THE FROZEN NORTH
Suddenly finding themselves tired of exploring their novel quarters and
realizing that they were exhausted, the boys gathered skins together and
laid them upon the floor of the snow hut, reserving one apiece for
covering.
Then they lay down on what seemed to them the most comfortable beds they
had ever known.
It was not till they were delightfully snug and comfortable that Billy
had the disquieting idea that somebody really ought to get up and put
out the lights. These consisted of three oil lamps that threw a mellow
and not unpleasant light about the room.
Billy’s suggestion was received with a storm of uncomplimentary remarks.
“But we can’t leave ’em burning all night,” persisted Billy, when the
riot had somewhat subsided.
“Do it yourself then,” said Fred drowsily; he was already more than half
asleep.
“And for the love of Pete, stop making so much noise,” added Mouser
pathetically. “I’ve got to sleep.”
“Suppose you do it, Sleepyhead,” retorted Billy, turning so that the
light from the lamp nearest him would not shine in his eyes. “You’re
nearest them—”
With a sigh Bobby threw off his fur blanket and got up.
“I suppose I’m the goat, as usual,” he complained. “If I didn’t start
something, you fellows would still be arguing to-morrow morning.”
And then, when all the lights were out and the blessed dark enveloped
them, some one said they ought to have some ventilation.
“Say,” said Fred, raising himself belligerently on one elbow, “if
anybody wants more air in this shebang he can go dig in the snow
himself. I’m going to sleep.”
“Who says we need more air?” Bobby demanded sleepily. “Didn’t you see
that four-inch hole in the roof of the igloo? That’s supposed to let in
all the fresh air we need. Now, if anybody says another word, I’m going
to pitch him out into the snow and let the polar bears get him.
Goodnight!”
It is to be supposed that this threat silenced the boys. At any rate, no
more suggestions of any sort were heard from them that night.
However, with the first feeble rays of daylight filtering through the
ice that served as windows they were awake, feeling enormously refreshed
by their good night’s sleep and healthily ready for anything that might
happen.
“I feel as if I could tackle a polar bear right now,” boasted Fred,
holding out his good right arm and feeling proudly of his muscle. “Boy,
what I wouldn’t do to him!”
“Boy, what I wouldn’t do with his carcass,” added Billy, sniffing the
air hungrily. “I wonder if there’s any of that stew left?”
He went over to the pot and peered in, giving a whoop of joy.
“Lots of it,” he cried. “Who’s with me?”
“Better wait a while,” Bobby counseled. “Maybe Mrs. Eskimo wants the
stew for dinner. Anyway, I had enough last night. I’d like a change of
diet this morning.”
“My, listen to him!” exclaimed Fred, grinning. “Ain’t he fussy? Say,
what do you think this is, Bobby? A hotel or something?”
“Maybe our friends won’t come back at all,” ventured Mouser. “And then I
bet we’d be pretty glad to eat stew.”
But he had hardly finished speaking when the Eskimo woman arrived.
She came in attired just as she had left the night before, and the boys
wondered if she had slept that way all night.
She grinned good-naturedly and went about the business of preparing
breakfast as though she were used to having four strange boys as
visitors every day of the week.
The boys watched her admiringly as she prepared meal and cut bread in
thick slabs for the table. They hung about her eager to help, and her
perpetual grin widened as she gave them various small chores to do. She
had on hand some provisions brought from the trading station.
When the breakfast was almost ready the two Eskimo men came in,
completing the party. They brought with them many things from the
longboat.
When the boys, having satisfied their ravenous appetites, tried to thank
the Eskimos for their timely help, the latter looked so painfully
embarrassed and ill at ease that the boys had to stop.
However, despite the natural backwardness of the natives to speak about
themselves, Bobby, by careful questioning, managed to find out something
about these people who had befriended them.
The two male Eskimos were father and son and the woman of the wide,
good-natured grin, was none other than the wife and mother of the
household.
It was the older Eskimo who had spoken to Bobby the night before and
promised to take them to see the guide Mooloo. The younger native seemed
even more taciturn and uncommunicative than his father; so quiet was he,
in fact, that the boys often forgot that he was around.
The name of the older man, as near as they could get it, was Kapje, but
they never found out what the other two members of the family were
called.
Breakfast over, Kapje became communicative to the point of saying that
although the snowstorm had not developed into the blizzard he had
expected, it was still snowing so heavily that it would be unwise to try
to find the guide Mooloo that day.
“To-morrow,” he said heavily. “Maybe next day. No can tell. Snow, she
stop—we go!”
And despite all their arguing and pleading, the boys could not move him
a step from that resolution.
“Might as well try to move that five-foot snow wall outside,” Billy had
muttered to Bobby in an aside, and Bobby had nodded understanding.
Although he was sensible enough to believe that Kapje knew his business,
the delay was hard to bear. If he had had only himself to consider it is
probable he would have decided to take his chance in the storm, but they
could do nothing without the Eskimo’s help.
Of course, they might seek out some of the other natives, but they would
probably think the same as Kapje about starting out in a threatened
blizzard. And, anyway, Bobby knew that he and the other boys owed more
than they could ever hope to pay to the Eskimo and his son and he did
not want to anger them.
After breakfast the boys determined they’d like to have a look around
them, but when they started to put on the coats they had worn the night
before, Kapje grunted a protest and pointed to a pile of fur clothing
which the boys had not noticed till that moment.
“Clothes no good—no keep cold out,” said the Eskimo scornfully. “I bring
you fur. See! This way you wear ’em.”
While the boys, voicelessly grateful for the Eskimo’s kindness, looked
on with interest, Kapje held up the clothing he had brought for them.
“See,” he explained. “This your undershirt.” It was a garment made of
fawn skin and designed to be worn with the hair in, next the body. “You
put that on first, you see. Then this pants and coat made of caribou
skins, and these boots, they keep the legs warm. Seal skin, you
know—maybe? An’ these stockings, also of the seal skin, yes? Fur keep
you warm always. Wool, never.”
Then, as though embarrassed at this, for him, remarkably long speech,
the Eskimo turned and left the place before the boys could thank him.
Eagerly the boys examined the strange fur garments. There was a complete
outfit, one for each of them, even including mittens of caribou or seal.
Their inspection was interrupted by the woman who led the way to one end
of the igloo and pushed aside a heavy skin, revealing a low arched
doorway, the existence of which the boys had never suspected up to this
moment.
The woman motioned them inside, showing again her friendly grin.
“Put on fur,” she said. “An’ you never be cold again. Fur very warm—like
fire.”
“Oh, boy!” cried Fred, as he hurriedly flung off his own clothing and
stepped into the undergarment of fawn skin. “I’ll say this is the life.
Some good old scout, our friend Kapje!”
“You bet he is!” exclaimed Bobby, warmly. “I only wish we had some way
to pay him for all he is doing for us.”
“Oh, we’ll pay him all right,” cried Billy exuberantly. “When we get the
treasure we’ll divide up fifty-fifty.”
“Say, not so loud, not so loud,” cried Fred, scornfully. “What’s the
matter with you, you old stewed prune? Do you want to give our secret
away?”
“Oh, say! I forgot,” cried Billy penitently. “Honest I did, fellows. I
wonder if anybody heard it.”
“We’ll hope not,” said Bobby, adding, as he pulled on the caribou pants:
“But seriously, fellows, we’d better be pretty careful what we say. If
we can once get what we’re after, we can be generous. But until then,
the least said, soonest mended.”
And when, attired in fur from head to foot, the boys stepped out into
the bitter world of ice and snow that surrounded the igloo, they
realized how true had been Kapje’s statement that fur was the only
sensible or practical clothing for a climate where the thermometer often
fell to sixty degrees below zero.
The cold, which would have found its way irresistibly through porous
woolen clothing, no matter how heavy it might be, attacked in vain their
impenetrable suits of fur.
It was a glorious feeling. To know, by the way your nose felt and by
your watering eyes how bitterly cold it was and yet not to suffer any
actual discomfort.
They felt as though that grim North which had swallowed up so many
adventurous travelers from warmer places had suddenly turned friendly to
them. They loved even the snow that fell thickly and heavily, powdering
them in no time with a thick covering of white.
“We look like Santa Claus,” chuckled Bobby. “No wonder the dear old boy
is supposed to make his home up this way. I feel as if we ought to come
across him any minute with his reindeer and sleigh.”
“I wish we would,” said Billy. “Maybe he’d take us to see Mooloo. Look,”
he added. “Isn’t that our old college chum Kapje coming toward us?”
Clearing their eyes of the snow that blinded them, they peered ahead and
found that it was Kapje looking like a white grizzly bear in his
snow-covered furs.
He was heading for the igloo the boys had just left, and when Bobby
called out to him he halted in evident impatience.
“No can wait,” he called through the brittle air. “Fin’ big walrus.
Walrus no wait Eskimo.” With which peculiar words he disappeared inside
the igloo.
“Say, fellows,” cried Billy, his eyes as big as saucers, “I’ll bet he’s
going to hunt walrus.”
“Well, if he is,” said Bobby joyfully, “you can just bet we’re going,
too!”