Part 12

In the morning we had to break the ice to get water for our tea, which with the two remaining caribou ribs constituted our breakfast. George then made another attempt at his mountain. Again he failed to reach the summit, and I failed to induce any more trout to rise. In a somewhat despondent mood we turned back, and paddled for some distance into the lake expansions to the eastward of the point where our river flowed out. Although we were compelled to start for "home" before obtaining any definite knowledge of the course of the river, we were of the opinion that it came from the east. For all we knew, however, the river might end in those lake expansions; we could not tell, as no current could be discerned, and having no food we could not continue the search.

It was five o'clock in the evening when we reached camp, tired out and as hungry as two wolves, and we astonished Hubbard with the amount of venison we put out of sight. While George was temporarily out of hearing, Hubbard said:

"It's bully good to see you back again, Wallace. I was disappointed when you didn't come back last night, and I've been dead lonesome. I got thinking of my wife and home, and the good things to eat there, and was on the verge of homesickness."

"We were mightily disappointed, too, at not getting back," said I between mouthfuls. "Up there on the lakes we put in the toughest night yet, and we were thinking of the venison and warm blankets down here at camp."

Hubbard was much discouraged and depressed at our report of the uncertain course of the river, although he was careful to conceal his feelings from George.

The next day (Sunday, August 16) we cut up our canvas guncases and used some of the material to re-bottom our moccasins. What was left over we put away carefully for future use. George cracked the caribou bones and boiled out the marrow grease. He stripped the fat from the entrails and tried out the tallow, preserving even the cracklings or scraps. "We'll be glad to eat 'em yet," said he. One of the hoofs he dressed and put with our store of meat. We preserved everything but the head, the entrails and three of the hoofs. The tallow we found an excellent substitute for lard.

In the afternoon Hubbard and I caught thirty trout in an hour at the rapid a mile and a half above our camp, and a few more in the river close by the camp. High living during the day raised all of our spirits. For breakfast we had the caribou heart, which George thought at first he would roast but changed his mind and served stewed. For dinner we had the tongue, the tidbit of the animal, boiled with pieces of other parts. Hubbard's second bullet had torn out the centre of the tongue, but what there was of it was delicious. And at night we had the trout caught during the afternoon, to which, as a Sunday luxury, was added a cake of bread.

When we gathered around the fire in the evening Hubbard had entirely recovered from his depression and took a more hopeful view of the river. We discussed the matter thoroughly, and decided that the river George and I had seen coming from the eastward must take a turn farther north and break through the Kipling Mountains, and that it might prove to be Low's Northwest River we all thought was possible.

At the same time we could not disguise the fact that it was extremely probable we should have to portage over the mountains, and the prospect was far from pleasing; but, ragged and almost barefooted though we were, not a man thought of turning back, and on Monday morning, August 17th, we prepared to leave Camp Caribou and solve the problem as to where lay the trail of Michikamau.

VIII. "MICHIKAMAU OR BUST!"

The temperature was three degrees below freezing when grey dawn at half past four o'clock that Monday morning bid us up and on. The crisp air and the surpassing beauty of the morning stirred within us new hope and renewed ambition. And the bags of jerked venison and the grease gave us faith that we should succeed in reaching our goal. Though we had some food in stock, there was to be no cessation in our effort to get fish; our plan was for Hubbard to try his rod at the foot of every rapid while George and I did the portaging.

Before midday Hubbard had forty trout, one of them sixteen inches long--the biggest we had caught yet. We stopped for luncheon on the sandy shore of a pretty little lake expansion, and ate the whole morning's catch, fried in caribou tallow, with unsweetened coffee to wash it down. Then on we pushed towards the Kipling Mountains. At a narrow strait between two lakes we left Hubbard to fish, George and I going on two miles farther to the place where we had spent that chilly night while scouting, and where our camp for this night was to be pitched.

Our object in going there was to give George another chance to view the country on the other side of the mountain range. This time he was to try another peak. As he disappeared up the mountain side, I paddled back to get Hubbard, who was awaiting me with a good string of big trout. The two-mile stretch of lake from where Hubbard was fishing to our camping ground was as smooth as a sheet of glass. The sun hanging low over the mountains and reflecting their nude forms in the silvery water, and the dark green forest of fir trees on the shores moved Hubbard to exclamations of delight.

"Oh, if it could be painted just as it appears now!" he said. "Why, Wallace, this one scene is worth all the groaning we've done to get here. It's grand! grand!"

At dark George returned to camp with the report that from his peak he could see only higher mountains looming up to the westward. In the shadow of the grey rocks of the grim old mountains that so stubbornly held their secret of what lay beyond, we had a good supper of trout and were happy, though through the gulch the creek roared defiance at us, and off in the night somewhere a loon would break out at intervals in derisive laughter. At the base of the mountains the narrow lake reflected a million stars, and in their kindly light the snow and ice patches on the slopes above us gleamed white and brilliant.

With our day's work the listlessness from which we had recently suffered had entirely disappeared, and we felt ready to undertake any task, the more difficult the better. Hubbard suggested giving up route hunting if our river ended where we then were, and striking right across the mountains with our outfit on our backs, and we received the suggestion with enthusiasm. He talked, too, a great deal about snowshoeing in winter to St. Augustine on the St. Lawrence, cutting across country from the Kenemish River, which flows into Groswater Bay opposite Northwest River Post. This trip, which he held out as a possibility in the event of our missing the last steamer out from Rigolet, seemed to appeal to him immensely.

"I don't care if we are too late for the steamer," he said; "that snowshoeing trip would be a great stunt."

We found a great many wigwam poles near and in the pass hard by our camp, while by the creek we came across the remains of both summer and winter camps, probably those of hunters. "One of the beggars was high-toned," said George; "he had a stove." This was evidenced by the arrangement of stones within the circle of wigwam poles, and a few pieces of wood cut stove-size.

On Tuesday morning (August 18) we turned back and into the long, narrow lake expansions to the eastward, and soon satisfied ourselves that this was the right course. Our thermometer registered 28 degrees that morning. The day dawned clear and perfect; it was a morning when one draws in long breaths, and one's nerves tingle, and life is a joy. Early in the forenoon we reached rapids and quickly portaged around them; all were short, the largest being not more than half a mile. At ten o'clock we ate luncheon at the foot of one of the rapids where we caught, in a few minutes, fourteen large trout. Just above this rapid the river opened into long, narrow lakes, and the canoeing was superb. Suddenly the river took a sharp turn to the westward, and appeared to lead directly into the mountains. At that we sent up three rousing cheers--the river problem seemed to be solved; apparently the road to Michikamau lay straight before us.

A little above the bend in the river we came upon an old gander and goose and two unfeathered young. The gander with a great squawk and flapping wings took to the bush, but we killed the old goose with a rifle, and George "knocked over," as he expressed it, one of the young ones with a pistol. More luck (and food) came to us a little later. While George and I portaged around the last rapid that evening, Hubbard caught fifty trout averaging over a pound each. They jumped greedily to the fly, four or five rising at every cast.

Above this rapid the river again took the form of a long, narrow lake--a lake so beautiful that we were entranced. It was evening when we arrived, and the very spirit of peace seemed to brood over the place. Undoubtedly we were the first white men that had ever invaded its solitude, and the first human beings of any kind to disturb its repose for many years. On the north a barren, rocky bluff rose high above the water; at all other places the shores were low and wooded. A few miles to the westward could be seen the barren Kipling Mountains, and between them and us was a ridge of low hills covered with black-green spruce. The sun was setting in our faces as we paddled slowly along the lake, and as it went down behind the mountains a veil was gradually drawn over the lovely scene. Not a breath of air was stirring, and hardly a sound broke the stillness save the ripple at the bow of the canoe and the soft splash of the paddles. In the placid waters two otters were swimming and diving. One was timid and remained at a distance, but the other was bold and inquisitive and came close to the canoe. Here and there all over the lake, its mirror-like surface was broken by big jumping trout. Two loons laughed at us as we drew the canoe on to the sandy beach of a low jutting point, and they continued to laugh while we pitched our camp in the green woods near the shore and prepared our supper of roast goose. It was a feast day. With goose, plenty of trout and good water for paddling, it was a time to eat, drink, and be merry.

Our high spirits still remained when we broke camp in the morning (Wednesday, August 19), but they were destined soon to be dashed. Not long after we started we found ourselves in good-sized lakes, with arms extending in every direction. All day we hunted for the river, but found only small streams emptying into the lakes. The country now was much rougher, and much more rocky and barren, than any we had seen since we left the coast. The trees were more stunted and gnarled, and the streams usually had a bed-rock bottom. In the course of the day Hubbard shot three rock ptarmigans--"rockers," George called them. They were the first we had seen, and were still wearing their mottled summer dress; later in the season they are a pure, spotless white. Towards evening we made our way to a point on the northwesterly part of the lakes where a small stream came through a mountain pass, and there went into camp.

We were much disappointed at our failure to find the river, but not disheartened. In order to make certain that we had not overlooked it, we decided to paddle back the next day as far as the last rapid and make one more careful search. Failing then to find the river, we should portage through the mountain pass at the entrance to which we had camped.

"Do you remember," asked Hubbard, "the slogan of the old Pike's Peakers?--'Pike's Peak or Bust?'"

"Yes," said I; "and very often they busted."

"Well," said Hubbard, "we'll adopt it and change it to our needs. 'Michikamau or Bust,' will be our watchword now."

And sitting around the fire, we all took it up and repeated determinedly, "Michikamau or Bust!"

The morning of the next day (Thursday, August 20) we occupied in mending our moccasins with parts of the caribou skin. George also took the venison from the bags and hung it over the fire to give it a little more drying, as it had begun to mould. In the afternoon Hubbard and I, in accordance with the plan we had adopted, paddled back over our course and re-explored the lower lakes. We discovered nothing new. The fact was that these lakes were the source of the Beaver River.