"Listen, dad," he said.- "You've got a passage in our boat, and if ever a man earned a passage you have.But you know yourself you're pretty well along in years, and your health right now ain't exciting.If you go on with us you'll croak surer'n hell.- Now wait till I finish, dad.The price for a passage has jumped to five hundred dollars.I've been throwing my feet and I've hustled a passenger.He's an official of the Alaska Commercial and just has to get in.He's bid up to six hundred to go with me in our boat.Now the passage is yours.You sell it to him, poke the six hundred into your jeans, and pull South for California while the goin's good.You can be in Dyea in two days, and in California in a week more.What d'ye say?"Tarwater coughed and shivered for a space, ere he could get freedom of breath for speech.
"Son," he said, "I just want to tell you one thing.I drove my four yoke of oxen across the Plains in Forty-nine and lost nary a one.I drove them plumb to Californy, and I freighted with them afterward out of Sutter's Fort to American Bar.Now I'm going to Klondike.Ain't nothing can stop me, ain't nothing at all.I'm going to ride that boat, with you at the steering sweep, clean to Klondike, and I'm going to shake three hundred thousand out of the moss-roots.That being so, it's contrary to reason and common sense for me to sell out my passage.But I thank you kindly, son, I thank you kindly."The young sailor shot out his hand impulsively and gripped the old man's.
"By God, dad!" he cried."You're sure going to go then.You're the real stuff." He looked with undisguised contempt across the sleepers to where Charles Crayton snored in his red beard."They don't seem to make your kind any more, dad."Into the north they fought their way, although old-timers, coming out, shook their heads and prophesied they would be frozen in on the lakes.That the freeze-up might come any day was patent, and delays of safety were no longer considered.For this reason, Liverpool decided to shoot the rapid stream connecting Linderman to Lake Bennett with the fully loaded boat.It was the custom to line the empty boats down and to portage the cargoes across.Even then many empty boats had been wrecked.But the time was past for such precaution.
"Climb out, dad," Liverpool commanded as he prepared to swing from the bank and enter the rapids.
Old Tarwater shook his white head.
"I'm sticking to the outfit," he declared."It's the only way to get through.You see, son, I'm going to Klondike.If I stick by the boat, then the boat just naturally goes to Klondike, too.If I get out, then most likely you'll lose the boat.""Well, there's no use in overloading," Charles announced, springing abruptly out on the bank as the boat cast off.
"Next time you wait for my orders!" Liverpool shouted ashore as the current gripped the boat."And there won't be any more walking around rapids and losing time waiting to pick you up!"What took them ten minutes by river, took Charles half an hour by land, and while they waited for him at the head of Lake Bennett they passed the time of day with several dilapidated old-timers on their way out.The famine news was graver than ever.The North- west Mounted Police, stationed at the foot of Lake Marsh where the gold-rushers entered Canadian territory, were refusing to let a man past who did not carry with him seven hundred pounds of grub.In Dawson City a thousand men, with dog-teams, were waiting the freeze-up to come out over the ice.The trading companies could not fill their grub-contracts, and partners were cutting the cards to see which should go and which should stay and work the claims.
"That settles it," Charles announced, when he learned of the action of the mounted police on the boundary."Old Man, you might as well start back now.""Climb aboard!" Liverpool commanded."We're going to Klondike, and old dad is going along."A shift of gale to the south gave them a fair wind down Lake Bennett, before which they ran under a huge sail made by Liverpool.The heavy weight of outfit gave such ballast that he cracked on as a daring sailor should when moments counted.A shift of four points into the south-west, coming just at the right time as they entered upon Caribou Crossing, drove them down that connecting link to lakes Tagish and Marsh.In stormy sunset and twilight - they made the dangerous crossing of Great Windy Arm, wherein they beheld two other boat-loads of gold-rushers capsize and drown.
Charles was for beaching for the night, but Liverpool held on, steering down Tagish by the sound of the surf on the shoals and by the occasional shore-fires that advertised wrecked or timid argonauts.At four in the morning, he aroused Charles.Old Tarwater, shiveringly awake, heard Liverpool order Crayton aft beside him at the steering-sweep, and also heard the one-sided conversation."Just listen, friend Charles, and keep your own mouth shut," Liverpool began."I want you to get one thing into your head and keep it there: OLD DAD'S GOING BY THE POLICE.UNDERSTAND? HE'S GOING BY.When they examine our outfit, old dad's got a fifth share in it, savvee? That'll put us all 'way under what we ought to have, but we can bluff it through.Now get this, and get it hard: THERE AIN'T GOING TO BE ANY FALL-DOWN ON THIS BLUFF - ""If you think I'd give away on the old codger - " Charles began indignantly.
"You thought that," Liverpool checked him, "because I never mentioned any such thing.Now - get me and get me hard: I don't care what you've been thinking.It's what you're going to think.We'll make the police post some time this afternoon, and we've got to get ready to pull the bluff without a hitch, and a word to the wise is plenty.""If you think I've got it in my mind - " Charles began again.
