Aurore of the Yukon by Keith Halliday

Author:Keith Halliday [Keith Halliday]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: iUniverse
Published: 2006-05-16T00:00:00+00:00

“Thank you. It’s been much harder than we thought. This is like the coureurs du bois26 one hundred years ago. I had no idea trails like this still existed.”

“Well we’ll put you up in one of our tents and I can escort you back to Skag-way tomorrow.”

Maman got that look in her eye again. I’d been seeing it more often the longer we were in Alaska.

“Monsieur, you misunderstand me. We intend to continue to the Yukon! I don’t care how rough the trail is! If Louise can do it, then so can I!”

“But you don’t have 2000 pounds of supplies to get you through the winter!” We all looked at Skookum’s pack. It was all we had left.

Maman stood there in the wind, shouting as loud as she could to tell him how we were robbed in Skagway and had to get to Uncle Thibault’s. He looked at us in amazement. “You were there when Frank Reid shot Soapy Smith! Well, where are my manners! Come into our tent and have a cup of tea!”

As we entered the tent, I heard one of the other policemen complain to the Constable about having “Indians in the tent.” Louise looked terribly embarrassed. Lots of people in the North are mean to Native People just because they are Native People. It is really terrible.

But the Constable said something sharp to the other policeman and gave him an order, because the policeman suddenly stood straight up and ran off to chop some more wood for us.

The Constable said something friendly to Skookum and Louise in Tlingit and repeated his invitation for all of us to sit around the fire in his tent.

There was a little metal stove, which Yves, Louise and I got as close to as we could. You could actually see the steam coming off D’Artagnan’s coat. The Constable saw us inching closer to the stove and laughed. “I bet you kids could use a bowl of beans,” he said. “We always keep a pot of beans on the stove for emergencies just like this!” He gave us each a steaming bowl. Plus some bannock to put on top. He also opened up his own box and offered us some Worcestershire Sauce. English people really like Worcestershire Sauce for some reason, but that was the first time we had seen it. Yves said it smelled like rotten socks so we didn’t have any. Then we had a cup of tea. It wasn’t very strong, but it was nice and hot and he put in a big spoonful of sugar and a lot of canned milk.

I think that was the best lunch I have ever had! When you live in the city, you don’t realize how good hot beans and tea are. Whenyou are high in the mountains and have been walking and climbing in the rain all day, there is really nothing better.

We sat there listening to the adults talk in a variety of French, English and Tlingit. More policemen came in to hear about the gun-fight, which everyone treated like big news.

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