The Gaunt Gray Wolf

XVI
ALONE WITH THE INDIANS

At the edge of every frozen marsh and lake Ungava Bob paused to reconnoitre for caribou, but always to be disappointed, and when he and Shad halted at sundown to pitch their night camp, no living thing had they seen.

Shad's small wedge tent was stretched between two trees, snow was banked around it on the outside, and a thick bed of boughs spread upon the snow within. Two short butts of logs were placed at proper distance apart near the entrance and inside the tent, the tent stove set upon them, and with an ample supply of wood cut and split, their night shelter, with a roaring fire in the stove, was warm and cosy.

The days that followed were equally as disappointing. The smooth white surface of the snow was unmarred by track of beast or bird. No living creature stirred. No sound broke the silence. The frozen world was dead, and the silence was the silence of the sepulchre.

"It's so quiet you can hear it," Shad remarked once when they halted to make tea.

"Aye," said Bob, "'tis that, and they's no footin' of even rabbits. I can't make un out."

On the afternoon of the third day after leaving the river tilt, they came upon the southern shore of the Great Lake of the Indians, and turning westward presently discovered Sishetakushin's wigwam.

The travellers received a warm welcome from the Indians. Sishetakushin and Mookoomahn were indeed noisy and effusive in their greeting. Manikawan radiated pleasure, but she and her mother, a large, fat woman, as became their status as women, remained in the background.

The Indians had killed some caribou early in the season, and jerked the meat. They had just killed a bear whose winter den they had discovered, and over the fire was a kettle of stewing beaver meat, upon which they feasted their visitors.

At the proper time Bob presented them with tea, Shad gave them each some tobacco, and then Bob told them of his proposed trading project.

"My people will be glad," said Sishetakushin, "and you will have much trade."

It developed in the course of conversation that the Indians were preparing to move at once to the Lake of Willows (Petitsikapau), to the northwest, in the hope of meeting caribou, for none had been seen by them since those they had killed in early fall.

They were to cache some of their provisions near the Great Lake; and when they had made a sufficient kill in the North to supply them with food, were to return to their cache near the Great Lake to trap martens, for in the more northerly country, where wide barrens take the place of forests, martens are rarely to be found.

"Bob, here's a chance I've been hoping for," said Shad, when Bob interpreted to him the Indians' plan. "Do you think they would be willing to let me go with them until their return here, if I gave them some tobacco?"

"They's no tellin', Shad, how long they'll be away," suggested Bob.

"But I want to go if they'll let me go. Please ask them," insisted Shad.

"But they may not be findin' deer, an' if they don't find un they won't be comin' back here till th' end o' winter. You don't want t' be with un th' rest o' th' winter, Shad; 'twill be rougher cruisin' than with us," Bob warned.

"Ask them. I'm going if they'll have me along;" and Shad displayed in his tone a suggestion of resentment that Bob should question the advisability of anything upon which he had determined.

The Indians discussed the matter at some length before finally giving Bob an affirmative decision.

"They says you can go, Shad, but they'll not promise t' be back here for two months, whatever, an' when they does they'll come t' th' river tilt with you," said Bob.

"Good! It'll give me some change of experience, and the chance to study their life and customs that I've wanted;" and Shad was elated with the prospect.

Partly because of the earnest solicitation of his Indian friends, but chiefly in the hope of  dissuading Shad from his determination, Bob remained in the Indian camp the remainder of the week. While they still maintained a degree of reserve toward Shad, Bob was treated in every respect as one of them.

Manikawan made him the object of her particular attention. She waited upon him as the Indian women wait upon their lords, anticipating his needs.

In expectation of his coming she had, after her return from the river tilt, made for him a beautiful coat of caribou skins. The hair, left on the skins, made a warm lining, while the outside of the coat, tanned as soft and white as chamois, was decorated with designs painted in colours. Attached to it was a hood of wolfskin.

Accompanying the coat was a pair of long, close-fitting buckskin leggings, and a pair of buckskin moccasins, both decorated, and the whole comprising the typical winter suit of a Nascaupee hunter.

Manikawan's attentions were extremely irritating to Bob, but he could not well avoid them, and to have declined to accept the gift which she had made especially for him in anticipation of his coming, would have caused her keen disappointment. So he accepted them and donned them, to her evident delight.

"Shad," said Bob, on the Sunday evening after their arrival "I has t' start back in th' mornin', an' you better be goin' with me."

"No," insisted Shad, "I'll stick to the Indians for a while."

The following morning Bob bade them adieu.

"Take care of yourself, old man," said Shad. "I'll see you in a month or so."

"I hopes so, Shad, an' you take care o' yourself, now. I'm fearin' t' leave you, Shad."

"Oh, I know how to look out for myself," declared Shad. "Don't worry about me."

Turning to Manikawan, who stood mutely waiting for the word of farewell that she hoped Bob would bestow upon her, he said, in the Indian tongue:

"White Brother of the Snow must go to his hunting grounds. He is leaving behind him his friend. Will Manikawan minister to his friend as she would to him? Will she see that no harm comes to him?"

"Manikawan will do as White Brother of the Snow directs," she answered. "She will minister to his friend's needs. She will make for his friend the nabwe. His friend will not be hungry. Manikawan will care for him until White Brother of the Snow is weary of hunting and comes again to Sishetakushin's lodge. She will do this because he is the friend of White Brother of the Snow."

Then Bob turned into the white, frigid waste to the southward, and Shad was alone with the Indians.

XVII
CHRISTMAS AT THE RIVER TILT

Christmas fell on Thursday that year, and it had been arranged that the trappers, by turning back on their trails the preceding Saturday instead of waiting as was their custom until Monday, and by slighting some of the less important sections of the trails on their return trip, should gather at the river tilt on Wednesday evening, in order to celebrate the holiday with a feast.

It was late on Christmas eve when Ungava Bob, returning from the Indian camp, drew his toboggan into the clearing in the centre of which stood the river tilt. Its roof was scarcely visible in the moonlight above the high drifted snow. He had hoped that some of the others might have arrived before him, but no smoke issued from the pipe, and fresh drifted, untrodden snow around the door told him that he was the first.

It was fearfully cold. Rime filled the air. The deerskin coat which Manikawan had given him, and which he wore, was thick coated with frost.

He paused before the door and stood for a moment to painfully pick away the ice that had accumulated upon his eyelashes, partially closing his eyelids, and discovered that his nose and cheeks were frost-bitten. He drew his right hand from its mitten, and holding his nose in the bare palm, covered the exposed hand with the mittened palm of the other, quickly rubbing the frosted parts with the warm palm to restore circulation.

Presently, satisfied that the frost had been removed from nose and cheeks, he kicked off his snowshoes, shovelled the accumulated snow from the doorway with one of them, set the snowshoes on end in the snow at one side, and entering the tilt lighted a candle and kindled a fire in the stove.

Taking the kettle from the stove and an axe from a corner, he passed out of the tilt and down to the river, chopped open the water hole, filled the kettle, and returning set it over to heat.

Unpacking his toboggan and stowing the things away, he leaned it end up against the tilt, brought a bucket of water from the river for culinary use, removed his deerskin coat, and settled down in the now comfortable tilt to prepare supper and await his friends.

Presently he heard a movement outside, and a moment later Dick Blake poked his head in at the door.

"Evenin', Bob," he greeted. "Glad t' see you. Th' tilt smells fine an' warm! Where's Shad?" he asked, entering and rubbing his hands over the stove.

"Stoppin' wi' th' Injuns. I were tryin' t' get he t' come back, but he thinks he wants t' go huntin' deer with un, an' stays," explained Bob. "Any fur?"

"Only one marten an' one otter, but they's good uns. No sign o' foxes. But foxes won't stay when th' rabbits goes;" and Dick went out to unpack.

Presently Bill Campbell arrived, and a little later Ed Matheson drew his long form through the low doorway, his red beard laden with ice.

"Where's Shad?" he asked, after greetings were exchanged.

Bob explained Shad's absence.

"Well, now!" he exclaimed. "Shad must ha' been gettin' light-headed t' do that. Well, he's welcome t' 'bide 'long with Injuns if he wants to, but I'm thinkin' by about now he's wishin' he was where he ain't. An' by t'morrer he'll have boiled goose an' fried pa'tridges on his mind, an' wishin' harder 'n ever he were back here in th' river tilt."

"He were wantin' th' hunt, an' now he may not find un so bad," said Bob.

"He won't be havin' no feather-bed time cruisin' about with Injuns," insisted Ed. "Shad's gettin' wonderful peevish an' sot in his way lately. He's thinkin' o' th' fine grub an' good times he's been havin' t' that college place he talks about, instead o' thinkin' o' how he likes rabbit meat three times a day an' betwixt meals when you an' him was 'bidin' a time on th' island over here because you wasn't havin' wings t' fly off, an' they wa'n't no other way t' get off till th' Injun lass takes you off."

"Shad weren't gettin' peeved," objected Bob, ready to defend his absent friend. "He were just disappointed at findin' no huntin', an' he 'bides with th' Injuns t' get some deer."

"Maybe so, but Shad'll be glad enough t' get back t' th' river tilt, an' when he is gettin' back he'll be findin' it fine. He'll be thinkin' o' th' tough cruisin' with th' Injuns instead o' th' grub at his college place, an' that'll make he think 'tis fine in th' tilts. That's the way it mostly is with folks. They always wants somethin' they ain't got, an' when they gets un they wants somethin' else. An' like's not then they wants what they was havin' first, because they can't have un now."

Ed paused to pour a cup of tea and help himself to pork.

"Shad's a good mate, though," he continued magnanimously. "He ain't gettin' used t' th' bush yet. That's all's th' matter with he. He'll get used t' un after a bit, an' then he won't be gettin' peeved like he is now."

"I'm wishin' he weren't stayin' back with th' Injuns now. I'm fearin' he'll be havin' a hard time of un–an' I'm fearin' he may be gettin' in trouble not knowin' how t' take un," Bob remarked solicitously.

"I'm wonderful sorry, now, he stays wi' th' Injuns. 'Twould be fine t' have he here for Christmas," agreed Ed, as he drew a plug of black tobacco from his pocket and began to shave some of it into the hollow of his hand, preparatory to filling his pipe.

"Any fur this trip?" asked Bob.

"Two martens–both fine uns. Not so bad. How'd you make un, Dick?"

"I gets one marten an' shoots an otter," answered Dick.

"You gettin' any, Bill?" asked Ed, turning to Bill, who was reclining in one of the bunks and smoking in luxurious contentment.

"Aye, one marten, an' I shoots a wolf last evenin'–a wonderful poor wolf, an' his skin ain't much account. Three of un were after me on th' trail all day, but I only gets one."

"Three wolves, now–an' poor uns," commented Dick. "Wolves ain't follerin' a man all day unless they's hungry, an' they ain't like t' be hungry where they's deer."

"No," agreed Ed, who had lighted his pipe, one moccasined heel drawn up on the edge of the bunk upon which he lounged, the other long leg stretched out. "Wolves follers th' deer, but when they ain't no deer t' faller they don't faller un. Which means they ain't no deer in this part o' th' country, an' so they just naturally fallers Bill as th' next best meat."

"An' bein' poor means they's hungry, an' bein' hungry means they's lickin' their chops for Bill," continued Dick.

"Were it night, now?" asked Ed.

"No, 'twere broad day," answered Bill, undisturbed.

"Now if 'twere night, I'd say they was follerin' you because your red hair lights th' trail up for un."

"'Tain't no redder 'n your'n," retorted Bill.

"Never mind un, Bill," said Bob sympathetically. "Ed's jealous because your hair's curly an' his 'n ain't."

"Now, how about gettin' grub?" suggested Ed, when the laugh had subsided. "They ain't nothin' t' kill, an' we got t' haul grub in from th' Bay. I'm thinkin' t' start down Friday, an' if one o' you wants t' go along, we'll both haul up a load on our flatsleds. How'd you like t' go, Bill? They's a moon, an' by travellin' some at night we'll make th' Bay for th' New Year, goin' light, an' be back by th' first o' February, whatever, with our loads."

"I'd like wonderful well t' go!" answered Bill, elated at the prospect of a visit to the Bay, brief as it would be.

"What you think of un?" asked Ed, addressing Dick and Bob jointly.

"We got t' have grub if we stays on th' trails," agreed Dick, "an' they's no sign o' killin' any meat."

"Aye, we'll all have t' leave th' trails by th' first o' March, whatever, unless some of us goes for grub," said Bob.

"Bill an' me bein' away'll stretch th' grub we has, for Bill be a wonderful eater–" Bill interjected a protest, but Ed, ignoring it, continued: "An' what we hauls back on th' flatsleds'll carry us over th' spring trappin'. We'll be startin' early on Friday. We'll go down your trail an' spring your traps up on th' way out, Bill."

A late breakfast of fried ptarmigans, and a late afternoon dinner of boiled goose, with an evening "snack" of ptarmigan before retiring–the last of the game reserved from the fall shooting–together with camp bread and tea, comprised the Christmas menu.

Directly after breakfast Ed and Bill made ready for packing on their toboggans the light outfit which they were to use on their outward trip; and this done, the four held a service of song in which all joined heartily, and spent the remainder of the day luxuriously lounging in the tilt and telling stories.

Shad was sincerely missed. He had looked forward keenly to the Christmas feast, and many hearty good wishes were expressed for him–that even among the Indians he might pass a pleasant day–that he would not find the hardships so great as his friends had feared–and that he would soon return to them in safety and none the worse for his experiences.

Then the thoughts turned to home, and speculations as to what the far-off loved ones were doing at the moment.

"I'm thinkin' a wonderful lot of home now," said Bob. "Tell Mother an' Father, Ed, I'm safe an' thinkin' of un every day, an' of Emily, away off somewheres in St. Johns t' school. It's makin' me rare lonesome t' think o' home without Emily there. An'–an'–tell Mother, Ed–I never forgets my prayers."

"That I will, lad!" promised Ed heartily. "An' what you wantin' me t' say t' Bessie, now? Tell she about th' Injun lass an' th' fine deerskin coat she's givin' you?"

"Tell Bessie I always carries th' ca'tridge bag she gives me–an' I'm thinkin' how 'tis she that makes un–an' I'll be glad t'–get home t' th' Bay," directed Bob hesitatingly.

"Oh, aye. Glad t' get back t' see th' Bay, I'm thinkin'," laughed Ed.

As Bob and Dick returned to the tilt an hour before daybreak, after watching Ed and Bill disappear down the trail in the still, bitter cold of the starlit morning, Bob remarked:

"I'm feelin' wonderful strange–I'm not knowin' how. 'Tis a lonesomeness–but different–like as if somethin' were goin' t' happen."

"An' I has th' same sort o' feelin'," confessed Dick. "'Tis like th' stillness before a big storm breaks at sea–'tis like as if some one was dyin' clost by."

XVIII
THE SPIRIT OF DEATH GROWS BOLD

When Ungava Bob was gone, Shad Trowbridge returned to the deerskin lodge to think. Now that he was alone with the Indians, he was not at all sure that he did not regret his decision to remain with them and share their uncertain fortunes.

For a moment the thought occurred to him that he might even yet follow Bob's trail and overtake him in his night camp. But he thrust the impulse aside at once as unworthy consideration. He had come to his decision, and he was determined to remain and play the game to a finish.

He craved action and excitement, and the glamour of romance that surrounded the Indians and their nomadic life had attracted him. It was this, together with the human instinct to play at games of chance, and the primordial instinct slumbering in every strong man's breast to throw off restraint and, untrammelled, match his brains and strength against the forces of untamed nature, that had led Shad to adopt the red man's life for a period which he believed would not exceed three or four weeks at most.

In preparation for departure the following day, the Indians erected upon an elevated flat rock, which winds had swept bare of snow, a log shelter some five feet square and five feet high. After lining the bottom and sides of this shelter with spruce boughs, a quantity of jerked venison and dried fish was deposited in it, the top covered with boughs, and the roof, consisting of logs laid closely side by side and weighted with stones, was placed in position. This precaution was taken to protect the cache from marauding animals.

In the dim light of the cold December morning the deerskin covering of the wigwam was stripped from the poles, folded and packed upon the toboggans, together with the simple housekeeping equipment of the Indians, and a sufficient quantity of fresh bear's meat and jerked venison to sustain them for a fortnight.

Immediately the march was begun toward the Lake of Willows, Sishetakushin and Mookoomahn in turn taking the lead and breaking the trail, the others following, single file.

Day after day they pushed on and still on through scattered forests, across wide barrens and over frozen lakes, always on the alert for caribou but always disappointed.

Once a small flock of ptarmigans was seen along the willow brush that lined a stream. Shad drew his shotgun from his toboggan, but the Indians would not permit him to use it, and in disgust he returned it to its place while he watched Sishetakushin and Mookoomahn kill the birds with bows and arrows. He marvelled at their skill. Indeed, he did not observe a single arrow go astray of its mark.

Eleven birds were secured in this way–the first game they had seen, and the last they were to see for several days.

A dead, awful cold settled upon the earth. The very atmosphere was frozen. Rime in shimmering, glittering particles hung suspended in space, and covered bushes, trees, and rocks–scintillating in the sunlight and seeming to intensify the cold.

The few brief hours of sunshine were disregarded. The sun rose only to tantalise. For three or four hours each day it hung close to the horizon, then dropped again below the southwestern hills; and its rays gave out no warmth.

No sign of game was seen near the Lake of Willows, and no halt was made. The life of the Indians depended upon the killing of caribou. The little cache of jerked venison and fish left near the Great Lake would scarcely have sustained them a month. The few ptarmigans killed now and again were of small assistance. The food they hauled was nearly exhausted.

Then came a period of storm. For a week snow fell and gales blew with such terrific fury that no living thing could have existed in the open, and during this period a halt was unavoidable.

Once a day a small ration was doled out–pitifully small–enough to tantalise appetite, but not to still hunger. Shad was consumed with a craving for food. He could think of nothing but food. His days on the trails and in the tilts with the trappers were remembered as days of luxury and feasting. He wondered if Bob and the others had thought of him when they ate their Christmas dinner of geese and ptarmigans. "Oh, for one delicious meal of pork and camp bread. Oh, for one night of the luxurious warmth of the river tilt!"

When the storm abated sufficiently to permit them to continue their journey, he moved his legs mechanically, even forgetting at last that the effort was painful. An insidious weakness was taking possession of him. It was an effort to draw his lightly-laden toboggan. It made him dizzy to swing an axe when he assisted Manikawan to cut wood for the fire. His knees gave way under him when he sat down.

Manikawan's plump cheeks were sunken. Her eyes were growing big and staring. Her mother had lost half her bulk, and Sishetakushin and Mookoomahn were also noticeably affected. They no longer laughed and seldom spoke.

As one performing a duty that must not under any circumstance or condition be neglected, Manikawan conscientiously looked after Shad's welfare; but still she treated him with the same degree of dignity and reserve, if not aloofness, that she had always maintained toward him. He realised that what she did for him she did because he was the friend of her beloved White Brother of the Snow, and not for his own sake–as a dog will guard the thing which its master directs it to guard, faithfully and untiringly, for the master's sake, but with no other attachment for the thing itself.

He wondered why they did not return to their cache on the Great Lake after the long storm, and then it occurred to him that probably their destination was the trading post at Ungava, of which Bob had told him.

On the afternoon of the second day after the storm, they came upon a single wigwam. Sishetakushin and Mookoomahn looked into it and passed on. Shad raised the flap, and peering in saw the emaciated figure of an old Indian. He was quite stark and dead, his wide-open eyes staring vacantly into space. He had been abandoned to die.

That evening Shad stumbled over an object in the snow. He stooped to examine it in the starlight, and was horrified to discover the dead body of a woman.

The following morning, as they plodded wearily forward under the faint light of the stars, they came suddenly upon a group of wigwams. Men, women, and children came out to meet them–an emaciated, starved, unkempt horde that had more the appearance of ghouls and skeletons than human beings. Some of them tottered as they walked, some fell in the snow and with difficulty regained their feet.

"Atuk! Atuk! Have you found the atuk?" was the cry from all–a hopeless cry of desperation, as they crowded around the travellers.

"We have not found the atuk," answered Sishetakushin.

Some heard him stoically, others staggered hopelessly away to their wigwams, others wailed:

"The Great Spirit of the Sky is angry. He has sent all the spirits to destroy us. The Spirit of Hunger–the Gaunt Gray Wolf–is at our back. The raven, the Black Spirit of Death, is ready to attack us. The Spirit of the Tempest torments us. The Spirits of the Forest and of the Barrens mock us. The Great Spirit of the Sky has driven away the atuk, and our people are starving. Many of our people are dead. Four of our hunters now lie dead in their lodges."

Shad Trowbridge could not understand what was said, but he could not fail to understand the situation.

For some inexplicable reason the caribou, upon which the Indians depended for food, had disappeared from the land. All living things save these starving wretches had vanished.

For twenty-four hours not a mouthful of food had passed Shad's own lips, and a sickening dread engulfed his soul.

[Footnote: This was the winter of 1890-1891, known as "the year of starvation," when for some unknown reason the caribou failed to appear in their accustomed haunts, and as a result one out of every three of the Indians of northern Labrador perished of starvation.]