CHAPTER II
_In Which Jimmie Grimm is Warned Not to Fall Down, and Tog, Confirmed in Bad Ways, Raids Ghost Tickle, Commits Murder, Runs With the Wolves, Plots the Death of Jimmie Grimm and Reaches the End of His Rope_
Jimmie Grimm's father broke Tog to the traces before the winter wasover. A wretched time the perverse beast had of it. Labrador dogs arenot pampered idlers; in winter they must work or starve--as must men,the year round. But Tog had no will for work, acknowledged no mastersave the cruel, writhing whip; and the whip was therefore foreverflecking his ears or curling about his flanks. Moreover, he was a sadshirk. Thus he made more trouble for himself. When his team-matesdiscovered the failing--and this was immediately--they pitilesslyworried his hind legs. Altogether, in his half-grown days, Tog led ayelping, bleeding life of it; whereby he got no more than hisdesserts.
Through the summer he lived by theft when thievery was practicable;at other times he went fishing for himself with an ill will. Meantime,he developed strength and craft, both in extraordinary degree. Therewas not a more successful criminal in the pack, nor was there a moredespicable bully. When the first snow fell, Tog was master atBuccaneer Cove, and had already begun to raid the neighbouringsettlement at Ghost Tickle. Twice he was known to have adventuredthere. After the first raid, he licked his wounds in retirement fortwo weeks; after the second, which was made by night, they found adead dog at Ghost Tickle.
Thereafter, Tog entered Ghost Tickle by daylight, and with his teethmade good his right to come and go at will. It was this that left himopen to suspicion when the Ghost Tickle tragedy occurred. Whether ornot Tog was concerned in that affair, nobody knows. They say at GhostTickle that he plotted the murder and led the pack; but the opinion isbased merely upon the fact that he was familiar with the paths andlurking places of the Tickle--and, possibly, upon the fact of hisimmediate and significant disappearance from the haunts of men.
News came from Ghost Tickle that Jonathan Wall had come late from theice with a seal. Weary with the long tramp, he had left the carcass atthe waterside.
"Billy," he said to his young son, forgetting the darkness and thedogs, "go fetch that swile up."
Billy was gone a long time.
"I wonder what's keepin' Billy," his mother said.
They grew uneasy, at last; and presently they set out to search forthe lad. Neither child nor seal did they ever see again; but they cameupon the shocking evidences of what had occurred.
And they blamed Tog of Buccaneer Cove.
* * * * *
For a month or more Tog was lost to sight; but an epidemic had soreduced the number of serviceable dogs that he was often in JimGrimm's mind. Jim very heartily declared that Tog should have a berthwith the team if starvation drove him back; not that he loved Tog,said he, but that he needed him. But Tog seemed to be doing wellenough in the wilderness. He did not soon return. Once they saw him.It was when Jim and Jimmie were bound home from Laughing Cove. Of asudden Jim halted the team.
"Do you see that, Jimmie, b'y?" he asked, pointing with his whip tothe white crest of a near-by hill.
"Dogs!" Jimmie ejaculated.
"Take another squint," said Jim.
"Dogs," Jimmie repeated.
"Wolves," drawled Jim. "An' do you see the beast with the black eye?"
"Why, dad," Jimmie exclaimed, "'tis Tog!"
"I 'low," said Jim, "that Tog don't need us no more."
But Tog did. He came back--lean and fawning. No more abject contritionwas ever shown by dog before. He was starving. They fed him at theusual hour; and not one ounce more than the usual amount of food didhe get. Next day he took his old place in the traces and helped haulJim Grimm the round of the fox traps. But that night Jim Grimm lostanother dog; and in the morning Tog had again disappeared into thewilderness. Jimmie Grimm was glad. Tog had grown beyond him. The ladcould control the others of the pack; but he was helpless againstTog.
"I isn't so wonderful sorry, myself," said Jim. "I 'low, Jimmie," headded, "that Tog don't like _you_."
"No, that he doesn't," Jimmie promptly agreed. "All day yesterday hesnooped around, with an eye on me. Looked to me as if he was waitin'for me to fall down."
"Jimmie!" said Jim Grimm, gravely.
"Ay, sir?"
"You _mustn't_ fall down. Don't matter whether Tog's about or not. Ifthe dogs is near, _don't you fall down!_"
"Not if I knows it," said Jimmie.
* * * * *
It was a clear night in March. The moon was high. From the rear of JimGrimm's isolated cottage the white waste stretched far to thewilderness. The dogs of the pack were sound asleep in the outhouse. Anhour ago the mournful howling had ceased for the night. Half-way tothe fish-stage, whither he was bound on his father's errand, JimmieGrimm came to a startled full stop.
"What was that?" he mused.
_Courtesy of "The Outing Magazine"_INSTINCTIVELY, HE COVERED HIS THROAT WITH HIS ARMS WHENTOG FELL UPON HIM.]
A dark object, long and lithe, had seemed to slip like a shadow intohiding below the drying flake. Jimmie continued to muse. What had itbeen? A prowling dog? Then he laughed a little at his own fears--andcontinued on his way. But he kept watch on the flake; and so intentwas he upon this, so busily was he wondering whether or not his eyeshad tricked him, that he stumbled over a stray billet of wood, andfell sprawling.
He was not alarmed, and made no haste to rise; but had he then seenwhat emerged from the shadow of the flake he would instantly have beenin screaming flight toward the kitchen door.
The onslaught of Tog and the two wolves was made silently.
There was not a howl, not a growl, not even an eager snarl. They cameleaping, with Tog in the lead--and they came silently. Jimmie caughtsight of them when he was half-way to his feet. He had but time tocall his father's name; and he knew that the cry would not be heard.Instinctively, he covered his throat with his arms when Tog fell uponhim; and he was relieved to feel Tog's teeth in his shoulder. He feltno pain--not any more, at any rate, than a sharp stab in the knee. Hewas merely sensible of the fact that the vital part had not yet beenreached.
In the savage joy of attack, Jimmie's assailants forgot discretion.Snarls and growls escaped them while they worried the small body. Inthe manner of wolves, too, they snapped at each other. The dogs in theouthouse awoke, cocked their ears, came in a frenzy to the conflict;not to save Jimmie Grimm, but to participate in his destruction.Jimmie was prostrate beneath them all--still protecting his throat;not regarding his other parts.
And by this confusion Jim Grimm was aroused from a sleepy stupor bythe kitchen fire.
"I wonder," said he, "what's the matter with them dogs."
"I'm not able t' make out," his wife replied, puzzled, "but----"
"Hark!" cried Jim.
They listened.
"Quick!" Jimmie's mother screamed. "They're at Jimmie!"
With an axe in his hand, and with merciless wrath in his heart, JimGrimm descended upon the dogs. He stretched the uppermost dead. Asecond blow broke the back of a wolf. The third sent a dog yelping tothe outhouse with a useless hind leg. The remaining dogs decamped.Their howls expressed pain in a degree to delight Jim Grimm and toinspire him with deadly strength and purpose. Tog and the survivingwolf fled.
"Jimmie!" Jim Grimm called.
Jimmie did not answer.
"They've killed you!" his father sobbed. "Jimmie, b'y, is you dead?Mother," he moaned to his wife, who had now come panting up with abroomstick, "they've gone an' killed our Jimmie!"
Jimmie was unconscious when his father carried him into the house. Itwas late in the night, and he was lying in his own little bed, and hismother had dressed his wounds, when he revived. And Tog was thenhowling under his window; and there Tog remained until dawn, listeningto the child's cries of agony.
* * * * *
Two days later, Jim Grimm, practicing unscrup
ulous deception, luredTog into captivity. That afternoon the folk of Buccaneer Covesolemnly hanged him by the neck until he was dead, which is the customin that land. I am glad that they disposed of him. He had a noblebody--strong and beautiful, giving delight to the beholder, capableof splendid usefulness. But he had not one redeeming trait ofcharacter to justify his existence.
"I wonder why Tog was so bad, dad," Jimmie mused, one day, when, asthey mistakenly thought, he was near well again.
"I s'pose," Jim explained, "'twas because his father was a wolf."
Little Jimmie Grimm was not the same after that. For some strangereason he went lame, and the folk of Buccaneer Cove said that he was"took with the rheumatiz."
"Wisht I could be cured," the little fellow used to sigh.