Cheechako learned much and forgot a little in the weeks that followed.
When he could stand on his wabbling paws, Holliday took him off
invalid’s diet and fed him more naturally canine dishes—the perpetual
dried or frozen fish of the dog-teams, for instance. Cheechako wolfed
it as he wolfed everything else, and in that connection learned a
lesson. Once in his eagerness he leaped up to snatch it from
Holliday’s hand. His snapping teeth closed on empty air, and he was
soundly thrashed for the effort. Later, he learned not to snarl or
snap if his food was taken squarely from between his teeth. When he
had mastered that, he was tamed. He understood that he was not to try
to bite Holliday under any circumstances whatever. And when he had
mastered the idea he was almost pitifully anxious to prove his loyalty
to Holliday. The only thing was that in learning that he got it into
his head that he was not to snarl at or try to sink his teeth in any
man.
That was possibly why Holliday was disappointed when he took the dog
grimly downstream and made his inquiries as to who had come down in
the two weeks after Carson’s murder. He found the names of every
arrival, and he grimly pursued every one who might have been the man
he was looking for. Each one had a plausible tale to tell. Most of
them were known and could prove their whereabouts at the time of
Carson’s death. But enough had trapped or wintered inland near their
claims to make the absence of any explanation at all no proof of
guilt. That was where Cheechako was to come in.
Always, before his grim interrogation was over, Holliday unobtrusively
allowed Cheechako to draw near. Cheechako had known the man who had
been with Carson when he was murdered. Holliday watched him closely.
He would sniff at the man, glance up at his master, and wag his tail
placatingly. Holliday watched for some sign of recognition. Cheechako
grew to consider it a part of the greeting of every man his master
met. That was the difference between them. Cheechako simply did not
understand. He had already forgotten a great deal of what had happened
to him, and Holliday was his master now. Carson was a dim and misty
figure of the past.
By the time Holliday actually came upon the man of whom he was in
search, Cheechako considered the little ceremony a part of the scheme
of things, not to be deviated from.
They found him camping alone, after trailing him for two days.
“Howdy,” said he, looking up from his fire with its sizzling pan of
beans and bacon.
“Howdy,” said Holliday curtly. “You came down-river about a month
ago?”
The man bent forward over his fire. Cheechako, watching patiently, saw
his whole figure stiffen.
“I come down, yes,” said the camper, stirring his beans. Sweat came
out on his forehead, but he made no movement toward a weapon. He was
not the sort to fight anything out.
“Know Sam Carson?” demanded Holliday.
“Hm—” said the camper. “Seems like I knew him once in Nome.”
His eyes rested on Cheechako, and flicked away. Cheechako knew that he
was recognized and he wagged his tail tentatively, but he had changed
allegiance now. He waited to see what Holliday would do.
“Stop at his cabin?” demanded Holliday grimly.
“Nope,” said the camper. “What’s up?”
“Pup!” said Holliday.
This was Cheechako’s cue. Holliday did not know what Carson had called
him, and “Pup” had been a substitute. Knowing, then, what Holliday
expected of him and anxious to do nothing of which his master would
not approve, Cheechako went forward and sniffed politely at the man’s
legs. He rather expected some sign of recognition. When it came,
Cheechako would respond as cordially as was consonant in a dog who
belonged to someone else. But the man who had stayed with Carson made
no move whatever, though his smell to Cheechako was the smell of a
thing in deadly fear.
Cheechako glanced up at Holliday, and wagged his tail placatingly.
“He don’t seem to know you,” said Holliday grimly. “I guess you
didn’t.”
They camped with the stranger, then, and he told Holliday that his
name was Dugan and that he was a placer man, and told stories at which
Holliday unbent enough to smile faintly.
Holliday was grim and silent, these days, because he had a man-hunt on
his hands, and the gold dust that was to have made a certain girl
happy had been stolen by the murderer of his friend. He listened
abstractedly to Dugan’s jests, but mostly he brooded over the death of
his friend and his own hopes in the same instant.
Cheechako lay at the edge of the circle of firelight and watched the
two men. Mostly he watched Holliday, because Holliday was his master,
but often his eyes dwelt puzzledly on Dugan. He knew Dugan, and Dugan
knew him. Vaguely, a dim remembrance arose, of Dugan in Carson’s
cabin, feeding him a sweet and pleasant-tasting liquid out of a bottle
while he laughed uproariously. Yes, Cheechako remembered it
distinctly. He wondered if Dugan had any more of that pleasant stuff.
Once he rose and started forward tentatively. Dugan had been smelling
quite normally human, but as Cheechako drew near him he again smelled
like something that is afraid. It puzzled Cheechako. He sniffed and
would have gone nearer but first, of course, he looked at Holliday.
And Holliday merely glanced at him and did not notice. Cheechako was
used to such ignoring. He wagged his tail a little and went back
outside the firelight. His master did not want him near.
But later that night, when the two men lay rolled in their blankets in
the smoke of the smudge fire, Cheechako went thoughtfully forward
again. He began to nudge Dugan’s kit with his nose. There might be
some of that sweet-tasting liquid.
Holliday awoke and sat up with a start. The other man had not gone to
sleep.
“What the hell’s your dog doing in my kit?” he demanded hysterically.
“We’ll see,” said Holliday. His voice had a curious edge to it.
Cheechako sniffed about. There was something there that had a familiar
odor. He drew in his breath in a long and luxurious smell. Then he
began to scratch busily.
“I’ll take a look at that,” said Holliday grimly.
He went to where Cheechako scratched, while Dugan moved cautiously
among his blankets. The firelight glinted momentarily on polished
metal among the coverings. The metal thing was pointed at Holliday’s
back, though it trembled slightly.
Holliday looked up.
“Your bacon,” he said, his tone altered. “Get out!” he ordered
Cheechako.
Cheechako went away after wagging his tail placatingly. Presently he
curled up and slept fitfully, the odor he had sniffed permeating all
his dreams. The odor was that of Carson, and Cheechako dreamed of
times in the cabin when Dugan was there. Holliday, too, composed
himself to slumber, but Dugan lay awake and shivered. Some of Carson’s
possessions were in the kit Cheechako had nosed at, and though he had
had his revolver on Holliday, Dugan was by no means sure he could have
summoned the nerve to kill him. He had killed Carson in a fashion
peculiarly his own which did not require that he discharge the weapon
himself. But now he debated in a panicky fear if he had not better
shoot Holliday sleeping. It would be dangerous down here, not like the
hills at all. But it might be best. If that damned dog kept sniffing
around——
The next morning he cursed in a species of hysterical relief when he
saw Cheechako trotting soberly away behind his master. Cheechako
wagged his tail politely in parting. He did not understand why Dugan
had feigned not to remember him. Now they were going to find another
man, and Holliday would expect him to sniff that man’s legs and look
up and wag his tail. It was a ceremony that was part of the scheme of
things. Cheechako simply remembered Dugan as a man who had stayed a
long time with Carson in the cabin upriver, and had fed him sweet
liquid out of a bottle, and now smelled as if he were afraid.
But Holliday, of course, did not know that. Otherwise he would have
been burying Dugan by this time, with a grimly satisfied look upon his
face.