his eyes and often smiled at Annadoah. He was better, he told them,
and motioned the _angakoq_ to go. He bade Annadoah sit beside him. He
felt unquestionably better.
"You have asked me whether I went far over the mountains? Yea, we
travelled many sleeps, yet we scarcely rested. The world was white
about us. The spirits carried us over dark places in the hills,
wherein _Perdlugssuaq_ makes his home. But he did not strike. We were
borne over abysses. The spirits of one's ancestors are often kind. We
went through the world of the fog, she who was the wife of that hill
spirit who carried the dead from their graves and ate them. Yea, she
passed beneath our feet. We came to the high mountains. We passed
upward where the eyes of strange beasts glared upon us. I was afraid.
But I called upon my father. Then the spirits of the great dead came
down upon us. They wove _kamiks_ and _ahttees_ of fire. Their eyes
burned as the great light of the stars. They did not regard us. We
came unto the _ahmingmah_ . . . But upon our return the hill spirits
who live in the caves wakened and struck with their great harpoons.
They shook the mountains. Then the good ancestors carried me through
_sila_--the world of the air--yea, my dogs, my sledge, and the
_ahmingmah_ meat. I had called upon those who went before me. I woke
at the bottom of the mountain, three of my dogs were crushed, my sledge
was broken . . . I lay there a while . . . I slept again . . .
often . . . Then I lashed the sled, ate a little of the _ahmingmah_
meat, and came . . . hither . . . How . . . Ootah knows not . . . It
was hard at times . . . I could hardly walk . . . the ice moved about
me . . . always . . . so--" He described a circle with his hand. "But
I bethought me of Annadoah--" he smiled--"and I said I go to
Annadoah . . . That is how I came . . . I said Annadoah is
hungry--yea, as I said it when the eyes looked at me on the mountains,
when the hill spirits made my heart grow cold, when Koolotah desired to
return . . . Koolotah--he hath gone . . . Koolotah's dogs are
gone . . . But I called upon my dead father, my dead grandfather, and
the older ones--and I thought of Annadoah." He leaned toward her
yearningly, his voice trembling. Fearfully the girl drew away. "It is
she who brought the _ahmingmah_ meat," he said. "It is she who led me
to the _ahmingmah_. Yea, she brings you the _ahmingmah_ meat. For the
thought of her brings Ootah back after the spirits strike . . . It is
she, who lives in the heart of Ootah, who has done all this . . . But
you are hungry. Come!"
He rose slowly and crept through the underground tunnel leading from
the igloo. The others followed. Without, most of the tribe were
waiting. At Ootah's command the men unlashed the sledge-load of meat,
and the division began. To Annadoah Ootah gave one-eighth of the load,
enough to last by frugal use for more than two moons, or months. Among
the others, of whom there were about twenty-five, the remainder was
proportionately divided. For himself Ootah reserved only as much as he
gave the others.
Outside Annadoah's igloo all engaged in a joyous revel. Hungrily they
feasted upon the raw meat. Then they beat drums and danced. Their
voices rose in hilarious chants. Wild joy shook them. Ootah was
acclaimed hero of the tribe. Although they have no chiefs, he was
accorded the honor of being the bravest and strongest among them. And
to the strongest and most heroic the last word in all things belongs.
Of all who were able to participate in the celebration, Maisanguaq
alone retired. From the seclusion of his igloo entrance he watched the
scene with rancor in his heart.
Over the northern skies the auroral lights played, lighting the scene
of spontaneous rejoicing with magical glory. Great silver coronas--or
rings of light--constantly arose in the north, passed to the zenith and
melted as they descended to the south. Luminous curtain-like films
closed and parted alternately like the veils of a Valhalla drawn back
and forth before the warrior souls of the north. Tremendous fan-shaped
shafts of opalescent fire shot toward the zenith and like search-lights
moved to and fro across the sky. The clouds became illumined with an
interior flame and glowed like diaphanous mists of gold half concealing
the vague faces of the beauteous spirits of the dead. Their billowing
edges palpitated with a tremor as of quicksilver. Within and through
this empyreal web of light marvellous scenes were simultaneously woven.
They lasted a moment's space and vanished. The natives, dancing
unrestrainedly, saw heavenly mountain slopes covered with grass of
emerald fire and glittering with starry flowers. They saw the gigantic
shadows of celestial _ahmingmah_ passing behind the clouds . . . and
here and there were the cyclopean adumbrations of great caribou, and
creatures for which they did not have a name. A tossing sea of
rippling waves of light was presently unfolded, and over it they saw
millions of birds, with wings of fire, soaring with bewildering
rapidity from horizon to zenith . . . This faded . . . Monstrous and
gorgeous flowers of living rainbow tints burst into bloom--fields of
them momentarily covered the heaven. These the natives regarded with
only half accustomed wonder, for they knew there were strange flowers
in the land of the dead.
As they danced, the colored imageries steadily faded in the growing
intensity of the great banded coronas that rose from the north. A
light of cold electric fire increasingly blazed over the heavens until
a frigid silver day, brighter than any day of sunshine, reached its
brief noon upon the earth.
Rocking their bodies and singing, the natives dispersed to their
respective igloos. Sitting on his sledge by Annadoah, Ootah dimly
heard their voices echoing into silence; he experienced terrible pains
again in his limbs and the fever in his head. Everything became dizzy,
and with a sick feeling of faintness he crept into Annadoah's igloo and
fell upon her couch.
It was in his heart to ask her once again to be his, to repeat the
protestation of his love; he felt that he had shown he deserved to win
her. But his utter weakness, and the very enthralling delight of her
soft hands on his forehead, kept him still. He lay in a semi-delirium
suffering greatly, but at heart very happy. A new peace possessed him.
Never had Annadoah caressed him before, never had he felt the tingling
thrill of her tender hands, never had her breath so perilously warmed
his face. For an hour she sat by him, perfunctorily bathing his wounds
with the white men's ointment and rubbing a yellow salve upon his face.
And while she did this, often, very often, she closed her eyes.
Sometimes her hands, as they passed over his forehead, absently
wandered to the couch, sometimes they soothed the air near the
suffering man. Then she would recall herself. Gazing upon Ootah, pity
would fill her; and then--well, then her mind would wander. She was
faint herself, tired and half-asleep.
Once, as she touched Ootah's hand, he closed it impulsively over hers.
Her heart gave a thud. Her eyelids quivered. A smile appeared on her
face. Ootah pressed her hand more firmly--he did not realize how
fiercely in his fever. His blood ran high; in a mingled delirium of
pain and transport he drew her slowly toward him. Her one hand soothed
his brow, softly, very gently. The smile on her face deepened. She
gasped with a throe of the old memories.
"Olafaksoah," she breathed, rapturously.
Ootah felt a horrible pain grip his heart. He opened his eyes, stark
conscious. He saw the eyes of Annadoah were closed. On her face he
observed the fond, far-away smile; he knew her heart was in the south.
And in that frightful moment his untutored mind by instinct realized
why she had bandaged and soothed him so tenderly, realized, indeed,
that in doing so, in his stead, her mind had conjured up the vision of
Olafaksoah. His hands were strong, she had said, they hurt her.
Ootah, with ferocity, gripped her little hand tighter.
"Olafaksoah," she murmured again, with delight--then, recalling
herself, suddenly uttered a sharp cry of dismay as she opened her eyes.
Ootah staggered to his feet. The utter tragedy of her devotion to the
man who had deserted her, the utter hopelessness of his own deep
passion blightingly, horribly forced itself upon him.
"Annadoah! Annadoah! Annadoah!" he wailed, his voice sobbing the
beloved name.
The igloo was stifling; he felt that he was suffocating. Everything
reeling about him, he crept painfully from the igloo into the night.
He felt he must be alone.
Outside the aurora was paling with intermittent cascades of resolving
lights. Over the snows glittering rosy fingers painted running rainbow
traceries. It seemed as though the spirit revellers were pouring fiery
jewels from the skies.
Ootah stood before that revealed and radiant land of the dead--the dead
who danced and were happy--his hands clenched and upraised above him.
"Annadoah! Annadoah!" he sobbed the name again and again, and in his
voice throbbed all the piteousness, all the bitterness of his utter
heartbreak. There was no reproach in his shuddering sobs; only sorrow,
only the desolation and eternal heart-ache of that which loves
mightily, unrequitedly, and realizes that all it desires can never,
never be.
Ootah asked himself all the questions men ask in such a crisis; why,
when he loved so indomitably, the heart of Annadoah should stir only
with the thought of another; why the spirits that weave the fabric of
men's fate had designed it thus. Why the ultimate desire of the heart
is forever ungranted and an intrinsically unselfish love too often
finds itself defeated--these questions, in his way, he asked of his
soul, and he demanded, with wild weeping, their answer from the dead
rejoicing in the paling Valhalla. But there was no answer--as perhaps
there may be no answer; or, if there is, that God, fearing lest in
attaining the Great Desire men should cease to endeavor, to serve and
to labor, has kept it locked where He and the dead live beyond the
skies.
Ootah fell prostrate to the ground and his body throbbed on the ice in
uncontrollable throes of grief. The aurora faded above him. Darkness
closed upon the earth. Sitting in her igloo, startled, vaguely
perplexed and half-afraid, Annadoah heard him sobbing throughout the
night.
VIII
"_For a long black hour of horror they were driven over the thundering
seas and through a frigid whirlwind of snow sharp as flakes of
steel . . .
"Seeing Ootah turn slightly toward Annadoah, Maisanguaq sprang at his
throat. Their arms closed about one another . . . The floe rocked
beneath them--they slipped to and fro on the ice . . . About them the
frightful darkness roared; they felt the heaving sea under them. And
while they struggled in their brief death-to-death fight, the floe was
tossed steadily onward._"
The long night began to lift its sable pall, and at midday, for a brief
period, a pale glow appeared above the eastern horizon. In this brief
spell of daily increasing twilight the desolate region took on a
grey-blue hue; the natives, as they appeared outside their shelters,
looked like greyish spectres. Ootah felt the grim grey desolation
color his soul.
He had regained his strength, and his wounds had healed with the
remarkable rapidity that nature effects in people who lead a primitive
life; only the hurt in his heart remained. Annadoah had often visited
him, and while he lay on his bed of furs she had boiled _ahmingmah_
meat and made hot water over the lamp very solicitously. Once,
half-hesitating, she looked into his eyes, and as though she had a
confession to make, said quietly:
"Thou art very brave, Ootah."
This pleased him--once she had said he had the heart of a woman.
He had thrilled when she soothed him, and now he was half sorry that
the injuries no longer needed attention. He loved Annadoah more deeply
than ever, and his greatest concern was for her. He might win
her--yes, perhaps some day, but he could not forget that, whenever she
had touched him with tenderness, she thought of Olafaksoah.
Standing before his igloo, musing upon these things, Ootah espied in
the semi-light a dark speck moving on the ice.
"_Nannook_! (_Bear_)" he called, and the men rushed from their houses.
Without pausing to get his gun Ootah ran down to the ice-sheeted shore.
Nature, as if repenting of her bitterness, had sent milder weather, and
the bear, emerging from its winter retreat, made its way over the ice
in search of seal. Lifting his harpoon, Ootah attacked the bear. It
rose on its haunches and parried the thrusts. A half-dozen lean dogs
came dashing from the shelters and jumped about the creature. The bear
grunted viciously--the dogs howled. The bear was lean and faint from
hunger, and its fight was brief--the lances of four natives pierced the
gaunt body. The bear meat was divided after the communal custom of the
tribe, and the gnawing of their stomachs was again somewhat appeased.
Some days later three bears were killed near the village. The hearts
of the tribe arose, for spring was surely dawning.
Early in March Arnaluk, skirmishing along the shore, saw a bear
disappearing in the distance. The animal was making its direction
seaward, and this indicated to the astute native that its quick senses
had detected the presence of seal.
"Ootah! Ootah!" he called. "Attalaq! Attalaq!" The two tribesmen
responded. With harpoons and lances they followed the trail of the
bear. Less than a mile from shore they found it sitting near a seal
blow hole in the ice. At the sight of the men it fled. A close
inspection resulted in the discovery of a half dozen blow holes--or
open places to which the seal rise under the ice and come to the
surface to breathe. For a long while the men waited. Standing near
the holes, their weapons ready to strike, they imitated the call of
seals. Finally there was a snorting noise beneath one of the holes.
Ootah detected a slight rise of vapor. Attalaq's harpoon descended. A
joyous cry arose. Breaking open the ice about the hole a seal was
drawn to the surface. Daily visits were thereafter made to the
vicinity and the hunters, patiently watching near the holes, succeeded
in catching several seals. Other blow holes were later detected along
the ice, then they disappeared and for a period no seal rewarded the
hunters.
The weather continued to moderate, and these excursions on the sea ice
became more and more dangerous. One day Attalaq and Ootah, while
walking along the shore, heard a familiar call in the far distance, out
toward the open sea.
"Walrus," said Ootah, the zest of the hunt tingling in his veins.
"But the danger is great--the ice splits," said Attalaq.
"But we need food." Ootah thought of Annadoah. She had not been well,
she needed food--that was sufficient. Moreover, he thought of the
children; three were dying of lack of food. So he called the tribesmen
and gave the signal for preparations to depart. A selection had to be
made of the best dogs for the dangerous trip. Few dogs remained in the
village; many had been frozen by the bitter cold; others had to be
killed as food for their companions; some had occasionally been
devoured by the famished natives. And this the desperate people had
done with reluctance and great sorrow--for, as I have said, a native
loves his dog but little less than his child.
Ootah in the lead, with five others, started on the hunt, with three
sledges, each of which was drawn by a team of five lean, hungry dogs.
After some urging Maisanguaq had sullenly consented to accompany the
party.
Joy flushed the natives' skin, for a thin film of sunlight trembled low
over the eastern horizon. As they sped northward past great
promontories they saw several auks. Later two ptarmigan were spotted,
and still later an eider duck. They began chanting songs of the race.
Quickly, however, the brief sunlight faded, heavy grey clouds piled
along the sky-line, the atmosphere became perceptibly warmer, and
intermittent gusts of wind blew downward from the inland mountains.
They directed their steps over the ice to a distant black spot,
somewhat more than a mile distant, which they knew to be open water.
There, if there were any, the walrus would be found. As they were
marching, a very faint crackling noise vibrated through the ice under
their feet. They ceased singing. Four of the party paused and would
have turned back. Ootah urged them onward. They paced off half a
mile. The wind increased in volume and whined dolefully. Their steps
lagged. Suddenly they heard the harsh nasal bellow they knew so well.
The hearts of all expanded with the joy of the hunt.
The dogs howled hungrily and, with tails swishing savagely, tore ahead.
As they approached the edge of the sea ice they passed great lakes of
open water. The twilight still continued to thicken, the wind came in
increasingly furious blasts. Nearer and nearer came the low call of
walrus bulls.
In a lake of lapping black water, about five hundred feet from the open
sea, a small herd rose to the surface intermittently for breath. In
the deep gloom the hunters saw fountains of spray ascending as they
breathed. Hitching their dogs to harpoon stakes driven in the ice,
they separated and quietly took positions about the open water.
"Wu-r-r!" The low walrus call rose over the ice. Ootah leaned over
the edge of the ice and imitated the animal cry. "Woor-r," Maisanguaq,
near him, replied. The water seethed, and two glistening white tusks
appeared. Ootah raised his harpoon--it hissingly cut the air. A
terrific bellow followed. The little lake seethed. A dozen fiery
eyes, of a phosphorescent green, appeared above the water. Maisanguaq
struck, so did Arnaluk. They let out their harpoon lines--the savage
beasts dove downward, then rose for breath. In their frantic struggle
their heads beat against the ice about the edge of the space of open
water. The natives fled backward--the ice broke into thousands of
fragments. Each time the animals came up the hunters delivered more
harpoons so as to pinion securely and at the same time despatch the
prey. In the gathering gloom they had to aim by instinct. For an hour
the struggle between the alert men and the enraged beasts continued.
Several times Ootah and Arnaluk fired their guns as the green eyes
appeared so as to finish the task of killing.
Meanwhile the grey reflection of the descending sun entirely faded
along the horizon; a bluish gloom blotted out the landscape. The wind
swept over the ice with fiendish hisses. With a quick change the air
became colder and snow flakes fell. The natives became alarmed. As
they were drawing the first walrus to the ice a sound, like the
discharge of a gun beneath the sea, startled them. Seizing their
knives they dexterously fell upon the animal and lifted the meat and
blubber in long slices from the bones. A great quantity was cast to
the ravenous dogs. Two more walrus were lumberingly drawn to the ice;
the first sledge load and two hunters started shoreward; soon the
second sledge was loaded. Ootah and Maisanguaq remained to dress the
third beast.
Like scorpions in the hands of the mighty _tornarssuit_ the wind now
steadily beat upon the ice. The two men were almost lifted from their
feet. Not far away they heard the tumultuous crash of the rising
waves. As they were lashing the blubber to Ootah's sledge, a
resounding detonation vibrated through the ice under him--the field on
which they stood slowly but unmistakably began to move!
Maisanguaq spoke. The wind drowned his voice. Above its clamor they
heard the ice separating with the splitting sound of artillery.
Whipped by the terrific gale the snow cut their faces like bits of
steel. In the darkness, which steadily thickened, they heard the
appalling boom of bergs and the grind of floes colliding on the sea.
Ootah leaped to the team of dogs and interrupted their feast. He knew
they had not a single moment to lose--the field had surely parted from
the land ice and it was now a dreadful question as to whether a return
was possible. As he was hitching the dogs to the loaded sledge he
suddenly gave a start. Was he dreaming? Was he hearing the
disembodied speak, as men did in dreams? He listened intently--surely
he heard a soft sweet voice calling piteously through the wind. His
heart gave a great thud.
Through the gathering gloom he saw something . . . a blur of
blackness . . . gathering substance as it approached over the ice. It
moved uncertainly . . . and seemed to be driven toward him by the
furious wind.
"Look--who is it?" he called to Maisanguaq.
For answer, through the din of the elements, a voice called brokenly,
sobbingly:
"Ootah! . . . Ootah!"
Ootah leaped to his feet. Out of the snow-driven blackness a frail
figure staggered toward him.
"Annadoah," Ootah murmured, seizing the trembling woman in his arms.
She seemed about to faint.
"Why hast thou come hither?" He hugged her fiercely to his bosom. He
felt a throb of ecstatic delight; for the first time she had
surrendered to his arms; for the first time he held her close to him;
death--for the moment--lost its terrors--he felt that he would be
willing to die, in that storming darkness, with her heart beating, so
that he felt its every pulse, close, close to his.
The wild winds almost drowned Annadoah's words.
"The women came to me," she panted with difficulty, and Ootah had to
bend his ear to her mouth so as to hear. "They were angry. They said
'She stealeth souls! Annadoah stealeth souls!' They said, 'Annadoah
hath caused the death of many children!' Ootah! Ootah! They came, as
they do when thou art absent. They threatened me--they called upon the
spirits, as they once called to them beneath the sea. And the curse of
the long night--of darkness--hunger--death . . . they invoked . . . of
the dead . . . upon me . . . I was afraid." Ootah felt her shuddering
in his arms. "The women came unto my igloo," she repeated
wildly--"they desired that ravens peck my eyes--that I rest without a
grave--that my body lie unburied and that my spirit never rest. And
the curse of darkness--_io-o-h-h_!--they called the curse of darkness
upon me. They trampled upon me with their feet, and they tore at my
hair . . . They came unto my igloo as the storm came and called upon
the spirits of the skins to strike me; for they said I had again driven
thee to thy death, that I had sent the others to their death. Thou
knowest I lay ill when thou didst depart. But they fell on me one by
one and hurt me--I feared they would kill me. They were angry and they
called upon the dead. The storm strikes; the spirits of the winds are
angry; the ice breaks, and it is the fault of Annadoah. So they said."
Her eyes were wild, her hair dishevelled. Ootah felt her forehead--it
burned with fever.
"How didst thou come hither--and why?" he asked, his heart bounding in
the thought that she had followed him, that of him she sought
protection.
"I know not--methinks I called upon the spirits. I knew thou didst
come this way--I knew thou wouldst save me from the women. And I
followed. The way was dark. The wind held me back. But I knew thou
wert here--my heart led me; my heart found thee as birds find grass in
the mountains. Ootah! Ootah! I fear I shall die!" She collapsed in
his arms. The wind shrieked! In the distance two icebergs
exploded--there was a flash of phosphorus on the sea as the arctic
dinosaurs collided.
"Come! Or we perish in the sea!" Maisanguaq, his head bent near so as
to hear, now yelled into Ootah's ear.
Annadoah cowered at the sound of his voice. Ootah felt her trembling,
in his arms.
"And he . . . is here?" she whispered. "I am afraid."
They felt the great ice field rocking on the waves imprisoned beneath
them. It trembled whenever it touched a passing berg.
Maisanguaq prodded the terror-stricken dogs. Their howls shrilled
through the storm,
"_Huk_! _Huk_! _Huk_!" he urged.
Supporting Annadoah with one arm Ootah pushed forward after the moving
team. He knew they were being carried steadily and slowly seaward, but
he had hopes that the ice field would swerve landward toward the south
where an armlike glacier jutted, elbow-fashion, into the sea and caught
the current.