Gypsy - Lesley Pearse [148]
Beth had been on tenterhooks during the few days they spent at Lake Lindemann, as she could see how exasperated Jack was becoming with Theo. Jack had willingly hauled extra weight for him over the mountains. He’d let him ride on the sledge from Happy Camp to Lake Lindemann when his shoulder hurt, and excused him from helping to cut wood and other strenuous jobs. But he resented Theo swanking around treating him like his servant. Beth feared Jack would push on to Dawson City on his own, and she wouldn’t have blamed him if he had.
But as it was, Theo lost most of his remaining money in a poker game, so buying a boat was out of the question, and ultimately he had no choice but to fall in with Jack’s plans.
He hadn’t taken it well, though. Beth felt that underneath all Theo’s superiority, he was actually jealous of Jack because so many people looked up to him, while he was seen as something of a parasite. He’d hardly said a word as they walked along the frozen lake, not even to her.
But then, Beth had her own private irritations with him too. While she wanted to put aside the hurt he’d caused her back in Skagway and have things back the way they were in Vancouver, she was finding it difficult.
As they all moved forward on to Lake Bennett, however, any ill feeling between them fell away, for the sight that met their eyes was truly astonishing.
Aside from the spellbinding beauty of the long, narrow frozen lake insinuating its way through a range of snow-covered mountains, there were tents spread along its shores for as far as the eye could see.
The thousands of tents came in all shapes and sizes, from brand-new ones to old, tattered ones, from tiny improvised ones, which would only shelter one man, to marquees big enough for a circus, and every other kind in between.
They had known that the White Pass, the alternative, longer route over the mountains from Skagway, ended up here, so they had expected a crowd of people, but they hadn’t anticipated this many, or to see so many animals.
The White Pass had been dubbed ‘Dead Horse Trail’, because so many hundreds of horses died on it from starvation and ill treatment. One of the Mounties at the border had spoken out angrily at the cruelty and stupidity of people setting out without enough fodder for their animals. Yet there were many horses here, along with dogs, oxen, donkeys, goats, and even pens of chickens.
It was also a cacophony of sound: the thud of axes on wood, the buzz of saws, insistent hammering, dogs barking and people yelling to one another. Just a couple of years earlier this must have been a silent wilderness which only Indians and the occasional trapper passed through. Now it was a city in the making.
Theo brightened visibly as he saw a marquee advertising faro and poker games nightly, and although Beth could take no pleasure in him gambling away the last of his money, she was glad to see him smiling again. She thought too that she could make some money by playing her fiddle, as she had at Lake Lindemann.
‘How much further?’ Theo grumbled when an hour later Jack was still heading onwards down the lake.
‘There’s more trees down here. It’s bad enough having to chop them down for the boat without having to haul them a distance,’ Jack said tersely.
Beth exchanged glances with Sam. She knew he felt awkward being stuck in the middle, for he liked both men and had sympathies on either side. He too enjoyed a game of cards and a drink, and he still believed that Theo was the one who would eventually make them all rich. Yet at the same time he knew the three of them depended on Jack, for he had all the skills required to get them to Dawson safely.
Sam pulled a face at Beth. He didn’t need to say a word — she knew he was thinking that Jack was a little too forceful and bossy, and that they could all do with a couple of days of complete rest before starting to build a boat.
She decided that she should intervene, so, picking up her skirt, she ran after Jack.