# The Trail of the Golden Horn/Chapter 20

CHAPTER 20
United Forces
THE sun of the short winter day was sinking below the distant mountain peaks away to the west. It touched with its departing rays three forms moving slowly across a vast desolate waste of snow. Hugo, the trapper, and Tom Rolfe, the constable, were in harness, drawing the toboggan on which Marion was seated. The men were on snow-shoes, with Hugo ahead, with ropes across their shoulders. They were part way over the burnt region where the sergeant had been overcome by the storm when the sun went down. Ahead in the distance where the trees stood thick and sombre, they planned to rest for the night. Here they hoped to find the sergeant, and Marion’s heart beat fast at the thought of meeting him again.
It was dark by the time they reached the edge of the forest, and a few rods among the trees they found the sergeant standing before a cheerful fire. His face brightened with joy as he saw them, and in another minute he had Marion clasped in his arms. Hugo and Rolfe pretended not to notice the meeting of the lovers, but busied themselves about the fire.
Strange thoughts were beating through the trapper’s mind for all his apparent unconcern. How he longed for Marion to greet him in such an affectionate manner as she did the sergeant. He was her father, while the other she had known but a short time. A sudden im​pulse swept upon him to get off by himself, and forget forever that he had a daughter. He would crush out every vestige of affection from his heart, and turn his hand more strongly than ever against all mankind. He had been a weak fool to be so easily deluded by mere sentiment.
He straightened himself up with a jerk from his bending position. Yes, he would go at once, pretending that he had business elsewhere. But just then Sergeant North stepped toward him, and held out his hand.
“I want to thank you for what you have done,” he began. “I can never repay you. Let us henceforth be friends.”
Taken completely aback by this unexpected move, Hugo hesitated. It was only for a minute, however, and then he drew his body to its full height and looked steadily into the eyes of the man standing before him.
“How can we be friends?” he asked. “Am not I a suspected criminal? Have you not been seeking me for years? But for a peculiar turn of events, I would now be away in the fastness of the hills where you could never find me. I am your prisoner now, so how can captor and captive be friends?”
“You are no captive of mine,” the sergeant calmly replied. “You may leave this place whenever you wish, and no hand will be raised to restrain you. I never yet arrested a man who did what you have done for us.”
“But how can you face your commanding officer when you meet him if you let me go? In the eyes of the law I am a criminal. Have you forgotten that?”
“I never knew it to forget, Hugo. Explain what you mean.”
​“About that murder near the C. D. Cut-Off, of course. Am I not suspected of that? Have you not been on my trail ever since you heard of my visit to the Kynox hospital with the little child?”
“You are right, but only to a certain extent. Your actions naturally aroused our suspicions, especially after you fled that night from the cabin when we had taken shelter from the storm. But I had no orders from Headquarters to follow you. I merely took the matter into my own hands while on patrol from the river to The Gap. I wished to overtake you to find out from your own lips what you knew about that murder. But now I would no more think of suspecting you than I would Marion. You are too noble a man to do such a diabolical deed. Do you not believe me?”
“And you say that you never had orders to follow me and arrest me?” Hugo asked in surprise. “Are you sure that the Force hasn’t been on the watch for me for years? Haven’t I been looked upon as a criminal escaped from justice?”
Into the sergeant’s mind there came all at once something which partly explained the reason of the strange actions of the man standing before him. He had evidently been labouring for years under a great misapprehension. He had been obsessed with the idea that the Police were searching for him. It was quite apparent that the man had fled from the ways of civilisation, but to imagine that he could escape in the northland was ridiculous. Of all places on the earth the Yukon territory was the worst region for any criminal to flee for refuge. Here the two Divisions of the Mounted Police spread out their marvellous net into the most remote recesses. No miscreant had ever yet escaped, no matter to what part of the world he ​had fled. Had they wanted Hugo, the trapper, they could have taken him years ago. They knew of his wanderings, and his peculiarities. Although the man was a mystery, they never interfered with his manner of living. To them he was a harmless being, one of many dwelling in the country.
“We never considered you as a criminal,” the sergeant replied. “We never had any orders to arrest you.”
“You didn’t!” Hugo exclaimed. “Why, then, did you demand me to surrender when I found you wallowing about in the snow, overcome by the storm?”
“I wanted to hold you that you might give evidence in the murder case. And, besides, I guess I must have been half crazy that day. I hardly knew what a fool-thing I was doing.”
“H’m, you are certainly right. But it was a mighty plucky thing to do, as I told you then. Why, I could have knocked you on the head and no one would have been the wiser. It would have been charged to the storm.”
“Why didn’t you do it? It was your great opportunity.”
“Because I am not a brute. And, further, for my daughter’s sake. Now you understand.”
“I do,” the sergeant replied. “And for her sake, if for nothing else, let us be friends.”
Once more he held out his hand, which Hugo immediately grasped. For a few seconds they faced each other without a word. Their eyes met in a steady look, and their hearts thrilled. Thus two strong men became friends there in the heart of the great wilderness. The bond of union was sealed which neither would lightly break.
​All this had been of intense interest to Marion. She listened to the conversation, and studied the faces of the two men with fast-beating heart. But when they at length clasped hands, she sprang forward and threw her arms about her father. Her eyes were moist with tears, but her face was radiant with joy.
“Oh, I am so glad, so glad!” she murmured. “Now we can all be happy.”
“Why, yes, so we can,” Hugo replied, his heart lighter than it had been for years. “And something to eat will make us happier still.”
“Supper all ready on the dining car,” was the startling and unexpected announcement from Rolfe, who had been busy preparing the meal. His face was beaming with satisfaction as the three turned toward him. “Seats for two right here,” he continued, motioning to a blanket spread out upon some fir boughs. “Please walk this way.”
“You are to be congratulated, Mr. Rolfe,” Marion smilingly told him. “You have served a wonderful supper.”
“It certainly is, Miss Brisbane. Fried moose steak, with things we call ‘potatoes,’ bread, hardtack, biscuits, jam, and tea. Say, this is a banquet after what we’ve been eating.”
“Poetry, eh, Tom?” the sergeant queried. “Those are the best words I’ve heard you utter in a long time. That’s the kind of poetry which appeals to me.”
“Oh, that’s nothing to what I can do, sergeant. Just listen to this:
“Give me, oh, give me, just as I am, Potatoes and moose steak, hardtack and jam.
“Doesn’t that strike you as a masterpiece? Let me ​sing it for you. I am sure you will enjoy it. I can add more lines as I go along.”
“Mercy! Mercy, Tom!” the sergeant exclaimed, taking his seat at Marion’s side. “We’ve come through enough hardships of late. Do you wish to inflict on us any more?”
“I only wanted to cheer you all up,” Rolfe explained. “After your most solemncoly and dramatic spiel, I thought a little diversion wouldn’t come amiss. However, if you don’t appreciate my efforts, I shall keep my great thoughts to myself. The course of true genius, like love, never did run smooth. I guess it’s something like what Crabbe, the poet, said:
“‘Genius! thou gift of Heav’n! thou light divine! Amid what dangers art thou doom’d to shine!’”
While Rolfe was thus talking, Hugo was watching him most intently. His gray eyes shone with humor, a striking contrast to the fire of fear and rage which had so often gleamed in those same orbs.
“Young man,” he began, “your words do me good. It’s been long years since I have heard the light chatter of youth. Tragedy has been hanging dark over my life. It has surrounded me on every trail, and entered into my very soul. I have been a victim of gloom and despair. To me the past was as a closed book, the present a period of misery, and the future held out no hope. At times I had almost forgotten that I was a man, and was in danger of becoming a mere brute. But a change has taken place. The spirit of heaviness has been removed, and I see with other eyes. Give me your hand, young man, and let us shake. I like your buoyant spirit.”
Rolfe was much surprised at this unexpected speech, ​and as he seized the trapper’s outstretched hand in a firm grip, his bronzed face flushed with pleasure.
“Thank you, sir,” he replied. “I am pleased to know that you appreciate my poetic chatter, and that it has done something to dispel the clouds of darkness from your soul. I hope the rest of our discerning company will make a note of this. It is certainly great to have such peace and harmony reigning in our midst. This has been a regular old-time experience meeting. I shall now call on the sergeant to lead us in singing the ‘Doxology.’ He has a wonderful voice, which once heard can never be forgotten.”
The truce agreed upon that night was a real one. It was a calm after storm, peace after conflict. All were weary after the toil of the day and for lack of sleep, and it was a great comfort to sit near the bright fire and talk about the events of the last few days. Marion’s face grew grave as Hugo told about finding the half-breed girl, lost, demented, and how he had taken her to one of his cabins, and from there to The Gap. He passed lightly over what that journey had meant to him, and how for several miles he had been forced to carry the unconscious girl in his arms.
“Poor Zell!” Marion said. “She was so bright and animated when we left Big Chance. She was longing to hurry back to be once more with her wounded young lover. She must have become lost when she went after the wood.”
“The girl was not lost at first,” Hugo replied. “She was carried off by that villain, Bill, the Slugger. I have proof, and when we come face to face there will be another kind of experience meeting. The mean, contemptible cur! Why, he even rewarded the hospitality of the missionary at The Gap, that noble man of ​God, by stealing all of his food, and lighting out some time in the night. It might be as well, sergeant, to round up that brute and ask him a few questions about that murder near the C. D. Cut-off.”
“I am not surprised at what you tell me,” the sergeant replied. “Bill is a bad man, and we need him. I was hoping to be first at The Gap to head him off. The task will be much more difficult now, so we shall need your help.”
“And you shall have it,” Hugo emphatically declared. “I shall do everything in my power to bring the guilty to justice.”
For a long time that night the sergeant and Hugo talked after Marion and the constable were asleep. The trapper told all he knew about finding the Haines child in the lonely cabin, and the blood-stains leading to the river. But of the finding of the diamond ring he said nothing. He would explain about that when he received it from the missionary, and handed it over to the sergeant.
“I never expected to tell you all this,” he said in conclusion. “I looked upon the Force as my deadly enemy, for reasons which you already partly know. What led me to flee to this country I do not wish to explain now. That can wait. But I see things in a new light, and I am glad. I have been living long enough in hell, but have at last escaped. There, now, I think we have talked enough. We need rest, for a hard journey lies ahead of us to-morrow.”