Produced by Al Haines
[Illustration: Cover art]
SHASTA OF THE WOLVES
BY
OLAF BAKER
ILLUSTRATIONS BY
CHARLES LIVINGSTON BULL
NEW YORK
DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY
1952
COPYRIGHT, 1919
BY DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY, INC.
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
AMERICAN BOOK-STRATFORD PRESS, INC., NEW YORK
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I The Wolf-Child
II The Coming of Shoomoo
III Shasta Comes Very Near Being Eaten by a Bear
IV The End of the Fight
V Gomposh, the Wise One
VI Shasta Sings the Wolf Chorus
VII Shasta Joins the Wolf Pack
VIII The Voice that Was Goohooperay
IX The Coming of Kennebec
X How Shasta Hid in Time
XI Shasta's Restlessness and What Came of It
XII Shasta Sees His Redskin Kindred
XIII The Bull Moose
XIV Shasta Leaves His Wolf Kin
XV How Shasta Fought Musha-Wunk
XVI The Danger From the South
XVII Shasta Goes Scouting
XVIII The Wolves Avenge
SHASTA OF THE WOLVES
CHAPTER I
THE WOLF-CHILD
It was the old she-wolf Nitka that came running lightly along the
dusk. Though she had a great and powerful body, with a weight heavy
enough to bear down a grown man, her feet made no sound as they came
padding through the trees. She had been a long way, travelling for a
kill, because at home the wolf-babies were very hungry and gave her
no peace. They were not well-behaved babies at all. Whatever
mischief there was in the world seemed to be packed tight into their
little furry bodies. They played and fought and worried each other
till they grew hungry again, and then they fell upon their mother
like the little ravening monsters that they were. But Nitka bore it
all patiently, as a kind old mother should, and only gave them a
smack occasionally, when their behaviour was beyond everything for
naughtiness.
Now, as she came running through the trees she drank in the air
thirstily through her long nose. For it was her nose that brought
her news of the forest, telling her what creatures were abroad, and
whether there was a chance of a kill. This evening the air was full
of smells, and heavy with the heat of the long summer day; but many
of them were wood smells, tree smells, green smells; not the scent of
the warm fur and the warm flesh and the good blood that ran in the
warm bodies and made them spill the secret of themselves along the
air. And it was this warm, red, running smell for which Nitka was so
thirsty, and of which there was so little spilt upon the creeping
dusk. Yet now and then a delicate whiff of it would come, and Nitka
would sniff harder, swinging her head into the wind. And sometimes
it grew stronger and sometimes weaker, and sometimes would cease
altogether, swallowed up in the scent of the things that were green.
And then, all of a sudden, the smell came thick and strong, flowing
like a stream along the drift of the air.
In the wild, your scent is yourself. What you smell like, that you
are. And so, accordingly as the wind blows, you spill yourself, even
against your will, either backwards or forwards, on the currents of
the air.
Nitka increased her pace, and as she ran the smell grew sweeter and
stronger, and made her mad for the kill. It was not long before her
sharp eyes gave her sight of a deer feeding in an open glade. Nitka
stooped her long body to the earth, and began to stalk her prey. All
about her the forest seemed to hold back its breath.
It was no noise which Nitka made which betrayed her presence. She
herself came stooping nearer like a shadow on four feet. And as it
was up-wind that she came, she spilt herself upon the air backwards,
not forwards, to the deer. Yet something there was which seemed to
give it warning beyond sound, or sight, or smell.
It stopped feeding, and lifted its head. For a moment or two it
stood as still as an image carved in stone; yet, as Nitka knew well,
it was the stillness of warm flesh that paused before it fled. She
gathered her legs under her for the deadly spring. The deer turned
its head quickly, and saw a long grey shadow launch itself through
the dusk. It was the last leaping shadow the deer would ever see.
For the law of the forest is a stern and unpitying one--the law of
Hunger, and the law of Desire.
When Nitka had finished her kill, and satisfied her hunger, she
thought of the babies at home. They were too small yet for flesh
food, so it was no use carrying any back to them. Nevertheless they
would be wanting their supper badly, and she must go and give it to
them if she would have any quiet in her mind. So she trotted through
the forest, having first buried some pieces of the deer where she
would know where to find them.
The cave in which her cubs were waiting was far away, for she had
travelled many miles, but her instinct told her how to find it easily
again, and she made a straight line for it, loping along towards the
hills. She was going down-wind now, and did not catch a scent of the
things in front. But as she had had her kill, that did not matter.
There was one thought in her old wise head, and that thought was home.
But before she reached it, she lit upon a strange thing. It lay
right in her path--a small brown bundle that now and then set up a
thin wail. Nitka observed it carefully, then ran round to the
leeward of it to pick up its scent the better. With strange things
she always did this. You never knew what a strange thing might do
before your nose could give you warning. As she circled, she came
upon another smell which she had smelled before--the scent of man, of
which she was afraid. But it was a trail several hours old, and was
growing a little stale. Nitka crept up to the peculiar bundle. She
sniffed at it hard, then turned it over gently with her paw. As she
did so, it stirred a little and whimpered. The smell was the smell
of man, but the whimper was that of a cub. Nitka distrusted the
smell, but the whimper was good. She was not hungry now, but there
were the hungry babies at home. She must not delay any longer. She
caught up the bundle by the loose skin that covered it, and started
off again. She had to go more slowly now, because of the bundle, and
when at last she reached the cave upon the mountain-side, the night
had fallen. Dark though it was, the baby wolves were awake, and
ready for a famous meal; but in the odd bundle which their mother
dropped inside the mouth of the den they were not interested enough
to find out what it was. When they had had their supper they fell
fast asleep, and when the rising moon cast a glimmer into the cave,
you might have seen an old mother wolf and a family of cubs all
snuggled up together and very fast asleep.
But in the morning, when they woke up, there was another cub, a cub
whose clothes were not of fur, but of a strange covering which they
would have called Indian blanket if they had had any word for such a
thing in their furry language. However, they speedily took to
worrying this odd blanket; and presently off it came and was found to
be no skin at all, but only a loose cover that tore to pieces
beautifully, and made you cough when you tried to swallow it.
Inside, the baby had another skin that was of a reddish brown and
very soft. They began to worry that also, hoping it might come off
too, but it stuck fast to what was underneath, as is the way with
such skins, being specially prepared to stick, and the baby inside it
began to squeal like mad.
For some reason or other, the baby did not bite back again. It just
lay on its back, and waved fat arms and legs in the air. That hurt
nobody, so the little wolves rolled it over and over, and tried to
take pieces out of its arms and legs, and thought it was quite the
biggest joke they had had in all their lives. Only the new baby did
not have a sense of humour, and refused to enter into the fun. It
only squealed louder and louder, and actually squeezed water out of
its little eyes!
Then, all at once, without any warning whatever, Nitka put a stop to
the fun by cuffing her babies right and left; and so the new baby did
not have to cry alone, but was joined by all the little wolves,
yelping with fear and pain. So from that time onward they learned
slowly that the new baby was not to be bitten just for fun, but was
somehow or other a little naked brother who had left his coat behind
him in the outside world.
If you had asked Nitka why she had taken the baby's part, I don't
believe she could have told you. All she knew was that there was a
feeling inside her that this odd thing she had found in the forest
was to be protected from harm.
That was in the early days of little Shasta's life. He was so tiny
that he soon grew used to the difference between living among the
wolves and living among his own kind. And soon he forgot even the
dim thing he once remembered, and thought there was no life but the
life of the cave where always it was shadowy and cool even in the
hottest summer day. And he learned to play with the little wolves,
his brothers, and wrestle and box with them, and go tumbling all over
the cave floor with never a squeal. Only sometimes when the play
seemed to grow too rough, and old Nitka thought he was having a bad
time of it, she would rescue him from his playmates, and give
everybody a general smacking all round: and then there would be peace
for a little time.
So that is how it came to pass that Shasta learnt the language of the
wolves, and of the other animals--and indeed for a time knew no
other--and understood what they said and thought, and even felt, when
there was no need of any words.
And all this knowledge was of great use afterwards, and was the
saving of his life, as you shall presently be told.