I raised my head, listening,— not only with my ears but with every square inch of my skin, waiting for recurrence1 of the sound that had awakened2 me. There was silence, utter silence. No soughing in the boughs3 of the spruces clustered around the little camp. No stirring of furtive4 life in the underbrush. Through the spires5 of the spruces the stars shone wanly6 in the short sunset to sunrise twilight7 of the early Alaskan summer.
A sudden wind bent8 the spruce tops, carrying again the sound — the clangour of a beaten anvil10.
I slipped out of my blanket, and round the dim embers of the fire toward Jim. His voice halted me.
“All right, Leif. I hear it.”
The wind sighed and died, and with it died the humming aftertones of the anvil stroke. Before we could speak, the wind arose. It bore the after-hum of the anvil stroke — faint and far away. And again the wind died, and with it the sound.
“An anvil, Leif!”
“Listen!”
A stronger gust11 swayed the spruces. It carried a distant chanting; voices of many women and men singing a strange, minor12 theme. The chant ended on a wailing13 chord, archaic14, dissonant15.
There was a long roll of drums, rising in a swift crescendo16, ending abruptly17. After it a thin and clamorous18 confusion.
It was smothered19 by a low, sustained rumbling20, like thunder, muted by miles. In it defiance21, challenge.
We waited, listening. The spruces were motionless. The wind did not return.
“Queer sort of sounds, Jim.” I tried to speak casually22, He sat up. A stick flared23 up in the dying fire. Its light etched his face against the darkness — thin, and brown and hawk24-profiled. He did not look at me.
“Every feathered forefather25 for the last twenty centuries is awake and shouting! Better call me Tsantawu, Leif. Tsi’ Tsa’lagi — I am a Cherokee! Right now — all Indian.”
He smiled, but still he did not look at me, and I was glad of that.
“It was an anvil,” I said. “A hell of a big anvil. And hundreds of people singing . . . and how could that be in this wilderness26 . . . they didn’t sound like Indians . . . .”
“The drums weren’t Indian.” He squatted27 by the fire, staring into it. “When they turned loose, something played a pizzicato with icicles up and down my back.”
“They got me, too — those drums!” I thought my voice was steady, but he looked up at me sharply; and now it was I who averted28 my eyes and stared at the embers. “They reminded me of something I heard . . . and thought I saw . . . in Mongolia. So did the singing. Damn it, Jim, why do you look at me like that?”
I threw a stick on the fire. For the life of me I couldn’t help searching the shadows as the stick flamed. Then I met his gaze squarely.
“Pretty bad place, was it, Leif?” he asked, quietly. I said nothing. Jim got up and walked over to the packs. He came back with Some water and threw it over the fire. He kicked earth on the hissing29 coals. If he saw me wince30 as the shadows rushed in upon us, he did not show it.
“That wind came from the north,” he said. “So that’s the way the sounds came. Therefore, whatever made the sounds is north of us. That being so — which way do we travel tomorrow?”
“North,” I said.
My throat dried as I said it.
Jim laughed. He dropped upon his blanket, and rolled it around him. I propped31 myself against the bole of one of the spruces, and sat staring toward thesnorth.
“The ancestors are vociferous32, Leif. Promising33 a lodge34 of sorrow, I gather — if we go north. . . . ‘Bad Medicine!’ say the ancestors. . . . ‘Bad Medicine for you, Tsantawu! You go to Usunhi’yi, the Darkening-land, Tsantawu! . . . Into Tsusgina’i, the ghost country! Beware! Turn from the north, Tsantawu!’”
“Oh, go to sleep, you hag-ridden redskin!”
“All right, I’m just telling you.”
Then a little later:
“‘And heard ancestral voices prophesying35 war’— it’s worse than war these ancestors of mine are prophesying, Leif.”
“Damn it, will you shut up!”
A chuckle36 from the darkness; thereafter silence.
I leaned against the tree trunk. The sounds, or rather the evil memory they had evoked37, had shaken me more than I was willing to admit, even to myself. The thing I had carried for two years in the buckskin bag at the end of the chain around my neck had seemed to stir; turn cold. I wondered how much Jim had divined of what I had tried to cover . . . .
Why had he put out the fire? Because he had known I was afraid? To force me to face my fear. and conquer it? . . . Or had it been the Indian instinct to seek cover in darkness? . . . By his own admission, chant and drum-roll had played on his nerves as they had on mine. . .
Afraid! Of course it had been fear that had wet the palms of my hands, and had tightened38 my throat so my heart had beaten in my ears like drums.
Like drums . . . yes!
But . . . not like those drums whose beat had been borne to us by the north wind. They had been like the cadence39 of the feet of men and women, youths and maids and children, running ever more rapidly up the side of a hollow world to dive swiftly into the void . . . dissolving into the nothingness . . . fading as they fell . . dissolving . . . eaten up by the nothingness . . . .
Like that accursed drum-roll I had heard in the secret temple of the Gobi oasis40 two years ago!
Neither then nor now had it been fear alone. Fear it was, in truth, but fear shot through with defiance . . . defiance of life against its negation41 . . . upsurging, roaring, vital rage . . . frantic42 revolt of the drowning against the strangling water, rage of the candle-flame against the hovering43 extinguisher . . . .
Was it as hopeless as that? If what I suspected to be true was true, to think so was to be beaten at the beginning!
But there was Jim! How to keep him out of it? In my heart, I had never laughed at those subconscious44 perceptions, whatever they were. that he called the voices of his ancestors. When he had spoken of Usunhi’yi, the Darkening-land, a chill had crept down my spine46. For had not the old Uighur priest spoken of the Shadow-land? And it was as though I had heard the echo of his words.
I looked over to where he lay. He had been more akin47 to me than my own brothers. I smiled at that, for they had never been akin to me. To all but my soft-voiced, deep-bosomed, Norse mother I had been a stranger in that severely48 conventional old house where I had been born.
The youngest son, and an unwelcome intruder; a changeling. It had been no fault of mine that I had come into the world a throw-back to my mother’s yellow-haired, blue-eyed, strong-thewed Viking forefathers49. Not at all a Langdon. The Langdon men were dark and slender, thin-lipped and saturnine50. stamped out by the same die for generations. They looked down at me, the changeling, from the family portraits with faintly amused, supercilious51 hostility52. Precisely53 as my father and my four brothers, true Langdons, each of them, looked at me when I awkwardly disposed of my bulk at their table.
It had brought me unhappiness, but it had made my mother wrap her heart around me. I wondered, as I had wondered many times, how she had come to give herself to that dark, self-centred man my father — with the blood of the sea-rovers singing in her veins54. It was she who had named me Leif — as incongruous a name to tack55 on a Langdon as was my birth among them.
Jim and I had entered Dartmouth on the same day. I saw him as he was then — the tall, brown lad with his hawk face and inscrutable black eyes. pure blood of the Cherokees, of the clan9 from which had come the great Sequoiah, a clan which had produced through many centuries wisest councillors, warriors56 strong in cunning.
On the college roster57 his name was written James T. Eagles, but on the rolls of the Cherokee Nation it was written Two Eagles and his mother had called him Tsantawu. From the first we had recognized spiritual kinship. By the ancient rites58 of his people we had become blood-brothers, and he had given me my secret name. known only to the pair of us, Degataga — one who stands so close to another that the two are one.
My one gift, besides my strength, is an aptness at languages. Soon I spoke45 the Cherokee as though I had been born in the Nation. Those years in college were the happiest I had ever known. It was during the last of them that America entered the World War. Together we had left Dartmouth, gone into training camp, sailed for France on the same transport.
Sitting there, under the slow-growing Alaskan dawn, my mind leaped over the years between . . . my mother’s death on Armistice59 Day . . . my return to New York to a frankly60 hostile home . . . Jim’s recall to his clan . . . the finishing of my course in mining engineering . . . my wanderings in Asia . . . my second return to America and my search for Jim . . . this expedition of ours to Alaska, more for comradeship and the wilderness peace than for the gold we were supposed to be seeking —
A long trail since the War — the happiest for me these last two months of it. It had led us from Nome over the quaking tundras61, and then to the Koyukuk, and at last to this little camp among the spruces, somewhere between the headwaters of the Koyukuk and the Chandalar in the foothills of the unexplored Endicott Range. A long trail . . . I had the feeling that it was here the real trail of my life began.
A ray of the rising sun struck through the trees. Jim sat up, looked over at me, and grinned.
“Didn’t get much sleep after the concert, did you?”
“What did you do to the ancestors? They didn’t seem to keep you awake long.”
He said, too carelessly: “Oh, they quieted down.” His face and eyes were expressionless. He was veiling his mind from me. The ancestors had not quieted down. He had lain awake while I had thought him sleeping. I made a swift decision. We would go south as we had planned. I would go with him as far as Circle. I would find some pretext62 to leave him there.
I said: “We’re not going north. I’ve changed my mind.”
“Yes. why?”
“I’ll tell you after we’ve had breakfast,” I said — I’m not so quick in thinking up lies. “Rustle up a fire, Jim. I’ll go down to the stream and get some water.”
“Degataga!”
I started. It was only in moments of rare sympathy or in time of peril63 that he used the secret name.
“Degataga, you go north! You go if I have to march ahead of you to make you follow. . .” he dropped into the Cherokee. . . . “It is to save your spirit, Degataga. Do we march together — blood-brothers? Or do you creep after me — like a shivering dog at the heels of the hunter?”
The blood pounded in my temples, my hand went out toward him. He stepped back, and laughed.
“That’s better, Leif.”
The quick rage left me, my hand fell.
“All right, Tsantawu. We go — north. But it wasn’t — it wasn’t because of myself that I told you I’d changed my mind.”
“I know damned well it wasn’t!”
He busied himself with the fire. I went after the water. We drank the strong black tea, and ate what was left of the little brown storks64 they call Alaskan turkeys which we had shot the day before. When we were through I began to talk.
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1
recurrence
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| n.复发，反复，重现 | |
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awakened
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| v.（使）醒( awaken的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）觉醒；弄醒；（使）意识到 | |
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boughs
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| 大树枝( bough的名词复数 ) | |
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furtive
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| adj.鬼鬼崇崇的，偷偷摸摸的 | |
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spires
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| n.（教堂的） 塔尖，尖顶( spire的名词复数 ) | |
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wanly
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| adv.虚弱地；苍白地，无血色地 | |
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twilight
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| n.暮光，黄昏；暮年，晚期，衰落时期 | |
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bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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clan
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| n.氏族，部落，宗族，家族，宗派 | |
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anvil
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| n.铁钻 | |
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gust
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| n.阵风，突然一阵（雨、烟等），（感情的）迸发 | |
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minor
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| adj.较小(少)的，较次要的；n.辅修学科；vi.辅修 | |
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wailing
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| v.哭叫，哀号( wail的现在分词 )；沱 | |
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archaic
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| adj.(语言、词汇等)古代的，已不通用的 | |
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dissonant
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| adj.不和谐的；不悦耳的 | |
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crescendo
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| n.(音乐)渐强，高潮 | |
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abruptly
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| adv.突然地，出其不意地 | |
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18
clamorous
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| adj.吵闹的，喧哗的 | |
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smothered
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| （使）窒息， （使）透不过气( smother的过去式和过去分词 )； 覆盖； 忍住； 抑制 | |
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rumbling
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| n. 隆隆声, 辘辘声 adj. 隆隆响的 动词rumble的现在分词 | |
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defiance
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| n.挑战，挑衅，蔑视，违抗 | |
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casually
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| adv.漠不关心地，无动于衷地，不负责任地 | |
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Flared
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| adj. 端部张开的, 爆发的, 加宽的, 漏斗式的 动词flare的过去式和过去分词 | |
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hawk
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| n.鹰，骗子；鹰派成员 | |
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forefather
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| n.祖先；前辈 | |
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wilderness
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| n.杳无人烟的一片陆地、水等，荒漠 | |
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27
squatted
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| v.像动物一样蹲下( squat的过去式和过去分词 )；非法擅自占用（土地或房屋）；为获得其所有权；而占用某片公共用地。 | |
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28
averted
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| 防止，避免( avert的过去式和过去分词 )； 转移 | |
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29
hissing
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| n. 发嘶嘶声, 蔑视 动词hiss的现在分词形式 | |
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30
wince
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| n.畏缩，退避，（因痛苦，苦恼等)面部肌肉抽动；v.畏缩，退缩，退避 | |
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31
propped
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| 支撑，支持，维持( prop的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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vociferous
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| adj.喧哗的，大叫大嚷的 | |
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33
promising
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| adj.有希望的，有前途的 | |
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34
lodge
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| v.临时住宿，寄宿，寄存，容纳；n.传达室，小旅馆 | |
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35
prophesying
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| v.预告，预言( prophesy的现在分词 ) | |
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chuckle
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| vi.／n.轻声笑，咯咯笑 | |
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evoked
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| [医]诱发的 | |
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tightened
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| 收紧( tighten的过去式和过去分词 )； （使）变紧； （使）绷紧； 加紧 | |
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cadence
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| n.（说话声调的）抑扬顿挫 | |
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oasis
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| n.（沙漠中的）绿洲，宜人的地方 | |
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41
negation
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| n.否定；否认 | |
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frantic
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| adj.狂乱的，错乱的，激昂的 | |
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43
hovering
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| 鸟( hover的现在分词 )； 靠近（某事物）； （人）徘徊； 犹豫 | |
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44
subconscious
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| n./adj.潜意识(的)，下意识(的) | |
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45
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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46
spine
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| n.脊柱，脊椎；(动植物的)刺；书脊 | |
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akin
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| adj.同族的，类似的 | |
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severely
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| adv.严格地；严厉地；非常恶劣地 | |
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49
forefathers
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| n.祖先，先人；祖先，祖宗( forefather的名词复数 )；列祖列宗；前人 | |
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50
saturnine
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| adj.忧郁的，沉默寡言的，阴沉的，感染铅毒的 | |
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51
supercilious
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| adj.目中无人的，高傲的；adv.高傲地；n.高傲 | |
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52
hostility
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| n.敌对，敌意；抵制［pl.］交战，战争 | |
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53
precisely
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| adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地 | |
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54
veins
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| n.纹理；矿脉( vein的名词复数 )；静脉；叶脉；纹理 | |
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55
tack
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| n.大头钉；假缝，粗缝 | |
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56
warriors
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| 武士，勇士，战士( warrior的名词复数 ) | |
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57
roster
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| n.值勤表，花名册 | |
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58
rites
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| 仪式，典礼( rite的名词复数 ) | |
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59
armistice
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| n.休战，停战协定 | |
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frankly
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| adv.坦白地，直率地；坦率地说 | |
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61
tundras
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| n.（多数位于北极圈的）冻土带( tundra的名词复数 )；苔原；冻原；寒漠 | |
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62
pretext
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| n.借口，托词 | |
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63
peril
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| n.(严重的)危险；危险的事物 | |
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64
storks
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| n.鹳( stork的名词复数 ) | |
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