  Dick Kent tossed aside the wolf trap he had been trying to repair, and turned to his chum, Sandy McClaren. “Let’s go back to your Uncle Walter’s at Fort Good Faith,” said Dick restlessly. “It’s getting too quiet around here.” Sandy McClaren’s big blue eyes turned from the marten pelt he had been scraping. “I’m with you, Dick. Uncle Walt needs us, too. He’s still having a lot of trouble with that outlaw, Bear Henderson.” For a year after finishing school in the United States, Dick Kent and Sandy McClaren had been pursuing adventure two hundred miles north of Hay River Landing, Canada, where they had gone to visit Sandy’s uncle. Lately they had come to Fort du Lac at the invitation of Martin MacLean, the factor there. The savage northland already had woven its spell of dangerous adventure about them, but Fort du Lac had proved dull after the excitement of the more lawless trading post supervised by Sandy’s uncle on the northern fringe of the Hudson’s Bay Company’s territory. Dick and Sandy had turned toward the big log store building where Martin MacLean bartered for furs, when they stopped dead, looking northeast along the trail that curved about a high headland of pine forest. “What’s that?” cried Dick suddenly. “Looks like an Indian runner!” Sandy exclaimed. “I’ll tell Mr. MacLean,” Dick stretched his athletic legs toward the store. The fur trader came out on Dick’s heels a moment later, his broad, bony frame and bearded face tense at the hint of trouble. “It’s a runner all right,” confirmed the trader, watching the distant figure, which was rapidly approaching. Presently a swarthy faced Indian, his coarse black hair streaming about his haggard features, fell almost exhausted into their arms. “Help me carry him in,” Martin MacLean commanded. “He’s tuckered out. We’ve got to get him to talk. There’s trouble somewhere.” They tugged the limp body of the runner into the store and lay him on several bales of fur. The trader hurried for stimulant, which he forced between the Indian’s teeth. The runner soon opened his eyes. All three bent over him as he spoke: “Him Bear Henderson take um post—from Mister McClaren,” gasped the runner. “Tie um up. Kill all good Injuns!” Dick Kent’s face paled as he turned to Sandy. “Henderson has captured your Uncle Walter!” “Well, he’ll get his when the mounted police get there,” flared Sandy, his Scotch temper showing itself. The factor of the post turned to them. They fell silent. “Boys, I can’t leave the post,” he said, “and I don’t trust any of the Indians around the store. Can I depend on you to go down the river and get Malcolm Mackenzie?” “Can you!” Dick and Sandy chorused, “I should smile.” “You know what this means,” the trader went on sternly. “Bear Henderson is a powerful man. There isn’t a doubt this runner was followed here. There may be men right here at Fort du Lac who are in sympathy with the outlaw. Henderson is plotting against the whole northern frontier held by Hudson’s Bay Company. It’s life or death.” “We’ll do it!” Dick cried eagerly. “Tell us what to do.” “All right then. You go by canoe down the river to Mackenzie’s Landing. Tell Mackenzie I asked him to go with you to the mounted police post at Fort Dunwoody. You know the trail that far. Malcolm knows it from the landing on. There’s a grub cache he might have forgotten. In case he has——” the boys followed MacLean behind the counter. From the strong box the trader drew a map. “Now here is our post,” the trader continued, indicating a dot on the rough map with a match end, while Dick and Sandy followed him attentively; “There’s Little Moose Portage, and further down Mackenzie’s Landing, the free trader’s post. Twenty miles further the river swings north and you leave the water and go by land. Then here’s where you strike the cache of food——” Dick’s sudden, startled cry interrupted. “What was that at the window!” “I didn’t see anything,” whispered Sandy. “Sure you weren’t imagining something?” said the trader. “I know I saw a face right there a moment ago,” Dick insisted, pointing to a window in the rear of the long store. “It seemed to be an Indian’s face which was covered with hideous scars.” MacLean walked back and pulled the curtains shut over the window. He returned and went on explaining the location of the cache and the route to be taken to Fort Dunwoody. Once started, Dick and Sandy were not long in preparing for the trip down the river to Mackenzie’s Landing. They cleaned and oiled their 30.30 Ross rifles, packed a canoe with flour, beans, bacon, coffee, salt, sugar and camp utensils, and saw that they were well supplied with ammunition. On their last trip to the canoe from the storehouse, Sandy, too, had a singular surprise. But he did not cry out. Instead, he called softly to Dick, who was a little ahead of him. “I saw the same face you saw behind those boxes over there on the landing,” Sandy said tensely. “Make believe we didn’t notice anything. Then we’ll pick up our rifles and walk down the river till we get where we can see behind the boxes.” “All right,” Dick replied cooly, his dark eyes gleaming as they always did at the promise of excitement. “Don’t shoot. Capture him,” Dick added, as they deposited their packs into the canoe, picked up their rifles and started off down the river bank, their eyes bent to the left. When they had advanced far enough to see behind the boxes, they turned and looked. The face was gone! There was no one behind the packing boxes. Sandy scratched his head. “Blame it, I know I saw somebody watching us.” “Come on, we’ll look closer.” Dick led the way forward and they examined all the boxes, but found each one empty. “Looks queer,” Dick admitted. “Those Indians can disappear mighty suddenly,” Sandy said. “Let’s tell Mr. MacLean.” They hurried back to the store. The trader plainly was deeply concerned over what they had to tell. “I tell you, boys, I hadn’t ought to let you make this trip,” he said, pacing back and forth. “Henderson has men here that I know nothing about. They say he has secret operatives all over the northern frontier. Sandy’s uncle never would forgive me if anything happened to you fellows. But I don’t see what else I can do. The mounted police must be notified.” “Well, Sandy and I aren’t men,” Dick replied modestly, “but you know we’ve been in the north country for a year now and so far we’ve taken pretty good care of ourselves. Sandy’s Uncle Walter will tell you that.” The trader surveyed Dick Kent’s stalwart figure and Sandy’s more stocky frame with a renewal of confidence. “Yes,” he concluded, “I believe you fellows will come out all right. Shake.” Dick and Sandy gripped Martin MacLean’s hard hand. They felt a glow of admiration for the big “sourdough” who had so complimented two “chechakos,” or tenderfeet. The trader drew from his pocket a wallet of money and thrust it into Dick’s hand, with the remark it might come in handy for expenses. An hour later the boys were gliding down the river, Dick in the stern steering, Sandy in front on the lookout for snags. The dark walls of spruce forest on either side closed in on them with a mysterious silence. They seemed to feel malevolent eyes watching them as they sheered the oily surface of the stream. The strange face both had seen at Fort du Lac remained in their memory and made them silent as they forged along with the current. It was the last warm days of fall; already a hint of winter was in the air, and with the threat of danger hovering about was combined another feeling of dread, as if the very atmosphere of the vast, lonely land heralded the approach of mercilessly cold weather. “You watch the south bank, and I’ll watch the north,” Dick broke the silence when the landing at Fort du Lac had faded from view around a bend. “I think we’ll be followed by land if our suspicions are correct and there’s really some one on our trail.” “They’ll have to follow by land for a ways anyway,” rejoined Sandy. “Mr. MacLean will see them if they use one of the canoes at the landing. But I suppose they have a canoe hidden somewhere along the river.” “That’s about it,” Dick agreed. “We’ll keep sharp watch and be ready to duck if there’s any shooting.” They paddled on silently for a quarter of an hour, making good time and keeping to the center of the stream. They were just passing a large heap of driftwood, lodged in an eddy near the north shore, when Sandy called Dick’s attention to something under the brush. “What do you make of that light brown object just the other side of the little sand point sticking out into the river?” asked Sandy. “I was looking at it myself,” responded Dick. “I thought it was a log with the bark off it at first, but it might be a canoe.” “It looks a lot like a canoe—as if they tried to hide it under some brush but the brush sprung up after they left and exposed it.” “We’ll turn in and see,” Dick plied his paddle lustily, and the light craft swerved toward the shore. “Aren’t we taking an awful risk?” Sandy was cautious. “Suppose they’re close to us.” “We’ll take a chance,” Dick returned. “Better take a chance now than have them catch up with us in that canoe. It’s plain they’re not here yet.” Nerves keyed high at thought of the peril they might be floating into, Dick and Sandy bore swiftly into the sand point, and presently the bottom of the canoe grated on the gravel. Dick leaped out into the shallow water and beached the canoe, Sandy following closely. “It’s a canoe sure enough!” Dick exclaimed when they reached the spot where they had seen the suspicious object. “And they tried to hide it,” Sandy came back, as they drew nearer. “See the tracks in the mud? Say! That canoe hasn’t been there a day, if that!” “You’re right!” Dick cried, “and right here and now we’re going to see that nobody chases us in this canoe.” “Be careful,” Sandy cautioned. “We’ll set her adrift,” Dick went on, unheeding Sandy’s precautions. “Here, Sandy, you grab the bow and I’ll get around behind and push. Soon as we get it out in the current it’ll float down where they can’t find it. We might sink it, but we’d have to tow it into the river and we haven’t time.” Sandy fell to work with a will. The canoe was lodged in the mud rather securely and they strained for some minutes before it at last came loose with a suck and splash that nearly tumbled Sandy over. An instant later they had shoved the canoe out into the stream, where the current caught it and carried it past the sand point. The young adventurers paused to gaze with satisfaction upon this blow they felt they had dealt the enemy, when a sound from the shore drew their startled attention. “Listen,” whispered Dick. They could hear a crashing among the trees. Looking toward the forest they could see nothing at first. Then suddenly, into a small clearing that led down to the river bank, burst three men, running and waving their rifles menacingly. “Quick! The canoe!” cried Dick hoarsely. “Don’t stop to shoot. We’ve got to get away. They’re after that canoe. It’s the Indian with the scarred face!” Sandy tumbled into the stern of the canoe in one flying leap, and as Dick shoved on the prow, he picked up his paddle and stroked backward. The canoe left the beach with a lunge, and Dick was nearly precipitated into the water as he leaped into his position in the bow. As they crouched to paddle, three shots sounded and bullets cut the water about them. “Downstream fast,” shouted Dick. “Stay low, Sandy.” Rifle balls were flying thick and fast as they rounded the sand point, paddling frantically after the canoe they had set adrift. “Diable!” they could hear an enraged cry in French, as their pursuers found the canoe gone and the boys escaping. Dick turned and looked back. All three of the men were kneeling with rifles leveled. “Duck!” he shouted to Sandy just in time. The rifles cracked almost as one and two bullets ripped through the bottom of the canoe, plowing up splinters in their wake. “We’ve sprung a leak,” called Sandy almost immediately. “Those shots have put the canoe out of commission!” Dick glanced about at the bottom of the canoe. Sandy was right. The bullets had struck below the waterline and the river was gurgling in around the packs and blankets. |
|
