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skookum top-chief of the whole caboodle. What he says goes. You want to get that from the start-off. Danny McCanā€™s been tryinā€™ to get away from him for six years. Dannyā€™s all right, but he ainā€™t got go in him. He knows a way outā€”learned it on huntinā€™ tripsā€”to the west of the way you anā€™ me came. He ainā€™t had the nerve to tackle it by his lonely. But we can pull it off, the three of us. Whiskers is the real goods, but heā€™s mostly loco just the same.ā€

ā€œWhoā€™s Whiskers?ā€ Smoke queried, pausing in the wolfing-down of a hot strip of meat.

ā€œWhy, heā€™s the top geezer. Heā€™s the Scotcher. Heā€™s gettinā€™ old, anā€™ heā€™s sure asleep now, but heā€™ll see you to-morrow anā€™ show you clear as print what a measly shrimp you are on his stompinā€™-grounds. These grounds belong to him. You got to get that into your noodle. They ainā€™t never been explored, nor nothinā€™, anā€™ theyā€™re hisn. Anā€™ he wonā€™t let you forget it. Heā€™s got about twenty thousand square miles of huntinā€™ country here all his own. Heā€™s the white Indian, him anā€™ the skirt. Huh! Donā€™t look at me that way. Wait till you see her. Some looker, anā€™ all white, like her dadā€”heā€™s Whiskers. Anā€™ say, caribou! Iā€™ve saw ā€˜em. A hundred thousanā€™ of good running meat in the herd, anā€™ ten thousanā€™ wolves anā€™ cats a-followinā€™ anā€™ livinā€™ off the stragglers anā€™ the leavinā€™s. We leave the leavinā€™s. The herdā€™s movinā€™ to the east, anā€™ weā€™ll be followinā€™ ā€˜em any day now. We eat our dogs, anā€™ what we donā€™t eat we smoke ā€˜n cure for the spring before the salmon-run gets its sting in. Say, what Whiskers donā€™t know about salmon anā€™ caribou nobody knows, take it from me.ā€

 

ā€œHere comes Whiskers lookinā€™ like heā€™s goinā€™ somewheres,ā€ Shorty whispered, reaching over and wiping greasy hands on the coat of one of the sled-dogs.

It was morning, and the bachelors were squatting over a breakfast of caribou-meat, which they ate as they broiled. Smoke glanced up and saw a small and slender man, skin-clad like any savage, but unmistakably white, striding in advance of a sled team and a following of a dozen Indians. Smoke cracked a hot bone, and while he sucked out the steaming marrow gazed at his approaching host. Bushy whiskers and yellowish gray hair, stained by camp smoke, concealed most of the face, but failed wholly to hide the gaunt, almost cadaverous, cheeks. It was a healthy leanness, Smoke decided, as he noted the wide flare of the nostrils and the breadth and depth of chest that gave spaciousness to the guaranty of oxygen and life.

ā€œHow do you do,ā€ the man said, slipping a mitten and holding out his bare hand. ā€œMy name is Snass,ā€ he added, as they shook hands.

ā€œMineā€™s Bellew,ā€ Smoke returned, feeling peculiarly disconcerted as he gazed into the keen-searching black eyes.

ā€œGetting plenty to eat, I see.ā€

Smoke nodded and resumed his marrow-bone, the purr of Scottish speech strangely pleasant in his ears.

ā€œRough rations. But we donā€™t starve often. And itā€™s more natural than the hand-reared meat of the cities.ā€

ā€œI see you donā€™t like cities,ā€ Smoke laughed, in order to be saying something; and was immediately startled by the transformation Snass underwent.

Quite like a sensitive plant, the manā€™s entire form seemed to wilt and quiver. Then the recoil, tense and savage, concentered in the eyes, in which appeared a hatred that screamed of immeasurable pain. He turned abruptly away, and, recollecting himself, remarked casually over his shoulder:

ā€œIā€™ll see you later, Mr. Bellew. The caribou are moving east, and Iā€™m going ahead to pick out a location. Youā€™ll all come on to-morrow.ā€

ā€œSome Whiskers, that, eh?ā€ Shorty muttered, as Snass pulled on at the head of his outfit.

Again Shorty wiped his hands on the wolf-dog, which seemed to like it as it licked off the delectable grease.

Later on in the morning Smoke went for a stroll through the camp, busy with its primitive pursuits. A big body of hunters had just returned, and the men were scattering to their various fires. Women and children were departing with dogs harnessed to empty toboggan-sleds, and women and children and dogs were hauling sleds heavy with meat fresh from the killing and already frozen. An early spring cold-snap was on, and the wildness of the scene was painted in a temperature of thirty below zero. Woven cloth was not in evidence. Furs and soft-tanned leather clad all alike. Boys passed with bows in their hands, and quivers of bone-barbed arrows; and many a skinning-knife of bone or stone Smoke saw in belts or neck-hung sheaths. Women toiled over the fires, smoke-curing the meat, on their backs infants that stared round-eyed and sucked at lumps of tallow. Dogs, full-kin to wolves, bristled up to Smoke to endure the menace of the short club he carried and to whiff the odor of this newcomer whom they must accept by virtue of the club.

Segregated in the heart of the camp, Smoke came upon what was evidently Snassā€™s fire. Though temporary in every detail, it was solidly constructed and was on a large scale. A great heap of bales of skins and outfit was piled on a scaffold out of reach of the dogs. A large canvas fly, almost half-tent, sheltered the sleeping-and living-quarters. To one side was a silk tentā€”the sort favored by explorers and wealthy big-game hunters. Smoke had never seen such a tent, and stepped closer. As he stood looking, the flaps parted and a young woman came out. So quickly did she move, so abruptly did she appear, that the effect on Smoke was as that of an apparition. He seemed to have the same effect on her, and for a long moment they gazed at each other.

She was dressed entirely in skins, but such skins and such magnificently beautiful fur-work Smoke had never dreamed of. Her parka, the hood thrown back, was of some strange fur of palest silver. The mukluks, with walrus-hide soles, were composed of the silver-padded feet of many lynxes. The long-gauntleted mittens, the tassels at the knees, all the varied furs of the costume, were pale silver that shimmered in the frosty light; and out of this shimmering silver, poised on slender, delicate neck, lifted her head, the rosy face blonde as the eyes were blue, the ears like two pink shells, the light chestnut hair touched with frost-dust and coruscating frost-glints.

All this and more, as in a dream, Smoke saw; then, recollecting himself, his hand fumbled for his cap. At the same moment the wonder-stare in the girlā€™s eyes passed into a smile, and, with movements quick and vital, she slipped a mitten and extended her hand.

ā€œHow do you do,ā€ she murmured gravely, with a queer, delightful accent, her voice, silvery as the furs she wore, coming with a shock to Smokeā€™s ears, attuned as they were to the harsh voices of the camp squaws.

Smoke could only mumble phrases that were awkwardly reminiscent of his best society manner.

ā€œI am glad to see you,ā€ she went on slowly and gropingly, her face a ripple of smiles. ā€œMy English you will please excuse. It is not good. I am English like you,ā€ she gravely assured him. ā€œMy father he is Scotch. My mother she is dead. She is French, and English, and a little Indian, too. Her father was a great man in the Hudson Bay Company. Brrr! It is cold.ā€ She slipped on her mitten and rubbed her ears, the pink of which had already turned to white. ā€œLet us go to the fire and talk. My name is Labiskwee. What is your name?ā€

And so Smoke came to know Labiskwee, the daughter of Snass, whom Snass called Margaret.

ā€œSnass is not my fatherā€™s name,ā€ she informed Smoke. ā€œSnass is only an Indian name.ā€

Much Smoke learned that day, and in the days that followed, as the hunting-camp moved on in the trail of the caribou. These were real wild Indiansā€”the ones Anton had encountered and escaped from long years before. This was nearly the western limit of their territory, and in the summer they ranged north to the tundra shores of the Arctic, and eastward as far as the Luskwa. What river the Luskwa was Smoke could not make out, nor could Labiskwee tell him, nor could McCan. On occasion Snass, with parties of strong hunters, pushed east across the Rockies, on past the lakes and the Mackenzie and into the Barrens. It was on the last traverse in that direction that the silk tent occupied by Labiskwee had been found.

ā€œIt belonged to the Millicent-Adbury expedition,ā€ Snass told Smoke.

ā€œOh! I remember. They went after musk-oxen. The rescue expedition never found a trace of them.ā€

ā€œI found them,ā€ Snass said. ā€œBut both were dead.ā€

ā€œThe world still doesnā€™t know. The word never got out.ā€

ā€œThe word never gets out,ā€ Snass assured him pleasantly.

ā€œYou mean if they had been alive when you found themā€”?ā€

Snass nodded. ā€œThey would have lived on with me and my people.ā€

ā€œAnton got out,ā€ Smoke challenged.

ā€œI do not remember the name. How long ago?ā€

ā€œFourteen or fifteen years,ā€ Smoke answered.

ā€œSo he pulled through, after all. Do you know, Iā€™ve wondered about him. We called him Long Tooth. He was a strong man, a strong man.ā€

ā€œLa Perle came through here ten years ago.ā€

Snass shook his head.

ā€œHe found traces of your camps. It was summer time.ā€

ā€œThat explains it,ā€ Snass answered. ā€œWe are hundreds of miles to the north in the summer.ā€

But, strive as he would, Smoke could get no clew to Snassā€™s history in the days before he came to live in the northern wilds. Educated he was, yet in all the intervening years he had read no books, no newspapers. What had happened in the world he knew not, nor did he show desire to know. He had heard of the miners on the Yukon, and of the Klondike strike. Gold-miners had never invaded his territory, for which he was glad. But the outside world to him did not exist. He tolerated no mention of it.

Nor could Labiskwee help Smoke with earlier information. She had been born on the hunting-grounds. Her mother had lived for six years after. Her mother had been very beautifulā€”the only white woman Labiskwee had ever seen. She said this wistfully, and wistfully, in a thousand ways, she showed that she knew of the great outside world on which her father had closed the door. But this knowledge was secret. She had early learned that mention of it threw her father into a rage.

Anton had told a squaw of her mother, and that her mother had been a daughter of a high official in the Hudson Bay Company. Later, the squaw had told Labiskwee. But her motherā€™s name she had never learned.

As a source of information, Danny McCan was impossible. He did not like adventure. Wild life was a horror, and he had had nine years of it. Shanghaied in San Francisco, he had deserted the whaleship at Point Barrow with three companions. Two had died, and the third had abandoned him on the terrible traverse south. Two years he had lived with the Eskimos before raising the courage to attempt the south traverse, and then, within several days of a Hudson Bay Company post, he had been gathered in by a party of Snassā€™s young men. He was a small, stupid man, afflicted with sore eyes, and all he dreamed or could talk about was getting back to his beloved San Francisco and his blissful trade of bricklaying.

ā€œYouā€™re the first intelligent man weā€™ve had,ā€ Snass complimented Smoke one night by the fire. ā€œExcept old Four Eyes. The Indians named him so. He wore glasses and was short-sighted. He was a professor of zoology.ā€

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