CHAPTER XIV
THE ESCAPE FROM THE WHITE INDIANS
The man, O'Brien, despite the fact that he spent half his time mooningand muttering to himself about quarts of gold and the delights of atorrid clime, proved himself no mean strategist, and his intimateknowledge of the lay of the land and the habits and language of thenatives, was invaluable in formulating the plan of escape.
Far into the night the three lay, Connie and Waseche Bill in theirsleeping bags under the little shelter tent pitched close against therounded side of the _igloo_, and O'Brien lying inside the _igloo_ uponhis vile-smelling bed of skins with his face to the hole he had boredlow in the snow wall.
Their only hope in getting out of the Lillimuit lay in saving the dogs,and it was decided that this could be accomplished only by a quick dashfor the Ignatook, which joined the larger river a quarter of a mile tothe northward.
On the sleds remained about five hundred pounds of caribou venison,besides a small quantity of tea, coffee, bacon, and flour.
"Ut's loike this," concluded O'Brien, when the situation had beencarefully reviewed from every slant and angle, "Oi'll go to owldMetlutak, tomorry, an' Oi'll say: 'Chayfe,' Oi'll say, 'thim dogs is aplinty soight ribbier thin phwat Oi thought they wuz. We can't git nofat onto um insoide av a wake or tin days but we kin hav' th' _potlatch_jist th' same--ondly we'll hav' _two potlatchs_ instead av th' wan. Theyis foive hunder' pounds av caribou mate on th' sleds an' we'll hav' th'caribou _potlatch_ fur-rust, an' th' dog _potlatch_ lather, phwinthey've bin give a chanst to lay on some fat.'
"Th' owld b'y won't loike th' caribou so much as th' dog but Oi'll pintout to um that av we use th' caribou fur-rust th' dogs can't shlip alongin th' noight an' ate it up on us, whoilst av we kill th' dogs an' laveth' caribou, ye can't tell phwat w'd happin."
"But the dogs couldn't eat the meat if they were dead!" objected Connie.
"Whisht lad! Th' chayfe don't know no 'rithmetic. Two _potlatches_ isbether thin wan, an' beyant that he ain't goin' to study.
"We'll wor-rk ut loike this: they's about tin pound av mate apiece--nogr-reat glut--but enough to kape um busy afther th' dance. Th' dance'llbegin phwin th' sun jist edges yondher peaks, an' wanst they git het tothe wor-rk, 'twill kape up till mid-noight. We'll dhrag th' mate over,an' Bill, here, he'll shtand ridy wid his axe to cut ut in chunks, an'Oi'll toss ut to wan an' another so they'll all git a piece. They'llghrab ut an' dhrive their har-rpoons into ut so they kin howld ut overth' foir-re an' thaw ut out. They'll ate ut raw off th' ind av th'har-rpoons--'tis a gr-rand soight!
"Now, her-re's phwere th' b'y comes in: as soon as Bill shtar-rtschoppin' mate, ye must shlip over here an' har-rness th' dogs f'r allye're worth. Ye must finish befoor th' mate's all doled out. Hav' th'loight grub an' th' robes an' shlapin' bags on th' sleds, but lave th'tint shtand. Lave th' roifles in th' pack; they've niver kilt me, an' Oiwon't see har-rm come to thim--but av Oi c'd git a good cr-rack at wanor two wid me fisht, 'tw'd aise th' mimry av thim, twinty-wan toimesthey've dhrug me back over th' tundra.
"Wanst their har-rpoons gits dhrove into th' fr-rozen mate, they'llniver git um out till they're thawed out. They'll be too heavy to runwid, an' be th' toime they kin fr-ree thim, we'll be safe on th'Ignatook, phwere they wudn't come afther us av they doied fur-rst.
"We kin take our own toime gittin' to th' outsoide. They's plinty avgrub in th' tunnel--an' plinty av gold, too--all put away in tomattycans; an' they're heavy--foorty pound apiece they weigh, av they weighan ounce--an' that's wan rayson they've tur-med me back thim twinty-wantoimes.
"How far-r did ye say ut wuz to Flor-ridy, afther ye cr-ross th'muskeg?"
"I reckon it's quite a spell, O'Brien," answered Waseche. "But yo' c'nbet yo' last blue one, me an' th' kid'll see yo' git theah--an' don'tyo' fo'get it!"
Darkness--not the black darkness of the States, but the long twilight ofthe early Arctic night--descended upon the Lillimuit. Upon the narrowplateau overlooking the unnamed river, squat fur-clad figures emergedfrom the tunnel-like entrances of the _igloos_ and, harpoon in hand,moved slowly through the gloom toward a circular level of hard-packedsnow immediately in front of the house of the chief, where other figureswere busily heaping brushwood and frozen pieces of drift upon a firethat smoked and smouldered in the centre of the area.
At the edge of the circle, Waseche Bill, Connie Morgan, and O'Brien satupon the haunches of venison and watched the strange men and women taketheir places about the fire where they ranged themselves in two circles,one within the other, and waited in stolid silence for the appearanceof the two chiefs.
Presently they approached, carrying queer shaped drums which consistedof a narrow frame or hoop of split willow about two feet in diameter.Upon these frames were stretched the thin, tough membranes that form theabdominal lining of the seal. A handle of carved walrus ivory wasaffixed to the hoop with lashings of sealskin. The chiefs carried noharpoons, and as each took his place, the old chief in the inner circle,and the young chief in the outer, they raised their drums and strucksharply upon the edges of the rims with their short ivory drumsticks.The sound produced was a resonant, rather musical note, and at thesignal the circles moved, the inner from right to left, the outer fromleft to right. Slowly, at first, they moved to the measured beat of thedrums. The scene was weird and impressive, with the strange, silentpeople circling in the firelight whose red flare now and then illuminedtheir flat grease-glistening faces. The drums beat faster and betweenthe beats could be heard the husk of the _mukluks_ as they scraped uponthe hard surface of the snow.
Gloom deepened into darkness and still they danced. Suddenly out of thenorth flashed a broad band of light--mystic illusive light writhing andtwisting--now bright--now dim. Rose flashed into amethyst and vividscarlet into purple and pale yellow colouring the whole white world withits reflected light.
Instantly the scene changed. Faster and faster beat the drums; fasterand faster circled the dancers, and suddenly from every throat burst thestrange words of a weird, unearthly chant:
"Kioya ke, Kioya ke, A, yana, yana, ya, Hwi, hwi, hwi, hwi!
Tudlimana, tudlimana, A, yana, yana, ya, Hwi, hwi, hwi, hwi!
Kalutana, Kalutana, A, yana, yana, ya, Hwi, hwi, hwi, hwi!"
Eerie and impressive the sight, and eerie the rise and fall of the chantwith which the children of the frozen wastes greet the Aurora--theflashing, hissing warning of the great Tuana, the bad man, who lies deadat the end of the earth.
The words ceased, the drums struck into a measured, monotonous, pom,pom, pom, and the dancers continued to circle about the fire. A manseparated himself from the others and, stepping into the fire-litcircle, began to chant of his deeds of valour in the hunt, of hisendurance on the trail, and his fortitude in accident and famine. As hechanted he danced, swaying and contorting his body, and then, either histale was told, or he became weary and dropped back into the circle andgave place to another. Hour after hour the white men watched the strangeincantations, moving about at intervals to keep warm. The endurance ofthe natives was a source of wonder to Connie and Waseche Bill. They hadbeen continuously at it for nine hours, and it was midnight whenO'Brien reached swiftly over and touched Connie upon the shoulder.
"Look aloive, now, b'y! The owld chayfe is th-radin' his dhrum f'r ahar-rpoon, an 'tis th' sign f'r th' _potlatch_!"
Sure enough! With amazing suddenness the circles broke up and thedancers made a concerted rush for the caribou meat. Connie slippedunnoticed into the shadows and ran for the sleds, while Waseche Billswung his ax and O'Brien distributed the chunks to the crowding Indians.
As soon as one received his portion he placed it upon the snow and drovehis harpoon in past the barbs to prevent its being jerked off in thewild scramble for a place at the fire. As O'Brien had said, the orgythat started as a religious ceremony was winding up like a Donnybrookfair, for the natives fought and pummelled each other with spear andfist in their efforts to thaw out their meat.
At the end of
half an hour all were served and not a shred remained thatwas not firmly transfixed upon the point of a harpoon. Most of theIndians still fought by the fire, but some of the more fortunate hadretreated to a distance and were gnawing and tearing at the raw chunks,using the harpoons in the manner of a huge fork.
"Now's our chanst!" whispered O'Brien; and with an eye upon those whowere eating, they dodged swiftly behind the chief's _igloo_.
When Connie reached the shelter tent he fell immediately to workharnessing the dogs which he roused from their snug beds in a hugesnowdrift. At first his fingers trembled with excitement so that hefumbled clumsily at the straps, but he soon regained his nerve and, oneafter another, the _malamutes_ were fastened into their proper places.He slipped the collar on to McDougall's gaunt leader and waited, tensewith anxiety, listening and peering into the darkness for sound or sightof his two companions.
After what seemed hours of suspense, he saw them approaching at a run,and sprang to his place, his fingers gripping tightly the handle of hisdog whip.
At the same instant, the boy became aware that the scene at the firesidehad changed. In the uncertain light of the flaring flames he had beenable to make out an indistinct blur of fighting figures accompanied by ajumble of growls and short, animal-like yelps, as the natives pushed andpummelled each other for a place by the coveted fire. As the figures ofWaseche and O'Brien drew closer, the yelps and growls gave place to loudcries, the fighting ceased, and in the dim light Connie made out otherrunning figures, and still others standing upon their chunks of meat andwrenching frantically to free their harpoons.
The next instant Waseche Bill leaped to his dogs and O'Brien threwhimself upon Connie's waiting sled.
"Let 'em go, kid!" cried Waseche, and the sharp crack of the dog whipsrang on the air to the cries of: "Mush! Hi! Hi! Mush-u! Mush-u!"
Both teams shot away toward the inclined trail of the river. Neck andneck, they ran over the crusted snow, while the three free dogs rompedand raced beside them.
While most of the Indians followed directly in the wake of theretreating men, a few of the wiser ones cut straight for the head of thetrail down which the outfit must pass. Waseche's eight _malamutes_,travelling lighter than Connie's big ten-team, forged to the front andgained the incline at the same moment that three Indians led byAnnunduk, the young chief, leaped out upon the trail. The natives, tiredby their long exertions at the dance, had thrown away their weightedharpoons and, except for a short club that Annunduk had snatched from a_cache_ frame as he ran, were unarmed.
Waseche dodged a blow from the club and an Indian who tried to throwhimself upon the flying sled was hurled from the trail and rolled endover end down the steep hundred-foot slope to the river.
A quarter of a minute later McDougall's big _malamutes_ swung into thetrail and would have dashed past the spot before the Indians could havecollected their senses, had not O'Brien, with Irish impetuosity, leanedfar over the side and aimed a mighty blow of his fist at the head ofAnnunduk. The blow swung wide and O'Brien, losing his balance, pitchedheadlong into the snow almost at the Indian's feet.
Connie, whose attention was upon the rushing dogs, felt the sled leapforward as the man's weight was removed, and without an instant'shesitation halted the dogs in their tracks and, clutching his dog whip,ran to the assistance of O'Brien, who was clawing and rolling about inthe snow in a vain effort to regain his feet.
There was not a second to lose. By the light of the stars the boy sawAnnunduk leap forward with club upraised, while the remaining Indian wasmaking ready to spring upon the defenceless man from behind. Connieredoubled his efforts and, just as the chief raised his club for a longshoulder swing at O'Brien's head, the boy's fifteen-foot gut lash sangthrough the thin air. There was a report like a pistol-shot and, with aloud yell of pain, Annunduk dropped his club and clutched frantically athis face.
"The boy's fifteen-foot lash sang through the thin air."]
Meanwhile the other Indian had almost reached the Irishman who hadscrambled to his hands and knees. Connie leaped backward to get therange of his long whiplash, but before the boy could draw back his arm,the air roared with a long, throaty growl and Slasher, the savagewolf-dog, with back-curled lips and flashing fangs, leaped past andlaunched himself full at the throat of the Indian. With awful impact,the great tawny brute landed squarely upon the man's chest, carryinghim backward into the snow. The next instant the air was filled withfrightened shrieks and ferocious, full-mouthed snarls as the wolf-dogtore and wrenched at the heavy skin shirt, while the terrified Indianprotected his face with his arms.
The whole incident occupied scarcely a minute, and Connie half-draggedthe dazed O'Brien to his feet and hurried him to the sled. With a loudwhistle to Slasher, the boy cracked his whip above the ears of theleader and, just as the head of the trail became black with pursuingIndians, the _malamutes_ shot away, with Slasher running beside them,growling fiercely and shaking a great patch of quill-embroidered shirtfront which waved from his tight-clamped jaws.
Down on the river, Waseche Bill was in the act of swinging his dogs fora dash over the back trail when the long ten-team rushed out onto therime-carpeted ice. All danger from pursuit was past, and they jogged theteams slowly northward, while all about them fell the frost spicules ina feathery shimmer of tinsel. Ten minutes later O'Brien pointed out thetrail which passed between two enormous rocks and entered the valley ofthe Ignatook, the creek of the stinking steam, into which the Indiansdared not venture. And it was with a grateful sense of security andrelief that they headed the dogs for the spot where they were to camp,in the old tunnel of the lost mine of the Ignatook--at the end of thedead man's lonely trail.