University Missourian. [volume] (Columbia, Mo.) 1908-1916, 1915-09-14
CHAPTER XXVI
An Empty World

! Mile after mile KaZan went on. For
a time he was oppressed by the shiv-
ering note of death that had come 20
him in Sandy McTrigger's cry, and he
| slipped through the banskians like a
shadow, his ears flattened, his t.,
trailing, his hindquarters betray ir !,
that curious Sinking qual.,y OF the
wolf and dog stealing away iron dan
ger. Then he came out upon a plain,
and the stiffness, the billion stars in
the clear vault of the sky, and the
keen air that carried with ii a breath
of the Arctic barrens made him alert
and questioning He faced the direc-
tion of the wind. Somewhere off there
far to the south and west, was GRAY
Wolf. For the first time in many
weeks he sat back on his launches and
gave the deep and vibrant call that
echoed Weirdly for miles about him
Back in the banskians the big Dane
heard it, and whined. From over the
still body of Sandy McTrigger the lit
tie professor looked up with a white
tense face, and listened for second
cry. But instinct told Kazan that 20
that first call there would be no ans
wer, and now he struck out swiftly,
gallOping mile after mile, as a dog
follows the trail of its master home.
He did not turn back to the lake, nor
was his direction toward Red Gold
City. AS straight as he might have fol-
lowed road blaZed by the hand of
man he cut across the forty miles of
plain and swamp and forest and rocky
ridge that lay between him and the
McFarlane. All that night he did not
call again for Gray Wolf With him
reasoning was process brought about
by habit-by precedent-and as Gray
Wolf had waited for him many times
before he knew that she would be
bar.
By dawn he had reached the rive.,
within three miles of the sand-bar.
Scarcely was the sun up when he stood
on the white strip of sand where he
and Gray Wolf had come down to
drink. Expectantly and confidently
he looked about him for Gray Wolf, |
whining softly, and wagging his tail |
He began to search for her scent, but |
rains had washed even her footprints |
from the clean sand All that day he |
searched for her along the river and |
out on the plain. He went to where |
they had killed their last rabbit He |
shifted at the bushes where the |
poison bats had hung Again and |
again he sat back on his launches and |
sent out his mating cry to her. And |
slowly, as he did these things, nature
was working in him that miracle of /
the wild which the Crees have named /
the spirit call" AS it had worked In /
Gray Wolf, so now it stirred the blood
Of Kazan. With the going of the sun,
and the sweeping about him of shad-
Owy night, he turned more and more
to the south and east. His whole
world was made up of the trails over
which he had hunted. Beyond those
places he did not know that there was
such thing as existence. And in that
world. small in his understanding OF
things, was Gray Wolf He could not
miss her. That world, in his compre-
lension of it, ran from the McFarlane
N a narrow trail through the forests
and over the plains to the valley from
which the beavers had driven them.
If Gray Wolf was not here--she was
here. and tirelessly he resume his
iuest Of her.
Not until the stars were fading out
Of the sky again and gray day was
giving place 10 night, did exhaustion
in1 hunSe- stop him. He killed a
'abbit. ami for hours after te had
easted he lay close to his kill, and
slept Then he went on.
The fourth night he came to the lit
lie valley between the two ridges, and
lnder the stars, more brilliant now in
he chill clearness of the early au-
umn nights. he followed the creek
lown into their old swamp home. II
vas broad day when he reached ..m
dge of the great beaver pond that now
surrounded the windfall
Inder which Gray VOLTS second born
lad come into the world Broken II