South from Hudson Bay: An Adventure and Mystery Story for Boys, Page 3

  II FORT YORK

  The first view of Fort York was as disappointing as the first glimpse ofshore. To Elise and Walter a fort meant massive stone walls and towers,rising from some high and commanding position. A stretch of log fencingin a bog was not their idea of fortification. It had the interest ofnovelty, however, for it was very different from anything they had everseen before. The logs were set upright and close together, and above thisstockade rose the flat, leaded roofs of the buildings. Near the fortstood a cluster of strange dwellings, quite unlike the Eskimo summer hutsof stones, sod, and skins, with which the Swiss had become familiar sincereaching Arctic waters. These queer skin tents were roughly cone-shaped,and the ends of the framework of poles projected at the peak. They wereCree Indian summer lodges. Up the wide board walk from the dock to thefort gates, men were carrying sacks and boxes. The unloading of thesupply ships had begun.

  The Perier family were among the last of the immigrants to go ashore.Very much like a homeless wanderer, motherless Elise Perier felt as shestood on the river bank beside her father, with Max clinging to her hand,and their scanty belongings piled around them. It was good to be on landagain of course, but this was such a strange land. In spite of crampedquarters, poor food, seasickness, and the other hardships of the voyage,the _Lord Wellington_ seemed almost homelike compared to this wild,barren country. Elise tried bravely to smile at her father and Walter,but she felt as if she must cry instead.

  Captain Mai was calling them. "Go right up to the fort, Perier. I want toget you all together."

  Walter picked up as much of the luggage as he could carry. Mr. Perier waslooking doubtfully at a heavy wooden chest, when a boyish voice at hisshoulder said in French, "Let me help, M'sieu. If you will put that on myback, I will carry it for you."

  Walter dropped his own load, and he and Mr. Perier lifted the chest andplaced it so it rested on the portage strap, as the young Canadiandirected. Then the latter led the way up the walk. He was a slender,supple lad, not as tall as Walter, but he carried the heavy load withapparent ease. The Swiss boy admired the young fellow's strength as muchas he liked his face, with its bright brown eyes and clean-cut features.

  The log stockade proved to be more imposing and fort-like than it hadappeared from the river. It was about twenty feet high, with bastions atthe corners pierced with openings for cannon. The massive entrance gatesstood open, and in front of them was a tall flagstaff, bearing theCompany flag with the letters H. B. C. and the curious motto, "_Pro pellecutem_,"--"Skin for skin." Entering the gates and passing within thedouble row of stockades, their guide led the Perier family amongworkshops and cabins to an inner court, which was surrounded withsubstantial log structures where the officers lived and where themerchandise and furs were stored. In this court the Swiss were gathered.

  Mr. Perier tried to thank the friendly lad, but he shook his head. "It isnothing, nothing, M'sieu," he replied, a quick smile displaying his even,white teeth. "I must not linger. There is much to do." And he was off ata run.

  When all of the Swiss were assembled, one of their leaders suggested thatit was fitting they should give thanks to God that the dangerous oceanvoyage was over and they were safe on land once more. They stood withbowed heads while he led the prayer. The lump in Elise's throatdisappeared and she felt better.

  In the meantime, Captain Mai had been arranging with the ChiefFactor,--as the Hudson Bay Company officer in charge of the fort wascalled,--for quarters for the immigrants. There was not room for all inthe buildings, so many of the men and boys would have to sleep in tents.A place in one of the houses was found for the Periers, but Walter wasassigned to a tent with Mr. Scheidecker and his sons, German Swiss fromBerne.

  That first night on land was a miserable one for Walter. Fort York stoodin a veritable bog or muskeg, firm and hard enough the greater part ofthe year, when it was frozen, but wet and soft in the short summerseason. The ground was damp of course, and Walter's one blanket did notkeep out the chill. To make matters worse, he and his companions werepestered by the bloodthirsty mosquitoes that bred in inconceivable hordesin the swampy lowlands. But the discomfort of the night was quicklyforgotten the next day.

  A busy and interesting place the Swiss boy found York Factory, as theHudson Bay men called the fort. It was not a factory in our commonmeaning of the word,--not a _manufactory_,--for nothing was manufacturedthere except boats for river traffic, dog sleds, wooden kegs, and sucharticles of use and trade as an ordinary carpenter, blacksmith, ortinsmith could make with simple tools. _Factory_ in the fur trade meant atrading post in charge of an officer called a _factor_, a commercialagent who bought and sold.

  For more than a century York Factory had been the principal port of entryfor the Hudson Bay Company. There the Company's ships from Englandbrought the supplies and trade goods destined for all the widelyseparated posts in the interior. To York Factory, in bark canoes andwooden boats, down rivers and lakes, from all parts of the Company'sgreat domain, came the bales of costly furs to be sorted and repacked andshipped. A considerable staff was employed at the place, a Chief Factor,a Chief Trader, a surgeon, several clerks and apprentice clerks, asteward, a shipwright, a carpenter, a mason, a cooper, a blacksmith, atailor, laborers, cooks, and servants. The boatmen or _voyageurs_ whowent to and fro into the interior were hired independently for each trip.

  Until he sailed for America, Walter had never even heard of the HudsonBay Company or the fur trade. Everything in the fort was novel andinteresting to him. A good-natured apprentice clerk, who spoke Frenchreadily, showed him the Indian store, a large room well filled with allsorts of goods used in the Indian trade, from bales of heavy blankets,blue and red woolens, calicos of every color, long-barreled trading guns,kegs of powder, and big iron and copper kettles, to drawers of usefullittle things, gun flints, fire steels, files, awls, needles, fish hooks,twine, beads of all imaginable tints, and ochre, vermilion, and other drycolors, used by the Indians to adorn both their handiwork and themselves.

  "I never saw so many different things in one shop," Walter commented.

  The clerk laughed. "The worst of it is that we have to keep the closestaccount of it all. We must know what is in every package sent out andwhat post it goes to. Being a fur trader isn't all adventure I can tellyou. There is a lot of office drudgery, with all the bookkeeping,invoicing, and checking of lists. We can't afford to make mistakes," headded soberly. "The very lives of the men in some far-away post maydepend on their getting the right supplies. Why, last year----" He brokeoff suddenly, and switched to English. "I spoke to the Chief Trader aboutyour proposal. He says it can't be done. It's not the policy of theCompany to send voyageurs out to trade, especially on such long trips."

  Walter had turned to see to whom the clerk was speaking. He had heard nofootsteps, but there, close behind him, was a tall man in blue coat,deerskin leggings, and moccasins. In his surprise, the boy drew back alittle and stood staring. Of all the men he had seen since coming ashore,this one was the strangest and most striking. He was tall, powerfullybuilt, and very dark of skin, with high cheek bones and high-bridgednose. His long, coarse black hair, slick and shining with grease, wasworn in what seemed to the Swiss boy a curious fashion for a man, partedin the middle and plaited in two braids bound with deerskin thongs andhanging one over each shoulder.

  "You not give me goods?" The man's voice was peculiarly deep, notunmusical but of a hard, metallic quality. His small, dark eyes lookedstraight into the clerk's large blue ones.

  The young man shook his head. "No, your plan is too wild, too much riskin it. That sort of thing is against the Company's policy."

  The voyageur's brown face stiffened. His hard eyes seemed to catch fireas they rested first on the clerk and then, for a moment, on Walter.Without a word he turned and with long, soft-footed stride, left the roomas noiselessly as he had entered it.

  "Pleasant manners," commented the clerk. "He needn't have included you inhis wrath."r />
  "What did he want?" asked Walter. He had understood but little of thebrief conversation.

  "A lot of goods on credit. He claims to have great influence with theSioux, and he wants an outfit to go and trade with them. Of course wecan't let him have it."

  "You don't trust him?"

  "We don't know anything about him, except that he is a good voyageur.It's against the Company's policy to send voyageurs out to trade. And hisscheme is a crazy one. The Sioux country is a thousand miles away. Hesaid he would bring all the furs back here and take whatever commissionwe chose to give, but probably we should never hear of him or the goodsagain."

  "Is he an Indian?"

  "Half-breed I imagine. Finely built fellow, isn't he? Has the strength ofa moose, they say. He is an expert voyageur."

  "I don't like him," Walter commented.

  "Neither do I, and I suppose he has a grudge against me now, though therefusal wasn't my doing of course. Well, I must stop talking and get towork checking this new stuff that has come in."

  Thus dismissed, Walter wandered out into the court, through the opengates and down to the shore. Everywhere was bustle and activity. Therewas much to be done, and done quickly. With the least possible delay theships must be unloaded and loaded again with the furs waiting packed andready for the voyage to England. The little fleet must get away promptlywhile Hudson Straits were still open. All the goods and supplies receivedhad to be checked, examined, and sorted. The things to be sent to tradingposts in the interior were repacked for transport in open boats up therivers, and every package was invoiced and plainly marked. Boats must bemade ready and equipped and provisioned, not only to carry the suppliesand trade goods, but the one hundred and sixty new settlers as well. Thetwelve hours a day that the employees of the Company were required towork in summer, if necessary, were not enough. Most of the men weresimply doing all they possibly could each day until the rush should beover.

  Down by the river Walter found the young fellow who had carried Mr.Perier's chest. He was putting a new seat in one of the large, heavilybuilt boats ranged along the bank. Looking up from his work, he greetedthe Swiss boy with a cheery "_Bo jou_," which the latter guessed to bethe Canadian way of saying "_Bon jour_" or "Good day." Walter, who washandy with tools, offered his help.

  As they worked they talked. His new acquaintance's French was fluent, butWalter found it puzzling. To a Swiss, the Canadian dialect seemed astrange sort of French, differing considerably in pronunciation and inmany of its words from his own native tongue. Yet Walter and LouisBrabant managed to understand each other fairly well.

  "I suppose this is your home, here at the fort," said Walter.

  "My home? _Non_, I live at the Red River."

  "Why, that is where we are going!"

  "You go to the Selkirk Colony at Fort Douglas. It is not there that Ilive, but at Pembina, farther up the river."

  "Is Pembina a town?"

  "Not what you would call a town. It is a settlement and there are tradingposts there, a Hudson Bay post and a Northwest Company post. Now the twocompanies have united, one of the forts will be abandoned I suppose. Youmay be glad the fighting between them is over. There will be better timesin the Selkirk Colony now. They have had a hard time and much trouble,those poor settlers!"

  "What do you mean by fighting,--and trouble?" asked the surprised Walter."What is the Northwest Company? Isn't the Hudson Bay the only tradingcompany? Doesn't it own all the country where the Indians and the furbearing animals are?"

  "Oh no," returned Louis with a smile and a shake of his head. "Farthersouth there is fur country that belongs to the United States. The HudsonBay Company has no power there. It is true that the Company claims allthe northern fur country, but the Northwest Company said they had a rightto trade and trap there too, and that was how the trouble began. Have younever heard of the Northwest Company, and how for years they have foughtthe Hudson Bay men for the furs, and how they drove the settlers from theSelkirk Colony and captured Fort Douglas and killed the Governor?"

  Walter shook his head in bewilderment, and Louis went on to tell, brieflyand vividly, something of the conflict between the two great tradingcompanies, and the disasters that conflict had brought upon the settlers.The Swiss boy listened in amazement, understanding enough of the story tograsp its significance.

  "But why didn't Captain Mai tell us all that?" he cried. "Why did he letus think that everything was all right?"

  "Perhaps he thought you would not come if you knew. But those oldtroubles are all over. Last spring the two companies became one."

  Louis' story troubled Walter. He retold it to Mr. Perier and Mr.Scheidecker, and they carried it to other leading men of the prospectivesettlers. Several of them sought out Captain Mai and demanded to know whythey had not been informed of all those wild doings in the colony.Unsatisfied by their conductor's explanations, they asked for aninterview with the Chief Factor, and put their questions to him. Heconfirmed the statement that the fur-traders' rivalry and warfare were atan end. About five months before the arrival of the Swiss, the two greattrading companies had united under the Hudson Bay name. The colony on theRed River would now have a chance to develop in peace.

  In spite of this assurance, the Hudson Bay officer's replies to some oftheir queries left the Swiss in no happy mood. Mr. Perier was stunned tolearn that they still had some seven hundred miles to travel, all the waythrough untamed wilderness. But he had no thought of turning back. He hadsigned an agreement with Captain Mai, and had paid for his family'spassage,--a moderate sum, but he could ill afford to lose it. To paytheir fare back again would leave him penniless. Fertile land, onehundred acres of prairie,--that would not have to be cleared,--had beenpromised him rent free for a year. After that he was to pay a rent offrom twenty to fifty bushels of wheat from his crop, or he might buy theland outright for five hundred bushels. The offer was enticing, and heand Walter had made many plans for the future.