by Gordon Ryan
The final decision reached by both women, was that Harold was not to know of their knowledge, at least until after the birth of Teresa’s baby. Teresa’s move into the guest room, explained to Harold as having been suggested by the midwife to assure the rest necessary during her final weeks, was supported by the tragedy that had befallen Katrina and Harold’s first baby.
So, as Harold arrived home toward the end of the second week of his trip, the conditions that greeted him were depressing. Katrina had lost her baby, Teresa had moved into isolation to protect her final weeks of pregnancy, and Harold found himself virtually alone in the house, as both women kept to themselves and shared their thoughts only with each other. All in all, it was not the situation Harold had contemplated when he thought of the establishment of New Hope and the reinstitution of the Principle, at least not as his father had explained it.
Chapter 18
The winter beauty of Alaska was spectacular, and Tom almost immediately fell in love with the country. Although they were actually in Canada, most of the miners still referred to the area of the Yukon River and its tributaries as part of Alaska. The cold air provided wonderful visibility, and on a clear day, standing on the ridge above their claim, Tom could literally see for well over a hundred miles.
He had seen beautiful mountain country while traveling through the Rockies the previous winter, but one evening in Alaska, he saw a spectacular phenomenon, such as he had never experienced. As the calendar advanced, it had grown dark earlier each evening, and then one night in late October, long after Tom had gone to sleep, he was awakened by a strange light shining through the wall of their tent. Thinking someone was searching their camp for gold, he pulled on his boots and jumper and carefully lifted the tent flap to peer outside. The air was bitterly cold, and the hair in his nostrils crackled, but the sight he beheld was the most fascinating he had ever seen. The thought even crossed his mind that perhaps the world was coming to an end; for the sky was ablaze with a kaleidoscope of vivid, constantly changing, colored lights. The effect was truly amazing, and awestruck by the vision before him, Tom watched the sky for some moments before thinking to alert John.
Stepping back into the tent to wake John, he urged him to get out of bed and view the magnificent display. But taking one glimpse through the open flap, John simply rolled over and pulled his bedroll up around his ears, mumbling, “It’s just the northern lights, lad—‘God’s paint board,’ they call it. Go back to sleep.”
Seeing no concern on the part of his uncle, Tom went back outside, no longer frightened that some catastrophic event was in progress. He spent the next several hours enjoying his first encounter with the aurora borealis, or “northern lights,” the luminescent nighttime display that can be observed north of the Arctic Circle in the winter months. For centuries, mankind had been startled and amazed by the natural phenomena and enthralled by its beauty. Many times throughout the winter, Tom found the show exciting enough to brave the cold and lose a few hours sleep to watch its cascading shadows.
Tom learned that at that northern position, ice and snow were almost permanent fixtures. Even in late April, winter retained a fast grip on the land, and, according to the sourdoughs, most of whom still took pleasure in ribbing the young Irishman about his cheechako status, “old man winter kin throw a blanket ‘round you quicker’n a grizzly kin get mad and rip your heart out.”
Through the fall and winter months, it was apparent that the tributaries on which Tom and his uncle had established their claims, were producing exceptionally fine gold and in quantities in excess of those being panned by Carmack and his brothers-in-law down on Bonanza Creek. Over a hundred miners had finally found their life’s dream, and through the winter of 1896–1897, they sat around the campfire at night, figuring how they were going to spend it. Many of the old-timers had been digging and scratching in the dirt and stream beds for nearly thirty years, ever since the United States purchased Alaska from Russia, eking out a sparse living off the land while they searched for gold. Ever gold.
The previous October, in a celebration quite rare, since most miners worked through all daylight hours, and as much also as they could by lamplight in the dark, the small cluster of men around Emerald One and Emerald Two had gathered to usher Tom through his twenty-first birthday.
“Rich before he’s dry behind the ears,” said one of the old-timers. “Reckon we oughta be sure he stays wet behind them ears, don’tcha reckon?” he threatened. Whether or not they actually would have thrown Tom in the creek in the middle of a Canadian winter, he didn’t know, but Tom was grateful for the intervention of his uncle.
The surprising thing to Tom, apart from the difficulty he had in accepting their good fortune, was the fact that the miners seemed unconcerned about theft by their neighbors.
“Oh, the thieves’ll come, all right,” John had said. “But it won’t be ’til next spring, after word gets out. Then we’ll see ’em, all kinds, whooping it up, snatching claims and the like. Then we’ll all have to guard our gold like it was,” he laughed, “like’n it was gold.”
The first hint of spring came as the runoff from the watershed caused their small tributary to swell considerably, disrupting the placer operations they had constructed on the banks of the stream. Working knee-deep in water so cold it threatened to freeze their legs, the men continually dredged up gravel and sand, working it in their pans, ever alert for the “color” that was gold.
On one particularly bright day, their gold dust stashed all around the campsite in leather packets, tin cans, and any other container that could be used to hold the precious grains, John announced he was heading in to Fortymile.
“It’s time for a wallop, I reckon,” he declared.
“A what?” Tom asked.
“A long drunk, my young nephew. And since you don’t imbibe anymore, you can keep pulling that there yellow stuff out of the river, so’s I can pay for the drink I intend to consume.”
“Aye, I’ll stay,” Tom responded, no argument forthcoming.
Two days after John and two of the other miners left for Fortymile, a great northwester blew in, leaving eighteen inches of freshly fallen snow on the campsite. It only took about a day and a half to walk to Fortymile, so Tom had no concerns that John had not reached his destination, but he knew his uncle would be unable to return quickly. That much snow around their claim site, at a low elevation, was certain to mean that the pass through which the miners traveled to Fortymile would be heavily snowed in. Tom didn’t expect John to return for several more days, until after the snow had melted enough to let him walk the trail.
Five days later, the two miners who had gone with John made their way into Tom and John’s claim. No horses were available to the miners for lack of feed through the winter, and the two men were on foot, lugging a blanket rigged between two poles. Each miner was struggling to lift one side of the contraption. Instantly, Tom knew something was wrong. He waded out of the stream and walked toward the approaching pair.
Setting their burden down on the ground, one of the men said, “Tom, we got bad news for ya, lad.”
Tom could see it was a body wrapped in the blanket, completely covered except for the boots sticking out at one end—boots Tom recognized as belonging to John.
“John got into a fight the first night in town, with that German fellow from down on Bonanza Creek. He didn’t pick the fight, Tom, it just kind of got started. Anyways, John said he didn’t reckon he’d stick around to waste a good drunk, so’s he took about a dozen bottles in his pack, and started back for here, thinking, I s’pose, he’d get liquored up here at camp.”
“What happened?” Tom asked.
“Reckon the storm caught him, Tom. He were near drunk when he left Fortymile, and we found him yesti’day afternoon when we was comin’ back, froze solid ’longside the trail.”
Tom knelt down by the body and unwrapped the blanket from around the head. Bits and pieces of ice dropped away from the covering. John’s mustache was coated
with frost and his hair was frozen in place. But his face was peaceful as he lay on the jerry-rigged stretcher.
“Reckon we could get that preacher fella, up to Six Above, to come down and say a few words, Tom, if’n you’d like.”
Tom just nodded. Then, without waiting, he got a shovel from the tent and moved to a spot up the hill from the stream. There, he attempted to dig, but was unable to make much of a dent in the frozen ground. One of the other miners brought a pick to help Tom dig his uncle’s grave, while his partner started up the creek for Six Above to bring the preacher down.
For the next three days, Tom moped around the camp, going about the ritual of daily work, missing John more than he would have thought, and glancing frequently up the hill at the pile of rocks he’d arranged on the mound of Uncle John’s grave.
On the third day after John’s burial, one of the old-timers, who’d known John in Anvil, stopped by the camp. He’d heard about his friend’s death, and he told Tom about some of the adventures the two had shared. After a bit, the old fellow fell silent. Then he said, “What do ya plan to do, young fella?”
Without waiting for an answer, he went on, “This summer, son, hordes and hordes of folk are gonna come plunderin’ down this valley, searchin’ for their dreams. I seen it in Californy when I were but fifteen. It won’t be a pretty sight, that it won’t,” he said. “I’ve started takin’ my stash out, bit by bit, into Fortymile. And after breakup, I’ll hit for Dawson. Reckon at my age, I got enough to last the rest o’ my life.”
Tom sat quietly, listening to the older man ramble. After some moments, he gestured to the jumble of containers stacked around the inside of the tent, and asked, “How much do you think we got here?”
The grizzled old man glanced around at the stash. Then, shaking his head, he squinted at Tom and said, “Dunno, lad. Cept’n you take it into Dawson and get it assayed, you ain’t sure. But from what I done took down already, I’d say you got into the millions.”
Tom stared at the old man. “Millions?” he asked.
There were two topics Tom and his uncle had never discussed—one was the dollar value of their pannings, and the other was the tattered picture of a young woman Tom kept pinned to the sloping wall of his tent, above his bedroll. For some reason, Tom had never attached a monetary value to the gold they were accumulating. The dust had become so commonplace, and there was so much of it, it had lost its ability to excite him. There was nothing about it that resembled wealth; it didn’t even sparkle very much. So its value had ceased to be a consideration. It was gold. And Tom knew they were rich. How rich, didn’t matter.
The picture of Katrina had been another matter entirely.
Over the winter, Tom had spent hours, hunched over the stream, performing the repetitive task of sluicing his pan. The work was mundane and mindless, and his thoughts went frequently to Katrina.
It was curious, that as much as he thought about her, Tom never spoke to John about Katrina, even though John had come into the tent on a number of occasions to find John looking at her picture. John’s silence was the product of either not wishing to interfere in Tom’s personal life, or disinterest. Either way, Tom had let the subject lay dormant, apart from his own continuing remorse over losing Katrina to another man. But as for that, Tom always thought of her as Katrina Hansen. Katrina Stromberg wasn’t part of the fantasy.
But, the old man’s comment about millions had raised the unspoken question of value, startling Tom. “Millions!” Tom said again.
“Reckon that’d be ’bout right. That’s what I figger I’ve got, and it weren’t as much as you and your uncle got piled up. I’ll be glad to help you load it out, lad. I’m leaving anyway, come breakup. I’ll be headin’ in to Fortymile to get a couple of horses to haul it all out. We could do it together. What say? I know you’re still a young man, but you reckon you got enough?” he said, looking around the tent again.
Tom stood, lifted the tent flap and stepped outside into the fading light of day. The sun had disappeared behind the western mountain, which shaded their campsite from the sunset throughout the winter months. The old man followed him out, tossed the remains of his coffee into the stream, and stood next to Tom in the twilight. After a few moments, Tom turned to look at the older man.
“Reckon I’ve got enough,” Tom said.
Teresa drove the buggy hard, trying to reach her home as quickly as she could. In her eighth month of pregnancy, she had become bulky and awkward. The lean, athletic body she had always enjoyed was temporarily gone, and she sat uncomfortably on the buggy seat as it bounced and rocked along.
She had been surprised by how angry her father had become. Don Sebastian was not a man given to fits of temper or open displays of frustration, but the news Miguel brought from the village had transformed him into an enraged man. Displaying a degree of anger she had never seen in him, he had made violent threats toward those who had deceived him. Even now, almost an hour later, his words continued to ring in her ears.
“They will not live on my land and continue this barbaric practice. They have deceived me!” he shouted, pacing back and forth in the study. “Miguel, who told you these things?” he demanded of his son.
“Father, Señor Rameriez in the village told me himself. His oldest daughter was taken in marriage by one of the colonists—a man with two wives already,” Miguel repeated.
“No! We will not tolerate this!” Don Sebastian declared, slamming his fist down onto the desk.
“They are organizing the men to retrieve her. They ride with anger, Father.”
Recognizing the potential for disaster, a degree of caution began to overtake the older man. In his youth, he had been involved in a prolonged family feud and had seen enough of violence. He wished now to spare his people the kind of ugliness he had seen and the sorrow that always came from such conflict.
“We must not have a blood bath, Miguel. You must ride with them and bring order to this vengeance.”
“Sí, Father. I will do what I can, but the men are very angry.”
Before leaving hurriedly for her home, Teresa had seen Miguel organizing their father’s caballeros and had heard the hooves of the horses as her brother and the men from the hacienda rode out, intent on joining the mob from the village. Whether to calm or to inflame, she knew not, for what she had seen in her brother’s eyes frightened her.
Teresa knew what Don Sebastian did not: the woman taken in marriage had been fancied by Miguel, and he had been bested by the Yanqui—a married Yanqui.
“Miguel, please be rational. You must not do this thing,” she had pleaded.
“Go home, Teresa. Stay in your house and tell Harold also to stay away from the colony. You must not be involved in this.”
“But I am. We are, Miguel. I am married to one of them, and now, Juanita is married to one of them as well.”
“So you are. So you both are,” he said, mounting his horse. “If Harold is to stay alive, see that he stays home with you,” he ordered, spurring his horse and leading the men at a gallop, out through the gates of the hacienda and toward the nearby Mexican village.
The memory of the encounter with her brother and father still fresh in her mind, Teresa stopped the buggy in front of the house and was met by one of the stable hands, who helped her down from the buggy. “Señor Harold?” she queried.
“No es aquí,” he replied.
“Then where is he?” she asked, racing up the front steps of the house.
“Señor Stromberg is in the colony,” he pointed, indicating New Hope.
“No!” Teresa cried. “Katrina,” she shouted, running to the bottom of the stairs, her swollen belly the unwieldy companion of a woman in haste. “Katrina!”
Appearing at the top of the stairs, Katrina moved quickly down the steps.
“What is it?” she said.
“We’ve got to get to the village. To warn the people and Harold.”
“Warn them of what?” Katrina asked.
“The villager
s are organizing. They’re very angry, Katrina. One of the local girls has been taken in marriage by one of your colonists—one who already has two wives. A mob, with Miguel and some of father’s men, is riding toward the village. We must warn them.”
“Let me get a coat. Are you sure you should go?” Katrina asked, concerned for Teresa’s pregnancy.
“We must. Hurry, Katrina, hurry!”
The two women rode in silence, the horse laboring to keep pace with the demands Teresa placed on him after the earlier gallop from her father’s house. Reaching the outskirts of New Hope, they could see the colonists, some of them toiling in the fields, others working on partially constructed houses, and a group loading a wagon with lumber that was being stored in the large barn where Teresa had first met Katrina. The horse raced down the slope toward the village, the buggy careening along behind and both women hanging on over the bumpy, rutted cart path. Pulling her horse to a stop in front of the barn, Katrina stood up in the buggy, looking about wildly for Harold. He had seen the buggy coming and now came running from where he had been overseeing the construction of a house.
“What’s happened?” he asked.
“Harold,” Teresa blurted out, “some of the villagers are coming to rescue the village girl one of your settlers married.”
“Rescue? She’s not being held captive.”
“Harold,” Teresa said, “this cannot continue. The local people are angry. To live out your family lives in peace as your father promised my father is one thing, but to continue this terrible practice—the people will not tolerate it.”
“It is none of their business,” Harold stated flatly.
