October Contest Fiction 04
Title: To Start a Fire
Summary: Sho is a reporter who sets out late in 1898 to document the Klondike Gold Rush and the prospectors who trade the comforts of civilization for the lure of gold. (With some slight homage to vague memories of Jack London’s story of similar title and very different outcome.)
Rating: PG-13
To Start a Fire
Sho was only about a hundred and twenty kilometers north of Skagway when he realized he was going to die. He would never see the sun rise again - not that it really rose at all in December in the Yukon. The sky was a strangely lit grey above the endless, unbroken white of the landscape. He knew, of course, that the sun didn’t rise for days at a time at this latitude, but he hadn’t contemplated the effect of the actual experience of living without real sunlight.
Some reserve of energy kept his feet moving along, though he was shivering constantly and couldn’t really feel the ground beneath them anymore, just a sort of stinging pain with each impact of his boots on the frozen snow. His hands were numb inside thick mittens, and the frigid air felt like knives against the exposed skin of his cheekbones where the muffler kept slipping. The woolen muffler itself had become more ice than textile where the condensation from his breath had frozen solid, but he made no attempt to adjust it or remove the ice - it would only freeze again, and he had no wish to be without the protection it provided his beardless face, not even for a moment.
Sho half-lamented his inability to grow decent facial hair. He hadn’t shaved since he’d set out from Seattle into the Alaskan Territory, but he had produced only enough disreputable scruff to make him look like the kind of person who might lure little boys into dark alleys for unmentionable activities. It was certainly nothing like the rampant beards worn by the prospectors to provide insulation for faces and necks against the bitter cold. Then again, perhaps he wasn’t sure he would want to have the condensation from his breath freezing onto his beard as he had seen on the men out on the trail; those who chewed tobacco had sported icy beards streaked with a vile amber color where the tobacco juice had frozen as it was expelled.
Distracted by the unsavory image, he stumbled suddenly, landing on hands and knees in the snow, his pack thudding painfully against his back. His long hike in the icy climate had rendered his limbs too uncoordinated to rise quickly to his feet before the moisture soaked into his clothing and mittens. Once he had scrambled awkwardly into a vertical position, though, he realized that the snow and the air and his clothing were all too cold to melt the snow on contact as he was used to in Toronto winters. Sho felt the tension drain out of his body at the realization, but then laughed bitterly at himself. He was still going to die out here.
Stamping his feet a bit, largely just to feel the sting that had become oddly reassuring, Sho fished his compass out of his coat pocket with a clumsy mittened hand, then had to take his mitten off after all in order to open the case. His fingers were bare only for a moment, but the icy air burned into them painfully and he thrust them hurriedly back into the mitten, glad the compass itself had been slightly warmer than the ambient air, thanks to its shelter in his pocket.
He wished he had tried to bargain for one of Nakai’s dogs when they’d parted company in Caribou Crossing after traveling up Bennett Lake together. Then he would at least have a little company to keep his mind off his imminent death, and maybe a dog’s sense of smell would be able to help him find the camp he was looking for. But Nakai hadn’t offered, and Sho hadn’t wanted to be rude, so he had simply shaken the man’s hand and watched him mush away to the east toward his camp. Sho himself was headed up toward White Horse following the route of the proposed railroad as well as interviewing prospectors along the way.
This was his assignment from the Globe, at least. News of the Gold Rush had reached the east, and his editors wanted to capture the Drama of the discovery and the Progress represented by the railroad after the economic panic a few years back. Sho was relatively new to the paper and eager to prove himself, so he enthusiastically embarked on the long trip by rail from Toronto to Chicago and then to Seattle; from Seattle he traveled by ship to Skagway, which was the jumping-off point for most prospectors. Now he was somewhere north of Caribou Crossing in the Yukon Territory and, according to the compass needle, still heading north.
The wide expanse of flat whiteness he was standing on was the Yukon River, he thought; under more than a meter of snow was probably the same thickness of ice. The railroad was planned to run along the west side of the river, he’d learned from interviewing engineers at Skagway, though there was no activity in the harsh winter months. There were mining camps all along the river as well, he’d been told, but nothing in sight, not even a curl of smoke on the horizon. But maybe he wouldn’t see one against the grey of the sky.
He would just have to keep going. He’d been stupid to try this alone.
***
“Are you insane?” the man behind the bar asked, pausing in his almost constant wiping of glasses to stare at Sho. “Late November is not the time to head up into the Yukon, no matter what your newspaper thinks. I’m surprised you made it to Alaska at all in this season.”
Sho was mildly offended that this man doubted his ability to rough it in the wilderness - this saloon keeper who flaunted the most immaculately coifed hair, cleanest hands, and best-tailored waistcoat he’d seen since leaving Seattle. Actually, the man’s sartorial sense rivaled that of many wealthy Toronto businessmen, Sho thought.
“I know what I’m doing,” he pouted. “It’s not like it doesn’t get cold in Toronto. And I’m really quite fit.” He flexed his biceps a bit, though his musculature was hidden by the thick sweater. He debated rolling up the sleeve, but even in the saloon - the nicer-looking one on the main street of Skagway - the winter cold could not be entirely dispelled by the cast-iron stove in the middle of the room.
The bartender shook his head and looked around for someone to back him up. “Oi, Captain,” he said as he slid a glass of whiskey down the bar toward a small man Sho had assumed was sound asleep. He waited for the drink to slosh and spill against the man’s arm, but, without even turning his head, the man smoothly shifted his weight, caught the sliding glass, and lifted it to his lips to toss back the alcohol.
He turned then to regard Sho and the bartender with kind eyes in a mild, expressionless face. His gaze slid to the bartender. “He looks new, Matsujun,” the Captain said quietly, with no particular intonation. The bartender made a frustrated noise, and Sho thought it prudent to give his own introduction.
“Ah… Sakurai Sho.” He extended a hand, which the sleepy man blinked at for a moment before slowing reached to grasp it. “I’m a journalist with the Toronto Globe, and I’ve traveled here to document the Gold Rush and the construction of the new railway line up to White Horse and Fort Selkirk.”
The Captain said “Ah” and nodded, so Sho continued. “I’ll be conducting some interviews with the railroad company employees while I’m in town, and then I’ll head north to Caribou Crossing and then to White Horse, interviewing prospectors I meet on the way.”
Someone came in from the street then, sending a blast of arctic air into the room before he closed the door again and causing them all to shiver and hunch their shoulders. The bartender - Matsujun, Sho reminded himself; he always tried to remember names - left the bar to attend to the newcomer who had taken a table near the stove.
The Captain cocked his head slightly to one side, his brow furrowed in a way that, strangely, made Sho want to ruffle his short, messy hair like a little kid. Sho wondered what he could possibly be a captain of; he didn’t look like a typical soldier with that round face, and anyway there really wasn’t an American military presence out here. Even crime boss Soapy Smith had been defeated by vigilant citizens rather than military or police, he knew.
“It’s winter,” the Captain said, and then peered at Sho intently. When Sho only stared back, he continued, “No one is working on the railroad now. They’re all in town. Ice fishing is good, though, if you can cut through the ice. I cut my fishing hole over at Smugglers Cove last month, but it’s tough to keep it open.”
“I see,” Sho responded, rather untruthfully.
“Hard to pan for gold when the creeks are frozen solid. Prospectors come into town for winter, too, a lot of them. Why don’t you interview them here? Matsujun has nice rooms upstairs for guests.”
“Yes, I’m staying in one of them tonight. But I really should go out to the camps themselves to see the atmosphere, so I can show readers what the real thing is like. That’s my job, you know! Communicating pictures to the public through my words!”
“Didn’t your paper send you with a Kodak, if they want to you document the real thing so badly?” The bartender was back, frowning suspiciously as though he suspected Sho’s editor of some kind of conspiracy.
“Ah… no. I think they didn’t want to do without one of the paper’s cameras for such a long time…” Sho trailed off under Matsujun’s glare.
“Or because they knew its parts would freeze out here? Do you know what forty degrees below zero feels like?”
“Isn’t that about what the temperature here in Skagway is? It’s not so bad.”
“Wrong. One, it’s only about ten below tonight. Two, you’re talking about heading north, where it’s generally quite a bit colder. Three, this is a town, in its own way, and the buildings cut off a lot of the wind. You’ll be out in the open without this kind of protection. Four, you wouldn’t like even ten below very much after being out in it for longer than the time it takes to walk across the street from the railroad office to the saloon.” Matsujun punctuated his list by poking a finger into the air in front of Sho’s face, and Sho had to lean back to avoid the aggressive digit.
“People die from exposure, Sakurai.” The Captain’s quiet voice was firm, and Sho turned to meet his eyes, trying to combat the concern he saw there by putting his determination and dedication into his own. The Captain closed his eyes at last, sighing a little. “This is what you’ll need, then.”
****
The Captain had mandated warm clothes that kept his body a little too cool to sweat, plus protection for his extremities: the cap with ear flaps, the layers of socks, the thick mittens - and Sho could still feel himself slowly freezing to death. It had to be colder than forty below, and he still could see no sign of any camp, even though he could occasionally detect old sled tracks and tried to follow them while keeping his northerly bearing. He moved as briskly as possible, and he could hear the Captain’s birch bark, recommended as tinder for fires, crunching in his pocket as he moved his arms.
The Captain had also advised digging himself a cave in the snow in an emergency, where the tempterature would not be colder than zero, and where he would be insulated against the biting wind. Sho had laughed at first, earning another glare from Matsujun, for the little fisherman was, apparently, quite serious. Sho was glad of the advice now, since it appeared he might not be able to find a camp, even an abandoned one, before he became too cold to move. But he still didn’t like the idea of burying himself in the snow that seemed so much like his enemy.
Nonetheless, he noticed the snowbank on the side of the river’s expanse; he might be able to dig into the side, low down. There was a stand of evergreen trees nearby whose branches he could use to line the snow cave and block the opening. He stumbled toward the bank and struggled to reach the hatchet lashed to his pack. He clumsily shrugged the pack from his shoulders and closed his hand around the haft of the tool.
Except he couldn’t. His fingers could barely bend, and he could not feel the hatchet’s handle when he saw his hand come into contact with it. He should start a fire first, he thought, before trying to make the shelter, but wondered how he would be able to manipulate matches. He would have to remove his mittens as well.
He heard a muffled kind of crack and looked up at the river; it sounded a bit like the ice beginning to break up in the Humber back home in springtime. But it was far too cold for the ice to be thawing. His eye was caught by a shadow cast by the snowbank on the pristine white snow of the river. It looked like an angel kneeling, its wings arching protectively over its back, rather like the guardian angel in the painting that had hung in his bedroom when he was a child. As he stared, mesmerized by the beautiful sight and by his nostalgia, he felt his eyes slipping closed. He was so tired…
****
Death was considerably warmer than his last moments of life had been, and smelled somewhat of dog. It also, apparently, involved hot, moist air blowing intermittently on the back of his neck and what felt a lot like a hand on his waist. He drew in a long, careful breath, just to see if he could, and relished the sensation of air that hadn’t been filtered through an icy muffler. The hot air on his neck ceased abruptly, and the maybe-hand removed itself; at the same moment he felt a rush of cooler air on his back as the surface he was lying on shifted slightly and then settled again.
He struggled to raise eyelids that felt incredibly heavy and had a moment of panic in which he imagined that the freezing air had turned the moisture in his eyes to ice just like the moisture in his breath. But an instant later they did open and he found himself staring into a pair of warm brown eyes set in a long face that was far too close to his own.
“Finally,” said the reedy voice that belonged with the catlike mouth set at the bottom of that face. “I was starting to think I should have left you out there after all.” The face backed off and Sho saw a slightly built young man dressed in a woolen sweater and denim pants step toward the stove at the center of the room and use a split log to open the latch on the stove’s little door. He poked the same log into the vibrantly orange square revealed and then kicked the door shut swiftly with his foot. Sho wondered if it hurt to do that with only socks on. Then he wondered if he still had feet, but he was afraid to try moving them. He felt a strange weight at the end of his legs, but he wasn’t sure what it felt like to have extremities killed by frostbite.
The young man was back at his side with a steaming earthenware cup of something. He held it to Sho’s mouth and helped him take a few sips of a bittersweet liquid that tasted mostly like grass. He coughed a bit, and then the young man silently urged him to drink more, until the cup was empty.
“Well?” The young man gazed at Sho expectantly, free hand on his hip. “Can you speak?”
Sho tried, but could only croak out, “How--”
“Two days,” said the man, holding up two stubby fingers to emphasize. “Or did you mean, how did I rescue you, rather than, how long have you been sleeping? In that case, I found you frozen solid on the river when I was out hunting. It was Katsumi, really - he’s the one who sniffed you out when we were heading back. Then I had to dump my deer and lug your heavy carcass back here instead.” He paused, whether for Sho’s response or simply for air, Sho couldn’t tell.
“I’m sorry. Thank you?” Sho wasn’t sure which was the correct response.
“Well, Katsumi guarded the deer until I could go back for it. And your pack. Speaking of which, what the hell were you thinking, coming out here with only that much in supplies? Or rather, what the hell were the Mounties thinking? I thought they wouldn’t let anyone in from Alaska without a full year’s supplies, or have they changed the rules now that there’s a railroad coming? I know you’re not working a claim around here, so you must have just come in. I doubt you’re a claim-jumper, or you’d be better prepared. Or did you come from Edmonton? No, you’d never have made it this far. I hope you didn’t think you were going to make it all the way up to Dawson. I can’t see how you made it all this way from Skagway, either, honestly.” Another expectant pause.
“I did come from Skagway, traveling with a prospector from White Pass to Caribou Crossing. Then I was heading to White Horse. The Mounted Police allowed me to come through the pass with those supplies because I’m not a prospector and don’t plan to stay. I’m a journalist -- ”
“It’s pretty stupid to come out here in the winter - in the summer you can build a raft so even a city boy like you can make it down the river. I can’t believe you didn’t try to start a fire when you started getting numb. That’s just common sense. So is traveling in pairs or groups. It’s a lot easier to start a fire if you’re not alone, too.”
“-from the Toronto Globe.” Sho decided he needed to just plow on ahead, since this man obviously liked to talk a lot and apparently had never learned not to interrupt, either. “I came out west to report on the railroad and document the Gold Rush for our readers.”
The man snorted. “It’s over.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“The Gold Rush is over. It was a rush. Rushes are fast. You took weeks to get here, which can be forgiven, I suppose, but it’s already been more than two years since the big discovery. No one’s getting rich out here. Just plugging away and staying alive. Except for you, since you were obviously trying to die.”
“I thought I could handle it,” Sho murmured, not expecting there to be a pause in which he could be heard, but there was, and he heard the other man snort again. He raised his head and glared, even though he knew it was ungrateful. “So then, what if you had found me dead? Would you have left my corpse there to be eaten by wolves?”
The other man laughed suddenly, throwing his head back with an abandon Sho wouldn’t have expected, given the general economy of his movements. “No, I’d have brought you back even if you were dead. You’ve got some muscle on you.” He flashed a mischievous grin that crinkled his eyes and momentarily charmed Sho too much to notice the implication. Then he gasped.
“You… not really?” He’d heard about such things happening in extreme conditions, like that American traveling group about fifty years back.
The man laughed again, clapping his hands a few times. “You really are pretty stupid, aren’t you? Didn’t I just say I’d been out hunting and bagged a deer, which is now being stewed in here and smoked out back? Why would I need to eat you? You must not be a very good reporter if you can’t pay attention to details. No, I’d have brought you back, but I wouldn’t have been able to bury you till the spring thaw.” His smile faded with his last words, and he turned toward one of the windowless walls.
Sho felt awkward, and he breathed, “Katsumi?” Then he cursed inwardly for probably saying exactly the wrong thing. What if somehow this man’s companion had died helping to rescue Sho?
“What? Oh, he’s right there. Katsumi!” He spoke brightly and there was a quiet whuff from near his feet. Sho floundered his way into a half-sitting position for the first time since waking and realized that the weight on his feet was actually a large dog, one of the huskies he’d seen so frequently with the prospectors. The man rubbed the dog’s head with rough affection, saying, “You, you got a name? Otherwise I’ll call you ‘you’ all the time.”
“Sakurai. Sakurai Sho.”
“I’m Nino. You should go back to sleep now. I drugged your tea.”
***
When Sho woke again, Nino was sitting at the table across the single room of the cabin, shuffling playing cards in a way that Sho, watching silently, realized was quite complex. He wondered how Nino was able to flip the cards around like that with only one tiny round hand. Well, he had probably had plenty of time to practice, if he was alone out here all winter. That theory would also explain his chattering. Nino suddenly looked over at him and smiled, and Sho felt absurdly warm for someone who had almost frozen to death a few days ago. He summoned some indignation in self-defense.
“You drugged me!”
“You needed more sleep in order to recover. Don’t worry, it was just valerian, perfectly normal herbal stuff. You’ve probably had it before. Do you feel better? Do you think you can eat some stew?”
Sho started to sit up, and Nino was instantly by his side with the oil lamp. “Wait a second before you sit up. Let me check out your hands and feet.”
Nino pulled the blanket down slightly and sat on the edge of the bed, taking Sho’s hand gently in his. He stroked the skin on the back gently before moving to the fingers and pressing gently at each tip. “Does that hurt?” he murmured.
“It’s a little itchy,” Sho replied, looking away. In this pose felt oddly like Nino was courting him, even though he was just checking for evidence of frostbite.
“Hmm. You managed to stay pretty dry, and I think I got you inside pretty quickly, but there might be some minor damage. No black spots here, though, so it should heal up in time. Try not to rub the skin.” Nino had moved onto the other hand and seemed similarly satisfied with the condition of the skin. “Let’s see your feet, too. Katsumi! Down.”
The dog whuffed in response and obediently jumped off the end of the bed. Sho’s feet missed the warmth - the cabin was warm but not warm -- but he discovered that the dog’s weight had been the only hindrance to moving his feet. He sighed with relief and then yelped when Nino abruptly pulled all the blankets from him and then plucked off his socks.
“Shut it. I didn’t want to just grab your foot without looking at it, so you’re going to have to do without the warmth for a bit.” He gently lifted Sho’s left foot to examine the toes, frowning a bit when Sho didn’t react to some of his prods. “There’s some white patches here where the skin got bitten. It should heal, but you might be numb in these spots forever.”
Sho must have looked stricken, because Nino grinned that wicked grin. “Don’t worry, we won’t cut any toes off right away. Let’s see how it goes.” He tossed the socks at Sho’s head and turned to the iron pot that was sitting on flat rock next to the hot stove. “I’ll dish you some stew, but just a little for now, and you shouldn’t walk on those feet for a bit yet. Cover up and prop yourself up.”
Nino dragged a chair over to the side of the bed after he served Sho’s stew, and talked to him about Toronto while Sho chewed. Nino, it turned out, had been born in Toronto as well, the son of the cook in a wealthy household, but had come out to the western territories when he was sixteen after getting a general teacher’s license.
“I liked reading, and it seemed like a good deal - free ticket to unknown places. Too bad I hate kids,” he laughed, making a rueful face. Sho found himself laughing, too, at some of the frustrations Nino had experienced as a teacher before finally resigning and continuing his westward trek until he’d panned up some gold in the creek here and decided to build his little cabin and be stationary for a while. He also found that he liked Nino’s laughter better when Nino wasn’t making fun of Sho’s own foolish journey.
Finally, Nino got up to put another log in the stove and then walked around to perch on the other side of the bed. Sho followed him with his eyes. “It’s time for sleep,” Nino explained.
“How can you tell? With no windows to show the light, I mean.”
“Well, I’m tired. Plus, the wolves howl more at night.” And then Sho could hear them too, and couldn’t help shivering. Nino grinned.
“I’m sorry to take your bed,” Sho began awkwardly.
“You’re not taking it, you’re sharing it.” At Sho’s startled expression, he laughed. “The floor in winter is about as warm as the ground outside, so no way am I sleeping on it. There’s room enough for two, and besides, we’ll both be warmer if we share.” With that, he blew out the lamp and crawled under the blankets, whistling for the dog to hop back onto the foot of the bed. A moment later, Sho lay down as well, turning onto his side to stare blindly at the wall until warmth and exhaustion claimed him.
***
Nino refused to let Sho out of bed for the next few days, except to use the chamberpot (“Better than an outhouse in this weather,” said his host). Nino insisted on helping him to stand and balance himself at these times, though he discreetly averted his eyes, for which Sho was most grateful.
He dragged the table over to the bedside, though, and the two of them played several long games of chess with a set that had been carved for Nino by a friend of his in White Horse. Sho lost most of the games, partly because Nino was very good, and partly because he couldn’t tell which of the little wooden bears were supposed to be bishops and which were rooks. He wondered aloud whom Nino played chess with enough to need a set.
“Okada, when he comes down from White Horse. Sometimes Aiba will play with me, but he’s not much for concentration. Mostly I play against myself. See why I’m so excited to have found you?”
Nino also produced a few well-worn books from somewhere and hesitantly placed them on the table within Sho’s reach. When he nodded to them, Sho picked one up carefully, realizing that these were his host’s treasures and he had probably read each of them many times over the winters he’d been out here alone. Sho was intrigued to see Mr. Longfellow’s Dante, Mr. Bryant’s Odyssey, and the Aeneid in Latin, no less. He selected the Odyssey in honor of his own strange journey and turned the pages reverently until Nino relaxed and picked up Mr. Emerson’s Conduct of Life on the other side of the lamp.
When Nino finally gave Sho permission to rise and walk around the cabin on his own, Sho’s legs were stiff from disuse and Nino had to help him rub the function back into his calves and thighs. But he was pleased to feel a bit more independent, even if that meant that Nino left him alone more. With an extra person to feed - and Nino insisted on serving Sho enormous portions - they had consumed the fresh venison more quickly than Nino had planned, so he and the dog Katsumi went out hunting while the smoked meat was still on hand. Luck was not with them, however, and they failed to take anything more substantial than a rabbit from time to time. That obligated more hunting.
Sho understood - though he let Nino say it anyway - that he would be more hindrance than help on such expeditions, so he remained in the cabin and wrote down some of his experiences on the paper he’d brought in his pack, trying to form word pictures to show the Toronto readers the terrible beauty of the Yukon. But concentrating on descriptions of snow would begin to make his hands and feet throb in imagined pain, so he tried to paint a verbal portrait of Nino instead, as an example of the tough and yet surprisingly civilized prospectors this Gold Rush had attracted. He was never very satisfied with his efforts, though, and knew he would have to pay more attention to the real Nino when he returned. Whenever that might be. At this point, he would turn his attention to Odysseus.
But somehow, he found himself glancing at the door at the end of every page, and sometimes more frequently. He wondered how he would know if Nino was lost or hurt and needed his help. And how would he find him? Sho cursed his proven inability to survive in the wilderness because it meant he couldn’t pay the debt he owed Nino in kind. Usually, though, just when he was on the brink of something he wouldn’t admit was panic, he would hear the dog’s bark and the sound of Nino stomping off the snow outside the door, and Sho would have to make himself set down the precious book very carefully before he accidentally tore a page. Then the door would open with a rush of icy air and Nino would scurry inside with or without a rabbit to show for his time out in the cold.
Sho once hesitatingly shared his concern that Nino would stay out too long or go too far from shelter, as he had done - and Nino didn’t laugh as he’d half expected. Instead, Nino had gripped his shoulder and leaned forward until their faces were very close and Sho could see the warm light in his brown eyes. “Thank you, Sho. It’s been a while since anyone worried about me. But,” and he released Sho’s shoulder to continue removing his outerwear, “I’ve been out here on my own for a long time. I’m very familiar with the area, I know where to take shelter if I need to, and I know how long I can stay out. Plus I’m not alone. And neither will you be, the next time you go out there. So don’t worry, but thanks.”
Sho knew that he shouldn’t plan on staying with Nino until the spring thaw, but he couldn’t figure out how he should depart - or whether he would continue north or turn back to Caribou Crossing and Skagway. Meanwhile, Nino hadn’t grown tired of having someone to chatter to, and Sho had even grown accustomed to sharing the bed with the other man. Even though he sometimes awoke with Nino wrapped around him, he attributed it to an instinctive seeking of warmth, and neither man said anything about it.
***
Sho was at the Odyssey-reading and door-staring stage of his day when he heard the sound of several dogs barking outside and a man’s voice shouting commands. Not Nino’s. He set the book aside and rose just as the door burst open and an unfamiliar figure charged in, surrounding by at least ten large dogs of varying appearances. They were well trained, apparently, because they immediately retreated into a corner near the door, and the man busied himself with bowls and various packages until the dogs were all happily feeding. Sho remained standing on the other side of the stove, unsure how to address this stranger who seemed so confident about barging in with his dogs.
“Nino, I brought your flour and stuff, and Matsujun and Captain sent whiskey and fi--.” The man cut himself off as he finally looked at the other person in the room. “You’re not Nino. Oh! Are you a claim-jumper?”
The man seemed rather excited about the prospect, so Sho felt oddly guilty about denying the charge. Nonetheless, he didn’t want to be taken for a criminal, so he said, “Nino’s hunting. My name is Sakurai Sho, and I’m a journalist from Toronto. Nino gave me shelter from the cold when I unable to keep traveling.” He saw no harm in glossing over his failure.
“Ah! Matsujun and Captain Ohno asked me to keep an eye out for your frostbitten corpse!” The man pointed at him joyfully and Sho couldn’t help laughing at the juxtaposition of the image and the tone. The strange man giggled breathily and offered a hand. “Aiba Masaki. I have a claim a little north of here off the west fork of the creek. But mostly I have dogs.”
“I see that.”
“Do you want to meet them?” Aiba’s enthusiasm was impossible to refuse, and by the time Sho had met Becky and Encho and Daigo and the rest of the sled team, he felt that he had known Aiba for much longer than fifteen minutes. And then he helped Aiba bring in supplies from the sled, and by the time Nino came back with a couple of rabbits over his shoulder, he and Aiba had managed to make up some biscuits with the new supply of flour and some fish stew with the dried cod the Captain had sent up - well, Sho had watched Aiba make them.
Nino had seen the sled outside and seemed to have thrown the door open in his hurry to get inside and see his friend. Katsumi barked happily and went to sniff all the other dogs, and Nino thrust the rabbits at Sho and wordlessly walked into Aiba’s open arms. Sho held the little corpses and looked at Aiba and Nino holding each other and turned away, pretending to watch the dogs. After a moment, Sho felt the rabbits being taken from his loose grip and then watched Nino’s back as he left the cabin again to skin the rabbits outside. A hand on his shoulder: Aiba’s.
“He always says he likes to be alone, but he gets pretty lonely out here in the winter, I think. It’s good that you’ve been here with him.” He opened the door a bit and snapped some commands in a language Sho didn’t recognize. The dogs all slithered out the narrow opening to make a meal of fresh rabbit innards, and Sho went to the stove to stir the fish. He looked longingly at the bottle of whiskey Aiba had brought, but it was Nino’s to open.
When Nino came back in, he smilingly asked Sho about Odysseus’s progress and they sat down to a dinner with the first bread Sho had eaten in weeks. Aiba had plenty of news to share, but since much of it concerned the railroad or Sho’s acquaintances from Skagway, he didn’t feel excluded from the reunion of these two longtime friends. And maybe the opened bottle helped the mood. They talked into the night after dinner, and Sho could hear the wolves howling in full force when Aiba finally ran out of breath and material.
Abruptly tired, Sho glanced at the bed, realizing that Aiba was staying over and was probably used to the side of the bed Sho had been sleeping on. “Um, what should we…”
Nino stood, apparently not troubled by the awkwardness Sho was feeling. “We’ll be extra warm. I call middle!” And he quickly toed off his boots and leapt to the bed, squirming his way under the blankets and positioning himself in the center, leaving on either side a space that looked just barely wide enough to accommodate Sho’s body.
Aiba laughed and hopped in on Nino’s left, squirming playfully until Nino punched him in the side. Sho watched them scold each other for a moment, then blew out the lamp before taking his own spot. It was small, and he could definitely feel Nino’s warmth next to him. He turned on his side to avoid the contact.
***
Sho awoke to dog noises and cold air on his face as Aiba herded his team out the door to do their business outside. He assumed Nino was still asleep, because he was still wrapped around Sho’s back and side, one leg thrown over Sho’s and left hand clutching the front of Sho’s shirt. Nino was breathing evenly into the back of Sho’s neck, and he recalled the same sensation from when he first awoke here. Nino must have used his body heat to help restore Sho’s own. Sho lay still, considering this proximity, ignoring the heat pooling in his belly, and unwilling to move until Nino woke by himself.
But there was only a moment more until Aiba and his dogs came back inside, whuffing excitedly over the prospect of breakfast. Nino rolled away with a protesting groan and sat up to rub the sleep from his eyes with the back of his hand. While Sho eased his feet over the side of the bed and into his boots, Nino donned his, jumped up, and dashed outside to stick a handful of snow into his face. Sho had never quite figured out this habit, but Nino said it woke him up, and he was never out long enough to cause himself harm. Sho put the leftover fish stew on the stove to warm for breakfast.
“Aiba,” said Nino when he came back inside, “why don’t you take Sho back down to Skagway? Or up to White Horse.”
Sho dropped the split log he had been about to feed into the stove.
“Nino?” Aiba paused in his ministrations to Becky or Yoko (Sho wasn’t quite sure) and peered at Nino. “Is it time for Sho to leave?”
“He’s been here long enough. He’s healthy again, and he has dispatches to wire to his newspaper anyway. There’s no reason for him to stay here anymore, and he has a job to get back to in the city.”
Nino was talking to the ceiling, and Sho wished he could see his face better. “That’s true,” he said quietly. “Aiba?”
Aiba was still watching Nino, but after a beat he offered, “My team can pull two, but it would still be a two-day trip to Skagway. I could get you up to White Horse late tonight, if we leave pretty soon.” He turned back to his dogs.
Sho felt completely unbalanced and didn’t know how he could make such a decision quickly. Even though he knew he was just an interloper in Nino’s cabin and really belonged back in Toronto, he wanted some reason to stay and continue this quiet life in this warm place out of the snow. “Nino?”
“Time for you to go, Sho. I’d like my solitude back.” Nino did look at him then, and his face was impassive, his eyes without the usual warm light. “Sorry if I seem rude, but I’ve lost my manners out here.”
Sho looked away. “Skagway, then, if that’s alright. I realize I can’t do any more to report on the railroad progress or on gold prospecting in this season, so there’s no point in my going up to White Horse now.” He waited for Aiba’s affirmation and then strode over to his pack that had been sitting in the corner of the room for weeks. He automatically began to repack the few things he had taken out: socks, papers, and writing supplies.
A folded paper appeared in his line of vision. “If you’re going back south, then please post this for me. To my mother in Toronto. I haven’t been able to send word in a while.” Sho took the letter without looking at Nino, glancing at the Queen Street address and then tucking it in with the articles he’d written.
Breakfast was a quiet meal, though Aiba did share a comical story about his puppies and a rabbit. At Nino’s insistence, they left the bowls for him to clean up later and all helped Aiba to painstakingly tie forty little booties onto his dogs’ feet. While Aiba loaded Sho’s pack into the sled and hitched the dog team, Sho attempted to take his leave of Nino.
“I can’t thank you enough for saving my life, you know.”
“I know.” Nino was fiddling with the bowls on the table.
“Right. Well. Thank you anyway.” He held out a hand, but Nino didn’t notice. Sho turned his back and reached for the door handle.
“Sho.” Sho stopped, but didn’t turn around. “I promised you wouldn’t have to go out alone. You have Aiba with you, and the dogs, so you’ll be safe.”
“I thought you meant something else,” Sho said, and he opened the door and had shut it behind him again before Nino could respond, if he even had anything to say.
***
Aiba didn’t have much to say for the first leg of the trip, during which Sho stared at the dogs’ curling tails ahead of him as they ran lightly over the snow. He envied their ease in covering distance that had been so hard for him; they had passed Caribou Crossing remarkably early and were already running along the flat shoreline of Lake Bennett. Sho and Nakai had used a boat to transport Nakai’s dogs and sled on the way north, but Aiba said he preferred to run the beach in the winter, since he made better time that way.
They spent the first night at a camp where Aiba had friends and set off early again, reaching Skagway in mid-afternoon. “You’re not heavy, so the dogs were able to run fast,” Aiba said with a proud beam as he hauled Sho, stiff-limbed, from the sled.
“Thank you, Aiba.” Sho hefted his pack and waited for Aiba to unhitch the dogs before heading to the saloon where he’d stayed on his previous visit to Skagway.
“Look who I found!” Aiba shouted as they entered. Sho cringed.
***
The saloon keeper Matsujun had been able to arrange a shallow, but warm, bath for Sho in one of the saloon’s rooms, and he felt glad to wash of weeks of grime that he hadn’t even noticed particularly while living in Nino’s cabin. He came downstairs to a simple but hearty meal waiting for him at a table near the stove. He was glad to sit apart from Aiba’s animated chatter to Matsujun at the bar. He felt inexplicably depressed as he applied himself to the potatoes.
A chair scraped and he looked up to see the quiet Captain sitting down across the table. But the man said nothing as he gazed at something - or nothing, perhaps - across the room, so Sho continued to eat slowly.
“I’m glad you didn’t die,” he finally said quietly as Sho wiped his mouth on the back of his hand (no such thing as napkins in the territories, even at this tidy saloon).
“I almost did,” Sho admitted, and waited for his gloom to deepen at the confession of his failure. Suprisingly, it didn’t.
“Nino found you,” the Captain said with a fond smile. “Aiba said. I’m glad.”
“I was glad not to die,” Sho responded.
“Yes, that too.” The Captain rose then, leaving a dried fish on the table and waving to the two men at the bar as he went out into the freezing night.
In the morning, Sho thought, contemplating the fish, he would go to the docks and see when a ship might be heading to Seattle - some did, even in the winter; that was how he had gotten here in the first place, though he ought to have been a bit more aware of the significance of the difficulty he had had in booking passage north. Then he could find the telegraph office in Skagway and contact his newspaper to inform them of the impossibility of investigating the planned rail route in the winter season. But he could also begin to wire the stories he had completed while in Nino’s cabin, the ones about Nakai, Nino, and the other men he’d met, as well as his own experiences in the Yukon winter. Tonight, he thought, he could write a piece on Aiba and his dog companions as well. He should also send a wire to his parents, who were probably more worried about him than they had let on. Perhaps he would make it home for Christmas still.
“Sho,” a voice said behind him, and he looked up to see Aiba’s usual bright smile. “I’ll be heading north again in the morning, pretty early, so I might not see you again.”
Sho rose hurriedly and grasped Aiba’s hand firmly, hoping to express the magnitude of his gratitude. “You really saved me, bringing me all the way back here. I know it must have been an inconvenience to you.”
“Nino saved you - I just gave you a ride. And I love mushing, so it’s nice to have a good excuse to run.” Aiba suddenly enveloped him in a tight hug then, whispering, “He was sad, I think.” And then just as suddenly he was gone, disappearing into whatever back room Matsujun had decided was shabby enough to house ten dogs along with their master.
The bartender nodded as Sho headed up to his room with the fish, and he wondered if he should take that as a confirmation.
***
The breeze that ruffled the tender grasses along the creek was brisk, but he felt comfortable in his cap and muffler and gloves. It was probably somewhere around five degrees, he guessed, and the sun was well above the horizon on his right. The river on his left was running strongly with the melting ice, though the edges of the stream still bore a thin skirt of ice where the water was stiller. His boots crunched on the sandy ground where the railroad company was clearing a path for the narrow gauge rail to rest. He thought it should be another hour or so, though he really wasn’t sure.
He veered away from the railway route to follow the curves of the river more closely, his boots sinking into the moist glacial silt. The tree cover thickened and he stumbled over a few fallen branches in the shadows, but he managed not to fall into the river. A good thing, since it was surely frigid.
And then the evergreens gave way to birches and scrubby bracken, and then he was in a small clearing. And across the clearing, a hundred yards downstream, stood a tiny cabin made of rough-hewn logs and clay in the seams. As he started toward it, moving a little more quickly although the briars caught on his coat, a dog barked and he saw a low grey shape moving through the brush in his direction.
He met the dog halfway and stooped to let it sniff his hand and then to rub its head. When he straightened, he could see a slight figure standing still at the edge of the river behind the cabin. The dog abandoned him to run back to its master. Sho followed more slowly, suddenly feeling considerably more doubt than he’d had when he had gotten on the train in Toronto and the ship in Seattle and the train that now ran almost to Bennett from Skagway, where he’d been able to interview some workers ferrying supplies up to the current end of the line during the trip.
“You came back,” Nino said when Sho reached him.
“Yes.”
“This is a better season for it. Though you still might need to stop and start a fire in an emergency.” He could see Nino’s eyes now, and they were warm; the shifting shadows from the sunlight filtering through the sparse leaves created the impression of tiny flames in the irises.
“That’s easier to do if I’m not alone,” Sho replied, and he closed the distance between them to wrap his arms around Nino, who stiffened. “I brought you some books,” he added, and then Nino’s arms were around his waist, and he was so warm.
Summary: Sho is a reporter who sets out late in 1898 to document the Klondike Gold Rush and the prospectors who trade the comforts of civilization for the lure of gold. (With some slight homage to vague memories of Jack London’s story of similar title and very different outcome.)
Rating: PG-13
To Start a Fire
Sho was only about a hundred and twenty kilometers north of Skagway when he realized he was going to die. He would never see the sun rise again - not that it really rose at all in December in the Yukon. The sky was a strangely lit grey above the endless, unbroken white of the landscape. He knew, of course, that the sun didn’t rise for days at a time at this latitude, but he hadn’t contemplated the effect of the actual experience of living without real sunlight.
Some reserve of energy kept his feet moving along, though he was shivering constantly and couldn’t really feel the ground beneath them anymore, just a sort of stinging pain with each impact of his boots on the frozen snow. His hands were numb inside thick mittens, and the frigid air felt like knives against the exposed skin of his cheekbones where the muffler kept slipping. The woolen muffler itself had become more ice than textile where the condensation from his breath had frozen solid, but he made no attempt to adjust it or remove the ice - it would only freeze again, and he had no wish to be without the protection it provided his beardless face, not even for a moment.
Sho half-lamented his inability to grow decent facial hair. He hadn’t shaved since he’d set out from Seattle into the Alaskan Territory, but he had produced only enough disreputable scruff to make him look like the kind of person who might lure little boys into dark alleys for unmentionable activities. It was certainly nothing like the rampant beards worn by the prospectors to provide insulation for faces and necks against the bitter cold. Then again, perhaps he wasn’t sure he would want to have the condensation from his breath freezing onto his beard as he had seen on the men out on the trail; those who chewed tobacco had sported icy beards streaked with a vile amber color where the tobacco juice had frozen as it was expelled.
Distracted by the unsavory image, he stumbled suddenly, landing on hands and knees in the snow, his pack thudding painfully against his back. His long hike in the icy climate had rendered his limbs too uncoordinated to rise quickly to his feet before the moisture soaked into his clothing and mittens. Once he had scrambled awkwardly into a vertical position, though, he realized that the snow and the air and his clothing were all too cold to melt the snow on contact as he was used to in Toronto winters. Sho felt the tension drain out of his body at the realization, but then laughed bitterly at himself. He was still going to die out here.
Stamping his feet a bit, largely just to feel the sting that had become oddly reassuring, Sho fished his compass out of his coat pocket with a clumsy mittened hand, then had to take his mitten off after all in order to open the case. His fingers were bare only for a moment, but the icy air burned into them painfully and he thrust them hurriedly back into the mitten, glad the compass itself had been slightly warmer than the ambient air, thanks to its shelter in his pocket.
He wished he had tried to bargain for one of Nakai’s dogs when they’d parted company in Caribou Crossing after traveling up Bennett Lake together. Then he would at least have a little company to keep his mind off his imminent death, and maybe a dog’s sense of smell would be able to help him find the camp he was looking for. But Nakai hadn’t offered, and Sho hadn’t wanted to be rude, so he had simply shaken the man’s hand and watched him mush away to the east toward his camp. Sho himself was headed up toward White Horse following the route of the proposed railroad as well as interviewing prospectors along the way.
This was his assignment from the Globe, at least. News of the Gold Rush had reached the east, and his editors wanted to capture the Drama of the discovery and the Progress represented by the railroad after the economic panic a few years back. Sho was relatively new to the paper and eager to prove himself, so he enthusiastically embarked on the long trip by rail from Toronto to Chicago and then to Seattle; from Seattle he traveled by ship to Skagway, which was the jumping-off point for most prospectors. Now he was somewhere north of Caribou Crossing in the Yukon Territory and, according to the compass needle, still heading north.
The wide expanse of flat whiteness he was standing on was the Yukon River, he thought; under more than a meter of snow was probably the same thickness of ice. The railroad was planned to run along the west side of the river, he’d learned from interviewing engineers at Skagway, though there was no activity in the harsh winter months. There were mining camps all along the river as well, he’d been told, but nothing in sight, not even a curl of smoke on the horizon. But maybe he wouldn’t see one against the grey of the sky.
He would just have to keep going. He’d been stupid to try this alone.
***
“Are you insane?” the man behind the bar asked, pausing in his almost constant wiping of glasses to stare at Sho. “Late November is not the time to head up into the Yukon, no matter what your newspaper thinks. I’m surprised you made it to Alaska at all in this season.”
Sho was mildly offended that this man doubted his ability to rough it in the wilderness - this saloon keeper who flaunted the most immaculately coifed hair, cleanest hands, and best-tailored waistcoat he’d seen since leaving Seattle. Actually, the man’s sartorial sense rivaled that of many wealthy Toronto businessmen, Sho thought.
“I know what I’m doing,” he pouted. “It’s not like it doesn’t get cold in Toronto. And I’m really quite fit.” He flexed his biceps a bit, though his musculature was hidden by the thick sweater. He debated rolling up the sleeve, but even in the saloon - the nicer-looking one on the main street of Skagway - the winter cold could not be entirely dispelled by the cast-iron stove in the middle of the room.
The bartender shook his head and looked around for someone to back him up. “Oi, Captain,” he said as he slid a glass of whiskey down the bar toward a small man Sho had assumed was sound asleep. He waited for the drink to slosh and spill against the man’s arm, but, without even turning his head, the man smoothly shifted his weight, caught the sliding glass, and lifted it to his lips to toss back the alcohol.
He turned then to regard Sho and the bartender with kind eyes in a mild, expressionless face. His gaze slid to the bartender. “He looks new, Matsujun,” the Captain said quietly, with no particular intonation. The bartender made a frustrated noise, and Sho thought it prudent to give his own introduction.
“Ah… Sakurai Sho.” He extended a hand, which the sleepy man blinked at for a moment before slowing reached to grasp it. “I’m a journalist with the Toronto Globe, and I’ve traveled here to document the Gold Rush and the construction of the new railway line up to White Horse and Fort Selkirk.”
The Captain said “Ah” and nodded, so Sho continued. “I’ll be conducting some interviews with the railroad company employees while I’m in town, and then I’ll head north to Caribou Crossing and then to White Horse, interviewing prospectors I meet on the way.”
Someone came in from the street then, sending a blast of arctic air into the room before he closed the door again and causing them all to shiver and hunch their shoulders. The bartender - Matsujun, Sho reminded himself; he always tried to remember names - left the bar to attend to the newcomer who had taken a table near the stove.
The Captain cocked his head slightly to one side, his brow furrowed in a way that, strangely, made Sho want to ruffle his short, messy hair like a little kid. Sho wondered what he could possibly be a captain of; he didn’t look like a typical soldier with that round face, and anyway there really wasn’t an American military presence out here. Even crime boss Soapy Smith had been defeated by vigilant citizens rather than military or police, he knew.
“It’s winter,” the Captain said, and then peered at Sho intently. When Sho only stared back, he continued, “No one is working on the railroad now. They’re all in town. Ice fishing is good, though, if you can cut through the ice. I cut my fishing hole over at Smugglers Cove last month, but it’s tough to keep it open.”
“I see,” Sho responded, rather untruthfully.
“Hard to pan for gold when the creeks are frozen solid. Prospectors come into town for winter, too, a lot of them. Why don’t you interview them here? Matsujun has nice rooms upstairs for guests.”
“Yes, I’m staying in one of them tonight. But I really should go out to the camps themselves to see the atmosphere, so I can show readers what the real thing is like. That’s my job, you know! Communicating pictures to the public through my words!”
“Didn’t your paper send you with a Kodak, if they want to you document the real thing so badly?” The bartender was back, frowning suspiciously as though he suspected Sho’s editor of some kind of conspiracy.
“Ah… no. I think they didn’t want to do without one of the paper’s cameras for such a long time…” Sho trailed off under Matsujun’s glare.
“Or because they knew its parts would freeze out here? Do you know what forty degrees below zero feels like?”
“Isn’t that about what the temperature here in Skagway is? It’s not so bad.”
“Wrong. One, it’s only about ten below tonight. Two, you’re talking about heading north, where it’s generally quite a bit colder. Three, this is a town, in its own way, and the buildings cut off a lot of the wind. You’ll be out in the open without this kind of protection. Four, you wouldn’t like even ten below very much after being out in it for longer than the time it takes to walk across the street from the railroad office to the saloon.” Matsujun punctuated his list by poking a finger into the air in front of Sho’s face, and Sho had to lean back to avoid the aggressive digit.
“People die from exposure, Sakurai.” The Captain’s quiet voice was firm, and Sho turned to meet his eyes, trying to combat the concern he saw there by putting his determination and dedication into his own. The Captain closed his eyes at last, sighing a little. “This is what you’ll need, then.”
****
The Captain had mandated warm clothes that kept his body a little too cool to sweat, plus protection for his extremities: the cap with ear flaps, the layers of socks, the thick mittens - and Sho could still feel himself slowly freezing to death. It had to be colder than forty below, and he still could see no sign of any camp, even though he could occasionally detect old sled tracks and tried to follow them while keeping his northerly bearing. He moved as briskly as possible, and he could hear the Captain’s birch bark, recommended as tinder for fires, crunching in his pocket as he moved his arms.
The Captain had also advised digging himself a cave in the snow in an emergency, where the tempterature would not be colder than zero, and where he would be insulated against the biting wind. Sho had laughed at first, earning another glare from Matsujun, for the little fisherman was, apparently, quite serious. Sho was glad of the advice now, since it appeared he might not be able to find a camp, even an abandoned one, before he became too cold to move. But he still didn’t like the idea of burying himself in the snow that seemed so much like his enemy.
Nonetheless, he noticed the snowbank on the side of the river’s expanse; he might be able to dig into the side, low down. There was a stand of evergreen trees nearby whose branches he could use to line the snow cave and block the opening. He stumbled toward the bank and struggled to reach the hatchet lashed to his pack. He clumsily shrugged the pack from his shoulders and closed his hand around the haft of the tool.
Except he couldn’t. His fingers could barely bend, and he could not feel the hatchet’s handle when he saw his hand come into contact with it. He should start a fire first, he thought, before trying to make the shelter, but wondered how he would be able to manipulate matches. He would have to remove his mittens as well.
He heard a muffled kind of crack and looked up at the river; it sounded a bit like the ice beginning to break up in the Humber back home in springtime. But it was far too cold for the ice to be thawing. His eye was caught by a shadow cast by the snowbank on the pristine white snow of the river. It looked like an angel kneeling, its wings arching protectively over its back, rather like the guardian angel in the painting that had hung in his bedroom when he was a child. As he stared, mesmerized by the beautiful sight and by his nostalgia, he felt his eyes slipping closed. He was so tired…
****
Death was considerably warmer than his last moments of life had been, and smelled somewhat of dog. It also, apparently, involved hot, moist air blowing intermittently on the back of his neck and what felt a lot like a hand on his waist. He drew in a long, careful breath, just to see if he could, and relished the sensation of air that hadn’t been filtered through an icy muffler. The hot air on his neck ceased abruptly, and the maybe-hand removed itself; at the same moment he felt a rush of cooler air on his back as the surface he was lying on shifted slightly and then settled again.
He struggled to raise eyelids that felt incredibly heavy and had a moment of panic in which he imagined that the freezing air had turned the moisture in his eyes to ice just like the moisture in his breath. But an instant later they did open and he found himself staring into a pair of warm brown eyes set in a long face that was far too close to his own.
“Finally,” said the reedy voice that belonged with the catlike mouth set at the bottom of that face. “I was starting to think I should have left you out there after all.” The face backed off and Sho saw a slightly built young man dressed in a woolen sweater and denim pants step toward the stove at the center of the room and use a split log to open the latch on the stove’s little door. He poked the same log into the vibrantly orange square revealed and then kicked the door shut swiftly with his foot. Sho wondered if it hurt to do that with only socks on. Then he wondered if he still had feet, but he was afraid to try moving them. He felt a strange weight at the end of his legs, but he wasn’t sure what it felt like to have extremities killed by frostbite.
The young man was back at his side with a steaming earthenware cup of something. He held it to Sho’s mouth and helped him take a few sips of a bittersweet liquid that tasted mostly like grass. He coughed a bit, and then the young man silently urged him to drink more, until the cup was empty.
“Well?” The young man gazed at Sho expectantly, free hand on his hip. “Can you speak?”
Sho tried, but could only croak out, “How--”
“Two days,” said the man, holding up two stubby fingers to emphasize. “Or did you mean, how did I rescue you, rather than, how long have you been sleeping? In that case, I found you frozen solid on the river when I was out hunting. It was Katsumi, really - he’s the one who sniffed you out when we were heading back. Then I had to dump my deer and lug your heavy carcass back here instead.” He paused, whether for Sho’s response or simply for air, Sho couldn’t tell.
“I’m sorry. Thank you?” Sho wasn’t sure which was the correct response.
“Well, Katsumi guarded the deer until I could go back for it. And your pack. Speaking of which, what the hell were you thinking, coming out here with only that much in supplies? Or rather, what the hell were the Mounties thinking? I thought they wouldn’t let anyone in from Alaska without a full year’s supplies, or have they changed the rules now that there’s a railroad coming? I know you’re not working a claim around here, so you must have just come in. I doubt you’re a claim-jumper, or you’d be better prepared. Or did you come from Edmonton? No, you’d never have made it this far. I hope you didn’t think you were going to make it all the way up to Dawson. I can’t see how you made it all this way from Skagway, either, honestly.” Another expectant pause.
“I did come from Skagway, traveling with a prospector from White Pass to Caribou Crossing. Then I was heading to White Horse. The Mounted Police allowed me to come through the pass with those supplies because I’m not a prospector and don’t plan to stay. I’m a journalist -- ”
“It’s pretty stupid to come out here in the winter - in the summer you can build a raft so even a city boy like you can make it down the river. I can’t believe you didn’t try to start a fire when you started getting numb. That’s just common sense. So is traveling in pairs or groups. It’s a lot easier to start a fire if you’re not alone, too.”
“-from the Toronto Globe.” Sho decided he needed to just plow on ahead, since this man obviously liked to talk a lot and apparently had never learned not to interrupt, either. “I came out west to report on the railroad and document the Gold Rush for our readers.”
The man snorted. “It’s over.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“The Gold Rush is over. It was a rush. Rushes are fast. You took weeks to get here, which can be forgiven, I suppose, but it’s already been more than two years since the big discovery. No one’s getting rich out here. Just plugging away and staying alive. Except for you, since you were obviously trying to die.”
“I thought I could handle it,” Sho murmured, not expecting there to be a pause in which he could be heard, but there was, and he heard the other man snort again. He raised his head and glared, even though he knew it was ungrateful. “So then, what if you had found me dead? Would you have left my corpse there to be eaten by wolves?”
The other man laughed suddenly, throwing his head back with an abandon Sho wouldn’t have expected, given the general economy of his movements. “No, I’d have brought you back even if you were dead. You’ve got some muscle on you.” He flashed a mischievous grin that crinkled his eyes and momentarily charmed Sho too much to notice the implication. Then he gasped.
“You… not really?” He’d heard about such things happening in extreme conditions, like that American traveling group about fifty years back.
The man laughed again, clapping his hands a few times. “You really are pretty stupid, aren’t you? Didn’t I just say I’d been out hunting and bagged a deer, which is now being stewed in here and smoked out back? Why would I need to eat you? You must not be a very good reporter if you can’t pay attention to details. No, I’d have brought you back, but I wouldn’t have been able to bury you till the spring thaw.” His smile faded with his last words, and he turned toward one of the windowless walls.
Sho felt awkward, and he breathed, “Katsumi?” Then he cursed inwardly for probably saying exactly the wrong thing. What if somehow this man’s companion had died helping to rescue Sho?
“What? Oh, he’s right there. Katsumi!” He spoke brightly and there was a quiet whuff from near his feet. Sho floundered his way into a half-sitting position for the first time since waking and realized that the weight on his feet was actually a large dog, one of the huskies he’d seen so frequently with the prospectors. The man rubbed the dog’s head with rough affection, saying, “You, you got a name? Otherwise I’ll call you ‘you’ all the time.”
“Sakurai. Sakurai Sho.”
“I’m Nino. You should go back to sleep now. I drugged your tea.”
***
When Sho woke again, Nino was sitting at the table across the single room of the cabin, shuffling playing cards in a way that Sho, watching silently, realized was quite complex. He wondered how Nino was able to flip the cards around like that with only one tiny round hand. Well, he had probably had plenty of time to practice, if he was alone out here all winter. That theory would also explain his chattering. Nino suddenly looked over at him and smiled, and Sho felt absurdly warm for someone who had almost frozen to death a few days ago. He summoned some indignation in self-defense.
“You drugged me!”
“You needed more sleep in order to recover. Don’t worry, it was just valerian, perfectly normal herbal stuff. You’ve probably had it before. Do you feel better? Do you think you can eat some stew?”
Sho started to sit up, and Nino was instantly by his side with the oil lamp. “Wait a second before you sit up. Let me check out your hands and feet.”
Nino pulled the blanket down slightly and sat on the edge of the bed, taking Sho’s hand gently in his. He stroked the skin on the back gently before moving to the fingers and pressing gently at each tip. “Does that hurt?” he murmured.
“It’s a little itchy,” Sho replied, looking away. In this pose felt oddly like Nino was courting him, even though he was just checking for evidence of frostbite.
“Hmm. You managed to stay pretty dry, and I think I got you inside pretty quickly, but there might be some minor damage. No black spots here, though, so it should heal up in time. Try not to rub the skin.” Nino had moved onto the other hand and seemed similarly satisfied with the condition of the skin. “Let’s see your feet, too. Katsumi! Down.”
The dog whuffed in response and obediently jumped off the end of the bed. Sho’s feet missed the warmth - the cabin was warm but not warm -- but he discovered that the dog’s weight had been the only hindrance to moving his feet. He sighed with relief and then yelped when Nino abruptly pulled all the blankets from him and then plucked off his socks.
“Shut it. I didn’t want to just grab your foot without looking at it, so you’re going to have to do without the warmth for a bit.” He gently lifted Sho’s left foot to examine the toes, frowning a bit when Sho didn’t react to some of his prods. “There’s some white patches here where the skin got bitten. It should heal, but you might be numb in these spots forever.”
Sho must have looked stricken, because Nino grinned that wicked grin. “Don’t worry, we won’t cut any toes off right away. Let’s see how it goes.” He tossed the socks at Sho’s head and turned to the iron pot that was sitting on flat rock next to the hot stove. “I’ll dish you some stew, but just a little for now, and you shouldn’t walk on those feet for a bit yet. Cover up and prop yourself up.”
Nino dragged a chair over to the side of the bed after he served Sho’s stew, and talked to him about Toronto while Sho chewed. Nino, it turned out, had been born in Toronto as well, the son of the cook in a wealthy household, but had come out to the western territories when he was sixteen after getting a general teacher’s license.
“I liked reading, and it seemed like a good deal - free ticket to unknown places. Too bad I hate kids,” he laughed, making a rueful face. Sho found himself laughing, too, at some of the frustrations Nino had experienced as a teacher before finally resigning and continuing his westward trek until he’d panned up some gold in the creek here and decided to build his little cabin and be stationary for a while. He also found that he liked Nino’s laughter better when Nino wasn’t making fun of Sho’s own foolish journey.
Finally, Nino got up to put another log in the stove and then walked around to perch on the other side of the bed. Sho followed him with his eyes. “It’s time for sleep,” Nino explained.
“How can you tell? With no windows to show the light, I mean.”
“Well, I’m tired. Plus, the wolves howl more at night.” And then Sho could hear them too, and couldn’t help shivering. Nino grinned.
“I’m sorry to take your bed,” Sho began awkwardly.
“You’re not taking it, you’re sharing it.” At Sho’s startled expression, he laughed. “The floor in winter is about as warm as the ground outside, so no way am I sleeping on it. There’s room enough for two, and besides, we’ll both be warmer if we share.” With that, he blew out the lamp and crawled under the blankets, whistling for the dog to hop back onto the foot of the bed. A moment later, Sho lay down as well, turning onto his side to stare blindly at the wall until warmth and exhaustion claimed him.
***
Nino refused to let Sho out of bed for the next few days, except to use the chamberpot (“Better than an outhouse in this weather,” said his host). Nino insisted on helping him to stand and balance himself at these times, though he discreetly averted his eyes, for which Sho was most grateful.
He dragged the table over to the bedside, though, and the two of them played several long games of chess with a set that had been carved for Nino by a friend of his in White Horse. Sho lost most of the games, partly because Nino was very good, and partly because he couldn’t tell which of the little wooden bears were supposed to be bishops and which were rooks. He wondered aloud whom Nino played chess with enough to need a set.
“Okada, when he comes down from White Horse. Sometimes Aiba will play with me, but he’s not much for concentration. Mostly I play against myself. See why I’m so excited to have found you?”
Nino also produced a few well-worn books from somewhere and hesitantly placed them on the table within Sho’s reach. When he nodded to them, Sho picked one up carefully, realizing that these were his host’s treasures and he had probably read each of them many times over the winters he’d been out here alone. Sho was intrigued to see Mr. Longfellow’s Dante, Mr. Bryant’s Odyssey, and the Aeneid in Latin, no less. He selected the Odyssey in honor of his own strange journey and turned the pages reverently until Nino relaxed and picked up Mr. Emerson’s Conduct of Life on the other side of the lamp.
When Nino finally gave Sho permission to rise and walk around the cabin on his own, Sho’s legs were stiff from disuse and Nino had to help him rub the function back into his calves and thighs. But he was pleased to feel a bit more independent, even if that meant that Nino left him alone more. With an extra person to feed - and Nino insisted on serving Sho enormous portions - they had consumed the fresh venison more quickly than Nino had planned, so he and the dog Katsumi went out hunting while the smoked meat was still on hand. Luck was not with them, however, and they failed to take anything more substantial than a rabbit from time to time. That obligated more hunting.
Sho understood - though he let Nino say it anyway - that he would be more hindrance than help on such expeditions, so he remained in the cabin and wrote down some of his experiences on the paper he’d brought in his pack, trying to form word pictures to show the Toronto readers the terrible beauty of the Yukon. But concentrating on descriptions of snow would begin to make his hands and feet throb in imagined pain, so he tried to paint a verbal portrait of Nino instead, as an example of the tough and yet surprisingly civilized prospectors this Gold Rush had attracted. He was never very satisfied with his efforts, though, and knew he would have to pay more attention to the real Nino when he returned. Whenever that might be. At this point, he would turn his attention to Odysseus.
But somehow, he found himself glancing at the door at the end of every page, and sometimes more frequently. He wondered how he would know if Nino was lost or hurt and needed his help. And how would he find him? Sho cursed his proven inability to survive in the wilderness because it meant he couldn’t pay the debt he owed Nino in kind. Usually, though, just when he was on the brink of something he wouldn’t admit was panic, he would hear the dog’s bark and the sound of Nino stomping off the snow outside the door, and Sho would have to make himself set down the precious book very carefully before he accidentally tore a page. Then the door would open with a rush of icy air and Nino would scurry inside with or without a rabbit to show for his time out in the cold.
Sho once hesitatingly shared his concern that Nino would stay out too long or go too far from shelter, as he had done - and Nino didn’t laugh as he’d half expected. Instead, Nino had gripped his shoulder and leaned forward until their faces were very close and Sho could see the warm light in his brown eyes. “Thank you, Sho. It’s been a while since anyone worried about me. But,” and he released Sho’s shoulder to continue removing his outerwear, “I’ve been out here on my own for a long time. I’m very familiar with the area, I know where to take shelter if I need to, and I know how long I can stay out. Plus I’m not alone. And neither will you be, the next time you go out there. So don’t worry, but thanks.”
Sho knew that he shouldn’t plan on staying with Nino until the spring thaw, but he couldn’t figure out how he should depart - or whether he would continue north or turn back to Caribou Crossing and Skagway. Meanwhile, Nino hadn’t grown tired of having someone to chatter to, and Sho had even grown accustomed to sharing the bed with the other man. Even though he sometimes awoke with Nino wrapped around him, he attributed it to an instinctive seeking of warmth, and neither man said anything about it.
***
Sho was at the Odyssey-reading and door-staring stage of his day when he heard the sound of several dogs barking outside and a man’s voice shouting commands. Not Nino’s. He set the book aside and rose just as the door burst open and an unfamiliar figure charged in, surrounding by at least ten large dogs of varying appearances. They were well trained, apparently, because they immediately retreated into a corner near the door, and the man busied himself with bowls and various packages until the dogs were all happily feeding. Sho remained standing on the other side of the stove, unsure how to address this stranger who seemed so confident about barging in with his dogs.
“Nino, I brought your flour and stuff, and Matsujun and Captain sent whiskey and fi--.” The man cut himself off as he finally looked at the other person in the room. “You’re not Nino. Oh! Are you a claim-jumper?”
The man seemed rather excited about the prospect, so Sho felt oddly guilty about denying the charge. Nonetheless, he didn’t want to be taken for a criminal, so he said, “Nino’s hunting. My name is Sakurai Sho, and I’m a journalist from Toronto. Nino gave me shelter from the cold when I unable to keep traveling.” He saw no harm in glossing over his failure.
“Ah! Matsujun and Captain Ohno asked me to keep an eye out for your frostbitten corpse!” The man pointed at him joyfully and Sho couldn’t help laughing at the juxtaposition of the image and the tone. The strange man giggled breathily and offered a hand. “Aiba Masaki. I have a claim a little north of here off the west fork of the creek. But mostly I have dogs.”
“I see that.”
“Do you want to meet them?” Aiba’s enthusiasm was impossible to refuse, and by the time Sho had met Becky and Encho and Daigo and the rest of the sled team, he felt that he had known Aiba for much longer than fifteen minutes. And then he helped Aiba bring in supplies from the sled, and by the time Nino came back with a couple of rabbits over his shoulder, he and Aiba had managed to make up some biscuits with the new supply of flour and some fish stew with the dried cod the Captain had sent up - well, Sho had watched Aiba make them.
Nino had seen the sled outside and seemed to have thrown the door open in his hurry to get inside and see his friend. Katsumi barked happily and went to sniff all the other dogs, and Nino thrust the rabbits at Sho and wordlessly walked into Aiba’s open arms. Sho held the little corpses and looked at Aiba and Nino holding each other and turned away, pretending to watch the dogs. After a moment, Sho felt the rabbits being taken from his loose grip and then watched Nino’s back as he left the cabin again to skin the rabbits outside. A hand on his shoulder: Aiba’s.
“He always says he likes to be alone, but he gets pretty lonely out here in the winter, I think. It’s good that you’ve been here with him.” He opened the door a bit and snapped some commands in a language Sho didn’t recognize. The dogs all slithered out the narrow opening to make a meal of fresh rabbit innards, and Sho went to the stove to stir the fish. He looked longingly at the bottle of whiskey Aiba had brought, but it was Nino’s to open.
When Nino came back in, he smilingly asked Sho about Odysseus’s progress and they sat down to a dinner with the first bread Sho had eaten in weeks. Aiba had plenty of news to share, but since much of it concerned the railroad or Sho’s acquaintances from Skagway, he didn’t feel excluded from the reunion of these two longtime friends. And maybe the opened bottle helped the mood. They talked into the night after dinner, and Sho could hear the wolves howling in full force when Aiba finally ran out of breath and material.
Abruptly tired, Sho glanced at the bed, realizing that Aiba was staying over and was probably used to the side of the bed Sho had been sleeping on. “Um, what should we…”
Nino stood, apparently not troubled by the awkwardness Sho was feeling. “We’ll be extra warm. I call middle!” And he quickly toed off his boots and leapt to the bed, squirming his way under the blankets and positioning himself in the center, leaving on either side a space that looked just barely wide enough to accommodate Sho’s body.
Aiba laughed and hopped in on Nino’s left, squirming playfully until Nino punched him in the side. Sho watched them scold each other for a moment, then blew out the lamp before taking his own spot. It was small, and he could definitely feel Nino’s warmth next to him. He turned on his side to avoid the contact.
***
Sho awoke to dog noises and cold air on his face as Aiba herded his team out the door to do their business outside. He assumed Nino was still asleep, because he was still wrapped around Sho’s back and side, one leg thrown over Sho’s and left hand clutching the front of Sho’s shirt. Nino was breathing evenly into the back of Sho’s neck, and he recalled the same sensation from when he first awoke here. Nino must have used his body heat to help restore Sho’s own. Sho lay still, considering this proximity, ignoring the heat pooling in his belly, and unwilling to move until Nino woke by himself.
But there was only a moment more until Aiba and his dogs came back inside, whuffing excitedly over the prospect of breakfast. Nino rolled away with a protesting groan and sat up to rub the sleep from his eyes with the back of his hand. While Sho eased his feet over the side of the bed and into his boots, Nino donned his, jumped up, and dashed outside to stick a handful of snow into his face. Sho had never quite figured out this habit, but Nino said it woke him up, and he was never out long enough to cause himself harm. Sho put the leftover fish stew on the stove to warm for breakfast.
“Aiba,” said Nino when he came back inside, “why don’t you take Sho back down to Skagway? Or up to White Horse.”
Sho dropped the split log he had been about to feed into the stove.
“Nino?” Aiba paused in his ministrations to Becky or Yoko (Sho wasn’t quite sure) and peered at Nino. “Is it time for Sho to leave?”
“He’s been here long enough. He’s healthy again, and he has dispatches to wire to his newspaper anyway. There’s no reason for him to stay here anymore, and he has a job to get back to in the city.”
Nino was talking to the ceiling, and Sho wished he could see his face better. “That’s true,” he said quietly. “Aiba?”
Aiba was still watching Nino, but after a beat he offered, “My team can pull two, but it would still be a two-day trip to Skagway. I could get you up to White Horse late tonight, if we leave pretty soon.” He turned back to his dogs.
Sho felt completely unbalanced and didn’t know how he could make such a decision quickly. Even though he knew he was just an interloper in Nino’s cabin and really belonged back in Toronto, he wanted some reason to stay and continue this quiet life in this warm place out of the snow. “Nino?”
“Time for you to go, Sho. I’d like my solitude back.” Nino did look at him then, and his face was impassive, his eyes without the usual warm light. “Sorry if I seem rude, but I’ve lost my manners out here.”
Sho looked away. “Skagway, then, if that’s alright. I realize I can’t do any more to report on the railroad progress or on gold prospecting in this season, so there’s no point in my going up to White Horse now.” He waited for Aiba’s affirmation and then strode over to his pack that had been sitting in the corner of the room for weeks. He automatically began to repack the few things he had taken out: socks, papers, and writing supplies.
A folded paper appeared in his line of vision. “If you’re going back south, then please post this for me. To my mother in Toronto. I haven’t been able to send word in a while.” Sho took the letter without looking at Nino, glancing at the Queen Street address and then tucking it in with the articles he’d written.
Breakfast was a quiet meal, though Aiba did share a comical story about his puppies and a rabbit. At Nino’s insistence, they left the bowls for him to clean up later and all helped Aiba to painstakingly tie forty little booties onto his dogs’ feet. While Aiba loaded Sho’s pack into the sled and hitched the dog team, Sho attempted to take his leave of Nino.
“I can’t thank you enough for saving my life, you know.”
“I know.” Nino was fiddling with the bowls on the table.
“Right. Well. Thank you anyway.” He held out a hand, but Nino didn’t notice. Sho turned his back and reached for the door handle.
“Sho.” Sho stopped, but didn’t turn around. “I promised you wouldn’t have to go out alone. You have Aiba with you, and the dogs, so you’ll be safe.”
“I thought you meant something else,” Sho said, and he opened the door and had shut it behind him again before Nino could respond, if he even had anything to say.
***
Aiba didn’t have much to say for the first leg of the trip, during which Sho stared at the dogs’ curling tails ahead of him as they ran lightly over the snow. He envied their ease in covering distance that had been so hard for him; they had passed Caribou Crossing remarkably early and were already running along the flat shoreline of Lake Bennett. Sho and Nakai had used a boat to transport Nakai’s dogs and sled on the way north, but Aiba said he preferred to run the beach in the winter, since he made better time that way.
They spent the first night at a camp where Aiba had friends and set off early again, reaching Skagway in mid-afternoon. “You’re not heavy, so the dogs were able to run fast,” Aiba said with a proud beam as he hauled Sho, stiff-limbed, from the sled.
“Thank you, Aiba.” Sho hefted his pack and waited for Aiba to unhitch the dogs before heading to the saloon where he’d stayed on his previous visit to Skagway.
“Look who I found!” Aiba shouted as they entered. Sho cringed.
***
The saloon keeper Matsujun had been able to arrange a shallow, but warm, bath for Sho in one of the saloon’s rooms, and he felt glad to wash of weeks of grime that he hadn’t even noticed particularly while living in Nino’s cabin. He came downstairs to a simple but hearty meal waiting for him at a table near the stove. He was glad to sit apart from Aiba’s animated chatter to Matsujun at the bar. He felt inexplicably depressed as he applied himself to the potatoes.
A chair scraped and he looked up to see the quiet Captain sitting down across the table. But the man said nothing as he gazed at something - or nothing, perhaps - across the room, so Sho continued to eat slowly.
“I’m glad you didn’t die,” he finally said quietly as Sho wiped his mouth on the back of his hand (no such thing as napkins in the territories, even at this tidy saloon).
“I almost did,” Sho admitted, and waited for his gloom to deepen at the confession of his failure. Suprisingly, it didn’t.
“Nino found you,” the Captain said with a fond smile. “Aiba said. I’m glad.”
“I was glad not to die,” Sho responded.
“Yes, that too.” The Captain rose then, leaving a dried fish on the table and waving to the two men at the bar as he went out into the freezing night.
In the morning, Sho thought, contemplating the fish, he would go to the docks and see when a ship might be heading to Seattle - some did, even in the winter; that was how he had gotten here in the first place, though he ought to have been a bit more aware of the significance of the difficulty he had had in booking passage north. Then he could find the telegraph office in Skagway and contact his newspaper to inform them of the impossibility of investigating the planned rail route in the winter season. But he could also begin to wire the stories he had completed while in Nino’s cabin, the ones about Nakai, Nino, and the other men he’d met, as well as his own experiences in the Yukon winter. Tonight, he thought, he could write a piece on Aiba and his dog companions as well. He should also send a wire to his parents, who were probably more worried about him than they had let on. Perhaps he would make it home for Christmas still.
“Sho,” a voice said behind him, and he looked up to see Aiba’s usual bright smile. “I’ll be heading north again in the morning, pretty early, so I might not see you again.”
Sho rose hurriedly and grasped Aiba’s hand firmly, hoping to express the magnitude of his gratitude. “You really saved me, bringing me all the way back here. I know it must have been an inconvenience to you.”
“Nino saved you - I just gave you a ride. And I love mushing, so it’s nice to have a good excuse to run.” Aiba suddenly enveloped him in a tight hug then, whispering, “He was sad, I think.” And then just as suddenly he was gone, disappearing into whatever back room Matsujun had decided was shabby enough to house ten dogs along with their master.
The bartender nodded as Sho headed up to his room with the fish, and he wondered if he should take that as a confirmation.
***
The breeze that ruffled the tender grasses along the creek was brisk, but he felt comfortable in his cap and muffler and gloves. It was probably somewhere around five degrees, he guessed, and the sun was well above the horizon on his right. The river on his left was running strongly with the melting ice, though the edges of the stream still bore a thin skirt of ice where the water was stiller. His boots crunched on the sandy ground where the railroad company was clearing a path for the narrow gauge rail to rest. He thought it should be another hour or so, though he really wasn’t sure.
He veered away from the railway route to follow the curves of the river more closely, his boots sinking into the moist glacial silt. The tree cover thickened and he stumbled over a few fallen branches in the shadows, but he managed not to fall into the river. A good thing, since it was surely frigid.
And then the evergreens gave way to birches and scrubby bracken, and then he was in a small clearing. And across the clearing, a hundred yards downstream, stood a tiny cabin made of rough-hewn logs and clay in the seams. As he started toward it, moving a little more quickly although the briars caught on his coat, a dog barked and he saw a low grey shape moving through the brush in his direction.
He met the dog halfway and stooped to let it sniff his hand and then to rub its head. When he straightened, he could see a slight figure standing still at the edge of the river behind the cabin. The dog abandoned him to run back to its master. Sho followed more slowly, suddenly feeling considerably more doubt than he’d had when he had gotten on the train in Toronto and the ship in Seattle and the train that now ran almost to Bennett from Skagway, where he’d been able to interview some workers ferrying supplies up to the current end of the line during the trip.
“You came back,” Nino said when Sho reached him.
“Yes.”
“This is a better season for it. Though you still might need to stop and start a fire in an emergency.” He could see Nino’s eyes now, and they were warm; the shifting shadows from the sunlight filtering through the sparse leaves created the impression of tiny flames in the irises.
“That’s easier to do if I’m not alone,” Sho replied, and he closed the distance between them to wrap his arms around Nino, who stiffened. “I brought you some books,” he added, and then Nino’s arms were around his waist, and he was so warm.