into safety against Fairfax's return. But Thom stretched out a detaining
hand and stood up, facing him.
"You?" she said, in the Arctic tongue which differs little from Greenland
to Point Barrow. "You?"
And the swift expression of her face demanded all for which "you" stood,
his reason for existence, his presence there, his relation to her husband—
everything.
"Brother," he answered in the same tongue, with a sweeping gesture to the
south. "Brothers we be, your man and I."
She shook her head. "It is not good that you be here."
"After one sleep I go."
"And my man ?" she demanded, with tremulous eagerness.
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Van Brunt shrugged his shoulders. He was aware of a certain secret
shame, of an impersonal sort of shame, and an anger against Fairfax. And
he felt the warm blood in his face as he regarded the young savage. She
was just a woman. That was all—a woman. The whole sordid story over
again, over and over again, as old as Eve and young as the last new lovelight.
"My man! My man! My man!" she was reiterating vehemently, her face
passionately dark, and the ruthless tenderness of the Eternal Woman, the
Mate-Woman, looking out at him from her eyes.
"Thom," he said gravely, in English, "you were born in the Northland
forest, and you have eaten fish and meat, and fought with frost and famine,
and lived simply all the days of your life. And there are many things,
indeed not simple, which you do not know and cannot come to understand.
You do not know what it is to long for the flesh-pots afar, you cannot
understand what it is to yearn for a fair woman's face And the woman is
fair, Thom, the woman is nobly fair. You have been woman to this man,
and you have been your all, but your all is very little, very simple. Too
little and too simple, and he is an alien man. Him you have never known,
you can never know. It is so ordained. You held him in your arms, but you
never held his heart, this man with his blurring seasons and his dreams of
a barbaric end. Dreams and dream-dust, that is what he has been to you.
You clutched at form and gripped shadow, gave yourself to a man and
bedded with the wraith of a man. In such manner, of old, did the daughters
of men whom the gods found fair. And, Thom, Thom, I should not like to
be John Fairfax in the night-watches of the years to come, in the nightwatches,
when his eyes shall see, not the sun- gloried hair of the woman
by his side, but the dark tresses of a mate forsaken in the forests of the
North."
Though she did not understand, she had listened with intense attention, as
though life hung on his speech. But she caught at her husband's name and
cried out in Eskimo:—
"Yes ! Yes! Fairfax! My man !"
"Poor little fool, how could he be your man?"
But she could not understand his English tongue, and deemed that she was
being trifled with. The dumb, insensate anger of the MateWoman flamed
in her face, and it almost seemed to the man as though she crouched
panther-like for the spring.
He cursed softly to himself and watched the fire fade from her face and the
soft luminous glow of the appealing woman spring up, of the appealing
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woman who foregoes strength and panoplies herself wisely in her
weakness.
"He is my man," she said gently. "Never have I known other. It cannot be
that I should ever know other. Nor can it be that he should go from me."
"Who has said he shall go from thee?" he demanded sharply, half in
exasperation, half in impotence.
"It is for thee to say he shall not go from me," she answered softly, a halfsob
in her throat.
Van Brunt kicked the embers of the fire savagely and sat down.
"It is for thee to say. He is my man. Before all women he is my man. Thou
art big, thou art strong, and behold, I am very weak. See, I am at thy feet.
It is for thee to deal with me. It is for thee."
"Get up !" He jerked her roughly erect and stood up himself. "Thou art a
woman. Wherefore the dirt is no place for thee, nor the feet of any man. " ,
"He is my man."
"Then Jesus forgive all men!" Van Brunt cried out passionately.
"He is my man," she repeated monotonously, beseechingly.
"He is my brother," he answered.
"My father is Chief Tantlatch. He is a power over five villages. I will see
that the five villages be searched for thy choice of all maidens, that thou
mayest stay here by thy brother, and dwell in comfort."
"After one sleep I go."
"And my man?"
"Thy man comes now. Behold!"
From among the gloomy spruces came the light carolling of Fairfax's
voice.
As the day is quenched by a sea of fog, so his song smote the light out of
her face. "It is the tongue of his own people," she said; "the tongue of his
own people."
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She turned, with the free movement of a lithe young animal, and made off
into the forest.
"It's all fixed," Fairfax called as he came up. "His regal highness will
receive you after breakfast."
"Have you told him?" Van Brunt asked.
"No. Nor shall I tell him till we're ready to pull out."
Van Brunt looked with moody affection over the sleeping forms of his
men.
"I shall be glad when we are a hundred leagues upon our way," he said.
Thom raised the skin-flap of her father's lodge. Two men sat with him, and
the three looked at her with swift interest. But her face betokened nothing
as she entered and took seat quietly, without speech. Tantlatch drummed
with his knuckles on a spear-heft across his knees, and gazed idly along
the path of a sun-ray which pierced a lacing-hole and flung a glittering
track across the murky atmosphere of the lodge. To his right, at his
shoulder, crouched Chugungatte, the shaman. Both were old men, and the
weariness of many years brooded in their eyes. But opposite them sat
Keen, a young man and chief favorite in the tribe. He was quick and alert
of movement, and his black eyes flashed from face to face in ceaseless
scrutiny and challenge.
Silence reigned in the place. Now and again camp noises penetrated, and
from the distance, faint and far, like the shadows of voices, came the
wrangling of boys in thin shrill tones. A dog thrust his head into the
entrance and blinked wolfishly at them for a space, the slaver dripping
from his ivory-white fangs. After a time he growled tentatively, and then,
awed by the immobility of the human figures, lowered his head and
grovelled away backward. Tantlatch glanced apathetically at his daughter.
"And thy man, how is it with him and thee ?"
"He sings strange songs," Thom made answer, "and there is a new look on
his face."
"So? He hath spoken?"
"Nay, but there is a new look on his face, a new light in his eyes, and wit
h
the New-Comer he sits by the fire, and they talk and talk, and the talk is
without end."
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Chugungatte whispered in his master's ear, and Keen leaned forward from
his hips.
"There be something calling him from afar," she went on, "and he seems
to sit and listen, and to answer, singing, in his own people's tongue. "
Again Chugungatte whispered and Keen leaned forward, and Thom held
her speech till her father nodded his head that she might proceed.
"It be known to thee, O Tantlatch, that the wild goose and the swan and
the little ringed duck be born here in the low-lying lands. It be known that
they go away before the face of the frost to unknown places. And it be
known, likewise, that always do they return when the sun is in the land
and the waterways are free. Always do they return to where they were
born, that new life may go forth. The land calls to them and they come.
And now there is another land that calls, and it is calling to my man,—the
land where he was born,—and he hath it in mind to answer the call. Yet is
he my man. Before all women is he my man."
"Is it well, Tantlatch? Is it well?" Chugungatte demanded, with the hint of
menace in his voice.
"Ay, it is well!" Keen cried boldly. "The land calls to its children and all
lands call their children home again. As the wild goose and the swan and
the little ringed duck are called, so is called this Stranger Man who has
lingered with us and who now must go. Also there be the call of kind. The
goose mates with the goose, nor does the swan mate with the little ringed
duck. It is not well that the swan should mate with the little ringed duck.
Nor is it well that stranger men should mate with the women of our
villages. Wherefore I say the man should go, to his own kind, in his own
land."
"He is my own man," Thom answered, "and he is a great man."
"Ay, he is a great man." Chugungatte lifted his head with a faint
recrudescence of youthful vigor. "He is a great man, and he put strength in
thy arm, O Tantlatch, and gave thee power, and made thy name to be
feared in the land, to be feared and to be respected. He is very wise, and
there be much profit in his wisdom. To him are we beholden for many
things,—for the cunning in war and the secrets of the defence of a village
and a rush in the forest, for the discussion in council and the undoing of
enemies by word of mouth and the hard- sworn promise, for the gathering
of game and the making of traps and the preserving of food, for the curing
of sickness and mending of hurts of trail and fight. Thou, Tantlatch, wert a
lame old man this day, were it not that the Stranger Man came into our
midst and attended on thee. And ever, when in doubt on strange questions,
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have we gone to him, that out of his wisdom he might make things clear,
and ever has he made things clear. And there be questions yet to arise, and
needs upon his wisdom yet to come, and we cannot bear to let him go. It is
not well that we should let him go."
Tantlatch continued to drum on the spear-heft, and gave no sign that he
had heard. Thom studied his face in vain, and Chugungatte seemed to
shrink together and droop down as the weight of years descended upon
him again.
"No man makes my kill." Keen smote his breast a valorous blow. "I make
my own kill. I am glad to live when I make my own kill. When I creep
through the snow upon the great moose, I am glad. And when I draw the
bow, so, with my full strength, and drive the arrow fierce and swift and to
the heart, I am glad. And the meat of no man's kill tastes as sweet as the
meat of my kill. I am glad to live, glad in my own cunning and strength,
glad that I am a doer of things, a doer of things for myself. Of what other
reason to live than that? Why should I live if I delight not in myself and
the things I do? And it is because I delight and am glad that I go forth to
hunt and fish, and it is because I go forth to hunt and fish that I grow
cunning and strong. The man who stays in the lodge by the fire grows not
cunning and strong. He is not made happy in the eating of my kill, nor is
living to him a delight. He does not live. And so I say it is well this
Stranger Man should go. His wisdom does not make us wise. If he be
cunning, there is no need that we be cunning. If need arise, we go to him
for his cunning. We eat the meat of his kill, and it tastes unsweet. We
merit by his strength, and in it there is no delight. We do not live when he
does our living for us. We grow fat and like women, and we are afraid to
work, and we forget how to do things for ourselves. Let the man go, O
Tantlatch, that we may be men! I am Keen, a man, and I make my own
kill!"
Tantlatch turned a gaze upon him in which seemed the vacancy of
eternity. Keen waited the decision expectantly; but the lips did not move,
and the old chief turned toward his daughter.
"That which be given cannot be taken away," she burst forth. "I was but a
girl when this Stranger Man, who is my man, came among us. And I knew
not men, or the ways of men, and my heart was in the play of girls, when
thou, Tantlatch, thou and none other, didst call me to thee and press me
into the arms of the Stranger Man. Thou and none other, Tantlatch; and as
thou didst give me to the man, so didst thou give the man to me. He is my
man. In my arms has he slept, and from my arms he cannot be taken."
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"It were well, O Tantlatch," Keen followed quickly, with a significant
glance at Thom, "it were well to remember that that which be given cannot
be taken away."
Chugungatte straightened up. "Out of thy youth, Keen, come the words of
thy mouth. As for ourselves, O Tantlatch, we be old men and we
understand. We, too, have looked into the eyes of women and felt our
blood go hot with strange desires. But the years have chilled us, and we
have learned the wisdom of the council, the shrewdness of the cool head
and hand, and we know that the warm heart be over- warm and prone to
rashness. We know that Keen found favor in thy eyes. We know that
Thom was promised him in the old days when she was yet a child. And we
know that the new days came, and the Stranger Man, and that out of our
wisdom and desire for welfare was Thom lost to Keen and the promise
broken."
The old shaman paused, and looked directly at the young man.
"And be it known that I, Chugungatte, did advise that the promise be
broken."
"Nor have I taken other woman to my bed," Keen broke in. "And I have
builded my own fire, and cooked my own food, and ground my teeth in
my loneliness."
Chugungatte waved his hand that he had not finished. "I am an old man
and I speak from understanding. It be good to be strong and grasp for
power. It be better to forego power that good
come out of it. In the old
days I sat at thy shoulder, Tantlatch, and my voice was heard over all in
the council, and my advice taken in affairs of moment. And I was strong
and held power. Under Tantlatch I was the greatest man. Then came the
Stranger Man, and I saw that he was cunning and wise and great. And in
that he was wiser and greater than I, it was plain that greater profit should
arise from him than from me. And I had thy ear, Tantlatch, and thou didst
listen to my words, and the Stranger Man was given power and place and
thy daughter, Thom. And the tribe prospered under the new laws in the
new days, and so shall it continue to prosper with the Stranger Man in our
midst. We be old men, we two, O Tantlatch, thou and I, and this be an
affair of head, not heart. Hear my words, Tantlatch! Hear my words! The
man remains!"
There was a long silence. The old chief pondered with the massive
certitude of God, and Chugungatte seemed to wrap himself in the mists of
a great antiquity. Keen looked with yearning upon the woman, and she,
unnoting, held her eyes steadfastly upon her father's face. The wolf-dog
shoved the flap aside again, and plucking courage at the quiet, wormed
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forward on his belly. He sniffed curiously at Thom's listless hand, cocked
ears challengingly at Chugungatte, and hunched down upon his haunches
before Tantlatch. The spear rattled to the ground, and the dog, with a
frightened yell, sprang sideways, snapping in midair, and on the second
leap cleared the entrance.
Tantlatch looked from face to face, pondering each one long and carefully.
Then he raised his head, with rude royalty, and gave judgment in cold and
even tones: "The man remains. Let the hunters be called together. Send a
runner to the next village with word to bring on the fighting men. I shall
not see the New-Comer. Do thou, Chugungatte, have talk with him. Tell
him he may go at once, if he would go in peace. And if fight there be, kill,
kill, kill, to the last man; but let my word go forth that no harm befall our
man,—the man whom my daughter hath wedded. It is well."
Chugungatte rose and tottered out; Thom followed; but as Keen stooped to
the entrance the voice of Tantlatch stopped him.
"Keen, it were well to hearken to my word. The man remains. Let no harm
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