But these hundred thousand people of all nationalities and colors, speaking all languages, confessing all faiths, practicing all means of livelihood, indulging in all vices, consisting of all types, with all character traits, had one thing in common: the Goal. It was the goal that united the members in this folkwandering, the strangest migration ever to take place on the earth. It had forced them to leave their homes in widely separated countries and continents and had brought them together in civilization’s outposts in North America from where the caravan started. It drove them across prairies and deserts, over mountains and plains, over rivers and marshes, and made them endure the desert-heat and the mountain-cold. Any one unable to move forward on this road was also unable to turn back; there remained only to stay in the place and await the final end. The cowards, the cringers, had remained at home, and the weakest had been weeded out before horses’ or mules’ hoofs had taken a single step toward the west.
So the train pushed on, along the unblazed trail that was only a name, enduring the heat of the fiery sun, resting under the vaulted, starry night sky, through the days and months, from spring to fall. Only a dream could unite this human horde, and before the train of the hundred thousand there moved as guidance, day and night, a mirage, a pillar of fire: gold! It was their common goaclass="underline" GOLD! It was the end of the road that united them: The Land of Gold!
And broad was the land and unmeasured, long was the road, and without end, greatminded and daring the participants, and immeasurable their dreams.
The Gold Caravan traveled every year, from spring to fall, over the California Trail, but it happened that two out of three who followed its pillar of fire never reached their goal.
XIII. A YOUTH WHO IS NOT YOUNG
— 1—
One June evening as Karl Oskar Nilsson made his way through his field, hoeing his corn, he saw a stranger approaching along the lakeshore. A tall, stooped man with a rucksack on his back came toward him, jerking along and swinging his arms as he climbed the road up to the old log cabin. He veered off toward the maple grove, walking as if he had no command over his tall, loose body. Then he stopped and looked at the new main house under the great sugar maples.
Karl Oskar rested against the hoe, staring at the man. During their first years on the claim they had barely had one visitor a month, now someone came almost every day. But this man was not one of their neighbors. And the stranger looked from one building to the other as if he had lost his way. When he saw Karl Oskar in the cornfield, he turned and walked in that direction.
He was a gaunt young man, and judging from his clothing he must be a fur trapper. He wore a broad hat, a long black-and-white-checked coat, and a hunting shirt of flaming red flannel. His pants were made of deerskin, held up by a broad yellow leather belt; his snug leggings fit into high boots. He was a skinny man; his clothes seemed too big for him, hanging on his body as they did.
To Karl Oskar the strangers walk reminded him of his brother Robert. But he was taller than Robert, and as he came closer Karl Oskar could not discern any likeness to his brother.
It must be someone who had lost his way and wanted to inquire about directions.
“Hello, Karl Oskar!”
The farmer stood openmouthed with the hoe in his hand: a stranger, in strange clothing, with a strange face, in a hoarse voice he had never heard before, called him by name.
“Don’t you recognize your brother, Karl Oskar?”
Could it be possible that someone was trying to pretend to be the brother who had left for California four years before?
“I’m back from the California Trail!”
The evening was still light; Karl Oskar peered more closely at the newcomer, looked him in the eye, and began to recognize him, feeling rather than seeing who it was. His younger brother, Robert, was standing in front of him.
Slowly, almost hesitantly, Karl Oskar put down his hoe and offered his hand: “Back at last! Welcome, Robert!”
“Thanks, Karl Oskar. Didn’t you recognize. .?”
“Well, you’ve grown taller. And changed!”
It was the height that had confused him; Robert had grown several inches — that was only natural, he had been gone four years. But the clothes; he had left in his old Swedish wadmal, and now he returned dressed like an American trapper. The greatest change, however, was in his face. When Karl Oskar had last seen his brother’s face it had been round and full with only the first down of a beard and still with a childish softness in its contours. Now his cheeks were cavernous, bones protruding under the scabby, pale-yellow skin which looked as if worms had gnawed it. Deep, dark gray furrows underlined his eyes. It was a ravished youth-face he now saw. And when Robert smiled, black holes from missing front teeth appeared.
Robert had been eighteen when he set out. Now he was twenty-two. He was still young but he looked old.
“We thought you were dead. .”
“But I wrote — many times. .”
“Only two letters have come.”
“Well, some were lost, I guess. They often rob the mail out west.”
Karl Oskar took hold of Robert by the shoulder, holding him as if wishing to convince himself that this was really his brother: Robert’s body was wasted to bones and sinews.
“Nice clothes you have!”
“Did you think I would return looking like a ragbag, Karl Oskar?”
And Robert again smiled his black, toothless smile.
“I came up the river with the steamboat — to St. Paul. Then I got a ride with an ox team. The last part I walked. You have roads through the forest now. .”
He interrupted himself with a racking, hollow cough, accompanied by a growling noise from inside his chest. “I caught a cold on the steamboat.”
He turned and looked up at the new main house. “You’ve raised some house, Karl Oskar!”
“It isn’t as big as I planned but it’ll do.”
“Two stories!”
Karl Oskar replied that he had not yet had time to finish the inside of the upper story, but downstairs they had one large room for daily use, a bedroom for the children, and a good-sized kitchen. He had built sturdy fireplaces so they would be warm in winter.
Robert had only praise for the new house, so pleasant on the slope under the maples, which gave shade in summer and protection in winter. And the maples were full and handsome. When he compared the new house with the old log cabin, he realized that things had improved for his brother while he had been away.
“Let’s go home!” said Karl Oskar, and picked up the hoe from among the furrows.
“I see you’ve started to plant Indian corn.”
“This is the second year — it’s well worth it. And I’ve sown wheat for three years now. Wheat and corn go best in Minnesota.”
Yes, Robert knew that wheat was king of the grains in America, and Indian corn the queen. And he thought that much had indeed changed since he left.
In a burst of brotherly affection Karl Oskar put his arm on Robert’s shoulder as they walked up to the house. He had been almost sure that his brother was dead. Now joy at his return and bafflement at the changes in him mingled within Karl Oskar: Robert’s emaciated body, his jaundiced, unhealthy complexion, the hollowness of his voice, his stiff motions — something of life itself was missing in Robert. He stooped as he walked — the halting gait of an old man. Perhaps he had grown too tall to carry his body erect, perhaps he was forced to stoop a little. His brother was ten years younger than he, yet he didn’t seem young any more. What was the matter with him? Was he sick?