The Wolf Hunters Part 9

There was no more gold.

In a way this fact brought relief with it. Both Wabi and Rod gradually recovered from their nervous excitement. The thought of gold gradually faded from their minds; the joy and exhilaration of the "hunt life"

filled them more and more. Mukoki set to work cutting fresh cedars for the floor; the two boys scoured every log with water from the lake and afterward gathered several bushels of moss for refilling the c.h.i.n.ks.

That evening supper was cooked on the sheet-iron "section stove" which they had brought on the toboggan, and which was set up where the ancient stove of flat stones had tumbled into ruin. By candle-light the work of "rec.h.i.n.king" with moss progressed rapidly. Wabi was constantly bursting into s.n.a.t.c.hes of wild Indian song, Rod whistled until his throat was sore and Mukoki chuckled and grunted and talked with constantly increasing volubility. A score of times they congratulated one another upon their good luck. Eight wolf-scalps, a fine lynx and nearly two hundred dollars in gold--all within their first week! It was enough to fill them with enthusiasm and they made little effort to repress their joy.

During this evening Mukoki boiled up a large pot of caribou fat and bones, and when Rod asked what kind of soup he was making he responded by picking up a handful of steel traps and dropping them into the mixture.

"Make traps smell good for fox--wolf--fisher, an' marten, too; heem come--all come--like smell," he explained.

"If you don't dip the traps," added Wabi, "nine fur animals out of ten, and wolves most of all, will fight shy of the bait. They can smell the human odor you leave on the steel when you handle it. But the grease 'draws' them."

When the hunters wrapped themselves in their blankets that night their wilderness home was complete. All that remained to be done was the building of three bunks against the ends of the cabin, and this work it was agreed could be accomplished at odd hours by any one who happened to be in camp. In the morning, laden with traps, they would strike out their first hunting-trails, keeping their eyes especially open for signs of wolves; for Mukoki was the greatest wolf hunter in all the Hudson Bay region.

CHAPTER VIII

HOW WOLF BECAME THE COMPANION OF MEN

Twice that night Rod was awakened by Mukoki opening the cabin door. The second time he raised himself upon his elbows and quietly watched the old warrior. It was a brilliantly clear night and a flood of moonlight was pouring into the camp. He could hear Mukoki chuckling and grunting, as though communicating with himself, and at last, his curiosity getting the better of him, he wrapped his blanket about him and joined the Indian at the door.

Mukoki was peering up into s.p.a.ce. Rod followed his gaze. The moon was directly above the cabin. The sky was clear of clouds and so bright was the light that objects on the farther side of the lake were plainly visible.

Besides, it was bitter cold--so cold that his face began to tingle as he stood there. These things he noticed, but he could see nothing to hold Mukoki's vision in the sky above unless it was the glorious beauty of the night.

"What is it, Mukoki?" he asked.

The old Indian looked silently at him for a moment, some mysterious, all-absorbing joy revealed in every lineament of his face.

"Wolf night!" he whispered.

He looked back to where Wabi was sleeping.

"Wolf night!" he repeated, and slipped like a shadow to the side of the unconscious young hunter. Rod regarded his actions with growing wonder.

He saw him bend over Wabi, shake him by the shoulders, and heard him repeat again, "Wolf night! Wolf night!"

Wabi awoke and sat up in his blankets, and Mukoki came back to the door.

He had dressed himself before this, and now, with his rifle, slipped out into the night. The young Indian had joined Rod at the open door and together they watched Mukoki's gaunt figure as it sped swiftly across the lake, up the hill and over into the wilderness desolation beyond.

When Rod looked at Wabi he saw that the Indian boy's eyes were wide and staring, with an expression in them that was something between fright and horror. Without speaking he went to the table and lighted the candles and then dressed. When he was done his face still bore traces of suppressed excitement.

He ran back to the door and whistled loudly. From his shelter beside the cabin the captive wolf responded with a snarling whine. Again he whistled, a dozen times, twenty, but there came no reply. More swiftly than Mukoki the Indian youth sped across the lake and to the summit of the hill. Mukoki had completely disappeared in the white, brilliant vastness of the wilderness that stretched away at his feet.

When Wabi returned to the cabin Rod had a fire roaring in the stove. He seated himself beside it, holding out a pair of hands blue with cold.

"Ugh! It's an awful night!" he shivered.

He laughed across at Rod, a little uneasily, but with the old light back in his eyes. Suddenly he asked:

"Did Minnetaki ever tell you--anything--queer--about Mukoki, Rod?"

"Nothing more than you have told me yourself."

"Well, once in a great while Mukoki has--not exactly a fit, but a little mad spell! I have never determined to my own satisfaction whether he is really out of his head or not. Sometimes I think he is and sometimes I think he is not. But the Indians at the Post believe that at certain times he goes crazy over wolves."

"Wolves!" exclaimed Rod.

"Yes, wolves. And he has good reason. A good many years ago, just about when you and I were born, Mukoki had a wife and child. My mother and others at the Post say that he was especially gone over the kid. He wouldn't hunt like other Indians, but would spend whole days at his shack playing with it and teaching it to do things; and when he did go hunting he would often tote it on his back, even when it wasn't much more than a squalling papoose. He was the happiest Indian at the Post, and one of the poorest. One day Mukoki came to the Post with a little bundle of fur, and most of the things he got in exchange for it, mother says, were for the kid. He reached the store at night and expected to leave for home the next noon, which would bring him to his camp before dark. But something delayed him and he didn't get started until the morning after. Meanwhile, late in the afternoon of the day when he was to have been home, his wife bundled up the kid and they set out to meet him. Well--"

A weird howl from the captive wolf interrupted Wabi for a moment.

"Well, they went on and on, and of course did not meet him. And then, the people at the Post say, the mother must have slipped and hurt herself. Anyway, when Mukoki came over the trail the next day he found them half eaten by wolves. From that day on Mukoki was a different Indian. He became the greatest wolf hunter in all these regions. Soon after the tragedy he came to the Post to live and since then he has not left Minnetaki and me. Once in a great while when the night is just right, when the moon is shining and it is bitter cold, Mukoki seems to go a little mad. He calls this a 'wolf night.' No one can stop him from going out; no one can get him to talk; he will allow no one to accompany him when in such a mood. He will walk miles and miles to-night. But he will come back. And when he returns he will be as sane as you and I, and if you ask him where he has been he will say that he went out to see if he could get a shot at something."

Rod had listened in rapt attention. To him, as Wabi proceeded with his story of the tragedy in Mukoki's life, the old Indian was transformed into another being. No longer was he a mere savage reclaimed a little from the wilderness. There had sprung up in Rod's breast a great, human, throbbing sympathy for him, and in the dim candle-glow his eyes glistened with a dampness which he made no attempt to conceal.

"What does Mukoki mean by 'wolf night'?" he asked.

"Muky is a wizard when it comes to hunting wolves," Wabi went on. "He has studied them and thought of them every day of his life for nearly twenty years. He knows more about wolves than all the rest of the hunters in this country together. He can catch them in every trap he sets, which no other trapper in the world can do; he can tell you a hundred different things about a certain wolf simply by its track, and because of his wonderful knowledge he can tell, by some instinct that is almost supernatural, when a 'wolf night' comes. Something in the air to-night, something in the sky--in the moon--in the very way the wilderness looks, tells him that stray wolves in the plains and hills are 'packing' or banding together to-night, and that in the morning the sun will be shining, and they will be on the sunny sides of the mountains. See if I am not right. To-morrow night, if Mukoki comes back by then, we shall have some exciting sport with the wolves, and then you will see how Wolf out there does his work!"

There followed several minutes of silence. The fire roared up the chimney, the stove glowed red hot and the boys sat and looked and listened. Rod took out his watch. It lacked only ten minutes of midnight. Yet neither seemed possessed with a desire to return to their interrupted sleep.

"Wolf is a curious beast," mused Wabi softly. "You might think he was a sneaking, traitorous cur of a wolf to turn against his own breed and lure them to death. But he isn't. Wolf, as well as Mukoki, has good cause for what he does. You might call it animal vengeance. Did you ever notice that a half of one of his ears is gone? And if you thrust back his head you will find a terrible sear in his throat, and from his left side just back of the fore leg a chunk of flesh half as big as my hand has been torn away. We caught Wolf in a lynx trap, Mukoki and I. He wasn't much more than a whelp then--about six months old, Mukoki said.

And while he was in the trap, helpless and unable to defend himself, three or four of his lovely tribe jumped upon him and tried to kill him for breakfast. We hove in sight just in time to drive the cannibals off.

We kept Wolf, sewed up his side and throat, tamed him--and to-morrow night you will see how Mukoki has taught him to get even with his people."

It was two hours later when Rod and Wabigoon extinguished the candles and returned to their blankets. And for another hour after that the former found it impossible to sleep. He wondered where Mukoki was--wondered what he was doing, and how in his strange madness he found his way in the trackless wilderness.

When he finally fell asleep it was to dream of the Indian mother and her child; only after a little there was no child, and the woman changed into Minnetaki, and the ravenous wolves into men. From this unpleasant picture he was aroused by a series of prods in his side, and opening his eyes he beheld Wabi in his blankets a yard away, pointing over and beyond him and nodding his head. Rod looked, and caught his breath.

There was Mukoki--peeling potatoes!

"h.e.l.lo, Muky!" he shouted.

The old Indian looked up with a grin. His face bore no signs of his mad night on the trail. He nodded cheerfully and proceeded with the preparation of breakfast as though he had just risen from his blankets after a long night's rest.

"Better get up," he advised. "Big day's hunt. Much fine sunshine to-day.

Find wolves on mountain--plenty wolves!"

The boys tumbled from their blankets and began dressing.

"What time did you get in?" asked Wabi.

"Now," replied Mukoki, pointing to the hot stove and the peeled potatoes. "Just make fire good."

Wabi gave Rod a suggestive look as the old Indian bent over the stove.

"What were you doing last night?" he questioned.