The Love of Peechecan

by Roy Norton

 

THE LOVE OF PEECHECAN

 

By Roy Norton

 

THERE are many of us left who knew him in those far off days when we were wanderers in distant and forbidding places. There are some of us who recall him to memory with a little quicker beat of the heart and see him as we knew him best in that remote Northland which was then a place of illusive mystery. He was called Jim Jones, and I doubt not that it was his real name; for so far as we ever knew he had done nothing to make a pseudonym desirable. And he was like the rest of us, a graduate into the prospectors' field from the ranks of cowboys, sailors, hunters, or whalers who carelessly sauntered over a few thousand miles of sea or land in quest of what might be found.

Almost everyone knew that Jim Jones, grave, six feet, bearded like a viking, and renowned for strength, had for a partner Tim Jordan, merry, five feet, hairless on face and crown, and merely wiry. The law of contrast! And for some seasons they were accepted as a pair of inseparables; but Death forced a division, and there came a spring season when Jim, after laying Tim away near where they had been prospecting, started to return to the trading post alone. Now, it was loneliness that killed in that country in those days, and that is the principal reason for his errors—or excellence, whichever way you may choose. It's a question of ethics after all, and his was either a great downfall or a great victory.

Jim, coming down the river, had not only the lonesomeness to fight, but hunger as well, and wielded a starved paddle when he reached the first Indian village on the Koyukuk, where, with the swift swinging drag of the hand, they helped him to land his canoe and watched him try to stagger out on feet that had become wooden and jointless. They housed him in the kasima, or club house, and the first one to give him food and sympathy was Peechecan. She was the daughter of a shaman, and in those days a beauty; long limbed, lithe, fair skinned, ami wide eyed. I had it from Jim himself,—all that took place.

AS a whole they didn't like me.” he explained, “because part of them hated us white men; but I was too weak to care much. All I wanted was something, anything, to eat. She brought me some juicy smoked salmon instead of the dogfish I expected. I saw something in her eyes that kept me looking at them. When I got stronger and began to sit in the sun. I could pick her out of a crowd around the fish racks. She had a bow of red in her hair. I could tell when she laughed, because it sounded like the bells at Holy Cross Mission. I could tell her footstep when she whisked past me, if my back was turned, because it was so light it seemed barely to touch the ground

“I got to watching for her I talked some of their lingo; so when I met her down by the canoes one night I spoke and tried to put my arm around her. She slapped my face and ran away. I started after, and if I could have caught her would have slapped her as she had me, because I saw red. It must have caused some talk, because one morning the old shaman came down to the beach. grabbed her by her braid, swung her round, and struck her in the face as he whirled her to the sand. He called her a name and accused her of running after me. It was a lie. I couldn't stand for it.”

I remember that as he told me this his face hardened and he took two or three quick pulls at his pipe to conquer his emotions. His eyes, with the lids half-shut, had become cold and glistened in that way that we of the West know and hold back from,—the danger sign.

“I got down to where they were in just a few jumps,” he went on before the fire of his memory had died down, “and I struck. The shaman fell twenty feet away, where he quivered but didn't get up. She lay on the shale tossed back from the river and was sobbing. I put my arms around her and picked her up. She trembled. The blood was slowly running over her cut cheek. I brushed it away with the sleeve of my mackinaw. Somehow I felt different than I ever had before. It was as if the cut cheek hurt me. I whispered in her ear so the others couldn't hear. Can't tell you what I said, because it's too—too—well, I whispered.

“She tried to push me away with her hands which were shaking. I whispered again. She forgot the others, looked straight at me, then put her arms clean around my neck, and held close to me. I turned and swore at the crowd. I told 'em that she'd been struck for me, and that from then on I'd strike for her. I picked her up and carried her to my canoe. I shoved it off. She took the paddle that Tim used to use, and I the other. We pulled out into the stream. We were gone.”

Leaning over the trading post counter and staring at the skin hung logs without seeing them, I thought awhile, dreamingly, of this daring seizure,—of the man, white and invincible, taking to himself this native girl in the only way she could have understood; of her swift parting from an unkind father and all her pitiful, paltry possessions. He too sat and thought. Then he laughed softly and went on speaking low as if in fear that some one might hear this confidence with which he was honoring me.

“She made me marry her as she knew it. You know the way: the broken bundle of sticks and the two others tied together by four bands,—a sort of certificate, I suppose. I related the words she said. They didn't amount to much to me; but I reckon they meant a lot to her, and I wanted to please her all I could. We camped where the trees gave good shade. She mended my rags; she made me new moccasins; she taught me how to trap in a way I hadn't known before, and how to live when all our cartridges were gone. We came on down the river and landed here at the post. That's how I got her—and I'm satisfied! She's mine!”

He straightened up and looked at me and all the others in the smoke filled room with a certain defiance, and somehow I liked him for the way in which he talked; though when I heard him boldly announce himself for the Indian girl he had so cavalierly carried away from her tribe I wondered if it had been for the best, or whether in time she would be deserted as others have been deserted when we free men of the world forsake old scenes and ties and take to the long trails.

However, here's what happened as time went on.

WE grew to know them as one, and our liking for Jim didn't lessen, because in that country it was no disgrace for a man to take to himself an Indian wife. We called her “The Big Chicken,” not because she was big, for she was little; but it was easier to pronounce than Peechecan. There was a subtle change in him, and he forgot the old ways, which I'm sorry to say some of us never did. When he came to camp, the hutchnu, insidious and quarrelsome, went past him untouched and the deadly Russian beer never found him dry. He took to working harder as the seasons went on, and was known to the trading company as a man who, if he didn't find enough to pay for an outfit one year, would surely do so the next. His seasons of brief prosperity, when some river bar yielded well, alternated, as with the rest of us, with times when the cold, and the work, and the search brought no returns.

I remember one occasion when she brought him in with a broken leg. Pulled the sled herself across a waste of snow and over more miles than I care to travel, so that he might reach other white men and secure assistance. He was in bad shape. I'd come down from up the river and was there when they arrived. I was sorry for her that day. She looked worn to the bone, half starved, and wholly anxious. We couldn't keep her from his side by night or day. He had the fever, and when he shrieked or muttered at the phantoms around his bed she would come and put her hand over his and he'd quiet down and go to sleep. So, between us, we brought him through all right.

WELL, I went farther and didn't see them for a year or two, and then came the big strike. I heard of it through Father Barnum, and, like lots of others, loaded my sled, harnessed my huskies, and stampeded a few hundred miles to get there on time. Jim Jones had struck it rich, and on account of our old friendship helped me to locate a claim that paid, and we all prospered in proportion. We were right happy, felling trees, cutting them into lengths, and planting our fires to thaw away the pay dirt. Many a night I wandered along the gulch when the northern lights, blue or yellow and flaming, spread themselves like the fingers of an angel across the sky, and saw those other glows that came from the mouths of the pits, as if Heaven was above and Hell beneath our feet. And many a day I looked over at Number One claim and saw Peechecan, in her denim parka, turning at the windlass and hoisting the dirt Jim carefully picked up below.

Sometimes I think we failed to realize how rich and happy we were off there in that wilderness by ourselves and so far removed from the greed and harshness of civilization. The knowledge was brought to us when the summer came and the world flowed in on our fastness, bringing by thousands and tens of thousands a drove of gold-mad men. The early trails were hard trodden by them, and the open waters blackened with their whipsawed boats. They stormed us; they overran us, they envied us and robbed us. The river front was lined with cabins and tents that came in a night. Not an hour when the traders and the gamblers didn't thrive, or when the whine of the dance halls and the clink of bar glasses didn't sound. Restless, greedy, and in haste, the gold hunters forged out over the hills in turgid, writhing streams of living men. Everything excitement, everything crowded and turbulent.

Jim was a simple sort of man who had been away from others so much that he had quite lost sight of their viewpoints. As the richest of us, he was at first flattered and wheedled; it cost him money. Next he was petted and cajoled; that cost him more. Then he was sought by that army of blondined women who, with raucous voices and discordant laughter, had formed the second division of the desperate advance into the Arctic, and I doubt if there was a one of them who was not chagrined that big Jim Jones should disdain her proffered charms and cling to his Indian wife. So, before long the flattery and attention gave way to nasty remarks made behind his back; largely for the reason that none dared speak to his face.

PERHAPS it was several months before he actually became aware that he was known as “The Squawman.” Anyway, he took no notice nor said anything; until that morning when he went into the Goldpan to see some one and was coming out when a scurrilous remark from a rough group in the corner pulled him to a halt. He swung round and frowned at the fellow who had been talking the loudest,—a chechaco of the most undesirable type, a second rate prize fighter who was in the camp trying to get a match. This chap, eager to display his prowess, belligerently bristled and came toward Jim.

“Say, Mister Yap,” he hailed as he advanced, “when you come buttin' in here, don't forgit that a damned squawman ain't got no business mixin' it with gents! See?”

I don't suppose Jim had much science: but it must have been interesting to see the way he prepared that pugilist for the hospital that had just been opened. It was admitted afterward that he struck only twice. Then the others, birds of a feather protecting one another, closed in, and Jim resorted to a chair. He was now blind with anger, and used it as a flail. He was a berserker, a madman, a cruel animal, striking hard and fast and leaping in and out among them.

Then some one shot, and Jim, springing back against the wall, dropped the fragments of the chair and pulled a gun. I happened in before he could use it; and I've always been thankful for that, because he had done enough damage as it was. The floor was covered with injured, writhing, groaning proofs of his terrific strength when I jumped across them and grabbed his wrist, at the same time time protecting him with my body so that none could shoot without hitting me. I knew they wouldn't do that.

“Don't shoot, Jim! Don't shoot! For God's sake stop!” I shouted, and then, when his arm relaxed, I swung round with my own gun in hand and confronted the crowd. By this time the place was alive, and there were as many oldtimers as tenderfeet; so I knew we should get fair play.

“Give us room there!” I yelled, walking toward the door, and Jim followed.

“That's right, give 'em a square deal,” another voice called, and they began to jostle aside, making a lane for our egress. We got out and headed for Jim's cabin. One of his hands was dripping red.

“Hurt, Jim?” I asked.

“Not much,” he answered. “Shot caught me in the arm. Might have been worse if you hadn't come. Thanks!"

Peechecan was there when we entered, and went white when she saw that he was hurt. He tried to calm her; but she wept as she bathed his wound. She couldn't look at him without showing her affection, and again had an opportunity to act as nurse, and was mothering him as if he was a baby when I left to bring a doctor. After this sanguinary event no man dared cross the path of The Squawman or refer to his family affairs, and for the remainder of that and the succeeding year he lived unmolested.

Unmolested? Yes, quite so, and in a way that made itself felt; for in the second year there were good men and women with good families in the city of the wilderness who formed themselves into a respectable element. The respectability prevented recognition of Jim Jones the Squawman, though to my mind it took cognizance of others less worthy. That's for you to decide. Jim was sensitive enough to learn gradually and feel this ostracism bitterly. I know from what he incidentally said to me that it hurt; but Peechecan appeared to remain blissfully ignorant, ridiculously devoted, and supremely happy.

ONE day that summer I was passing his cabin, when he came to the door and hailed me. “Bill,” he said, “I hear you are going outside.” That's what we called the United States, a delightfully indefinite way of naming it as a destination.

“Yes,” I answered, coming up beside him. “I've got as big a stake as I can ever use. The next boat carries me.”

He seemed thoughtful, and at last sat down on his doorstep. “I've been studying over it for sometime. Bill,” he said, “and I've decided to go when you do.” He paused for an instant, and then went on in a quite different tone of voice, the old tone of confidence, “I'm telling you because I know you'll understand when I say that the girl goes with me.”

He jerked his thumb over his shoulder, and through the cabin door I could hear Peechecan singing the Koyukuk song of the hunt. I nodded my head; but I was in doubt. I feared that it meant a heartbreak for the Koyukuk girl; but I didn't suggest such an outcome. It was no business of mine. Nor did I bring the subject up after we'd embarked on the John J. Healy, which to us appeared palatial. We churned the length of the Yukon to St. Michael, passing the Holy Cross Mission, where Peechecan had once had brief schooling, and Anvik, where she had friends. We were in time for the Garonne, a great ship for those waters, and steamed away for San Francisco. Peechecan filled with wonder at the “smokeboat,” Jim quiet and meditative, and I intent on planning investments in lands I had known, on which I proposed to pass the last of my days.

Jim, while leaning over the stern rail one night and watching the long, phosphorescent wake of the screw, confided to me that he intended to buy a fruit ranch, to garb Peechecan as befitted the wife of a millionaire, and to hire teachers to instruct her. Indeed, I could gather from his words that he had gone well into details and—still I had my doubts.

IN San Francisco we all stopped at the Palace, then the famous place, and Jim began his round of buying. Poor Jim! How uncomfortable he appeared in his new clothing, how changed when stripped of his splendid beard, and how clumsily he walked in the shoes he must wear forever! I caught him in the act of sadly folding his moccasins after he had given his mukluks to a curio seeker. And Peechecan! Heavens! it was awful! In her native garb, thousands of miles from white women and in the freedom of the great North, she had appeared beautiful; but now! Well, you can imagine how difficult it was for her to fit in. She tried hard enough to assume the bravery of the city, which terrified her with its noise and strangeness. If it hadn't been so pitiable, it would have been laughable.

For instance, I saw a crowd snickering in Market-st. one day, and looked for the cause. Here came the Big Chicken and Jim. She had selected and he had foolishly allowed her to buy a bright red satin dress probably intended for evening wear. A yellow hat with plumes had also pleased her fancy. Round her neck and drooping far below her belt, which was made of nuggets, dangled a heavy nugget chain which weighed a few pounds and swung pendulous as she walked. Her hair was still in a braid, but was tied with a pink ribbon of enormous breadth. So far she had been unable to accustom herself to shoes, so she was wearing moccasins, and the pavements caused her to lose her lightness of foot until she appeared to lumber rather than to walk. And beside her towered Jim with a frown on his face and glancing fierce challenges from right to left, evidently hoping to find some one who questioned Peechecan's right to wear what she chose.

Pitying them, I got them into a cab and took them back to the hotel.

IT was the next night, I believe, that with native artlessness and innocence she came to my rooms while Jim for some reason or other was away. She entered softly and with unusual timidity. Her eyes were vaguely troubled.

"Killisnuish,” that is what she used to call me, meaning the Father of Killisnu,—"Killisnuish, why do the white men and women laugh at me?”

It was hard to answer; but her question was so direct that I had to try to tell her the truth. I did it as gently as possible, using her own tongue, with which I was thoroughly familiar, so that she might better understand. I tried to encourage her to learn the ways of the people with whom she was to spend the remainder of her life. She had seated herself, cross legged, in all her finery, on the floor, with the points of her little beaded moccasins sticking out from beneath the awful rags and frills of red. When I stopped for want of words, she was silent a moment, and then her voice came coldly, as though my own people were on trial before her sense of justice. I can interpret her words but lamely, and in spite of me the arraignment is partially lost.

“This, then, is the white man's civilization! The thing that makes him despise those not of his race while obsequiously taking their gold dust for goods he has to barter; that makes the white women of the street who are more beautiful than the shaman's daughter deride her because she is not clothed to their taste and laugh at her endeavor; sneer at her affections and, where she is known, scorn to have her in their homes, as if she was some unclean beast, unsouled. and not herself as they, a woman!”

For the first time I learned that the barb of northern ostracism had with refined cruelty wounded her, though till then she had never uttered a moan; discovered too that she had been more observant after arriving in San Francisco than I had thought. Poor little woman! brought up in the woods and the snows to revere the wonders of that outside world, and disillusioned!

“We will go back,” she said, as if pronouncing a final decision. “Peechecan would die here. We will go back.”

It was necessary for me to reason with her. “Peechecan,” I said, "what of Jim? He is still young. These are his people. He is rich, and can become a great chief among them. Is it fair to ask him to give it all up and go back to the North where there is nothing more for him to do? Is it fair to him?”

Her answer was long in coming and quite unexpected. She looked up at me with the most hurt and terrified eyes I have ever met. She clasped her hands together until the knuckles shone white,—the hands that had worked for him, had nursed him in illness and had saved his life,—and then threw herself at full length on the floor, moaning as if her heart would break in this new found agony. I was the sole spectator of her tragedy, and did not know what to do. Finally she stopped. As if a resolution had been formed, she got to her knees and, regardless of her silken array, crept on them until she was before me.

“Oh, Killisnuish!” she implored, and I could see that she was fluttering in her stress, “you must help me! I am only a squaw. I know it all now. He can be nothing among the white men if I stay or if he has me. I must leave him. He must not know that I know; but—but—Killisnuish, I love him so! I love him so!”

She laid arms and head on my knees to sob and I, trying to comfort her, patted her shoulders; yet I could not dispute or deny the truth. She must go! Quite old and weary, she at last lifted herself to her feet and left the room as she had come. Her relinquishment was over. There would be no more outbursts from her tortured soul, nothing to show that anything had actuated her but the summons of the land that never loses its own, calling her in faint, cold whispers across the thousands of miles of mountains, forests, and seas to return. She gave Jim no other reason. I know because in later years she was to tell me of it in all its cruel detail.

Her preparations were simple. She went out to the ridicule of the streets no more. She asked nothing, and he still in ignorance and grieving over her determination, tried in vain to learn why she was leaving him. It was an unexpected desertion, and for the first time he treated her with studied coldness and hardness, which she uncomplainingly bore. She went aboard the steamer the next morning while he visited the Alaska Commercial Company's offices and so arranged that as long as he lived she should have everything that money could buy in the North. Her credit was unlimited. She was to be the wealthiest Kovukuk that ever lived. The steamer was due to sail at noon, and I sent aboard everything I could think of for her comfort.

I WAS sitting in my room in the late afternoon when Jim came in. It was his first visit since she had been there. “Bill,” he said, and his face was white despairing, and drawn when he dropped his mask of sternness, “I'm hard hit. Its over with.” He walked up and down the room, his shoe heels striking awkwardly on the carpeted floor “I wish,” he went on bitterly, “that I'd never struck it! It isn't much to be richer than a king if you've got to pay—some prices.”

As I watched him, it began to dawn on me, dimly at first but with insistence, that this man of the wilderness, who belonged in the stern and undefiled places of the world, had only one road to happiness. I felt that perhaps I had been a fool.

“Jim,” I said in a sudden resolve to tell him the truth. “Peechecan left because she didn't want to be a drag on your life.”

Then I made him sit down, and without reservation told him all, told him as best I could the story of her naked heart, while he could only whisper now and then, “Good God!” For a time he sat quietly and looked at the floor while I waited. Without saying anything more, he got up and left the room. I didn't see him again, and didn't learn until the next day that the steamer's sailing had been delayed until after night had fallen, when the moon stared through the channel of the Golden Gate and peered into the shadows of the coves. As I say, she told me about it years afterward.

She was too dumb with misery to weep as she stood in the bow of the ship, quite alone, and looking off into the distances where lay the land of her youth's happiness and the goal of her desolation. The sound of the engines was lost behind, and only the soft, slow purl of parted waters came to her ears—until she heard something else, a noise that would have been audible to none but her. It was the quick, springing tread of moccasined feet. He had donned his old footgear and his worn mackinaw once more, and by his garb she knew, as she clung to him and felt the embrace of his arms, that she was not voyaging to a world of solitude

DID the formal marriage ceremony which they underwent make their wedding more binding than that of faith and the bound twigs? Did he prove recalcitrant to his opportunities and his race? Is an Indian girl to be treated as less than a woman? I don't know. As I said before, its a question of ethics which none may decide; but I do know of their happiness and their home in that dim, weird. repellent and yet subtly alluring land and personally I am forced to believe in the wisdom of his choice.