[Previous page]...n advance of the pursuit. With his rifle, in the
broad daylight, it might be possible for him to awe the wolves and
save the dog.
'Say, Bill!' Henry called after him. 'Be careful! Don't take no
chances!'
Henry sat down on the sled and watched. There was nothing else for
him to do. Bill had already gone from sight; but now and again,
appearing and disappearing amongst the underbrush and the scattered
clumps of spruce, could be seen One Ear. Henry judged his case to be
hopeless. The dog was thoroughly alive to its danger, but it was
running on the outer circle while the wolf-pack was running on the
inner and shorter circle. It was vain to think of One Ear so
outdistancing his pursuers as to be able to cut across their circle in
advance of them and to regain the sled.
The different lines were rapidly approaching a point. Somewhere
out there in the snow, screened from his sight by trees and
thickets, Henry knew that the wolf-pack, One Ear, and Bill were coming
together. All too quickly, far more quickly than he had expected, it
happened. He heard a shot, then two shots in rapid succession, and
he knew that Bill's ammunition was gone. Then he heard a great
outcry of snarls and yelps. He recognized One Ear's yell of pain and
terror and he heard a wolf-cry that bespoke a stricken animal. And
that was all. The snarls ceased. The yelping died away. Silence
settled down again over the lonely land.
He sat for a long while upon the sled. There was no need for him
to go and see what had happened. He knew it as though it had taken
place before his eyes. Once, he roused with a start and hastily got
the axe out from underneath the lashings. But for some time longer
he sat and brooded, the two remaining dogs crouching and trembling
at his feet.
At last he arose in a weary manner, as though all the resilience had
gone out of his body, and proceeded to fasten the dogs to the sled. He
passed a rope over his shoulder, a man-trace, and pulled with the
dogs. He did not go far. At the first hint of darkness he hastened
to make a camp, and he saw to it that he had a generous supply of
firewood. He fed the dogs, cooked and ate his supper, and made his bed
close to the fire.
But he was not destined to enjoy that bed. Before his eyes closed
the wolves had drawn too near for safety. It no longer required an
effort of the vision to see them. They were all about him and the
fire, in a narrow circle, and he could see them plainly in the
firelight, lying down, sitting up, crawling forward on their
bellies, or slinking back and forth. They even slept. Here and there
he could see one curled up in the snow like a dog taking the sleep
that was now denied himself.
He kept the fire brightly blazing, for he knew that it alone
intervened between the flesh of his body and their hungry fangs. His
two dogs stayed close to him, one on either side, leaning against
him for protection, crying and whimpering, and at times snarling
desperately when a wolf approached a little closer than usual. At such
moments, when his dogs snarled, the whole circle would be agitated,
the wolves coming to their feet and pressing tentatively forward, a
chorus of snarls and eager yelps rising about him. Then the circle
would lie down again, and here and there a wolf would resume its
broken nap.
But this circle had a continuous tendency to draw in upon him. Bit
by bit, an inch at a time, with here a wolf bellying forward, and
there a wolf bellying forward, the circle would narrow until the
brutes were almost within springing distance. Then he would seize
brands from the fire and hurl them into the pack. A hasty drawing back
always resulted, accompanied by angry yelps and frightened snarls when
a well-aimed brand struck and scorched a too daring animal.
Morning found the man haggard and worn, wide-eyed from want of
sleep. He cooked breakfast in the darkness, and at nine o'clock, when,
with the coming of daylight, the wolf-pack drew back, he set about the
task he had planned through the long hours of the night. Chopping down
young saplings, he made them cross-bars of a scaffold by lashing
them high up to the trunks of standing trees. Using the
sled-lashings for a heaving rope, and with the aid of the dogs, he
hoisted the coffin to the top of the scaffold.
'They got Bill, an' they may get me, but they'll never sure get you,
young man,' he said, addressing the dead body in its tree-sepulchre.
Then he took the trail, the lightened sled bounding along behind the
willing dogs; for they, too, knew that safety lay only in the
gaining of Fort McGurry. The wolves were now more open in their
pursuit, trotting sedately behind and ranging along on either side,
their red tongues lolling out, their lean sides showing the undulating
ribs with every movement. They were very lean, mere skin-bags
stretched over bony frames, with strings for muscles- so lean that
Henry found it in his mind to marvel that they still kept their feet
and did not collapse forthright in the snow.
He did not dare travel until dark. At midday, not only did the sun
warm the southern horizon, but it even thrust its upper rim, pale
and golden, above the skyline. He received it as a sign. The days were
growing longer. The sun was returning. But scarcely had the cheer of
its light departed, than he went into camp. There were still several
hours of gray daylight and sombre twilight, and he utilized them in
chopping an enormous supply of firewood.
With night came horror. Not only were the starving wolves growing
bolder, but lack of sleep was telling upon Henry. He dozed despite
himself, crouching by the fire, the blankets about his shoulders,
the axe between his knees, and on either side a dog pressing close
against him. He awoke once and saw in front of him, not a dozen feet
away, a big gray wolf, one of the largest of the pack. And even as
he looked, the brute deliberately stretched himself after the manner
of a lazy dog, yawning full in his face and looking upon him with a
possessive eye, as if, in truth, he were merely a delayed meal that
was soon to be eaten.
This certitude was shown by the whole pack. Fully a score he could
count, staring hungrily at him or calmly sleeping in the snow. They
reminded him of children gathered about a spread table and awaiting
permission to begin to eat. And he was the food they were to eat! He
wondered how and when the meal would begin.
As he piled wood on the fire he discovered an appreciation of his
own body which he had never felt before. He watched his moving muscles
and was interested in the cunning mechanism of his fingers. By the
light of the fire he crooked his fingers slowly and repeatedly, now
one at a time, now all together, spreading them wide or making quick
gripping movements. He studied the nail-formation, and prodded the
fingertips, now sharply, and again softly, gauging the while the
nerve-sensations produced. It fascinated him, and he grew suddenly
fond of this subtle flesh of his that worked so beautifully and
smoothly and delicately. Then he would cast a glance of fear at the
wolf-circle drawn expectantly about him, and like a blow the
realization would strike him that this wonderful body of his, this
living flesh, was no more than so much meat, a quest of ravenous
animals, to be torn and slashed by their hungry fangs, to be
sustenance to them as the moose and the rabbit had often been
sustenance to him.
He came out of a doze that was half nightmare, to see the red-hued
she-wolf before him. She was not more than half a dozen feet away,
sitting in the snow and wistfully regarding him. The two dogs were
whimpering and snarling at his feet, but she took no notice of them.
She was looking at the man, and for some time he returned her look.
There was nothing threatening about her. She looked at him merely with
a great wistfulness, but he knew it to be the wistfulness of an
equally great hunger. He was the food, and the sight of him excited in
her the gustatory sensations. Her mouth opened, the saliva drooled
forth, and she licked her chops with the pleasure of anticipation.
A spasm of fear went through him. He reached hastily for a brand
to throw at her. But even as he reached, and before his fingers had
closed on the missile, she sprang back into safety; and he knew that
she was used to having things thrown at her. She had snarled as she
sprang away, baring her white fangs to their roots, all her
wistfulness vanishing, being replaced by a carnivorous malignity
that made him shudder. He glanced at the hand that held the brand,
noticing the cunning delicacy of the fingers that gripped it, how they
adjusted themselves to all the inequalities of the surface, curling
over and under and about the rough wood, and one little finger, too
close to the burning portion of the brand, sensitively and
automatically writhing back from the hurtful heat to a cooler
gripping-place; and in the same instant he seemed to see a vision of
those same sensitive and delicate fingers being crushed and torn by
the white teeth of the she-wolf. Never had he been so fond of this
body of his as now when his tenure of it was so precarious.
All night, with burning brands, he fought off the hungry pack.
When he dozed despite himself, the whimpering and snarling of the dogs
aroused him. Morning came, but for the first time the light of day
failed to scatter the wolves. The man waited in vain for them to go.
They remained in a circle about him and his fire, displaying an
arrogance of possession that shook his courage born of the morning
light.
He made one desperate attempt to pull out on the trail. But the
moment he left the protection of the fire, the boldest wolf leaped for
him, but leaped short. He saved himself by springing back, the jaws
snapping together a scant six inches from his thigh. The rest of the
pack was now up and surging upon him, and a throwing of firebrands
right and left was necessary to drive them back to a respectful
distance.
Even in the daylight he did not dare leave the fire to chop fresh
wood. Twenty feet away towered a huge dead spruce. He spent half the
day extending his campfire to the tree, at any moment a half dozen
burning fagots ready at hand to fling at his enemies. Once at the
tree, he studied the surrounding forest in order to fell the tree in
the direction of the most firewood.
The night was a repetition of the night before, save that the need
for sleep was becoming overpowering. The snarling of his dogs was
losing its efficacy. Besides, they were snarling all the time, and his
benumbed and drowsy senses no longer took note of changing pitch and
intensity. He awoke with a start. The she-wolf was less than a yard
from him. Mechanically, at short range, without letting go of it, he
thrust a brand full into her open and snarling mouth. She sprang away,
yelling with pain, and while he took delight in the smell of burning
flesh and hair, he watched her shaking her head and growling
wrathfully a score of feet away.
But this time, before he dozed again, he tied a burning pine-knot to
his right hand. His eyes were closed but a few minutes when the burn
of the flame on his flesh awakened him. For several hours he adhered
to this program. Every time he was thus awakened he drove back the
wolves with flying brands, replenished the fire, and rearranged the
pine-knot on his hand. All worked well, but there came a time when
he fastened the pine-knot insecurely. As his eyes closed it fell
away from his hand.
He dreamed. It seemed to him that he was in Fort McGurry. It was
warm and comfortable, and he was playing cribbage with the Factor.
Also, it seemed to him that the fort was besieged by wolves. They were
howling at the very gates, and sometimes he and the Factor paused from
the game to listen and laugh at the futile efforts of the wolves to
get in. And then, so strange was the dream, there was a crash. The
door burst open. He could see the wolves flooding into the big
living-room o...
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