Mooswa & Others of the Boundaries Part 32

The big Stag-hounds sniffed the Wolf trail, dropped their long, bony tails in sullen fear, raised their heads, and bayed a howling note of defiance.

"Shut up, Bruce!" exclaimed one of the men, pulling at the raw-hide leash, "you'll be better up against a Moose than tackling that gang."

Now the mark in the snow had been made by Mooswa just to draw the hunters on; he wasn't tired, for the hard crust held him up, and he could have kept that gait for two days.

They had travelled probably thirty miles when the leader said, "Better slip the dogs, Mac, this Moose is putting up a game on us; he's as cunning as an old fox, and we'll lose him to-night, I'm afraid."

When the straps were unbuckled the Scotch hounds broke into a chorus of delight: "Yi, yi, yi, yi! yap! yap! yi, yi! Bah-h-h! Bah-h-h!"

stretched their long limbs and raced on the Bull Moose's trail. That showed a strain of Collie blood in their veins, for if they had been pure bred they would have run silent, and by sight only.

"Pleasant greeting that," muttered Mooswa, as his flanks lengthened out in a terrific pacing gait.

"We're coming--we're coming! yi, yi!" sang the Stag-hounds, their heads low to the snow; their lean flanks stretching out until they seemed like something shot from a catapult. But swift as they were, Mooswa was swifter. They were running at high pressure, straining every nerve, using every ounce of speed that was in their wire-haired bodies; the Bull was running with a little in hand--something in reserve. "They will upset everything," he thought. "Those blood thirsters will chase me on past the Shack, and the Men may never see it."

At the Second Rapid, with its tortuous ice-humps, the Bull lost a little ground--he had to go slower. The dogs, quicker of foot, and able to turn sharper, gained on him. Each time they caught sight of their prey they gave a savage yelp of eager exultation, and ran with heads high--ran by the eye.

"Sing, gaunt Brothers!" said Mooswa; "on the level you'll have to run with your bellies closer to the trail to keep your advantage."

Well clear of the Rapid ice, the Bull again swung his awkward-looking body forward with increased pace. Suddenly a hoof crashed through the crust almost bringing him on his nose; before he had gone a hundred yards this happened again. Fringed by giant Spruce, tall banks on either side had stood as barrier between the fierce biting frost-wind and snow crust; also the day's hot sun was beginning to rot its brittle sh.e.l.l. Oftener and oftener it broke under the racing Moose; the lighter dogs ran freely over its treacherous surface. The Bull looked over his shoulder at his pursuers; they were gaining--he could see that. "Six points more to the Shack," he muttered, as he rounded a low-reaching headland that turned the river wide in its snake-like course. Animals count river distances as do the Indians, so many land points from one place to another; Mooswa's six points were a good ten miles.

Each time he floundered in the deep Snow his swift-running enemies gained at least a dozen yards.

"I wish Blue Wolf were here," thought Mooswa; "I'll never make the Shack. I'll try a Boundary Call." He stretched his throat, and called, "Wha-a-a--i-i-n-g," which is not unlike the cry of a Rook. The hounds answered with an ironical yell; but another sound struck the runner's ear, very faint, and very far ahead; it was the Help-call of The Boundaries--Blue Wolf's voice.

"Good old Rof!" cried the Moose, as he shot forward with revived strength.

The hounds were now running by sight, head up all the time. Every few minutes Mooswa repeated his signal--each time it was answered ahead, stronger and closer; and behind him the eager yap! of the pursuers was drawing nearer. "There'll be more fighting than running presently," he thought; "it's just as well--if Rof has the Pack, it won't take long to settle these hungry Hunters."

Rounding the next bend a clear stretch of two miles lay straight away, and at the farther end of it his trained eye discovered three moving specks. Behind him, not thirty yards back, raced the dogs.

"It will be a battle," he muttered; "four against four--four of the Boundaries in the Starvation Year, against four Fish-fed Dwellers in Man's camp."

Another mile and the foremost dog was snapping at the Bull's hocks, just falling short each jump; but Blue Wolf and his comrades were only a stone's-throw off.

As Mooswa and his pursuers neared the great, gaunt, blue-coated Wolf, the latter crouched--chest, and neck, and jaw flat on the snow; behind, well spread in rigid leverage, were the strong, gnarled legs. A length off two younger wolves waited ready for battle, flat-lying as their leader. Mooswa understood. As he slashed by Blue Wolf, almost touching him, the close-following Stag-hound sprang for his quarters, all but dragging him to earth; but the fangs failed to hold, tearing a gash down Moose's thigh, and as the Dog fell sideways a pair of jaws, strong as a bear-trap, closed on his lean throat.

"Hold fast, Brother!" wheezed Mooswa, swinging around in his own length, and making a vicious sword-cut at the hound's back with his iron hoof.

A second dog sprang at the Bull's throat, only to strike the big antlers quickly lowered to guard it.

Rof's two sons had closed with the other hounds, and a battle to the death raged. There was not much noise, only a snarling sucking from where Blue Wolf's fangs were fastened in the throat of the hound he had pinned down.

Once Mooswa got a clean slash at his fighting dog with a fore-foot that laid the brute's shoulder open; once the dog fastened in Mooswa's throat as the treacherous crust gave way and threw him off his guard. It seemed anybody's battle. Blue Wolf knew better than to let go the first hold he had taken. It was said in the Boundaries that long ago, two or three generations back, a Bull-dog had mated with one of his ancestors, and the strong strain had more than held its own--the way of the Bull-dog, which is to catch and hold, against the way of the Wolf, which is to cut and jump, cut and jump. Certain it is that Rof fought as no other Wolf ever did--except his two Sons, holding and sucking, and working his jaws saw-like, as an Otter-hound does, more and more into the grip. But the Stag-hound had a well-fed strength which stood him in good stead. Over and over the two rolled; the hound's jaws fastened on one of Blue Wolf's fore-legs, close to the paw. The bone had been broken long ago--chewed into splinters, and the pain was terrific; but if Blue Wolf had the tenacity of the Bull-dog strain, he also had the wild wisdom of the Wolf brain, and he knew that to let go meant death.

Once something swept the hound sideways with terrific force from over the top of Rof, almost breaking the dog's back; that was a little side help from the shovel-horns of Bull Moose. Up to that time it had been all hoa.r.s.e growls from the strong-fighting animals, for the advantage had lain not much on either side. Suddenly a "Wh-u-f-f!

ki-yi-yi-yi--wh-e-e-e, yi-i-i," dying into a piercing treble, went up.

Mooswa was grinding his dog into the snow-crust with his hundred-pound antlers. A lucky pa.s.s with a fore-foot had brought the hound down, and before he could recover, Mooswa had thrown the weight of his fighting charge upon him, and was cutting his steel-gray body into fragments.

There was still hot work to be done, for one of the young Wolves had been overcome, stretched out with a broken neck, and the released dog was helping his comrade pull down the other. They were both at him when Mooswa charged. Once, twice, three times, as a trip-hammer hits hot iron, the heart-shaped hoofs, knife-like on the edges, smote the dogs, for they were taken unawares; then, as before, his horns made the work complete.

As Mooswa straightened himself a little staggeringly, for his throat was badly torn, there were only two left fighting; all the rest were dead--the two sons of Blue Wolf, and the three Stag-hounds.

"Thanks, Brother," said Blue Wolf, rising on weak legs, as a deft, dragging blow from Moose's right arm laid open the hound's stomach, and finished the work Rof's fast-tiring strength was hardly equal to. "Very neatly done--I could almost fancy it was a rip from Muskwa's paw. My two Lads are done for," he whined piteously, looking at the gaunt, gray bodies stretched out on the white snow, all splashed crimson with red wine from their veins. "Wolf-blood and Dog-blood--it scents much alike," he said, turning his head away, as he sat on his haunches holding up a broken leg. Drip, drip-drip, drip, little red drops ate their hot way into the snow from Bull-Moose's neck.

"That is a nasty slash, Mooswa," sympathized Blue Wolf, looking at his companion's wound.

"We twig-feeders have strong gullets," answered the Bull, "else it had been worse. There's nothing torn, for I still breathe through my nose; but for many a day you'll hunt on three legs because of me, Comrade."

"I suppose so," moaned Blue Wolf, regretfully, licking nervously at his crushed paw. "I'll mate well with Black King. But it is all in the life of the Pack, and not your fault; no one takes blame to himself who calls when his life is at bay. Where go you, Brother--how far back are the Hunters?"

Mooswa straightened his head sharp into the wind--it still held steady from the North. "Their scent comes from the second point, and we must trail again; the Firestick is not like a Dog--it bites beyond reach.

Get in my horns, Rof, and I'll carry you."

"No," said Blue Wolf, decidedly; "each takes his own hurt to his Burrow--that is the way of the Pack; each to himself in the fight--one down is all on top. Besides, Comrade, your long legs are knocking together in weariness; the snow drinks much of your red blood."

"Come," called Mooswa, "the Man-scent turns the first point."

Blue Wolf, whining piteously, was rubbing his red-stained jowl up the neck of one of his dead Sons. He turned, balanced himself unsteadily, and tried to kick snow over their dead bodies. Bull-Moose, seeing this, lowered his head, gave three or four mighty sc.r.a.pes with his wide horns, and piled great white mounds over Blue Wolf's dead children.

"Come away now," he commanded again; "the Hunt-men sight us--they are racing."

"They'll have a fair trail to follow for a little," answered Wolf; "then it will be dark, and we'll lose them. I go to the Pack for safety; had I known of the Dogs and this other Man I should have brought more than two Cub-wolves."

"I go to the Shack," said Mooswa, shortening his steps to keep pace with Wolf.

"To be killed by the Hunt-men?"

"I don't know; I go to The Boy."

As they climbed the bank, "Bang! pin-g-g-g!" sang a leaden messenger, fairly whistling through the crotches of Mooswa's horns.

"The Firestick!" he grunted; "sight of his dead Train-dogs has angered the Hunt-man. Slip off to your Pack now," he continued, as they trailed through the little clearing surrounding the Shack. "Get Umisk to fix up your foot as he did Black King's."

"And you?" queried Blue Wolf.

"I stop here!" the other answered, swaying as he stood in his tracks for a second.

"Come with me," pleaded Rof; "my Pack shall turn back the Hunters."

"Here they come--off to the Woods!" Mooswa answered, going himself to the Shack door and rattling his horns against the boards. The noise wakened Whisky-Jack, who had curled up for his night's sleep under the eave.

"Thieves!--h.e.l.lo, Mooswa!" he piped, craning his neck around the corner, and seeing the big horned head.

Inside a faint querulous voice asked impatiently, "Is that you, Francois, or is it the angels with wood? If it is, throw it down the chimney, please--I'm too sick to get up."

Mooswa "whuffed," blowing the wind through his blood-coated nostrils with a sound The Boy knew, and sc.r.a.ped his horn up and down the door again. There was a m.u.f.fled, slipping noise of some one crawling to the door. The bar dropped, Mooswa pushed it gently open, staggered in, and plumped down exhausted on the floor.

Carcajou had heaped the fire-place well with wood for the night--dry Tamarack to make it blaze, and green Poplar to make it last; the bright light shone on Mooswa's blood-matted body and revealed to Roderick his terrible condition.

"Mooswa, Mooswa!" he cried, dragging himself close and putting his arm around the big nose, "who has done this? You are wounded." Just then two men, with the blood-thirst of the chase hot in their hearts, glided to the door on snow-shoes. One had thrust forward a rifle, but his companion knocked it up with his arm. "What would you shoot?" he asked.