Jack Heaton, Gold Seeker

Jack Heaton, Gold Seeker by A. Frederick Collins

Jack Heaton and his close friend Bill Adams, enriched by their recent Mexican adventure, seek a new fortune. Bill dreams of diamonds in South America, but Jack persuades him instead to pursue a tale from Jack London’s “Call of the Wild”: prospectors supposedly found a vast cache of gold in the country of the fierce Yeehat Indians, packed it into moosehide sacks, and were killed before they could carry it away. Jack’s inquiries to government authorities confirm that the Yeehats existed, and he convinces Bill to join him in Alaska. They travel by rail from New York to Seattle, then by the Princess Alice through Alaskan waters to Skagway. Along the way, Jack instructs Bill on geography, gold rush history, and the country ahead, while Bill judges nearly everything by comparison with “Noo York.” At Juneau they meet Grizzly Hank Dease, an old prospector whose stories of Klondike riches and gold nuggets intensify their gold fever. In Skagway they hear of Soapy Smith’s violent career and death, then take the White Pass and Yukon Railway to White Horse and a stern-wheel steamer down the Yukon River. At Circle, near the Arctic region, they find a decayed former gold-rush town. In the Grand Palace Hotel, Jack refuses Black Pete’s invitation to drink or smoke; Pete draws a gun, but Bill disarms and defeats him. Bill later knocks Pete out in a formal fight, winning the respect of Circle’s inhabitants. Jack McQuesten, an honest pioneer trader, outfits the boys with fur clothing, tools, provisions, sleds, and two dog teams. Jack takes the malamutes, led by ’Frisco, while Bill drives the huskies, led by Sate. They learn sled-driving and snowshoeing, then set out across the Yukon River toward the Big Black River and the former land of the Yeehats. They build a log cabin as their permanent base and spend the winter making radiating prospecting journeys with the dogs. They endure severe cold, solve the apparent misdirection of their compasses by recognizing the difference between magnetic and geographic north, make snow igloos, hunt for food, and repeatedly search for marks of hidden treasure. They meet miners, Indians, and hunters, including Bull Moose Joe, who knows the legend of Thornton’s moosehide sacks of gold but has failed to find them despite years of searching. A potlatch among the Yikyak shows them Indians wearing gold-nugget necklaces and belts, strengthening their conviction that the region is rich. Their dogs become valued companions and defenders. In one attack by starving wolves, the teams fight fiercely; Jack loses two dogs, while Bill secretly transfers one of his own better dogs to Jack’s team. The boys kill caribou for meat and moose for hides and provisions. Bill survives a desperate hand-to-hand struggle with a huge brown bear, killing it with his hunting knife but suffering serious wounds. Although they see miners with abundant nuggets and dust, Jack refuses to abandon the search for the legendary cache in favor of ordinary mining. After a blizzard leaves them short of food, they find an isolated cabin occupied by a starving half-breed girl, Eileen, and her dying father, Michael Carscadden, called Moosehide Mike. The boys revive them as best they can, but Michael’s cancer and weakness defeat him. Before dying, he reveals that Eileen’s mother descended from a Yeehat chief and knew the secret of Thornton’s treasure. Michael and his wife found the gold in a cave, remade the rotted moosehide sacks, and hid the treasure beneath their cabin floor. He asks Jack and Bill to raise and protect Eileen, giving her one-third of the gold and them the other two-thirds. Beneath the floor the boys discover sack upon sack of nuggets. They bury Michael beneath the cabin, with Bill playing “Nearer My God To Thee” and taps on his mouth-organ. Though they are suddenly wealthy, they are nearly starving, and must haul Eileen and the gold back to their own camp. They feed themselves and the dogs at last, nurse Eileen back toward strength, and plan to reach Seattle by sledding down the Big Black and Porcupine Rivers to Fort Yukon, avoiding Canadian taxes and questions. Spring weakens the river ice. Bill’s sled breaks through, taking Jinx and more than half the gold to the river bottom; Jack saves Bill by cutting the traces. The survivors build cairns to mark the lost treasure and construct a raft to carry Eileen, their remaining gold, supplies, and themselves downstream. The dogs follow along the bank. Near the mouth of the Big Black River, the raft strikes a projecting rock and breaks apart, throwing Jack, Bill, and Eileen into the water and sweeping away the rest of their gold.

By A. Frederick Collins · First published 1898 · Genre: Juvenile Adventure Fiction, Gold Rush Fiction, Treasure Hunt Fiction · 12 chapters · 54,456 words

First lines

"Well glory be! an' if it ain't Jack Heaton hisself. An' right glad am I to see yuh, Jack. Bill will be mighty glad, too, for he's that bugs on goin' to South America for them di-_am_-onds. Sure he's been talkin' o' nothin' else these last two weeks gone Saturday. An' how are yuh anyhow, Jack?"

It was Mrs. Adams, Bill's warm-hearted and courageous mother, who had answered the bell and was greeting Jack in this whole-souled fashion.

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Tags

Alaskan adventure fiction · juvenile adventure novel · gold rush quest · treasure hunting · Yukon Territory · early 20th-century Alaska · dog sled travel · Klondike history · prospectors · hidden gold cache · moosehide sacks · Arctic winter survival

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Jack Heaton, Gold Seeker is listed on Textopian as a novel by A. Frederick Collins, dated 1898 CE.

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More by A. Frederick Collins