The Last Homestead Page 5

  Denny gave Charlie one of his long, deep looks. Even though Brady had been through more than most people ever know about, there was something about Caraway’s intense stare that made even him want to take one mental step back, though he didn’t let it show.

  Using Brady’s first name, an unusual thing, Denny said, “Charlie, I like living a peaceful, trouble-free life, but it wouldn’t make one bit of difference to me either way. If I need to come out or go in to my place, nothing would stop me from doing so.”

  “And you’d get no problems out of me, Denny, even if I was still on duty. Some things ought to be left as they are. I’d have your back, no matter what.”

  “I know you would, and I appreciate it.”

  That was the end of the conversation. Denny paid his tab, nodded at Charlie who responded in kind, and left to make his purchases so he could get back home again.

  Charlie Brady made a mental note to himself: “Denny Caraway hasn’t gone totally bushy, but he sure seems to be a little feral these days.”

  Caraway wasn’t sure why, but he decided to stay the night at the trailer. He never questioned his gut any more, but simply went with whatever it told him. Besides, he really didn’t mind not running out the trail until the next day. The bed in the trailer was comfortable and he could always listen to some music on the old record player George left behind.

  Denny took some more moose stew from the refrigerator’s freezer and a big piece of fry bread from his pack. It was simple fare, but tasty. He put on a recording of Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker Suite. He was pleased when he’d first gone through the record collection George had accumulated. It was a varied collection, from classic to blues to Big Band, so Denny could always find something to suit his mood the times he’d stayed in the trailer, though the Big Band sounds were not really to his taste, too loud and raucous.

  Feeling restless, he browsed through the closet in the bedroom. Some of Levine’s personal possessions were still there, including a photo album. Denny wondered why George had left it. Perhaps it was for Denny’s sake, but he’d never know.

  After his meal, Denny sat on the couch and looked through the album. A lot of the photos were typical family images. George had apparently come from Kansas, and the farm in the background of many of the shots must have been his family’s property. It sure looked like a hardscrabble place. There were enough images for Caraway to see how George had grown up. Most of the photos showed him doing some kind of farm work, even as a young boy.

  He began seeing more images of George, probably in his late teens in a U.S. Marines uniform, the photos dated during World War II. As he kept looking, Denny became more and more impressed with George the Marine. He had obviously been in combat in the Pacific, and some of the later photos taken after the war showed him to be in frogman gear, as a member of the UDT, as written on the back of several shots, forerunner of the Navy Seals. He’d apparently transferred over from the infantry after the war. The last photo showed an older George in uniform, with a pretty girl on his lap, beer bottle in hand, surrounded by a bunch of smiling, drunken sailors. The photo caption read, “Bon voyage, Frogman Levine. Keep your ammo dry.” The date was August, 1966. He had served twenty-five years in the service, and not behind a typewriter, either.

  The rest of the photos were of George in Alaska, the earliest dated 1967. They showed him hunting, fishing, panning for gold, and building a log cabin somewhere in the bush. One showed him standing in front of a small plywood cabin, which looked freshly built. Denny recognized it as the cabin he was living in on Lanyard Creek. In the photo, George was standing with his friend Mitch, the man who had introduced Caraway to George.

  Denny was sorry he hadn’t had time to get to know Levine better when he was still around. After going through the album, he felt he knew him a little better. He could relate to how George had matured in the military, seeing how he had changed through the war and in the years afterwards. It connected with him as to how he himself had “come of age” as a homesteader, developing into the person he had to be to survive and thrive in wild country. Though he would never compare himself to a man who had fought in combat, willing to sacrifice all for what he believed in, still there was that element to his existence. There was always the chance a deadly situation might prove his end. Denny nodded to himself. It seemed as if, even though alone and isolated on his homestead, he was still an element on the wheel of life, a part of the whole process.

  Caraway put the album back in the closet and went to bed. Morning would come soon enough and he wanted to be rested for the run in.

  Chapter Ten

  The snow on the trail was nice and firm when Denny headed out to his cabin. By the time he was half way home, however, the air temperature had risen dramatically, above the freezing mark, and the snow had softened noticeably by the time he’d reached the homestead. Denny knew spring break-up was right around the corner.

  Later that week, he heard loud cracking and grinding noises from Lanyard creek. The ice was breaking up. Though the creek was not particularly wide, its main channel had some depth, so the ice was pretty thick in the middle. Now, it was jamming up with large, jagged chunks of ice. Denny loved the whole process, the transition to spring, though it was a relatively short season this far north. He considered it simply a lead-in to summer.

  His plywood cabin was located on a slight rise of land, far enough from the edge of the creek to be safe from the ice jams. The melting snow in spring drained down easily, allowing the soil around the cabin to dry quickly. George had chosen the cabin site well.

  A few days later, winter was well on its way out. He could see the stacked metal roofing he had hauled in the previous winter, now freed from the covering of snow that had hidden it for months. Proenneke had made the roof of his cabin out of sod. Denny wanted to use a more durable material, forgoing the esthetic quality a sod roof would provide. He had lots of years left and knew sheet metal roofing would be a longer-lasting material to use. He opted for a dark brown color, rather than green or bare metal.

  Break-up had arrived and Denny couldn’t do any traveling for a few weeks, but in a week to ten days time, he could start work on his new cabin, his main project for the coming warmer months.

  As he had anticipated, Denny was soon able to begin working on the cabin. He would have a wooden floor in the place, instead of a tamped-earth floor like the one in George Whiting’s old cabin outside Hazel. He was in the habit of walking around in his socks, so a smooth board floor was necessary for them to survive for long. Denny had felt a little funny about wanting a hard floor for such a reason, until he realized he could do any damn thing he wanted to do, and for any reason that suited him. After all it was his life, free and clear.

  The building of his cabin was a straightforward lesson in notched log construction. He liked the way notched logs looked, and was determined to do it well. Walker’s book had a warning on the first page stating that a person’s first attempt at log cabin building probably wouldn’t be perfect. Caraway was determined to do a proper job, and when he set his mind to something, that was all there was to it.

  The main thing he learned was that building with logs was heavy, time-consuming work. He had to peel the bark off the logs with a draw knife, choose the right logs to lay together for the best fit, and cut the notches as carefully as he could using a compass for scribing the right shape and size of notch for each pair of logs. Denny proved to be a natural at log construction, skillful enough to get the whole job done right.

  The hardest part of the process for him was rolling the upper-level wall logs into place. These twenty and twenty-four foot logs he had picked for the same ten-inch diameter were heavy. He had cut them overlong to allow for trimming later. He was able to use the winch attached to the front end of his old wheeler to pull them up onto the walls, stopping to lock the logs in place with wooden wedges on two logs he used for a ramp, resetting the winch cable again, then pulling the logs up higher. It took three pulling sessions to get th
e highest wall logs into place.

  While setting the next to last log on the south wall, when he had come back around to place the wedges, the winch cable end had come loose, the log had slipped free, and rolled back down the ramp, the end of the log grazing his lower leg, knocking him off his feet.

  Luckily, the log had not landed on him. From then on, Denny made sure to always set the cable right. Being all alone as he was, he had to be extra cautious. There would be no help coming if he got jammed up. As it was, Denny had a sore leg for days to remind him of his moment of carelessness.

  Making the loft had added some complications, but he sat down with a mug of tea and studied the log cabin building book. It described the process of putting in a second floor, setting cross poles for flooring notched into the main walls, and it was easy to adapt the process to make a sturdy loft.

  Sooner than he had anticipated, he had a complete log frame waiting to be roofed.

  Even though he wanted to continue working on the cabin until it was completed, Caraway had to take time out for normal chores, such as gathering, cutting, and splitting enough firewood for the year. He had to can up what meat was left from the big bull moose he had taken. It was the largest moose he had ever shot, and there was more meat left after winter than he had expected. It took all the canning jars to get the job done, and then he had plenty of ground and cut up meat to last until next season, as well as more jerky.

  Before doing the roof, Denny needed to gather ten more logs to finish the roof ends and beams. The beams would be a little tricky. Because he was going to use metal roofing, he’d have to mill one flat side on each roof beam, then mill some boards to act as purlins on which to screw the metal roofing. Working slowly and methodically, he was able to set the beams correctly. Milling the boards he needed for the metal sheets was no problem. He had milled all the wood for his cabin on the first homestead, and it was second nature to him. Denny still had the same chain saw mill he had used for that first cabin. It was old and rough looking, with dried pitch all over it, but still worked fine. He had to make a guide for the first leveling and squaring cuts. That too was no problem.

  Once the main structure was done, including the roof, he cut the window and the front door openings, and framed them in with more milled wood. He over-sized one of the two window openings and had to mill a new frame of thicker boards to bring the dimensions back down, and that did the trick. He chinked the wall logs with a special mixture Ed Gundross had told him about in one of their many conversations about building cabins. It was a compound made of common ingredients, which hardened into a semi-flexible sealant which would move with temperature changes instead of cracking and falling out. It was white, so it looked good between the logs.

  The most milling he had to do was for the flooring. He cut vertical notches in the lowest row of the east and west wall logs to fit floor joists into, the ends of the joists notched to match the slots in the logs. After that it was simply a matter of milling and nailing down the floorboards, full-dimensioned two by eights. He had hunted for some big spruce trees to make the floor boards. It had taken several days to find them and cut short trails in to where he would fell the trees, buck them into the right lengths, then mill them into dimensional lumber, before stacking them to dry.

  Caraway found he enjoyed milling more than he had when making the boards for his earlier cabin. It was a rough go, dragging them to the new cabin site, though. As usual, he didn’t think about how much work it was; he just got it done. Denny used his draw knife to smooth out one side of each floorboard for walking on. It was tedious work, but every time he wearied of it, he thought how nice it would be to have a smooth floor, and continued on.

  Temperatures were in the fifties by then, though bugs were not out yet. Denny worked without a shirt on most of the time, a real treat after the long hard winter. Once the mosquitoes, no-see-ums and black flies were out, he’d be wearing hard-woven shirts tightly buttoned.

  The day came when he walked through the door of his completed cabin. The hand-made door of narrow milled birch boards didn’t look as fancy as Proenneke’s Dutch door. But Denny too had formed hinges out of wood, using metal bolts slipped into matching holes on both parts of the hinge, instead of dowels. It would do.

  The only thing left was to build the fireplace. He didn’t like having to cut the large opening in the wall where the fireplace would be located, but he measured repeatedly to make sure the dimensions were correct. Referring to Proenneke’s book, Caraway built it of stones he hand-picked from the banks of Lanyard Creek. It took a lot of stones to have enough to get the top of the chimney several feet higher than the roof ridge. He built wooden forms of milled wood to support the stone and mortar body of the fireplace and chimney, fitting in a metal flue he had bought at a heating store in Fairbanks.

  He messed up the first time, and had to break the flue out of the hardened mortar, getting it right the second time. Building the whole she-bang had taken him several weeks, and the first time he set a fire in it, he forgot to open the flue, smoking up the new cabin. When he opened the flue, it had drawn beautifully. The heavy metal stove pipe he installed on top of the chimney looked good with the conical cap he had fitted to it.

  Denny moved the woodstove into the new place from the plywood cabin, positioning it at the other end of the cabin from the fireplace, cutting the hole needed to run the stove pipe out through the roof. It had been a real struggle to haul the heavy woodstove over to the cabin, but as planned, the cabin door was wide enough to let it pass through with a bit of wiggling. He used a plumb line to position the stovepipe collar on the stove body directly under the hole in the roof. He ran the stovepipe up through and made the outside of the hole watertight with some sheet metal flashing and sealant. Now he could be sure of having two heat sources in the coldest part of winter, and a good stove to cook on.

  Denny Caraway’s cabin was complete, and he was satisfied with the job he’d done. Because of his solitary life, he had to enjoy the experience, this good moment, by himself, as he had previously when he’d done something he was proud of.

  Standing in front of his new home, he nodded in acknowledgment of his creation. Caraway called it a day and went inside his new home to enjoy a cup of Labrador tea, and a few Oreos.

  It took several days to move all his possessions into the new place, leaving some of his gear in the plywood shack, which would make a good storage shed for his extra equipment and supplies.

  Over the next several weeks, Denny built the interior cabinets and shelving. It was enjoyable, a real labor of love, as was building the cabin itself. Finishing the interior, Denny felt more connected to his new home, having given up lots of sweat and a little blood to construct it.

  Standing by the creek bank one morning, admiring the cabin, Denny felt a deep sense of satisfaction and contentment. There was a certain joy in knowing every log and board was worked and fitted by his own hands. Acting spontaneously, he jumped into the creek, but the icy cold water instantly brought him to his senses and to dry land with a loud “WOW!” He stood there feeling foolish and happy all at once.

  Sitting by the fireplace in his new home that first evening, Denny let his mind drift as he watched the open fire. He had, as was required in the early days, proved up his homestead, developed it in appropriate ways.

  Despite his years of living remote, Denny often felt the same way he did the first day he had come into the Alaska bush, that pure sense of wonder and excitement. Being in this newest cabin brought back memories of how it was that first night in the cabin he had built on his land outside Hazel. The large frame structure had taken much longer to build, the hand milling, transporting, and construction taking all of five years.

  Then Denny reflected on why he’d decided to leave, the hassles with his homesteading neighbor and nemesis, Bucky Waters and with Monty Leer too, being the last straw for him. Dealing with Waters at Ed’s reception had settled a lot for Denny, but he’d never forget what had occurred, and it was
the reason he was so determined to hold on to his new place. Hopefully, he would never have to be put to the test.

  Chapter Eleven

  The fourth winter Denny Caraway was on his Lanyard Creek homestead seemed a perfect time for him. It was the kind of life he had craved when he’d migrated to the Alaska wilderness. Nothing happened to disrupt his daily living. No marauding animals, or humans for that matter, no mechanical failures with his equipment, and no painful accidents. Even the winter weather was mild for the area, moderate snowfall and temperatures rarely dropping lower than ten below zero. Denny gathered his wood and food, got his clean water from the creek, ate, read, and slept well. All in all, it was a fine time.

  While someone who had never lived the life might think being a homesteader had to include adventure and excitement to be complete and satisfying, well, such a person had a lot to learn, if he was able.

  Denny made his two yearly supply runs to Fairbanks, one at the beginning of winter and one just before break-up, paid his visits to Charlie Brady at the North Star Cafe, got his winter moose in fall, and a small black bear for food in the spring. Life was good, and Denny was content.

  The next summer, Denny was in the lean-to behind his cabin, replacing several worn hub bearings on his snow mobile’s track wheels. He paused, hearing a motor and voices. Walking around to the front, he saw two men in a side-by-side ATV pulling onto his property.

  The hairs on his neck stirred, something which happened when Caraway sensed potential trouble. One of the men appeared to be a field worker of some sort, a miner or oil man. The other one seemed more like a supervisor or engineer.

  When they saw Caraway, they gave each other a quick glance, then shut the ATV’s engine off. Walking toward him, they stopped at a slight distance, the look on Denny’s face making them do so.