章节正文
two women had come up, and he noticed that the second one was Dora
Holmes. He doffed his fur cap, the flaps of which were flying,
shook hands with her, and turned toward Mabel. She swayed forward,
splendid and radiant, but faltered before his outstretched hand.
He had intended to say, "How do you do, Mrs. Hutchinson?"--but
somehow, the Mrs. Hutchinson had choked him, and all he had managed
to articulate was the "How do you do?"
There was all the constraint and awkwardness in the situation he
could have wished. Mabel betrayed the agitationappropriate to her
position, while Dora, evidently brought along as some sort of
peacemaker, was saying:-
"Why, what is the matter, Lawrence?"
Before he could answer, Corry plucked him by the sleeve and drew
him aside.
"See here, old man, what's this mean?" Corry demanded in a low
tone, indicating Lashka with his eyes.
"I can hardly see, Corry, where you can have any concern in the
matter," Pentfield answered mockingly.
But Corry drove straight to the point.
"What is that squaw doing on your sled? A nasty job you've given
me to explain all this away. I only hope it can be explained away.
Who is she? Whose squaw is she?"
Then Lawrence Pentfield delivered his stroke, and he delivered it
with a certain calm elation of spirit that seemed somewhat to
compensate for the wrong that had been done him.
"She is my squaw," he said; "Mrs. Pentfield, if you please."
Corry Hutchinson gasped, and Pentfield left him and returned to the
two women. Mabel, with a worried expression on her face, seemed
holding herself aloof. He turned to Dora and asked, quite
genially, as though all the world was sunshine:- "How did you stand
the trip, anyway? Have any trouble to sleep warm?"
"And, how did Mrs. Hutchinson stand it?" he asked next, his eyes on
Mabel.
"Oh, you dear ninny!" Dora cried, throwing her arms around him and
hugging him. "Then you saw it, too! I thought something was the
matter, you were acting so strangely."
"I--I hardly understand," he stammered.
"It was corrected in next day's paper," Dora chattered on. "We did
not dream you would see it. All the other papers had it correctly,
and of course that one miserable paper was the very one you saw!"
"Wait a moment! What do you mean?" Pentfield demanded, a sudden
fear at his heart, for he felt himself on the verge of a great
gulf.
But Dora swept volubly on.
"Why, when it became known that Mabel and I were going to Klondike,
EVERY OTHER WEEK said that when we were gone, it would be lovely on
Myrdon Avenue, meaning, of course, lonely."
"Then--"
"I am Mrs. Hutchinson," Dora answered. "And you thought it was
Mabel all the time--"
"Precisely the way of it," Pentfield replied slowly. "But I can
see now. The reporter got the names mixed. The Seattle and
Portland paper copied."
He stood silently for a minute. Mabel's face was turned toward him
again, and he could see the glow of expectancy in it. Corry was
deeply interested in the ragged toe of one of his moccasins, while
Dora was stealing sidelong glances at the immobile face of Lashka
sitting on the sled. Lawrence Pentfield stared straight out before
him into a dreary future, through the grey vistas of which he saw
himself riding on a sled behind running dogs with lame Lashka by
his side.
Then he spoke, quite simply, looking Mabel in the eyes.
"I am very sorry. I did not dream it. I thought you had married
Corry. That is Mrs. Pentfield sitting on the sled over there."
Mabel Holmes turned weakly toward her sister, as though all the
fatigue of her great journey had suddenly descended on her. Dora
caught her around the waist. Corry Hutchinson was still occupied
with his moccasins. Pentfield glanced quickly from face to face,
then turned to his sled.
"Can't stop here all day, with Pete's baby waiting," he said to
Lashka.
The long whip-lash hissed out, the dogs sprang against the breast
bands, and the sled lurched and jerked ahead.
"Oh, I say, Corry," Pentfield called back, "you'd better occupy the
old cabin. It's not been used for some time. I've built a new one
on the hill."
TOO MUCH GOLD
This being a story--and a truer one than it may appear--of a mining
country, it is quite to be expected that it will be a hard-luck
story. But that depends on the point of view. Hard luck is a mild
way of terming it so far as Kink Mitchell and Hootchinoo Bill are
concerned; and that they have a decided opinion on the subject is a
matter of common knowledge in the Yukon country.
It was in the fall of 1896 that the two partners came down to the
east bank of the Yukon, and drew a Peterborough canoe from a moss-
covered cache. They were not particularly pleasant-looking
objects. A summer's prospecting, filled to repletion with hardship
and rather empty of grub, had left their clothes in tatters and
themselves worn and cadaverous. A nimbus of mosquitoes buzzed
about each man's head. Their faces were coated with blue clay.
Each carried a lump of this damp clay, and, whenever it dried and
fell from their faces, more was daubed on in its place. There was
a querulous plaint in their voices, an irritability of movement and
gesture, that told of broken sleep and a losing struggle with the
little winged pests.
"Them skeeters'll be the death of me yet," Kink Mitchell whimpered,
as the canoe felt the current on her nose, and leaped out from the
bank
"Cheer up, cheer up. We're about done," Hootchinoo Bill answered,
with an attempted heartiness in his funereal tones that was
ghastly. "We'll be in Forty Mile in forty minutes, and then--
cursed little devil!"
One hand left his paddle and landed on the back of his neck with a
sharp slap. He put a fresh daub of clay on the injured part,
swearing sulphurously the while. Kink Mitchell was not in the
least amused. He merely improved the opportunity by putting a
thicker coating of clay on his own neck.
They crossed the Yukon to its west bank, shot down-stream with easy
stroke, and at the end of forty minutes swung in close to the left
around the tail of an island. Forty Mile spread itself suddenly
before them. Both men straightened their backs and gazed at the
sight. They gazed long and carefully, drifting with the current,
in their faces an expression of mingled surprise and consternation
slowly gathering. Not a thread of smoke was rising from the
hundreds of log-cabins. There was no sound of axes biting sharply
into wood, of hammering and sawing. Neither dogs nor men loitered
before the big store. No steamboats lay at the bank, no canoes,
nor scows, nor poling-boats. The river was as bare of craft as the
town was of life.
"Kind of looks like Gabriel's tooted his little horn, and you an'
me has turned up missing," remarked Hootchinoo Bill.
His remark was casual, as though there was nothing unusual about
the occurrence. Kink Mitchell's reply was just as casual as though
he, too, were unaware of any strange perturbation of spirit.
"Looks as they was all Baptists, then, and took the boats to go by
water," was his contribution.
"My ol' dad was a Baptist," Hootchinoo Bill supplemented. "An' he
always did hold it was forty thousand miles nearer that way."
This was the end of their levity. They ran the canoe in and
climbed the high earth bank. A feeling of awe descended upon them
as they walked the deserted streets. The sunlight streamed
placidly over the town. A gentle wind tapped the halyards against
the flagpole before the closed doors of the Caledonia Dance Hall.
Mosquitoes buzzed, robins sang, and moose birds tripped hungrily
among the cabins; but there was no human life nor sign of human
life.
"I'm just dyin' for a drink," Hootchinoo Bill said and
unconsciously his voice sank to a hoarse whisper.
His partner nodded his head, loth to hear his own voice break the
stillness. They trudged on in uneasy silence till surprised by an
open door. Above this door, and stretching the width of the
building, a rude sign announced the same as the "Monte Carlo." But
beside the door, hat over eyes, chair tilted back, a man sat
sunning himself. He was an old man. Beard and hair were long and
white and patriarchal.
"If it ain't ol' Jim Cummings, turned up like us, too late for
Resurrection!" said Kink Mitchell.
"Most like he didn't hear Gabriel tootin'," was Hootchinoo Bill's
suggestion.
"Hello, Jim! Wake up!" he shouted.
The old man unlimbered lamely, blinking his eyes and murmuring
automatically: "What'll ye have, gents? What'll ye have?"
They followed him inside and ranged up against the long bar where
of yore a half-dozen nimble bar-keepers found little time to loaf.
The great room, ordinarily aroar with life, was still and gloomy as
a tomb. There was no rattling of chips, no whirring of ivory
balls. Roulette and faro tables were like gravestones under their
canvas covers. No women's voices drifted merrily from the dance-
room behind. Ol' Jim Cummings wiped a glass with palsied hands,
and Kink Mitchell scrawled his initials on the dust-covered bar.
"Where's the girls?" Hootchinoo Bill shouted, with affected
geniality.
"Gone," was the ancient bar-keeper's reply, in a voice thin and
aged as himself, and as unsteady as his hand.
"Where's Bidwell and Barlow?"
"Gone."
"And Sweetwater Charley?"
"Gone."
"And his sister?"
"Gone too."
"Your daughter Sally, then, and her little kid?"
"Gone, all gone." The old man shook his head sadly, rummaging in
an absent way among the dusty bottles.
"Great Sardanapolis! Where?" Kink Mitchell exploded, unable longer
to restrain himself. "You don't say you've had the plague?"
"Why, ain't you heerd?" The old man chuckled quietly. "They-all's
gone to Dawson."
"What-like is that?" Bill demanded. "A creek? or a bar? or a
place?"
"Ain't never heered of Dawson, eh?" The old man chuckled
exasperatingly. "Why, Dawson's a town, a city, bigger'n Forty
Mile. Yes, sir, bigger'n Forty Mile."
"I've ben in this land seven year," Bill announced emphatically,
"an' I make free to say I never heard tell of the burg before.
Hold on! Let's have some more of that whisky. Your information's
flabbergasted me, that it has. Now just whereabouts is this
Dawson-place you was a-mentionin'?"
"On the big flat jest below the mouth of Klondike," ol' Jim
answered. "But where has you-all ben this summer?"
"Never you mind where we-all's ben," was Kink Mitchell's testy
reply. "We-all's ben where the skeeters is that thick you've got
to throw a stick into the air so as to see the sun and tell the
time of day. Ain't I right, Bill?"
"Right you are," said Bill. "But speakin' of this Dawson-place how
like did it happen to be, Jim?"
"Ounce to the pan on a creek called Bonanza, an' they ain't got to
bed-rock yet."
"Who struck it?"
"Carmack."
At mention of the discoverer's name the partners stared at each
other disgustedly. Then they winked with great solemnity.
Holmes. He doffed his fur cap, the flaps of which were flying,
shook hands with her, and turned toward Mabel. She swayed forward,
splendid and radiant, but faltered before his outstretched hand.
He had intended to say, "How do you do, Mrs. Hutchinson?"--but
somehow, the Mrs. Hutchinson had choked him, and all he had managed
to articulate was the "How do you do?"
There was all the constraint and awkwardness in the situation he
could have wished. Mabel betrayed the agitationappropriate to her
position, while Dora, evidently brought along as some sort of
peacemaker, was saying:-
"Why, what is the matter, Lawrence?"
Before he could answer, Corry plucked him by the sleeve and drew
him aside.
"See here, old man, what's this mean?" Corry demanded in a low
tone, indicating Lashka with his eyes.
"I can hardly see, Corry, where you can have any concern in the
matter," Pentfield answered mockingly.
But Corry drove straight to the point.
"What is that squaw doing on your sled? A nasty job you've given
me to explain all this away. I only hope it can be explained away.
Who is she? Whose squaw is she?"
Then Lawrence Pentfield delivered his stroke, and he delivered it
with a certain calm elation of spirit that seemed somewhat to
compensate for the wrong that had been done him.
"She is my squaw," he said; "Mrs. Pentfield, if you please."
Corry Hutchinson gasped, and Pentfield left him and returned to the
two women. Mabel, with a worried expression on her face, seemed
holding herself aloof. He turned to Dora and asked, quite
genially, as though all the world was sunshine:- "How did you stand
the trip, anyway? Have any trouble to sleep warm?"
"And, how did Mrs. Hutchinson stand it?" he asked next, his eyes on
Mabel.
"Oh, you dear ninny!" Dora cried, throwing her arms around him and
hugging him. "Then you saw it, too! I thought something was the
matter, you were acting so strangely."
"I--I hardly understand," he stammered.
"It was corrected in next day's paper," Dora chattered on. "We did
not dream you would see it. All the other papers had it correctly,
and of course that one miserable paper was the very one you saw!"
"Wait a moment! What do you mean?" Pentfield demanded, a sudden
fear at his heart, for he felt himself on the verge of a great
gulf.
But Dora swept volubly on.
"Why, when it became known that Mabel and I were going to Klondike,
EVERY OTHER WEEK said that when we were gone, it would be lovely on
Myrdon Avenue, meaning, of course, lonely."
"Then--"
"I am Mrs. Hutchinson," Dora answered. "And you thought it was
Mabel all the time--"
"Precisely the way of it," Pentfield replied slowly. "But I can
see now. The reporter got the names mixed. The Seattle and
Portland paper copied."
He stood silently for a minute. Mabel's face was turned toward him
again, and he could see the glow of expectancy in it. Corry was
deeply interested in the ragged toe of one of his moccasins, while
Dora was stealing sidelong glances at the immobile face of Lashka
sitting on the sled. Lawrence Pentfield stared straight out before
him into a dreary future, through the grey vistas of which he saw
himself riding on a sled behind running dogs with lame Lashka by
his side.
Then he spoke, quite simply, looking Mabel in the eyes.
"I am very sorry. I did not dream it. I thought you had married
Corry. That is Mrs. Pentfield sitting on the sled over there."
Mabel Holmes turned weakly toward her sister, as though all the
fatigue of her great journey had suddenly descended on her. Dora
caught her around the waist. Corry Hutchinson was still occupied
with his moccasins. Pentfield glanced quickly from face to face,
then turned to his sled.
"Can't stop here all day, with Pete's baby waiting," he said to
Lashka.
The long whip-lash hissed out, the dogs sprang against the breast
bands, and the sled lurched and jerked ahead.
"Oh, I say, Corry," Pentfield called back, "you'd better occupy the
old cabin. It's not been used for some time. I've built a new one
on the hill."
TOO MUCH GOLD
This being a story--and a truer one than it may appear--of a mining
country, it is quite to be expected that it will be a hard-luck
story. But that depends on the point of view. Hard luck is a mild
way of terming it so far as Kink Mitchell and Hootchinoo Bill are
concerned; and that they have a decided opinion on the subject is a
matter of common knowledge in the Yukon country.
It was in the fall of 1896 that the two partners came down to the
east bank of the Yukon, and drew a Peterborough canoe from a moss-
covered cache. They were not particularly pleasant-looking
objects. A summer's prospecting, filled to repletion with hardship
and rather empty of grub, had left their clothes in tatters and
themselves worn and cadaverous. A nimbus of mosquitoes buzzed
about each man's head. Their faces were coated with blue clay.
Each carried a lump of this damp clay, and, whenever it dried and
fell from their faces, more was daubed on in its place. There was
a querulous plaint in their voices, an irritability of movement and
gesture, that told of broken sleep and a losing struggle with the
little winged pests.
"Them skeeters'll be the death of me yet," Kink Mitchell whimpered,
as the canoe felt the current on her nose, and leaped out from the
bank
"Cheer up, cheer up. We're about done," Hootchinoo Bill answered,
with an attempted heartiness in his funereal tones that was
ghastly. "We'll be in Forty Mile in forty minutes, and then--
cursed little devil!"
One hand left his paddle and landed on the back of his neck with a
sharp slap. He put a fresh daub of clay on the injured part,
swearing sulphurously the while. Kink Mitchell was not in the
least amused. He merely improved the opportunity by putting a
thicker coating of clay on his own neck.
They crossed the Yukon to its west bank, shot down-stream with easy
stroke, and at the end of forty minutes swung in close to the left
around the tail of an island. Forty Mile spread itself suddenly
before them. Both men straightened their backs and gazed at the
sight. They gazed long and carefully, drifting with the current,
in their faces an expression of mingled surprise and consternation
slowly gathering. Not a thread of smoke was rising from the
hundreds of log-cabins. There was no sound of axes biting sharply
into wood, of hammering and sawing. Neither dogs nor men loitered
before the big store. No steamboats lay at the bank, no canoes,
nor scows, nor poling-boats. The river was as bare of craft as the
town was of life.
"Kind of looks like Gabriel's tooted his little horn, and you an'
me has turned up missing," remarked Hootchinoo Bill.
His remark was casual, as though there was nothing unusual about
the occurrence. Kink Mitchell's reply was just as casual as though
he, too, were unaware of any strange perturbation of spirit.
"Looks as they was all Baptists, then, and took the boats to go by
water," was his contribution.
"My ol' dad was a Baptist," Hootchinoo Bill supplemented. "An' he
always did hold it was forty thousand miles nearer that way."
This was the end of their levity. They ran the canoe in and
climbed the high earth bank. A feeling of awe descended upon them
as they walked the deserted streets. The sunlight streamed
placidly over the town. A gentle wind tapped the halyards against
the flagpole before the closed doors of the Caledonia Dance Hall.
Mosquitoes buzzed, robins sang, and moose birds tripped hungrily
among the cabins; but there was no human life nor sign of human
life.
"I'm just dyin' for a drink," Hootchinoo Bill said and
unconsciously his voice sank to a hoarse whisper.
His partner nodded his head, loth to hear his own voice break the
stillness. They trudged on in uneasy silence till surprised by an
open door. Above this door, and stretching the width of the
building, a rude sign announced the same as the "Monte Carlo." But
beside the door, hat over eyes, chair tilted back, a man sat
sunning himself. He was an old man. Beard and hair were long and
white and patriarchal.
"If it ain't ol' Jim Cummings, turned up like us, too late for
Resurrection!" said Kink Mitchell.
"Most like he didn't hear Gabriel tootin'," was Hootchinoo Bill's
suggestion.
"Hello, Jim! Wake up!" he shouted.
The old man unlimbered lamely, blinking his eyes and murmuring
automatically: "What'll ye have, gents? What'll ye have?"
They followed him inside and ranged up against the long bar where
of yore a half-dozen nimble bar-keepers found little time to loaf.
The great room, ordinarily aroar with life, was still and gloomy as
a tomb. There was no rattling of chips, no whirring of ivory
balls. Roulette and faro tables were like gravestones under their
canvas covers. No women's voices drifted merrily from the dance-
room behind. Ol' Jim Cummings wiped a glass with palsied hands,
and Kink Mitchell scrawled his initials on the dust-covered bar.
"Where's the girls?" Hootchinoo Bill shouted, with affected
geniality.
"Gone," was the ancient bar-keeper's reply, in a voice thin and
aged as himself, and as unsteady as his hand.
"Where's Bidwell and Barlow?"
"Gone."
"And Sweetwater Charley?"
"Gone."
"And his sister?"
"Gone too."
"Your daughter Sally, then, and her little kid?"
"Gone, all gone." The old man shook his head sadly, rummaging in
an absent way among the dusty bottles.
"Great Sardanapolis! Where?" Kink Mitchell exploded, unable longer
to restrain himself. "You don't say you've had the plague?"
"Why, ain't you heerd?" The old man chuckled quietly. "They-all's
gone to Dawson."
"What-like is that?" Bill demanded. "A creek? or a bar? or a
place?"
"Ain't never heered of Dawson, eh?" The old man chuckled
exasperatingly. "Why, Dawson's a town, a city, bigger'n Forty
Mile. Yes, sir, bigger'n Forty Mile."
"I've ben in this land seven year," Bill announced emphatically,
"an' I make free to say I never heard tell of the burg before.
Hold on! Let's have some more of that whisky. Your information's
flabbergasted me, that it has. Now just whereabouts is this
Dawson-place you was a-mentionin'?"
"On the big flat jest below the mouth of Klondike," ol' Jim
answered. "But where has you-all ben this summer?"
"Never you mind where we-all's ben," was Kink Mitchell's testy
reply. "We-all's ben where the skeeters is that thick you've got
to throw a stick into the air so as to see the sun and tell the
time of day. Ain't I right, Bill?"
"Right you are," said Bill. "But speakin' of this Dawson-place how
like did it happen to be, Jim?"
"Ounce to the pan on a creek called Bonanza, an' they ain't got to
bed-rock yet."
"Who struck it?"
"Carmack."
At mention of the discoverer's name the partners stared at each
other disgustedly. Then they winked with great solemnity.
- evidently [´evidəntli]
ad.明显地 (初中英语单词) - sleeve [sli:v] n.袖子；袖套 (初中英语单词)
- acting [´æktiŋ] a.代理的 n.演戏 (初中英语单词)
- miserable [´mizərəbəl] a.悲惨的；可怜的 (初中英语单词)
- silently [´sailəntli] ad.寂静地；沉默地 (初中英语单词)
- running [´rʌniŋ] a.奔跑的；流动的 (初中英语单词)
- sprang [spræŋ] spring 的过去式 (初中英语单词)
- whenever [wen´evə] conj.&ad.无论何时 (初中英语单词)
- movement [´mu:vmənt] n.活动；运动；动作 (初中英语单词)
- winged [´wiŋd] a.有翼的 (初中英语单词)
- unusual [ʌn´ju:ʒuəl] a.不平常的；异常的 (初中英语单词)
- sunlight [´sʌnlait] n.日光 (初中英语单词)
- partner [´pɑ:tnə] n.伙伴 v.同....合作 (初中英语单词)
- absent [´æbsənt, əb´sent] a.不在的 vt.使缺席 (初中英语单词)
- unable [ʌn´eibəl] a.不能的；无能为力的 (初中英语单词)
- radiant [´reidiənt] a.发光的 n.光源(体) (高中英语单词)
- agitation [,ædʒi´teiʃən] n.鼓动；摇动；焦虑 (高中英语单词)
- appropriate [ə´prəupri-it, ə´prəuprieit] a.适宜的 vt.私占；拨给 (高中英语单词)
- reporter [ri´pɔ:tə] n.报告人；记者；广播员 (高中英语单词)
- ragged [´rægid] a.衣服破烂的 (高中英语单词)
- dreary [´driəri] a.阴郁的；枯燥无味的 (高中英语单词)
- decided [di´saidid] a.明显的；决定的 (高中英语单词)
- paddle [´pædl] n.踏板 v.用浆划；划船 (高中英语单词)
- casual [´kæʒuəl] a.偶然的；临时的 (高中英语单词)
- occurrence [ə´kʌrəns] n.发生；(偶发)事件 (高中英语单词)
- uneasy [ʌn´i:zi] a.不安的；不自在的 (高中英语单词)
- ordinarily [´ɔ:dinərili] ad.平常地；普通地 (高中英语单词)
- gloomy [´glu:mi] a.昏暗的；忧郁的 (高中英语单词)
- merrily [´merili] ad.欢乐地；愉快地 (高中英语单词)
- restrain [ri´strein] vt.抑制；管束；限制 (高中英语单词)
- whereabouts [,weərə´bauts] n.下落；行踪；所在 (高中英语单词)
- gathering [´gæðəriŋ] n.集会，聚集 (英语四级单词)
- unaware [,ʌnə´weə] a.不知道的；不觉察的 (英语四级单词)
- hoarse [hɔ:s] a.嘶哑的；嗓门粗哑的 (英语四级单词)
- nimble [´nimbəl] a.敏捷的；聪明的 (英语四级单词)
- outstretched [,aut´stretʃt] a.扩张的；伸长的 (英语六级单词)
- articulate [ɑ:´tikjulit] a.口齿清楚的 v.连接 (英语六级单词)
- biting [´baitiŋ] a.刺痛的；尖利的 (英语六级单词)
- solemnity [sə´lemniti] n.庄严；(隆重的)仪式 (英语六级单词)
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