A thousand deaths by Jack London

deck, and they didn’t pile it any too securely either. The mate

expected to come back to it again, and then forgot about it. I thought at the

time that there was something familiar about the big husky dog that

climbed over the baggage and freight and lay down next to the box. And

then we passed the Glendale, bound up for Dawson. As she saluted us, I

thought of Dave on board of her and hurrying to Dawson for Flush of

Gold. I turned and looked at her where she stood by the rail. Her eyes

were bright, but she looked a bit frightened by the sight of the other

steamer, and she was leaning closely to the Count fellow as for protection.

She needn’t have leaned so safely against him, and I needn’t have been so

sure of a disappointed Dave Walsh arriving at Dawson. For Dave Walsh

wasn’t on the Glendale. There were a lot of things I didn’t know, but was

soon to know–for instance, that the pair was not yet married. Inside half

an hour preparations for the marriage took place. What of the sick men in

the main cabin, and of the crowded condition of the Golden Rocket, the

likeliest place for the ceremony was found forward, on the lower deck, in

an open space next to the rail and gang-plank and shaded by the mountain

of freight with the big box on top and the sleeping dog beside it. There

was a missionary on board, getting off at Eagle City, which was the next

stop, so they had to use him quick. That’s what they’d planned to do, get

married on the boat.

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54

“But I’ve run ahead of the facts. The reason Dave Walsh wasn’t on the

Glendale was because he was on the Golden Rocket. It was this way. After

loiterin’ in Dawson on account of Flush of Gold, he went down to

Mammon Creek on the ice. And there he found Dusky Burns doing so

well with the claim, there was no need for him to be around. So he put

some grub on the sled, harnessed the dogs, took an Indian along, and

pulled out for Surprise Lake. He always had a liking for that section.

Maybe you don’t know how the creek turned out to be a four-flusher; but

the prospects were good at the time, and Dave proceeded to build his cabin

and hers. That’s the cabin we slept in. After he finished it, he went off on a

moose hunt to the forks of the Teelee, takin’ the Indian along.

“And this is what happened. Came on a cold snap. The juice went down

forty, fifty, sixty below zero. I remember that snap–I was at Forty Mile;

and I remember the very day. At eleven o’clock in the morning the spirit

thermometer at the N.A.T.&T. Company’s store went down to seventy-

five below zero. And that morning, near the forks of the Teelee, Dave

Walsh was out after moose with that blessed Indian of his. I got it all from

the Indian afterwards–we made a trip over the ice together to Dyea. That

morning Mr. Indian broke through the ice and wet himself to the waist. Of

course he began to freeze right away. The proper thing was to build a fire.

But Dave Walsh was a bull. It was only half a mile to camp, where a fire

was already burning. What was the good of building another? He threw

Mr. Indian over his shoulder–and ran with him–half a mile–with the

thermometer at seventy-five below. You know what that means. Suicide.

There’s no other name for it. Why, that buck Indian weighed over two

hundred himself, and Dave ran half a mile with him. Of course he froze

his lungs. Must have frozen them near solid. It was a tomfool trick for any

man to do. And anyway, after lingering horribly for several weeks, Dave

Walsh died.

“The Indian didn’t know what to do with the corpse. Ordinarily he’d have

buried him and let it go at that. But he knew that Dave Walsh was a big

man, worth lots of money, a hi-yu skookum chief. Likewise he’d seen the

bodies of other hi-yu skookums carted around the country like they were

worth something. So he decided to take Dave’s body to Forty Mile, which

was Dave’s headquarters. You know how the ice is on the grass roots in

this country–well, the Indian planted Dave under a foot of soil–in short,

he put Dave on ice. Dave could have stayed there a thousand years and

still been the same old Dave. You understandÄ just the same as a

refrigerator. Then the Indian brings over a whip-saw from the cabin at

Surprise Lake and makes lumber enough for the box. Also, waiting for the

thaw, he goes out and shoots about ten thousand pounds of moose. This he

keeps on ice, too. Came the thaw. The Teelee broke. He built a raft and

loaded it with the meat, the big box with Dave inside, and Dave’s team of

dogs, and away they went down the Teelee.

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55

“The raft got caught on a timber jam and hung up two days. It was

scorching hot weather, and Mr. Indian nearly lost his moose meat. So

when he got to Teelee Portage he figured a steamboat would get to Forty

Mile quicker than his raft. He transferred his cargo, and there you are,

fore-lower deck of the Golden Rocket, Flush of Gold being married, and

Dave Walsh in his big box casting the shade for her. And there’s one thing

I clean forgot. No wonder I thought the husky dog that came aboard at

Teelee Portage was familiar. It was Pee-lat, Dave Walsh’s lead-dog and

favorite–a terrible fighter, too. He was Iying down beside the box.

“Flush of Gold caught sight of me, called me over, shook hands with me,

and introduced me to the Count. She was beautiful. I was as mad for her

then as ever. She smiled into my eyes and said I must sign as one of the

witnesses. And there was no refusing her. She was ever a child, cruel as

children are cruel. Also, she told me she was in possession of the only two

bottles of champagne in Dawson–or that had been in Dawson the night

before; and before I knew it I was scheduled to drink her and the Count’s

health. Everybody crowded ’round, the captain of the steamboat, very

prominent, trying to ring in on the wine, I guess. It was a funny wedding.

On the upper deck the hospital wrecks, with various feet in the grave,

gathered and looked down to see. There were Indians all jammed in the

circle, too, big bucks, and their squaws and kids, to say nothing of about

twenty-five snarling wolf-dogs. The missionary lined the two of them up

and started in with the service. And just then a dog-fight started, high up

on the pile of freight–Pee-lat Iying beside the big box, and a white-haired

brute belonging to one of the Indians. The fight wasn’t explosive at all.

The brutes just snarled at each other from a distance–tapping at each other

long-distance, you know, saying cast and dassent, cast and dassent. The

noise was rather disturbing, but you could hear the missionary’s voice

above it.

“There was no particularly easy way of getting at the two dogs, except

from the other side of the pile. But nobody was on that side–everybody

watching the ceremony, you see. Even then everything might have been

all right if the captain hadn’t thrown a club at the dogs. That was what

precipitated everything. As I say, if the captain hadn’t thrown that club,

nothing might have happened.

“The missionary had just reached the point where he was saying ‘In

sickness and in health,’ and ‘Until death do us part.’ And just then the

captain threw the club. I saw the whole thing. It landed on Pee-lat, and at

that instant the white brute jumped him. The club caused it. Their two

bodies struck the box, and it began to slide, its lower end tilting down. It

was a long oblong box, and it slid down slowly until it reached the

perpendicular, when it came down on the run. The onlookers on that side

the circle had time to get out from under. Flush of Gold and the Count, on

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56

the opposite side of the circle, were facing the box; the missionary had his

back to it. The box must have fallen ten feet straight: up and down, and it

hit end on.

“Now mind you, not one of us knew that Dave Walsh was dead. We

thought he was on the Glendale, bound for Dawson. The missionary had

edged off to one side, and so Flush of Gold faced the box when it struck. It

was like in a play. It couldn’t have been better planned. It struck on end,