he knew there was no human hand to help.
Then, as though in an answer to his cry, he heard a splash in the stream above and at the same instant saw a great shape spring into the river and begin swimming rapidly towards him. At first he could not make it out because of the blood in his eyes, but as it drew near he recognized with an added pang of horror that it was his enemy, the great gray wolf, the beast who had pursued him. So this was to be hisend! This bar sinister of a beast, who had dogged him for nearly a week, had some premonition of his doom and was following him to be in at the finish. So this gray shape was his Nemesis.
Of the two Dick thought he would rather be dashed to pieces on the rocks in the waterfall below, than be torn to pieces by this savage beast; so the heart went out of him and his head drooped until he sucked in the rushing water and his grip upon the slippery rock loosened and the dark waters sucked him down the stream. Of the next few hours and especially the next few minutes Richard never fully realized. He had a dim memory of what occurred. He was able afterwards by going over the ground carefully to piece it together, but to him personally it seemed more like a hideous dream—and then a reality.
He had a very faint impression that a strong power gripped his coat by the collar and that this grip did not let go. He had a dim memory of a great shape that battled terribly with the rushing waters. He could feel the hot breath of the beast on his neck and he felt the frantic efforts of the animal to breast the rushing waters. It seemed to him that this frantic battle with the current would never end. It finally did, however, and he was dragged out into shallow water. Here he had just sense enough left partly to help himself up on the low bank, and then he sank into a deep swoon caused by utter collapse.
Then he had dreams, when he was sometimes conscious, but often more dead than alive, of a great gray shape by his side, that hovered over him and licked his face. Finally Richard fell into a deep sleep of utter exhaustion and did not waken for several hours. When he at last awoke and sat up the sun was shining brightly, and the river was rushing by, just as though it had not tried with all its strength to pull him down to death. He looked about for a gray wolf which he remembered dimly or thought he remembered. At first he did not see him, but he finally discovered him standing by a thicket a hundred feet away watching him.
Instinctively Richard reached for his revolver and the wolf sprang into the thicket, but he soon discovered him watching him through the brush. When he raised the revolver the head again disappeared. He snapped all five cartridges and none of them would go. The revolver had been thoroughly soaked in the river. So he got out some new cartridges from a waterproof case in his knapsack and reloaded it.
By this time the gray wolf had again come into the open, perhaps fifty yards away. Richard's eyesight was still dim from the blow on his head so he could not see as plainly as he would otherwise have done. His head ached terribly, and he was weak and discouraged. At the thought of his plight, and the loss of his rifle in the river, and all his bad luck for the past six days, a sudden anger against the wolf flamed up in him and he took careful aim at the gray wolf's head and fired. Always before when he had raised a gun against him he had run and jumped as though frantic to escape, but he now stood quite still as though waiting for the bullet. When the revolver cracked Richard had the satisfaction of seeing the wolf fall as though struck by lightning.
"There," said the young man, "I guess I have spoiled this dogging me about. Perhaps I will have some good luck again now I have gotten rid of you." Painfully Dick got to his feet and walked towards the prostrate animal. He had a great curiosity to see the gray wolf close up. He had followed him so relentlessly for six days. Perhaps he was not like other wolves. There was something strange about it anyhow.
When about ten feet from the prostrate beast Richard stood in his tracks as though petrified, and what color there had been Ieft in his face forsook it. Then another cry as agonized as that with which he had called for help the night before rent the air. He flung himself on the ground beside the wolf, crying, "Oh, Silversheene, oh, Silversheene, I have killed you!"