The Brookings register. [volume] (Brookings, Brookings County, S.D.) 1903-1971, 1917-09-13
Tho DAYS Of Fire.
CHAPTER XII.

From the night of the terrible fight
With the big gray lynx on the top Of
the Sun Rock, KaZan remembered less
and less wildly the old days when he
had been a sledge-dOg, and the leader
Of q pack. He would never quite for
get them, and always there would
stand out certain memories from
among the rest, like fires cutting the
0lacknesS Of night. But as a mar
dates events from his birth, his mar
riage, his freedom from a bondage, or
some foundation-step in his career, so
all things seemed to Kazan to begin
With two tragedies which had followed
n fast upon the other after the birth
Of Gray VOLTS pups.
The first was the fight on the Sun
Rock, when the big gray lynx had
blinded his beautiful wolf mate for all
time, and had torn her pups into pieces.
He In turn had killed the lynx. But
Gray Wolf was still blind. Vengeance
had not been able to give her sight.
She could no longer hunt with him, as
they had hunted with the wild wolf
packs " on the plain, and in the
dark forests. SO at thought of that
night he always snarled, and his lips
curled back to reveal his inch-long
fangs.
The other tragedy was the going of
Joan, her baby and her husband. Some
thing more infallible than reason told
kazan that they would not come back.
Brightest of all the pictures that re-
manned with him was that of the sunny
morning when the woman and the baby
he loved, n the mar he endured be-
cause Of them, had gone away In the
canoe, INK often he would go to the
point, and gaze longingly downstream,
where he had leaped from the canoe to
return to his blind mate.
So Kazan's life seemed now to be
made up chiefly of three things: his
hatred Of everything that bore the
scent or mark of the lynx, his grieving
for Joan and the baby, and Gray Wolf.
1t was natural that the strongest pas
sion in him should be his hatred of the
lynx, for not only Gray VOLTS blind
ness and the death of the pups, but
ever the loss of the woman ana the
baby he laid to that fatal struggle on
the Sun Rock. From that hour he be-
came the deadlieSt enemy of the lynx
tribe. Wherever he struck the scent
of the big gray cat be was turned into
a %snarling demon, and his hatred grew
day by day, as he became more COM
pletely Il part Of the wild.
He found that Gray Wolf was more
necessary to him now han she had
ever been since the day she had left
the wolf-pack for him. He was three
quarters dog, and the dog-part Of him
demanded companionship. There was
only Gray Wolf to give him that now.
They were alone. Civilization was four
hundred miles south of them. The
nearest Hudson's Bay post was sixty
miles to the west. Often, in the days
Of the woman and the baby, Gray Wolf
had spent her nights alone out in the
forest, waiting and calling for KaZan.
Now it was Kazan who was lonely and
Uneasy when he WAS away from her
side.
In her blindness Gray Wolf could
no longer hunt with her mate. But
gradually q new code of understanding
grew up between them, and through
her blindness they learned many
things that they had not known be-
fore. BY early summer Gray Wolf
could travel with Kazan, if he did not
move too swiftly. She ran at his flank,
with her shoulder or muzzle touching
him, and Kazan learned not to leap,
but to trOt. Very quickly he found that
he must choose the easiest trails for
Gray VOLTS feet. When they came to
a space to be bridged by a leap, he
would muzzle Gray Wolf and whine.
and she would stand with ears alert
listening. Then Kazan would take the
leap, and she understood the distance
she had to cover. She always over
leaped, which was q good fault.
In another way. and one that was
destined to serve then many times In
the future, she became of greater help
than eve to Kazan. Scent and near
Ing entirely took the place Of sight.
Each day developed these sense more
and more, and at the same time there
developed between them the dumb lam
guage whereby she could impress upon
Kazan what she had discovered by
scent or sound. 1t became a curious
habit of Kazan's always to look at
Gray Wolf when they stopped to listen,
or to scent the air.
After the fight IN the Sun Rock, IA
Ean had taken his blind mate to a thick
clump of spruce and balsam in the
river bottom, where they remained I'M
til early summer. Every day for weeks
Kazan went to the cabin where Joan
and the baby-and the man-had been.
For a long time he went hopefully,
looking each day or night to see some
sign Of life there. But the door was
never open. The boards and saplings
at the windows always remained.
Never a spiral Of smoke rose from the
clay chimney. Grass and vines be-
gan to grow in the path. And fainter