THE WHITE ESKIMO
It was thirty below zero the following morning when two teams of twelve
dogs, each drawing sledges, loaded with supplies, departed from the
little village of igloos. The warm breath from man and dog turned to
vapor in the freezing air, and all were enveloped in a cloud of steam as
they trekked eastward along the coastline.
Corporal McCarthy had found Sipsa willing to lead the party and had also
enlisted the aid of two Eskimo dog drivers, Okewah and Ootanega. The
policeman had promised all of them large rewards in tools, rifles, and
tents, provided they served him faithfully in pursuit of the “white
Eskimo.”
“I wonder how soon we’ll pick up the trail,” Sandy spoke from the depths
of his frost-rimmed parka.
“No telling,” replied Dick through a cloud of steam, “we’re now
following the tracks made by the Eskimo who came in last half scared to
death. Corporal McCarthy believes these tracks will lead to the place
where the white Eskimo and his men attacked those three Eskimos who went
after the stolen dog team.”
The boys said no more then for the fast pace at which they were
traveling took all their breath. For two hours they drove eastward
across the snowfields under a gray cloud filmed sky. At the end of this
time they came to a narrow defile between huge blocks of ice that had
been thrown up by the waves at high tide. They threaded their way among
the ice cakes for about a hundred yards when they came upon the scene of
a terrible tragedy.
“It’s the two Eskimos that failed to come back last night!” Dick’s
horrified exclamation was echoed by Sandy while the two policemen and
the Eskimos bent over the two huddled forms in the snow.
The Eskimos had been killed, and all about them were signs of a deadly
struggle. One sledge had been crushed, and its packing torn up and
rifled of supplies. Two dogs lay dead, and prowling foxes had torn them
to bits.
“If this isn’t the work of Fred Mistak, then I don’t know my name!”
Corporal McCarthy cried, shaking his fist at the white silent hills.
“But we’ll get him, we’ll get him, and he’ll pay a big price!”
Dick and Sandy thrilled at the words, and hastened to lend a hand to the
burial of the bodies.
Two typical Eskimo graves were made by heaping small boulders upon the
dead natives in a cairn-like mound, which would keep away the foxes,
which had as yet scarcely harmed them, probably because the dogs had
satisfied them for the present. To agree with the superstitions of the
Eskimos the sledges, weapons and other paraphernalia of the deceased
were buried with the dead.
“Now that sorry business is over,” Corporal McCarthy addressed the
somber company, “we’ll pick up Mistak’s trail and see how fast we can
mush. Every man of you keep watch for an ambush. This fellow is about as
desperate as they make them, and we’ve already had a taste of his
treachery. It’s our hide or his and let’s be careful it’s his. Mush on!”
Once more the dogs buckled into the harness and the long Eskimo whips
lashed and crackled over many bobbing, white tails.
But it was a weary, half-frozen company that camped late that night
without sighting the mysterious person they pursued. Dick and Sandy were
almost too tired to be hungry once they had thrown up their tupik, or
Eskimo tent made of sealskins. Not until they had drunk several cups of
hot tea, an indispensable drink in the far north, did they feel anywhere
near themselves, and could discuss the doings of the day while munching
hard biscuit and pemmican.
“I wonder where this trail will end?” Sandy ventured dubiously.
“Wish I knew,” rejoined Dick, “but I think the ‘white Eskimo’ will lead
us on a real old wild goose chase. He knows more about this country than
any of us, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he knew the lay of the land
better than any of these Eskimo guides. Anyway the Eskimos can’t be of
much use in tracking that fellow because they believe the ‘white Eskimo’
is an Angekok, or devil. They’re so superstitious that if we once got
very close to the fellow we’re chasing, they’d probably lead us astray
or run off and leave us alone.”
“I guess they believe in ghosts alright,” agreed Sandy, pouring another
cup of tea.
Dick was about to continue the discussion, when he chanced to look
through the opening of their tupik.
“Look at that!” he grasped Sandy’s arm tensely.
What Dick saw was their three Eskimo hands gathered before their tupik
in a private council of some secret purpose. The native drivers were
gesturing excitedly with their hands and heads, evidently arguing with
Sipsa, the guide.
“The drivers seem to be ready to quit right now, the way they act,”
observed Sandy.
“Well, we can’t go far without them, at least, without a guide. I ought
to tell Corporal McCarthy about this.”
However, no more were the words out of Dick’s mouth than the police
Corporal approached the three Eskimos and scattered them to various
tasks.
Presently the Corporal joined the boys in their tent and confirmed their
fears. “I’m afraid these Eskimos will desert us if we don’t keep close
watch of them,” said the policeman. “We’ll all have to take turns on
watch tonight, tired as we are. I think Sipsa still is loyal, but the
other two are doing their best to make him desert. The ‘white Eskimo’
certainly has them scared.”
It was twelve o’clock when Dick Kent’s turn came to stand watch, and it
was with some difficulty that he shook the sleep out of his eyes when
Constable Sloan spoke to him.
“Don’t think we’ll have any trouble tonight after all,” the Constable
reassured him. “The Eskimos seem pretty quiet, but be ready for anything
and don’t hesitate to call McCarthy and me if anything unusual turns up.
Good night.”
Dick shivered as he took his post at the entrance of the tupik with
rifle in his mittened hands. The dogs were quarreling among themselves
where they were leashed to the sledges, and from the Eskimos’ tupik came
the muffled sound of voices. They did not seem as quiet now as Constable
Sloan had reported them. They were speaking in their native tongue and
Dick could not understand what they were talking about.
“I’ll just keep close watch of their tent,” he murmured to himself. “If
any of them try to sneak away I’ll call the policemen.”
An hour passed, the Eskimos quieting down and apparently falling asleep.
The vast silence of the far north brooded over the little encampment,
when Dick detected, out of the corner of his eye, a movement beyond the
huddled dogs. It was like a small animal that had moved across the top
of a snowdrift. Dick’s heart skipped a beat as he strained his eyes to
catch sight of whatever had appeared.
A dog growled, and Dick spoke quietly to the big huskies, getting up and
going to them. The leader of the team, a giant malemute, was sitting up,
his ears alert, and his nose wriggling as he sniffed the air uneasily.
“What is it, old boy?” whispered Dick. “What do you see?”
The malemute growled ominously in answer, his hair rising along his back
as he scented some sort of danger.
Dick looked carefully about camp again, seeking the cause for the dog’s
uneasiness, but all seemed peaceful enough. Impulsively, he decided to
walk out to the drift where he had seen the suspicious movement,
thinking he would find there the tracks of some animal.
The drift was only about fifty yards from the sledges where the dogs
were tied, and Dick soon reached it. About to go around the drift and
investigate, a weird, low call from behind him brought him to an abrupt
halt, the blood congealing in his veins at the strangeness of the sound.
He turned and looked back at camp. There came a soft swishing sound from
the snowdrift he had been about to inspect, and he whirled to see a dark
form bearing down upon him. His startled cry was cut off sharply as
something hard descended forcefully upon his head and he went down in
the snow, thousands of stars blazing before his eyes.
But Dick had not been knocked entirely unconscious. He lay still a
moment until his senses came back to him, feeling the person who had
attacked him leap over him and toward camp. Then came the cries of the
aroused camp, mingled with the barking dogs, and above all the shriek of
a frightened Eskimo, followed by a wail of fear.
Struggling to his feet, Dick saw Corporal McCarthy taking aim at two
fleeing figures, and heard his rifle crack. But the policeman was firing
into the air, merely to frighten the attackers.
Sipsa was struggling in the strong arms of Constable Sloan, and from the
mouthings of the frightened native Dick could make out that Sipsa had
seen the “white Eskimo.”
“Where are the drivers?” Dick shouted to Sandy who was standing as if
stunned, his rifle held in his hands.
Sandy seemed to regain his wits at that and dived for the Eskimos’ tupik
along with Dick. They almost collided with Toma coming out of the tent.
“Um gone,” said Toma, “Um run away when seen um ‘white Eskimo.’”
The truth of Toma’s statement was soon revealed when a search of the
camp and the vicinity revealed no sign of the two drivers, other than
their tracks in the snow.
“Well,” said Corporal McCarthy, “I guess the ‘white Eskimo’ knows how to
scare the wits out of the natives. I don’t suppose there’s any use for
us to chase our guides. They’d be of no further use anyway. I hope Sipsa
doesn’t take it into his head to follow them when he gets a chance to
break away.”
“We’re lucky to have whole skins,” Constable Sloan remarked.
“My head feels as if it was too big for my parka,” said Dick, manfully
fighting off a dizzy spell.
“Hurry into your tent and I’ll get the medicine kit,” said Corporal
McCarthy. “I want to get going again in an hour anyway. We ought to
locate some more drivers tomorrow, and if possible, overtake Mistak, the
‘white Eskimo,’ before he gets another lead on us.”
Dick’s head wound proved not serious. His heavy parka had protected his
scalp from the blow, which had probably been made with a spear butt.
There was, however, a large lump about the size of an egg over his left
temple, and it was rather sore. But the young northman would not think
of delaying the pursuit, and speedily forgot his slight wound as he
hustled about making tea, while Sandy and Toma lent willing hands with
the packs and dog harnesses.
Within an hour dog and man had partaken of an early breakfast and were
mushing grimly along a fresh trail under the midnight sun.
“This was a wise move on our part,” Dick told Sandy as they woddled
along on their snowshoes. “Mistak won’t expect us to start out so soon
and we’ve a good chance to overtake him.”
“I get the creeps whenever I think of that Eskimo stealing into camp
that way,” rejoined Sandy. “Suppose he is a kind of a devil.”
“Nonsense,” replied Dick, “just because these poor, superstitious
Eskimos are frightened is no sign you should be. I’ll admit he’s a
dangerous character, but he’s no more than a human being, and the
mounted will get him in the end.”
Sandy was about to reply when an exclamation from one of the policemen
silenced him.
They had come out on the rim of an ice-bound ridge and below them
stretched a vast valley bounded by the sea on the north and filled with
age-old ice formations.
Directly below them were two dog teams, the drivers of which had
apparently not yet detected the mounted police.
Dick and Sandy could not forbear a cheer as Corporal McCarthy called for
full speed ahead and they drove the dogs yelping down the slope toward
the fugitives from justice. At that moment it looked very much as if
Fred Mistak’s career of outlawry were doomed already, and the boys
prepared themselves for a battle.