"Thought they were hunting," replied Johnny.
"Hunting, no!" she exclaimed. "Boiling hooch."
Johnny knew in a moment what she meant. "Hooch" was whisky, moonshine.
Many times he had heard of this vicious liquor which the Eskimos and Chukches concocted by boiling sourdough, made of mola.s.ses, flour and yeast.
The girl told him frankly of the many carouses that had taken place during the winter, of the deaths that had resulted from it, of the shooting of her only brother by a drink-crazed native.
Johnny listened in silence. That she told it all without apparent emotion did not deceive him. Hooch was being brewed now. She wished it destroyed. This was the last brew, for no more mola.s.ses and flour remained in the village. This last drunken madness would be the most terrible of all. She told him finally of the igloo where all the men had gathered.
Johnny pondered a while in silence. He was forever taking over the troubles of others. How could he help this girl, and save himself from harm? What could he do anyway? One could not steal four gallons of liquor before thirty or forty pairs of eyes.
Suddenly, an idea came to him. Begging a cigaret from the native beauty, he lighted it and gave it three puffs. No, Johnny did not smoke. He was merely experimenting. He wanted to see if it would make him sick. Three puffs didn"t, so having begged another "pill" and two matches he left the room saying:
"I"ll take a look."
When the j.a.p girl leaped through the smoke hole of the igloo at East Cape she rolled like a purple ball off the roof. Jumping to her feet she darted down the row of igloos. Pausing for a dash into an igloo, she emerged a moment later bearing under one arm a pile of fur garments and under the other some native hunting implements. Then she made a dash for the sh.o.r.e ice.
It was at this juncture that the first Chukche emerged from the large igloo. At his heels roared the whole gang. Like a pack of bloodthirsty hounds, they strove each one to keep first place in the race. Their grimy hands itched for a touch of that flying girlish figure.
Though she was a good quarter mile in the lead she was hampered by the articles she carried. Certain young Chukches, too, were noted for their speed. Could she make it? There was a full mile of level, sandy beach and quite as level sh.o.r.e ice to be crossed before she could reach the protection of the up-turned and tumbled ice farther out to sea.
On they came. Now their cries sounded more distinctly; they were gaining. Now she heard the hoa.r.s.e gasps of the foremost runner; now imagining that she felt his hot breath on her cheek she redoubled her energy. A gra.s.s slipper flew into the air. She ran on barefooted over the stinging ice.
Now an ice pile loomed very near. With a final dash she gained its shelter. With a whirl she darted from it to the next, then to the right, straight ahead, again to the right, then to the left. But even then she did not pause. She must lose herself completely in this labyrinth of up-ended ice cakes.
Five minutes more of dodging found her far from the shouting mob, that by this time was as hopelessly lost as dogs in a bramble patch.
The j.a.p girl smiled and shook her fist at the sh.o.r.e. She was safe.
Compared to this tangled wilderness of ice, the Catacombs of Rome were an open street.
Throwing a fur garment on a cake of ice, she sat down upon it, at the same time hastily drawing a parka over her perspiring shoulders. She then proceeded to examine her collection of clothing. The examination revealed one fawn skin parka, one under suit of eider duck skin, one pair of seal skin trousers, two pairs of seal skin boots, with deer skin socks to match, and one pair of deer skin mittens. Besides these there was an undressed deer skin, a harpoon and a seal lance.
Not such a bad selection, this, for a moment"s choosing. The princ.i.p.al difficulty was that the whole outfit had formerly belonged to a boy of fourteen. The j.a.p girl shrugged her shoulders at this and donned the clothing without compunctions.
When that task was complete she surveyed herself in an up-ended cake of blue ice and laughed. In this rig, with her hair closely plaited to her head, her own mother would have taken her for a young Chukche boy out for a hunt.
Other problems now claimed her attention. She was alone in the world without food or shelter. She dared not return to the village. Where should she go?
Again she shrugged her shoulders. She was warmly clad, but she was tired and sleepy. Seeking out a cubby hole made by tumbled cakes of ice, she plastered up the cracks between the cakes with snow until only one opening remained. Then, dragging her deer skin after her, she crept inside. She half closed the opening with a cake of snow, spread the deer skin on the ice and curled up to sleep as peacefully as if she were in her own home.
One little thing she had not reckoned with; she was now on the drifting ice of the ocean, and was moving steadily northward at the rate of one mile an hour.
CHAPTER XI
A FACE IN THE NIGHT
When Johnny left the igloo of the native girl he made his way directly up the hill for a distance of a hundred yards. Then, turning, he took three steps to the right and found himself facing the entrance to a second stone igloo. That it was an old one and somewhat out of repair was testified to by the fact that light came streaming through many a crevice between the stones.
Keeping well away from the entrance, Johnny took his place near one of these crevices. What he saw as he peered within would have made John Barleycorn turn green with envy. A moonshine still was in full operation. Beneath a great sheet iron vat a slow fire of driftwood burned. Extending from the vat was the barrel of a discarded rifle. This rifle barrel pa.s.sed through a keg of ice. Beneath the outer end of the rifle barrel was a large copper-hooped keg which was nearly full of some transparent liquid. The liquid was still slowly dripping from the end of the rifle barrel.
That the liquid was at least seventy-five per cent alcohol Johnny knew right well. That it would soon cease to drip, he also knew; the fire was burning low and no more driftwood was to be seen.
Johnny sized up the situation carefully. Aside from some crude benches running round its walls and a cruder table which held the moonshine still, the room was devoid of furnishings. Ranged round the wall, with the benches for seats, were some thirty men and perhaps half as many hard-faced native women. On every face was an expression of gloating expectancy.
Now and again, a hand holding a small wooden cup would steal out toward the keg to be instantly knocked aside by a husky young fellow whose duty it appeared to be to guard the hooch.
Johnny tried to imagine what the result would be were he suddenly to enter the place. He would not risk that. He would wait. He counted the moments as the sound of the dripping liquid grew fainter and fainter. At last there came a loud:
"Dez-ra" (enough), from an old man in the corner.
Instantly the tank was lifted to one side, the fire beaten out, the keg of ice flung outside and the keg of hooch set on the table in the center of the room.
Everybody now bent eagerly forward as if for a spring. Every hand held a cup. But at this instant there came the shuffle of footsteps outside.
Instantly every cup disappeared. The kettle was lifted to a dark corner.
The room was silent when Johnny stepped inside.
"h.e.l.lo," he shouted.
"h.e.l.lo! h.e.l.lo!" came from every corner.
"Where you come from?" asked the former tender of the still.
"East Cape."
"Where you go?"
"Cape Prince of Wales."
"Puck-mum-ie?" (Now?) The man betrayed his anxiety.
"Canak-ti-ma-na" (I don"t know), said Johnny seating himself on the table and allowing his glance to sweep the place from corner to corner.
"I don"t know," he repeated, slowly. "How are you all anyway?"
"Ti-ma-na" (Not so bad), answered the spokesman.
Johnny was enjoying himself. He was exactly in the position of some good motherly soul who held a pumpkin pie before the eyes of several hungry boys. The only difference was that the pie Johnny was thinking of was raw, so exceeding raw that it would turn these natives into wild men. So Johnny decided that, like as not, he wouldn"t let them have it at all.
Johnny enjoyed the situation nevertheless. He was mighty unpopular at that moment, he knew, but his unpopularity now was nothing to what it would be in a very short time. Thinking of this, he measured the distance to the door very carefully with his eye.
At last, when it became evident that if he didn"t move someone else would, he turned to the still manager and said:
"Well, guess I"ll be going. Got a match?"