KOOGA THE ALEUT, AND HIS BIDARKIE
To say that our friends were startled by the sound of these rifle-shots
in that wilderness, which but a minute before they would have sworn did
not contain a human being other than themselves, but feebly expresses
their astonishment and joy. To them, or at least to Phil Ryder, a
rifle-shot indicated the presence of white men. These must belong to a
vessel that would take him and his companions to some point from which
passage might be engaged for Sitka. Thus, ere the breeze had dissipated
the little cloud of blue smoke from that second shot, all the
perplexities of the situation had vanished, and Phil felt as though the
object of his long journey were at length attained. To his amazement
and dismay, the figure that bounded into view from behind a jutting
point of rock as the caribou fell was not that of a white man, but of
a native. Although he was clad in hat, shirt, trousers, and boots of
the quality adopted by all who lead rough out-of-door lives, his short
figure, dark skin, and broad face proved him to be a full-blooded Aleut.
If the castaways were surprised to see him, he was equally so at their
appearance, and at sight of them stopped short in his tracks. Then with
a glance at his caribou to assure himself that it was dead, he slowly
advanced towards where they stood.
Serge, with extended hand, stepped forth to meet him, and, in the
Russian trade patois common to that coast, told him how glad they were
to see him, and asked how he happened to be in that place.
He replied that his name was Kooga, that he had come alone in his
bidarkie from Oonga Island to act as hunter for, and keep supplied with
food during the next three months, a party of sea-otter-catchers who
were daily expected to reach that neighborhood from Oonalaska.
Having in turn learned who the strangers were, and expressed his
gratification at meeting them, Kooga turned his attention to his game,
which he proceeded to skin and cut up with the utmost dexterity.
As the others watched him with hungry anticipations, Serge continued
to ply him with questions, and thus learned that he, like themselves,
had been weather-bound on the island by the tempest of the past week,
but for which his friends would long since have arrived. Now he thought
they would leave Oonalaska in the traders’ schooner that very day, and
that the next one would witness their arrival off that point of Oonimak
nearest the little outlying island of Saanak, where are the best
sea-otter grounds of the coast.
“He also says,” continued Serge, interpreting this communication for
the benefit of the others, “that after leaving her hunters the schooner
will run on to Saanak, where she will cache a store of provisions for
their use, and will then return to Oonalaska, not to come back for
three months.”
“What a splendid chance for us!” cried Phil. “It is exactly such a one
as we have been wanting. Talk about bad-luck now!” he added, with a sly
glance at Serge. “It seems to me ours couldn’t be much better than it
is if we had arranged it to suit ourselves.”
Serge paid no attention to this remark, for he was listening
attentively to Kooga, who was again talking, and saying that in four
days from that time another trading-schooner bound for Oonalaska from
the eastward was due to pass close to the north side of Oonimak Island.
“Better and better!” exclaimed Phil, when this was translated. “We
surely can’t miss them both, and must be taken off by one or the other.
I hope it will be by the sea-otter fellow, though, as I should dearly
love to see something of that hunting.”
“And I,” said Jalap Coombs, “hope it will be by the other one, seeing
as it will be so much handier to load our seal-skins into her.”
“Oh, I had forgotten them!” replied Phil, in a tone of disappointment.
“Yes, I suppose we must take the north-side schooner.”
“You speak as if you were certain of catching either one you wanted,”
laughed Serge; “but, for my part, I think there is a big chance of
missing both of them. They may pass in the night, or in a fog, or too
far out to notice our signals. Now I propose that we divide into two
parties, and watch at both ends of the island at once. If Mr. Coombs
is willing to remain in camp at the north end, you and I can go with
Kooga to the south end, where we may have a chance to see something of
sea-otter hunting. If at the same time we can catch that schooner, and
persuade her to come round to this side of the island, we sha’n’t need
the other. If we miss her, or she refuses to take us, we shall still
have plenty of time to get back here before the other is due.”
“Good for you, Serge!” shouted Phil. “That’s an immense scheme, and I
don’t see why I didn’t think of it myself, only I never do think of
things until afterwards.”
“It shows the result of a sea-training,” said Jalap Coombs. “I was jest
a-considering of that same plan, and would have laid it afore all hands
arter dinner, which, it seems to me, is the thing to be thought of
fust. So now, if our oakum-colored friend will give us a hunk of his
meat, we’ll lay a course for our own galley fire over yonder. Arter
stowing a cargo of grub we’ll consider what’s the next thing to be did.”
“That suits me exactly,” agreed Phil, who had been casting longing eyes
at the tempting-looking venison, “and the sooner that plan is carried
out the better. So open negotiations at once――won’t you, Serge, like a
good fellow? I don’t believe I ever was more nearly starved.”
Serge laughed, and after a few minutes’ conversation with Kooga,
informed his companions that the native was perfectly willing to go
with them to the barrabkie, and that they were welcome to all the meat
they wanted, as his bidarkie would not hold half of it. The fact is
that the young Aleut was fully as hungry as they, and possessed of an
equal longing for fresh meat, the gale having so interfered with his
hunting as to compel him to live on shell-fish ever since he reached
the island.
This being settled, all four loaded themselves with venison and
followed Kooga’s lead to the place where he had made his lonely and
cheerless camp, and where his bidarkie was carefully hauled up on the
beach beyond high-water mark. His shelter was a tiny A tent, supported
by paddles and spears, and pitched in the lee of a huge bowlder. A
quantity of moss heaped within it had formed for him a bed similar to
that of our castaways. He had not, however, been able to make a fire,
his supply of tinder being wet, and he not having had the good-fortune
to discover an eider-duck’s nest.
The bidarkie excited Phil’s curiosity to such an extent that it seemed
as though he would never weary of examining it. It was one of the
two-holed craft, and after it had been carefully launched and laden
the Yankee lad asked Serge if he thought Kooga would allow him to
occupy its vacant hatch for the short cruise.
When Serge made the request the young native looked dubious, and
shook his head. He had seen too many self-confident white men spilled
into the icy waters of that coast from those ticklish craft; but as
Phil insisted, he finally yielded a reluctant consent. He, of course,
did not know that the white lad had been considered the most expert
canoeman in New London, or that his own canoe was a tiny-decked affair
of cedar every whit as crank as this bidarkie. His eyes therefore
opened wide with surprise as his new companion stepped lightly into the
canoe and settled himself in its forward hatch, with all the confidence
of one who had always been accustomed to such things. When, in addition
to this, Phil seized a double-bladed paddle and began to wield it
with the practised skill of an old canoeman, the young Aleut actually
laughed aloud with gratified amazement.
As under the influence of its two well-handled paddles the light craft
shot away up the strait, Jalap Coombs and Serge watched it with a
feeling of pride that their companion should thus prove himself the
equal of a native in one of his own especial lines of business. The
mate was especially outspoken in his admiration of this feat, which
would have been as impossible to him as the navigating of a balloon.
“I don’t believe even old Kite Roberson hisself could have done it any
handier,” he said, as he resumed his burden of venison, and started
with it along-shore in the direction of the barrabkie.
[Illustration: “THE LIGHT CRAFT SHOT AWAY UP THE STRAIT”]
The canoe reached a point opposite the hut some time before the others,
and when they got there it was already unloaded. Most of its cargo had
been transferred to the hut, and its occupants were just returning
for the few things that were left. Among these was Kooga’s rifle,
which Phil picked up and examined with interest. He marvelled to find
it so good a one, for it was a Winchester of the latest pattern. As
he lifted it to his shoulder and sighted it his eye was caught by a
slight movement on a small rock nearly half a mile out in the strait.
A hair-seal which had been sleeping there had just lifted its head. At
that distance it did not look larger than a man’s fist.
Phil drew Kooga’s attention to it and offered him the rifle,
signifying by motions that he should shoot; but the native shook his
head decisively, and gave the former to understand that the mark was
too small for such a distance. Upon this the Yankee lad, carefully
adjusting the sights of the rifle, and assuring himself that there was
a cartridge in its chamber, took a deliberate aim and fired.
The seal dropped its head as though it had again gone to sleep, and the
native smiled.
“Tell him to go and get it,” said Phil to Serge, who came up at that
moment. When the latter repeated this request Kooga’s pitying smile
changed to an expression of incredulity. Nevertheless, he again placed
his canoe in the water and paddled away. When he returned with the
dead seal, shot directly through the brain, his expression was one of
amazement.
“He must be the white man who makes guns,” he said to Serge, “and
command them to do his will. Take him away from here soon, for if he
once gets among the kahlan [sea-otter] he will leave none for us.”
A sea-otter hunt was, however, the one thing upon which Phil Ryder’s
heart was most set just then. Not only that, but he had determined to
go on one in Kooga’s company.