Then spoke Amishku[13] who was the leader, or chief, and Toby, who understood their language well, interpreted his words:
"We have been far into the land hunting the caribou, the marten and the fox, and it has been long since we have visited the wigwams of the white man. This is the first tea we have had in many moons. It is good, and we are hungry for it. You are our friends."
"Tell un we"ll be havin" supper after a bit," said Mrs. Twig, "and then I"ll make more tea."
Upon Toby repeating this, the Indians laughed and two of them went to the porch, where their belongings had been left, and presently returned with a quant.i.ty of jerked[14] caribou meat, half a dozen caribou tongues smoked and cured after the Indian manner, and six beautifully tanned hides of buckskin, all of which they presented to Mrs. Twig.
"Give the poor men each a stick of your father"s tobacco," directed Mrs.
Twig, when the Indians had seated themselves upon the floor, with their backs against the wall, after supper.
Toby went to Skipper Zeb"s chest, and fetched a plug for each of them.
When they saw the tobacco their faces beamed, and every man drew a red stone pipe from his belt, and when they had filled their pipes and were sending up clouds of smoke they began to laugh and joke.
The conversation inevitably turned to the success of the winter"s hunt, and the fur they had caught, and Toby went proudly to his chest to produce and exhibit his precious silver fox pelt to the appreciative eyes of the Indians.
He gave an exclamation of horror, and standing up held in his hand the empty bag in which he had kept the pelt. Then he wildly rummaged to the very bottom of the chest, and finally cried out:
""Tis gone! The silver"s gone!"
Madly he looked through the chest again, throwing out every pelt and every article it contained, but the pelt was not there.
FOOTNOTES: [12] Hudson"s Bay Company.
[13] The Beaver.
[14] Dried.
XXIV
THE VENGEANCE OF THE PACK
Marks was well satisfied with his day"s work. He had gone to Double Up Cove for the silver fox pelt, and he had it. He also had the otter pelt.
He had paid a good price for the otter--more than he would have paid under ordinary circ.u.mstances. Still, it would yield him a fair margin of profit.
He and Toby had been alone when the bargain was struck. Mrs. Twig and the little maid had retired and were asleep, and in any case could not have heard the final bargaining or conversation between himself and Toby. He was a.s.sured, also, by the lad"s heavy breathing, that Charley was asleep. There was no witness. It would be his word against Toby"s.
He was a trader with an established reputation, Toby was only a boy.
Marks cringed a little when it occurred to him that contracts made with minors were not binding, if the minor"s parents or guardians chose not to approve them. But this was Labrador, with no court of justice to which they might appeal. Possession was the point, and Marks grinned with satisfaction. He had the pelt in his possession.
No doubt, when the silver fox pelt was missed, he would be accused of having stolen it. When they came to him, he would simply claim that he had purchased it from Toby, upon a trade basis, and that the price was five hundred and fifty dollars. He would stand upon this claim. He was prepared to supply them with goods to this extent of value at any time they might choose to come to his shop at White Bear Run and select them.
The price he should put on the goods, he a.s.sured himself, would be sufficiently high to render the deal a highly profitable one for him.
Marks had no doubt that he could establish a plausible case. He a.s.sured himself that he had no intention of stealing the pelt. At most, he had been guilty only of sharp practice. He would pay for it. From the moment that Aaron Slade had told him about it, he had set his heart upon possessing it, and, he told himself, he usually got what he wanted.
"I"m a go-getter," he laughed in self-appreciation.
The sun was climbing in the sky, and the reflection from the great white field of snow covered ice was intense. At this season it is never safe to travel in the north with the eyes unprotected by goggles fitted with smoked or orange-tinted gla.s.ses. The penalty for neglect might prove a serious attack of snow-blindness.
Marks felt in a pocket for his goggles. He could not find them. He felt in another pocket, and repeated the search, but they were not to be found. Then he remembered that he had laid them on the shelf beside the clock, at Double Up Cove, at the time he had taken off his adikey the previous day, and he had no recollection of having removed them from the shelf.
It was a risk to proceed without them, but there was a very good reason why he could not safely return to the cabin at Double Up Cove. He felt that it was to his advantage, until the Twigs had become accustomed to the loss of the silver fox skin, to place as many miles as he could between himself and them, and to do it as quickly as possible. Toby was stubborn, and n.o.body knew what he might do in his first anger upon discovering his loss.
"He might even shoot," he mused. "That other fellow didn"t like me, and the two work together. I"ll take a chance without gla.s.ses, and won"t go back for them."
He turned about on the komatik and looked toward the cabin, his guilty conscience prompting him to fear that even now he might be followed. The cabin was still in view, and to his relief he could discover no activity, and nothing to alarm him.
He urged the dogs forward, and did not halt until he had pa.s.sed Pinch-In Tickle, and early in the afternoon had turned into the next bay to the southward.
Here he found a grove of spruce trees, and with firewood at hand he stopped and lighted a fire and put his kettle over to boil for luncheon.
When the fire was burning freely, Marks discovered, upon looking into it, a painful sensation in his eyeb.a.l.l.s. The glare of the snow had affected them. Before he finished eating, the pain had developed considerably, and he determined to remain where he was until sunset, when he would proceed to Aaron Slade"s cabin, some five miles farther.
Here he could spend the night, and could borrow a pair of goggles, he was sure, from Aaron. If he kept his eyes closed in the meantime, he had no doubt they would be much improved when evening came.
Snapping his long whip over the dogs, he compelled them to lie down. The big gray dog was slow to obey, and Marks laid the lash upon him two or three times to enforce authority.
The dogs quieted, he dropped the whip in the snow at the rear of the komatik, and within reach, and breaking some boughs arranged them to form a comfortable couch near the fire. He then unlashed his sleeping bag from the top of the load on his komatik, spread it upon the boughs and crawled into it.
Marks fell asleep. When he awoke it was nearing sunset, and time to drive on to Aaron Slade"s. But he could only open his eyes to a narrow slit, and that for a moment, when they would close. The pain was excruciating. Marks was s...o...b..ind.
It was near feeding time, and the dogs were on their feet and restless.
If he could get them started, perhaps they would carry him unguided to Slade"s. At any rate, he determined to try, for he could not remain where he was.
With much fumbling and groping he succeeded fairly well in securing his load. He felt for his whip, and found it on the snow at the rear of the komatik, where he had dropped it after compelling the dogs to lie down.
The restless dogs had swung around in their traces, and were facing him.
Through some mysterious instinct they appeared to have sensed the fact that there was something wrong with Marks. When he ordered them forward, and snapped the whip over them in an effort to straighten them out in the direction in which he wished to go, they replied with snarls, and refused to obey. Their open defiance of his authority sent Marks into a rage. He tried to lash them, but in his blinded condition his aim was poor and his efforts ineffectual.
His anger rose to white heat. If he could not lash them, he could at least beat them into submission, at close quarters, with the clubbed handle of the whip. With a volley of curses, he flew at them blindly, beating right and left, and bringing whines of pain from the unfortunate dogs that he chanced to strike.
Still they did not move into position. In painful peeps that he had through narrow eye slits he saw the big gray dog facing him and snarling at him with a show of its ugly fangs. That dog was the instigator of the trouble he was having! He hated the creature! He would beat it into submission!
The gray dog was in the center of the pack, and to reach it Marks was compelled to step over the traces of some of the other dogs. One of them, in fear of the whip handle, sprang away as Marks approached, and in the movement wrapped its trace around the man"s foot. Marks stooped to disentangle his foot, and as he did the dog swung in another direction in an effort to escape.
This motion jerked the blinded man"s feet from under him, and unable to recover his balance, he fell at full length among the dogs.
In a moment the gray dog, followed by the pack, was upon the prostrate and helpless man. The trader"s team had suddenly become a snarling, yelping savage pack of wolves.
XXV
AMISHKU AND MAIGEN, THE INDIANS
Every one gathered around Toby and the chest. The Indians were no less excited than were Charley and Toby. Again the chest was searched, but with no result, until Charley thrust his hand into the cotton bag in which Toby had kept the missing pelt, and drew forth a piece of paper.