31

Thirty miles down the Flat River, Faille was expecting visitors—and they were more than welcome. Last summer, he’d heard that Kraus and Clark were planning on going out by boat or raft, to save money. Their operation on Bennett Creek wasn’t producing as they’d hoped, and backers were pulling out. And Zenchuk had mentioned that he and Lomar would make their way up the Flat as soon as trapping was over, to wait for breakup.

“It seems that Lomar doesn’t like to play cards,” was the explanation.

Faille was sitting in his cabin, feet up on a block of firewood placed in front of his cook stove. He was content. The winter’s trapping had been good; there was about $3,000 worth of pelts in the cache. Enough to get the outboard motor fixed. Enough for materials for a new scow. Enough for another winter’s supplies, something for Marian and a bit for the bank in Simpson.

A single lantern burned in the cabin, throwing a soft glow. On the stove sat a pot of simmering beans, laced with molasses.

“Going over to the Caribou River a spell,” he said aloud to himself. “In the morning. Follow up that third fork. Stay out for a night or two. Maybe get a moose and make the dogs happy. Leave a note and some beans for the boys in case they come early. They’ll wait for Albert, the river rat.”

He thought for a moment, then stood up, stretched all 5 feet 4 inches of his thick-set frame, turned up the kerosene lamp on his table and stared down at a photo album that was sitting open, a head-and-shoulders picture of a pretty woman with round spectacles and a pug nose. The spectacles made her look quizzical.

“Panned a couple nuggets out of that creek,” Faille said to the woman in the photo. “Remember them? Mailed them to you last year. How come you don’t write now that I got a permanent address? Still mad at me, I bet.” He brushed the back of his index finger along her cheek, blew the light out and turned toward his bunk.

“Couldn’t live in town after the war, Marian. Couldn’t even live at the edge of town.”

Then he heard a shot from downriver. It would be Zenchuk. Outside, the dogs began to howl.

Chuckling, shaking his head, he went to the door and opened it to moonlight. The yard in front of the cabin sparkled with frost. Five huskies bounded across the clearing toward him. He stepped outside and lifted his rifle from where it sat on two pegs driven into the logs just beside the door, under the overhang. He reached into his pants pocket and pulled out a shell, slid it into the chamber and closed the bolt, pointed the rifle to the sky and fired.

He returned the rifle to its pegs and then took a chain off a hook. “C’mon, boys. I’ll put you out back. Don’t want you tearing into Nazar’s dogs.”

He returned in a few minutes, entered the cabin, took a railroader’s hurricane lantern off its nail on the wall, lit it and then went out again, carrying the lantern to his cache.

“Saved some coffee for just this occasion. Nazar will like that. Better find that pemmican ball, too. Probably they’re hungry.”

When he returned to the cabin, he left the lantern sitting on a stump in front. An hour later, as he was sitting at his table turning for the umpteenth time the yellowed and ragged pages of an old Maclean’s, the exotic smell of coffee pervading the cabin, the dogs began a ruckus and the door swung open.

“Good God, Albert. I smelled that coffee two miles down the river. Poor John here is run ragged from trying to keep up to me.”

“You’re worse than a bear, Nazar, when it comes to coffee.”

Zenchuk stepped in and behind him, Lomar.

“Hi, Albert,” said Lomar. “The dogs are tied to a tree along your trail to the river.”

“That’s fine, John. Come on in. Drop your stuff on the bunks. You boys should be hungry.”

“We are,” said Zenchuk, as he and Lomar peeled off their packs and outer clothing. “We were hoping to run into a moose on the way, but we didn’t see a track even.”

“They’ve been avoiding the area, I swear. They’ve posted warnings.”

Zenchuk lifted the lid on the bean pot.

“Those are still hard as nails,” said Faille. “But I’ve got some pemmican.”

“We can wait for the beans, Albert,” said Zenchuk. “Don’t trouble yourself. I’m no lover of pemmican. Hope you don’t mind if I just pour myself a cup of this.”

“Go ahead,” said Faille. “You too, John. But Nazar, you just taste my pemmican before you decide.” Faille rose, taking the fist-sized lump of pemmican off his table. “Move that pot over a bit, John, and put the skillet on. Nazar, I’ll need your help outside. This is still frozen solid.”

Zenchuk followed Faille from the cabin to the chopping block. Faille handed him the lantern and picked up the axe. A sharp blow with the top of the axehead shattered the pemmican ball into a dozen pieces, which Faille and Zenchuk proceeded to pick up and carry to the cabin.

All the while Faille kept talking, enlightening Zenchuk as to the ingredients and virtues of pemmican and which lady in Fort Simpson made the best.

They dropped the pemmican into the frying pan. Once it was sizzling, Faille added one handful of raisins and one of oatmeal. He cooked it until the raisins and oatmeal were soft, the oatmeal soaking up the fat. Then he dished it into three bowls.

“Not bad,” said Zenchuk, chewing on his first mouthful. “The oatmeal gives it body, and the raisins cut the fat and sweeten it.”

“And the fat makes us strong,” said Faille. “Go without fat for too long in this country, and the sky gets grayer, the bush darker, the wolves better organized. I buy pemmican off the Indians every chance I get. This’ll carry us until tomorrow, and then the beans’ll be ready. After that, we’ve got to make a serious attempt to get a moose. We got to walk right up to Mr. Moose, introduce ourselves and invite him to dinner.”

“We got 50 pounds of flour in our cache,” said Lomar.

Faille nodded. “It shouldn’t be long before we can get at it. What’s the Caribou River look like now?”

“Quite a sight,” said Zenchuk. “Thawed from top to bottom, by the looks of it. Shooting right out over the ice on the Flat and flooding the bush. Ice blocks and broken trees everywhere.”

After they’d eaten, they poured themselves more coffee.

“Did you know that Eppler and Mulholland could meet up with us here or at the mouth of the Flat?” asked Zenchuk.

“They’re down on the Liard. I saw them setting up in their usual spot near the Butte on my way here.”

“They didn’t bring much in through November and December. I guess that line is pretty well trapped out. Dal dropped in at the Butte in January and talked them into trying up at Rabbitkettle Lake.”

“A good idea! They’ll do well there. The Liard’s too crowded, no doubt about it. So they’re rafting their stuff out as far as the Flat and then hooking up with us?”

“That’s the trouble. Dal couldn’t pin Bill down. His original plan was to build a skinboat and get out with all the pelts straight down the Nahanni.”

“A skinboat! Utter suicide,” said Faille.

“Dal suggested they use a raft or just leave the pelts in the cache for him to pick up, and walk down Irvine Creek to here. Bill didn’t commit.”

“Dal’s right,” said Faille, “but Bill’s like a mule when he gets an idea in his head.”

Lomar yelped. His pipe had fallen out of his mouth, hit his lap and spilled.

“Better sleep,” he muttered.

“There’s more coffee,” said Faille.

“Gotta sleep.” Lomar banged his pipe out on the stove top, lurched over to the bunks and climbed into the top one, not even bothering with his eiderdown.

“Sweet dreams,” said Zenchuk.

No answer.

“Tell me, Albert, was Eppler already at Fort Simpson when you came into the country?”

“I don’t think so. I think he was still trapping in the Barrens. I believe he had a trading post in that direction, too, at Providence. I met him in ’29. He came to Simpson not long after I did, and trapped along the Liard before he partnered up with Jack Mulholland to start the post at the Butte.”

“It’s a good post. They know what people around here need.”

“I’ll say. Like the biggest kickers money can buy. There’s one out there under my scow that I bought off Jack and Bill last summer. Mind you, I broke it right away on some rocks when Bill and Dick Turner came upriver and sweet-talked me into going to their claims on McLeod Creek. Just had to show those boys how to get a boat through the canyon. Do you think John would mind if I helped myself to another bowl of fine cut?”

“I’ll ask him. John, Albert wants to know if he can help himself to more of your fine cut.”

No response.

“Silence means consent, Albert.”

Faille took the can from the floor and stuffed his pipe, lighting it from the stove and puffing hard until a huge cloud of fragrant smoke once again enveloped his head.

“Do you know the whole story about that murder charge in the U.S?” asked Zenchuk.

“Eppler was an orphan,” Faille said. “It’s something he and I have in common. He was raised in an orphanage in Winnipeg, but he left there when he was 11 years old and he was on his own after that. Like me, he turned into a wanderer. Both of us rode the rails for a time, hung out with the hoboes. When he was about 18, he was passing through the States, thinking that California would be the place to find work. He arrived in some midwest town, riding the freights, and ate a meal at the café there. The owner was a Greek, and he figured since Bill was a stranger and not much more than a kid, he could get away with charging him a little extra. Bill up and argued.”

“As he would,” said Zenchuk.

Faille nodded. “It came near to a fist fight except the other customers intervened. Bill threw down what he figured he owed and headed for the tracks, meaning to bed down and wait for the next freight. On the way, he stopped to watch some kids playing baseball. One of them hit a fly ball that went into the grass not far from Bill. The kids couldn’t find the ball and accused Bill of picking it up. He said no and invited them to search him and his bag, which they did. No ball. A few minutes later, one of them found it in the grass and the game went on with Bill still watching.”

Faille sucked hard on his pipe. Once again his head disappeared in a cloud.

“A half-hour later the police turned up, grabbed Bill and took him to jail. Turns out the Greek had just been shot to death out back of his café and some of the customers that the police talked to remembered Bill and the fight. Bill was in jail for two weeks waiting for his trial. He told me it was the worst time of his life. He got claustrophobic, afraid there’d be a fire at night and he wouldn’t be able to get out. A few days into his stay there, a guy in the next cell was taken out and hung, yelling that he was innocent.

“They gave Bill a lawyer, and he contacted the orphanage in Winnipeg. They sent a good character reference. Then the lawyer rounded up the boys who’d been playing baseball, and some customers who did think Bill was overcharged. The kids were the key.

“At the trial, the police admitted that they had no weapon, and the prosecution assumed that Bill had ditched it somewhere. The boys testified that there was no gun on Bill when they’d searched him and his pack, and the way the times lined up, it was clear that Bill couldn’t have gone anywhere but from the café to the baseball diamond. So he got off. He says he hightailed it for the Canadian border as fast as he could go, and he didn’t stop running until he hit Great Bear Lake. He figures they’d have hung him if it hadn’t been for the sheer accident of stopping to watch the baseball game and being searched by the boys. He swore he’d never allow anyone to drag him into jail again.”

Faille sucked reflectively on his pipe. Zenchuk poured himself more coffee.

“Poker?” asked Zenchuk.

“Thought you’d never ask.”