McCREADY PAYS THE DEBT
For a long time after he had uttered those words McCready sat in silence
beside the fire. Only for a moment or two at a time did his eyes leave
Kazan. After a little, when he was sure that Thorpe and Isobel had
retired for the night, he went into his own tent and returned with a
flask of whisky. During the next half-hour he drank frequently. Then he
went over and sat on the end of the sledge, just beyond the reach of
Kazan's chain.
"Got you, didn't I?" he repeated, the effect of the liquor beginning to
show in the glitter of his eyes. "Wonder who changed your name, Pedro.
And how the devil did _he_ come by you? Ho, ho, if you could only
talk--"
They heard Thorpe's voice inside the tent. It was followed by a low
girlish peal of laughter, and McCready jerked himself erect. His face
blazed suddenly red, and he rose to his feet, dropping the flask in his
coat pocket. Walking around the fire, he tiptoed cautiously to the
shadow of a tree close to the tent and stood there for many minutes
listening. His eyes burned with a fiery madness when he returned to the
sledge and Kazan. It was midnight before he went into his own tent.
In the warmth of the fire, Kazan's eyes slowly closed. He slumbered
uneasily, and his brain was filled with troubled pictures. At times he
was fighting, and his jaws snapped. At others he was straining at the
end of his chain, with McCready or his mistress just out of reach. He
felt the gentle touch of the girl's hand again and heard the wonderful
sweetness of her voice as she sang to him and his master, and his body
trembled and twitched with the thrills that had filled him that night.
And then the picture changed. He was running at the head of a splendid
team--six dogs of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police--and his master was
calling him Pedro! The scene shifted. They were in camp. His master was
young and smooth-faced and he helped from the sledge another man whose
hands were fastened in front of him by curious black rings. Again it was
later--and he was lying before a great fire. His master was sitting
opposite him, with his back to a tent, and as he looked, there came out
of the tent the man with the black rings--only now the rings were gone
and his hands were free, and in one of them he carried a heavy club. He
heard the terrible blow of the club as it fell on his master's head--and
the sound of it aroused him from his restless sleep.
He sprang to his feet, his spine stiffening and a snarl in his throat.
The fire had died down and the camp was in the darker gloom that
precedes dawn. Through that gloom Kazan saw McCready. Again he was
standing close to the tent of his mistress, and he knew now that this
was the man who had worn the black iron rings, and that it was he who
had beaten him with whip and club for many long days after he had killed
his master. McCready heard the menace in his throat and came back
quickly to the fire. He began to whistle and draw the half-burned logs
together, and as the fire blazed up afresh he shouted to awaken Thorp
and Isobel. In a few minutes Thorpe appeared at the tent-flap and his
wife followed him out. Her loose hair rippled in billows of gold about
her shoulders and she sat down on the sledge, close to Kazan, and began
brushing it. McCready came up behind her and fumbled among the packages
on the sledge. As if by accident one of his hands buried itself for an
instant in the rich tresses that flowed down her back. She did not at
first feel the caressing touch of his fingers, and Thorpe's back was
toward them.
Only Kazan saw the stealthy movement of the hand, the fondling clutch of
the fingers in her hair, and the mad passion burning in the eyes of the
man. Quicker than a lynx, the dog had leaped the length of his chain
across the sledge. McCready sprang back just in time, and as Kazan
reached the end of his chain he was jerked back so that his body struck
sidewise against the girl. Thorpe had turned in time to see the end of
the leap. He believed that Kazan had sprung at Isobel, and in his horror
no word or cry escaped his lips as he dragged her from where she had
half fallen over the sledge. He saw that she was not hurt, and he
reached for his revolver. It was in his holster in the tent. At his feet
was McCready's whip, and in the passion of the moment he seized it and
sprang upon Kazan. The dog crouched in the snow. He made no move to
escape or to attack. Only once in his life could he remember having
received a beating like that which Thorpe inflicted upon him now. But
not a whimper or a growl escaped him.
[Illustration: "Not another blow!"]
And then, suddenly, his mistress ran forward and caught the whip poised
above Thorpe's head.
"Not another blow!" she cried, and something in her voice held him from
striking. McCready did not hear what she said then, but a strange look
came into Thorpe's eyes, and without a word he followed his wife into
their tent.
"Kazan did not leap at me," she whispered, and she was trembling with a
sudden excitement. Her face was deathly white. "That man was behind me,"
she went on, clutching her husband by the arm. "I felt him touch me--and
then Kazan sprang. He wouldn't bite _me_. It's the _man_! There's
something--wrong--"
She was almost sobbing, and Thorpe drew her close in his arms.
"I hadn't thought before--but it's strange," he said. "Didn't McCready
say something about knowing the dog? It's possible. Perhaps he's had
Kazan before and abused him in a way that the dog has not forgotten.
To-morrow I'll find out. But until I know--will you promise to keep away
from Kazan?"
Isobel gave the promise. When they came out from the tent Kazan lifted
his great head. The stinging lash had closed one of his eyes and his
mouth was dripping blood. Isobel gave a low sob, but did not go near
him. Half blinded, he knew that his mistress had stopped his punishment,
and he whined softly, and wagged his thick tail in the snow.
Never had he felt so miserable as through the long hard hours of the day
that followed, when he broke the trail for his team-mates into the
North. One of his eyes was closed and filled with stinging fire, and his
body was sore from the blows of the caribou lash. But it was not
physical pain that gave the sullen droop to his head and robbed his body
of that keen quick alertness of the lead-dog--the commander of his
mates. It was his spirit. For the first time in his life, it was broken.
McCready had beaten him--long ago; his master had beaten him; and
during all this day their voices were fierce and vengeful in his ears.
But it was his mistress who hurt him most. She held aloof from him,
always beyond they reach of his leash; and when they stopped to rest,
and again in camp, she looked at him with strange and wondering eyes,
and did not speak. She, too, was ready to beat him. He believed that,
and so slunk away from her and crouched on his belly in the snow. With
him, a broken spirit meant a broken heart, and that night he lurked in
one of the deepest shadows about the camp-fire and grieved alone. None
knew that it was grief--unless it was the girl. She did not move toward
him. She did not speak to him. But she watched him closely--and studied
him hardest when he was looking at McCready.
Later, after Thorpe and his wife had gone into their tent, it began to
snow, and the effect of the snow upon McCready puzzled Kazan. The man
was restless, and he drank frequently from the flask that he had used
the night before. In the firelight his face grew redder and redder, and
Kazan could see the strange gleam of his teeth as he gazed at the tent
in which his mistress was sleeping. Again and again he went close to
that tent, and listened. Twice he heard movement. The last time, it was
the sound of Thorpe's deep breathing. McCready hurried back to the fire
and turned his face straight up to the sky. The snow was falling so
thickly that when he lowered his face he blinked and wiped his eyes.
Then he went out into the gloom and bent low over the trail they had
made a few hours before. It was almost obliterated by the falling snow.
Another hour and there would be no trail--nothing the next day to tell
whoever might pass that they had come this way. By morning it would
cover everything, even the fire, if he allowed it to die down. McCready
drank again, out in the darkness. Low words of an insane joy burst from
his lips. His head was hot with a drunken fire. His heart beat madly,
but scarcely more furiously than did Kazan's when the dog saw that
McCready was returning _with a club_! The club he placed on end against
a tree. Then he took a lantern from the sledge and lighted it. He
approached Thorpe's tent-flap, the lantern in his hand.
"Ho, Thorpe--Thorpe!" he called.
There was no answer. He could hear Thorpe breathing. He drew the flap
aside a little, and raised his voice.
"Thorpe!"
Still there was no movement inside, and he untied the flap strings and
thrust in his lantern. The light flashed on Isobel's golden head, and
McCready stared at it, his eyes burning like red coals, until he saw
that Thorpe was awakening. Quickly he dropped the flap and rustled it
from the outside.
"Ho, Thorpe!--Thorpe!" he called again.
This time Thorpe replied.
"Hello, McCready--is that you?"
McCready drew the flap back a little, and spoke in a low voice.
"Yes. Can you come out a minute? Something's happening out in the woods.
Don't wake up your wife!"
He drew back and waited. A minute later Thorpe came quietly out of the
tent. McCready pointed into the thick spruce.
"I'll swear there's some one nosing around the camp," he said. "I'm
certain that I saw a man out there a few minutes ago, when I went for a
log. It's a good night for stealing dogs. Here--you take the lantern! If
I wasn't clean fooled, we'll find a trail in the snow."
He gave Thorpe the lantern and picked up the heavy club. A growl rose in
Kazan's throat, but he choked it back. He wanted to snarl forth his
warning, to leap at the end of his leash, but he knew that if he did
that, they would return and beat him. So he lay still, trembling and
shivering, and whining softly. He watched them until they
disappeared--and then waited--listened. At last he heard the crunch of
snow. He was not surprised to see McCready come back alone. He had
expected him to return alone. For he knew what a club meant!
McCready's face was terrible now. It was like a beast's. He was hatless.
Kazan slunk deeper in his shadow at the low horrible laugh that fell
from his lips--for the man still held the club. In a moment he dropped
that, and approached the tent. He drew back the flap and peered in.
Thorpe's wife was sleeping, and as quietly as a cat he entered and hung
the lantern on a nail in the tent-pole. His movement did not awaken her,
and for a few moments he stood there, staring--staring.
Outside, crouching in the deep shadow, Kazan tried to fathom the meaning
of these strange things that were happening. Why had his master and
McCready gone out into the forest? Why had not his master returned? It
was his master, and not McCready, who belonged in that tent. Then why
was McCready there? He watched McCready as he entered, and suddenly the
dog was on his feet, his back tense and bristling, his limbs rigid. He
saw McCready's huge shadow on the canvas, and a moment later there came
a strange piercing cry. In the wild terror of that cry he recognized
_her_ voice--and he leaped toward the tent. The leash stopped him,
choking the snarl in his throat. He saw the shadows struggling now, and
there came cry after cry. She was calling to his master, and with his
master's name she was calling _him_!
"_Kazan_--_Kazan_--"
He leaped again, and was thrown upon his back. A second and a third
time he sprang the length of the leash into the night, and the babiche
cord about his neck cut into his flesh like a knife. He stopped for an
instant, gasping for breath. The shadows were still fighting. Now they
were upright! Now they were crumpling down! With a fierce snarl he flung
his whole weight once more at the end of the chain. There was a snap, as
the thong about his neck gave way.
In half a dozen bounds Kazan made the tent and rushed under the flap.
With a snarl he was at McCready's throat. The first snap of his powerful
jaws was death, but he did not know that. He knew only that his mistress
was there, and that he was fighting for her. There came one choking
gasping cry that ended with a terrible sob; it was McCready. The man
sank from his knees upon his back, and Kazan thrust his fangs deeper
into his enemy's throat; he felt the warm blood.
The dog's mistress was calling to him now. She was pulling at his shaggy
neck. But he would not loose his hold--not for a long time. When he did,
his mistress looked down once upon the man and covered her face with
her hands. Then she sank down upon the blankets. She was very still. Her
face and hands were cold, and Kazan muzzled them tenderly. Her eyes were
closed. He snuggled up close against her, with his ready jaws turned
toward the dead man. Why was she so still, he wondered?
A long time passed, and then she moved. Her eyes opened. Her hand
touched him.
Then he heard a step outside.
It was his master, and with that old thrill of fear--fear of the
club--he went swiftly to the door. Yes, there was his master in the
firelight--and in his hand he held the club. He was coming slowly,
almost falling at each step, and his face was red with blood. But he had
_the club_! He would beat him again--beat him terribly for hurting
McCready; so Kazan slipped quietly under the tent-flap and stole off
into the shadows. From out the gloom of the thick spruce he looked back,
and a low whine of love and grief rose and died softly in his throat.
They would beat him always now--after _that_. Even _she_ would beat him.
They would hunt him down, and beat him when they found him.
From out of the glow of the fire he turned his wolfish head to the
depths of the forest. There were no clubs or stinging lashes out in that
gloom. They would never find him there.
For another moment he wavered. And then, as silently as one of the wild
creatures whose blood was partly his, he stole away into the blackness
of the night.