At about eight o'clock one evening of the early summer a group of men were seated on a grass-plot overlooking a broad river. The sun was just setting through the forest fringe directly behind them.
Of this group some reclined in the short grass, others lay flat on the bank's slope, while still others leaned against the carriages of two highly ornamented1 field-guns, whose embossed muzzles2 gaped3 silently at an eastern shore nearly two miles distant.
The men were busy with soft-voiced talk, punctuating4 their remarks with low laughter of a singularly infectious character. It was strange speech, richly embroidered5 with the musical names of places, with unfamiliar6 names of beasts, and with unintelligible7 names of things. Kenógami, Mamátawan, Wenebógan, Kapúskasíng, the silver-fox, the sea-otter, the sable9, the wolverine, the musk-ox, parka, babiche, tump-line, giddés,--these and others sang like arrows cleaving10 the atmosphere of commoner words. In the distant woods the white-throats and olive thrushes called in a language hardly less intelligible8.
There scarcely needed the row of glistening11 birch-barks below the men, the warehouse12 with its picketed13 lane, the tall flag-staff, the block-house stockade14, the half-bred women chatting over the low fences of the log-houses, the squaws wandering to and fro in picturesque15 silence, the Indian children playing noisily or standing16 in awe17 before the veranda18 of the white house, to inform the initiated19 that this little forest- and river-girt settlement was a post of the Honourable20 the Hudson's Bay Company. The time of sunset and the direction of the river's flow would have indicated a high latitude21. The mile-long meadow, with its Indian camp, the oval of forest, the immense breadth of the river identified the place as Conjuror's House. Thus the blue water in the distance was James Bay, the river was the Moose; enjoying his Manila cheroot on the Factory veranda with the other officers of the Company was Galen Albret, and these men lounging on the river bank were the Company's post-keepers and runners, the travellers of the Silent Places.
They were of every age and dressed in a variety of styles. All wore ornamented moccasins, bead22 garters, and red sashes of worsted. As to the rest, each followed his taste. So in the group could be seen bare heads, fillet-bound heads, covered heads; shirt sleeves, woollen jerseys23, and long, beautiful blanket coats. Two things, however, proved them akin24. They all possessed25 a lean, wiry hardness of muscle and frame, a hawk26-like glance of the eye, an almost emaciated27 spareness of flesh on the cheeks. They all smoked pipes of strong plug tobacco.
Whether the bronze of their faces, thrown into relief by the evening glow, the frowning steadiness of their eyes, or more fancifully the background of the guns, the flag-staff and the stockade was most responsible, the militant28 impression persisted strongly. These were the veterans of an hundred battles. They were of the stuff forlorn hopes are fashioned from. A great enemy, a powerful enemy, an enemy to be respected and feared had hardened them to the unyielding. The adversary29 could almost be measured, the bitterness of the struggle almost be gauged30 from the scars of their spirits; the harshness of it, the cruelty of it, the wonderful immensity of it that should so fashion the souls and flesh of men. For to the bearing of these loungers clung that hint of greater things which is never lacking to those who have called the deeps of man's nature to the conquering.
The sun dipped to the horizon, and over the landscape slipped the beautiful north-country haze31 of crimson32. From the distant forest sounded a single mournful wolf-howl. At once the sledge-dogs answered in chorus. The twilight33 descended34. The men gradually fell silent, smoking their pipes, savouring the sharp snow-tang, grateful to their toughened senses, that still lingered in the air.
Suddenly out of the dimness loomed35 the tall form of an Indian, advancing with long, straight strides. In a moment he was among them responding composedly to their greetings.
"Bo' jou', bo' jou', Me-en-gen," said they.
"Bo' jou', bo' jou'," said he.
He touched two of the men lightly on the shoulder. They arose, for they knew him as the bowsman of the Factor's canoe, and so understood that Galen Albret desired their presence.
Me-en-gen led the way in silence, across the grass-plot, past the flag-staff, to the foot of the steps leading to the Factory veranda. There the Indian left them. They mounted the steps. A voice halted them in the square of light cast through an intervening room from a lighted inner apartment.
The veranda was wide and low; railed in; and, except for the square of light, cast in dimness. A dozen men sat in chairs, smoking. Across the shaft36 of light the smoke eddied37 strangely. A woman's voice accompanied softly the tinkle38 of a piano inside. The sounds, like the lamplight, were softened39 by the distance of the intervening room.
Of the men on the veranda Galen Albret's identity alone was evident. Grim, four-square, inert40, his very way of sitting his chair, as though it were a seat of judgment41 and he the interpreter of some fierce blood-law, betrayed him. From under the bushy white tufts of his eyebrows42 the woodsmen felt the search of his inspection43. Unconsciously they squared their shoulders.
The older had some fifty-five or sixty years, though his frame was still straight and athletic44. A narrow-brimmed slouch hat shadowed quiet, gray eyes, a hawk nose, a long sweeping45 white mustache. His hands were tanned to a hard mahogany-brown carved into veins46, cords, and gnarled joints47. He had kindly48 humour in the wrinkles of his eyes, the slowly developed imagination of the forest-dweller in the deliberation of their gaze, and an evident hard and wiry endurance. His dress, from the rough pea-jacket to the unornamented moccasins, was severely49 plain.
His companion was hardly more than a boy in years, though more than a man in physical development. In every respect he seemed to be especially adapted to the rigours of northern life. The broad arch of his chest, the plump smoothness of his muscles, above all, the full roundness of his throat indicated that warmth-giving blood, and plenty of it, would be pumped generously to every part of his body. His face from any point of view but one revealed a handsome, jaunty50 boy, whose beard was still a shade. But when he looked at one directly, the immaturity51 fell away. This might have been because of a certain confidence of experience beyond what most boys of twenty can know, or it might have been the result merely of a physical peculiarity52. For his eyes were so extraordinarily53 close together that they seemed by their very proximity54 to pinch the bridge of his nose, and in addition, they possessed a queer slant55 or cast which twinkled perpetually now in one, now in the other. It invested him at once with an air singularly remote and singularly determined56. But at once when he looked away the old boyishness returned, enhanced further by a certain youthful barbarity in the details of his dress--a slanted57 heron's feather in his hat, a beaded knife-sheath, an excess of ornamentation on his garters and moccasins, and the like.
In a moment one of the men on the veranda began to talk. It was not Galen Albret, though Galen Albret had summoned them, but MacDonald, his Chief Trader and his right-hand man. Galen Albret himself made no sign, but sat, his head sunk forward, watching the men's faces from his cavernous eyes.
"You have been called for especial duty," began MacDonald, shortly. "It is volunteer duty, and you need not go unless you want to. We have called you because you have the reputation of never having failed. That is not much for you, Herron, because you are young. Still we believe in you. But you, Bolton, are an old hand on the Trail, and it means a good deal."
Galen Albret stirred. MacDonald shot a glance in his direction and hastened on.
"I am going to tell you what we want. If you don't care to tackle the job, you must know nothing about it. That is distinctly understood?"
He hitched58 forward nearer the light, scanning the men carefully. They nodded.
"Sure!" added Herron.
"That's all right. Do you men remember Jingoss, the Ojibway, who outfitted59 here a year ago last summer?"
"Him they calls th' Weasel?" inquired Sam Bolton.
"That's the one. Do you remember him well? how he looks?"
"Yes," nodded Sam and Dick Herron together.
"We've got to have that Indian."
"Where is he?" asked Herron. Sam Bolton remained silent.
"That is for you to find out." MacDonald then went on to explain himself, hitching60 his chair still nearer, and lowering his voice. "A year ago last summer," said he, "he got his 'debt' at the store of two hundred castors[1] which he was to pay off in pelts61 the following spring. He never came back. I don't think he intends to. The example is bad. It has never happened to us before. Too many Indians get credit at this Post. If this man is allowed to go unpunished, we'll be due for all sorts of trouble with our other creditors62. Not only he, but all the rest of them, must be made to feel that an embezzler63 is going to be caught, every time. They all know he's stolen that debt, and they're waiting to see what we're going to do about it. I tell you this so you'll know that it's important."
[Footnote 1: One hundred dollars.]
"You want us to catch him?" said Bolton, more as a comment than an inquiry64.
"Catch him, and catch him alive!" corrected MacDonald. "There must be no shooting. We've got to punish him in a way that will make him an example. We've got to allow our Indians 'debt' in order to keep them. If we run too great a risk of loss, we cannot do it. That is a grave problem. In case of success you shall have double pay for the time you are gone, and be raised two ranks in the service. Will you do it?"
Sam Bolton passed his emaciated, gnarled hand gropingly across his mouth, his usual precursor65 of speech. But Galen Albret abruptly66 interposed, speaking directly, with authority, as was his habit.
"Hold on," said he, "I want no doubt. If you accept this, you must not fail. Either you must come back with that Indian, or you need not come back at all. I won't accept any excuses for failure. I won't accept any failure. It does not matter if it takes ten years. _I want that man_."
Abruptly he fell silent. After a moment MacDonald resumed his speech.
"Think well. Let me know in the morning."
Bolton again passed his hand gropingly before his mouth.
"No need to wait for me," said he; "I'll do it."
Dick Herron suddenly laughed aloud, startling to flight the gravities of the moment.
"If Sam here's got her figured out, I've no need to worry," he asserted. "I'm with you."
"Very well," agreed MacDonald. "Remember, this must be kept quiet. Come to me for what you need."
"I will say good-by to you now," said Galen Albret. "I do not wish to be seen talking to you to-morrow."
The woodsmen stepped forward, and solemnly shook Galen Albret's hand. He did not arise to greet these men he was sending out into the Silent Places, for he was the Factor, and not to many is it given to rule a country so rich and extended. They nodded in turn to the taciturn smokers67, then glided68 away into the darkness on silent, moccasined feet.
The night had fallen. Here and there through the gloom shone a lamp. Across the north was a dim glow of phosphorescence, precursor of the aurora69, from which occasionally trembled for an instant a single shaft of light. The group by the bronze field-cannon were humming softly the sweet and tender cadences70 of _La Violette dandine_.
Instinctively71 the two woodsmen paused on the hither side of rejoining their companions. Bolton's eyes were already clouded with the trouble of his speculation72. Dick Herron glanced at his comrade quizzically, the strange cast flickering73 in the wind of his thought.
"Oh, Sam!" said he.
"What?" asked the older man, rousing.
"Strikes me that by the time we get through drawin' that double pay on this job, we'll be rich men--and old!"
收听单词发音 |
1
ornamented
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| adj.花式字体的v.装饰，点缀，美化( ornament的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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muzzles
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| 枪口( muzzle的名词复数 )； （防止动物咬人的）口套； （四足动物的）鼻口部； （狗）等凸出的鼻子和口 | |
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gaped
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| v.目瞪口呆地凝视( gape的过去式和过去分词 )；张开，张大 | |
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punctuating
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| v.（在文字中）加标点符号，加标点( punctuate的现在分词 )；不时打断某事物 | |
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embroidered
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| adj．绣花的 | |
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unfamiliar
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| adj.陌生的，不熟悉的 | |
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unintelligible
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| adj.无法了解的，难解的，莫明其妙的 | |
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intelligible
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| adj.可理解的，明白易懂的，清楚的 | |
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sable
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| n.黑貂；adj.黑色的 | |
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cleaving
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| v.劈开，剁开，割开( cleave的现在分词 ) | |
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glistening
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| adj.闪耀的，反光的v.湿物闪耀，闪亮( glisten的现在分词 ) | |
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warehouse
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| n.仓库；vt.存入仓库 | |
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picketed
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| 用尖桩围住（picket的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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stockade
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| n.栅栏，围栏；v.用栅栏防护 | |
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picturesque
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| adj.美丽如画的，（语言）生动的，绘声绘色的 | |
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standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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awe
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| n.敬畏，惊惧；vt.使敬畏，使惊惧 | |
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veranda
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| n.走廊；阳台 | |
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initiated
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| n. 创始人 adj. 新加入的 vt. 开始，创始，启蒙，介绍加入 | |
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honourable
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| adj.可敬的；荣誉的，光荣的 | |
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latitude
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| n.纬度，行动或言论的自由(范围)，(pl.)地区 | |
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bead
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| n.念珠；(pl.)珠子项链；水珠 | |
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jerseys
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| n.运动衫( jersey的名词复数 ) | |
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akin
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| adj.同族的，类似的 | |
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possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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hawk
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| n.鹰，骗子；鹰派成员 | |
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emaciated
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| adj.衰弱的，消瘦的 | |
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militant
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| adj.激进的，好斗的；n.激进分子，斗士 | |
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adversary
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| adj.敌手，对手 | |
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gauged
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| adj.校准的；标准的；量规的；量计的v.（用仪器）测量( gauge的过去式和过去分词 )；估计；计量；划分 | |
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haze
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| n.霾，烟雾；懵懂，迷糊；vi.(over)变模糊 | |
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crimson
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| n./adj.深(绯)红色(的)；vi.脸变绯红色 | |
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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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descended
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| a.为...后裔的，出身于...的 | |
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loomed
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| v.隐约出现，阴森地逼近( loom的过去式和过去分词 )；隐约出现，阴森地逼近 | |
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shaft
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| n.(工具的)柄，杆状物 | |
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eddied
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| 起漩涡，旋转( eddy的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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tinkle
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| vi.叮当作响；n.叮当声 | |
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softened
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| （使）变软( soften的过去式和过去分词 )； 缓解打击； 缓和； 安慰 | |
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inert
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| adj.无活动能力的，惰性的；迟钝的 | |
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judgment
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| n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见 | |
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eyebrows
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| 眉毛( eyebrow的名词复数 ) | |
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inspection
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| n.检查，审查，检阅 | |
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athletic
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| adj.擅长运动的，强健的；活跃的，体格健壮的 | |
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sweeping
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| adj.范围广大的，一扫无遗的 | |
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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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47
joints
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| 接头( joint的名词复数 )； 关节； 公共场所（尤指价格低廉的饮食和娱乐场所） （非正式）； 一块烤肉 （英式英语） | |
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48
kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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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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50
jaunty
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| adj．愉快的，满足的；adv.心满意足地，洋洋得意地；n.心满意足；洋洋得意 | |
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51
immaturity
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| n.不成熟；未充分成长；未成熟；粗糙 | |
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52
peculiarity
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| n.独特性，特色；特殊的东西；怪癖 | |
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53
extraordinarily
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| adv.格外地；极端地 | |
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54
proximity
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| n.接近，邻近 | |
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55
slant
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| v.倾斜，倾向性地编写或报道；n.斜面，倾向 | |
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56
determined
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| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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57
slanted
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| 有偏见的； 倾斜的 | |
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58
hitched
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| （免费）搭乘他人之车( hitch的过去式和过去分词 )； 搭便车； 攀上； 跃上 | |
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outfitted
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| v.装备，配置设备，供给服装( outfit的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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hitching
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| 搭乘； （免费）搭乘他人之车( hitch的现在分词 )； 搭便车； 攀上； 跃上 | |
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61
pelts
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| n. 皮毛，投掷, 疾行 vt. 剥去皮毛，（连续）投掷 vi. 猛击，大步走 | |
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62
creditors
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| n.债权人，债主( creditor的名词复数 ) | |
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embezzler
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| n.盗用公款者，侵占公款犯 | |
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inquiry
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| n.打听，询问，调查，查问 | |
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precursor
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| n.先驱者；前辈；前任；预兆；先兆 | |
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abruptly
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| adv.突然地，出其不意地 | |
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67
smokers
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| 吸烟者( smoker的名词复数 ) | |
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68
glided
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| v.滑动( glide的过去式和过去分词 )；掠过；（鸟或飞机 ） 滑翔 | |
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aurora
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| n.极光 | |
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70
cadences
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| n.（声音的）抑扬顿挫( cadence的名词复数 )；节奏；韵律；调子 | |
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71
instinctively
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| adv.本能地 | |
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72
speculation
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| n.思索，沉思；猜测；投机 | |
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flickering
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| adj.闪烁的，摇曳的，一闪一闪的 | |
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