Zachary's Gold (20 page)

With me so feeble of both mind and body, it was surprising that we got as far as we did. I continued to place one foot in front of the other until I had lost all track of time and no longer had any idea of where we were. After a while, I realized that Rosh had now taken the lead, but I no longer had the strength to resist.

Even simple speech surpassed my abilities, but I felt that if the Chinaman was not totally devoid of merciful humanity, he must soon stop and allow me to rest, for the fire that had begun in my shoulder now raged across my back and licked down to the base of my spine.

When we reached Cornish Lake and Rosh began to unpack the mule, I flopped to the ground in relief and joy, deluded for the moment into the belief that we had somehow reached the sea. I was bothered, however, by the fact that I could see all the way across to the other side. Somehow, Rosh had led us to a place where the ocean was narrow enough for us to raft across to China. The idea worried me for a moment, then it slipped away.

I suppose I fainted, for I awoke to find my partner dragging me across the ground like a carcass. Miserably, I could do nothing much to help him or to defend myself from the horrible pain he caused me by grasping me under the arms. He pulled me over to a bed he had made against a rock under a big spruce and covered me with a blanket. He removed my boots, and the thought came to me that he was planning to abandon me and didn't want me to be able to follow him. But if that were the case, I wondered, why was he making me such a wonderful bed?

I slept for a time and awoke in full darkness, with a fire burning four or five feet from me. The Chinaman was watching me, and when he saw I was awake, he ladled a cup of water out of a pot and brought it to me. I wanted that water more than anything in the world, but I could not summon the strength to sit up for it—a fact that Rosh noticed easily enough. He placed his right hand under my bad shoulder and attempted to lift me. The scream of agony that followed startled him into spilling the water and eclipsed my own vision with showers of sparkling stars.

After he had found a better way to manoeuvre a cupful of water into my mouth, Rosh delicately unbuttoned my shirt and undershirt, and exposed the wound inflicted by the wolverine a couple of weeks earlier. The look of horror and revulsion on his face told me everything I needed to know. The chafing of the packstrap had stripped away the surface layer of skin and scab, and now the area was a pulpy mass of pus and blood. I was assaulted by an overpowering fear and panic.

I was a walking, breathing clump of infection. It had been three days since I had even examined my shoulder properly, let alone cleaned or cared for it. The poison had seeped inward from my wound and it now flowed through my body unrestricted. I have not, either before or since, felt such a sensation of fear. Nothing is so frightening as sickness—the invisible demon warrior that comes from without and within, and can only be chased away, never defeated.

I don't know how I managed to return to sleep, but I must have done so very quickly. When my restless flurries of dreams and hallucinations next abated, the Chinaman was once again forcing me to drink. Why so much water? I thought. Why so much water? I was already soaked to the skin.

Again I slept, and again awoke. The fire was low, mostly coals laced with occasional flame. My companion was curled up under his own blanket at the edge of our pale circle of light. Shifting my position slightly, I could see shapes on the ground just past my feet—my boots, and my revolver.

I gauged the distance to my revolver, stretched out my arm, and wiggled my fingers towards it. If I could reach it, I would shoot the Chinaman before he could stir. It was a matter of self-defence, and revenge as well. First, though, I needed a bit more rest.

My eyes closed and opened again to more water being pushed at me. He was up and had his boots on, although it was still dark. At first I thought I could see the beginnings of daylight, but the extra brightness came from the fire being more built up. The horror of night would never end. The water felt good on my throat, though, and when I slipped back below the surface of sleep, it felt more like I was relaxing, rather than returning to a great unconscious battle.

Although I had wandered in and out of wakefulness all night, when I next awoke I felt that it was the first time I had reached full consciousness. The day had dawned, the sky was bright blue above me, and I felt like I was neither burning nor freezing. My relief was great but short-lived.

Rosh was gone.

A person can somehow sense the difference between momentary separation and the emptiness of being absolutely alone. Stretching my neck a bit, I could see the spot where the mule had been tethered for the night, just past the boulder facing me. Rosh was gone, and he had taken my gold.

He would never make it. I would catch him.

I looked down to see my boots and my Colt .45 still at my feet. I would catch him and when I did I would blow the traitor's head right off his shoulders. He had a head start, but even if I laid up and recuperated for a full day or even two, I would make up the ground before he could reach the Thompson River canyon, because I would be travelling light and angry, while he struggled along under a greedy robber's double burden. He could have saved himself by taking my gun and boots, but he was complacent and in a hurry, which he would live to regret.

I slept.

It was dark when I regained consciousness. Somehow, I was going to have to care for myself for the next twelve hours or so, while my body destroyed the invading poison and my arm regained its strength. I would have to keep the fire alive, refill the water pot when it was empty, and scrounge a bit of food from somewhere. Then I would start after the Chinaman.

With my right hand, I daintily lifted my shirt front to inspect my wound. It was developing a foul odour. I found my underwear to be solidly attached to the grey dried skin of the infection and knew that I would have to swim until the water soaked the material away.

I prepared to sit up, a move that required the use of both arms to some extent, but my left limb would no longer shift at my command. I touched it with my good hand but there was no feeling left at all. I might as well have been prodding at a chunk of pork. My arm was no longer my arm.

For the first time in my adult life, I wept bitterly—partly in fear, partly in frustration. I would not recapture my gold. I would die here, alone in the wilderness. Probably the fever would burn me to death before I starved, but one way or the other, there was no question of recuperating and chasing after my turncoat partner.

My panic was so great that I was unable even to retreat into sleep. At times, I would try to reassure myself by saying that the great weight of my anger and hatred could accelerate the recuperative process and renew my strength, but one cold touch to the dead meat on my left side quickly deflated such postures. I was dying.

Soon I became aware of the return of the fever in full force, and with the fever came my fear. At the periphery of my understanding was a knowledge that I could scarcely bear to face—that this night would be my last on earth.

It was a welcome release when blackness absorbed me.

It took a great deal of time and effort to decide whether what happened next was reality or painful dream, as Rosh propped me against his chest and levered my mouth open to make me swallow the most foul-smelling liquid I had ever encountered. If my metabolism had been more vital, I believe I would have vomited, but as it was, I let the horrible brew trickle down into my stomach and tried to make sense of this dream. Was he supposed to be helping me, or had he returned to torture me still further?

It was the centre of night. Sharp stars burned above me; a campfire crackled at my left. Rosh kept me leaning against his own chest and peeled away the clothing from my upper body, anointing me with another liquid that somehow managed to exude a stench even more disgusting than the stuff he had made me drink. Gazing past the cloth in his hand, I saw the flames flickering and dancing in the night blackness.

He had pursued me into hell.

He would not, it seemed, allow me to sleep in peace for any length of time that night. I was continually dragged from my rest to quaff more of his horrible potion, then subjected to repetitious ablutions in the other noxious liquid.

The disgusting odours and taste of Rosh's concoctions did not improve over the next couple of days, but by the time I had regained enough strength to resist their administration, I had been forced to admit their almost magical efficacy, and I accepted them willingly, albeit with revulsion. I cannot guess the nature of the components of those medicines, but I am living witness to their miraculous ability to carry a man from the brink of death to reasonably good health in three nights and two days.

To my great discredit, I did not, at that point in time, feel particularly grateful. My physical pain was accompanied by an overwhelming malaise, and even when I was able to rest more comfortably, with the alternating numbness and ache in my shoulder being replaced by an itchy tenderness, I felt a constant irritation. I was annoyed by the delay I had caused, and I was angry at Rosh.

I no longer harboured any delusions about his treachery or duplicity. Indeed, I recognized that I owed him my life. I was irritated, though, by his attitude, as I perceived it. I would have felt better if he had chastised me for holding up our expedition, but he did not. He tended to my needs with a bland patience. This is not to say that he showed any particular sympathy for me. He ignored me most of the time, whittling at sticks or wandering around the clearing, humming discordantly to himself until it was time to fix my medicines. He treated me as he would have treated the mule if it had developed an ailment, and he had been forced to return to his old encampment and bring back medicines.

He was not angry; he was not sympathetic. I could only assume that he was gloating, and that bothered me a great deal. His face often seemed expressionless to me, and he did not exhibit his feelings in any way, but while I lay there, watching him and brooding over recent events, I became convinced that he was basking in the glow of his own success. He had every right to gloat. He had gone from cabin boy to captain almost overnight, and on top of it all, had proven his moral superiority by remaining faithful to me, even after I had showed him no consideration or respect.

Each time I awoke, I found him watching me. He would greet me with a word that I initially took to be Chinese but later realized was his simulation of “hello.” Presumably, he was also able to say “goodbye,” but the occasion did not arise for him to make use of it. To pass the time, I made an attempt to teach him a few more words of English, but he brushed it aside, revealing that he was not always as patient as I had thought. He was satisfied with a six-word English vocabulary and preferred to whittle, juggle pebbles, and mumble to himself.

At sunrise on the morning of our fifth day at the Cornish Lake camp, I arbitrarily reset my watch, which had completely unwound. At first, I called it seven o'clock but then decided that was a little late and changed it to six. I then wound it. Taking the map from the side pocket of my pack, I spent some time examining it. The line I had drawn for our projected course was already obsolete—a fact I found unreasonably distressing. Resisting the temptation to call Rosh and have him point out our position, I finally guessed where we must be and the route we would now have to take. I couldn't find pen and ink to mark it down, though, which also irritated me.

My partner watched me carefully while I did my share of the packing, and as we sat in the morning sunshine, each chewing on a slab of bannock, he evidently concluded that I was well enough to do some walking.

Only when he came forward to return them did I realize that he had taken from my pocket the nine coins that symbolized my share of the gold. I was still eating, seated on a rock, while he carefully counted them into my hand, from one to eight. The ninth coin he held up for me to see, then dropped it into his own pocket and smiled.

I scowled briefly, then shrugged and stood up to leave.

On the one hand, I had paid him—for three days' doctor's wages—enough money to build a hospital. Then again, I reasoned, I had bought back my own life with only a tenth part of my fortune. It wasn't a bad bargain. I would have conceded four times as much without argument. I began to feel some of the gratitude that I knew I owed my travelling companion.

We could not hope to cover much territory on my first day, but we knew we needed to reach the Willow River and make lower ground as soon as possible. The snow on the Cariboo Mountains behind us crept lower each day.

WE TRAVELLED SIXTEEN OR EIGHTEEN
miles that first day—an excellent distance for a convalescent. It was fairly easy ground, down the Willow River to a main junction with a tributary not named on my maps, then up this stream to the opening of Beaver Pass. The descent was gentle, the valley fairly wide compared to the gullies and crevasses higher up, and the trail, while occasionally rocky and occasionally wet, made for easy walking. We stopped three or four times, and Rosh always waited for my signal before standing up to move again. He momentarily showed his disappointment when I signalled that I had had enough, although there were still a couple of hours of daylight, but he quickly set to work making camp and would accept none of my help. He knew as well as I that our rate of progress would be established by how much my battered body could endure. In spite of the feelings I had experienced on my sickbed, there was now no sense of competition between us. For my part, I was too tired to attempt to regain any of the status I had lost.