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To Build a Fire and Other Favorite Stories
Jack London
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eBook - ePub
To Build a Fire and Other Favorite Stories
Jack London
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Born into poverty, Jack London led a knockabout existence before achieving success as one of the most popular authors of his era. In the course of his brief but active life, he sought adventure — as a hobo, prospector, sailor, and a dozen other occupations — along with self-education from the works of Marx, Darwin, Nietzsche, and Jung. The vitality and variety of London's experiences are reflected in his stories, which range from earthy accounts of survival in the Arctic and the South Sea Islands to gripping tales of political upheaval and drama within the boxing ring.
The short story format offers an ideal showcase for London's narrative genius, providing a focus for the great power and fluency of his language. This collection features 13 of London's best works in the genre, including his most acclaimed short story, `To Build a Fire,` in which a new arrival to the Klondike stubbornly ignores warnings about the folly of traveling alone. Additional tales include `A Piece of Steak,` `The Mexican,` `The Law of Life,` `All Gold Canyon,` and eight others.
The short story format offers an ideal showcase for London's narrative genius, providing a focus for the great power and fluency of his language. This collection features 13 of London's best works in the genre, including his most acclaimed short story, `To Build a Fire,` in which a new arrival to the Klondike stubbornly ignores warnings about the folly of traveling alone. Additional tales include `A Piece of Steak,` `The Mexican,` `The Law of Life,` `All Gold Canyon,` and eight others.
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North American Literary CollectionsTHE PEARLS OF PARLAY
I
THE KANAKA HELMSMAN put the wheel down and the Malahini slipped into the eye of the wind and righted to an even keel. Her headsails emptied; there was a rat-tat of reef points and quick shifting of boom tackles, and she was heeled over and filled away on the other tack. Though it was early morning and the wind brisk the five white men who lounged on the poop deck were scantily clad. David Grief and his guest, Gregory Mulhall, an Englishman, were still in pajamas, their naked feet thrust into Chinese slippers. The captain and mate were in thin undershirts and unstarched duck trousers, while the supercargo still held in his hands the undershirt he was reluctant to put on. The sweat stood out on his forehead and he seemed to thrust his bare chest thirstily into the wind that did not cool.
âPretty muggy for a breeze like this,â he complained.
âAnd whatâs it doing around in the west? Thatâs what I want to know,â was Griefâs contribution to the general plaint.
âIt wonât last, and it ainât been there long,â said Hermann, the Holland mate. âShe is been chop round all nightâfive minutes here, ten minutes there, one hour somewhere other quarter.â
âSomething makinâ, something makinâ,â Captain Warfield croaked, spreading his bushy beard with the fingers of both hands and shoving the thatch of his chin into the breeze in a vain search for coolness. âWeatherâs been crazy for a fortnight. Havenât had the proper trades in three weeks. Everythingâs mixed up. Barometer was pumping at sunset last night and itâs pumping now, though the weather sharps say it donât mean anything. All the same, Iâve got a prejudice against seeing it pump. Gets on my nerves, sort of, you know. She was pumping that way the time we lost the Lancaster. I was only an apprentice, but I can remember that well enough. Brand-new four-masted steel ship; first voyageâbroke the old manâs heart. Heâd been forty years in the company. Just faded away and died the next year.â
Despite the wind and the early hour, the heat was suffocating. The wind whispered coolness but did not deliver coolness. It might have blown off the Sahara, save for the extreme humidity with which it was laden. There was no fog or mist; nor hint of fog or mist; yet the dimness of distance produced the impression.
There were no defined clouds; yet so thickly were the heavens covered by a messy cloud pall that the sun failed to shine through.
âReady about!â Captain Warfield ordered with slow sharpness.
The brown, breechclouted Kanaka sailors moved languidly but quickly to head sheets and boom tackles.
âHard alee!â
The helmsman ran the spokes over with no hint of gentling and the Malahini darted prettily into the wind and about.
âJove! Sheâs a witch!â was Mulhallâs appreciation. âI didnât know you South Sea traders sailed yachts.â
âShe was a Gloucester fisherman originally,â Grief explained, âand the Gloucester boats are all yachts when it comes to build, rig, and sailing.â
âBut youâre heading right inâwhy donât you make it?â came the Englishmanâs criticism.
âTry it, Captain Warfield,â Grief suggested. âShow him what a lagoon entrance is on a strong ebb.â
âClose and by!â the captain ordered.
âClose and by,â the Kanaka repeated, easing half a spoke. The Malahini laid squarely into the narrow passage, which was the lagoon entrance of a large, long, and narrow oval of an atoll. The atoll was shaped as if three atolls, in the course of building, had collided and coalesced and failed to rear the partition walls. Coconut palms grew in spots on the circle of sand and there were many gaps where the sand was too low to the sea for coconuts, through which could be seen the protected lagoon where the water lay flat like the ruffled surface of a mirror. Many square miles of water were in the irregular lagoon, all of which surged out on the ebb through the one narrow channel. So narrow was the channel, so large the outflow of water, that the passage was more like the rapids of a river than the mere tidal entrance to an atoll. The water boiled and whirled and swirled and drove outward in a white foam of stiff, serrated waves. Each heave and blow on her bows of the upstanding waves of the current swung the Malahini off the straight lead and wedged her as with wedges of steel toward the side of the passage. Part way in she was when her closeness to the coral edge compelled her to go about. On the opposite tack, broadside to the current, she swept seaward with the currentâs speed.
âNowâs the time for that new and expensive engine of yours,â Grief leered good-naturedly.
That the engine was a sore point with Captain Warfield was patent. He had begged and badgered for it until, in the end, Grief had given his consent.
âIt will pay for itself yet,â the captain retorted. âYou wait and see. It beats insurance; and you know the underwriters wonât stand for insurance in the Paumotus.â
Grief pointed to a small cutter beating up astern of them on the same course.
âIâll wager a five francs the little Nuhiva beats us in.â
âSure!â Captain Warfield agreed. âSheâs overpowered. Weâre like a liner alongside of her, and weâve only got forty horsepower. Sheâs got ten horse, and sheâs a little skimming dish. She could skate across the froth of hell; but just the same she canât buck this current. Itâs running ten knots right now.â
And at the rate of ten knots, buffeted and jerkily rolled, the Malahini went out to sea with the tide.
âSheâll slacken in half an hourâthen weâll make headway,â Captain Warfield said, with an irritation explained by his next words. âHe has no right to call it Parlay. Itâs down on the Admiralty charts, and the French charts too, as Hikihoho. Bougainville discovered it and named it from the natives.â
âWhatâs the name matter?â the supercargo demanded, taking advantage of speech to pause with arms shoved into the sleeves of the undershirt. âThere it is, right under our nose; and old Parlay is there with the pearls.â
âWho see them pearls?â Hermann queried, looking from one to another.
âItâs well known,â was the supercargoâs reply. He turned to the steersman: âTell them, Tai-Hotauri.â
The Kanaka, pleased and self-conscious, took and gave a spoke. âMy brother dive for Parlay three-four month and he make much talk about pearl. Hikihoho very good place for pearl.â
âAnd the pearl buyers have never got him to part with a pearl,â the captain broke in.
âAnd they say the old man had a hatful for Armande when he sailed for Tahiti,â the supercargo carried on the tale.
âThatâs fifteen years ago and heâs been adding to it ever sinceâstored the shell as well. Everybodyâs seen thatâhundreds of tons of it. They say the lagoonâs fished clean now. Maybe thatâs why heâs announced the auction.â
âIf he really sells what he has, this will be the biggest yearâs output of pearls in the Paumotus,â Grief said.
âI say, now, look here!â Mulhall burst forth, harried by the humid heat as much as the rest of them. âWhatâs it all about? Whoâs the old beachcomber anyway? What are all these pearls? Why so secretive about it?â
âHikihoho belongs to old Parlay,â the supercargo answered. âHeâs got a fortune in pearls, saved up for years and years; and he sent the word out weeks ago that heâd auction them off to the buyers tomorrow. See those schoonersâ masts sticking up inside the lagoon?â
âEightâso I see,â said Hermann.
âWhat are they doing in a dinky atoll like this?â the supercargo went on. âThere isnât a schoonerload of copra a year in the place. Theyâve come for the auction. Thatâs why weâre here. Thatâs why the little Nuhivaâs bumping along astern there, though what she can buy is beyond me. Narii Herringâheâs an English Jew half-casteâowns and runs her, and his only assets are his nerve, his debts, and his whisky bills. Heâs a genius in such things. He owes so much that there isnât a merchant in Papeete who isnât interested in his welfare. They go out of their way to throw work in his way. Theyâve got toâand a dandy stunt it is for Narii. Now I owe nobody. Whatâs the result? If I fell down in a fit on the beach theyâd let me lie there and die. They wouldnât lose anything. But Narii Herring! What wouldnât they do if he fell in a fit? Their best wouldnât be too good for him. Theyâve got too much money tied up in him to let him lie. Theyâd take him into their homes and hand-nurse him like a brother. Let me tell you, honesty in paying bills ainât what itâs cracked up to be.â
âWhatâs this Narii chap got to do with it?â was the Englishmanâs short-tempered demand. And, turning to Grief, he said, âWhatâs all this pearl nonsense? Begin at the beginning.â
âYouâll have to help me out,â Grief warned the others, as he began. âOld Parlay is a character. From what Iâve seen of him I believe heâs partly and mildly insane. Anyway, hereâs the story. Parlayâs a full-blooded Frenchman. He told me once that he came from Paris. His accent is the true Parisian. He arrived down here in the old days. Went to trading and all the rest. Thatâs how he got in on Hikihoho. Came in trading when trading was the real thing. About a hundred miserable Paumotans lived on the island. He married the Queenânative fashion. When she died, everything was his. Measles came through and there werenât more than a dozen survivors. He fed them and worked them, and was King. Now before the Queen died she gave birth to a girl. Thatâs Armande. When she was three he sent her to the convent at Papeete. When she was seven or eight he sent her to France. You begin to glimpse the situation. The best and most aristocratic convent in France was none too good for the only daughter of a Paumotan island king and capitalistâand you know the old-country French draw no colour line. She was educated like a princess, and she accepted herself in much the same way. Also she thought she was all white and never dreamed of a bar sinister.
âNow comes the tragedy. The old man had always been cranky and erratic, and heâd played the despot on Hikihoho so long that heâd got the idea in his head that there was nothing wrong with the Kingâor the princess either. When Armande was eighteen he sent for her. He had slews and slathers of money, as Yankee Bill would say. Heâd built the big house on Hikihoho and a whacking fine bungalow in Papeete. She was to arrive on the mail boat from New Zealand and he sailed in his schooner to meet her at Papeete. And he might have carried the situation off, despite the hens and bull beasts of Papeete, if it hadnât been for the hurricane. That was the year, wasnât it, when Mann-Huni was swept and eleven hundred drowned?â
The others nodded and Captain Warfield said: âI was in the Magpie that blow and we went ashore, all hands and the cookâMagpie and allâa quarter of a mile into the coconuts at the head of Taiohae Bayâand it a supposedly hurricane-proof harbor.â
âWell,â Grief continued, âold Parlay got caught in the same blow and arrived in Papeete with his hatful of pearls three weeks too late. Heâd had to jack up his schooner and build half a mile of ways before he could get her back into the sea.
âMeantime there was Armande at Papeete. Nobody called on her. She did, French fashion, make the initial calls on the governor and the port doctor. They saw her, but neither of their hen wives was at home to her or returned the call. She was out of casteâwithout casteâthough she had never dreamed it; and that was the gentle way they broke the information to her. There was a gay young lieutenant on the French cruiser. He lost his heart to her, but not his head. You can imagine the shock to this young woman, refined, beautiful, raised like an aristocrat, pampered with the best of old France that money could buy! And you can guess the end.â He shrugged his shoulders. âThere was a Japanese servant in the bungalow. He saw itâsaid she did it with the proper spirit of the samurai. Took a stilettoâno thrust, no drive, no wild rush for annihilationâtook the stiletto, placed the point carefully against her heart, and with both hands slowly and steadily pressed home.
âOld Parlay arrived after that with his pearls. There was one single one of them, they say, worth sixty thousand francs. Peter Gee saw it and has told me he offered that much for it. The old man went clean off for a while. They had him strait-jacketed in the Colonial Club for two daysâââ
âHis wifeâs uncle, an old Paumotan, cut him out of the jacket and turned him loose,â the supercargo corroborated.
âAnd then old Parlay proceeded to eat things up,â Grief went on. âPumped three bullets into the scalawag of a lieutenantâââ
âWho lay in sick bay for three months,â Captain Warfield contributed.
âFlung a glass of wine in the governorâs face; fought a duel with the port doctor; beat up his native servants, wrecked the hospital; broke two ribs and the collarbone of a man nurseâand escaped; went down to his schooner, a gun in each hand, daring the chief of police and all the gendarmes to arrest him, and sailed for Hikihoho. And they say heâs never left the island since.â
The supercargo nodded. âThat was fifteen years ago, and heâs never budged.â
âAnd added to his pearls,â said the captain. âHeâs a blithering old lunatic. Makes my flesh creep. Heâs a regular Finn.â
âWhatâs that?â Mulhall inquired.
âBosses the weatherâthatâs what the natives believe, at any rate. Ask Tai-Hotauri there. Hey, Tai-Hotauri, what you think old Parlay do along weather?â
âJust the same one big weather devil,â came the Kanakaâs answer. âI know. He want big blow, he make big blow. He want no wind, no wind come.â
âA regular old warlock,â said Mulhall.
âNo good luck, them pearl,â Tai-Hotauri blurted out, rolling his head ominously. âHe say he sell. Plenty schooner come. Then he make big hurricane; everybody finish, you see. All native men say so.â
âItâs hurricane season now,â Captain Warfield laughed morosely. âTheyâre not far wrong. Itâs making for something right now; and Iâd feel better if the Malahini was a thousand miles away from here.â
âHe is a bit mad,â Grief concluded. âIâve tried to get his point of view. Itâsâwell, itâs mixed. For eighteen years heâd centred everything on Armande. Half the time he believes sheâs still aliveânot yet come ...