The Valley of Silent Men

The Valley of Silent Men, subtitled A Story of the Three River Country, is by James Oliver Curwood. The book describes Athabasca Landing, before the railroad's thin lines of steel bit their way up through the wilderness, as the picturesque threshold over which one must step who would enter into the mystery and adventure of the great white North. A scene names Kedsty, Inspector of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police, as in charge of N Division during an indefinite leave of absence of the superintendent.

A man named Kent, sitting bolstered up in his cot, can see through his window the slow-moving shimmer of the great Athabasca River as it moved on its way toward the Arctic Ocean. A storm scene has a rending streak of lightning reveal a figure for an instant, her bare head bowed to the wind, and a crash of thunder shake the earth under their feet. Kent looks southward for a long distance and sees in the vivid sunlight the shimmer of creeks and little lakes, and the rich glow of thick patches of cedar and spruce and balsam.