The Eskimo Twins Part 12

This was glorious news to the twins. They ran down to the beach with Koko as fast as their legs could carry them.

They got there just in time to hear Koko's father say to Kesshoo, "I think it's safe to start. The ice is pretty well out of the bay, and the reindeer will be coming down to the fiords after fresh moss."

All the men listened to hear what Kesshoo would say, and the twins listened, too, with all their ears.

"If it's clear, I think we could start after one more sleep," said Kesshoo.

III.

The twins didn't wait to hear any more. They flew for home, and dashed down the tunnel and up into the room.

Koolee was gathering all the knives and spoons and fishing-things and sewing things, and dumping them into a large musk-ox hide which was spread on the floor.

The musk-ox hide covered the entrance hole. The first thing Koolee knew something thumped the musk-ox skin on the under side, and the knives and thimbles and needle cases and other things flew in all directions.

Up through the hole popped the faces of Menie and Monnie!

"Oh, Mother," they shouted. "We're going off on the woman-boats! After only one more sleep, if it's pleasant! Father said so!"

Koolee laughed. "I know it!" she said. "I was just packing. You can help me. There's a lot to do to get ready."

The twins were delighted to help. They got together all their own treasures--the sled, and the fishing rods, the dog harnesses, and Annadore, and bound them up with walrus thongs. All but Annadore.

Annadore rode in Monnie's hood as usual.

Koolee gathered all her things together again and wrapped them in the musk-ox hide. She took down the long narwhal tusks that the dog harnesses were hung on.

These were the tent poles. She and the twins carried all these things to the beach. The men stayed on the beach and packed the things away in the boats. The other women brought down their bundles from their igloos. There was room for everything in the two big boats.

Only the skins were left on the sleeping bench in the hut. When everything else was ready, Koolee and the twins went up on top of the igloo.

They pulled the moss and dirt out of the c.h.i.n.ks between the stones that made the roof, and then Koolee pulled up the stones themselves and let them fall over to one side. This left the roof open to the sky.

"What makes you do that?" Menie asked.

"So the sun and rain can clean house for us," said Koolee.

Everybody else in the village got ready in the same way.

At last Kesshoo came up from the beach and said to Koolee, "Let us have some meat and a sleep and then we will start. Everything is ready. The boats are packed and it looks as if the weather would be clear."

Koolee brought out some walrus meat and blubber for supper, though it might just as well be called breakfast, for there was no night coming, and the twins ate theirs sitting on the roof of the igloo with their feet hanging down inside.

Once Menie's feet kicked his father's head. It was an accident, but Kesshoo reached up and took hold of Menie's foot and pulled him down on to the sleeping bench and rolled him over among the skins.

"Crawl in there and go to sleep," he said.

Monnie let herself down through the roof by her hands and crept in beside Menie. Then Kesshoo and Koolee wrapped themselves in the warm skins and lay down, too.

It took Menie and Monnie some time to go to sleep, for they could look straight up through the roof at the sky, and the sky was bright and blue with little white clouds sailing over it. Besides, they were thinking about the wonderful things that would happen when they should wake up.

IX. THE VOYAGE

THE VOYAGE

I.

When the twins awoke, the sun was shining as brightly as ever, and Nip and Tup were barking at them through the hole in the roof.

Kesshoo and Koolee were gone!

Menie and Monnie were frightened. They were afraid they were left behind. They sat up in bed and howled!

In a moment Koolee's face looked down at them through the roof.

"What's the matter?" she said.

"We thought we were left," wailed Monnie!

"As if I could leave you behind!" cried Koolee.

She laughed at them. "Hand up the skins to me," she said. She reached her arm down the hole and pulled out all the skins from the bed as fast as the twins gave them to her.

Then she put her head down into the opening and looked all around. "We haven't left a thing," she said; "come along."

The twins couldn't climb out through the roof, though they wanted to, so they went out by the tunnel, and helped their mother carry the skins to the beach.

All the people in the village and all the dogs were there before them.

The great woman-boats were packed, the kyaks of the men waited beside them in a row on the beach, with their noses in the water.

The dogs barked and raced up and down the beach, the babies crowed, and the children shouted for joy. Even the grown people were gay. They talked in loud tones and laughed and made jokes.

II.

At last Kesshoo shouted, "All ready! In you go!" He told each person where to sit.

He put the Angakok in one boat to steer. He put Koko's father in the other.

In Koko's father's boat he placed Koko and his mother and the baby, Koolee and the twins, the pups, all three dogs, and four of the women who lived in the other igloos. So you see it was quite a large boat.

In the Angakok's boat he placed his two wives, and all the rest of the women and children and dogs. The women took up the paddles. One end of the boat was partly in the water when they got in. The men gently pushed it farther out until it floated.

Then the men got into their kyaks at the water's edge, fastened their skin coats over the rims, and paddled out into deep water.