Toilers of the Trails/The Land of His Fathers
THE LAND OF HIS FATHERS
THE LAND OF HIS FATHERS
"De map lie!"
The old Ojibway turned from the slab counter of the trade-house at Jackfish Lake, a lean forefinger still resting on the engineer's map of a section of the preliminary survey for the new Transcontinental Railroad. There was a glitter in his black eyes as they met the surprised gaze of McDuff, the Scotch engineer.
"What d'you mean, David?" queried Cameron, the factor, peering over the Ojibway's shoulder at the map spread before them.
"All dees lak'," replied the old Indian, pointing to a chain of lakes along the shores of which ran a trial line for the contemplated Right-of-Way, "lie two—tree day travel to de sunset from de Flaming Riviere. Dey not flow dees way; beeg heel shut dat valley from de riviere." The speaker indicated with his finger.
"De man who mak' map; I know how he travel," the Ojibway continued. "De freezing moon was near; he was starve an' in great hurry, an' he listen to half-breed. He mak' bad map, for de half-breed lie."
The Indian drew a long breath as his narrowed eyes bored into the engineer's questioning gaze.
"You know this country pretty well, David?"
The Ojibway straightened to his full six feet. A flicker of a smile played at the corners of his set mouth.
"Many snows I hunt dat country. My fader hunt dat country, an' hees fader, I know eet lak' I know my tepee out dere on de lak' shore."
"There ain't a lake or hill in the Kabenakagami country that David don't know," broke in the factor. "He was born there and his ancestors were born there and hunted it. You can depend on what David tells you about the Kabenakagami and Flaming River country."
The eyes of the old Ojibway softened.
"Well, the man who made this flying survey knows his business," grunted McDuff to John Gordon, his assistant, "but if he was close to the freeze-up and had to get out in a hurry, he may have guessed at these lakes flowing into the Flaming River, when he worked up his notes with the topographer. The Agricultural Survey sure made a mess of their western Ontario map, but they hardly made a compass survey and plotted a great deal by hearsay."
"I should say so," nodded Cameron; "the man who follows the Nepigon Trail to the Albany with that map will sure leave his bones in the bush. It don't show half the network of lakes you travel through, and water running two ways out of 'em at that."
The government engineer turned to old David, who had been an interested listener.
"David, I want you and your sons as guides until the freeze-up. Will you come with us?"
"To-morrow I tell you." And the erect figure of the treaty-chief of the Kabenakagami Ojibways disappeared through the door.
Later McDuff and Gordon sat smoking after-supper pipes in the factor's quarters.
"There's no doubt in your mind, Cameron, that old David is the best man you've got for our business?" asked McDuff.
"There are others trading at this post who trap the Kabenakagami country above and below David's hunting-grounds, but if your map is correct the preliminary survey runs through the country he has travelled all his life. He's the man you want and he's he most intelligent Indian that trades at this post. That's why he's treaty-chief."
"I guess you're right, but it don't seem possible that Stevens could have made such a bull on the Flaming River survey. Why, it may mean running a new line thirty or forty miles."
"I don't care," maintained the factor. "If David says your map is off, you can gamble your life that it is."
"Well, we've got to go and find out."
Down on the lake shore across the post clearing where already stood scattered tepees of Ojibways in for the spring trade, the occasional laugh of an Indian girl or yelp of a husky dog alone broke the hush of the June twilight. Each day, now, from north and cast and west, would bring to the post the canoes of fur-hunters, freighted with noisy cargoes of children and dogs, and the winter catch of pelts. Soon the trade-house would swarm with swarthy trappers, red-man and half-breed, bartering fox and mink, lynx and otter, for powder, flour, and cloth, or lounging about, smoking Company niggerhead as they gossiped of winter camps and winter trails in the silent places.
Beyond the tepees, where the cleared ground rose to a miniature sand-cliff above the lake, sat a motionless figure silhouetted against the waning western light. Throughout the hours of the long twilight he had been there, as if carved from stone, chin in hands, gazing across the sleeping lake to purple western ridges. But his eyes had not seen the timbered hills of Jackfish, for they looked on a green, northern valley, where swift streams sang through forests of spruce and birch and fir, seeking lakes shimmering in the sun.
It was a valley that had been the hunting-ground of his father and his father's father. For generations, by the law of the north, it had belonged to the family of the Makwa—the bear. For forty miles none but the Makwa trapped its ridges and streams or netted its fish-filled lakes. In the Ojibway tongue it was called Gwanatch Tawadina, The Beautiful Valley, and there David had been born, and as a boy first learned to snare the ptarmigan and snow-shoe rabbit, and later hunt the moose and caribou. In the outlet of these lakes his father had taught him the art of running the white-water and poling the swift current in a birch-bark. There, as a child, he had lain when the camp was asleep, gazing in awe and wonder at the myriad stars while he listened to the voices of the forest night. Not a spruce ridge, or swift brook, or wild meadow, with its dead water above the beaver dam where the moose came at sunset to eat the roots of lilies and the sweet grasses, but was a loved and familiar sight to the one who brooded in the dusk.
From the largest of the lakes of The Beautiful Valley, called the Lake of the Islands, lifted sheer a rocky mass crowned by a forest of ancient spruce and jack-pine. There for generations had the dead of his family found their long rest. There lay the mother of his tall sons, his father and father's father with their kinsmen, sleeping the endless sleep beneath the murmuring jack-pines and spruce of the Island of the Dead, the sacred ground of the Makwa.
The last light in the west had long since died. Deep the lake slept at his feet, mirroring the stars. Down among the tepees the voices of the women were hushed. From the opposite shore drifted the hoo-hoo, hoo-hoo, of a gray owl. But the lone figure on the cliff kept vigil far into the night with his vision.
At sunrise the government engineers with their assistants, canoemen, and packers, started north for the summer survey of the Kabenakagami section of the Transcontinental. In the bow of the big birch-bark carrying McDuff and young Gordon paddled the grizzled treaty-chief of the Kabenakagami Ojibways, David Makwa. A hundred miles north, down river to Stevens's flying survey, then months of line running east and west, seeking an easier grade among the hills, around the swamps and along the wild rivers of the intractable wilderness, awaited them.
All summer McDuff and Gordon with their chain-men and voyageurs, red, half-breed, and white, toiled in the Ontario "bush," tormented by the forest pests, the midge, black fly, and bulldog; at times, when the packers failed to bring up their supplies, living on the fish and game of the country, in order that some day the deep voice of the Iron Horse might thunder through the solitudes of the Ontario hills.
Late in August, the trial lines having been run east to the Missinaibi section, the survey-party returned to its base cache on the Kabenakagami and pushed west. Here, in circling ridges and horsebacks, dodging lakes and bottomless muskeg, the skill of that old wheel-horse of the Transcontinental staff, Donald McDuff, was taxed to the limit to find a better grade than that shown by Stevens's trial line, or even maintain the required seventy-three feet per mile.
In the arduous toil of the past weeks the woodcraft and ability as a canoeman of old David had received the acid test at the hands of the gruff Scotch engineer, ruthless in the treatment of his men in the pursuit of his end and aim. And so great was the respect with which the old Indian came to be held that he started west from the big river as head man of the voyageurs.
In September the survey reached the Flaming River, having found no glaring mistake in Stevens's lines. Here, to the west, paralleling the stream, a succession of high ridges barred the way, requiring a wide bend in the line either north or south, Stevens's line dipped south.
One evening in his tent, with the help of two lanterns, the chief engineer and John Gordon were comparing the Flaming River country on Stevens's map with those of the Agricultural and the Geological Survey.
"Well, I guess there's something in what that Injun says about this proposition, Gordon," rasped out McDuff at last. "This country west seems all cut up with small lakes and if the Geological survey wasn't made by blind men, it's some rough."
"Compare these lakes off here to the southwest on Stevens's survey with this map," said Gordon, pointing with sinewy finger. "They don't look much alike, do they? David told me to-day," he continued, "that we couldn't find a break in this ridge to the south for twenty miles. He says it turns and dips southwest."
"If that's so, Stevens made a bad guess then," growled McDuff.
"I got to the top of it yesterday with one of David's boys," went on Gordon, "and the glasses showed nothing but rolling horsebacks. I'm satisfied we must swing north past this big shoulder."
"Call David!" commanded McDuff.
Shortly the old Indian entered the tent.
"Mr. Gordon tells me that you've been clear to the headwater lakes of this river and that the ridge over there holds without a break for twenty miles?" queried McDuff.
David looked the engineer steadily in the eyes.
"Dees heel run many mile' to de scut', den turn wes'. You get no trail tru flat country for day travel. To de nord you get 'round een leetle piece."
"You say that the outlet of these lakes runs north-west and don't flow east into the Flaming. This map says it does. Are you lying or telling the truth?"
At the insult the Indian's breath quickened. His hands clinched convulsively as he faced the factor, but choking down his anger, he answered:
"Dees lak' run far nordwes' many day travel. Dees map ees bad map!" The veins stood out like whip-cords on the old man's temples and neck. His dark eyes blazed defiantly into those of the engineer as he hissed:
"Eet lie!"
"Well, maybe it does; maybe it does; we'll see soon enough."
The Indian's resentment was lost on the thick-skinned McDuff, who turned to the map before him, but there flashed through the brain of Gordon the impression that something more than the error of a surveying-party lay behind old David's vehemence. At Jackfish he had turned like a trapped wolverine to utter in that tragic manner the same words: "Eet lie!"
There was something behind all this, but what it was he could not guess.
Again David assured McDuff that he had been the length of the Flaming and only to the north could they maintain the required grade for the road. When he had gone McDuff turned to Gordon.
"Well, I'm stumped. Stevens gets through this ridge not ten miles above here and he don't have to dig much either, if his altitudes are right, and David, who is about the best bushman I've ever knocked into, swears it's north, not south, we've got to swing.
"To-morrow," he continued, "you take David and an outfit and go up-river a week and see what you can find. I'll swing north. I'm inclined to think that we've stumbled upon the first bad blunder Stevens ever made. He was in here when the country was freezing up, and starved out in the bargain. That may account for it."
While the engineers still argued the pros and cons of the problem before them, a swarthy face appeared in the tent-opening.
"Meester MeecDuff, I wesh to spik somet'ing wid you," was whispered.
It was one of the half-breed voyageurs.
"Well, what d'you want? Haven't I ordered you to keep away from this tent? If you've got any kick to make, take it up with David. He's your boss!"
The half-breed waited until McDuff finished, his beady eyes wandering from the maps on the rough slab table to the faces of the white men; then he said in a low, insinuating tone:
"Eet ees about Daveed dat I spik. He lie to you. Dees bed over dere," waving his hand to the west, "a beeg river come tru, a day polin' up de Flamin'. I have travel to de headwater. I know dees countree."
McDuff looked at Gordon. Over John Gordon swept a sense of disappointment—of regret. If the half-breed's tale was true, David, whom he trusted, whom he had made his friend in the strenuous weeks behind them, was deceiving them. If the tale was true, the Indian surely had a powerful reason for insisting that the location of the road must swing north.
That the old Indian with whom he was accustomed often at night to talk in Ojibway of the life and folk-lore of his people, whom he had found the whitest Indian he had ever known, should lie to them, was incredible. And yet—there were suspicious circumstances.
"You say that a river breaks through the ridge a few miles above here?" asked McDuff.
"Oua, yes? To-day I hear you have talk wid Daveed an' I cum to tell you he lie."
The half-breed seemed nervous. He turned to the tent-door and peered out into the darkness, then waited for McDuff's reply.
"When were you on this river?"
"Four—five year back. I come up here from the Kabenakagami for to hunt fur."
"Um-m." The Scotchman scratched his bearded jaw. "All right, Jean! We'll soon know who's wrong. That's all—get out!" The engineer pointed to the tent-opening.
As the half-breed left, a dark form noiselessly arose near the rear wall of the tent and was swallowed in the gloom.
"Well, what do you think of that for half-breed jealousy of the Injun boss, or"
The silence of the night was broken by the sound of trampling in the brush down near the tents of the voyageurs, followed by an oath and rapid talk in the Ojibway tongue.
The two engineers hurried outside, but the camp of their men seemed hushed in slumber.
"There was somebody in the bush out there just now. Hello, down there!" McDuff bellowed. "What's all that noise about?"
Shortly one of the white chain-men appeared.
"What are y' having down there, Andrew, a row?"
"All quiet, sir, now! There was a little noise over near the Injun's tents, but no trouble. Somebody yellin' in his sleep. I looked in and they all had their heads under the blankets."
"All right, turn in, then; but I won't have any rows in this camp, understand? Report anything you see!"
"Yes, sir," and the sleepy chain-man returned to his blankets.
Next morning, when the returning supply-boats started back down-river for the Kabenakagami, the half-breed voyageur, Jean Nadeau, reported sick and asked to be sent home. Although he showed no signs of illness, he was allowed to go.
"Looks to me, Gordon," laughed McDuff, as the canoes pulled out, "as if that half-breed who knows so much about this country got cold feet, I guess he wanted to rub it into David, and then lost his nerve."
The same day, with David and an Indian crew, Gordon started up-stream to reconnoitre the country, while his chief followed the ridge to the north on a flying survey.
Towering in the bow of Gordon's big Peterboro canoe old David piloted the craft up the quick-water of the swift river with a skill that only those born to the game possess. As they slowly bucked the current, driven by the setting-poles of David and the five voyageurs, Gordon's eager eyes followed the great ridge to the west searching for the opening that might mean a way through for the line. But in the middle of the morning, when he landed below a long stretch of white-water to get a better view-point for observation, it still loomed far to the south, hemming in the river.
"Can you pole this rapid, David?" asked Gordon.
"I pole it in small canoe, in dees boat, maybe."
"Those shores look pretty rough; where's the Indian portage?"
"Injun portage all dees water 'cross leetle lak'. You no see hill from de portage."
"I don't want to lose sight of that ridge. If you can pole it, go ahead."
There was murmuring and shaking of heads among the crew, but a few words in Ojibway from David served to reassure them, and he turned the nose of the canoe into the boilers below the white-water.
AGAIN AT HIS SIGNAL THE CREW THRUST THE BOAT FORWARD
Up the first chute slowly moved the boat driven by the poles of the iron-backed crew—the voice of the tall bowman rising high above the roar of the waters that flung them back. Now they hugged the shore, where ran a deep channel, now shot across current, seeking a way through between ugly ledges white with foam, huge boulders over which piled high the racing torrent, and pinnacle rocks which thrust upward sharp teeth that could slash the bottom of the boat into ribbons. Here, skirting destruction to canoe and supplies by a hair, dodging an upset there by the breadth of a hand, up the rapids the voyageurs fought their way, throwing their weight onto the long spruce poles at the command of the bowman.
They had not got far into the long white-water when John Gordon regretted having made the attempt. His supplies and canoe were too valuable to be recklessly imperilled.
"I think we'd better get out of this, David, and carry around," he shouted.
"Up dere a piece we can land," replied David, leaning on his pole.
Again at his signal the crew thrust the boat forward, sometimes gaining feet, sometimes inches, on the weight of hurrying water. Then, as the bowman pried the nose of the craft off the current to avoid a rock, his pole snapped in his hands. Unable to recover his balance, he plunged head first into the rapids, while the canoe swung broadside on.
Before the crew behind regained control of the boat it was lifted and dropped on a jagged ledge; while, tossed and buffeted by eddies and cross-currents, the Indian was swept below them, his arms clasped about his head, as a protection from the rocks.
Frantically the crew struggled with their poles, finally swinging the canoe off the ledge, then swiftly snubbed down-stream on the road they had come and landed half full of water below the rapids.
There on the shore stood David wringing out his clothes.
"Dees rapeed no good for beeg boat," he volunteered to Gordon.
"Are you hurt, David?"
"Naw, not one leetle rock bite me."
The bottom of the canoe was badly slashed and most of the flour wet. The flying survey must be made without delay. No excuses were accepted by McDuff.
"Patch her up the best you can and drop back to camp, boys," he told the crew. "David and I will take a few days' grub and strike into the bush. I want to see what the country looks like from that big hill up-river."
As Gordon spoke the eyes of the old Indian narrowed and the muscles of his lean face set hard, but he said nothing.
That night, miles above the rapids, Gordon and David sat smoking in front of their camp-fire.
"I thought you knew this river pretty well, David?" Gordon essayed after a long silence. But the Indian smoked on with eyes averted, as if he had not heard the question.
As they ate their supper, Gordon's mind had been full of the events of the last few days. In vain he had struggled to throttle the suspicion which was steadily gaining strength—that this silent old Indian sitting there across the fire was playing a deep and subtle game. But why?
In the eastern survey lately completed they had camped together many nights on a flying reconnaissance of the country, as they were then camped. Born in a Hudson's Bay Post where his father was factor, Gordon as a boy had become familiar with the Ojibway tongue, and it was in Ojibway that he talked to David when they were alone. This knowledge of the language of his fathers had been the means of drawing out the proud old Indian as nothing else could have done, and of speedily cementing a warm friendship between white engineer and red voyageur.
Night after night they had burned much tobacco discussing the ways of the furred prowlers and horned wanderers of the Ontario forests and muskeg. David had spun many a tale of his journeys to the great salt bay of the north where the geese and duck swarm in myriads for the fall migration. Gordon had spent two years in the British Columbian Rockies and his talk of that land of summer snows and glaciers, lying far beyond the sunset, enthralled the imagination of the Indian. But for the most part it had been David who taught and Gordon who listened. The old man's knowledge of woodcraft, his many winter trails with the dog-teams and summer journeys in the boats of the Great Company through the Ontario silent places, his love of the mystic in nature, had been a source of interest and delight upon which Gordon never ceased to draw.
And now, as he sat there by the fire, his doubts had at last crystallized into a deep suspicion of his friend. Well, a day or two would tell the story, he mused, and with a "Good-night, David," turned into his blanket.
It was the afternoon of the next day. They had climbed to a shoulder of the big hill Gordon had seen far down the river, and sat for a space smoking. North and south at their feet ran the winding valley of the Flaming River. Low hills of spruce and fir splashed with the yellow and gold of birch and poplar rolled to the eastern horizon where the pale blue of the watershed ridges of the Kabenakagami merged in a hazy sky. In places, where silver reaches of river met the yellow birch forests, the stream seemed suddenly to burst into flame.
"Now, I know how the river got its name. It looks afire down there, David!" exclaimed Gordon. "It's certainly a rare country."
"I show you one at sunset," said the old Indian, whose brooding eyes were blind to the beauty of the valley.
Then something impelled John Gordon to ask:
"David, why did you take me into that swamp yesterday and lose me?"
For an instant the Indian did not answer; then, turning, he rested his hand on his friend's knee and said in Ojibway:
"Because, one sleep ago, the face of the sun was hidden, and when it died behind the hills the sky would not hang with the colors of the flowers of the forest over The Beautiful Valley."
"The Beautiful Valley?" Gordon's eyes widened in wonder. "What do you mean?"
"My son," continued the old chief, "the country you look upon gladdens your heart, for the great Manitou has given you eyes to see the rivers and the hills. In a little while when we stand on the bald head of this mountain above us as the sun dies in the west, you shall behold a land as fair as the Happy Hunting-Grounds that lie at the end of the last trail, for you shall look upon The Beautiful Valley."
Thrilled at the words, Gordon vaguely sensed what he was about to hear.
"One sleep ago, if you had been the Big White Boss who has no heart you would now lie in the black swamp down there and no white man would see your face again—for the black swamp keeps its dead. But you have the soul of an Ojibway; your heart loves the lone lands; your ears hear the voices of the rapids and the talking wind in the birches. To me you are as a son."
Held by the tragic face of the Indian, Gordon listened to the dramatic confession. The old man rested his saddened eyes momentarily on the valley, then faced the engineer with a gesture of hopelessness.
"But it is no good! Others would come some day and find the break in the hills and bring the Iron Trail to The Beautiful Valley. The white man is strong. It is no good!"
"You mean, David, that you have been trying to keep us out of your hunting-grounds—this valley you call The Beautiful Valley? There is, after all, a break in the hills above here?"
"Yes, my son; the map does not lie."
For Gordon the situation had cleared.
"I thought yesterday when you led me into that swamp—that you were trying to lose me," Gordon said, half to himself. Then he reached out impulsively and gripped the hand of the heart-broken old man.
"David, you know we are sent here by the government. We are ordered to find a trail for the road by the Fathers at Ottawa. If we make a bad trail, others will follow and find a good one. If I could—if I could keep the Transcontinental out of your valley, my friend, I would. You know I would do it, don't you?"
"Yes, you would help me, my son, for you have the soul of an Ojibway. You love the clean waters and the green forests. The burned lands sadden your heart."
To John Gordon the despair of the old man who stood with averted face to hide the play of emotion on his twisted features was a pitiful sight.
"You will know when we stand at sunset and look upon The Beautiful Valley, why David, a chief, has lied to the White Boss that the Iron Trail might not come to the land of the Makwa."
For a time the two sat in silence, then Gordon asked:
"You scared that half-breed Nadeau into going back with the supply-boats?"
"Yes, he knew this river. I followed him to your tent and heard what he said. Then I told him to go back with the supply-boats, for he fears the Makwa."
"And you broke your pole in the rapids and risked drowning yourself to keep us from finding the break in the hills?"
"Yes, but it was no good, no good!"
"Will McDuff find an easy grade through to the north?"
"No, there are many hills there and high; they must come this way after all."
"David, my friend, if there was a good way north, I'd try to help you. But other engineers follow us this winter on the snow. We are only a flying survey. They are sure to find the easy grade through the hills above here."
"Yes," assented the old man sorrowfully, "the white man is strong; he will find The Beautiful Valley."
At sunset they climbed to the bald brow of the mountain. Gordon followed his guide up out of the thick scrub to the rock face of the summit and stood thrilled at the panorama rolling away for forty miles to the west.
With a sweep of his long arm, David said proudly:
"Look, my son, upon The Beautiful Valley."
Flanked by high ridges to the north and south, the lower levels broken with undulating hills of jack-pine, spruce, and fir shot with the maroon and gold of the hardwood, the hunting-ground of the Makwa faded far into the sunset. Here and there—like silver islands studding the sea of endless forest—shimmered a hundred lakes. And out of the nearest of these the bright thread of a river, now lost in emerald depths, now emerging, flashed off to the southeast.
Far at the head of the valley loomed a range of purple hills, over which in wondrous hues the sunken sun painted the canvas of the sky with magic brush. Not a blemish of burned country or barren marred the perfect whole.
Long the enchanted Gordon drank in the beauty of the picture.
"God, what a country!" he finally sighed.
"You know now why David lied?" wistfully the old man asked.
"Yes, I don't wonder you fought for it."
Then as the two watched the deepening splendor of the sunset, the Indian began:
"Often I have journeyed to the south in the boats of the Great Company. Once, many long snows ago, far by the Big Sweet Water I saw white men, like ants, cutting a wide trail through the living forests. Again, when the mail-canoe went south we met the smoke of forest-fires, so thick that it hid the sun, two sleeps from the great trail. There we found men, as many as there are midges in a swamp, digging holes in the hills like the foxes, and shooting the rocks and ledges with gunpowder, following those who went before. North and south for a day's journey stood blackened ridges burned by the fires these men had made. Later they laid small trees on the naked earth and over them made a trail of iron that ran into the east, without end.
GORDON DRANK IN THE BEAUTY OF THE PICTURE
blackened ridges burned by the fires these men had made. Later they laid small trees on the naked earth and over them made a trail of iron that ran into the east, without end.
"And then one summer we saw the Iron Horse, fed with fire, come out of the east following the Iron Trail. And with the Iron Horse came the free-traders to barter for furs the burning water which the Great Company would not give the Indians. Here I saw Ojibways sell in one day for this devil-water their winter hunt of fur, while the women wailed in the tepees where there was no tea or flour. The young men, no longer men but slaves to the traders—and not ashamed—begged for the bad medicine that filled their veins with fire and stole their manhood. Here I looked on starvation and misery among my people brought by those who followed the Iron Trail with their camps.
"All this I saw when I journeyed far south to the Big Sweet Water.
"When I learned, two long snows ago, that the white man would make another Iron Trail, my heart was saddened. It was in the freezing moon before the last long snows that white men came to The Beautiful Valley. I was south at the post when my sons found them, so they gave them their lives."
On the old man's face was written the torture of his thoughts. Shortly he continued:
"You have the soul of an Ojibway, and understand. Look down there at those forests untouched by fire; those lakes, clean as the springs which feed them; those hills without a sear. In that big lake far up the valley—we call it the Lake of the Islands—lie the bones of my people. For many, many long snows, since the big battle when we took the country from the Crees, it has been the home of the Makwa, and now the Iron Trail will come through the break in the hills and The Beautiful Valley will vanish. What your eyes see to-night will be hidden by the smoke of the burning forests. The thunder of the white man's powder will echo among its hills and its lakes lie befouled by the camps of the wood-choppers. And later the traders will come and corrupt my young men and women with their poisoned water.
"But it is no good. I am old and the white men are strong."
With a gesture of despair David turned his tragic eyes from the land of his fathers and covered his face with his hands.
Gordon tried to explain how the government had made laws for the building of the new road; how there were to be no forest-fires started by careless workmen; how the whiskey-trader would be banished from the Right-of-Way; but in his heart he knew that David was right. The magic of The Beautiful Valley would vanish at the coming of the Iron Trail.
Slowly the riot of pagan color faded from the western sky, and twilight followed. But not until dusk masked the valley did the watchers on the mountain stir.
In the middle of October, when the leaves of the hardwood yellowed the floor of the forest and the first stinging winds from the north gave warning of the freeze-up, the flying survey through the land of the Makwa was completed. In the last weeks old David had seemed to Gordon, who tried to cheer him, somewhat reconciled to the inevitable, but the heart of the proud Ojibway was broken.
One afternoon the canoes of the party, having run the outlet of the lakes on their way to the break in the hills, were nearing the portage which skirted the steep cliffs of the gorge through which thundered the river. In front, in a sixteen-foot birch-bark, David paddled McDuff. Close behind, Gordon and five voyageurs followed in a Peterboro, with the remaining canoes in their wake. The large boat had already turned into the shore at the head of the rapids, when suddenly the Indian rose to his knees, and calling to Gordon, "Bo'-jo'! Bo'-jo'!" paddled like a demon out into midstream.
Off his guard, McDuff at first took it as an attempt by David to frighten him, but when the grim-visaged Ojibway, heedless of the engineer's shouts to turn inshore, drove the light canoe into the broken water toward the suck of the first chute, he knew that it was a madman who paddled in the stern. Then, for he was no coward, McDuff plunged into the river, attempting to reach a ledge jutting from the shore. But, though he fought desperately, the swimmer, together with the canoe, was swept into the flume.
Stunned by the swiftness of the tragedy moving before his eyes, Gordon fancied he saw, as the canoe took the plunge, a smile light the swarthy face turned toward him and a hand raised in farewell as the doomed craft was sucked into the riot of wild water.
Far down the break in the hills they found the battered bodies of the drowned engineer and the Ojibway. As Gordon lifted the broken clay and looked at the face of the old chief, he knew that it had been a smile of triumph his fancy pictured lighting the dark features in that last look back at his friend. For from the face of David sorrow and despair had vanished, and in their place, was peace.
While the rest of the survey continued on down the Flaming River with the body of the chief engineer, Gordon, with David's sons, brought the old chief up the valley to the Lake of the Islands. There, on the Island of the Dead, they laid him beside his forefathers for his long sleep beneath the talking pines he loved.
Gordon stood by the grave at the head of which they had erected a cross of hewn spruce, and repeated what he could remember of the burial service. Then, in personal tribute to his friend, the engineer cut in the white wood of the arm these words, in English:
Here lies David Makwa Ojibway Chief who,
rather than live to see the Iron Trail dese-
crate his Beautiful Valley—chose death.