Books: Nomads Of The North
J >>
James Oliver Curwood >> Nomads Of The North
Pages:
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
9 | 10 |
11 |
12 |
13 |
14
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Nanette, the woman, saw Jacques come out of the edge of the timber
late in the afternoon, dragging something on the snow behind him.
In her heart, ever since her husband had begun to talk about him,
she had kept secret to herself a pity for the wild dog. Long
before the last baby had come she had loved a dog. It was this dog
that had given her the only real affection she had known in the
company of The Brute, and with barbarous cruelty Le Beau had
driven it from her. Nanette herself had encouraged it to seek
freedom in the wilderness, as Netah had at last sought his.
Therefore she had prayed that the wild dog of the trapline might
escape.
As Le Beau came nearer she saw that what he drew after him upon
the snow was a sledge-drag made of four lengths of sapling, and
when, a moment later, she looked down at its burden, she gave a
little cry of horror.
Miki's four feet were tied so firmly to the pieces of sapling that
he could not move. A cord about his neck was fastened to one of
the crossbars, and over his jaws Le Beau had improvised a muzzle
of unbreakable BABICHE thong. He had done all this before Miki
regained consciousness after the clubbing. The woman stared, and
there was a sudden catch in her breath after the little cry that
had fallen from her lips. Many times she had seen Jacques club his
dogs, but never had she seen one clubbed like this. Miki's head
and shoulders were a mass of frozen blood. And then she saw his
eyes. They were looking straight up at her. She turned, fearing
that Jacques might see what was in her face.
Le Beau dragged his burden straight into the cabin, and then stood
back and rubbed his hands as he looked at Miki on the floor.
Nanette saw that he was in a strangely good humour, and waited.
"By the Blessed Saints, but you should have seen him kill Netah--
almost," he exulted. "OUI; he had him down by the throat quicker
than you could flash your eye, and twice he was within an inch of
my life when I fought him with the club. DIEU! I say, what will
happen to Durant's dog when they meet at Post Fort 0' God? I will
make a side wager that he kills him before the second-hand of LE
FACTEUR'S watch, goes round twice. He is splendid! Watch him,
Nanette, while I go make a corral for him alone. If I put him in
with the pack he will kill them all."
Miki's eyes followed him as he disappeared through the cabin door.
Then he looked swiftly back to Nanette. She had drawn nearer. Her
eyes were shining as she bent over him. A snarl rose in Miki's
throat, and died there. For the first time he was looking upon
WOMAN. He sensed, all at once, a difference as vast as the world
itself. In his bruised and broken body his heart stood still.
Nanette spoke to him. Never in his life had he heard a voice like
hers--soft and gentle, with a breaking sob in it; and then--
miracle of miracles--she had dropped on her knees and her hands
were at his head!
In that instant his spirit leapt back through the generations--
back beyond his father, and his father's father; back to that far
day when the blood in the veins of his race was "just dog," and he
romped with children, and listened to the call of woman, and
worshipped at the shrine of humankind. And now the woman had run
quickly to the stove, and was back again with a dish of warm water
and a soft cloth, and was bathing his head, talking to him all the
time in that gentle, half-sobbing voice of pity and of love. He
closed his eyes--no longer afraid. A great sigh heaved out of his
body. He wanted to put out his tongue and lick the slim white
hands that were bringing him peace and comfort. And then the
strangest thing of all happened. In the crib the baby sat up and
began to prattle. It was a new note to Miki, a new song of Life's
spring-tide to him, but it thrilled him as nothing else in all the
world had ever thrilled him before. He opened his eyes wide--and
whined.
A laugh of joy--new and strange even to herself--came into the
woman's voice, and she ran to the crib and returned with the baby
in her arms. She knelt down beside him again, and the baby, at
sight of this strange plaything on the floor, thrust out its
little arms, and kicked its tiny moccasined feet, and cooed and
laughed and squirmed until Miki strained at his thongs to get a
little nearer that he might touch this wonderful creature with his
nose. He forgot his pain. He no longer sensed the agony of his
bruised and beaten jaws. He did not feel the numbness of his
tightly bound and frozen legs. Every instinct in him was centred
in these two.
And the woman, now, was beautiful. She UNDERSTOOD; and the gentle
heart throbbed in her bosom, forgetful of The Brute. Her eyes
glowed with the soft radiance of stars. Into her pale cheeks came
a sweet flush. She sat the baby down, and with the cloth and warm
water continued to bathe Miki's head. Le Beau, had he been human,
must have worshipped her then as she knelt there, all that was
pure and beautiful in motherhood, an angel of mercy, radiant for a
moment in her forgetfulness of HIM. And Le Beau DID enter--and see
her--so quietly that for a space she did not realize his presence;
and with him staring down on her she continued to talk and laugh
and half sob, and the baby kicked and prattled and flung out its
little arms wildly in the joy of these exciting moments.
Le Beau's thick lips drew back in an ugly leer, and he gave a
savage curse. Nanette flinched as if struck a blow.
"Get up, you fool!" he snarled.
She obeyed, shrinking back with the baby in her arms. Miki saw the
change, and the greenish fire returned into his eyes when he
caught sight of Le Beau. A deep and wolfish snarl rose in his
throat.
Le Beau turned on Nanette. The glow and the flush had not quite
gone from her eyes and cheeks as she stood with the baby hugged up
to her breast, and her big shining braid had fallen over her
shoulder, glistening with a velvety fire in the light that came
through the western window. But Le Beau saw nothing of this.
"If you make a POOS (a house-kitten) of that dog--a thing like you
made of Minoo, the breed-bitch, I will--"
He did not finish, but his huge hands were clinched, and there was
an ugly passion in his eyes. Nanette needed no more than that. She
understood. She had received many blows, but there was the memory
of one that never left her, night or day. Some day, if she could
ever get to Post Fort O' God, and had the courage, she would tell
LE FACTEUR of that blow--how Jacques Le Beau, her husband, struck
it at the nursing time, and her bosom was so hurt that the baby of
two years ago had died. She would tell it, when she knew she and
the baby would be safe from the vengeance of the Brute. And only
LE FACTEUR--the Big Man at Post Fort O' God a hundred miles away--
was powerful enough to save her.
It was well that Le Beau did not read this thought in her mind
now. With his warning he turned to Miki and dragged him out of the
cabin to a cage made of saplings in which the winter before he had
kept two live foxes. A small chain ten feet in length he fastened
around Miki's neck and then to one of the sapling bars before he
thrust his prisoner inside the door of the prison and freed him by
cutting the BABICHE thongs with a knife.
For several minutes after that Miki lay still while the blood made
its way slowly through his numbed and half-frozen limbs. At last
he staggered to his feet, and then it was that Le Beau chuckled
jubilantly and turned back to the cabin.
And now followed many days that were days of hell and torment for
him--an unequal struggle between the power of The Brute and the
spirit of the Dog.
"I must break you--OW! by the Christ! I WILL break you!"--Le Beau
would say time and again when he came with the club and the whip.
"I will make you crawl to me--OUI, and when I say fight you will
fight!"
It was a small cage, so small that Miki could not get away from
the reach of the club and the whip. They maddened him--for a time,
and Le Beau's ugly soul was filled with joy as Miki launched
himself again and again at the sapling bars, tearing at them with
his teeth and frothing blood like a wolf gone mad. For twenty
years Le Beau had trained fighting dogs, and this was his way. So
he had done with Netah until The Killer was mastered, and at his
call crept to him on his belly.
Three times, from a window in the cabin, Nanette looked forth on
these horrible struggles between the man and the dog, and the
third time she buried her face in her arms and sobbed; and when Le
Beau came in and found her crying he dragged her to the window and
made her look out again at Miki, who lay bleeding and half dead in
the cage. It was a morning on which he started the round of his
traps, and he was always gone until late the following day. And
never was he more than well out of sight than Nanette would run
out and go to the cage.
It was then that Miki forgot The Brute. At times so beaten and
blinded that he could scarcely stand or see, he would crawl to the
bars of the cage and caress the soft hands that Nanette held in
fearlessly to him. And then, after a little, Nanette began to
bring the baby out with her, bundled up like a little Eskimo, and
in his joy Miki whimpered and wagged his tail and grovelled in his
worship before these two.
It was in the second week of his captivity that the wonderful
thing happened. Le Beau was gone, and there was a raging blizzard
outside to which Nanette dared not expose the baby. So she went to
the cage, and with a heart that beat wildly, she unbarred the
door--and brought Miki into the cabin! If Le Beau should ever
discover what she had done--!
The thought made her shiver.
After this first time she brought him into the cabin again and
again. Once her heart stood still when Le Beau saw blood on the
floor, and his eyes shot at her suspiciously. Then she lied.
"I cut my finger she said," and a moment later, with her back to
him, she DID cut it, and when Jacques looked at her hand he saw a
cloth about the finger, with blood-stain on it.
After that Nanette always watched the floor carefully.
More and more this cabin, with the woman and the baby in it,
became a paradise for Miki. Then came the time when Nanette dared
to keep him in the cabin with her all night, and lying close to
the precious cradle Miki never once took his eyes from her. It was
late when she prepared for bed. She changed into a long, soft
robe, and then, sitting near Miki, with her bare little feet in
the fireglow, she took down her wonderful hair and began brushing
it. It was the first time Miki had seen this new and marvellous
garment about her. It fell over her shoulders and breast and
almost to the floor in a shimmering glory, and the scent of it was
so sweet that Miki crept a few inches nearer, and whimpered
softly. After she had done brushing it Miki watched her as her
slim fingers plaited it into two braids; and then, before she put
the light out, a still more curious thing happened. She went to
her bed, made of saplings, against the wall, and from its hiding
place under the blankets drew forth tenderly a little ivory
Crucifix. With this in her hands she knelt upon the log floor, and
Miki listened to her prayer. He did not know, but she was asking
God to be good to her baby--the little Nanette in the crib.
After that she cuddled the baby up in her arms, and put out the
light, and went to bed; and through all the hours of the night
Miki made no sound that would waken them.
In the morning, when Nanette opened her eyes, she found Miki with
his head resting on the edge of the bed, close to the baby that
was nestled against her bosom.
That morning, as she built the fire, something strange and
stirring in Nanette's breast made her sing. Le Beau would be away
until dark that night, and she would never dare to tell him what
she and the baby and the dog were going to do. It was her
birthday. Twenty-six; and it seemed to her that she had lived the
time of two lives! And eight of those years with The Brute! But
to-day they would celebrate, they three. All the morning the cabin
was filled with a new spirit--a new happiness.
Years ago, before she had met Le Beau, the Indians away back on
the Waterfound had called Nanette "Tanta Penashe" ("the Little
Bird") because of the marvellous sweetness of her voice. And this
morning she sang as she prepared the birthday feast; the sun
flooded through the windows, and Miki whimpered happily and
thumped his tail, and the baby cackled and crowed, and The Brute
was forgotten. In that forgetfulness Nanette was a girl again,
sweet and beautiful as in those days when old Jackpine, the Cree--
who was now dead--had told her that she was born of the flowers.
The wonderful dinner was ready at last, and to the baby's delight
Nanette induced Miki to sit on a chair at the table. He felt
foolish there, and he looked so foolish that Nanette laughed until
her long dark lashes were damp with tears; and then, when Miki
slunk down from the chair, feeling his shame horribly, she ran to
him and put her arms around him and pleaded with him until he took
his place at the table again.
So the day passed until mid-afternoon, when Nanette cleared away
all signs of the celebration and locked Miki in his cage. It was
fortunate she was ahead of time, for scarcely was she done when Le
Beau came into the edge of the clearing, and with him was Durant,
his acquaintance and rival from the edge of the Barrens farther
north. Durant had sent his outfit on to Port O' God by an Indian,
and had struck south and west with two dogs and a sledge to visit
a cousin for a day or two. He was on his way to the Post when he
came upon Le Beau on his trapline.
Thus much Le Beau told Nanette, and Nanette looked at Durant with
startled eyes. They were a good pair, Jacques and his guest, only
that Durant was older. She had become somewhat accustomed to the
brutality in Le Beau's face, but she thought that Durant was a
monster. He made her afraid, and she was glad when they went from
the cabin.
"Now I will show you the BETE that is going to kill your POOS as
easily as your lead-whelp killed that rabbit to-day, m'sieu,"
exulted Jacques. "I have told you but you have not seen!"
And he took with him the club and the whip.
Like a tiger fresh out of the jungles Miki responded to the club
and the whip to-day, until Durant himself stood aghast, and
exclaimed under his breath: "MON DIEU! he is a devil!"
From the window Nanette saw what was happening, and out of her
rose a cry of anguish. Sudden as a burst of fire there arose in
her--triumphant at last and unafraid--that thing which for years
The Brute had crushed back: her womanhood resurrected! Her soul
broken free of its shackles! Her faith, her strength, her courage!
She turned from the window and ran to the door, and out over the
snow to the cage; and for the first time in her life she struck at
Le Beau, and beat fiercely at the arm that was wielding the club.
"You beast!" she cried. "I tell you, you SHALL NOT! Do you hear?
You SHALL NOT!"
Paralyzed with amazement, The Brute stood still. Was this Nanette,
his slave? This wonderful creature with eyes that were glowing
fire and defiance, and a look in her face that he had never seen
in any woman's face before? NON--impossible! Hot rage rose in him,
and with a single sweep of his powerful arm he flung her back so
that she fell to the earth. With a wild curse he lifted the bar of
the cage door.
"I will kill him, now; I will KILL him!" he almost shrieked. "And
it is YOU--YOU--you she-devil! who shall eat his heart alive! I
will force it down your throat: I will--"
He was dragging Miki forth by the chain. The club rose as Miki's
head came through. In another instant it would have beaten his
head to a pulp--but Nanette was between it and the dog like a
flash, and the blow went wild. It was with his fist that Le Beau
struck out now, and the blow caught Nanette on the shoulder and
sent her frail body down with a crash. The Brute sprang upon her.
His fingers gripped in her thick, soft hair.
And then--
From Durant came a warning cry. It was too late. A lean gray
streak of vengeance and retribution, Miki was at the end of his
chain and at Le Beau's throat. Nanette HEARD! Through dazed eyes
she SAW! She reached out gropingly and struggled to her feet, and
looked just once down upon the snow. Then, with a terrible cry,
she staggered toward the cabin.
When Durant gathered courage to drag Le Beau out of Miki's reach
Miki made no movement to harm him. Again, perhaps, it was the
Beneficent Spirit that told him his duty was done. He went back
into his cage, and lying there on his belly looked forth at
Durant.
And Durant, looking at the blood-stained snow and the dead body of
The Brute, whispered to himself again:
"MON DIEU! he is a devil!"
In the cabin, Nanette was upon her knees before the crucifix.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
There are times when death is a shock, but not a grief. And so it
was with Nanette Le Beau. With her own eyes she had looked upon
the terrible fate of her husband, and it was not in her gentle
soul to weep or wish him alive again. At last there had overtaken
him what LE BON DIEU had intended him to receive some day:
justice. And for the baby's sake more than her own Nanette was not
sorry. Durant, whose soul was only a little less wicked than the
dead man's, had not even waited for a prayer--had not asked her
what to do. He had chopped a hole in the frozen earth and had
buried Le Beau almost before his body was cold. And Nanette was
not sorry for that. The Brute was gone. He was gone for ever. He
would never strike her again. And because of the baby she offered
up a prayer of gratitude to God.
In his prison-cage of sapling bars Miki cringed on his belly at
the end of his chain. He had scarcely moved since those terrible
moments in which he had torn the life out of the man-brute's
throat. He had not even growled at Durant when he dragged the body
away. Upon him had fallen a fearful and overwhelming oppression.
He was not thinking of his own brutal beatings, or of the death
which Le Beau had been about to inflict upon him with the club; he
did not feel the presence of pain in his bruised and battered
body, nor in his bleeding jaws and whip-lashed eyes. He was
thinking of Nanette, the woman. Why had she run away with that
terrible cry when he killed the man-beast? Was it not the man-
beast who had struck her down, and whose hands were at her white
throat when he sprang the length of his chain and tore out his
jugular? Then why was it that she ran away, and did not come back?
He whimpered softly.
The afternoon was almost gone, and the early gloom of mid-winter
night in the Northland was settling thickly over the forests. In
that gloom the dark face of Durant appeared at the bars of Miki's
prison. Instinctively Miki had hated this foxhunter from the edge
of the Barrens, just as he had hated Le Beau, for in their brutish
faces as well as in their hearts they were like brothers. Yet he
did not growl at Durant as he peered through. He did not even
move.
"UGH! LE DIABLE!" shuddered Durant.
Then he laughed. It was a low, terrible laugh, half smothered in
his coarse black beard, and it sent an odd chill through Miki.
He turned after that and went into the cabin.
Nanette rose to meet him, her great dark eyes glowing in a face
dead white. She had not yet risen above the shock of Le Beau's
tragic death, and yet in those eyes there was already something
re-born. It had not been there when Durant came to the cabin with
Le Beau that afternoon. He looked at her strangely as she stood
with the baby in her arms. She was another Nanette. He felt
uneasy. Why was it that a few hours ago he had laughed boldly when
her husband had cursed her and said vile things in her presence--
and now he could not meet the steady gaze of her eyes? DIEU! he
had never before observed how lovely she was! He drew himself
together, and stated the business in his mind.
"You will not want the dog," he said. "I will take him away."
Nanette did not answer. She seemed scarcely to be breathing as she
looked at him. It seemed to him that she was waiting for him to
explain; and then the inspiration to lie leapt into his mind.
"You know, there was to be the big fight between HIS dog and mine
at Post Fort O' God at the New Year carnival," he went on,
shuffling his heavy feet. "For that, Jacques--your husband--was
training the wild dog. And when I saw that OOCHUN--that wolf
devil--tearing at the bars of the cage I knew he would kill my dog
as a fox kills a rabbit. So we struck a bargain, and for the two
cross foxes and the ten red which I have outside I bought him."
(The VRAISEMBLANCE of his lie gave him courage. It sounded like
truth, and Jacques, the dead man, was not there to repudiate his
claim.) "So he is mine," he finished a little exultantly, "and I
will take him to the Post, and will fight him against any dog or
wolf in all the North. Shall I bring in the skins, MADAME?"
"He is not for sale," said Nanette, the glow in her eyes
deepening. "He is my dog--mine and the baby's. Do you understand,
Henri Durant? HE IS NOT FOR SALE!"
"OUI," gasped Durant, amazed.
"And when you reach Post Fort O' God, m'sieu, you will tell LE
FACTEUR that Jacques is dead, and how he died, and say that some
one must be sent for the baby and me. We will stay here until
then."
"OUI," said Durant again, backing to the door.
He had never seen her like that. He wondered how Jacques Le Beau
could swear at her, and strike her. For himself, he was afraid.
Standing there with those wonderful eyes and white face, with the
baby in her arms, and her shining hair over her breasts, she made
him think of a picture he had once seen of the Blessed Lady.
He went out through the door and back to the sapling cage where
Miki lay. Softly he spoke through the bars.
"OW, BETE" he called; "she will not sell you. She keeps you
because you fought for her, and killed MON AMI, Jacques Le Beau.
And so I must take you my own way. In a little while the moon will
be up, and then I will slip a noose over your head at the end of a
pole, and will choke you so quickly she will not hear a sound. And
who will know where you are gone, if the cage door is left open?
And you will fight for me at Post Fort 0' God. MON DIEU! how you
will fight! I swear it will do the ghost of Jacques Le Beau good
to see what happens there."
He went away, to where he had left his light sledge and two dogs
in the edge of the timber, and waited for the moon to rise.
Still Miki did not move, A light had appeared in the window of the
cabin, and his eyes were fixed on it yearningly as the low whine
gathered in his throat again. His world no longer lay beyond that
window. The Woman and the baby had obliterated in him all desire
but to be with them.
In the cabin Nanette was thinking of him--and of Durant. The man's
words came to her again, vividly, significantly: "YOU WILL NOT
WANT THE DOG." Yes, all the forest people would say that same
thing--even LE FACTEUR himself, when he heard. SHE WOULD NOT WANT
THE DOG! And why not? Because he had killed Jacques Le Beau, her
husband, in defence of her? Because he had freed her from the
bondage of The Brute? Because God had sent him to the end of his
chain in that terrible moment that the baby Nanette might live, as
the OTHER had not, and that she might grow up with laughter on her
lips instead of sobs? In her there rose suddenly a thought that
fanned the new flame in her heart. It MUST have been LE BON DIEU!
Others might doubt, but she--never. She recalled all that Le Beau
had told her about the wild dog--how for many days he had robbed
the traps, and the terrific fight he had made when at last he was
caught. And of all that The Brute had said there stood out most
the words he had spoken one day.
"He is a devil, but he was not born of wolf. NON, some time, a
long time ago, he was a white man's dog."
A WHITE MAN'S DOG!
Her soul thrilled. Once--a long time ago--he had known a master
with a white heart, just as she had known a girlhood in which the
flowers bloomed and the birds sang. She tried to look back, but
she could not see very far. She could not vision that day, less
than a year ago, when Miki, an angular pup, came down out of the
Farther North with Challoner; she could not vision the strange
comradeship between the pup and Neewa, the little black bear cub,
nor that tragic day when they had fallen out of Challoner's canoe
into the swift stream that had carried them over the waterfall and
into the Great Adventure which had turned Neewa into a grown bear
and Miki into a wild dog. But in her heart she FELT the things
which she could not see. Miki had not come by chance. Something
greater than that had sent him.
She rose quietly, so that she would not waken the baby in the
crib, and opened the door. The moon was just rising over the
forest and through the glow of it she went to the cage. She heard
the dog's joyous whine, and then she felt the warm caress of his
tongue upon her bare hands as she thrust them between the sapling
bars.
Pages:
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
9 | 10 |
11 |
12 |
13 |
14