"Dat Spitz fight lak hell," said Perrault, as
he surveyed the gaping rips and cuts.
"An' dat Buck fight lak two hells," was Francois's answer. "An' now we make good time. No more
Spitz, no more trouble, sure."
While Perrault packed the camp outfit
and
loaded the
sled,
the
dog- driver proceeded
to harness the dogs. Buck
trotted up to the place Spitz
would
have occupied as
leader; but Francois, not noticing him, brought Sol-leks to the coveted position.
In his judgment, Sol-leks was the best lead-dog left. Buck sprang upon Sol-leks in a fury, driving him back and standing in his place.
"Eh? eh?" Francois cried, slapping his
thighs gleefully. "Look at dat
Buck. Heem keel dat Spitz, heem t'ink
to take de job."
"Go 'way, Chook!"
he cried, but Buck refused to
budge.
He took Buck by the
scruff
of the neck, and though the dog growled threateningly, dragged him to one side and replaced Sol-leks. The old dog did not like it, and showed plainly
that he was afraid
of Buck. Fran- cois was
obdurate, but
when he turned his back Buck
again displaced Sol-leks, who was not at all unwilling to
go.
Francois was angry. "Now, by Gar, I feex you!" he cried,
coming
back with a heavy club
in his hand.
Buck remembered the
man
in the red sweater, and retreated slowly; nor did he attempt to
charge
in when Sol-leks was once
more brought
forward. But he circled
just
beyond the
range
of the club,
snarling with bitterness and rage; and while
he circled he watched the
club
so as to dodge
it if thrown by Francois, for he was become
wise
in the way of clubs.
The
driver went
about
his work,
and
he
called
to
Buck when he was ready to put him in his old place
in front of Dave.
Buck retreated two or three steps. Francois followed him up, whereupon he again re- treated. After some time
of this, Francois threw down the
club, thinking that Buck feared a thrashing. But Buck was
in open revolt. He wanted, not
to escape a clubbing, but
to have the leadership. It
was his by right. He had
earned it, and he would not be
content with less.
Perrault took a hand. Between
them
they
ran
him
about
for the better part of an hour.
They threw clubs
at him. He dodged. They
cursed him, and his fathers
and
mothers before
him,
and
all his
seed
to come after
him down to
the remotest generation, and every hair
on his body
and drop of blood
in
his
veins;
and
he
answered curse
with
snarl
and
kept out of their
reach.
He did not try to run away, but retreated around and around the camp, advertising plainly that when his desire
was met,
he would come in and be good.
Francois sat down and scratched his head. Perrault looked at his watch and swore.
Time
was flying,
and
they
should have
been
on
the
trail
an hour gone. Francois scratched his head again. He shook
it and grinned sheepishly
at the courier, who
shrugged his
shoulders in sign that they were beaten. Then Francois went up to where Sol-leks stood and called to Buck. Buck laughed, as dogs laugh,
yet
kept
his
distance. Francois
unfastened Sol-leks's
traces
and
put
him
back in his old place. The team stood harnessed to the sled in an unbroken line, ready for the trail.
There was no place for Buck save
at the front. Once more
Francois
called,
and once more Buck laughed and kept
away.
"T'row down de club," Perrault commanded.
Francois complied, whereupon Buck trotted in, laughing tri- umphantly, and swung around into position at
the head of the team.
His traces were fastened,
the sled broken out,
and
with
both
men
running they dashed out on to the river trail.
Highly as the dog-driver had forevalued Buck, with his two
devils,
he found, while the day was yet young, that he had undervalued. At
a bound Buck took up the duties of
leadership; and where judgment
was required, and quick thinking and quick acting, he showed himself
the su- perior even
of Spitz, of whom Francois
had never seen
an equal.
But it was in giving the law and making his
mates
live
up
to
it, that Buck excelled. Dave and Sol-leks did not mind the change in
leadership. It was none of their business. Their business was to toil, and toil migh-
tily, in the traces. So long as that
were
not
interfered with,
they
did
not care
what
happened. Billee, the good-natured, could lead for
all
they cared, so long as he kept order.
The
rest
of
the
team,
however, had grown unruly during the last days of Spitz,
and
their
surprise was
great
now
that Buck proceeded to lick them
into shape.
Pike, who pulled at
Buck's heels, and who never put an ounce
more
of his weight against
the breast-band than he was compelled to do, was swiftly
and
repeatedly shaken for
loafing; and ere the first day
was done he was
pulling more
than
ever
before
in his life. The first night in camp, Joe, the sour one, was punished roundly—
a thing that
Spitz
had
never
succeeded in doing. Buck
simply smothered him by virtue of superior weight, and cut him up till he ceased
snapping and began to whine for mercy.
The general tone
of the team picked up immediately. It recovered its old-time solidarity, and once more the dogs leaped as one dog in the traces. At the Rink Rapids two
native huskies, Teek and Koona, were ad-
ded; and
the
celerity with
which
Buck broke
them
in took
away Francois's breath.
"Nevaire such a dog
as dat Buck!" he cried. "No, nevaire! Heem worth one t'ousan' dollair,
by Gar! Eh? Wot you say, Perrault?"
And Perrault nodded.
He was ahead of the record then, and gaining day
by day. The trail was in excellent condition, well packed and
hard, and
there
was no new-fallen snow
with
which
to contend. It was
not too cold. The temperature dropped
to fifty below zero and remained there the whole trip.
The men rode and ran by turn, and the dogs
were kept
on the jump, with but infrequent stoppages.
The Thirty Mile
River
was
comparatively coated
with
ice, and they
covered in one day going out
what
had
taken
them
ten
days
coming
in. In one run they
made
a sixty-mile dash
from the foot of Lake Le Barge to the
White
Horse
Rapids. Across
Marsh,
Tagish,
and
Bennett
(seventy miles
of lakes),
they
flew
so fast that the man whose turn it was to run towed behind the
sled
at the end of a rope.
And
on the last
night of the second week they topped White
Pass
and
dropped down the sea slope
with the lights
of Skaguay and of the shipping at their feet.
It was a record run. Each day for
fourteen days
they
had
averaged forty
miles.
For three days
Perrault and
Francois
threw chests
up
and down the main street
of Skaguay and were deluged with invitations to
drink, while the team was the constant centre of a worshipful crowd of dog-busters and mushers. Then three or four western bad men aspired to clean out the town, were riddled like pepper-boxes for their
pains,
and public interest turned to other idols. Next came official
orders. Francois
called Buck to him, threw his arms around him, wept over
him. And that was the last of Francois and Perrault. Like other men, they passed out
of
Buck's life for good.
A Scotch half-breed took charge of him and his mates,
and
in company with a dozen other dog-teams he started back over
the
weary trail
to
Dawson. It was no light
running now,
nor
record time, but heavy toil
each day, with a heavy load behind; for
this was the mail train,
carrying word from
the
world to the men who sought gold under the shadow of the Pole.
Buck did not like it, but he bore up
well to the work, taking
pride in it after the manner of Dave and Sol-leks, and seeing that his mates, wheth- er
they prided in
it or not, did their
fair share. It was a monotonous life, operating with machine-like regularity. One day was very
like
another. At a
certain
time
each
morning the
cooks
turned out,
fires
were
built, and breakfast was eaten. Then,
while some broke camp, others harnessed the dogs, and they were under way an hour
or so before the darkness fell which gave warning of
dawn.
At night, camp
was
made.
Some
pitched the flies, others cut firewood and pine boughs for the beds,
and
still oth- ers carried water or ice for the cooks. Also, the dogs were
fed. To them,
this was the one feature of the day, though it
was good to loaf around, after the fish was eaten, for an hour or so with
the
other
dogs,
of which there were
fivescore and
odd.
There
were
fierce
fighters among them, but three battles
with
the fiercest brought Buck to mastery, so
that when he bristled and showed his teeth they got out of his way.
Best of all, perhaps, he loved to lie near the fire, hind legs
crouched under him, fore legs stretched out in front, head raised, and eyes
blink- ing dreamily at the flames.
Sometimes he thought of Judge Miller's big house in
the sun-kissed Santa Clara Valley, and of the cement
swimming-tank, and
Ysabel, the Mexican
hairless, and
Toots,
the Japan-
ese pug; but
oftener
he
remembered the
man
in
the
red
sweater, the death of
Curly, the great fight
with
Spitz,
and
the
good
things he had eaten
or would like to eat. He was
not homesick. The Sunland was very
dim and distant, and such memories had
no power over him. Far more potent were
the
memories of his heredity that
gave
things he had never seen before
a seeming
familiarity; the instincts (which were
but
the memories of his ancestors become
habits)
which
had lapsed in later days, and still later, in him, quickened and become
alive again.
Sometimes as he crouched there, blinking dreamily at the flames, it seemed that the flames were of another fire, and that as he crouched by
this other fire he saw another and different man from the half-breed cook before him. This other man was shorter of leg and longer of arm, with muscles that were stringy and knotty rather than rounded and swelling. The hair of this man
was long and matted, and his head slanted back un- der it from the eyes. He uttered strange sounds,
and seemed very
much
afraid
of the darkness, into which he peered continually, clutching in his hand, which hung midway
between knee and foot,
a stick with a heavy
stone
made fast
to the end. He
was
all but naked, a
ragged and fire-
scorched skin hanging part way down his back, but
on his
body
there
was much hair.
In some places,
across the chest and
shoulders and
down the outside of
the arms and thighs, it was matted into almost a thick
fur. He did not stand erect, but with
trunk inclined forward from the hips, on legs that bent at the knees. About his
body there was a peculiar springi-
ness, or resiliency, almost
catlike,
and
a quick alertness as
of one who lived in perpetual fear of things seen and unseen.
At other times
this
hairy
man
squatted by the fire
with head between his legs and slept.
On such
occasions his
elbows
were
on
his
knees,
his hands clasped above his head as though to shed rain by the hairy arms.
And beyond that fire, in the circling
darkness, Buck
could
see
many gleaming coals, two by two, always two by two, which he knew
to be the eyes of great beasts of prey. And he could
hear
the crashing
of their bod- ies through the undergrowth, and the noises they made in
the night. And dreaming there by the Yukon bank,
with
lazy
eyes
blinking at
the
fire, these
sounds and
sights
of another world would make the hair to rise along his back and
stand
on end across his shoulders and up his neck,
till he whimpered low and suppressedly, or growled softly,
and the half-
breed cook shouted at him, "Hey, you Buck, wake up!" Whereupon the other world would vanish
and the real world come into his eyes, and
he would get up and yawn and stretch as
though he had been asleep.
It was a hard trip, with the
mail
behind them,
and
the
heavy
work
wore them down. They were short of weight and in poor condition when they
made Dawson, and should have had a ten days' or a week's rest at least. But in two days'
time they dropped down the Yukon
bank from the Barracks, loaded with letters for the outside. The dogs were tired, the drivers
grumbling, and to make
matters worse, it snowed every day.
This meant a soft trail,
greater friction on the runners,
and heavier pulling for the dogs; yet the drivers were fair through it
all, and did their best for the animals.
Each night the dogs were attended to
first. They ate before
the drivers ate, and no man sought his
sleeping-robe till he had seen to the
feet
of the dogs
he drove. Still, their strength went down. Since the beginning of the winter they had travelled eighteen
hundred miles, dragging sleds the whole weary distance;
and eighteen hundred
miles will
tell upon life of the
toughest. Buck
stood it, keeping his mates up to their
work
and maintaining discipline, though he, too, was
very
tired. Billee
cried and
whimpered regularly in his sleep
each
night.
Joe was sourer than ever, and
Sol-leks was unapproachable, blind side or other
side.
But it was Dave who suffered most of all. Something had
gone
wrong with him. He became more
morose and
irritable, and
when camp
was pitched at once made his nest, where his driver fed
him. Once
out of the harness and
down, he did not get on his feet again till
harness-up time in the
morning. Sometimes, in the traces, when jerked by a sudden stop- page of the
sled,
or by straining
to start it, he would cry out with pain.
The driver examined him, but could find nothing. All the drivers became interested in his case. They talked it over at meal-time, and over their last pipes
before going to bed,
and
one
night
they
held
a consultation. He
was brought from his nest to the fire
and was pressed and prodded till he cried out many times. Something was wrong inside,
but
they
could locate no broken bones, could not
make it out.
By the time Cassiar Bar was reached, he
was so weak
that
he was fall-
ing repeatedly in the traces. The Scotch half-breed called
a halt and took
him out of the
team,
making the
next
dog, Sol-leks,
fast to the
sled.
His intention was to rest Dave, letting him run free behind the sled. Sick as he was, Dave resented being
taken
out, grunting and growling while the traces were unfastened, and whimpering broken-heartedly when he saw Sol-leks
in the position he had held and served so long. For
the pride of trace and trail was his, and, sick
unto death, he could not
bear
that
an- other
dog should do his work.
When the sled started, he floundered in
the soft
snow alongside the
beaten trail, attacking
Sol-leks
with
his teeth, rushing against
him and
trying to thrust him
off into the soft snow on the other side, striving to leap inside his traces
and get between him and the
sled, and all the while whining and yelping and crying with
grief and pain.
The half-breed tried to drive him away with the
whip;
but
he paid no heed
to the stinging lash, and the
man had not the heart to strike
harder. Dave refused to run quietly on the trail behind the sled, where the
going
was
easy,
but
con- tinued to
flounder alongside in the soft snow, where the going was most difficult, till exhausted. Then he fell,
and lay where he fell, howling lugubriously as
the long train of sleds churned by.
With the last remnant of his strength he managed to
stagger along be- hind
till the train
made another stop,
when he floundered past the sleds to his own,
where he
stood alongside Sol-leks.
His driver lingered
a moment to get a light
for
his
pipe
from
the
man
behind. Then
he
re- turned and started his dogs. They swung out on the trail with
remark- able
lack of exertion, turned their heads uneasily, and
stopped in sur- prise.
The driver was surprised, too; the sled had not moved. He called
his comrades to
witness the sight. Dave had bitten
through both
of Sol- leks's traces, and was standing directly in front of the
sled
in his proper place.
He pleaded with
his
eyes
to remain there. The driver was perplexed. His comrades talked of
how a dog
could
break
its
heart
through being denied the work that
killed
it, and recalled
instances they had known, where dogs,
too
old
for the toil,
or injured, had died
because they
were cut out
of the traces. Also, they held
it a mercy,
since
Dave
was
to
die anyway, that he should die in
the
traces,
heart-easy and
content. So he was
harnessed in
again,
and
proudly he
pulled as of old,
though more than once he cried out involuntarily from the bite of his inward hurt. Several times he fell down and
was
dragged in the traces, and once
the sled ran upon him so that he limped thereafter in
one of his hind legs.
But he held out till
camp was reached, when his
driver made a
place for him by the fire. Morning found him
too weak to travel. At harness-up time
he
tried
to crawl to his
driver. By convulsive efforts he got on his feet, staggered, and
fell. Then he wormed his
way
forward slowly
to- ward where the harnesses were being put on his mates.
He would ad-
vance his fore legs and drag up his body with a sort
of hitching move- ment, when he
would
advance his fore legs and hitch ahead again for a few more inches. His strength left him, and the last his mates saw of him he lay gasping
in the snow and yearning toward them.
But
they
could
hear
him
mournfully howling till they
passed out
of sight behind a
belt of river timber.
Here the train
was
halted. The Scotch
half-breed slowly retraced his steps to the camp they had left. The men ceased talking. A revolver-shot rang out. The man came back
hurriedly. The whips snapped, the bells tinkled merrily, the sleds churned along
the
trail;
but
Buck knew, and every dog knew, what
had taken place
behind the belt of river trees.