The Walrus Hunters Part 27

The presumptuous one, puckering his face, was about to vent his dismay in a lamentable yell, when it suddenly occurred to him that he might thereby disturb the hunters and earn a severe flogging. He therefore restrained himself, and sat down to indulge in silent sorrow.

Meanwhile the explorers topped the ridge, and, peeping over, saw a large white bear not more than a hundred yards off, sitting on its haunches, engaged, apparently, in contemplation of the scenery.

At this critical moment they heard a noise behind them, and, glancing back, beheld their dogs careering homeward, with the empty sledge swinging wildly in the rear. Cheenbuk looked at Gartok, and then both looked at the bear. Apparently the ridge prevented the distant sound from reaching it, for it did not move.

"We must go at it alone--without dogs," said Gartok, grasping his spear, while a flash of the old fire gleamed in his eyes.

"You must not try," said Cheenbuk; "the drive here has already tired you out. Anteek will do it with me. This is not the first time that we have hunted together."

The boy said nothing, but regarded his friend with a look of gratified pride, while he grasped his spear more firmly.

"Good," returned Gartok, in a resigned tone; "I will stand by to help if there is need."

Nothing more was said, but Cheenbuk looked at Anteek and gave the brief order--

"Go!"

The boy knew well what to do. Grasping his spear, he ran out alone towards the bear and flourished it aloft. Turning with apparent surprise, the animal showed no sign of fear at the challenge of such an insignificant foe. It faced him, however, and seemed to await his onset. The boy moved towards the right side of the bear. At the same time Cheenbuk ran forward towards its left side, while Gartok went straight towards it at a slow walk, by way of further distracting its attention.

As the three hunters approached from different directions, their prey seemed a good deal disconcerted, and looked from one to the other as if undecided how to act. When they came close up the indecision became more p.r.o.nounced, and it rose on its hind-legs ready to defend itself.

Gartok now halted when within five or six yards of the animal, which was anxiously turning its head from side to side, while the other two ran close up.

The plan was that usually followed by Eskimos in similar circ.u.mstances.

Anteek's duty was to run forward and p.r.i.c.k the bear on its right side, so as to draw its undivided attention on himself, thereby leaving its left side unguarded for the deadly thrust of Cheenbuk. Of course this is never attempted by men who are not quite sure of their courage and powers. But Cheenbuk and Anteek knew each other well. The latter was not, perhaps, quite strong enough to give the death-dealing thrust, but he had plenty of courage, and knew well how to administer the deceptive poke.

As for Gartok, besides being incapable of any great exertion, he would not on any account have robbed the boy of the honour of doing his work without help. He merely stood there as a spectator.

With active spring Anteek went close in and delivered his thrust.

The bear uttered a savage roar and at once turned on him. Just at the moment the boy's foot slipped and he fell close to the animal's feet.

In the same instant the two men sprang forward. Cheenbuk's spear entered the bear's heart, and that of Gartok struck its breast. But the thrust of the latter was feeble. In his excitement and weakness Gartok fell, and the dying bear fell upon him. His action, however, saved Anteek, who rolled out of the way just as his preserver fell.

Cheenbuk and Anteek did not hesitate, but, regardless of the few death-struggles that followed, rushed in, and grasping its thick hair dragged the monster off the fallen man.

Gartok was insensible, and it was a considerable time before he fully recovered consciousness. Then it was found that he could not rise, and that the slightest motion gave him intolerable pain.

"He will die!" exclaimed Anteek, with a look of painful anxiety.

"Yes, he will die if we do not quickly get him home," said Cheenbuk.

"He cannot walk, and he would freeze long before we could make an igloe.

I must depend on you now, Anteek. Go back as fast as you can run, and send men with a sledge and skins and something to eat. The boy will remain with me. Away!"

Without a word Anteek leaped up, and, dropping his spear, ran as if his own life depended on his speed. The little boy, who had acted so foolishly, came up with an anxious look on being hailed, but soon forgot himself in his anxiety to be of use to the injured man.

There was a mound of snow within three yards of the spot where the combat had taken place. To the lee side of this Cheenbuk carried Gartok. Being very strong, he was able to lift him tenderly, as if he had been a child, but, despite all his care, the poor man suffered terribly when moved.

It was well that this mound happened to be so close, for a dark cloud which had been overspreading the sky for some time began to send down snow-flakes, and frequent gusts of wind gave indications of an approaching storm. Having placed Gartok in such a position that he was quite sheltered from the wind, Cheenbuk took off his upper seal-skin coat, laid it on the snow, and lifted the injured man on to it. He then wrapped it round him and folded the hood under his head for a pillow, bidding the boy bank up the snow beside him in such a way as to increase the shelter. While thus engaged he saw with some anxiety that Gartok had become deadly pale, and his compressed lips gave the impression that he was suffering much.

"Come here," said Cheenbuk to the boy quickly; "rub his hands and make them warm."

The boy obeyed with alacrity, while the other, hastening his movements, began to skin the bear. Being an expert with the knife in such an operation, he was not long of removing the thick-skinned hairy covering from the carca.s.s, and in this, while it was still warm, he wrapped his comrade--not a moment too soon, for, despite the boy's zealous efforts, the intense cold had taken such hold of the poor man that he was almost unconscious. The warmth of the bearskin, however, restored him a little, and Cheenbuk, sitting down beside him, took his head upon his lap, and tried to shelter him from the storm, which had burst forth and was raging furiously by that time--fine snow filling the atmosphere, while the wind drove it in huge volumes up the valley.

Cheenbuk noted this, and congratulated himself on the fact the wind would favour the progress of the rescue sledge.

Sometimes the whirling snow became so suffocating that the little boy was compelled to cease his labours on the sheltering wall and crouch close to it, while Cheenbuk buried his nose and mouth in the white fur of the bear until the violence of the blasts abated. By keeping the skin well over the face of the wounded man, he succeeded in guarding him from them effectually. But his mind misgave him when he tried to look through the whirling confusion around, and thought of the long tramp that Anteek would have ere he could commence his return journey with the sledge.

It turned out, however, that this was one of those short-lived squalls, not uncommon in the Arctic regions, which burst forthwith unwonted fury, sweep madly over the plains of the frozen seas, rush up into the valleys of the land, and then suddenly stop, as though they felt that all this energy was being spent in vain. In a short time, which however seemed interminable to the watchers on the hillside, the wind began to abate and the wild gusts were less frequent. Then it calmed down; finally it ceased altogether; and the storm-cloud, pa.s.sing away to the south-east, left the dark sky studded with the myriad constellations of the starry host.

Uncovering Gartok's face to see how it fared with him, and hoping that he slept, Cheenbuk found that he was wide awake, but in a condition that made him more anxious than ever. He looked up at the face of his protector with a faint but grateful smile.

"I have always been your enemy," he said, in a low voice, "but you have been my friend."

"That does not matter now," replied Cheenbuk. "I have never been _your_ enemy. We will be friends from this time on."

Gartok closed his eyes for a few seconds, but did not speak. Then he looked up again earnestly.

"No," he said, with more of decision in his tone; "we shall neither be friends nor enemies. I am going to the country where all is dark; from which no sound has ever come back; where there is nothing."

"Our people do not talk in this way. They think that we shall all meet again in the spirit-land, to hunt the seal, the walrus, and the bear,"

returned Cheenbuk.

"Our people talk foolishness. They _think_, but they do not _know_,"

rejoined this Hyperborean agnostic, as positively and as ignorantly as if he had been a scientific Briton.

"How do you know that there is `_nothing_' in the place where you are going?" asked Cheenbuk, simply.

Gartok was silent. Probably his logical faculty told him that his own thinking, and coming to a conclusion without knowing, was as foolish in himself as in his comrades.

The subject of conversation happened to be very congenial to Cheenbuk's cast of mind. He remained thinking and gazing upwards for a minute or two, then he said meditatively, as if he were trying to work out some mental problem--

"Did you ever make a sledge, or a spear, and then destroy it utterly while it was yet good and new?"

"Never. I have been bad, it may be, but I am not a fool."

"Is the great Maker of all a fool? He has made _you_, and if He lets you die now, utterly, He destroys you in your best days. Is it not more likely that He is calling you to some other land where there is work for you to do?"

"I don't understand. I do not know," replied Gartok, somewhat doggedly.

"But you do understand, and you do know, that He would be foolish to kill you now, _unless_ He had some work and some pleasure for you in the unknown land from which no sound ever comes back. When a father gives his son a work to do, he does not destroy his son when the work is done.

He gives him another piece of work; perhaps sends him on a long journey to another place. When the Maker of all sees that we have finished our work here, I ask again, is it not likely that He will send us to work elsewhere, or is it more likely that He will utterly destroy us--and so prove Himself to be more foolish than we are?"

"I do not know," repeated Gartok, "but I do know that if the Maker of all is good, as I have heard say, then I have not done _His_ work here-- for you know, everybody knows, I have been bad!"

Cheenbuk was much perplexed, for he knew not "how to minister to a mind diseased."

"I have often wondered," he said at last, "why it is that some things are wrong and some right. The Maker of all, being good and all-powerful, could have made things as He pleased--all right, nothing wrong. Perhaps men, like children, will understand things better when they are older--when they have reached the land from which no sound comes back. But I am not much troubled. The Maker of all must be all-good and all-wise. If He were not, He could not be the Maker of all. I can _trust_ Him. He will throw light into our minds when the time comes. He has already thrown some light, for do we not know right from wrong?"

"True, but although I have known right I have always done wrong,"

returned Gartok moodily. "I am sorry now. If you had not been kind to me, your enemy, Cheenbuk, I should never have been sorry. Ever since I was hurt by the Fire-spouters you have been kind to me, and now you would save my life if you could. But it is too late. You have known right, and done it."