The Boy Ranchers of Puget Sound Part 20

CHAPTER XIII

THE SCHOONER REAPPEARS

It was early in the evening when after a toilsome march Mr. Barclay and the boys reached a Siwash rancherie built just above high-water mark on the pebbly beach of a sheltered inlet. Frank had already discovered that the northern part of the Pacific Slope is a land of majestic beauty, but he had so far seen nothing quite so wild and rugged as the surroundings of the Indian dwelling. Behind it, a great rock fell almost sheer, leaving only room for a breadth of s.h.i.+ngle between its feet and the strip of clear green water. On the opposite side mighty firs climbed the face of a towering hill so steep that Frank wondered how they clung to it, and at the head of the tremendous chasm a crystal stream came splas.h.i.+ng out of eternal shadow. Seaward a wet reef guarded the inlet's mouth, with its outer edge hidden by spouts of snowy foam, upon which the big Pacific rollers broke continually, ranging up in tall green walls and crumbling upon the stony barrier with a deep vibratory roar which rang in long pulsations across the stately pines.

The rancherie was a long and rather ramshackle, single-storied, wooden building not unlike a frame barn, only lower, and Frank discovered that although it was inhabited by the whole Siwash colony there were no divisions in it, but each inmate or family claimed its allotted s.p.a.ce upon the floor. A tall pole rudely carved with grotesque figures stood in front of it, and it occurred to Frank as he inspected them that he was face to face with the rudiments of heraldry. The n.o.bles of ancient Europe, he remembered, blazoned devices of this kind upon their s.h.i.+elds, and their descendants still painted their lions and griffins and eagles upon their carriages and stamped them upon their note paper. He was probably right in his surmises, though there are different views upon the subject of totem poles, and the Siwash, who ought to know most about them, seem singularly unwilling to supply inquirers with any reliable information.

A group of brown-faced, black-haired men and women dressed much as white folks stood about the rancherie, and near them were ranged rows of shallow trays of bark containing drying berries. Frank noticed that the woods were full of the latter--hat berries, salmon berries, and splendid black and yellow raspberries. Several big sea canoes were drawn up at the edge of the water, and Mr. Oliver sat near one of them with another cl.u.s.ter of Siwash gathered about him. They had spread a number of peltries out upon the stones, which Mr. Oliver explained were seal skins. Frank examined one, and found it difficult to believe that this coa.r.s.e, greasy, and nastily smelling hair was the material out of which the beautiful glossy furs were made. He confided his views to Harry.

"Yes," said the latter, "they're not much to look at now. They have to go through quite a lot of dressing, and I've heard that in the first place all the long outside hair is plucked out. There's an inner coat."

He looked at the men. "It's done in England, isn't it?"

Mr. Barclay smiled. "A good deal of it is, anyway." Then he addressed Mr. Oliver. "You're buying some of these peltries?"

"One or two," was the answer. "We want an excuse for this visit."

Mr. Barclay made a sign of a.s.sent, and after chaffering with the Indians for a few moments Mr. Oliver broke in again: "They're cheap, that's sure. I suppose these fellows would rather sell them on the spot for dollars down than pack them along down to Alberni or some other place where they'd probably have to take grocery stores in payment. If you're open to make a deal we'll take two or three between us. We ought to get our money back with something over in Victoria."

Mr. Oliver kept up the bargaining for a while, and then explained that he and his companion did not care for the rest of the skins, which were inferior to those they had chosen. One of the Siwash thereupon informed him that more canoes were expected in a day or two, adding that he would probably be able to show them further peltries if they could wait their arrival.

"Tell him we'll stay," said Mr. Barclay. "At the same time you had better ask him if there's any likelihood of our getting down to Victoria by water. You can say we've had about enough crawling through the bush--it's a fact that _I_ have--and lead up to the question naturally."

Frank, observing a twinkle in Harry's eyes, watched the Indians' faces when Mr. Oliver addressed them, but they remained perfectly expressionless.

"I can't get anything out of them about the schooner," Mr. Oliver reported at length. "This fellow says the easiest way would be to send our Indians back for the canoe, which I'll do. It's possible that we may chance upon a little more information later on."

"Where do they get the skins?" Frank asked presently, when the Indians had left them.

"That's a point they don't seem much inclined to talk about," Mr.

Barclay answered. "They probably follow them in their canoes as they work up north, though it's only odd seals they pick up in that way. The princ.i.p.al supply comes from the Pribyloff Islands up in the Bering Sea.

It's supposed that with the exception of a few which frequent some reefs lying nearer Russian Asia practically all the seals in the North Pacific haul out there for two or three months every year. The American lessees club them on the land, but the crews of the Canadian schooners kill a number in open water outside our limit. They claim that although the seals are born on American beaches we don't own them when they're in the sea, but, as it's suggested that they're not always very particular about their exact distance from the islands, their proceedings make trouble every now and then. I'm talking about the fur seals; there are several other kinds which are more or less common everywhere."

He broke off and sat smoking silently for a while, looking at the skins.

"They seem to have taken your fancy," Mr. Oliver observed presently.

"It's a fact," Mr. Barclay a.s.sented. "I was just thinking I'd like to take that big one and the other yonder home with me. My daughter Minnie visits East in the winter now and then, and she's fond of furs, though so far I haven't been able to buy her any particularly smart ones.

There's a man I know in Portland who can fix up a skin as well as any one in London. He was a good many years in Alaska trading furs for the A. C. C., and some of the Russians who stayed behind there taught him to dress them."

Mr. Oliver laughed. "I suppose the thing is quite out of the question?"

"It is," said Mr. Barclay dryly. "You ought to know that the United States charges a big duty on foreign furs."

"On foreign ones!" broke in Harry, nudging Frank. "A seal born on an American beach could certainly be considered an American seal."

"When you import goods into the United States you require a certificate of origin, young man."

"That fixes the thing," said Harry. "On your own showing, those seals originated on the Pribyloffs. They're American."

"Ingenious!" exclaimed Mr. Barclay, with a longing glance at the skins.

"There's some reason in that contention, but won't you go on? You don't seem to have got through yet."

"In case you felt justified in taking a skin or two," continued Harry thoughtfully, "I'd like to point out that, as a rule, the Customs fellows don't trouble about a sloop the size of ours. We just run up to our moorings when we come back from a yachting trip, and there's a nice little nook forward which would just hold a bundle of those peltries.

It's hidden beneath the second cable."

Mr. Barclay picked up a piece of s.h.i.+ngle and flung it at him.

"You can stop right now before you get yourself into difficulties. What do you mean by proposing a smuggling deal to a man connected with the United States revenue?"

"I'm sorry," Harry answered with a chuckle. "I should have waited until the rest had gone."

Mr. Barclay regarded him severely, though his eyes twinkled.

"Your smartness is going to make trouble for you by and by," he said.

"Go and see what that Siwash is doing about our supper."

Harry moved away, but presently came back to announce that the meal was ready. When it was over the boys strolled off toward the reef, leaving the men sitting smoking on the beach.

"That boy of yours told me what seemed a rather curious thing last night," said Mr. Barclay, and he briefly ran over what Harry had related about the man with the peculiar shoulder.

Mr. Oliver listened in evident astonishment.

"It's the first time I've heard of the matter," he exclaimed. "What do you make of it?"

"In the meanwhile I don't quite know what to think. If that man is boss of the gang it explains a good deal that has been puzzling me, but I must own it's considerably more than I expected. The general idea was that he'd cleared out of the country, which would have been a very natural course in view of the fact that he'd probably have been sandbagged if he'd show himself after dark on any wharf of two of the coast states. Anyway, your son's description was quite straight. He seemed sure of him."

"Harry's eyes are as good as yours or mine," said Mr. Oliver with a smile. Mr. Barclay wrinkled his brow.

"There's a point that struck me--though I can't say if it explains the thing. The boy's only young yet, he has imagination and, it's possible, a fondness for detective literature, like the rest of them. Now we'll a.s.sume that he had heard of a certain sensational case--a particularly grewsome crime on board an American s.h.i.+p--and the arrest of the rascal accused of it. I needn't point out that the fellow only escaped on a technical point of law and that his picture figured in some of the papers. Isn't that the kind of thing that's likely to make a marked impression on the youthful mind?"

"I can see two objections," responded Mr. Oliver. "In the first place, Harry was away in Idaho while the case was going on. The second one's more important. Harry might try to put the laugh on you, as he did not long ago, but when he makes a concise statement it's to be relied upon.

In such a case I've never known him to let his imagination run away with him."

Mr. Barclay spread his hands out in a deprecatory manner.

"Then we'll take the thing for granted, and it certainly simplifies the affair. I'd no trouble in finding the Chinese colony, and though I've no idea how they get the dope, that doesn't matter. The point is that it's very seldom anybody is likely to disturb them in this part of the bush, and there are two inlets handy. A schooner could slip in here a dozen times without being noticed by anybody except the Siwash. Then we have the fact that a notorious rascal who has evidently a hand in the thing was seen heading for the Chinese colony. It seems to me decisive."

"What are you going to do about it?" Mr. Oliver asked.

"Wait and keep my eyes open. If it appears advisable I may communicate with the Canadian authorities later on, though, of course, we must contrive to get our hands on the fellows in American waters. I've an idea it can be done."

Mr. Oliver said nothing further, and by and by, when a thin haze rolled down from the hillside and night closed in, they strolled toward the rancherie, where they were given a strip of floor s.p.a.ce not far from the entrance. The boys came in a little later and lay down apart from them and nearer the door, but Frank did not go to sleep. The rancherie was hot and the dull roar of the combers on the reef came throbbing in and made him restless. He lay still for what seemed a considerable time, and at last there was a low sound which might have been made by somebody rising stealthily, after which a dim black object flitted out of the door. Then Harry, who lay close to him, touched his arm.

"Are you asleep?" he asked very softly.