CHAPTER VII
Twenty-four Hours of Sunlight
“WHOOPS! Look at the sleigh, dad! Look at it for a wreck!”
Kak stormed down on his father with these cheerful words as the latter returned from fishing.
The party had been delayed at Rae River, Noashak was feverish; she lay on her bed for a week and took no interest in anything, while her parents worried over her and over this hitch in their plans. If they were held up long it was likely to place them in serious difficulty, for they had to cross another large river before turning south on the prairie, and with no boat to carry inland they must cross by the bay ice at its mouth. Spring had begun in earnest here; the snow was melting rapidly. Warm water pouring down every stream and rill and all along the banks ran out over the ice and melting formed channels, which flowed themselves like little rivers seeking their outlet by way of the tide cracks. They ran in all directions, wearing away the softer ice and leaving wet bumps and hummocks sticking up between. The tide cracks, which are always found in ice near the shore and are caused, as their name suggests, by the action of the tides, instead of being several inches wide, were worn away to three or four feet. Hauling a loaded sleigh across these and over this wet irregular surface was sure to prove a pretty severe business. Guninana dare not start with a sick child.
A stubborn spell of glum and sulky weather setting in saved their lives. Noashak recovered during the second week. She was able to be out when a stiff wind, springing up in the night, at last blew the clouds off, and allowed the sun to rise into a bare sky. It rose so early and shone so long and so fiercely all the ice patches melted, and the snow vanished as if by magic. Taptuna’s home-made, musk-ox runner began to look ill about six o’clock. The little girl had watched it anxiously as it grew softer and softer, and finally doubled down under the weight of the frame and lay sodden and sad on the wet ground.
“That’s your finish!” Kak promised. “You’ll have to leg it along now. No more rides on top of the load—how will you like it, sis?”
Noashak tossed her head. “I can’t walk—I am sick! Daddy’ll arrange something,” she added confidently.
Later she watched the faces of the older people gathered around the useless sleigh.
“Daddy, I can’t walk,” she wheedled, shoving her little hand into his.
“Don’t you worry,” he said, pulling her ear affectionately while she rubbed against him. “Kak and Kommana and I are going to fix up a runner good enough to get us around the river mouth. Run, boy, and tell your friend if he whirls in and helps he can have the old sled for his trouble; we’ll cache it for him down the coast.”
Kak darted off; Taptuna turned to the others.
“I’ve had a look at the bay and we’ve got to leave to-night or give up. One more day like this will mean open water all along the shore.”
Kak soon came back bringing his chum. Kommana thought it a good bargain, though the sleigh was very old; he agreed to do his bit and for a wonder worked, boring holes vigorously till the sweat dripped from his nose and chin. By supper time they had knocked up a substitute runner and everything was packed and ready. After they had eaten, the whole village turned out to see them off, with hearty good will and pleased anticipation of their return with the first autumn snow.
The journey started by a long slow drag over bare ground before the ice bridged the open water from the Rae River and gave them a chance to get out on to the bay. It was hard for everybody; the men and Kak had to help the dogs pull, and Noashak walked with her mother’s hand. Once they touched the ice however, Taptuna packed his small girl in behind the load where a nest had been left for her and where she could be kept dry. She did not find it very comfortable being hauled from hummock to hummock with the men wading up to their knees, dragging the sled out of one rill, over a bump of harder ice, and down across another rill; always having to be careful it did not slip sidewise and dump the passenger into a couple of feet of water. Still, it was better than trying to walk on her short legs. They were all cheerful about their trouble and had lots of fun, roaring with laughter when either of the team slid off the ice into the water and had to swim for it, as frequently happened, for Eskimo dogs are not very tall.
Occasionally they found good going for a few miles when the thaw water had all run off into some neighboring crack, and the surface was fairly even and nearly dry. But after they passed the Richardson River and tried to work nearer the shore, their difficulties increased every minute. Taptuna began to be anxious; Okak was in a blue funk; and even Guninana, the cheerful, cast many a glance at the brightening sky. If they could not find an ice bridge to the shore before sunrise, their chances of making it at the end of another long, sweltering, Arctic day would be considerably less. At last they came to a stretch where the ice did close in to the shore.
“It’s rotten, absolutely rotten!” Okak almost wept.
“We’ve got to try it just the same,” Taptuna said.
He looked significantly eastward. The sky already crimsoned, the weather promised hot and clear. Out on the gulf the sea ice, though rough, was thick enough and safe enough; here shore water had eaten it away above and below till it was dangerously thin. Taptuna gazed longingly toward the land rising from the remains of a solid old pressure ridge still lying on the beach firm and inviting. He felt impelled to risk crossing—though he knew it was a risk for both themselves and the sleigh.
They debated the question; Okak was strongly negative.
“Don’t try it, don’t try it! Let us go farther on—we may come to a better bridge.”
“And we may not find any at all. There is the Coppermine River south,” Guninana answered.
“That’s true.” Taptuna fell into a deep silence gazing carefully up and down the coast.
“This is as good as any place,” he decided. “I’m going to try. You and Noashak had better come along with me; Kak can drive the dogs, and Okak steady the sleigh behind.”
“We’ll be drowned! We’ll certainly be drowned! Oh, what will become of us?” moaned Okak.
“We’ll be drowned!” piped Noashak.
Amid this dismal chorus the three started picking their way to shore. Noashak had to be lifted across all the deep places, and it took time, yet the going was better than Taptuna expected. As soon as he had landed the child safely on the old ridge he turned back to help with the sleigh.
Meantime Okak had persuaded Kak into crossing a little farther on where the ice looked smoother, reasoning if it were smoother they could move faster and so would be less likely to go through. Sound enough sense in its way, if they had not happened to choose the thinnest part of the whole bridge. Taptuna took in the position at a glance and watched, horrified. He could see the ice bending under them, and dashed up shore, followed by Guninana. The load had but one chance now—to keep moving.
“Come on, Kak!—ahead of the dogs!” he yelled. “Rush it. Okak, hold back there—farther! Farther back! Right away from the sled!”
Kak was in his element. His eyes snapped and his heart bounded.
“Hok!—Hok!—Hok!” he cried to his team. Everybody broke in with yells and cheers.
The light sleigh went banging and bumping over the rough surface, taking its chances, for Okak was too scared to be much good at his office. His place behind had turned out the worst rather than the best, yet he clung to it. Mad with fear at realizing he would be the last to land, he kept pace with the team, flinging his weight on to ice already strained and bending under the load. The feel of it bending drove him daffy. He mixed up this quiet shore water with his recent dread of the straits, saw himself going through to certain death, and lost the remnant of his wits. Instead of holding back as Taptuna cried at him, he pitched forward, clutching the only solid thing in sight.
Kak landed with a flying jump. The runners were already half over on firm ice, when a shriek of mortal terror rent the air. The jar of Okak’s hands falling on the sleigh had been a last straw. Down went the back end into the water with him clinging to it like a limpet.
Taptuna understood his companion so well now he had foreseen this—was expecting disaster. At the same instant Okak grabbed for the load he grabbed for the dogs, and was hauling them on when Kak alighted. For a moment the sleigh teetered on the edge of the solid ice; then Guninana and the boy, screaming wildly, threw themselves each over a runner, clung to them, pressed them down. That day’s hasty repairs tore away with a splintering crash; but the chief guide had control by then. Their combined weight heaved the stern out of the water with Okak still aboard. He was blowing like a bow-head whale and quite insane from fright.
A long pull and a strong pull altogether with the dogs dragged their neighbor and their goods to safety; and then Kak and his mother dropped on the ground and laughed till they could laugh no more. Tennis flannels and evening clothes are funny when sopping wet, but for real class neither of them can hold a candle to a fur suit! Okak resembled nothing on earth but a half drowned pup. He was a small man to begin with, and the hair and hide of his loose garments now fitted like his skin. He stood with chattering teeth and dripping locks, a sort of human spigot, while his four friends made the welkin ring.
“Ha—ha—ha—ha!”
“He—he—he!”
“Oh—ho—ho—ho!”
HE STOOD WITH CHATTERING TEETH AND DRIPPING LOCKS.
Sight of the poor chap slopping around shivering and trying to pull his wet shirt over his head at last touched a soft spot in Guninana’s heart. She shut Taptuna up, gave Noashak a poke to make her stop, and turned to Kak.
“Go, you two, and gather driftwood. Don’t you see our walrus needs a fire?”
They dashed away with a chuckle and a shout, while Taptuna worked off his humor unlashing the load. They would have to stay here a couple of days to dry out their things, but that would be a rest for Noashak, so no one minded. Kak built a dandy bonfire; his father lugged their goods up on top of the bank into the sunshine. Okak, wearing borrowed clothes, pitched the tent, and Guninana cooked breakfast. Considering they were, in a sense, shipwrecked on a barren spot where none of them had the least desire to linger, they made a wonderfully jolly camping party of it. Okak got a good deal of teasing about his bath; but as he was the best tempered man in the world, when not frightened or worried, he laughed at himself, enjoyed their jokes, cracked others, and even showed a slight spirit of vainglory over having done something to bring him into such prominence. Kak marveled at this and stored it in his memory for Akpek.
“Wouldn’t it make a wolf laugh!” he said to his parents later. “Poor old Okak doesn’t know he’s a joke!”
“Perhaps it is better to be a joke than not to be noticed at all. Every man cannot expect to excel in this publicity business as you do. Okak has never been a hero,” Taptuna replied, winking at Guninana.
Kak took the speech seriously, straightened up, threw out his chest, and said in a patronizing tone: “No, and I guess he never will be.”
The whole family burst into roars of laughter.
When the boy found they were making fun of him he did not take it half so well as Okak. He felt cheap and comic and knew he ought to laugh; but he was angry instead of amused, and that made him feel mean; then he was angrier still, so he went out and played with the dogs.
The travelers turned in right away, and when they waked up, after a long sleep, all the things they had laid out under the fierce sun were bone-dry. Noashak, too, seemed none the worse for her rough journey. She looked like a morning flower; and seeing these good signs, Taptuna said they would continue at once.
“Hurrah!”
Kak cut a caper, jumped over Sapsuk’s back and then over Pikalu’s, turned a handspring and mired down on the oozy ground. Despite the pessimist he was all eagerness to explore that vast inland rolling southward as far as the eye could see. Kommana’s horror of the prairie found no echo in the boy’s soul. He was far too hardy to be upset by the promise of a few difficulties. Poof! Mosquitoes and flies raged everywhere at this time of year, and it was hot all over. Taptuna’s family had so rarely suffered for food that Kak only half believed in hunger, while wholly yielding to the lure of the unknown. This country they were about to cross and invade held two great, romantic possibilities—grizzly bears and Indians! Both thrilled him with terror and anticipation.
Since seeing Omialik kill the polar foe with his magic gun, Kak had lost some of his respect for that deadly enemy. Still, bears are bears, and everybody in the Arctic circle believes that a grizzly, when angered, is the fiercest of this powerful family. Kak yearned and dreaded to meet one of these big, brown bears. He could shut his eyes and see the huge beast rearing up before him, twice his own height, tawny-colored, shaggy, long-nosed, all teeth and claws and matted hair; could see himself tackling the brute single-handed, plunging his knife in under the foreleg.... Hunters do tackle them single-handed with a knife; but Kak had once met a man whose eye had been clawed out by a grizzly, and so at that point the vision usually faded in a wild surge of funk.
Indians were not so definite to the boy’s imagination. They fascinated him more while frightening him quite as much. Eskimos are the natural enemies of all Indians. For centuries the Mackenzie River Eskimos maintained an aggressive attitude toward their red-skinned neighbors; but with Kak’s people fear was divided half and half. The two races rarely encountered each other. When the snow had disappeared, while the lakes were still frozen, it was the Indians’ custom to cross on the ice and make their yearly trading trip to the Hudson’s Bay post on Great Bear Lake. So when the Eskimos arrived at Dease River most of the Slavey Indians were three hundred miles away. Occasionally, however, stray bands ran across each other with dire results. Stories of Indians attacking tents in which Eskimos slept and killing them all had been part of Kak’s education. The possibility of seeing Indians made the second thrill of this amazing summer; while over all hung the certainty of meeting Omialik again and learning a whole lot more about Kabluna. At marching orders the boy went leaping and hurrahing around like a mad thing; and supplied a pair of willing hands when it came to packing up.
Their entire store of dried meat was put into saddlebags slung over the dogs’ backs; and the tent poles were tied to the harness so that their long ends dragged behind. This seems an awkward kind of load for poor Sapsuk and Pikalu, but nobody expected to go more than about two miles an hour, so it was easy for them to keep up with the party. Guninana carried her cooking pots very carefully rolled in bedding skins, her ulu (a little knife, like a chopping knife, for preparing food) and her sewing kit. Taptuna and Okak carried their bows and arrows, their tool bags, which were heavy, and some fragments of copper that might come in handy for making new arrows to replace those lost in the hunt. Kak had his bow and arrows, and to show what a man he was, insisted on carrying the tent besides. They all wore their oldest clothes. Old clothes are much the most comfortable at this time of year, for the hair being rubbed off makes them cooler; also if they are gone into holes in places, as Kak’s were, little breezes can trickle in and cool the skin; when the thermometer stands at about a hundred degrees, cooling winds are welcome. Unfortunately though, sunshine and hot weather bring insects. Along with the little breezes mosquitoes come, “biz, biz, biz,” and settle on the holes and bite like fury.
“Ouch!” Kak would cry, clapping his hand on elbow or knee, and desperately fanning the host away.
Mosquitoes are not the worst pests in the Arctic either. They only came poking their noses into the holes and biting him a few times on that spot. Later on he would have to endure sand flies. Once these find an opening and buzz into it they never go out again, but creep up the arms and down the legs and crawl and itch till their victim dances in agony.
I want you to try to picture the party coming up over a crest of the rolling prairie: the dogs clattering their awkward gear on either side, the people, all in their loose, old, baggy clothes, all but Noashak bending a little under their loads, and all swishing right and left, left and right, with willow branches or loon skins at the cloud of insects following them.
“Swish, swish, swish.” “Biz, biz, biz, biz, biz.” “Swish.” “Biz, biz, biz, biz.” “Swish, swish.” “Biz, biz, biz, biz, biz, biz.”
So the chorus kept up from waking to sleeping, the army of flies numbering about a million to one and getting quite the best of it.
Kak trudged on manfully ahead of the others, keeping up with his father; sometimes stopping to fit an arrow and take a shot at a bird or small animal, and always with his eye open for the dreaded grizzly bear. Game abounded. Taptuna killed a caribou right at the start and they feasted on it, carrying the fresh meat with them. They were faring well, yet the farther they went inland the hotter it grew, till Guninana panted under her load of bedding as they toiled up a sharp incline to pitch camp. Okak always insisted on choosing the highest point for camping.
“You never know when or from where the Indians may come!” he repeated every evening; a speech that thrilled Kak, and made Taptuna smile, though he humored it.
“Much easier to spy out caribou from a hill,” he allowed.
And Guninana sighed: “There may be a breeze on the high ground and that will mean fewer mosquitoes.”
So far they had found excellent camping places with plenty of loose stones lying about to use as tent pegs weighting the flaps; and quantities of heather for cooking; but the increasing heat made their day’s march dreadfully tiresome and uncomfortable. At last it proved too much even for Okak.
“It’s sheer waste of effort to lug this extra food. We could go twice as fast without,” he said, removing the heavy bags of dried meat from Pikalu’s back. The poor dog laid himself on the ground panting. His eyes were swollen almost shut and his feet lame from mosquito bites all around where the hair joined the pad. The whole family gathered to consider his plight.
“Poor old fellow!” Kak stroked him gently.
“Looks to me as if there was going to be plenty of game,” Okak continued, “and if we cached this stuff here we could let the dogs run light.”
Taptuna stood plunged in deep thought. It was his wise and safe custom to carry extra food across any region where scarcity had ever been rumored; but on the other hand they were moving slowly, he did not want to miss Omialik at the ford, and if the dogs petered out it would delay them still further. Sapsuk was in better condition only because Kak had taken care of him, swishing for his favorite as well as himself. Things could not go on thus. The ease with which they were getting supplies amazed him; and most of all he felt impressed by the fact of Okak’s overcoming his habitual fears far enough to make such a suggestion.
After considerable grave pondering the chief guide said: “That is a good idea of yours, neighbor. We will cache the meat here for our return journey. Pikalu and Sapsuk shall carry their poles and the fresh game.”
Unfortunately they dared not trust the bedding to the dogs, for in a lake country such as they were crossing the animals constantly splash into the water to cool off, and drag their saddlebags with them.
All hands turned to gathering stones for the cache. They had a jolly time there, cooking over a fire of heather, eating their food off the rocks, and burning smudges to drive the pests away. Really it was a camping party such as you would enjoy if you went into the wilds at the same time of year. Only for them the sun just disappeared below the horizon for a few minutes every twenty-four hours and it was always bright daylight.
They broke camp and started about ten o’clock at night in order to have the coolest time for traveling. All were in high spirits and very cheery. Kak with only his bow and arrows to handle felt like a king. During the sun-lit night he shot several spermophile, small animals something like prairie dogs, and bringing them home made him feel a conqueror as well.
They supped and breakfasted off Kak’s prize, nobody felt a bit badly about not having more. Now they had decided to travel light, all they wanted was just enough to eat, nothing to pack. Pikalu had recovered some of his lost pep and the party were in splendid feather.
“Push ahead! Push ahead!” they sang for slogan.
“It won’t be any time till we join Omialik,” Kak chuckled.
Taptuna hoped to get a caribou that day or the next, but he did not see any; nor the following day either; nor the next after that. His eyes, instead of peering alertly, now began to look strained. He rose early, leaving Kak and Okak to break camp, and went off to stalk a possible deer; watching closely all the way for hares, or birds or anything eatable. The long, hot hours passed without bringing him luck. On he trudged fiercely, morosely till he saw the party pitching their tent; then he gave up and plodded slowly toward them. They rushed to meet him.
“Nothing!” he cried, showing his empty hands. “We learn now this country is tricky.”
“Hadn’t we better turn back!” faltered Okak.
“Too late! It’s too late for that! We’re dead sure there is no game behind us at least three days’ journey—on ahead we may find something.”
Taptuna was very blue; his low spirits frightened Okak and made Kak feel sober. Guninana, bustling about, talked to cheer them all:
“Nonsense! What’s the good of being so glum only because you haven’t killed a caribou the last few days? See here, Noashak and I have dug a grand bag of masu roots; we will have them boiled in no time and can go to bed with full tummies.”
But in spite of her efforts nobody looked happy. Masu is a sort of wild parsnip, at its best hardly a nice supper, and not very sustaining for hungry hunters.
Okak was thoroughly scared by the situation, much too scared to sleep. He felt he was to blame for having suggested caching their extra food; so he stole out while the others rested and succeeded in snaring two squirrels. You would never believe how small a squirrel is when it has been skinned! And there were five of them, besides the dogs, to breakfast off these two little fellows. Guninana got scarcely any, as she gave most of her share to Noashak. They were hungry all day and had to dine on three ptarmigans, small grouse, shot by Kak; for Taptuna was still bent on fetching home something worth while.
“Mark my words,” said Okak cheerlessly, “we are going to have to live all summer on birds and squirrels and masu roots.”
“Don’t be such a grouch,” Kak replied shortly. “I saw a hare to-day.”
“Why didn’t you get him, son? Seeing isn’t eating!”
Kak looked rather foolish. “Because,” he explained, “while I was following the hare I saw a caribou run over the ridge, and I thought he’d be grand to have, so I went for him. But he had seen me and he ran and ran, and I followed till I was afraid I might lose you all; so then I thought I’d come back after the hare—but he had skipped away.”
“Tut, tut! You ought to have stuck to the hare, lad, and made sure of him when we’re so short. A pot of boiled hare to-night would have been first rate.”
“Yes, wouldn’t it?”
“Elegant!”
Kak licked his lips and exchanged glances with his mother. Guninana’s look said: “All the same, your father is hunting caribou when he might be killing hares, he is wiser than his own words. I think you were quite right.” And that made the boy feel happy again.
They grew hungrier every day, and it grew hotter every day, and the flies seemed to bite worse and worse. Kak was so busy hunting now he could not look after Sapsuk, so the poor dog’s eyes and feet were almost as bad as Pikalu’s. Strange to say Noashak behaved better than anybody expected. She ate very little over her share, sometimes Guninana or Taptuna spared her an extra bite, but on the whole she fared like the rest and was no more cantankerous than usual. It was Noashak, too, who raised the first cry of “Woods!” Since they could see no break beyond the trees this was an alarm instead of their journey’s welcome end. The forest spreads thickly east of Dismal Lake. They must take their bearings afresh, turn and follow the straggling spruce till the first great disk of shining water lay on their left. At sight of it hope shot up like a rocket. One more night’s trek would bring them to the ford, where Omialik and his magic gun promised food!
That day they pitched their camp in a driving rain, built a big bonfire in front of the tent, and dined off part of a sleeping rug. The old caribou skin when boiled made a shockingly poor dinner but better than nothing. No one wanted to repeat it for breakfast though; they preferred to go without on the chance of finding something nicer. This was the first time they had really gone empty. The three bowmen took it stoically and separated for better hunting; while Guninana with a tearful, hungry little girl and the famished dogs, tried to make a straight course over the hills. The far shore running out between the two lobes of the lake gave them direction.
Now they had come so near Kak was all on fire to be the first to meet the Kabluna. He raced through the strip of woods, neglecting to watch for game, crashing over stones and under boughs, risking everything to reach the shore. The white man had promised to wait by the ford, and his party were sure to be there—sure! For Taptuna’s family had traveled slowly the last two weeks. Half rations do not make either men or animals feel particularly frisky, nor much like walking all day at top speed under a boiling sun.
When the ground began to drop toward the water and the trees thinned Kak redoubled his efforts. Coming out suddenly on to the narrow channel dotted with islands which joins the first and second parts of this triple lake, he saw men up the beach and near the woods a tent, gave one exultant whoop, and made for them. They in turn started, dropped their work, and ran forward.
“Omialik! Omialik!” gasped the breathless youngster.
But he was doomed to disappointment. It was not Omialik himself, only his Eskimos.
“Where are the others? Have you any food?” they asked in one voice.
“Not a bite,” Kak panted. “The rest are behind. I haven’t eaten since sleeping!”
“We’re pretty nearly starved ourselves but we can do better than that for you. Come along, Kid!” Linking arms they escorted their visitor to the tent, where they put before him a large bowl of cloudberries. These are something like raspberries and they grow in Victorialand, but strange to say, Kak had never eaten any, had never thought of tasting them.
“Are they good?” he asked suspiciously.
“Fine! Eat all you want,” cried both men, and scooping up fingerfuls stuffed them into their mouths. Kak was far too hungry for further question; he ate the berries and enjoyed them. It was the same with Noashak when she came; but Guninana refused to touch such food. To her it seemed like eating grass out in a field. She had been walking over those berries all her life and had never heard of anybody eating them, and why should she begin now?
The Kabluna’s Eskimos explained they had just arrived after a difficult and luckless journey; and their master was hunting while they made camp. They went one in either direction along the shore calling to guide Taptuna and Okak. Presently Okak turned up with some squirrels, and Taptuna with birds; and last of all came Omialik carrying a backload of caribou meat. Then there was a great feast and much rejoicing, and they sat up all night telling their experiences. Of course it did not seem like sitting up all night because the sun was shining the whole time and it continued broad day; but Omialik, who carried a watch and never forgot to wind it, said they had been up all night; and as it was nearly noon they had better go to bed and get some sleep.
All being strangers in that locality no one knew exactly where to find the ford. Rumor said it ran from island to island, a ridge of high bottom on which they might cross about waist-deep. After breakfast, a substantial meal eaten at nine o’clock in the evening, the Kabluna decided to look for it himself, while his men brought the rest of the caribou from the woods, and Okak and Taptuna hunted. Kak gained permission to help at the ford. It was about the hottest hour in the ceaseless Arctic day, and the two started out in fine spirits, thinking it would be no end of a lark wading in the cool lake while their friends fought flies and sweated on the chase.
With a loud laugh at their cleverness, Kak splashed into the water. “Whoop! Huroo! This is the life!”
The Kabluna picked a place where the shore eased off gradually, and waded right out above his waist.
“I’m coming with you,” yelled Kak.
“No, don’t! Stay where you are. It’s too deep for you here.”
In a few minutes Omialik was up to his neck.
“Be careful—do be careful!” the boy pleaded, expecting to see his companion go head under, and knowing it impossible to help.
Kak was in a panic watching the other moving slowly around out there; but after a while he grew more confident and began to search for himself, walking slowly up and down, to and fro, hoping to strike the shallow lead.
The sun had gone behind clouds. Soon it commenced to rain. The joke was on them! Wading in ice-water with a cold shower beating on your head and trickling down your neck is not nearly so much fun as wading when the thermometer on shore registers about a hundred degrees. Kak wished now he had gone with the hunters, for they returned at the first drop of rain, and were lying around, nice and warm and comfy inside the tents, swapping yarns and having a good, cheery time. Of course he could not desert Omialik—that was a base thought—and the white man did not seem to have the least idea of going back on his cold, miserable job.
The Kabluna waded and waded waist-deep, and Kak waded and waded waist-deep; speaking no word of complaint, for that would have meant being instantly sent home.
Once Omialik said: “The man who named this Dismal Lake was certainly inspired.”
Kak laughed. “I didn’t think so yesterday when I found your camp and had my first taste of cloudberries.”
They were standing side by side, the boy up to his armpits in water. “When I have a rifle and a fish net and learn all kinds of things there are to eat I’ll never be hungry, I expect,” he added thoughtfully.
His friend applauded this: “That’s the idea, youngster! Make up your mind to use the food you find around you, and there will be much less chance of starvation.”
Kak, who was paying more heed to the conversation than to where he went, answered with a frightful gurgle and disappeared from sight. Omialik made a lunge for him, missed, ducked under water, grabbed a shadowy substance, and hauled it to the light and air.
“For goodness’ sake, watch your step, child!” he exclaimed as they shook the lake out of their eyes. “I don’t want you drowned on my hands. Perhaps you’d better keep nearer to shore.”
Kak, crestfallen and scared, made his slow way back to the beach and in doing so came on a sound, level bottom. He turned to face about, walking toward the nearest island, a step at a time, for he was now far from his companion and he knew if his foot slipped into another hole it would be the end of him. On he went, so engrossed in feeling his careful way that he had been moving forward a long time before he thought to look up. To his surprise he found himself out in the lake beyond Omialik, and only waist-deep. The boy knew in a twinkling he was on the ford and saw a fine chance to play a joke. Maybe you would not feel like joking if your feet and legs were parked in a cold lake and your head buffeted by driving rain; but the Eskimos love fun above all things. The party had been a bit down on their luck lately, and Kak felt the world owed him several laughs. So he squatted low with his knees apart like a frog, his head and chin just showing on the surface, and cried:
“Omialik! Omialik!”
The Kabluna looked around. “Come back!” he yelled fiercely, shocked to see Kak taking such chances at that distance. He was not really alarmed, for he thought the boy was only showing off.
“I can’t!” Kak answered promptly, now with a wailing note. “I’m stuck. Do please come and help me—help!”
Impossible to turn a deaf ear to that cry! Omialik, who wanted to look for the ford instead of rescuing folks every few minutes, said something impatient under his breath and started toward Kak as quickly as he could go. To his amazement the water instead of getting deeper and deeper, grew shallower. “I’m walking right across the place,” he muttered. “Drat that boy! I’ll just about lose it again.” But still he kept on hurrying toward distress, while Kak splashed feebly once and again to show what a bad way he was in. At last Omialik had almost reached the drowning boy and the water continued only around his hips.
He stopped, and said suddenly, “What’s the matter with you? You’re on the ford!”
Then Kak shot up to his full height, gave a great leap, and seizing his companion’s shoulders, cried:
“Fooled you! Fooled you! Sure we’re on the ford! I knew it all the time!”
The white man looked rather cross for a minute, but he laughed and said:
“All right. I don’t mind being fooled like this any day. I guess you’ve found the ford; we’ll mark the spot and go along and explore.”
They both took hold of a long pole Omialik had been carrying and stuck it into the bottom of the lake, driving it down firmly, so that it stood alone with its top out; and then they walked ahead, feeling their way, right across to the island. They marked the place when leaving the water, started from the other side and waded to a second island and so on. It was less difficult once they had found the direction, but a cold enough job at best; and on arriving at the far shore they had to turn around and wade back, marking their course with poles so that it would be perfectly simple to find it next day when they all came to cross over with their things.