The Wolf Hunters, James Oliver Curwood [best contemporary novels .TXT] 📗

the small pack in which the hunters carried their food while on the trail, and which had been upon his shoulders since noon.
"There is a double handful of coffee, a cupful of tea, plenty of salt and a little bread," he said.
"Good! Few enough supplies for three people in this kind of a wilderness--but they'll save Mukoki!"
Wabi went back, while Rod, sheltered behind a rock, watched the narrow incline into the chasm. He almost hoped the Woongas would dare to attempt a descent, for he was sure that he and Wabi would have them at a terrible disadvantage and with their revolvers and three rifles could inflict a decisive blow upon them before they reached the bottom. But he saw no sign of their enemies. He heard no sound from above, yet he knew that the outlaws were very near--only waiting for the protecting darkness of night.
He heard the crackling of Wabi's fire and the odor of coffee came to him; and Wabi, assured that their presence was known to the Woongas, began whistling cheerily. In a few minutes he rejoined Rod behind the rock.
"They will attack us as soon as it gets good and dark," he said coolly. "That is, if they can find us. As soon as they are no longer able to see down into the chasm we will find some kind of a hiding-place. Mukoki will be able to travel then."
A memory of the cleft in the chasm wall came to Rod and he quickly described it to his companion. It was an ideal hiding-place at night, and if Mukoki was strong enough they could steal up out of the chasm and secure a long start into the south before the Woongas discovered their flight in the morning. There was just one chance of failure. If the spy whose trail had revealed the break in the mountain to Rod was not among the outlaws' wounded or dead the cleft might be guarded, or the Woongas themselves might employ it in making a descent upon them.
"It's worth the risk anyway," said Wabi. "The chances are even that your outlaw ran across the fissure by accident and that his companions are not aware of its existence. And they'll not follow our trail down the chasm to-night, I'll wager. In the cover of darkness they will steal down among the rocks and then wait for daylight. Meanwhile we can be traveling southward and when they catch up with us we will give them another fight if they want it."
"We can start pretty soon?"
"Within an hour."
For some time the two stood in silent watchfulness. Suddenly Rod asked:
"Where is Wolf?"
Wabi laughed, softly, exultantly.
"Gone back to his people, Rod. He will be crying in the wild hunt-pack to-night. Good old Wolf!" The laugh left his lips and there was a tremble of regret in his voice. "The Woongas came from the back of the cabin--took me by surprise--and we had it hot and heavy for a few minutes. We fell back where Wolf was tied and just as I knew they'd got me sure I cut his babeesh with the knife I had in my hand."
"Didn't he show fight?"
"For a minute. Then one of the Indians shot, at him and he hiked off into the woods."
"Queer they didn't wait for Mukoki and me," mused Rod. "Why didn't they ambush us?"
"Because they didn't want you, and they were sure they'd reach their camp before you took up the trail. I was their prize. With me in their power they figured on communicating with you and Mukoki and sending you back to the Post with their terms. They would have bled father to his last cent--and then killed me. Oh, they talked pretty plainly to me when they thought they had me!"
There came a noise from above them and the young hunters held their rifles in readiness. Nearer and nearer came the crashing sound, until a small boulder shot past them into the chasm.
"They're up there," grinned Wabi, lowering his gun. "That was an accident, but you'd better keep your eyes open. I'll bet the whole tribe feel like murdering the fellow who rolled over that stone!"
He crept cautiously back to Mukoki, and Rod crouched with his face to the narrow trail leading down from the top of the mountain. Deep shadows were beginning to lurk among the trees and he was determined that any movement there would draw his fire. Fifteen minutes later Wabi returned, eating ravenously at a big hind quarter of broiled rabbit.
"I've had my coffee," he greeted. "Go back and eat and drink, and build the fire up high. Don't mind me when I shoot. I am going to fire just to let the Woongas know we are on guard, and after that we'll hustle for that break in the mountain."
Rod found Mukoki with a chunk of rabbit in one hand and a cup of coffee in the other. The wounded Indian smiled with something like the old light in his eyes and a mighty load was lifted from Rod's heart.
"You're better?" he asked.
"Fine!" replied Mukoki. "No much hurt. Good fight some more. Wabi say, 'No, you stay.'" His face became a map of grimaces to show his disapproval of Wabi's command.
Rod helped himself to the meat and coffee. He was hungry, but after he was done there remained some of the rabbit and a biscuit and these he placed in his pack for further use. Soon after this there came two shots from the rock and before the echoes had died away down the chasm Wabi approached through the gathering gloom.
It was easy for the hunters to steal along the concealment of the mountain wall, and even if there had been prying eyes on the opposite ridge they could not have penetrated the thickening darkness in the bottom of the gulch. For some time the flight was continued with extreme caution, no sound being made to arouse the suspicion of any outlaw who might be patrolling the edge of the precipice. At the end of half an hour Mukoki, who was in the lead that he might set a pace according to his strength, quickened his steps. Rod was close beside him now, his eyes ceaselessly searching the chasm wall for signs that would tell him when they were nearing the rift. Suddenly Wabi halted in his tracks and gave a low hiss that stopped them.
"It's snowing!" he whispered.
Mukoki lifted his face. Great solitary flakes of snow fell upon it.
"She snow hard--soon. Mebby cover snow-shoe trails!"
"And if it does--we're safe!" There was a vibrant joy in Wabi's voice.
For a full minute Mukoki held his face to the sky.
"Hear small wind over chasm," he said.
"She come from south. She snow hard--now--up there!"
They went on, stirred by new hope. Rod could feel that the flakes were coming thicker. The three now kept close to the chasm wall in their search for the rift. How changed all things were at night! Rod's heart throbbed now with hope, now with doubt, now with actual fear. Was it possible that he could not find it? Had they passed it among some of the black shadows behind? He saw no rock that he recognized, no overhanging crag, no sign to guide him. He stopped, and his voice betrayed his uneasiness as he asked:
"How far do you think we have come?"
Mukoki had gone a few steps ahead, and before Wabi answered he called softly to them from close up against the chasm wall. They hurried to him and found him standing beside the rift.
"Here!"
Wabi handed his rifle to Rod.
"I'm going up first," he announced. "If the coast is clear I'll whistle down."
For a few moments Mukoki and Rod could hear him as he crawled up the fissure. Then all was silent. A quarter of an hour passed, and a low whistle came to their ears. Another ten minutes and the three stood together at the top of the mountain, Rod and the wounded Mukoki breathing hard from their exertions.
For a time the three sat down in the snow and waited, watched, listened; and from Rod's heart there went up something that was almost a prayer, for it was snowing--snowing hard, and it seemed to him that the storm was something which God had specially directed should fall in their path that it might shield them and bring them safely home.
And when he rose to his feet Wabi was still silent, and the three gripped hands in mute thankfulness at their deliverance.
Still speechless, they turned instinctively for a moment back to the dark desolation beyond the chasm--the great, white wilderness in which they had passed so many adventurous yet happy weeks; and as they gazed into the chaos beyond the second mountain there came to them the lonely, wailing howl of a wolf.
"I wonder," said Wabi softly. "I wonder--if that--is Wolf?"
And then, Indian file, they trailed into the south.


CHAPTER XVI
THE SURPRISE AT THE POST
From the moment that the adventurers turned their backs upon the Woonga country Mukoki was in command. With the storm in their favor everything else now depended upon the craft of the old pathfinder. There was neither moon nor wind to guide them, and even Wabi felt that he was not competent to strike a straight trail in a strange country and a night storm. But Mukoki, still a savage in the ways of the wilderness, seemed possessed of that mysterious sixth sense which is known as the sense of orientation--that almost supernatural instinct which guides the carrier pigeon as straight as a die to its home-cote hundreds of miles away. Again and again during that thrilling night's flight Wabi or Rod would ask the Indian where Wabinosh House lay, and he would point out its direction to them without hesitation. And each time it seemed to the city youth that he pointed a different way, and it proved to him how easy it was to become hopelessly lost in the wilderness.
Not until midnight did they pause to rest. They had traveled slowly but steadily and Wabi figured that they had covered fifteen miles. Five miles behind them their trail was completely obliterated by the falling snow. Morning would betray to the Woongas no sign of the direction taken by the fugitives.
"They will believe that we have struck directly westward for the Post," said Wabi. "To-morrow night we'll be fifty miles apart."
During this stop a small fire was built behind a fallen log and the hunters refreshed themselves with a pot of strong coffee and what little remained of the rabbit and biscuits. The march was then resumed.
It seemed to Rod that they had climbed an interminable number of ridges and had picked their way through an interminable number of swampy bottoms between them, and he, even more than Mukoki, was relieved when they struck the easier traveling of open plains. In fact, Mukoki seemed scarcely to give a thought to his wound and Roderick was almost ready to drop in his tracks by the time a halt was called an hour before dawn. The old warrior was confident that they were now well out of danger and a rousing camp-fire was built in the shelter of a thick growth of spruce.
"Spruce partridge in mornin'," affirmed Mukoki. "Plenty here for breakfast."
"How do you know?" asked Rod, whose hunger was ravenous.
"Fine thick spruce, all in shelter of dip," explained the Indian. "Birds winter here."
Wabi had unpacked the furs, and the larger of these, including six lynx and three especially fine wolf skins, he divided into three piles.
"They'll make mighty comfortable beds if you keep close enough to the fire," he explained. "Get a few spruce boughs,