The very next day they started. The boats were heavily loaded with
dried fish, there were great piles of new skins heaped in the
woman-boats, and every kyak towed a seal.
For days they traveled along the coast, stopping only for rest and
food. The twins and Koko sat in the bottom of the boat with the dogs,
and listened to the regular dip of the paddles, to the cries of the
sea-birds as they flew away toward the south, and to the chatter of the
women. These were almost the only sounds they heard, for the silence of
the Great White World was all about them. They talked together in low
voices and planned all the things they would do when the long night was
really upon them once more.
When at last they came in sight of the Big Rock, they felt as if they
had reached home after a very long journey.
Koko stood up in the boat and pointed to it. "See," he cried, "there's
the Big Rock where we found the bear!"
"Yes," Monnie said, "and where we slid downhill."
"And I see where I got caught on the ice raft," Menie shouted.
"Sit down," said Koko's mother. "You'll tip the boat and spill us all
into the water."
Koko sat down; the boat glided along through the water, nearer and
nearer, until at last they came round the Big Rock, and there, just as
if they had not been away at all, lay the whole village of five igloos,
looking as if it had gone to sleep in the sunshine.
The big boats waited until the men had all paddled to the shore and
beached their kyaks, then they were drawn carefully up on to the sand,
and every one got out. The beach at once became a very busy place. The
men pulled the walruses and seals out of the water and took care of the
boats, while the women set up the tents, cut the meat into big pieces
for storage, and carried all their belongings to the tents.
Although the village looked just the same, other things looked quite
different. Nip and Tup were big dogs by this time. They ran away up the
beach with Tooky and the other dogs the moment they were out of the
boats. They did not stay with the twins all the time now, as they used
to do. The twins were much bigger, too. Koolee looked at them as they
helped her carry the tent-skins up from the beach, and said to them,
"My goodness, I must make my needles fly! Winter is upon us and your
clothes are getting too small for you! You must have new things right
away." The twins thought this was a very good idea. They liked new
clothes as well as any one in the world.
Koolee set up the tent beside their old igloo, and there they lived
while the men of the village went out every day in their kyaks for seal
and walrus, or back into the hills after other game to store away for
food during the long winter. The women scraped and cured the skins and
cut up the meat and packed it away as fast as the men could kill the
game and bring it home.
Each day it grew colder, and each night was longer than the last, until
one short September day there came a great snow storm! It snowed all
day long, and that night the wind blew so hard that Koolee and the
twins nearly froze even among the fur covers of their bed, and when
morning came they found themselves nearly buried under a great drift.
That very day Koolee put the stones over the roof of the igloo once
more, and the twins helped her fill in the chinks with moss and earth,
and cover it with a heavy layer of snow, patted down with the snow
shovel, until everything was snug and tight again.
Then they moved in. By the next day all the igloos in the village were
in use, and when night came their windows shone with the light of the
lamps, just as they had so many months before.
Nip and Tup slept outside with Tooky now, in a snow house which Kesshoo
had built for them. Menie and Monnie missed them, but Koolee said, "You
are getting so big now you must begin to do something besides play with
puppies. Monnie must learn to sew, and Menie must help Father with
feeding the dogs and looking after their harnesses, and driving the
sledge."
"Maybe Father will teach you both to carve fine things out of ivory
this winter! Monnie will soon need her own thimble and needles. They
must be made. And she can help me clean the skins and suck out the
blubber, and prepare them for being made into clothes!"
"Dear me! what a lot there is to do to keep clothes on our backs and
food in our mouths! The Giants are always waiting before the igloo and
we must work very hard to keep them outside!"
She did not mean real giants. She meant that Hunger and Want are always
waiting to seize the Eskimo who does not work all the time to supply
food for himself and his family. She meant that Menie must learn to be
a brave strong hunter, afraid of nothing on sea or land, and that
Monnie must learn to do a woman's work well, or else the time would
come when they would be without food or shelter or clothing, and the
fierce cold would soon make an end of them.
It was lucky they got into the warm igloo just when they did, for the
winter had come to stay. The bay froze over far out from shore, and the
white snow covered the igloos so completely that if it had not been for
the windows, and for people moving about out of doors, no one could
have told that there was any village there.
The Last Day of all was so short that Menie and Monnie and Koko saw the
whole of it from the top of the Big Rock! They had gone up there in the
gray twilight that comes before the sunrise to build a snow house to
play in. They had been there only a little while when the sky grew all
rosy just over the Edge of the World. The color grew stronger and
stronger until the little stars were all drowned in it and then up came
the great round red face of the sun itself! The children watched it as
it peered over the horizon, threw long blue shadows behind them across
the snow, and then sank slowly, slowly down again, leaving only the
flaming colors in the sky to mark the place where it had been. They
waved their hands as it slipped out of sight. "Good bye, old Sun," they
shouted, "and good bye, Shadow, too! We shall be glad to see you both
when you come back again."
Then, because the wind blew very cold and they could see a snow cloud
coming toward them from the Great White World where the Giants lived,
the children ran together down the snowy slope toward the bright
windows of their homes.