I
The moment the sun had gone out of sight all the people in the village
came pouring out of their tunnels on their way to the feast at
Kesshoo's house.
Kesshoo's house was so small that it seemed as if all the people could
not possibly get into it.
But the Eskimos are used to crowding into very small spaces, indeed.
Sometimes a man and his wife and all his children will live in a space
about the size of a big double bed.
First the Angakok came out of his igloo, looking fatter than ever. The
Angakok always found plenty to eat somehow. Both his wives were thin.
Their faces looked like baked apples all brown and wrinkled.
When they reached Kesshoo's house, the Angakok went into the tunnel
first.
Now I can't tell you whether he had grown fatter during the five days,
or whether the entrance had grown smaller, but this much I know: the
Angakok got stuck! He couldn't get himself into the room no matter how
much he tried! He squirmed and wriggled and twisted, until his face was
very red and he looked as if he would burst, but there he stayed.
Other people had crawled into the tunnel after him. His two wives were
just behind. Everybody got stuck, of course, because no one could move
until the Angakok did. He was just like a cork in the neck of a bottle.
Kesshoo and Koolee and the twins and Nip and Tup were all in the igloo.
When they saw the Angakok's face come through the hole they thought, of
course, the rest of him would come too. But it didn't, and the Angakok
was mad about it.
"Why don't they build igloos the way they used to?" he growled. "Every
year the tunnels get smaller and smaller! Am I to remain here forever?"
he went on. "Why doesn't somebody help me?"
Kesshoo and Koolee seized him under his arms. They pulled and pulled.
The two wives pushed him from behind.
"I-yi! I-yi!" screamed the Angakok. "You will scrape my skin off!"
He kicked out behind with his feet. His wives backed hastily, to get
out of the way. That made them bump into Koko's mother who was just
behind them. Her baby was in her hood, and when she backed, the baby's
head was bumped on the roof of the tunnel.
The baby began to roar. In the tunnel it sounded like a clap of
thunder. The wives of the Angakok and Koko's mother all began to talk
at once, and with that and the baby's crying I suppose there never was
a tunnel that held so much noise. It all came into the igloo, and it
sounded quite frightful. The twins crept into the farthest corner of
the sleeping bench and watched their father and mother and the Angakok,
with their eyes almost popping out of their heads.
Nip and Tup thought they would help a little, so they jumped off the
bench; and barked at the Angakok. You see, they didn't know he was a
great medicine man. They thought maybe he ought not to be there at all.
Nip even snapped at the Angakok's ear!
That made the Angakok more angry than ever. He reached into the room,
seized Nip with one hand and flung him up on to the sleeping bench. Nip
lit on top of Menie. Nip was very much surprised, and so was Menie.
Now, whether the jerk he gave in throwing Nip did it or not, I cannot
say, but at that instant Kesshoo and Koolee both gave a great pull in
front. At the same moment the two wives gave a great push behind, and
the next moment after that, there was the Angakok, still red, and still
angry, sitting on the edge of the sleeping bench in the best place near
the fire!
Then his two wives came crawling through. The Angakok looked at them as
if he thought they had made him stick in the tunnel, and had done it on
purpose, too. The wives scuttled up on to the sleeping bench, and got
into the farthest corner of it as fast as they could.
The women and children always sat back on the bench at a feast.
When Koko's mother came in, the baby was still crying. She climbed up
on to the bed with him, and Menie and Monnie showed him the pups and
that made the baby laugh again.
As fast as they came in, the women and children packed themselves away
on the sleeping bench. The men sat along the edge of it with their feet
on the floor.